It was our Pop-Up Christmas Tea Party at the BUST Magazine Christmas Craftacular a few days ago and my-oh-my what a full on festive time was had by all! Our cute troupe of waitresses for the day were Patricia, Caity, Ailsa, Claire and Laura.

The Craftacular lived up to its legendary reputation as *the* busiest craft fair we've ever seen as hundreds of excited shoppers streamed through the doors at midday. The empty seats in our tea shoppe were filled in an instant and our first 50 customers popped their complimentary crackers and tucked into our new menu of homemade festive fancies.

The menu included our two Tea Shoppe favourites vanilla cupcakes with vanilla buttercream or chocolate frosting and a victoria sandwich (this time baked in a cute heart shape). Our Christmas Specials included red velvet cupcakes with cream cheese frosting, ginger cupcakes with ginger buttercream, yule logs, star mince pies and gingerbread cookies. We also introduced - Dip'n'Sip, a hot chocolate served with pink and white cocktail marshmallows! Yum!

Everything was served up on a beautiful array of vintage crockery but unfortunately we had our first ever breakage! In fact we're now 3 teacups and a tea plate down, oops.

We dedicated one of our tables to decorating your own gingerbread! I baked about 200 cookies using my friend Jeanne's secret recipe (which took over 2 years and numerous cocktails to prise out of her) and shaped them with my friend Kali's vintage collection of cookie cutters.

We were delighted to find the Broken Hearts DJ-ing in their too-cute-for-words matching outfits, telephone receiver "headphones" and a vintage festive playlist to die for. I only wish their set lasted the whole day!

Each tasty treat was topped off with a rockin' robin drawn by Lady Luck's Leah Stewart. Tweet, tweet.

I won't tell a lie and tell you all it was plain sailing... with only an hour and a half to set up an entire tea shoppe we were kinda higgledy-piggledy at the start and then we had pesky urn troubles, eek. But after this we settled into the swing of it and we all worked our lil' socks off for our delightful customers. We hope everyone enjoyed it as much as we did! Merry Christmas! x

The legendary BUST Magazine Craftacular is coming back to ole London Town and promises a real cracker of a festive shopping knees up! From knitwear and jewellery to home décor and stationery, the BUST Craftacular is the one-stop shop for the very best in handmade gifts and wares. Yearly, BUST goes above and beyond and turns out a great party including drinks, tasty treats, goodie bags and featuring the best DJ’s to keep shoppers’ dancing.

Launched in NYC in 2004, the BUST Craftacular has grown exponentially since its inception. More than just a shopping event, the BUST Craftacular is a fun, don’t-miss, all-day party, featuring musical performances, crafting classes and demonstrations, a raffle, product giveaways, food and drinks!

Lady Luck Rules OK will be there with bells on...visit our sales table which will be bursting full of our best selling jewellery where every purchase will come with a lil' festive freebie! Then come and snuggle into our Pop-Up Christmas Party with a pot of tea, a tasty festive treat including homemade mince pies, gingerbreadmen and snowy snacks and delve into the stocking filler lucky dip for free! Phewee.

After our first Pop-Up Tea Shoppe I wasn't sure I'd do another because the first was so so stressful - selling out of cakes by 1 o'clock, only having 2 hours to style 5 waitresses and the logistics of the venue. After a few days off and lots of looking through the photos I wasn't sure how I could NOT do it again? One thing was for sure, I wanted to wait for the right event which meant in the months between turning down a few offers until we heard news that the BUST Craftacular was coming back to London town! Early morning coffee meetings, venue measure ups and a little negotiating later and everything was in place for the second coming of the Pop-Up Tea Shoppe. Eek!

It had been 3 months since the first tea shoppe and I had pretty much been baking on a weekly basis perfecting recipes and seeking out new ones! Each Friday I bring baked delights into the studio to gain essential feedback for all the gals. My red velvet cake with creamy vanilla frosting was such a bit hit I definitely wanted to add that to the menu - and as sure as eggs is eggs it was the first thing to sell out on the day! I also set out a two day baking schedule which meant I nearly tripled my output, it did require 5am starts and midnight finishes but hey, ho, in for a penny...

Our new menu of traditional home-baked fancies included: carrot and cinnamon cupcakes with cream cheese frosting (and I remembered to refrigerate the frosting for 2 hours before piping this time!), banana and chocolate cupcakes, HUNDREDS of vanilla cupcakes with vanilla frosting (dyed in different candy colours), victoria sandwiches, lemon and poppyseed drizzle cakes, giant chocolate cookies, the mega popular red velvet cake and a super summer special...

