You must all have heard about the amazing craft market lovely Mathyld has organized. If you will be in Paris on Sundays the 6th or 13th of December get yourself along to Supervente. There are so many wonderful artists taking part including Encore Petite, Resurrection Fern, Hibou Caillou Chou. Check out the flyer above for some more names. Oh, did I forget to mention that I will be there too, well, my work will be! Supervente will be my first craft fair, I am nervous and excited all at the same time. You can check out some of the offerings in advance via the link above, Supervente also has its own Flickr group here. I would love to do all of my Christmas shopping at the event, here are a few of my picks from the show.

I was lucky enough to see some of the work in person when I visited Mathyld last week, photographs really can’t do it justice, stacks of beautifully made animal silhouette cushion covers like the one above, rows of pretty owlettes, necklaces, brooches, all manner of gorgeous things. If I had a pair of ruby slippers I would click my heels together and wish myself in Paris. Of course I am building up to blogging about my visit to the French capital, I have a weeks worth of hoops to make and then I am taking a little time off to prepare for Christmas, visit my lovely K and her new baby (who isn’t actually out in the world yet!) and, yes, get all of the Paris images off the camera and into the computer. Phew! There will be a few changes at Lou Lou & Oscar in the new year, including price rises, this makes me so sad, but I need to start charging more realistic prices and taking the exchange rate into account (come on dollar rise against the pound!). I feel that LL&O needs a little freshen up for 2010, new photos, a more coherent feel, the depth that comes with a little extra experience. My most recent work has streamed itself into two ‘collections’: Natural History and The Stars Down to Earth (thank you Mr.Adorno!). More about this tiny development soon I hope. Paris was so inspiring, I can’t wait to share it with you. I am going to leave you with a couple of images to whet your appetite, sources of inspiration for the Natural History collection.

So, the In Stitches Embroidery Showcase opens tonight at Renegade Handmade in Chicago. I wish I could be there to marvel at all of the wonderful artwork in person. The work of many of my stitching idols will be on display, including the wonderful and lovely Jessica Marquez aka Miniature Rhino. Jessica is pretty much the reason I began to try my hand at embroidery, her work is always such an inspiration, full of beauty, and oh, that neat, super-crisp stitching. Thanks Jessica! I have fallen hard for the work of Jennifer Porter, who goes by the name of Porterness. Scarily good! Check out some samples of the amazing work on display above, or even better, if you are in the area, get yourself down to Renegade Handmade. I still haven’t had a chance to get the images of my submissions out of the camera but you can see some pretty awful scans here. I have been sewing like a demon today to get some work ready for Supervente, neglecting husband, son, friends, siblings and email. Paris reporting will have to wait a little longer too, I have some exciting news to share when the time is right, it is good to be so busy, but why do I always leave things to the last minute?

And so, we are back from Paris. I have so much to tell, it will take a few weeks of mini-posts to tell the tale in its entirety. The absolute highlight for me was meeting the most incredible woman (ah, you all know who I am talking about right?!) and the cherry on top was spending a little time with another amazing girl who dropped by quickly for tea. I have to upload pictures and make sure I do justice to that afternoon, it warms my heart every time I think about it. I will be catching up over the next few days with email and beginning a huge sewing marathon to make sure I have some pretty things for the amazing Supervente event in Pairs next month, more about that coming soon too. Such busy times! The Lou Lou & Oscar shop will celebrate its first birthday on the 1st of December, I share that milestone with a very special person (I am waving and sending bear hugs!), oh yes, more on this too nearer the time. I feel so blessed to have such beautiful, warm, talented people in my life, hooray for our little community of makers and dreamers.