Yesterday, I had a day away from niblet and hubbie. I spent the day in Manchester looking at lots of lovely things made by other people, very talented people. I went to the 6th Manchester Artists Book Fair. It was my 4th time going, last year was a bit disappointing compared to the previous 2 years but, fear not, normal service has been resumed.
There were many different exhibitors than before and lots of tempting books and papery stuff to buy (I may have bought a few!!).

The fair is now run by Hotbed Press, a fantastic place to do all sorts of printing and paper related courses. I have done 2 bookbinding courses and a letterpress printing course there. All were fabulous and I just wish I had more opportunity to actually use what I have learnt to make stuff myself, but there never seems to be enough hours in the day. This year the Christmas cards I’m sending are the ones I made last December on the letterpress course.

I also visited the Great Northern Contemporary Craft Fair. This was full of lots more lovely handmade things, at generally more exhorbitant prices. I would love to support handmade loveliness but most of the things there that I loved were well out of my budget, or even the budget of most people I know.

The book fair was also a better place for filling my head with wonderful ideas of things to have a go at sometime. Not sure when that time will be, for now they are just dreams.