Names and News!

Hellloooooo everyone! Welcome back, how are we all? Good? Goood! I've been busy again, and I know it seems to be how I now begin every single blog post, 'yep, very busy week...' but it's only because it's true! Trying to summarise my week each week into a single word, the first one that comes to mind is definitely busy! The reason for this is that over the past two or three weeks I have taken on another several commissions as well as a few personal projects, and it is also the prime season for our stockists to order or re-order, and so with all that going on and Thorntons as well, busy is more of an understatement! Not that I'm complaining, of course, although it might sound like it - I love being busy, it's the best possible thing to be if you ask me, far better to be busy than to be bored, I think. So, as I have been ever so busy, I decided that to save myself some time this week, I'd make a little video for the blog post instead of writing a longer post. However, while in theory this was a great idea, it actually took me a lot longer to make the video than it would have to write a blog post, as I had to film or animate (you'll see!) each clip, import it, cut it, edit it, do the voiceover, find appropriate audio, render, add transitions, re-render... The list goes on. So, I certainly hope it was worth it! Before we get to that, though, I have a few important announcements to make. Firstly, I'd like to announce the winner of our competition and also the brand new name of our lovely puffin! It was such a tricky decision as there were so many fantastic entries, and so many to choose from! However, Mum and I whittled it down to a shortlist, and from there we decided that our Paddlin' Puffin would be called.... (drum roll please!)

Our little puffin, a year after his creation, finally has his name - Puddin. We absolutely love his new name, and the reason we chose this name is that we think it really suits him - his cake-loving character and his fluffy round tum. We're also very pleased to announce that the winner who suggested the name Puddin, has been messaged and will be winning a two night stay at the lovely Nook. Congratulations! Secondly, we have two new fabulous designs coming out very soon too, which you'll be able to purchase on cards and mugs and all our other amazing products, so keep your eyes peeled for those on our shop page in the coming weeks. So, here they are, and I'll be releasing more information on them soon.

And finally, the video you were promised! I apologize if my voice sounds a little bit funny, I'm 85% certain that I'm about to come down with a very bad cold, but I'm currently keeping it at bay with sheer will power I think, and I think you can hear the stuffiness encroaching in my voice at some points! So apologies for that and I hope you like it, although it's only a 'quick' video, each clip took quite a while to compose (the video is a questions and answers video and so the clips I refer to are the 'answers,' you'll hopefully see what I mean when you watch it!) Although it took me some time to make, I really enjoyed making all the little clips, particularly the animation and stop-motion clips, so expect more of those from me in the future! I'm going to stop wittering on now and let you watch it, so I'm going to sign off here and I will catch you next week, thanks for reading/watching, Rachel x