my creative space . . . purses and plans

Taking pics of my finished batch of little matryoshka coin purses, made on Monday in an intensive burst of productivity - these little ladies look a little bit grumpy, hehe!

. . . and browsing through a library book I picked up the other day, the colours in this pic look a little similar, sort of summery and sorbet(y!) So this weekend, assuming my hooks arrive in the post I will be learning (or re-learning - I did do some in school many, many years ago!!) the wonderful art of . . .

. . . Yup, crochet! I think seeing these lovely images of crocheting using string got my creative juices going - it just looks very organic - endless design, textural possibilties, I'm looking forward to it :) Wish me luck!

In between I may be making another little batch of something for the craft fairs, which I showed a snapshot of earlier in the week - but I'll see how the day goes and if it will fit in with everything else! A woman's work is never done . . . unfortunately : / !

Crochet pic images courtesy of: Family Circle (Easy Crochet) and Essential Crochet by Erika Knight

P.S. More lovely creative spaces over here - they look so fab this week, I wish I could spend the day reading them all! I'm seeing lots of crochet images in the thumbnail pics - yippee :)

Sneak Preview and a Craftshow

I've been a busy bee over the weekend - scheming, plotting, making - you know the kind of thing! Not particularly in that order, but one thing kinda led to the other . . . (BTW 'Little S'seems to have broken the spacebar on my laptop, so if my words start to jumble together, you'll know why!) The 'making' bit sort of led to the 'scheming/plotting' bit - after a successful attempt at making a new 'tweedie' item on Saturday, I got the idea into my head that if I was going to build up stock, I really needed a bit of an incentive or goal. One thing led to another and before I knew it I was e-mailing to make enquiries about local craft fairs - before I knew it I was booked into a Summer craft fair . . . way over on the other side of the island!

Well the 'plotting' bit was really about haggling with my 'Other Half' to get him to agree to drive me to and fro on the day - I must admit I did make a VERY nice fish/seafood pie for the dinner -it's all 'give and take' isn't it, hehe! The craft fair is in about 7 weeks time which should just about give me time to build up enough stock for a stall. Well at least I'll get to use my 'tweedie' banner I made last year - would be a shame to have it unused all year :) Who knows if it will be a successful fair - but it will get me started again and maybe lead to one or more later in the year. Getting back to the 'brass tacks' of displaying (or even 'selling' if I'm REALLY lucky!) at a craft fair event is quite appealing at the moment. Just straightforward making stuff and letting folks see them up close, and maybe having a chat about crafting - sounds quite pleasant. It will also be quite terrifying as I haven't done one for almost a year - yikes!!

Above and below pics show a sneaky preview of some stuff I've been playing around with over the weekend. I must say that LOTS of enjoyment was had in making both items - I'm all fired up to make more, I hope the boys enjoyed that fish pie - it might be a happy, distant memory for some weeks - it'll be Pot Noodles and egg 'n chips while I'm doing all that stock-building . . . if they're lucky!!

Happy Monday :)

my creative space - finally!

Finally getting the felt blobs sewn onto 'Little S's' pencil case - well ONE anyway! Maybe I'll do some more after tea :)

And a little pile of pencil cases made their way into my Big Cartel store this morning - at last, a little more productivity! And with 'Big S's' exams out of the way now, I can just let rip and go sewing crazy - well, perhaps just a little bit :)

I would really like to get a little pile of physical stock into my store at the moment - it seems an easier way for me to proceed given my limited workspace. Perhaps a couple of 'made to order' items will make an appearance, but I will be keeping them to a minimum, and just getting on with the job of making, making, making!

More creative peeps over here :)

Moral Dilemma

I'm in the throws of a moral dilemma today - well, not really - that's a bit of an overstatement. I just can't really decide what to do, or more precisely what to prioritise - sounds familiar???

Remember 'Little S' was going to get a handmade pencil case, with the skull fabric lining - well I dutifully fulfilled this task. Here it is in all its glory, I really like the emerald green tweed against the skull print fabric - I was quite pleased with it!

However, he wanted to customise it - well who am I to curtail my child's artistic leanings??! He described how he wanted to add different shapes of felt to the front of the pencil case, like so:

This really made me laugh, because basically he wanted to turn the new pencil case into an 'upmarket' version of his old camouflage pencil case, which is pictured above. Aren't kids funny! Now I have to handsew the felt pieces on - which is fine, but . . .

. . . I'd really like to contine making more pencil cases, here's a sneaky preview of some I made yesterday (I told you I'd get to use that cute puppy dog fabric!) and . . .

. . . I'd love to get started on making some more of them, which I've already cut out, ironed and added interfacing - all ready for the sewing machine.

So should I: (a) finish off 'Little S's' pencil case or (b) get stuck into sewing up some more for my shop or (c) and I really don't like this option!!! - do all the housework I didn't do yesterday because I was making new pencil cases!!!!

