Decisions, decisions…

At this time of year when we are busy doing fairs and pop ups around Surrey, we have the difficult decision of what to take with us and how to display it to the best advantage.  At most fairs we only have a 6ft x 2ft table and sometimes they are smaller still! This means we have to think laterally sometimes and over the years we’ve developed a strategy to make the most of our space by going up.  Its almost become a bit of a challenge to see how much we can put out in the smallest space and it’s amazing how the space can be adapted with a bit of thought!  It also means we have somewhere to hide behind when we are eating our hard earned sandwiches!!

Our stall at a Christmas Fair

On another note, everybody seems to be talking about flamingos after the flamingo march on Planet Earth (so funny) and we have our own flamingos in stock at the moment on cushions, lampshades and the hot water bottles that we sell at fairs at this time of year.

Something about these birds seem to grab peoples attention and apparently, this year, we can’t get enough of them! Certainly the cushion and lampshade combo in the middle picture is one of our best sellers, maybe because it will go with several different backdrops due to the combination of colours in the print.  In fact, having just sold some of these at the fairs we did at the weekend, we’re off to make some more before this weekends fairs!

No rest for us at HemLiv HQ!!  Back to work…

Love HemLiv xx

Christmas is coming!…

Christmas is definitely hurtling towards us now and with less than seven weeks to go to the big day, our thoughts have turned towards the very imminent Christmas fairs that we are attending.  Things have been hectic at HemLiv HQ while we have been busy preparing and making both the old favourites (Robbie Reindeer!!) and new lines for our sales – you could say it’s been organised chaos! Judging from this picture the Robbie Reindeer think so anyway!!

These aprons with unique hand printed pockets are some of the new items that we’ve been working on recently and each one will come complete with a wooden spoon in the pocket to inspire the next generation of “Great British Bake Off” bakers or, of course, just to stir the baked beans to go on toast! (Hungry now!)

We’ve also been busy with hot water bottles, stockings, bunting and another new line, hand printed lavender bags with bobbles. They smell gorgeous and make HemLiv HQ smell pretty good too! Some of these will also be available at a local (to us) independent store, One Forty in Cranleigh, which we are very excited about.

So, if you happen to be passing on your travels, pop in and follow your noses to find a lovely lavender bag stocking filler and maybe treat yourself as well? At this busy time of year we all need to relax a little too. 

With that thought in mind, we’re off to put the kettle on! Till next time…

Love HemLiv xx

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Fairs and festivities…

The clocks have gone back and we are now in full swing for all of the fairs that we have scheduled up until Christmas.  Last weekend we were at The Summerhouse which is in the grounds of The Packhouse at Farnham, a fabulous venue full of different sellers of vintage goods.  We had a lovely time over the two days meeting all sorts of people who came to see us in our “Pop-up” shop – the Summerhouse is a lovely place to be and we had lots of fun displaying our lampshades, cushions and pictures in such a way that customers could imagine them in a home setting.

   

 

Although we were thinking about Christmas and hung our Christmas bunting and stockings around the space, it was so warm at times that we were able to display cushions on chairs outside on the terrace!! Very confusing!!….

Now we have a few days to gather ourselves together and restock before we are off again as the Christmas shopping gets properly underway – this time we are at two different venues on the same weekend. One of us will be at South Hill Park Arts centre in Bracknell for the whole weekend (www.southhillpark.org.uk/craftfair2015) and the other will be at Cranleigh School Christmas fair in Cranleigh, Surrey on Saturday 14th only.

As the weather is getting chillier our hot water bottles are in demand as who wouldn’t want to snuggle up with one on a cold Winter’s evening? New for this year is our polar bear all wrapped up in his scarf as well as our old favourites – snoozy shabby sheep, reindeer and westies.

    

All this talk of Winter weather makes us want to snuggle up in front of the fire with a large mug of hot chocolate! Marshmallow anyone?…..

Love HemLiv xx