market stall !!

So exciting news folks, Maymarket is officially back as of today!

The main reason being that I am now fully organised and motivated and have actually booked a stall at which to sell my wares THIS SUNDAY at Rozelle Markets.

So come along and take a peek, there is so much stuff it might not even all fit in the 3x3m space! There are heaps of pretty vintage frocks ranging from $10-20 (mostly 15 and below), heaps of cute satchel-style and glomesh bags for $15 each and a a whole bunch of other exciting items ranging from the massive $5 basket to some more special and expensive items (e.g. a beautiful faux fur coat for $70)

So if you live anywhere near Rozelle please come down to the public school on Sunday and have a look ;)

xx Elly

ttyl.

Okay, okay, so i've become the worst blogger in history, I know..

So I am going on a break for a while to  focus on other things but one day I will be back, I have plans for a proper physical market stall one day so I will keep you posted.

I did have to make the effort just to post up this one very special link to the Arcade Fire's new interactive music video for "the Wilderness Downtown."

If you don't already have google Chrome, you will have to download it, but I think waiting a few minutes is definitely worth it. Plus you will have a fancy new web browser? I would actually love to make the change but I can't figure out how you use delicious on it.. oh well firefox stays I suppose.

Anyway, the magic that is this video is sure to amaze the pants off you so stop reading this rubbish and watch it already.

See you in the future!

xx Elly

one two three FOUR

Yeah, so i'm back at uni again, back to being a bad blogger again.. buuuuut at least I am not going crazy out of my mind because I actually have something productive to do with my time now! Nice to be back into some sort of a routine and to see friends again..

But more importantly, I saw Scott Pilgrim VS. the World last night and it was amazing. I have been waiting for this movie for months and months now so I had to see it on the first day it came out! What did I love so much about it? Well here is an exhaustive list:

• Michael Cera - skinny, awkward "indie" boys are my weakness..
• Totally rockin' music - seriously, it has revitalised my passion for music that doesn't make you want to fall asleep. Most of the songs are brought to you by Beck and BSS, so it can't really get much better than that.
• Cool coloured hair - Ramona has awesome hair colours (which of course made me want to go back to having super blonde hair that can be constantly colourfully dyed)
• Hipster jokes - because making fun of hipsters is so hipster.

Michael Cera vs. Scott Pilgrim from the comic

But more importantly, watching Ramona's hair throughout the movie had led me to an important life decision: I desperately need to get my hair cut. So I will have to somehow pluck up the courage to see a hairdresser, despite the fact that they terrify me...

One place I have been seeking inspiration is fuckyeahbitchinhair, which is a collection of pictures of some of the most amazing hair you will see anywhere. Of course it does have quite a few duds and often falls into the old trap of choosing pics for the pretty photography rather than the hair itself, but it has definitely given me a few ideas (as well as making me even crazier for pink hair...)

Some favourites:

jealous of girls who look gorgeously effortless in a messy bun

i'm obsessed with cool braiding, never works for me though!

what I want my hair to be like right now..

dying (haha) over this colour, it's perfect!

So go forth and be inspired to greater hair heights, and go see Scott Pilgrim ASAP !!

xx Elly

golden

Today while shuffling my files around I have found the pictures of my delicious cardamom buns with cinnamon butter that I made earlier in the year.. so I thought I would share a few with you now just to show off!





Out of all the things I have ever baked I think that these are the most impressive, as they actually involved using yeast (which is something I have been a bit scared of for a long time after some failed attempts years ago..) The fact that my buns came out looking beautifully golden brown and oozing with cinnamon butter was not what I had realistically expected! I think I will have to try them again as soon as possible!

I have been baking today though, making a lemon cheesecake for tonight's dessert, so I should probably try to steer clear of the sweet treats for at least a few days after that!