Answers on a postcard please, hehe :)

We had a great weekend at a local music festival this weekend (Sounds in the Grounds). I had a stall there last year but alas did not have stock to do one this year and as it happened the weather was so awful there was very little in the way of any craft stalls this year. It was a fab event however - lots of mud, great music, and I thoroughly enjoyed it :)

Off to muse over my 'moral dilemma', and probably end up doing none of the above - never mind! By the way, I've been working on setting up my Big Cartel shop and must say I have found the Support Team to be very helpful with a couple of queries I had, so things are looking good - just got to get the stock in there!!!

Bye for now :)

my creative space - fabric fun

Earlier this week I was working on a lovely commission for a 'tweedie' pencil case. I really enjoyed choosing the inner lining fabric (as I always do!) and after finishing the pencil case thought it would be nice to to make one for 'Little S' for school. He was delighted by the idea and I suggested that I had some cute 'puppy dog' fabric that would look good as a lining - he looked at me in disgust, "No way, I want fabric with skulls on it!", he exclaimed. Well, that was me told - I obviously momentarily forgot that he is leaving childhood 'puppydogs' and 'cute kitties' behind - what a shame :(

Anyway, we got to work and scoured Etsy for the appropriate fabric (with skulls on!) and came across some fabulous selections. In the pic from left to right: linen newsprint fabric used for the inner lining of my pencil case commission - thanks Ruth!, the 'offending' cute puppy dog fabric which will definitely get used for a pencil case inner because I love it!, and finally tada!, the skull fabric from Etsy which arrived in the post from Taiwan yesterday - he loves it! He has some very definite ideas on how this pencil case should look - I hope to have something to show you next week. In the meantime I'm itching to make some more cases with my fabric stash, for sale online. Off to drool over some lovely yummy prints!

More creative spaces here.

The Finished Gift

A whole week without blogging - but I'm afraid that's just the pace of life at the moment! It's not that I've been slacking, honest! I finally got round to getting a little gift together for the kind work colleague who donated me a lovely big piece of yummy Harris Tweed. I'd had some PVC lining fabric in for quite a while with a view to having a go at making 'tweedie' washbags, so that seemed the perfect gift as I think this lady has a a lovely holiday to the Big Apple planned later in the year - Ooooh, lucky her!!

Here's how it turned out (please excluse my fat, sunburnt arms - I told you we'd been having some lovely weather here recently!) . . .

I chose this tweed as the one she had given me was quite a dark one which I loved but I think she would have found too dark for her own personal taste. I think the peacock blue PVC lining looked really nice against the pale pink of the tweed. I jammed it up with some nice 'smellies' (that's 'toiletries!) and it seemed to take quite a good amount of products. Here's some pics of it before I packed it up, with just a few random items of my own to show the size. It was a really nice project to do and I'm looking forward to making some for sale hopefully!

As previously mentioned the current plan of action as regards selling my products is to start stocking up my Big Cartel site, but rather than abandon my Etsy shop I think it might be nice to keep it ticking over with a range of simple items eg. fabric covered buttons, or something similar - I enjoy the site too much to walk away from it and use it so much for purchasing supplies, etc.

My 'old' website www.tweeddelights.co.uk will be disappearing this week - out with the old and in with the new, or something like that!!! I'm looking forward to making some 'fresh' creations and having them up for sale on 'Big Cartel' - international shipping on all items of course!

Later 'tweedie' Gaters :)

Lost a Week!!??

Please don't ask me what happened to last week, because I have no idea where it went. If you've seen it, please get in touch with details of its' whereabouts!! I think the glorious weather we've been having here may have a lot to answer for - we've been engaging in lots of lovely summer activities such as visiting the beach, pitching tents (in the garden!), cycling (to the beach again!) . . . . and so on, and so forth! It probably won't last much longer and may be the only sunny weather we'll get, so I have no regrets about making the most of it!

Lots of signs of the Summer as I go on my walks out to the moor, which is fortunately on our doorstep; cuckoo flowers (Lady's Smocks is another name) coming in to bloom, to coincide with the arrival of the cuckoo . . .

The wild geese have been around for a while and seem to be a permanent feature of our landscape in the Hebrides these days . . .

I'm not always so keen on how these big birds circle around my head as I make my way out the moor track, they fly so low sometimes that you can hear the sound of their massive wings flapping - fascinating, if a little disconcerting! Lots of other birdlife too, but alas I'm not an expert in identifying them all.

Sunday (yesterday) brought a little lull in the good weather, so I rummaged my sewing basket and embroidered some fabric covered buttons - I thought the herringbone tweed would look good with some pastel coloured threads. It was very pleasant to do some relaxing crafting and browse through my new copy of Selvedge.

As for commerical crafting, I'm currently hoping to use my 'Big Cartel' website to post any new items as I make them (sorry Etsy!) - possibly a mix of commercial items and some more crafty/signature pieces. That's probably after I see 'teenage son' through his first big exams (Standard Grades in Scotland) - we're halfway there and I'll be breathing a big sigh of relief when they're done - he seems remarkably laid back about it all!

Bye for Now :)