Starting afresh . . . :)

A bit of a time-lapse on my blog since the beginning of the month. But so much happening!

After months of continual crafting, knitting, crocheting, I realised I'd forgotten to stop creating even although I was no longer operating as a crafts business (having closed down last year for various reasons - too long a story!).  Well, I thought, it seems if you're going to carry on regardless - you might as well see if anyone wants to buy any of this stuff!  So after my hiatus I finally came to the conclusion that a new start was inevitable.  A bit of a scary decision but one I'm glad I've made.  

I have now started a new crafting venture called 'Handmade on the Croft'.  This venture will have more of a focus on handmade crafts with a strong emphasis on traditional crafts such as knitting, crochet, embroidery, intermingled with creative textile crafts (Yes, my beloved Harris Tweed will still feature!).  It's really just a gentle transition from my love of creating handmade textile crafts in home to selling online and possibly to retail outlets.  

I've opened a Big Cartel Shop entitled Handmade on the Croft (just click on the image of the sheep in  my sidebar) and an Etsy shop called Yarns on the Croft where I plan to sell more of my 'yarny' type creations eg. knitting, crochet, etc.but I'm sure I'll sneak in some creative textile stuff there too :)

I'm now ready to go (after confronting the perils of setting up my Paypal checkout for both shops - oooops that was a bit scary!).  Enough of the business, blah, blah, blah - I'm up and running again.

Here's a detail of one of my tweedie collages in my Big Cartel shop (items are still to be made available but will be in the next few days, once I get my postal rates finalised - ah, the finer details!) . . . 

That's all the biz news - the personal crafty stuff in general is still going on.  Here's my very satisfying pile of crochet squares beside my sewing machine . . .

. . ., and beside this some lovely Malabrigo sock yarn which was going to be my background project (ie. a lace shawl for me!) before the 'grannying' took over.  I'll have to reserve this for later on in the year I think . . .

. . . It is lovely though and I have such a gorgeous pattern waiting in the wings for making this into a shawl.

And today, at the last count I have 34 granny squares - ie. almost 4 rows (I have to make 10 rows to complete the cover) . . .

Great fun and a real challenge to make every square different - so far so good :)

Well, that's my update - back to crafting online.  A bit of a vintage vibe going on in my shop I think you'll agree - my collection of lace doilies has been well and truly utilised :)  I had a lovely time designing these items though.  More on them later, once they've been made available to purchase.  My Etsy shop is empty at the moment until I get some yarny goodness in there - we'll get there though!

Thank goodness it's the end of school term - I have the whole of the Summer hols to get to grips with crafty biz again - hurray! :)

Speak soon,

Alison x

P.S.  Sorry for such a blurby, text-laden post - we're over it! - back to shorter crafty posts and the odd shop update here and there :)  Thankyou for following this em, rather bumpy, unpredictble crafty journey of mine - well, it never gets boring, hehe :) :)