Another worry on my mind was the event being held in the middle of summer - would people really want to drink tea and eat cake? (well, we all know the answer to that now!) So I wanted to present a summer special to woo in the customers and after hours of trawling baking blogs I came across Ice-Cream Cupcakes! Oh yes! The batter is baked INSIDE the cone and then frosted on top with sprinkles and a flake topper so it actually looks like an ice-cream. I remember the first time I brought them into the studio our intern Ashleigh nearly fell off her chair with excitement.

The next thing I wanted to change was to make our wonderful waitresses look well more waitress like. The aprons made for the first tea shoppe were amazing but the clothing underneath was a bit off kilter. So I decided to match them all in simple black shift dresses and design a bunch of name brooches. I also had a good excuse to watch many a film noir movie in the name of research - hairstyle and make up ideas for Tomoko and waitress outfit ideas!

I was happy with all the crockery and it was a real joy to see it all again when we laid out the tables on the day. On a sad note my 1930s teapot had cracked leaving an incomplete set (sniff) but my fave table is most certainly the 1950s table - it has a full Midwinter "Quite Contrary" tea set in the fashion shape. When Roy Midwinter designed it in the fifties inspired by America and bored of post war Britain he created a sensation. I love it! During a last minute trip to Columbia Road flower market the Sunday before we picked up little pots of red roses to use as centre pieces for the tables (and then as gifts for the waitresses at the end of the day).

On the day itself I was up at 5am to finish the frosting and I was a little ahead of schedule so decided to bake another cake (I think I'd lost the plot a little by that point!). Leah was looking after getting all the waitresses ready at Superette and we went to the venue to get the tea shoppe ready. All in all the day went without a single hiccup and this time the cakes lasted til 5pm - not bad eh? I want to say a MASSIVE thank you to everyone who helped out! Our super ace waitresses: 1930s Ailsa, 1940s Emma, 1950s Caity, 1960s Hannah and 1970s Emma. A big shout out to Tea Shoppe host Leah (who has been mentioned in several blog posts and comments about the Craftacular!). Our trusty kitchen helpers Mary, Dave and Tanya. Our cake counter lovely Esther. Sam THE Man. And of course all our SUPER ACE customers - we love you!

Will I do another Pop-Up Tea Shoppe....? Plans are already taking shape...xxx

There are more photos on our Flickr page check 'em out here!

Our latest Pop-Up Tea Shoppe at BUST magazine's Summer Craftacular was so super fun and so super busy we've decided to write a couple of blog entries so we can include all the juicy behind the scenes stories and ace photos! This first part is written by Lady Luck intern Ailsa who was also our super stylish 1930s waitress for the day.

When Leona asked if I’d be a waitress in the second ever Pop-Up Tea Shoppe I was really excited especially after seeing how amazing the girls looked last time. Being an intern, I was already helping with the planning but getting to play such a big part in the actual day sounded like loads of fun! The days before the Tea Shoppe became a mad rush to get everything perfect in time. Luckily, we all knew what we had to do and all the plans started coming together very nicely, including a Tea Shoppe Tombola with loads of lovely prizes that I very nearly stole for myself while sticking all the tickets on…

Lots and lots of bubble wrap was involved as I got all our crockery ready to make the journey down Bethnal Green Road to the venue. At the last moment we decided it would be a good idea to get some more 1940’s crockery so after some hunting by Leona, on Thursday I picked up the perfect teapot and cutest itty bitty cups from a stall in Spitalfields market. A trip to Party, Party in Dalston to pick up 15kg of icing sugar and drag it back to Superette in a broken suitcase on possibly the hottest day of the year (don’t ask!) and a mad hunt for blue food colouring round the Sainsburys’ of East London on Friday morning were also part of our final Tea Shoppe preparations but leaving work on Friday we were sure everything was in place for the day to go perfectly!

I arrived at Superette bright, early and makeup-less the next morning and pretty soon we had all five waitresses- even 1960's Hannah who went home to change her white tights into black ones (part of our matching outfits) but decided to keep her yellow shoes on (really not part of the matching outfits). There were a few minor hiccups along the way including 1970's Emma’s makeup having to be re-done because Tomoko wasn’t happy! By 11am however, we had three waitresses looking really good!

I was starting to get a little worried though, I still didn’t have any makeup on, my hair wasn’t finished and the car was coming for us in 20 minutes! As Leah and the three finished waitresses locked up the studio, Hannah’s eyelashes were still mid-application and my make-up was no way near done. Tomoko kept her cool though and we all bundled out of the studio… Leah had a moment of extreme panic when our car turned up and could only sit 6 people, when we had asked (AND confirmed) for a 7 seater. Luckily we had a nice taxi driver, who after a little persuasion (ok, a lot of begging) squished us all in and let us take part in a shoe drive-by on Bethnal Green Road. Hannah’s flatmate waited by the side of the road with black shoes for her and we pulled over so the shoes could be passed through the window! A very good time saving idea!

