The Eternal Maker Crafts

Monday 26 November 2007

10 days in a shed in Bath. Wish you were me?

The time is fast approaching to get out my long johns, to wrap up warm and get into the Christmas spirit.
Really? In a SHED??!! Yup. Until this year I have never associated christmas with sheds. It's gonna be cold, but I reckon a lot of fun. Look at it, it looks so pretty! It's mainly the buttons that we are taking, but I'm sneaking in a few other things, like some lovely papers, my amy butler patterns, and other lurvely things. I'm going to try making up some button jewellery to sell made up as well as the kits - haha i think i'm gonna need some fingerless gloves!
So Mum'll be looking after the shop in my absence, go in and say hello to her, she likes company. I dont think she'll know what to do not being able to just wander off and see people. Mum spends her days running from one person who needs her to the next, so maybe during this time they'll have to come to her... she may even find time to encourage her fledgling crafty side. This year has been such a learning curve for me - not just with the shop but finding out all about my mum and her secret sewing skills. Who knows what I'll come back to find? (Hopefully the quilt she is making me for christmas!) Just don't expect any entries in here til I get back. I've told mum how to log on to write in this but nothing has appeared so far. Not that I'm one to talk with my few and far between entries... I looked today on my listing in the Crafty Blogs site. I'm LOW! But it's nice to know that there's at least a couple of people out there..... i think.. unless it's my mum trying to log on.
The best thing for me about this whole 10 days in a shed thing is that some of my best friends live in the bath area, so I get to see loads of them! hurrah!
Anyhow, gotta go and pack.. if you are anywhere near the bath vicinity get yourselves down there, say hello, come and make some button jewellery with me.

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Saturday 17 November 2007

Stamping Caz

Today was a good day at the shop - we had the lovely stamping caz down to do some classes for us using some lovely stampendous stamps. I will show you pics later but they are at the shop and I am at home (yes, I do sometimes make it home..) The classes were both fully booked (a first, hurray!) and I think everyone seemed pretty pleased with themselves at the end. I think we're really lucky to have caz come to the shop as it is a fair distance for her (she fully admits she doesn't do motorways - thank god its all A roads between hers and ours)but she does such beautiful work.. It has inspired me so I think next weeks makings may involve a few cards. It was good to find out that our small workshop area will hold a full papercraft class, too. I'm just a little worried about Mandy Shaw's class on Monday - she has a full house too and it's gonna be sewing christmas stuff using buttons, felt, fabric, all sorts. I want to join in on that one (hell, it's someone else who's crazy enough to try making a living out of button jewellery, I gotta see this!)Oh well. Anyone who is booked in for that class - I suggest a crash diet for tomorrow, monday's gonna be a squeeze!
Hang on a mo, little cat is saying something to me. No, don't worry, she just wants a feed (she's a pig, that one). Ah well, better go do her bidding, she keeps stretching her paws up at me in a way she thinks is cute (well, it is cute, but I'm not going to let her know that).

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Friday 16 November 2007

Some things I have made this week whilst I haven't been writing this blog...

well, obviously my aims of writing more regularly were slightly too high - but I say its pretty good going that its not once every couple of months any more. Give me a couple more months and I'll be doing this daily - just you wait...
Anyway, I've not been idle while not writing, I have been a busy bee. Everything else has dfallen to the wayside, because this week I decided I was going to make stuff. It was sewing this week. For those of you who know me you'll know I really can't sew, but this week I was going to give it a try. thank god I have loads of ladies on hand to give me advice, as I am sure I wouldnt have completed a single project without the help of customers, sales reps, my mum, the postman...
so, this is a makeup/ wash bag (made with the expert advice of jane the moda fabric rep)
I used sticky velcro for the fastener and then sewed it on, it was good to get the positioning right with the sticky, and also it didn't move when i sewed it, brilliant, I'm all for the easy way out...
I also made this cushion with a rose thingy on it - it's made of linen so I had to do double the amount of sewing for fear of the fray. But I like the little fraying it's done, it makes it more messy, like something I would have in my house. hang on, I do have one in my house. or at least I will once I move out of my mum's attic, big cat would ruin it otherwise, with her constant plumping up of the cushions with her claws.

