Just enjoying a quiet morning read before I start doing some work in the studio. This month’s good read is Peppermint Issue 3, an Australian Eco Fashion mag. I love that it’s all about promoting small sustainable green business and eco friendly designers. It would certainly encourage others to adopt a greener lifestyle and practice a little green in their home or small business.

Little Mo and Friends handmade recycled stationery is also featured on Peppermint. I think that’s pretty cool too!

I’m already thinking of Christmas and I want to start making small gifts for Christmas stocking stuffers.

First up on my list of things to do is have 4 full sets of Little Mo paper dolls: Spring, Summer, Autumn and Winter…the whole wardrobe collection! I think it would be fun to swap clothes in each set and it would make a good collector’s set for those who like collecting art.

I managed to finish all my drawings and colouring today. I also printed them out on my printer to cut and test them out. All the clothes fit perfectly and I love the new outfits. Tomorrow I will take my dolls to get them professionally printed so expect to see these in my shop next week:)

The recent weekend we did Oxford St Market. So fun and it was cool to meet and chat with other stall holders. I was selling opposite Annie from 17threads. Her stall had all these pretty handmade brooches. I realised I didn’t take a photo of her stall but I’ll be seeing Annie again at the Made On the Left market on 25th and 26th July. So more pictures then! I promise!

But I what I really wanted to show you was my new table cloth, avocado green! I know this is a pathetic post from me. Cause it’s just a table cloth you know. But I couldn’t resist, cute colour too!

How do experienced vendors do this all the time? We’re totally exhausted from our first market!

We just want to say thanks to all our friends who turned up to give us that moral support at Unwrapped market! It was super awesome! As first timers, we were so stoked with the positive response and experience from our customers! Thanks to all you crazy strangers who became our Little Mo fan clubbers! You totally made our day! We didn’t expect such great sales for our first range of paper goods.

The most asked questions of the day were:
1. Is Little Mo you?
2. Are you guys selling imported stuff from china?
3. You made these? As in designed everything? But they look really good!
4. Who designed this?

In future, I will put a sign up that says EVERYTHING is designed and illustrated by Helena Tay and professionally printed in Australia. Nothing is from China except my grandfather! Anyway attaching pictures of our stall and the real little mo. Check it out yo!

Will post pictures of the lovely handmade things I bought in my next post.

Sorry for the absence! We have been so busy. A lot of things up our sleeves the past few days. A lot more film shoots, some new media projects, and of course our preparation for the market at the end of this month.

We’re so excited to be chosen as a seller at Unwrapped on 29th March 09. If you’re a Perthian and live around the area, come down to Mends Street, South Perth from 1pm to 6pm. Buy and support handmade from other independent artists! Check out our stationery in person or come up and say hi! We’d love to meet you!

To prepare ourselves for the market we’ve been stocking up our inventory by doing some large printing runs. We’ve also been burning the midnight oil by making as many envelopes and writing sets as we can. As we speak the boy, is complaining about a large blister on his finger due to using the blade and bone folder too much! Every night our work table is filled like a giant paper ant hill.

I think we have about a hundred more sets to make! Ugh.

But in all the hectic-ness going around, we still found time to see a terrific gig at the Perth Arts Festival. We saw Mogwai! Those who know me well enough, will know that I’m the biggest Mogwai fan. They top my most favourite things in the whole wide world…ok maybe after Little Mo and Friends and the boy and mud cake…but you get what I mean. The band was so amazing…that throughout the performance I was constantly thanking God for letting me have the chance to see this awesome band! I think we both went home feeling pretty inspired by those lads. Oh what a night!

Hands up those who have a habit of making lists! I write so many lists…I have a list for each topic!

Grocery list
New products to work on
On going projects for clients
Daily reminders
Current favourite songs
Books that I want to read
Films that I want to watch
Even a list of quotes!

I have my notes stuck on my table and it’s quite a sorry state to look at. So I decided that if I was going to stick notes all around my table, I was going to illustrate some cute and happy ones that would brighten up my work space.

So here is my Grow strong and healthy notepads. Each notepad is filled with 40 pages of full colour illustrations of Little Mo working in her vegetable garden. I love them and I am really happy at how good they turned out! I hope you will enjoy them!

Tell me what’s on your list of things to do today?

When I was young I had fond memories of playing paper dolls with my mum. We spent hours playing with paper dolls, no larger than the palm of our hands. Finding cute outfits and accessories to fit onto our dolls was the best part!

So 27 years on, I am still pretty much obsessed with my paper doll memories. Last weekend I illustrated a set of outfits for Little Mo and created a Spring Love collection.

It’s times like this when you really wish for a little girl to play paper dolls with! Playing alone, isn’t as much fun as it used to be when I was a kid! And I doubt my fiance would want to sit around playing paper dolls all day!

Do you have someone sweet you can play paper dolls with?

Yaay! I’m very excited about my new writing sets as they feature some of Little Mo’s cute forest friends! These two writing sets feature the adorable Wilco the cat, and Basil and her two ducklings; Salt and Pepper.

Each writing set comes in sweet coloured sheets, matching envelopes and cute stickers to seal your mail! All professionally printed! I think snail mail is the perfect way to brighten up your friend’s day as well as their mailbox! Do you like snail mails?

I love giving handmade gifts. To me, nothing is sweeter than wrapping those precious gifts in handmade wrapping paper.

I’ve designed some pretty gift wrap paper to suit all occasions. They are perfect for all seasons, baby shower, birthdays, valentine and mother’s day. For those who can’t decide a favourite, the whole gift wrap set includes all of my three designs and some handmade gift tags. It’s not too late for Valentine’s day! I hope you will enjoy them!

I have a range of notebooks in my shop now! I’m very excited about them because I love notebooks myself. I keep a few for sketching, journaling and collecting dried leaves and flowers or found objects!

Each notebook has 50 blank pages of recycled paper for you to draw and sketch to your heart’s content! They are available in 3 lovely designs; Cherry Blossom in Valentine, Wild Berries and ladybirds in Autumn and A Picnic Slumber in the Afternoon. I hope you will enjoy them!