We arrived at York Hall to an already massive queue of anxious looking craft shoppers waiting outside, we were rushed inside to meet Leona and have the final touches made to our styles. After a two-minute briefing and a few photos for the blog, The Pop-Up Tea Shoppe was open just moments before hundreds of excited customers rushed into the hall.

The Tea Shoppe got busy very, very quickly (possibly because all the cakes looked so delicious) but Leah kept everyone queuing in an orderly fashion making our job a whole lot easier! We rushed around taking orders, collecting and returning crockery to the kitchen. All the customers were lots of fun and were getting into the Tea Shoppe spirit.

The day went so quickly and we were extremely busy. By 5pm we were sold out of cakes but still served tea and played tombola with lots of happy customers, until we also ran out of teabags and had to close (a very successful) Tea Shoppe! Amazingly nothing was broken - I was so worried I was going to break something very pretty and irreplaceable.

Well done to everyone who took part in the day, I think we all worked really hard and I hope everyone had as much fun during their Tea Shoppe experience as we did, I’m looking forward to the next one already...

Come and join Lady Luck Rules OK and our Pop-Up Tea Shoppe at the BUST magazine summer Craftacular. The Craftacular is a shopping bonanza running from 12pm until 8pm at York Hall in Bethnal Green, London, featuring crafters, DJs, drinks, cakes and dancing. Shoppers can browse through hundreds of the best in handmade gifts and essential summer accessories, from handbags and ornaments to jewellery, clothing and cards.

Shoppers can take a break at the much anticipated second coming of the Pop-Up Tea Shoppe hosted by Lady Luck Rules OK! The exhibition style tea party features tables dressed up from different eras with waitresses styled in the fashions from each decade. A delicious menu of traditional home baked fancies and organic fairtrade tea will be served up on authentic tableware from each era. Summertime specials will include ice cream cupcakes and homemade lemonade!

The event is sure to be a Craftstravaganza with a super selection of bespoke activities and workshops for shoppers to take part in. We'll keep you up to date as this info comes in! Plus the V&A Museum of Childhood (which is a hop 'n' skip from York Hall) will be showing a craft themed exhibition entitled Make Do and Mend! What a great day out!

Our fave oversea's gal mag BUST came to town last weekend and hosted one of their infamous all-day-and-all-night Christmas Craftaculars! It was held in the homely and nostalgic St Aloysius Hall in Euston - the very place Sam and I met over 6 years ago. Word filtered through that there was a huge queue of excited Christmas shoppers forming outside and after a hiccup with the floor plan we had only 20 minutes to get our stalls up and ready for business!

All the vendors scurried to their tables and got to work in double quick time with crafty monsters springing out of suitcases and a huge Christmas tree was decorated with yarn. Pamflet zine's Phoebe Fangoul hopped onto the decks and started playing a host of vintage Christmas tunes to get us in the mood. Then that was it Vikki from BUST called out she was opening the doors and in came a tidal wave of Christmas shoppers and boy were they ready to shop! Yippee!

We were making our personalised necklaces at our stand including the Russian Doll, Goth Doll, all the Tattoo Parlour designs and our festive special the Rockin' Horse. We also took along our new collection of Jewel-POP necklaces and some little stocking fillers from Superette.

It was really lovely to see so many other ace vendors! Our friend Kandy Diamond (pictured above) had traveled down with her stash of super fun handmade knits. I love the knitted paperchain decorations!

We were also delighted to find Amy Lamé there with her Pom Pom International stand.

The music throughout the day and night was amazing! Pictured above is one of the Shellac Sisters who DJ 1920s vinyl from gramophones and all whilst knitting. How bloody cute is that!? To end the evening were my favourite trio of ladies the Vinyl Vendettas (pictured below) ladies you rock!

We really hope BUST come to town again next year so we can do it all over again. I've popped some more photos on Flickr, check 'em out click here!

Come and visit the Lady Luck Rules OK booth at BUST Magazine's first ever London based Christmas Craftacular! The shopping bonanza will run from 12 noon until 11pm at the super St. Aloysius Social Hall featuring crafters, classes, DJs, drinks and dancing. Shoppers may down pint as they learn to cross-stitch and work through their Christmas shopping list as they browse through hundreds of the best in handmade gifts and winter wares, from handbags and ornaments to jewellery and cards.

New York based BUST Magazine have hand picked over 25 of the most unique and talented designers and crafters from across the UK to attend. We’re thrilled to be invited and will be offering a while-u-wait service from our ‘Personalise It!’ collection. You’ll be able to choose designs from our Tattoo Parlour, Russian and Goth Dolls, Rosettes and our festive special Rockin’ Horse!

The first 100 visitors will receive goodie bags packed with crafty giveaways, and every attendee will have a chance to win an enormous BUST Craftacular gift basket.

Entrance fee will only be £2 and you can stay for up to 12 hours...bargain!