On another note, I have recently been obssesively listening to You by Gold Panda. Quitters Raga has been one of my favourites for a while, and I decided the other day to give some of their other songs another listen.. and so the obsession began. I will probably keep listening to it non-stop for a week and then be so sick of it I never want to listen to it again! I am always ruining perfectly good songs for myself by doing that. Anyway, take a listen for yourselves..



xx Elly

books

I have always loved books, and as a small child I was practically obsessed with reading (my favourites were Enid Blyton and books about reptiles..) but since starting high school I have been reading less and less. Now that I am at university, I don't think I have read a single novel. I do, however, read quite a few design books at the library, to the extent to which you can call that reading..

Recently when doing my rounds of local op shops, I have been paying closer attention to the book selections as I live in hope of finding proper vintage (70's or earlier) picture books with sweet illustrations. Although so far I have been unsuccessful with this idea, I did find some great books the other day that I would like to share with you.

All of these three came from the same Salvo's store, I love the Salvo's because they are always cheaper than Vinnie's and they all have furniture..







So, the first one I found was this old atlas from 1986, complete with the U.S.S.R and East Germany. Of course there are probably a whole heap of changes other than that but I am painfully ignorant of general world history... Anyway, the reason that I bought it (other than the fifty cent price tag) clearly not the ugly front cover but the fact that I really love atlases. Hopefully will be used in some designing capacity in the future.






The second book is a book called Master Photography, so of course I picked it up straight away. Now I often find a lot of books on photography in op shops (probably because some of the information is no longer relevant with the advent of the "digital age" and all that) but this one actually convinced me to buy it because it has a lot of picture examples of the different techniques and settings that it talks about, not to mention that many of these photos are quite beautiful. I don't really understand why more people don't snap up these books because most of the information is still relevant for those who want to learn how to properly use their DSLRs off automatic setting (e.g. me..)










The last book I found on this particular journey was this book, entitled Maximalism, The Graphic Design of Decadence and Excess. Now, as I'm sure I have made clear already, I practically jump on any books that have anything to do with art or design. You can imagine my amazement to find this relatively new design book in amongst the reference section! (This is why I meticulously comb through every section of the op shop, things are never in the right section..) Some of the stuff is a bit dated (it was published in 2004) but most of it is pretty decent, especially when it will mostly be used as inspiration (where I will decide I like two of the colours that happened to be placed next to each other..)

Anyway, with all this talk of books I thought I would also share an interesting blog with you that I discovered yesterday. Awful Library Books is a blog, run by librarians Mary and Holly, that catalogues the books that are picked out during the constant process of weeding out the old and irrelevant. Many of the entries are submitted by other librarians, who offer up photos of some of the most bizarre books you have ever seen, along with some witty commentary from Mary or Holly. Who would have thought there was the need for a book called Your Three-Year-Old, Friend or Enemy?



I have to admit though, if I had a child that resembled the one on the cover I might be more easily convinced..


xx Elly

renewal

Woo! finally finished the new layout for the blog after starting yesterday afternoon !!

I have noticed for a veryyy long time (as in since I started the blog) that it has been embarrassingly ugly, especially for a student studying Design! But alas in my unlimited laziness it has taken me this long to get around to it. It took me far longer than I thought it would, but then again I am very out of practice when it comes to coding. I used to be a coding whiz back when I used to make my own geocities websites making pixel dolls (yes I really am that cool.)

No other news to report, Newcastle post still in the making...
Hope all of your eyes are a bit less sore now :)

xx Elly

post

Hello there,

Shockingly I have actually been doing some things in the last two weeks, not to mention that the 29th of June was my nineteenth (weird looking word..) birthday

My birthday was actually quite uneventful, but I got to see a close friend I haven't seen in ages and she even made me a really delicious pear and almond cake. I didn't ask for much in the way of gifts either, but I did get a few nice things:

my gorgeous glockenspiel <3

- a cute angel glockenspiel from urban outfitters, fulfilling a small part of my earlier wishes. I have no idea what I will actually do with it, but so far I have learnt to play Don't Stop Believin' by Journey, which is clearly a good enough reason to own it. 

