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New Baby Keepsake Gift

Laser cut Millie wooden baby keepsake heart shaped gift woodcut by LaserSister (Kay Vincent)

This is the latest piece I’ve been commissioned to make – a ‘new baby’ keepsake gift. It’s a laser-cut wooden heart with the baby’s name and date of birth, and I’ve also spelled out the baby’s name in the little wooden blocks. The customer who commissioned it requested “NO STORKS!”, so I’ve created a stork-free design:

(No idea why there are fuzzy bits in the image. Maybe I need to clean the phone’s camera lenses. Anyway, you get the idea.)

I tried to incorporate lots of baby-themed elements but without being too sickly sweet. See how many you can spot! (Did I miss any traditional baby-related themes? You can use the comments section below to let me know what I should add next time.)

(And is it just me, or does that dummy look like it’s got eyes and a smiling mouth?!)

I like the filigree-type feel of this design. It feels a bit more special and delicate than just etching a design or message onto a solid sheet of wood.

I think it also has elements in common with some of my other work, like the wedding heart woodcut

That wedding heart is now on my TikTok shop, but I still need to upload the new baby keepsake gift woodcut to the TT shop.

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Author Nation Day 1-ish

As mentioned yesterday, I am currently (03 November 2025) at the Author Nation conference in Las Vegas.

Today was a bit of a run-up to the actual event, so that provided a great chance to ease into it. I registered then snagged a pen, notebook, and a lovely blueberry muffin:

Then in the evening there was a drinks reception (no photos available, to protect the innocent).

During the day I also had my author headshot taken, so I’m looking forward to seeing the result when they email the photo later…

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Author Nation 2025

Author Nation 2025

I’m in Las Vegas this week, for the Author Nation conference (which evolved from the ’20 Books to 50k’ conferences). This is from their ‘About Us’ page:

We believe successful authors are built, not born. Our mission is to empower writers to thrive in the golden age of content creation by fostering connections with industry experts, peers, and readers.

That fits exactly with what I need: to continue to build my business (both the writing and the craft sides of it), and to learn more about:

  • building my business brand
  • creating great products
  • advertising the great products
  • selling the products through various outlets

The conference hasn’t even started yet, but I know it’s going to be incredibly useful for me as an ‘indie creative’. Although my writing has had to take a back seat to many other life-y things over the last few years, I realised the other day that I’m actually a ‘five-figure creative’ already. (Thanks, Amazon Handmade!) I’m hoping that Author Nation 2025 will boost my knowledge and motivation so much that I’ll continue to creep toward 6-figure status.

In the meantime I’ve been for a swim in the pool at the bottom of the Eiffel Tower!