I love the new website MumsRock - for mothers with attitude, to shop, share and rant. And I'm delighted they are featuring Peak Princess in their Shopping Bible. "Our newest favourite fashion crush (for kids) is Peak Princess who take the prettiest Liberty patterns and cunningly make them into cute-as-a-button dresses and tops for girls."

flowers for laura

Thanks to everyone who came along to the Hassop Hall Seasonal Fayre last week to raise money for the Derbyshire branch of Macmillan Cancer. It was a wonderful event in a stunning location. It really felt like coming full circle as the last time I was there I was a baby and my mother was making a dress for the then owner, Lady Stephenson!

I met a lovely lady there called Sarah who runs a very special florists in Sheffield. Flowers for Laura is named after Sarah's baby girl who died very suddenly aged 19 weeks from Acute Myeloid Leukaemia. For every flower order they make a 10% donation to PACT, to help children with cancer receiving treatment at Sheffield Children’s Hospital. So by ordering flowers from flowersforlaura.com, you will be helping to support these children and their families. They deliver all over the city and surrounding areas.

Their arrangements are truly scrumptious at more than reasonable prices, like gorgeous this bridal bouquet and bridesmaid's rose flower wand they designed for the Sheffield based eco couture designers, Hope & Glory.

win a Peak Prince outfit for your little boy

So many people entered Daisy Green's competition to win a Peak Princess dress that I'm offering another prize - this time your choice from my new range for little boys - called of course 'Peak Prince'. It'll be launched at the end of October. Click here to enter and click here to take advantage of my preview prices on Liberty print culottes, dungarees, shirts and rompers.

Daisy Green is all about sustainable living without preaching. The magazine's staff describe themselves as a cross between The Good Life and Sex in the City! What more could you want? It's all online and well worth signing up to their newsletter.

we make london

......offers designers the opportunity to sell directly to buyers and offers buyers something unique and timeless in today’s fast-paced, throwaway world of mass production.

Their blog's currently featuring a behind the scenes peek into Peak Princess Palace.

Their next event will be in London on the 5th of December, 2009. So please come along for some handmade shopping.

when: SATURDAY 5TH December 2009 11.00am- 5pm

where: Chelsea Town Hall,
Kings Road, London, SW3 5EE

buy Liberty offcuts

I've put my snippets of Liberty tana lawn and kingly cord on the website so you can now buy bags of mixed prints from £2.99 plus p&p. Great for craft projects, covering buttons, patchwork and dolly dresses.

Thanks for the feedback from the Northern Belles bloggers!

harvey moonbeam dungarees

I've been putting the finishing touches to my new Peak Prince range this afternoon with the last item in the range. These cute Liberty print dungarees are named after my friend Lisa's little boy Harvey.

I'm also doing short-sleeved shirts (named after my godson Sam) and culottes (named after my friend Angela's little boy Charlie) as well as a cute baby romper.

All soon available online from £19.99 - £34.99

peak prince meets peak princess

If you're lucky enough to live in Leeds or Sheffield you might already have received your copy of the new free lifestyle magazine called Boo for parents and children (0-12). It's glossy and a perfect handbag size and packed with ideas about places to go.
Their debut autumn edition features my forthcoming Peak Prince romper.

tatum's arrived!

The lovely people at Liberty have just delivered a bolt of beautiful Tatum print tana lawn cotton. It's deep chocolate brown with pink garlands. Scrumptious.
I'll be using it for all my autumn/winter designs.

heave charlie mouse!

I've been busy this afternoon making a denim version of my new 'Charlie Mouse' culottes using Liberty's cars prints.

And congratulations to Carole Denney who's won a Peak Princess puff sleeve baby dress in the Daisy Green magazine competition! She's chosen the gorgeous red floral check Liberty Millie print.

THE dress of the season!

I'm hugely flattered that the lovely people at Angels and Urchins magazine have called my 'Anya Rose' denim shift "THE dress of the season" in their weekly newsletter.



