All Colour Fairy Tales - beautiful illustrations

My crafting inspiration has come to a complete standstill so nothing new to report on that front. So instead, here are some of the most beautiful illustrations from this lovely vintage children's book.

Vintage Childrens' Books - The Winter Bear

 Another charity shop find published by Picture Lions.Tells the story of a little bear found in a tree. The illustrations are lovely watercolours and quite  appropriate for today's weather. I have the worst cold going!

Lots going on in craft world in my head even though it hasn't been showing a lot on my blog lately. I've signed up for pottery classes starting beginning of May. Also signed up for a resin evening. Have designed cupboards to appear in the alcoves after doing Pinterest research, and am now looking forward to creating a craft alcove storage space which I think will really help with more productive crafting.

I've decided to wallpaper the alcoves with fabric, so have been busy researching ideas for different fabrics which  might look nice, and how to go about sticking it on with liquid starch! I've also been researching illustration copyright as I'm interested in using vintage illustrations on ceramics, and have discovered that I can use images where the creator has been gone for more than 70 years. I've found the most amazing images in the New York Public Library records which I might use. I've been thinking of sourcing little vintage people and putting them on houses, or even vintage lightshades, bicycles etc. simple every day things. Here's a lovely image I found in the posters section (left:).

The Pop-up Book Of Flying Machines

 Ellis loves this book but it's quite delicate so we keep it on a shelf away from his other books - two year olds and pop up books, great when we look together but definitely not for solo play! I found it in a charity shop for 50p, and fell in love with the illustrations. I look forward to learning about flight from this book with Ellis as he grows up. It's great to see a hot air balloon in there, especially as we see them regularly living in Bristol. I've tried finding this vintage book online and only found one for sale on Ebay in the USA for £20 so I it's definitely a vintage find!

The Book of Goodnight Stories

The Book of Midnight Stories was given to me  by Rachel@ myrainbowvintagehome as she thought I'd be inspired by the illustrations (illustrated by Karel Franta). I loved it so much that I tried out copying some of the pictures. The stories are beautiful too, really haunting and I look forward to the day I can tell these stories to Ellis as he grows up.

Phoebe and the Hot Water Bottles

Here's an unusual book I found in a charity shop which Ellis loves - Phoebe and the Hot Water Bottles by Terry Furchgott (first published in 1977). It's not very pc in terms of how to deal with a fire (!) but the illustrations are great, and I love Picture Lions books which are also the publisher of The Winter Bear and my childhood favourite, Treasury of Poetry illustrated by Hilda Boswell. This book was removed from libraries because the fire brigade didn't approve of it! I love the picture of Phoebe taking her hot water bottles to the swimming pool. You can see below as well, Phoebe putting out the fire at the end of the story with her hot water bottles!

Vintage books - Tick Tock around the Clock

As I love vintage children's books I thought I'd include them as a thing of love to share. Here's one called Tick-tock All Around The Clock that I found at Whitchurch carboot sale. I'm always rummaging in boxes for finds like this! I don't think it's worth anything as I've only seen it once on Ebay being sold in the States. But anyway, Ellis likes it, especially the bit where the children feed sugar to the bird. I like the picture with the mum carrying in a casserole (below) as it looks like the vintage Midwinter range that we use around the kitchen, check out our similar vintage coffee pot!

Tobacco Factory market book stall purchase

We bought Hansel and Gretel illustrated by Anthony Browne today at the Tobacco Factory Market for £2. The illustrations are so beautiful. I particularly love the illustrations of the downtrodden father. I was so excited to just look at the pictures - the book has a real vintage feel about it. I don't think I can read the story to Ellis for quite a few years as it's such a disturbing story.

Humpty Dumpty softie

Ellis started an obsession with Humpty Dumpty after seeing him in the First ladybird Book Of Nursery. Rhymes.

My husband bought the Second Ladybird book at the Tobacco Factory market book stall one Sunday. I have to admit I was a bit dubious as to whether Ellis would like them, but I was so wrong, as I often am with my husband's intuition on things! He loved the book so much that I ended up buying the rest of the series on Ebay. And now he knows all of the nursery rhymes so we sing them together. I have to avoid some which are violent, like one about beating a horse. But the illustrations are lovely and I've enjoyed making up tunes for the ones I don't know the tunes for - like "Here am I Little Jumping Joan", and "To Market to market...", and also "I saw a ship a sailing...".  And Ellis loves "Sing a Song of Sixpence" which I used to love when I was little.

So anyway, as Ellis's obsession with Humpty (or Dumpy as he first called him!) grew, I knew I had to make a Humpty for him. And here he is with trousers that match Ellis's.

Handmade Beegu

My husband Errol discovered a book called Beegu in a charity shop, and loved the illustrations. He bought it before Ellis was born, and when I saw it I knew I'd have to make a a Beegu one day. Here he is, made out of fleece and hand stitched with a blanket stitch around the edges. It's such a sad story with a beautiful ending. Ellis sleeps with Beegu every night, so he gets lots of love.