Pages

Monday 28 October 2013

WE ARE A FINALIST!

I am just bursting at the seams with excitement to announce that the Made With Love 2013 Santa Key Design has been awarded a finalist in the 2013 Australian Craft Awards!



I am extremely excited and proud to be sharing this news with you all!

Bummer I have to wait until the 1st of November to learn if I am a winner or not!

You can view my entry here!

I would love your help to 'rate' my design (with a '5' if you really love it) will help to improve my chances!

But check out the special certificate I get to print out and frame!


Thank you for allowing me to share this exciting news with you all!


Saturday 5 October 2013

Mums who LOVE Made With Love- Jenica's review

You might remember back in August I announced and opened applications for 'Mums who LOVE Made With Love' which is a review panel of several mums, which due to the overwhelming response of applicants I ended up choosing 24 mums, who over the course of the next year will receive a set of party stationary (invites, card, banner and cupcake toppers) for their child's party in exchange for a review.

I will introduce you to Jenica and her review of her experience with Made With Love for her Son Lucas "Lukie or Pookie" who celebrated his second birthday with a Minions and Trains theme.

What is your name and what do you do?
I’m Jenica, and I’m a stay at home mum to Lukie, as well as wife to Simon who is a medical intern.

What is your child’s name and the age recently celebrated?
My son is Lukie, and he just turned 2! I can’t believe how big he’s getting…



What was your theme of the party being celebrated?
Lukie has two obsessions at the moment – and I mean OBSESSIONS. He loves “mimyums” (minions) from Despicable Me, and he’s absolutely crazy for his “choos” (trains).


When you were dealing with Talya from Made With Love, How did you find the customer service?
Talya is BEYOND amazing. She goes out of her way to make sure you’re happy, takes into consideration everything you tell her even if it seems irrelevant, and her attention to detail exceeds any I’ve ever seen. Nothing is overlooked. She was amazingly creative at incorporating two themes that have nothing to do with each other, and not only came up with an awesome design, but came up with SEVERAL awesome designs, which I ended up basing my entire party on. 

Please describe why you gave this rating.
Because Talya is awesome!

Did Talya help create the excitement during the entire process for your upcoming party needs?
Honestly (bad mummy moment) I had no excitement for my son’s party until I started discussing things with Talya. I had some ideas floating around in my head but figured I’d just throw some stuff together the week before. While talking with Talya not only did she ask the right questions to create her AWESOME invites, decorations and card, but she also got ME excited and planning for the party, which I honestly don’t think I would have done more than a few days in advance if it weren’t for her.



What were your first thoughts or reactions when you received your order?
Holy Crap!!! I was blown away. The packaging alone was incredible, but opening it up and seeing all the wonderful pieces she had made was like Christmas. The banner she made was incredible and I must have spent five minutes just staring at it before I even opened the rest of the package. The invites were so amazing – I can’t fathom how much time it must have taken to design and create them with all the tiny pieces! The cupcake toppers were super cute, and much sturdier than I expected. His birthday card was the best though. She even decorated the envelope! I couldn’t believe how amazing everything was.


What was your Child’s reaction? (if old enough to give a reaction)
Keeping in mind that Lukie is little and not fully verbal yet, he took one look at the invites and yelled “MIMYUM CHOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!” so he knew what it was right away. Which is a testament to Talya’s work, because I made several minion decorations and pictures and he didn’t even look at them. He was SO excited to see his two loves combined together.

What was the reaction or feedback received from your invited guests?
Everyone was blown away. SO many people commented on the banner and asked where I found it. The kids were in love with the cupcake toppers, and most of them took them home with them.



What did you think of the quality of the invitations?
The quality is amazing. This is not your typical throw away invitation. They were sturdy and well made (nothing is coming apart on them despite being handled by toddlers), and they were INCREDIBLE. I couldn’t get over that each TOOTH on EACH minion was placed and stuck individually. WOW! They were far beyond what I had expected.

Are you planning on doing anything special with the invitations? 
Invites, his card, a cupcake topper, the banner and extra cut outs that I ordered will all be used for scrapbooking. Some extra invites that I collected back from people (yes, they are THAT awesome) will be framed and used to decorate Lukie’s room when he has his own bedroom.

How likely are you to want to refer Made with love to your friends and families?
I’ve already told my friends, my mums’ group and random people looking for invites on facebook to check out Talya’s work. It’s AMAZING

Do you have any feedback or comments you would like to offer?
Talya is amazing. Her work is amazing. That’s all you need to know.

Gallery of Images from the Party Below.
How cool are these Minion Balloons

Love this picture of the pinata in use!

Minion Dave guarding the cupcakes

Banana?

The Train track leading to the party!
Birthday 'Mimyum' in his costume playing with minions and trains


View of the table and cupcake toppers in use

Adorable cake trains!

Birthday 'Mimyum' Riding on the track

Minons and Trains- Can see the cupcake toppers used

Minion Pinata

Minion Pinata

Wednesday 2 October 2013

Is it a dream or is it reality?

What started off as a romantic jet set away soon saw reality crashing back down.

It all started when my husband suggested or more romantically demanded that I need a break well that we need a break.

Turns out he had this whole romantic holiday planned and it truly was beautiful!

We spent a gorgeous two weeks in a over water bure in Fiji and were waited on hand and foot, literally with medicures and pedicures and the facials too!

We renewed our wedding vowels which was so intimate and romantic, celebrating 5 strong years.

After touring the majestic island and swimming in the picturesque waters it was time to say goodbye to fiji and to jump on the cruise ship home.

That was when things took a rather unusual turn.

Here on the cruise liner I bumped into one of my old friends who is now this jet setting multi millionaire after having launched and invented this incredible product, which was just loved and adored by so many. Had been admiring his success for years, success that I wish would happen to come my way.

We got chatting and he mentioned that when the cruise ships gets into the Ports of Brisbane that we should follow him back to his 'pad' or should I say mansion for some drinks and he will fly us anywhere we want the following day.

Itching to get some craft and orders done more so some Santa Keys I asked if he could drop us off to our house back in Coffs Harbour. Told him the airport is quite fine as there was no need to escort us back to our humble abode- more that I was slightly embarrased at the fact we only rented this beautiful 3 bedroom house compared to owning a 20 bedroom mansion fit with butlers and maids.

Instead in mid air when approaching the Coffs Harbour Airport we struck some turbulence and engine failure and had to make the quick jump- skydive down out of the plane and into what we thought was our home..

In fact we landed on what appeared to be the set of Home and Away at 'Summer Bay'. Here we were greeted by the producers of the show who offered me a part! Yes me! I was quite shocked and Russ was a bit peeved that he wasn't offered a part but they told him he was far too old! I couldn't help but laugh.

Off I went to get my hair and makeup done. It was only going to be for a few episodes but my character 'Tayla' happened to be on a soul searching journey to find herself. or something like that.

I think Russ went off to snorkel and play with rocks.

After what seems like 2 days of filming Russ and I decided to head home along with my nice cheque from being on the show.

I don't recall how we got home but all I remember is waking up thinking "That would have to be one of the most wackiest dreams I have had in a long time".

I then remembered I hadn't infact been away for a romantic holiday or happened upon a tv set.

I had yet again been in hospital for acute pancreatitis, the past few days.

I woke feeling like I had been on this amazing adventure but I realised it was more then likely the morphine contribution to my dreams.

Ahh how much I would love to escape to Fiji for 2 romantic weeks though!!




 
Design by Small Bird Studios | All Rights Reserved