Hi, I’m Ella O’Reilly…

I’m the one mum behind Onemum. I’m a doting wife to Brendon, the proud mum of Connor and Lucas, and owner of Mac the Lab. (Or should I say I’m the owner of a husband and a dog…..)

I am now a primary school teacher, but ‘in my past life’ I was a graphic designer (owning Ellamac Solutions in Queenstown) and during my maternity leave, I reignited my love of all things crafty.

Where it all began…. the short story:

It started with a joke book I wrote for Connor, a joke crocheted Christmas present for my brother, and a challenge to go a year with giving only handmade gifts. That turned into two books, a market stall, a website, and so on and here you are!

Where it all began… the long story:

The book
It started with a politically incorrect book that I wrote for Connor. We were given a (child-friendly) book from our Aussie neighbours, which had all of the Australian animals. I told Brendon that he had to read to 3 month old Connor, so he chose this book. “I don’t read books, I won’t be able to read it to him” he tried to pull out the excuse – and then opened page one.

It was a picture of a possum…. and the word “possum”. Well, even Brendon could manage this story.

Page two “dingo”. Page three “emu”… I wont spoil the ending for you.

Anyway, as we kept reading it to Connor, we would make up stories to go along with the pictures. So page one became “Here is a possum. We hate possums because they were introduced into New Zealand and they destroy all the native wildlife, so we like to shoot them”. Brendon much preferred this story, (he’s a hunting man) so as joke, I wrote and illustrated it for him. So “The horrifically politically incorrect book for dad to read to Connor” was born. We only printed two copies of this one, it’s not being published!

However, soon after that, all of the silly songs I would make up and things we would talk about became potential stories. Connor has always been my cheeky little monkey, so sure enough book #2 “Little Monkey” was written. I’m from New Zealand was spurred by a friend moving back to England with her young son. Dads are so Awesome probably needs no explanation…

So that’s me! Thanks for visiting my website, and I hope you find something you like!