Cottage of the year 2012

It's time again for the annual round up of the country cottages I've spied on my travels this year. The months of summer rain put a literal dampener on getting out and about but there are still some absolute corkers to feast your eyes on over a cuppa.

So put your feet up and indulge yourself in some of my favourite cosy cottages of 2013. 

An American contender...

and the winner is...

Taking photos of cottages when I'm out and about usually entails an iPhone and a quick snap so as not to alarm the inhabitants. This photo below is one example of a quick shot, unplanned, that just captured the rustic charm of this Suffolk village cottage perfectly and has been endlessly re-pinned on Pinterest and gets my personal vote for cottage of the year 2012.  Do you have a favourite?

Christmas Wreath

Every year I drag the Christmas wreath down from the loft, shelling red berries everywhere as I go. The wreath gets patched up with some extra red flowers and this year I've added a little red tin star (I've gone a bit mad on tin stars since my US east coast trip) to spruce it up. Actually, my trusty old wreath has gone global - Farrow & Ball were asking for photos of wreaths for their Pinterest page yesterday on Facebook so I uploaded this photo and they are featuring it on FB as I write (the door is in F&B Pale Powder)  Clearly recycle/upcyle is still the way to go!

p.s. Are you all set and ready for Christmas? Nope me neither!

Christmas shopping evening at Hertfordshire Craft Collective

It's been a while since I've featured the Hertfordshire Craft Collective at Battlers Green Farm in Radlett, Herts, so I thought the recent Christmas shopping evening was a good excuse to show you all the lovely vintage and handmade on show.

Anything catch your eye?  ;-)

My first Christmas Vintage and Handmade Fair

Sorry I've been absent for a while but November has been so very hectic. Some time back in early summer my vintage mad friend and I thought of a insane super idea to put our vintage obsession to use by holding a vintage fair. 

Well after months of planning our Christmas Vintage and Handmade Fair took place on Sunday 25th November. First we had to find the right venue. Then seeking out quality stall holders to take part took a lot of work - we wanted to get the right mix of vintage and handmade with lot's of variety. Marketing the event was spread over many months. As well as newspaper adverts and lots of social networking we hand delivered over 1000 leaflets locally door to door - out in the rain on Halloween two police officers looking out for misbehaving kids suggested we might be a little old for trick and treating!  

But finally the big day arrived, our lovely stall holders set up their wares and for a moment we panicked. Would anyone come?! Opening the doors to the public at 11am We needn't have worried as a steady trickle of curious people made their way into the hall for the very first vintage fair in the area.

By lunchtime the place was buzzing and there was a queue of people waiting to buy tea and cake in our cosy vintage team room run by Vintage Tea 2 You

Here's some of the vintage and handmade gorgeousness on sale...

After all the months of hard work our fair came together and it was such a fun day. Customers bought Christmas gifts, our stall holders were happy and we were exhausted!  

We're already dreaming of a summer brocante.......