freebie day sneaky peak

it is freebie day today - but it's too dark to take good photos, so come back tomorrow and all will be revealed!
~ in other news: Becky is back, her youngest is feeling a bit better, but Becky didn't feel tip toe today!  John is still feeling awful and I am still feeling fine :-)
....see you for freebie day tomorrow!

a lonely wednesday

sickness has hit our little team - Becky's youngest is sick so Becky is at home looking after her - and John has had the lurgy for a couple of days but today he finally succumbed to the call of a warm bed and some soup at lunchtime, and is under strict instructions to stay there and get better - so I am here all on my own...I have packed all the orders and unpacked a tonne of deliveries...mostly restocking popular items, but a few new things have snuck in too ;-)

 *new* GINORMOUS jingle bells

 *new* mini wooden spools

 *new* mini embroidery hoops

 *new* big pom pom trim & lots of the ever popular teeny tiny pom pom trim

 sewing threads have been topped up, as have 4" purse zips, needles and pins

 tonnes of ric rac :: teeny tiny, standard & large

 AND the clip on black boards are back!  2 sizes of rectangles,  *new* clip on heart AND *new* blackboards on easels...how cool are they?

oh, and I've been dreaming up an idea for the next freebie (it's freebie day tomorrow!) and think I have come up with a cracker, so come back tomorrow and I will try my very best to have it ready on time (unless, of course, the lurgy strikes me down next!)
Quick Links ::
giant bells - click here
wooden spools - click here
mini hoops - click here
pom pom trim - click here
ric rac - click here
thread - click here
needles and pins - click here
zips - click here
clip on blackboards - click here
easel black boards - click here

oh and don't go thinking I am super woman that has done loads, look at this ::

a great BIG mess for me to tidy up (my packing table is under there somewhere!!)
 :-)

more weekend makes

 another batch of felt flowers are winging their way through the post - destined to be turned into more pretty hair clips

windswept

I hope everyone is safe and sound after the storm this weekend?  Our rather large fuchsia bush in the back garden has been injured...but it's not terminal - which is a good job because we have an extended family of sparrows living there this year.

All these Christmas Decoration orders were sewn at home yesterday, cosy on the sofa, while the weather turned more and more stormy outside, and today when I went to take a quick snap of them all the sun was shining, as if the storm had never happened!!
John and I ventured out into the rain/wind last night to take a look at the sea - we're only a hundred yards or so from the seafront so we did a quick dash down the road and back and boy, did we get drenched!! Worth it though, the sea was extraordinarily rough!!

friday night is pom pom night

these colourful pompoms are for our snowman kits

 don't they look glorious?

ribbons as far as the eye can see

look at all the lovely ribbons that arrived today!

lots of old favourites are back in stock and can be found on the website here

my sewing mission is continuing at full speed....lots more Christmas decorations have been made & sent out, along with a cute selection of embellishments

by day I am a parcel packer ....

and by night I am a hand sewer on a mission!  I got a lot of orders finished this weekend ::

 3 sets of Halloween decorations FINISHED

 lots of Christmas decorations FINISHED

 3 Owls FINISHED and some *ahem* naked snowmen....I didn't notice the lack of pompom scarves until after the photo, and they look so much cuter with them ;-)

ta-dah!

Garlands for John Lewis

Over the past few weeks I have been sewing some garlands which will shortly be decorating two John Lewis stores

 One garland is on it's way to John Lewis High Wycombe, and the other to John Lewis Milton Keynes, both are destined for the haberdashery departments, so if you're local do pop in and have a look

  Both the garlands have a mixture of designs from my Christmas Kits that John Lewis are stocking this year - I love the red ribbon they chose to hang them off, it looks very festive indeed

guess what I have been doing

yep, stitching up a storm!  and jingleing the father christmas jingle bells A LOT
I love jingle bells :-)

get your shopping mojo into gear!