- a new sims 3 expansion pack, ambitions. luckily I am now on break and have time to play!

- some money from my mother, aunty and grandmother, so now I feel slightly less like a poor hobo

- fancy nail polishes, which are my new obsession. I got a nice dark grey, light minty green, baby blue, the most beautiful lilac and two botttles of china glaze "matte magic" which is a topcoat that will give any colour an amazing matte finish. I am so in love with this right now, I can't stop looking at my fingers.

-----


The glockenspiel and nail polishes were especially exciting because they came through the post, which are a great novelty to me. I think getting something in a package makes it a bit more special though, because you have to wait for it. Even if it is a surprise, it is nice to think that the objects contained come from someplace far away.

I also received another package this week. A few months ago I mentioned and eventually signed up for the package project, which is a project organised by cupcake couture. People all over the world have emailed a few of their details (myself included), and have been paired up with another person and each pair must then send a package full of little treats to one another!

Now I sent my package off a couple of weeks ago, and I actually wish I had taken some photos of it because I went a bit crazy with it and made little labels and everything (what I get for being a bored designer..) My package arrived a few days ago, and I recieved a few lovely things including a pretty vintage red silk scarf, little pouch featuring Blythe (a great coincidence as I own two) and a mix C.D. featuring some of her songs as she is a singer/songwriter (and a talented one at that!).

As for the rest of my holidays, I have hardly any plans. One thing I do really want to get around to is a trip to Newcastle to visit some op shops that are far beyond my usual circuit and find some amazing bargains.

xx Elly

warm

As I may have mentioned in some of my previous posts, it is actually quite wintery in Sydney at the moment. Well, it has been getting warmer for the past few days (but still cool enough to wear a jacket if you aren't running about in the sun) and it is still freezing at night. Not actually freezing obviously, but in my bedroom it really does feel like it sometimes.

As such, I have compiled another list (yes, I am one of those list-loving people..) this time it is a list of Elly's winter essentials..

HOT WATER BOTTLES
Hot water bottles! I don't think I have had one since I was about eight but they are absolute heaven! This might just be because I am used to getting into bed in my ice cave of a bedroom and shivering for about an hour before my body works up enough heat to get me warm again.. but nevertheless, hot water bottles are an amazingly genius invention! You can also get little soft covers if you are worried about accidentally burning yourself.. like this super-cute owlie version from saracarr on etsy!




HOT CHOCOLATE
I'm one of those freaky people who doesn't like coffee at all, so almost every morning I wake up and make myself a nice cup of Cadbury's drinking chocolate. Of course there is always tea which I also love but hot chocolate appeals to my ravenous sweet tooth. My ultimate hot chocolate method is to add two large teaspoons of the Cadbury's powder to your mug and fill it with milk, then microwave for approximately 45 seconds (this will probably differ greatly between microwaves, but if you leave a bit of space at the top you can add a splash of cold milk afterwards to cool it..) And if you want to go really crazy, add a little bit of Baileys Irish Cream which makes it even more delicious, but probably not suitable for weekdays..

HEATERS
Well this is a bit of a stupidly obvious one but it had to be said. Almost all of my time spent at home is spent sitting on a small wooden stool in front of the heater. I am a little bit worried that this will have some adverse health effects but my desire for warmth overrides my health worries. Sitting on the little stool with no back support gives me better posture anyway!

BAKING
Now I love baking at any time of the year, but there is no time like winter to give your oven a workout. This is for two simple reasons: a) your oven will warm up your house and b) you will get to eat yummy and warm treats at the end of it. Plus, it is totally okay to stuff yourself with treats during winter because a bit of extra pudge will help you keep warm..? Perhaps you could go for a wintery theme with a snowflake cookie cutter from kitchen crafts.



