Little Lucy Willow

  It’s all over folks. The last lazy day has drawn to a close and we are now being dragged, kicking and screaming, into the autumn term.   I hope the rain didn’t stop you from enjoying yourselves over the holidays. It certainly didn’t stop me. But as a result of all those wet afternoons I am about to launch into the mother of all clean up operations.   That’s not to say I haven’t been keeping on top of the mess. On the contrary. I have happily tidied up at the end of each day and cheerily wiped the paint off the floor. I have gleefully unblocked the sink of chalk sticks and..

At this time of year, you will often find me in reflective mood. In a few days time I will drive away from school on the first day of term, with the rain lashing down onto the windscreen no doubt, thinking about endings and beginnings.   The summer is ending and the new term will begin. I will reminisce about our recent happy holiday and wish we were still there, on the beach. As a mother, there is nothing more heartwarming than seeing your children having fun. Laughing, running, playing and exploring as mine did on our Scottish retreat. I think, I hope, they had the carefree summer I re..

You can buy a bed on the high street for a little less than we charge at Little Lucy Willow, but will that bed be up to scratch? It might look similar but will it ooze quality, be hard-wearing, prove durable and strong? Will it be a real piece of craftsmanship that you will delight in for decades to come?   Ask yourself:   How long will a high street bed last?   We can’t possibly answer that but we do know that a Little Lucy Willow bed is made from far superior materials to imported goods. All our timbers are hand selected twice, once by the pickers and again by t..

Over the past few weeks I have been particularly irked by the amount of people pre-empting the end of summer. “I can’t believe the holidays are almost over, where has the time gone?” they all cry. Despite my dislike of such conversations and wild attempts at dodging them, I sheepishly admit that I have had to agree during the few times I have been cornered.   The sad fact is that as an adult, everything whizzes by at 100 miles per hour. Probably because we wish most of it away. But in a child’s eyes, time is irrelevant. Children get up and do what they have to do, when they are to..

Summer presents a great opportunity for us to revel in our many British traditions. To me, it means strawberries and cream, Wimbledon, The Proms and erm, cheese rolling amongst other interesting eccentricities.   We love and delight in them all. Homegrown and timeless, ever present and never ending. They existed when we were children and will continue when we're long gone. Rather like a Little Lucy Willow bed in fact...     Hand made to order in the UK, our children's beds are everything you would expect and probably much more. That's why our furniture bucks the trend. Some ..

After visiting relatives this weekend we endured a nightmare journey home, taking no less than 14 hours...We arrived at our front door shortly before midnight on Sunday. No roast dinner for us, only snacks in the car. No watching ‘Fake or Fortune’ with a glass of red whilst admiring Fiona Bruce and her increasingly futuristic wardrobe. ‘A’ roads and crazy diversions saw to that. It was a very, very, VERY long day. The children were bored to the point of playing ‘I spy’ on the motorway for the 159th time, which, when you’ve done cars, roads and central reservation (they did learn something I su..

  If you’re anything like me, most of the summer holidays are spent turning a blind eye to the whirlwind going on around you. Children whizzing in and out, along with all manner of grass and muddy footprints no doubt. It’s a killer for a neat freak like me but I have trained myself to let it go...counting one, two, three...3,963 etc.   But once you’ve jetted back from your hols, exhausted Netflix and found yourself on first name terms with all the animals at the zoo - and there’s STILL three weeks to go before the start of term - you might just decide to throw in the towel and declare..

It is always the same isn't it? Glorious sunshine in June, then as soon as the children finish school it’s rain, rain and more rain.   So what do we do when the weather is just not on our side?   I have exhausted all ideas of craft already, having given over my dining table to paints, glitter, glue, pom poms and last year’s Christmas cards. It was a great success, for one afternoon…   We have baked a mountain of cakes, which despite not looking quite like the picture in the book, at least tasted nice…   I have cleaned the house a thousand times and managed one day with..

  When I started out in business, children’s beds didn’t really figure in my plan. In those days it was all about French-style furniture for the home. From elegant chaise longues to carved and mirrored armoires, I had romance, opulence and luxury in mind. I was a new mum at the time so you might think that babies were all I could manage to think about. However, it seems I must have been craving something far, far removed from the piles of nappies, cuddly toys and general alien paraphernalia that had invaded my home!   To satisfy my wants, I did invest in a beautiful linen upholste..

It’s the little things that let us know when our children are growing up. The way they will happily give a once-worshipped toy to the tombola stall at the school fair. They way they might close their bedroom door and demand to be left alone - or else. And the way they suddenly produce a protective arm whenever little ones are around. A welcome but eerie change from all that relentless tormenting!   They may also decide to get rid of all those cuddly toys and hint at an upgrade to their bedroom accessories. Now that particular day is a very sad one indeed, but you must sigh and accept ..