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Monday 12 November 2007

Poppies for Remembrance Day


On saturday we had our own nod to remembrance day, we made silk poppies all day and gave 10% of all our takings on the day to the British Legion. We were all really pleased with the poppies we made with the gorgeous silk ribbon we brought back from america, and it was good to see lots of new people in the shop - including some really cool kids who came in and put us all to shame with their talents! I can't tell you how much was raised in the end because it all went into the sealed British Legion collection pot. If they let me know at any point, I'll pass on the info!

I made a card!


Well, I make lots of cards. But I thought I would post one. I quite liked it. We have these stamps in the shop which I love, stampendous' polka snowman, and I didn't think they were getting the recognition they deserved! I have also - yeah, I guess I'm pretty slow on the uptake - recently started stamping on calico with stazon, and machine sewing my stamps onto paper. I really love the effect of sewing on paper - either fabric to paper or paper to paper, there's so many more options.

Thursday 1 November 2007

Becky The Life Saver

I just wanted to say a seperate THANK YOU to Becky who took over running the shop at the last minute so we could still get to Houston. She took it on having never even visited us before but has done a stirling job at keeping all our customers on the straight and narrow. And the good news is that she is coming back to do Saturdays between now and Christmas!
I love having other people around in the shop, it's so much more fun in the down times when we're quieter. Today in the shop there was me, Becky, Mum, Grandma & our friendly neighbourhood teen, Shanice. A full house! Although there's always room for a few of our beloved customers ; )

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Stash in Suitcases

Aaarrgh i am rubbish at this! I honestly dont know how people can do this everyday - I really wish I could, I totally mean to, but then one thing after another happens and suddenly it is months later and I am sooo behind in updating this. I cant even say I have been working on any cool projects, (the list of things in my head just keeps getting longer) I have just been uploading item after item to our website. But here and now, in the presence of all of you (anybody out there?) I hereby promise to update this blog every day...every other day...ok, at least once a week. Promise. Fingers and toes uncrossed I am not lying I promise.
So, apart from the website I do have a legitimate excuse this week. This week I have been internetless because we (mum, me & the lovely corinne) headed off to houston, texas (yee hah!) to bag me a cowboy. Ahem - sorry - I mean, to learn us some stuff about quilts. and oooh boy did we learn good. I had been warned about the excitement of the quilt market out there, but even so, nothing can quite prepare you for it. And the impact it has on your bank account. We definitely spent a lot of money we didnt have (the shop is still very early days yet and we are still paying off the initial startup costs) but I think we've bought a lot of very cool stuff. And most of it we ALL agreed was lush (if you know us, especially me and mum, you'll know that agreeing on something we like is something not to be taken lightly, when it happens, you know you have to just go for it, to hell with the money!)
So we have some gorgeous fabrics, loads from Japan and Korea (after working there it seems I can sniff them out a mile off and just have to have them) Amy Butler's fabric to go with the patterns (you've all been asking for it so I kinda had to, huh?






I can only find a pic of some ribbon we ordered in the japanese range - we ordered this with fabric to match... aw, it's so kitschy and cute I am gonna be in heaven the day this fabric turns up!



And check these out - perfect for a mix of japanese and Amy Butler fabrics?
These patterns are by Melly & Me and were so fresh and vibrant we all just gravitated towards them. These aussie girls really know how to part a girl with her money! We were sat on the floor of their stand picking out patterns for a fair while, getting totally in the way of everyone else, luckily they didnt seem to mind! Unfortunately we only got there on the last day so we missed out Magoo the Monkey's pattern (have to wait for that one I'm afraid) although we did get most of the others - including mad mozzie (check him out at the back, he's the one with the crazy eyes - ok, the one with the REALLY crazy eyes!)

We also went to classes, overslept for classes, giggled like naughty schoolgirls in classes, nearly fell asleep in classes and learnt some pretty good stuff in classes. On the Saturday 10th Corinne will be in the shop (she hasnt had enough of us yet yay!) showing you all some of what we learnt and some cool new products we brought back. We didn't quite have to pay excess luggage fees (phew!) but let me tell you, on more than one of the cases the weight was exactly on the top of the tip of the scales. And that's a skill worth having. Although i wasnt such a fan of the skill of filling cases to overloading at gatwick where a lovely worker there wrongly told us the bus to the carpark was downstairs when it was on the floor we were on. 5 cases filled with fabric down a large ramp is bad enough - but up???!! Good thing I've been working out and lifting all those boxes of buttons.
So now I have a list of things to make as long as my arm inspired by all I have seen - hopefully in the next couple of weeks I'll have some cool stuff to show you. But I'm sure I've said that before!

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