What a busy week we’ve had here! Lots of deliveries of supplies, parcels sending out, new Ruby stockists…busy busy! Here’s our weekly update for this week and our favourite shop of the week!

Our Bestseller This Week: Probably have to say our Delicate Fluttering Butterfly cards…sold lots of these individually, in packs and to our lovely new stockist. They’re quite difficult to make as the smaller butterflies require extra knife-manuevering-skills! But, they look great and they’re always super popular!

What We’ve Been Doing: We’re still preparing for Christmas but I had a major Ellie Poo folding session at the start of the week, preparing card for hand cutting. Also, I’m really proud to have had a good reorganisation of all the cardboard boxes of supplies and packaging materials that have arrived recently. Everything is looking much less like a paper warehouse now!

Our Plans For Next Week: As regular readers will know, our little shop is going to be closed for a week as of tomorrow. We’ll be having a little break but my little laptop in it’s cute handmade (by Toggle UK) case will be busy (hopefully) creating a new swish catalogue for prospective wholesale customers.

Shop Of The Week: Fay’s Studio: http://www.faysstudio.com

Here at Ruby Wren, we love Greeting Cards (obviously!) and we love Fay’s Studio! A fellow Prince’s Trust supported business, Fay’s Studio creates some amazing cards from her illustrations. She’ll be at Top Drawer this September so check out stand E150A if you’re going.

I woke up today to realise that it’s the 3rd September – birthday of my hero, Mr Ty Warner. If you don’t know just who he is, you all will know the product he makes! Ty Warner is the creator and businessman behind Ty Inc, manufacturing Beanie Babies. He is the person that sparked my interest in the gift industry many, many years ago and who I’ve held as my inspiration for the ideas he’s had and the way he does business. I consider him my business hero, a marketing genius and a lovely guy!

So, Happy Birthday to you, Mr Warner! From the girl reporting at the British Trade Fairs…the one with the well-travelled Peace bear (ah, those were the days!).

Last week, I proofed the copy for the NOTHS Winter Gift Guide 2010 – and now, it’s just hit me that we’re in the last few weeks of preparation! Didn’t it just seem like 5 minutes ago that we were preparing for our Father’s Day feature in the Summer 2010 catalogue?

I know lots of my lovely fellow-NOTHS sellers are also in it and I’m getting excited to see find all our friends in the catalogue. I can’t wait for the Christmas orders to start flooding in (we’ve already had some, as early as August!).

How are everyone’s preparations going?

This is how I left my desk yesterday evening…approximately 200 Reindeer cards ready awaiting hand-cutting…

Ruby’s customers are the absolute best A lovely repeat customer of ours requested a bit of a customisation, and it turned out fantastically! She requested a customisation of our ‘Love Pigs’ design, featuring the bunny on our ‘Little Bunny’ card. Here’s the finished products – looks brilliant!

These will be available on NOTHS and here later today!

So, I had been planning to keep the shops open while I was away from the studio next week but dates have changed and I’ll now be away longer so have decided to set the shops to Holiday Mode.

It’s a hard decision as I’ve never closed the shops before but a week is a long time for customers to wait for their order to be dispatched. I’ll be making/packing/posting up until Saturday 4th September and will be away for the following week.

So, if you have events coming up and cards you’ve been planning on buying, please be aware that we’ll be unable to dispatch between 4th-11th September.

Busy busy week here! Not long left until my few days away and then once I get back to the studio, it’s not long then until the Winter Gift Guide is distributed!

Our Bestseller This Week: Plantable Christmas Reindeer Cards

Our Christmas orders are coming in already! We sold lots of little Reindeers and Family Reindeer Cards.  On a less-festive note, we’ve been selling lots of Birthday Butterflies too!

What We’ve Been Doing: We’ve been stocking up on Christmas cards this week and working on some cards for some lovely wholesale customers (more to follow about the special cards we’ve been making!)

Our Plans For Next Week: More Reindeers! And stocking up on our other cards ready for the start of the catalogue orders.

Shop Of The Week: The Green Gables www.thegreengables.co.uk

Gabrielle’s shop is gorgeous, full of stunning ethical products. My favourites have to be the paper heart bunting (see below!). It’s always lovely to meet handmade businesses that are run by people as nice as the products they make too

I know Christmas seems like aaaages away but I’ve had this little lovely made up, photographed and awaiting listing since the Spring and I just couldn’t wait any longer.

Personalisation is a wonderful bonus when working with small businesses handmaking products. This special Christmas Card features a handcut candy cane with a gift tag awaiting the name of your recipient. I really think these would be lovely for children to give to ‘Grandma’ or for kids to receive with their own name adorning the candy cane.

So exciting! All the new Christmas goodies are listed here on our shop and on our NOTHS shop, so there’s no excuse to start getting prepared for Christmas!

Hi Everyone!

Just wanted to give everyone a little notice concerning order dispatch dates in September. I’ll be away from the studio for a few days but I won’t be closing any of the shops. Cards can be purchased as usual but will be dispatched on my return.

If you have any Birthdays or Anniversaries coming up at the start of September and are planning to order a Ruby Wren Card, now is the time to do so Orders placed on and after Saturday 4th September will be despatched on my return the following weekend.

So, I told you about the cat-themed card I made my Mum last week and I’ve been trying to design a cat card for a little while…

Well…drumroll please!

Here’s the final ready-for-sale kittens! Part of our ‘Love’ range, these Love Kittens will be joining our Love Ducks, Love Pigs, Love Turtles and Love Birds. I LOVE these kittens…so sweet and simple. Well, I do love anything with a kitten on it, afterall!

Currently for sale on NOTHS: Click here but hope to add them to our homepage shop and our Etsy shop soon!

I thought I’d share one of our special new items for Christmas this year. I love that handmade gifting takes advantage of personalisation so here’s some of our lovely personal Reindeers!

These cards are made with Handmade, 100% Recycled Paper, Reindeer Poo and Christmas Tree Seeds. They feature handcut Reindeers (of course!) and can be personalised with adult and baby reindeers to reflect your own family. Choose up to 2 ‘parents’ and up to 4 ‘children’ to recreate your Christmas Family scene. These make great ‘From All Of Us’ cards for those special people in your lives! Perfect for grandparents, family friends and people who you think deserve something a little bit special at Christmas! And, don’t forget – these cards could grow your recipient a little Christmas Tree

They are currently available by clicking here.

Small Single Reindeer Cards are £3 each | Pack of 6 for £15

Large Family Reindeer Cards are £6 and can be customised