The dress has an inverted box pleat, pocket trims, lining & covered buttons in a range of Liberty tana lawns including this fab pink paisley. (£34.99 for 6-12 months up to 2-3 years and £39.99 for 3-4 years up to 5-6 years).

If you live in the London area it's well worth signing up to their weekly email with loads of ideas about what's going on and the glossy magazine's packed with fab articles on fashion, days out and having fun.

last of the liberty jellycat belles!

...just doing a stock check ahead of Saturday's Bump to Baby fair at Alexandra Palace and realised I have just four lovely Jellycat Liberty Poppy Belles left!

autumn/winter collection now online!

The autumn/winter collection's now available online with lots of lovely new Liberty prints including this golden meadow ('Phoebe') and this hippy chick pink paisley ('Mark').

I'm continuing the 'Wiltshire' berry & leaf as it's been so popular and introducing this lovely Delft blue peacock feather design ('Little Mari') as modelled here by my gorgeous god-daughter.

A divine chocolate brown/pink version of the 'Tatum' print that I used for the spring/summer range is being delivered from Liberty soon. I also have velvety soft Liberty baby cord shifts and denim dresses with Liberty trim.

The Peak Prince collection's coming along with cute little boys' shirts (up to age 7 at the moment) and I'm working on little demin shorts with Liberty trim for baby boys.

And I just have a few Jellycat Belles and Bunnies left in stock.

Either order online or email me direct for discount postage deals for multiple orders. And don't forget to sign up to my newsletter if you'd like to get preview offers and sample sales.

win a Peak Princess dress

Daisy Green magazine are offering readers the chance to win one of my dresses. Described as a cross between Sex and the City and The Good Life it's a great read full of eco-friendly and ethical ideas for sustainable living.

They've also published my guide to making your very own mini Peak Princess creation for dollies.

I'm starting to sell little "make your own Liberty dolly dress packs" including enough tana lawn cotton & ribbon for 2 dresses plus pattern & instructions. If you're interested in buying one just email me (mail@peakprincess.co.uk).

love hearts

I'm off to the Chilterns Craft Fair at the beautiful Stonor Park tomorrow. The show runs from Friday through til Monday so please do come along.

I'll have a big bowl of Love Hearts on my stall - made by the High Peak's answer to Willie Wonker's Chocolate Factory, Swizzels Matlow in New Mills.

Fortunately my velvet ribbons arrived this morning so I've been finishing off my autumn/winter 'Anya Rose' shift dresses. I'm doing them in denim with Liberty lining & trim and also in super soft Liberty cord prints.

pins and needles

A day that got off to a bad start but ended happily...
This morning at 8am I broke my last size 9 needle. It's the slender size that's perfect for sewing Liberty's Tana Lawn cotton. I was stupidly using it to sewing the inverted box pleat of my new 'Anya Rose' Liberty Kingly cord baby dress. Even though it's super soft, three layers of baby cord was too much and it snapped off. Disaster was averted by a trip to Sew-In in Buxton.

Cake and coffee and my first order from the United States for a 'Tilly Toadstool' pinafore in Liberty's Wiltshire print cheered me up enormously.

There are few greater pleasures in life than sewing on buttons to the gentle rhythm of Test Match Special - especially when Australia's collapsing. I mused about the wonders of my 'no need to thread' needles which have an ingenious little gap through which you snap the thread. It saves endless hours poking ragged ends through tiny holes, giving up, looking for my scissors which are always on the other side of the sewing room. (You can get them at Tesco in Whaley Bridge).

The pinafore has a lovely full gathered skirt which requires lots and lots of pinning. This is a photo of my wrist-band pin cushion. This one broke but I bought a new one from the wonderful Manchester wholesaler, Taylors (who are sending me a supply of Berisfords of Congleton's lovely velvet ribbons for mu autumn/winter collection).