CUP-A-SOUP
Okay, so I know you probably get the whole "put-warm-consumables-in-your-body" idea by now but think about it, you can have nice warm soup in your hands within minutes; any time, any place! I have only gotten back into them recently because they are actually on sale (a two-pack for a dollar!) at the moment and I couldn't resist them, but I can't believe I didn't think of it sooner. My favourite flavours are laksa, chicken noodle and one that I can't remember the name of which is something like italian minestrone..

COATS
For a very long time (I'm talking years here..) I have wanted a coat for winter, but always thought that buying one would be a ridiculously large expense for something I would only be able to wear for a maximum of about one month per year. Luckily, this year I actually remembered that practically all op-shops have plenty of coats in all shapes and sizes for around ten dollars, so when it came time for the 50% of everything sale I was ready and bagged myself a gorgeous grey coat for four dollars! So now my beautiful coat has been keeping me warm pretty much every day because I get too lazy to change outfits in the winter.. So go out and buy a coat! Even if it isn't four dollars it will be worth it to allow you to leave a one-metre radius from the heater!

Although I have already got a perfect coat of my own, I love this beautiful mustard-y coat and can't help but dream of teaming it with my mustard-y tights.. from vintage etc.


Anyway, that's all the exciting list action for now. I have actually been vaguely productive in my first week of holidays, crafting and cleaning, so hopefully this will continue!

xx Elly

something else..

Finally the time has come and I am actually on holidays, rather than ignoring my work and pretending that I am. Hooray!

Now I have only one long-winded and possibly uninteresting story to tell today (now I bet you are dying to continue reading..!)

For ages and ages I have had an obsession with Something Else by Natalie Wood. I swear, every single thing made by that brand I want so much it hurts. So while doing my random e-shop browsing I stumbled upon this beatiful collar (you may know I am obsessed with collars from previous posts..)


pic via idontlikemondays

And you can just guess who made it. Yep. Bloody Something Else. Trying to get me to spend all my hard-earned money already, and I only got it two days ago.. I swear whoever is designing these things has the ability to read my mind.

I do have a brilliant story about my gorgeous Something Else dress, which is white with black speckles and is practically weightless, the most beautiful thing to wear. Ever. I bought it from David Jones at the beginning of the year as I had been given a $100 gift voucher for christmas (thanks dad!) But that is not the amazing part. The dress was originally $260 (crazy-expensive for me..), but had been marked down on the label to $90. Only one of the dresses had been marked at this price and the rest were twice as expensive.. so I decided to get that one just to be on the safe side. When I got to the counter, the woman was confused because when she scanned the barcode it said $180.

Apparently, someone had marked the price wrong, as the $90 price was supposed to be for the tops of the same print. I'm glad they did though, because the woman called her supervisor and ended up letting me have it anyway! The sweetest thing about it is that only a couple of weeks ago I saw that they still had one left and it had been marked down to $120, so my price was still lower and that was half a year ago..

And that my friends is why they call me bargain shopper extraordinaire :)
(that and my three dollar vinnie's finds..)

xx Elly

cooking.

I have decided that as it is extremely cold (in Sydney terms) at the moment, to warm you up i've compiled some of my favourite sites on the theme of: cooking!
number one : whatthefuckshouldimakefordinner

So basically this is a site that will help indecisive people like me decide what they want to cook themselves for dinner. There is also a helpful vegetarian-only option for the herbivores/vegetarian fakers (that is just being mean to my eating-only-chicken-and-fish self, no offence intended!) among us. Just don't hand this site on over to your granny, unless she likes the work "fuck" a lot..

number two : eggwatchers

This site is one of my all-time favourites as it taught me how long to boil an egg for. Sad I know, but I do actually learn everything I know from the internet. Plus, this fancy gadget will not only tell you how long to cook your eggs for varying different sizes, temperatures, and outcomes but entertain you with fun youtube videos while you wait! So no more pacing around wondering why six minutes suddenly seems like years.. Some good ones i've seen have been crazy claymation zombie killing and a star wars dance-off. Awesome.

