Happy 4th of JULY..... 2011?

Happy 4th of JULY ! We thought we would share with you some of our new 4th of July designs that will be available for..... next 4th of July. We promise!

Since we missed this years deadline, all designs are on hold till next summer. But then we received this great looking 24" red goose feather tree in the mail last week we just had to jump into overdrive and finish these little guys before the fourth.

What do you think? How cool are these little patriotic guys?














Chloe approved! Happy 4th, enjoy the a weekend!
~Lianne & Paul

Creating a collection in 31 days!

Hello all. Summer is officially here and for us that means getting ready to start thinking of the upcoming holidays which will be here before we know it!

We thought we would try something a little different this month on our blog. We are dedicating the month of July to creating our new 2010 Halloween collection here at the studio and we wanted to take you along for the ride to give you a glimpse into what goes into making a Swirly Designs collection.

We'll share the ups and downs and try to give you daily (well mostly likely nightly since we are night owls) updates with goals and tasks that we need to complete in order to keep the collection on schedule while juggling everything else. So hopefully by the end of the month we will have a finished collection. We thought this idea could be interesting to you our readers, because we know we really enjoy reading other crafters/artists blogs that share their trials and tribulations behind the work they create.

So become a follower to our blog and keep checking in on us to see if we stay on track and feel free to share your thoughts and leave us feedback.

Hold on World...we're trying to catch up!

Okay, we admit it..we're guilty as charged...we are blog evaders. We have been really horrible about the up keep on this blog with posts lately and we apologize. Not only has our blog suffered but our spring & summer collection has suffered the same fate.

So what's going on you might ask? Well lots.....

When we started Swirly Designs it was just Lianne and myself spending a few nights and weekends here and there working on these fun ornaments for Christmas, and maybe doing a few craft shows...BUT we were still working our full time jobs—Lianne's design job and my illustration work—and it was just the two of us.

Jump to present day....we're still juggling the jobs and now we've added two kids to the mix. We don't have the luxury of daycare or nannies, so I have assumed the role of stay at home dad for now. We've also moved into a new house, well new to us, it's actually a 150 year old house!

Let's just say that the last few months have been difficult with trying to create 5 new ornament collections a year, website upkeep, booking shows, getting PR for Swirly, ordering supplies...I am going to stop here my head is spinning just writing this!!

Yes, I know what you're thinking...this is our world and we created it...suck it up and just do it! With us being two self proclaimed micro managers and wanting/needing to do it all ourselves we realize we've brought most of this on ourselves. Don't get us wrong, we love what we do and we aren't complaining, but we are slowly overcoming these hurdles and trying to find the perfect balance for everything and everyone.

At dinner recently I proclaimed to the family that I wanted the world to stop for a bit so we could all catch up. Even our 5 year old understood this simple statement, and agreed. Is that too much to ask??

So the point of all this is that we are still working away on a new collection for Halloween and Christmas for this coming season. We have lots of exciting marketing coming up too, so stay tuned!

I hope that you all enjoy Father's Day this weekend, I know I will relish all that I have and hope that I can catch up with life!

P.S. Check out my contribution to our friends new blog The Papa Post, in honor of Father's Day. (scroll down to see my post and a few funny pictures)

-Paul

Brimfield Show Part II HOLIDAY finds

While browsing Brimfield or any other fair or yard sale we are always on the hunt for anything to do with Holiday decor. We didn't find a whole lot of that here at Brimfield, but the little we found was either not jumping out at us or a little pricey for what we wanted to pay.
We are so not the bargaining types when it comes to these shows. I know, I know everyone talks about how bargaining is the fun part. We feel that they mark the items for a reason and when you question a price on an item they always come down on a price so for us to counter offer.. this seem very weird. Maybe it's the artist in us but when we do shows we don't appreciate it when people try to bargain with our ornament prices.

Anyway, here are some fun Holiday finds we did come across.







This collector was also a fellow designer who had these wonderful vintage Holiday postcards. We regret not picking some of these up. We could have framed them for our new studio space.
Here are some Christmas images above


Easter


Valentine


Halloween
There were so many more we wanted to take pictures of but we didn't want to offend him.



some fun Santas








Hey does any one need an extra elf on the shelf ?


We did see lots of glass bulbs but we didn't have the time to see if they were really vintage or not.






These Easter bunny chocolate molds were awesome. What a fun displays these would make.


More holiday odds and ends


This booth looked like it was chalk full of Holiday decor but of course by the time we came to it they were packing up for the day so we only were able to catch a glimpse of a few of the items


check out this small soft tinsel tree




Holiday finds... aren't they great?
Tell us what Holiday finds you have come across over the years?

Swirling around Brimfield Antique fair... part one

We have been MIA lately here on our blog to be honest. Some days we don't know if we are coming or going so we are really going to try to be better with our postings.

We thought we would take a little break from the Swirly studio on this beautiful clear Saturday and visit the Brimfield Antique and Collectible show. It's the largest outdoor antique show in the world, held since 1959 in Brimfield, Massachusetts, three times each year, with thousands of dealers attending! With these shows you really need to come with a game plan. We tried to do our homework and reread Flea Market Style magazine for tips and wore comfortable shoes. We did some serious walking....6 hours straight! We weren't going to subject our little ones (a 1 & almost 5 year old) to this long day of looking but don't touch, so we dropped them off with family.

The show is always fun. The last time we were there, it was before kids, and we found some nice treasures. This year we didn't have the same luck but it was nice to get out in the fresh air and be inspired.

Here are some photos. They are not the greatest; we took them super quick as to not to be to obvious, because we felt a little weird taking pictures of the people's collectibles even though no one said we couldn't, but we still felt the eyes glaring.

So enjoy and our next post will be more on Brimfield Antique fair and what we at Swirly designs live for... the holiday decorations.



tons and tons of tents


it was extremely crowded but since it's outside and there is so much to see it's not that bad


the show goes on for miles and you never see it all. We only made it half way down the street then crossed over and came back and that took 6 hours.


The show has everything from fine antiques to just plain junk


these were cool springs... visually pretty but not sure what to do with them.


we looked high and low for these knobs for our bedroom doors and of course we got something else and now we see them everywhere!


It was a good thing our five year old wasn't here or else we would want to get this fire truck.


lots of kitchen decor like these wire baskets








Some of the vendors had some clever ideas for displaying their goods


and others would just dump them in boxes.


pretty spools of thread


more door knobs


the old toy vendors always draws a crowd. We both point out the toys we had as kids and wonder if we only kept them in better condition. Of course this Animal doll from the Muppets looks like he's hanging himself... Yikes!


You gotta love this Dukes of Hazzard lunch box.


and check out this giant hot dog...this is perfect way to end part one of this post.
Enjoy your weekend
~Lianne & Paul