I also have a sweet little iced bun pin cushion that I bought from clever Kitty Eden who makes all sorts of handmade lovelinesses.

PS I'm always slightly wary of swallowing pins so I always have a pin cushion to hand to try and avoid holding them between my lips. We had a lovely golden retriever called Leah when I was a little girl. She swallowed one of Mum's pins. Luckily Mum knew to feed her buttered cotton wool balls which coated the pin long enough for the dog to get to the vets. (The only downside was that from then on Leah used to eat the cotton wool off the Christmas tree every year!)

Peak Prince shirt

This is my new Peak Prince shirt - called "Samuel L." in honour of my godson Samuel Lawrence. In Grayson Perry's new Liberty bicycle print called Philippa (after his wife I believe). I'm sure Sam would prefer Liberty's car print as he's adores anything with four wheels.

It's still in sample stage but if anyone would like to buy preview samples just email me.

learn to dress dolly

I borrowed a doll from my friend Hayley's little girls, Caitlin and Freya, after we spent an afternoon making dresses for their Jellycat Liberty Belles.

I was inspired to try and design my own 'Peak Princess' Liberty frocks for dolls - with a little help from Mum (who came up with the great ribbon strap idea).

This is dolly wearing a Liberty 'Phoebe' print tea dress with gold ribbon straps and belt, followed by a Liberty 'Ros' print prom dress with matching pink straps and belt. (Hair cut courtesy of Freya!)

Can't wait to try the new pattern out with the girls, especially as Mum's bought them a mini-sewing machine to practise on.

tweet tweet

I'm feeling quite proud of myself for having managed to put my twitter updates on my homepage as well as on this blog (see bottom right). How integrated is that!!

I've also started creating my autumn/winter Liberty print collection web boutique so my 'Freya Bean' blouses, 'Anya Rose' Liberty cord shifts and denim with Liberty trim shifts and 'Bella Luella' long sleeve baby dresses will be available online by the end of the month.

And I'm delighted that my 'Martha Grace' baby cord dress is in this month's Baby Hampshire and Baby Surrey magazines.

...got to go back up to the sewing room now.

ribbons and bows

Just discovered this gorgeous collection of bows, hairbands, clips and alice bands in every colour of the rainbow...there's loads more on Miss Gracie's site.

I've got ribbons on my mind at the moment and I'm in the middle of matching up sumptuous velvet ribbons to my lovely new Liberty tana lawn and baby cord autumn/winter prints.

I'm buying them from a local firm called Berisfords who've been making ribbons for more than a hundred and fifty years.

The only problem is that my kitten, Loki, runs into my sewing room, steals them and runs downstairs doing a bad impression of the Andrex puppy.

radio gaga

Behind my overlocker you can just see my radio. It's an ancient analogue Matsui which means Mum must have bought it years ago. The fm/lw/mw button's broken so you have to fiddle with it to get it to work.

In my former London life I used to work for Radio 4. We had gorgeous Pure digital radios in every room...when we moved to the digital desert that is the Peak District I 'loaned' them to my Mum (who moved down to London the same day we moved up here!). Roll on switchover.

I'm fond of this one because I once lent it to John Prescott when he was being interviewed for a BBC 5 live report that I produced in Manchester. (Read the Home Business magazine for more on my former life)

When I'm sewing I have it turned up really loud. (Probably why my writer husband works downstairs!). Generally I listen to Radio 4 til about lunchtime, then after Sean or Martha on The World at One it's time to tune into Simon Mayo on 5 live. Then it's back to Eddie Mair's PM of course.

When I fancy a bit of music I tune into High Peak Radio (you might hear me reading the news for them from time to time!). They allow me to indulge my passion for radio & kindly allowed me to do a lovely series about people born and bred in the High Peak which is also being published in Derbyshire Life magazine.

I'm also a podcast and audiobook addict...please post any recommendations.