number three : recipelook

Oh my good, words cannot describe how much I love this site. Seriously. A combination of two of my most favourite things: cute illustrations and cooking. Heaps of yummy recipes have been hand-illustrated, creating a very long list of images that are both beautiful and useful. Here are a couple of my picks from the site:


short and sweet nutella tortillas by Emilie Boudet


roasted potato wedges by Rachel Rauch

number four : taste.com.au

Okay, so this one is a bit more boring than the others, but this is really my first point of reference when I want to find a recipe. They have pretty much everything I have ever looked for, although sometimes the search tool is a bit unhelpful and you might have to try a few different ways of wording what you want. Other than that, love it forever <3

And a one last thing for those who can't be bothered to cook:

Who doesn't love nineties one hit wonders..?

xx Elly

urban

Hey there again,

My life is getting back to normal now that I have uni, and by that of course I mean that my routine of looking at blogs and various online shops is sometimes punctuated by actual work. Oh the humanity!

One shop that I am currently stalking is urban outfitters. I really envy American girls who can shop at these stores in real life whenever they please! But then again, I think maybe if everyone had access to these goods I would probably find them a bit common for my tastes.. I know, I know, but I hate seeing other people wearing the same thing as me, that's why I love op shopping!

The point is, I have heard that they are offering free shipping to us australians for the limited time of this merry month of may, with the one catch that you have to spend over $100. All you have to do is enter promo code 'shipaus3' at checkout time.

Now given that I am an extremely poor uni student living at home without a job, I don't think i'll be able to scrape up that much money before the 31st, but here how I would spend one hundred smackaroonies at their lovely shop...



most beautiful scalloped shorts in black - $14.99
mostly because I love rocking the fancy tights and shorts look in the cooler months, and also because they are scalloped. I love.
[I actually bought some great high-waisted black shorts on sale for $20 at sportgirl the other day which are exactly what I wanted and I died of happiness, incidentally..]


sweet beaded pearl collar - $34
Okay so there is no way in real life I would probably be able to justify spending $24 on something like this [I don't really know why, I think it falls to close to DIY-able territory] That being said, it is so beautiful and I love that it hangs a bit lower so people like me who feel like t-shirts are trying to strangle them will be able to cope with it. I don't really know what I could wear it with.. but I don't care because I have an obsession with collars!


cute glockenspiel with case - $32
you have no idea how long I have wanted to be in a band with me as the glockenspiel-playing person that everyone dislikes because they are pointless and talentless. But I won't care and will totally rock that glockenspiel. Glockenspiel is hardcore.



my perfect ideal matte grey nail polish - $19
You cannot possibly comprehend how much I want this. At the beginning of the year I decided to stop biting my nails once and for all, and so far with the help of keeping my nails more or less beautifully [self] manicured at all times I have kept them long. Now, ever since I heard about matte nail polishes I having been constantly pining over them yet being unable to find any except OPI, which would be great, except that in my matte nail polish dreams the only colour that will pass the test is my all time favourite: GREY!

But alas! I am only on $99.99, so just to make sure i'm OVER $100...

totally neccessary owl money bank - $8

Well it is only eight dollars, and it's for my owl collection!

--

Anyways, apart from all my dream shopping, I have a song for you as a parting gift. It's a cover of LCD Soundsystem's All My Friends, which is a good song in it's own right but not exactly one of my favourites. It's been covered by Franz Ferdinand, who although talented aren't exactly my favourite band either, but this song is surprisingly really good and has been stuck in my head for dayss.



That's all folks!

xx Elly

insecurities

Hey there lovelies,

Now I am not normally the sort of person who really gets into the whole "motivational" thing, I tend to zone out and just think about how unlikely it is that I am actually going to "take time out to de-stress" or "repeat my positive mantra five times a day" etc etc.. But when I came across this article today called insecurity doesn't pay the bills, and as a completely over-analytic anxiety wreck (i'll wager that I could beat most of you in a crazy-off) who aspires to be a "proper designer" one day this completely spoke to me.