the website is back - and looking just like it should look like!
If you are still seeing the wonky website please press F5 on your keyboard and it should refresh itself and go back to normal :-)
It's a weird thing, this world of websites, lots of you didn't see the wonky website and if you did it quickly righted itself, whereas I (and others too) could only see the wonky version...it's all very strange, and probably perfectly obvious to tech gurus, but I don't get it!!
What I do know is: orders have been pouring in over night and my website is working just as it should
Hooray!
Oh, and that my normal, sewing filled posts, will resume shortly...because boring old text posts really aren't cutting it, even if I did bold some text to try and spice it up a little ;-)

I think it's fixed????

yesterday my MrSite website was upgraded to a new system - but it didn't work properly and it ended up looking like it does in the photo!!  the website was still there but all the formatting was gone, and I couldn't access the admin side of it...today, they tell me it is fixed (after a gazillion phone calls) BUT I can still only see the wonky website - everyone in MrSites office can see the proper website but apparantly I need to wait a couple of hours for 'the DNS server reset to take effect' ... so if you are reading this I'd love to know which you can see? 
funny wonky website like in the photo, or my normal lovely website???
www.paper-and-string.co.uk

gremlins!

my website has gone wonky!
the tech team are on it (after a looong phone call) and all should be sorted by tomorrow...please email or leave a comment if you need me :-)

Thursday???

how on earth is it Thursday already??
this week is whizzing by in a flurry of phone interviews (for our job vacancy) packing parcels (oh so many lovely parcels!) and spending as many hours as I can sewing and sewing and sewing (it's non stop Christmas Decorations round here!)

paper-and-string have a vacancy!

would you like to be the fourth member of paper-and-string's staff?

the person we are looking for is ::  hard working, honest, reliable and jolly
we can offer you ::  regular hours every week* , a good hourly rate of pay, paper-and-string staff discount AND a felt-y-tabulous place to work!

If you want to know more please call me (Sarah) 01903 209724 and have a chat....our workshop is in Worthing (BN11 3ED) and this is where the job will be based.

* we have 36 hours to offer, this could be for one person or a couple of people, we can work round other commitments you may have as long as the days and hours you work stay the same week to week

we're back!

thanks for all the birthday wishes - we had a great time - we did a lot of relaxing, reading, eating of good food & drinking some lovely wine,  it was a lovely birthday weekend indeed :-)

We had a LOT of orders whilst we were away (yay!) - 86 were parcelled up and sent out today and we will be all caught up again by tomorrow - then I have a pile of hand sewing waiting for my attention, so if your order contains handmade items, please remember to allow 7 days for me to make it :-)

John took these photos of where we stayed, a lovely little self catering cottage that used to be a Smithy - they also have bed and breakfast rooms in the main house, and two gorgeous little luxury camping places to stay, one is a gypsy caravan and the other is a shepherds hut....you can see all about it by clicking here, if you wish too....John and I thoroughly recommend it - the owners and the property are amazing, and we will be going back as soon as we can!

birthday treats

it's my birthday weekend!

yesterday was my actual birthday and tonight we are off on a little mini holiday to Dorset...we're staying in a cute self catering cottage which looks all cosy and snuggly from the photos we've seen online...

it'll be good to relax and recharge our batteries ready for Christmas Mania to hit ;-)

 the photos are of a finished order I have been making all week - they should be with my customer today - I hope you like them Annabel, I enjoyed making them for you  :-)

read all about it!

remember this blog post?  the magazine came out today!  and thanks to Louise giving me the heads up via Facebook and another big thanks to John for dashing to WHSmiths to get me a copy I now have one here to read (and photograph for the blog!)

there are 3 whole pages all about paper-and-string,  I'm talking about Christmas Crafting and posing for some photos(!) and the lovely lady, Karen, who interviewed me has managed to squeeze 4 hours worth of chatting into an article that sketches out the many stages of paper-and-string from 2006 until today...the only thing that's missing is a paragraph about how vital John is to paper-and-string - but I tell him that a lot so I think he'll forgive me :-)

Annabel: these are for you...

...I am nearly done Annabel - I hope to get these finished and in the post tomorrow!

 I'll send you an email to confirm - and I'll send them next day delivery so you'll have them by the end of the week :-)