Quernus Christmas Sale!

28th December 2012
After the excitement of the Country Living Fair, followed by a rather large number of Christmas orders, the Quernus creatures have finally had a chance to put their paws up and have a large glass of Baileys to celebrate Christmas! And they want to continue the celebrations with their very first Christmas sale - for a limited time only, you can adopt a Quernus creature for 20% off the normal price! This sale will last as long as the wee creatures do (there are only a limited number of each design) - once they're sold, that's it for another year! The sale will end on 31st January 2013.

The Quernus Christmas Sale is happening over in my shop, and is for all Christmas creatures (and Christmas cards) still looking for a home.

To claim this discount, simply enter CHRISTMAS20 (make sure you use all capitals) when going through the checkout process. The discount can only be used against those items bought from the Sale section.

Happy New Year, everyone!

And the winner is....

31st October 2012
I'd like to give a HUGE thank you to everyone who entered the competition to come up with a phrase to be printed on this Santa Teacup Mouse's placard. With nearly 100 brilliant entries, I was definitely spoiled for choice, but one suggestion pipped the others to the post with its originality, quirkiness and brevity (which was quite important given the size of the placard!) So, a big congratulations to SAM for coming up with the winning entry - "MERRY KISSMOUSE" :) This wee mouse will be heading off to live with you very soon!

There were several entries that deserve a mention too - there were so many wonderful suggestions, I was just blown away by your inventiveness and wit! Here are some of my favourites:

"Mousie mistletoe kisses £1.00" - Nina J.
"Keep Calm and Be Merry" - Courtney Y.
"Please stop here, Santa" - Pamela B.
"Santa's Little Helper" - Alisha M, Honey Daze
"Santa Paws: The Mouse Before Christmas" - Lemur Lady

Many thanks once again to everyone who took the time to enter - I had so much fun reading all your ideas, and the mice had a good chortle as well! I will be selling a limited number of these special Merry KissMouse Mice in the run up to Christmas, and if anyone wants to reserve one (price £23 plus shipping), just drop me a line.

Competition time!

8th October 2012
This Christmas, I will be doing a limited edition Santa Teacup Mouse! This wee mouse has a lovely Santa hat on and is perched in a festive green tea cup, but he just doesn't know what his placard should say! Can you help him?

Wedded Bliss Part 2

Teapot Mice

4th October 2012

In the second part of my series of articles about the wedding cake toppers I've made, I thought I'd start off by looking at the role that props often play when I'm working on a design. And first up are these adorable Teapot Mice, made for the lovely Helen and her husband Gareth. Helen first got in touch with me in April through Etsy, as she had spotted the Teacup Mice and she thought the style would work for their wedding theme. Helen  had in mind the idea of a mouse in a teapot, and after we spoke on the phone, we came up with the idea of a mouse in a teapot, and also another mouse pouring a cup of tea (I just love the circularity of that!) Helen managed to source this wonderful miniature teapot, to which I added the mice (the little grey mouse just tagged along for the ride - the handle was just crying out for a mouse!)

Photo © Richard Moore 

And this was the amazing cake, upon which the Teapot Mice were perched! Isn't it beautiful? You may spot a little cup and saucer at the bottom of the cake - another couple of mice found their way in there, holding a sign saying "Keep Calm and Marry On". Perfect.

Another commission that involved a certain circularity was a computer mouse on a, err, computer mouse! These two mice were based on the bride and groom's professions, with the groom in IT and the bride a scientist. I managed to find a fairly flat computer mouse on eBay, and the mice were right at home!

Another recent commission I did involved a beautiful ceramic apple from Penkridge Ceramics. Jo had got in touch to see if I could make some fairly simple mice for her wedding, to include three little mice to represent their daughters and the flower girl.

What I loved about this commission was that the mice are wearing elements of the real wedding outfits, but just in highlighted form. So the bride has a couple of flowers at her waist, similar to those on Jo's dress, and the bridesmaids and flowergirl are wearing sashes, again taken from their dresses. The apple is just wonderful - Edie's mouse is clambering up the side (she loves climbing), whereas Lily's mouse is dancing. The tails of the bride and groom and entwined in a heart.

Signs are always a pretty popular prop when it comes to weddings. These two giraffes were commissioned by Al as a gift for her sister's wedding. The groom is about 9cm tall, and the bride is 8cm tall.

There is one final installment to go in this series of wedding cake toppers - if you'd like to see more of the sort of commissions I do, pop over to my Flickr page
.

Wedded Bliss Part 1

Michelle and Paul's wedding mice

10th August 2012
I consider it a great honour when I'm asked to make wee creatures to perch on the top of a wedding cake. To be a part of someone's special day is a big thing, even if it's only a small part, and I love working with people to come up with just the perfect design.  I've clocked up quite a few now, so I'm going to take a look at some of the ones I've made over a couple of posts.

Introducing the Moodlings

3rd July 2012
June was an interesting sort of a month for me, one of those roller coaster ones that come along every once in a while. Not only did it not get off to a great start when I dislocated my left thumb and was out of action for over a week, but it didn't really improve when my computer caught a few bugs which (thankfully) are now fully cured. But on the plus side, I have developed a new range of wee creatures, the Moodlings, AND I have finally opened my long-awaited new online shop!

Fame at last!

Craftseller magazine, Issue 12, July 2012

11th June 2012
Can you spot any familiar faces in this picture? Yes, that's right - Quernus Crafts was featured in the current issue of Craftseller magazine! I'm talking about my ArtFire shop, The Mouse House, which has been up and running for the past 18 months or so.

Summer's Here!

Keep Calm Mouse available to buy on Etsy

2 May 2012
Summer is definitely on the way! How do I know this? Perhaps not because of the weather, where the April showers are persisting into May. Nope, I know because today the Summer issue of the UK Handmade magazine is out!

Crafty Creatures

Little Sewing Mice - available on Etsy

19th April 2012
I was just thinking the other day how clever the wee creatures are - they've taught themselves to knit, sew, crochet and bake. The mice in particular have very nimble paws, but the occasional Snail has stepped up to the challenge too :)

An interview for UK Clay Users

27th February 2012
A few weeks ago, I was contacted through Etsy by Carmen of Orimui, who wanted to know if I'd be interested in doing an interview for the UK Clay Users, a group of British based artisans specialising in all sorts of clay. I had recently joined their team on Etsy, and I was delighted to have been asked. What followed was a thought-provoking, enlightening and above all fun experience whereby Carmen emailed me single questions, and I emailed my replies. In this way, we built up an ongoing dialogue that was much more revealing and participatory than just working through a list of questions.

As a result, this has been the most in-depth interview I have ever given, and I am so glad to have had the chance to reflect on my journey so far. Thank you, Carmen, and happy reading!

http://ukclayusers.blogspot.com/2012/02/featured-seller-quernus-crafts.html

One of my earliest sculptures, made at the tender age of 8 for my Gran

Here be dragons

Valentine Dragon, b. 8 February 2011

29th January 2012
I don't know much about the Chinese Calendar, but I do know that this is the Year of the Dragon, and it began on 23rd January! So here are a few Quernus dragons to welcome in the New Year.

Happy New Year!

1st January 2012
I don't know about you, but the last year has flown by! It feels like no time at all since I wrote my last New Year post just a shade under a year ago - the mice have definitely grown up a bit since then, if these wee mites are anything to go by!