22 Before 23

Today is my half birthday... (Exactly 6 months till my next birthday. Obviously)

So with this in mind, I have been inspired by this post over at A Beautiful Mess ( this is a very lovely blog by the way, so have a little nosy around over there!)  to set myself 22 goals to achieve by the time I turn 23.

And here they are... 

The first 2 are private goals, but if I achieve them i'll be sure to let you know!! Suddenly it all seems very daunting and difficult... but 6 months can be a long time and some of these things will be a fun kind of challenge! Like having a 100% Handmade Christmas. This has come from my love of making personal presents as well as frugal times hitting hard! The man, the brother and the mother are easy enough but what to make for the father?! He may well be my downfall... 

Number 14 should be easy enough... Today I am grateful for the inspiring and beautiful blogs I read everyday!

Trip to Europe is probably dependent on paying off the overdraft though... and soon!

It's magnetic!

It's been a while since my last blog (naughty blogger...) so I thought I would do a bit of a bumper blog on whats been going on and whats coming up!

Magnets

I have been dabbling in printing my photographs and artwork onto magnets for a little while now and I thought I would give you a sneaky peak...

These vintage Polaroid style magnets are designed by me and feature my own photography. They can be personalized with your own message and photo!

These smaller magnets are designed by myself... (I do adore PhotoShop!) They are 5cm x5cm in fully customisable lovely colours!

 And for that special day....

Test magnets printed... and they work! Hazzar!

I've been playing around with using them on greeting cards using photo corners so you can remove the magnet, these could work best with the save the date magnets? 

I was also thinking about using vintage adverts? who's up for some rationing tips?

If you're like me and absolutely love vintage adverts, I am slowly working my way through old magazines and newspapers to bring you digital collections of genuine vintage ads for a bargain price!

This collection contains 80 individual adverts all from the 1940's!

For sale on Etsy or Facebook!

http://www.etsy.com/listing/86035488/1940s-vintage-adverts-digital-collection

Magnets coming soon (I hope!)

Vintage Beauts

Vintage goodies for you today.....

Kitsch Heinz Tomato Soup Thermos 'Roughneck' flask c1960. £5.

 Some beautiful tonal buttons in my favorite colours. Simple but stunning!

My favorite.... Vintage silk thread on original wooden spools, most of which are nearly new!

These items will be available at The Norwich Vintage Fair and then in my Etsy shop.

Imperial...

Whats in the Box.....?

Why a vintage typewriter of course, I'm a lucky girl!

 Agghhh so pretty!!!! 'Imperial. The good companion' c1930

Free Retro Font Tutorial

My first tutorial....

I spent the morning hunting down retro fonts for a new mini 'zine feature I'm doing. Here is what I found! Oh so pretty....

These were so so easy peasy to download and use! So easy I have decided to do my first tutorialish post on how to get them for yourself!

I found them at an AMAZING site called ReFont.com where you can search for free fonts by category, I searched RETRO. Naturally.

All you need, to download these fonts is a zip compresser, I use jzip (I don't know a whole lot about zip software, I chose the free one cos I'm cheap, you may prefer to purchase if you feel safer doing so?). Once you have this little bit of software, the whole font catalogue is yours for the picking!

• Simply download your chosen font, which (should) open automatically in your zip software file.
• Extract to the 'Download' file in your 'Documents'. 
• Then open your 'Control panel' and open 'Fonts' a whole load of fonts will appear that you probably didn't know where there (I sure didn't!).
• Now drag your new fonts from the 'Download' file into the 'Font' file.

When you next open Photoshop or whichever program you use e.g Microsoft Word, they will appear in your fonts scroll bar ready for you to use (they won't appear on your program until you open the program fresh after downloading).

Easy Peasy!!!

Hope you enjoyed this little tutorial and you find lots of inspiring fonts for your creative needs!!

Website design preview

Drum roll please.......

Here are some sample pages I mocked up on Photoshop. More content will be added to the pages eventually, but i'm really just working on the design and layout etc at the moment...

Home page, which will hopefully incorporate my blog. Once I work out how!?

 About me page... pretty self explanatory?

Shop page, which (until I get the website shop up and running) will link to external shops on folksy and Etsy, although I am not currently selling on Etsy, it is my intention for vintage products... one thing at a time though!

Any and all feed back would be so so so appreciated! do the colours work? is the font clear enough? layout and scale ok? Spelling mistakes (that one is likely!)? any other tabs on the menu bar that would be useful? Whatever you can think of, no matter how small! Please enlarge images to see them more to web scale. Thanks so much for taking the time to have a look! Also, if you know how on earth this is all meant to work, I would be grateful of any advice, I'm just making it up as I go along at the moment!!

Vintage Knitting Patterns

My. Oh. MY.

What lovely loot I found the other day to add to my ever growing collection of vintage sewing patterns, vintage knitting patterns (to be fair to these patterns they are more like magazines, some with over 40 patterns in each). Oh yes, Polka.Button is branching out into a new realm and it makes me want to learn to knit so badly! Or maybe just settle for framing the gorgeous adverts and illustrations in these wonders.... Feast your button eyes people!

Patons Novelty Book c1970.

Full of some weird and wonderful things to knit for the home or as gifts. I for one was taken by this wildly extravagant cottage tea cosy!

Knitting for the Family; a house wife book c1950.

A lovely little magazine with a few patterns, but what I love most are all the adverts. I'm a sucka for an old cheesy ad.... 

First steps in Crochet by Patons, c1960.

Ok so strictly speaking this is a crochet book/magazine but it has so much retro charm it makes me want to pick up a hook and some yarn and get psychedelic! I feel like finally this is the book that will teach me to crochet... who knows?! Lets face it, every man I know is getting a crochet tie for christmas this year! (And my brother will actually love it which is a little worrying...)

 Dashing little bolero anyone??

Beehive Baby Book; Knitting for the first 6 months. By P&B Wools, c1940.

I nearly started hyperventilating when I found this treasure.... It has the most adorable illustrations I actually need to frame this in case I ever have a child so I can hang it in the nursery and design the whole room around it!

Lots more awesome vintage books to come (including an amazing BIBLE of hairdressing from the 30's to the 60's), when I get around to photographing them... I'm busy trying to learn web design as well as everything else, very exciting times at Polka.Button. All (or at least most) of these books and patterns will be available to buy soon either online (possibly branching off to etsy for vintage stuff) or at my next fair, so stay tuned for loads of exciting changes going on around here!

Vintage Treasure Trove!

During my lunch hour just the other day I stumbled across some beautiful vintage pieces

Beautiful floral seving dish with lid

Vanity table hand mirror and brush set in amazing condition with beautiful floral artwork on the back... I'm so in love I dont know if I can sell it?!

Finally I think its about time I introduced you to my two favorite things in the world...
Brandy... (she just woke up poor thing)

and Snoop... (The biggest poser dog ever)

They are the two most beautiful and ridiculous labaradors in the world!

I will probably have another post for you in a little while as I have a lot to catch up on!