January’s “favorites” and what an eclectic mix we have here! Family photo albums, rubber stamps and a stand-up show that will leave you raving and wishing for more. In the tradition of monthly favorites, there is a video to accompany this post – right at the bottom of the page.
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Let’s start with stamps, because I’ve had enough of my friends and family with them and need to move on to new victims. I’ll give you two good reasons why stamps (the rubber kind you ink, not the ones you stick on envelopes) should become a part of your life, and the first reason is incredibly healthy. Because you don’t miss the fun little craft projects of your childhood? Remember coloring for hours, or cutting out pieces of paper and gluing them to other pieces of paper and then putting them all over the floor and table and wondering why your mom always looked so… tired? It was crazy stuff exceptional. We loved it and then we grew up and most of us just stopped. No time, no desire to create extra chaos, no real need to create anything.
What if I gave you something marginally clever and artistic to do that didn’t really create a mess and that satisfied the desire to create something nice to look at while requiring minimal effort?
Stamps! They are undeniable! Someone else has done the hard, artistic part. You just have to ink the thing and slap it on paper, Early Man style. Silly, childish escapism and because someone with talent has made the stamp it also makes you look and feel pretty accomplished. Tempted? Good: I’m a stamp influencer now. A stamp.
But wait: I’m not just selling you on the satisfying, highly therapeutic nature of ink printing here. That was only the first reason. What if – the second reason – sealing really could save money? Think of all those notebooks and birthday cards and Funky Pigeon stuff you spend all the time and imagine if you could just open your stamp box (yes, I’ve made one) and print yourself something lovely and charmingly rustic for to send it to the nearest and filtatos; Or the perpetual rotation of your child’s classmates who seem to have about eight birthdays a year? Each?
Grab your Catherine Redgate stamp (special editions that make it look like each card is hand-illustrated, absolute genius) and press it onto a card (recycled paper for extra sanity points) then put the card in a brown envelope and you are away.
You can get custom stamps, great stamps with your company name, stamps to make patterns (I printed my own Christmas wrapping paper after seeing The English Stamp Company do it on Instagram, which is what started the whole thing) and there are dozens of beautiful botanical and animal stamps to personalize your stationery or make greeting cards or whatever you want.
You can find the English Stamp website here – They have given me a code for readers to get 10% off, it is RUTHCRILLY10.
From printing my own cards to… printing my own family photo albums. Granted I don’t do the actual printing, but even selecting the photos and ordering them correctly takes hours and so I claim the praise for these Papier books.
I have used Papier a few times before. I love that their photo albums have a kind of matte finish that looks very sleek and stylish. If you want glossy vibrancy and crazy Comic Sans captions (my mom) then this might be too subdued for you, but I love the Millennial vibes. Possibly because I am So close to being a true Millennial. (Born in 1980. Please keep commenting on this fact to make me feel more relevant and youthful.)
Just be careful when choosing photos for these books – make sure they are well lit. It’s very easy to be fooled into thinking that photos look great because everything looks nice and vibrant on a backlit screen. different story in print. Dim your screen to about 20% and think to yourself: does this image need any extra lift? Are there areas that are just different shades of black? I have to make quite a few changes.
You can get £10 off Papier with the MentionMe link here* – This is just the standard customer you get at checkout, so once you order yourself you’ll get your own code to give to your friends and family. Any little help etc.
Anyway, I’ve been making a photo album for every year since I had my first baby and I’m currently in 2019, so there’s very little to catch up on. I decided to put photos in a special phone album as I go to cut out most of the sorting work. Honestly, it took hours per book! But it was worth it.
Next favorite: totally free and I’m sure you’ll get great value out of it: it’s comedian Jen Brister’s comedy show, The Optimist. I had tickets to see it live last year, but I was sick, so I was very happy when Jen announced that she was putting the TV version online. She is mean. By all means. We highly recommend taking an hour or so out of your evening to sit with this and laugh at her antics. He’s like a very sexy John Cleese when he starts to lose the plot…
Now to the beauty favorites. Some clear winners here – these are things that got me going right away oooh and make a mental note to talk to you about them. First up, the Bio-Active Ceramide Enriched Moisturizer from The Inkey List. An ultra-nourishing, deeply hydrating face cream that manages to be rich yet completely non-greasy and helps restore the skin barrier. (Which most people need these days because they’re using every acid and retinoid on the market, all at once, six and a half days a week. It’s a problem.)
Inkey List don’t do fancy or fancy packaging, but the cream itself is a silky, luxurious feel that costs less than twenty quid. You can’t go wrong with this one. Pour it into a fancy glass container if packaging is what floats your boat!
Inkey List Ceramide Enriched Moisturizer*
Some hair heroes for finishing, which are especially good if you have hair that requires styling (or is the kind of length that looks better undone and relaxed than silky and sleek) and doesn’t do well with heavy, super moisturizing products.
First, Sam McKnight’s Cool Girl Wash and Conditioner (online here*): they properly nourish the hair without weighing it down. If you like to wave or curl your hair and need to keep as much texture and volume as possible, but still want to repair and prevent damage, then this range is just the ticket. The packaging comes in the perfect shade of pink, as a side note. Meaningless to some, but I love the fact that it matches my bathroom tiles the most!
Next, the Arkive Everyday series. The conditioner is slightly – slightly – heavier than Sam McKnight’s, but it still doesn’t weigh hair down and leaves everything soft and light and ready to style. You can find Arkive at Boots here*. It’s sometimes offered in their 3-for-2 deals, so it’s worth getting it when you spot it!
Correctly. I’m going to seal some things. Paper is running out fast, so if you see me walking around with what looks like multiple cat tattoos on my arms, neck and face, don’t fear – I’ll just get myself a different kind of ink.