So I suppose I have to be a better person now and blog more regularly!

Hope you're feeling just a little bit inspired :)

xx Elly

type

Today is the type of day that I haven't had in ages.

I got up, didn't get dressed until midday, sat on the sofa under a blanket and got some of my silly uni work done. It was so nice when I woke up, the kind of cold and rainy day where it is so nice to just sit inside.

I've really been loving the cold weather despite being sickly because I am a half-english, cold-loving kind of girl. My plans for the future are to move to Melbourne where they have proper winters, and then in the more distant future to move to Sweden where they have really proper winters. The type of winters where you can legitimately wear coats and smoke cigarettes in a sophisticated-european-black-and-white-film kind of way. This is what I am envisioning for my life. I just have to train my lungs to not die the day after I decide to smoke a single cigarette..

In other news, while procrastinating from my work AGAIN (this is a very common theme in my life) I found the most gorgeous little blog called we make words and am now absolutely obsessed.

Being the design-student typography-obsessive girl that I am, this is my idea of heaven, especially as cutesy real-life type is actually my favourite thing ever. Well one of them at least! And I love that the materials are unrelated to the words that are written.

Beautiful work girls I am totally jealous inspired!

xx Elly

movies

I don't go to the movies very often, but whenever I do I really hate it when I get there a bit late and miss all the trailers! Trailers are awesome. If it's for a good movie then I sit there gasping and pointing and poking whoever is next to me, and if it is for some silly action movie I sit there laughing and counting how many explosions they can possibly fit into one trailer.

I should be doing something more useful (uni readings, sewing, looking for a job!) but I came across this hilarious video regarding movie trailers and thought I need to show this to every single person ever...

from britanick

I feel like this is something I shouldn't find so funny, but pretty much every part is hilariously accurate (except it probably could have done without the bit in the middle about the latin teenager, avatar references etc..)

xx Elly

animated

Ever since the beginning of high school where I was forced into makingspeeches to the class, I have had a love for powerpoint presentations. My favourite part about them was adding in a load of animated gifs to distract everyone from my lack of knowledge (very successful by the way).

I now keep a file on my computer chock full of every random animated gif I come across in case I ever need it for presentation embellishment again, and looking through it brings me hours of amusement.

Today I found a completely amazing site filed with fancy animations that are somewhat design-related (which bodes well for my presentation relevance!) with various stationery and technology objects in action, a pencil being snapped for example, all in lovely bright colours.

Despite this, my current fave is one of a boy getting punched in the face and bleeding paper blood. I can't get enough of things that use paper as other objects, definitely appeals to my rather large crafty side.

in addition, more amazingness in the form of a claymation video from the same site. I love the well-choreographed dance break in the middle.

Wooork from Elisava on Vimeo.

That is all the coolness I can handle for today folks

xx Elly

hello there

Hello,

This is Elly and I am starting up a little business called MayMarket.
I am a student of Design in Visual Communications, which basically means that I get to sit around making pretty things all the time and pass it off as university work, and I am generally interested in craft, fashion, music, baking, and all kinds of design.

So what exactly is a MayMarket?

Throughout my teenage years I have become obsessed with vintage shopping, to the point where I have started buying far more things than I can conceivably keep in my wardrobe or house. I thought a good solution would be to earn a little bit of money by selling a couple of things that I have found on the lovely Etsy.

So I will be using this blog to keep you informed not only when new things go up for sale but also some of the things I have been making recently or just any things I come across that I think are pretty or interesting!

One day I will also be adding some of my design work to the shop, including stationery and accessories, but that will take a bit of time what with my uni work and everything.

Anyway, I hope that is enough info for you all and I hope you can find something you like around here somewhere

xx Elly