A Summer of Adventures

Giant bucket and spade at Beach Break Live

With the nights drawing in and our thoughts turning to freshers fairs and cosy autumnal clothing, I thought I would take a few minutes to reflect on all the fun we've had this summer. We've certainly got about a bit! We kicked off our summer at Beach Break Festival in the beautiful Pembrey Country Park in South Wales. Unfortunately the weather didn't seem to get the message that summer had arrived and it was wet, windy and chilly! But the crowd of post exam happy students didn't let that bother them and it was a really fun weekend. Plus, as someone who has a fascination with big versions of small things (or maxitures, as I like to call them), I loved this giant bucket and spade!

Meeting a new friend on our summer photoshoot

We also had a fun summer photoshoot with our lovely model Alex, we pulled out all the stops to create a cute and girly, pastel themed collection and we made a furry friend along the way. A lovely day out!

Wilderness Festival was a real gem of a festival, a relaxing and exciting weekend, it's become one of my new favourite festivals. You could go swimming in the lake, use a wood fired hot tub, learn how to do all kinds of crafts and take part in a huge Bugsy Malone splurge fight - what more could you want from a weekend?! Plus, the scenery was a delight.

A Wilderness sunset

Our stall

The Bugsy Malone gang out for a splurge

V Festival in Chelmsford was a scorcher of a weekend, we spent it with our pals from The Vintage Fair, and being conveniently located opposite the main stage we managed to take in all the music, including highlights from the Stone Roses, The Killers, Tom Jones and Madness.

The sunnies went down a treat at the hottest event we've ever attended, literally!

Our last festival outing of the summer was at The Big Feastival, a new festival taking place at Alex James' cotswolds farm. With the emphasis firmly on good food, we were in our element. We even went to a cheese and beer tasting event and met the cheesemaker himself! It was a fun weekend, with loads of kids having hay fights and making giant bubbles, and lots of celebrities milling about. We saw Jamie Oliver ambling about and Jules Oliver had a good browse around the vintage area, as did Pearl Lowe, Gaz Coombes and Graham Coxon. Which was nice for the britpop loving teenager within me!

Another great maxiture!

Alex James telling us all about his cheese!

So now it's time for us to leave the summer behind us, it's been a blast, but we're looking forward to getting out all the autumn stock and hitting the road again for a new season of vintage events. We're kicking things off later this week at Student Live, in Kensington Olympia. Would love to see you on our travels, you can always see where we're headed next by checking our event page. See you soon!

Minimum Mouse at Clothes Show Live 2011

Our stand - it wasn't this quiet very often!

We're just recovering from one of the busiest weeks of our lives - Clothes Show Live 2011! This fashion behemoth sets up camp once a year at the NEC in Birmingham (which conveniently happens to be just down the road from our house) so this year we decided to take a chance and be a part of it. Our little stall was part of the Anita's Vintage Fashion Fair area which, though I am biased, was one of the best areas of the show - full of unique treats and with a more laid back and less corporate vibe than some of the areas.

Vintage Jewels

More of Anita's Vintage Fair

It was a long 6 days - with screaming girls, pumping beats and bargain hungry shoppers everywhere, we were tucked up in bed by 10pm most nights! Not being a viewer of Hollyoaks or TOWIE I was quite amused by the regular stampedes of girls chasing after people from these shows, but I was more appreciative of the free Haagen Dazs and Diet Coke being handed about from time to time! It was interesting too, as the people who came to shop at our stand were often not our usual market and hadn't really shopped for vintage before - we had many questions like 'have you got this in another size?' or 'have you got more of these?' and some interesting comments from people who struggled to understand that the clothes had been worn before, but for the most part the people we met were enthusiastic and friendly, and it was quite exciting to see people taking their first steps into vintage fashion.

Our neighbours were the superb Le Keux Events & The Vintage Salon, who were offering vintage hairstyling and makeovers, and were also doing demonstrations about vintage hair on the Inspiration Stage. See below for a picture of my sister Elise, who came along to help us out on some of the days, having had her hair and make up done and looking very glamorous.

Also next to us were the lovely folks from Vintage Life Magazine, Trunk Junkies Vintage, Kate and Aud, Love The Baroness, Your Vintage Life and Borderline Vintage and over in the purple zone were our friends from Syd & Mallory - you need to check all these folks out, they're amaazing!

All in all it was a rollercoaster week, but an amazing experience!

X Factor star wears a Scrabble ring!

Our Scrabble rings have long been one of our best sellers. After all, what's not to love - it's recycled, it's personalised, it's quirky.... and now it's on the biggest TV show in the country!

Yes, here's the lovely Esther Campbell from Belle Amie wearing her Scrabble ring. And doesn't she look lovely. With taste in jewellery like that, she'll go far!

Get yours here!

Pixie Lott rocks a Scrabble Ring

What a lovely lady that Pixie Lott is. Not only does she produce toe tappingly catchy party pop, she also has rather fabulous taste in jewellery. Which explains why she has been spotted out and about wearing a personalised Scrabble ring, and why she is also rocking one in the video for her latest single, Turn It Up.

If you wanna make like Pixie and Scrabblify your fingers, you can by popping over to our ebay shop here, where we also have Scrabble necklaces, earrings and bracelets, as well as cufflinks for the boys!