Elegant Vintage Inpirations: The Wedding Boutique

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Today I'm teaming up with my spotlight sponsor for the month The Wedding Boutique to share some gorgeous vintage style wedding inspirations. 

I am so in love with the beautifully intricate tiaras - and those lace up shoes! The barefoot jewel sandals would be perfect for a beach wedding, I love the glitzy bohemian feel they have to them.

The Wedding Boutique is a UK based wedding wonderland with an amazing stock of everything from dresses to tiaras, shoes, and other finishing touches in a huge range of styles. All the beautiful pieces above can be found on their online store. They also have a new bridal blog page with the latest news and tips from the frontline of the UK wedding industry. It is an absolute pleasure to have such a wonderful company on my sidebar for the month! 

Any Brides-to-be out there? Let me know what you think. 

x Rachel 

This is a sponsored post, all opinions are my own. 

Sponsor Pointless Pretty Things in December

What a lovely December day it is in London today. I'm pretty excited because I have got a lot in store for the blog this month! A big ambitious christmas crafty project that I will be sharing tomorrow, tutorials galore, handmade gift guides plus the usual arty antics. 

Fancy sponsoring Pointless Pretty Things in the busiest blog month of the year? My spotlight spot has already been snapped up this month, but I have plenty of great value Medium and (not so) Little spots left! This will be the last month of 2013 rates so now is the perfect time to snap up a deal. I'm particularly interested in showcasing some lovely handmade shops on my sidebar, so if that's you and you are interested feel free to pop over on to my advertising page and have a look! 

I've spent the morning unashamedly listening to Christmas songs and making rocky road to take to my theatre company's Christmas/Thanksgiving party tonight. Feeling very happy and festive - I hope all of you are too! 

Happy December, 

x Rachel 

Medium Sponsor Spotlight: The Paper Emporium

I love it when a sponsor comes a long that is completely up my street both in their branding and products. This is true of The Paper Emporium - my medium sponsor this month and a new shop obsession of mine... Amy, the talented artist behind The Paper Emporium, creates gorgeous bespoke stationary for weddings and events and also has a great collection of greetings cards in her online store. I am in love with the foiled skulls and the silver kitty - plus she has a new personalised Christmas card set that I definitely have my eye on. 

Pop over and have a browse, I know you'll fall in love too! 

x Rachel 

Sponsor Spotlight: Crafter's Companion

A couple of items on my shopping list: 1//2//3//4//

If you are anything like me and get genuinely excited by craft tools, get ready... I love promoting clever ideas on the blog, and that's why I'm so excited about introducing you to this months spotlight sponsor: Crafter's Companion. This UK founded company has taken the crafting world by storm over the last decade and have picked up numerous awards for their innovative products. 

The product in particular that gives me that "oh no I NEED IT" feeling is the Ultimate Pro (pictured above). It's a 10 in 1 crafting tool that you can use for hand-making cards, envelopes, boxes, ribbons, pop-ups, embossed paper... All neatly packed away in a carry case for easy storage and creativity on the go. I love that it also includes a paper trimmer and scoring tools - this video explains it better than I do. As a card maker and paper craft dabbler myself - I'm convinced! 

The website carries a whole range of crafting essentials like this from the clever brains of Crafter's Companion and other brands. Also on my wish list is these clever Rock a Blocks for stamping... So useful! 

Has anyone else tried any of these? What do you think? 

x Rachel 

This is a sponsored post - all words, opinions and geeky excitement are my own.

Sponsor Spotlight: Elegant Steps

I love a good business success story, and Jayne - the owner of Elegant Steps - is no exception. Having had a nightmare finding shoes for her own wedding, Jayne decided it was time to bring the women of the UK - particularly those needing larger sizes - a selection of wedding shoes with a bit of personality. Ten years on and Elegant Steps is now the largest UK retailer of wedding shoes and Jayne has a showroom full of over nine hundred different styles! 

My favourite thing about Elegant Steps is their range of fancy flat shoes. I am not a fan of heels at all - in fact they are a night ruiner for me... No joke I have cried before on a night out because of hurting feet (don't judge my wimpyness, I like to be comfy). So I have always said that I would wear flats to my wedding, because there is no way I'd want heels to ruin my day! It's great to see a company catering for such a wide audience of women, rather than just those with tiny feet wanting sky scraper heels. However, if you do have tiny feet and want skyscrapers, there's plenty for you too ;) 

If you'd like to read more about the story of Elegant Steps, go to Jayne's blog here. 

x Rachel 

This is a sponsored post - all words and opinions are my own. 

Sponsor Spotlight: Charlotte Musha

Say hello to my newest feature sponsor; Charlotte Musha. I am excited to introduce Charlotte here not just because she has a wonderful blog covering her crafty adventures, but also because her shop Musha Makes is a new obsession of mine... Look at all the pretty washi tape she stocks (along with all the other crafting goodness): 

Also she has a pet hedgehog called Peppa, and anyone with a pet hedgehog is pretty cool in my book. Go check her out! 

Charlotte Musha Blog

Musha Makes Shop

Sponsor Spotlight: Laura Kate Is Crafty

I'm excited to introduce this lovely lady today as one of my feature sponsors of the month! Laura Kate has a wonderful blog celebrating all things crafty. I particularly love her posts on project life; she is a great source of scrap booking inspiration! She also has a shop full of sweet little printables for brightening up your personal projects, and often offers freebies on the blog too. 

Make sure you pop over and say hello! 

Laura Kate Is Crafty Blog.

Laura Kate Is Crafty Shop. 

x Rachel 

Sponsor Spotlight: el.inspired

My sidebar has been so spoilt with lovely sponsors this month! Today I'm very excited to introduce el.inspired: a beautiful Etsy shop selling jewellery, purses and accessories. Emma handmakes all of her products using crystals, beads, chains and leather - I just love the natural style of the bracelets! 

I'm delighted to be partnering up with Emma today to giveaway a $30 giftcard for el.inspired! One lucky winner will be picked at random, and the giftcard can be used for anything in the shop. See below for entry details... 

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Good luck!

x Rachel 

Spotlight: Sweetbriar Sisters + A Giveaway!

I'm delighted to introduce one of this month's lovely feature sponsors Sweetbriar Sisters! Jessica and Marika are the talent behind this sweet online store which sells beautiful sewing patterns for the home, kids and special occasions. The patterns are tried and tested by beginners and experts alike, and only call for materials that are easily found in your local sewing shop. The website also includes handy video tutorials, now if that isn't user friendly I don't know what is! 

Jessica is very generously giving away a 3-pack of her most popular patterns (pictured above) to FIVE lucky readers! Aren't they cute?! They would make great little weekend projects or really thoughtful gifts for children. I think the Delightful Dino is my favourite. And the best thing is that the patterns are PDF versions, so you can download and start sewing whenever you like. This giveaway is open to everyone worldwide... Hooray! 

Entries accepted below, there are lots of ways to enter and there will be FIVE winners selected so you have plenty of chances to win! I'm just jealous I can't enter myself ;) 

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Good Luck! 

x Rachel