The (bad) church cake

Once at church, it was the ministers wife’s 50thbirthday, I was asked to make a cake (obvs not the one in the pic) it was chocolate covered in sugar roses and very pretty (it took a while)
Somehow, people then assumed that cake making was my thing – I made a couple of cakes for a friend for a nominal fee and she collected them when we were at church (including the one in the pic )
Anyway. The other week I got cornered and talked into making two cakes I didn’t really want to make, a thank you cake and a birthday cake- thank you cake was ok, birthday cake was picked up this morning and I think the lady was very disappointed – she asked me for a white buttercream outside with happy birthday written on it – which is exactly what I did, I think she just expected a lot more……

So I feel a bit bad, I know the cake will taste good the decoration, sh probably just expected it to be spectacular

The (nearly finished) scirocco dress

This is a dress for my daughter awaiting a once over to cut/tie off loose threads and hand stitch the lining edge over the skirt edge – I’m so pleased with it!

It’s a figgys pattern which was set at intermediate level, the instructions are clear and the result lovely!
The only problem I had was I chose to leave out the skirt lining so when it came to make a channel for the elastic at the back it was a bit of a faff – the channel a little bit slim to pass a safety pin down and I ended up wrestling with it for an hour

It has a pretty, twisted back panel and figgys allow you to sell the dresses you make from their patterns so look out for similar type things in my etsy shop soon! This one is for my daughter though

That’s the link above of her wearing it, if you fancy a look!

It’s been a while….

So, I haven’t really been on the blog for a while, I’ve been pretty busy….

 

i started back working as a surgical staff nurse which I’m enjoying – I surprised myself a bit actually!

and then I got a horrible message on etsy, it was from a lady who had messages me over a number of months regarding a coat, actually a girls coat, but could I take the lace out – no problem I said. Several months later, she bought the coat and she didn’t like it – so much so that she sent a 12 point list of all the things she felt were wrong and didn’t like, I was gutted and it made me wonder if my things were worth even selling anymore – I thought my sewing was pretty good

anyway, I’m over it now, you can’t please everybody but it did knock my confidence

but I’ve been accepted for the highland textile fair so I’m totally delighted 🙂 lots of tweed booties, floral baby coats and other goodies hooray!

It’s been a while….

It’s been a while since I wrote anything on here, Christmas came and went and was pretty busy – I didn’t really have time, I started a new job, I’ve been on a few nights out with friends – including last night where we met some lovely chaps from New Zealand.
Anyway, then I got caught up in making a wee top for myself and starting my New Years resolution to get fit – doing jillian michaels brutal exercise DVD – couldn’t walk for days!
I’ve also had several custom etsy orders this month and the stress of one as yet not arriving in the USA after 3 weeks -if anyone has any helpful information on this that would be good, the lady in question is demanding a refund – she got a polite but firm message asking her to wait the 6 weeks recommended by Royal Mail but I hope it arrives, could do without refunding her

Yeah, so, that’s it, my upcoming plans include making a dress for my friends wedding (yay!) and making a load of stuff for etsy and also (hopefully) the highland textile fair

Listening to: puddle of mudd ‘blurry’

Cooking: post night out bacon rolls plus chocolate (obvs not together!)

Mutiny

So, after my last (and final, this year) craft fair, I’ve decided to part company with the people who organise it, the fees are high, we also pay membership fees. Anyway, the ladywho runs it (exclusively highlands) runs it on the idea being people can only live in the Scottish highlands and the crafts are of high quality – you have to be vetted first. Tables cost lots and are in lovely venues, the lady who runs it is downright rude – I got not even a hello the entire weekend, then, me and a number of other people were shoved into the back corridor of the venue to make way for a large company from Cheshire (in England) selling ill finished clothing.
This was the final straw for many people and the rumblings of discontent have turned into a mutiny with many people now leaving and one of the other craft stall holders collecting everyone’s email addresses to start our own group – interesting times ahead!
Also, I’ve applied to do the textile fair this year which I’m quite excited about and the organiser has a brilliant reputation, so we shall see, one things for sure, I’m done with expensive craft fairs – I’m going to stick to the 20quid a table type!

Craft fair mark 2

Craft fair number 2 happened last week, it was a whole weekend in our local theatre. The company who organise it are quite posh and therefore attract a certain customer (mostly middle class, a reasonable amount of money, 30 upwards) . Anyway, there was a lot of interest in my stall but Saturday passed with lots of interest but very little cash in my pocket. Sunday was a vast improvement and I sold a lot – including a large quilt (hooray!) so a very successful weekend in the end.
Now I’m preparing for the next craft fair – it seems the only downside to selling lots is having to make lots more in a short space of time!

Robert Kaufman lawn

Lately I’ve been pretty busy and not with sewing related stuff, the kids and my husband caught a sicky bug all pretty much at the same time so it ended up being pretty much 10 days of washing and cleaning. So now everyone is better, I’ve been frantically being trying to make new bits for the upcoming craft fair on the 16th, I got this gorgeous Robert Kaufman cotton from guthrie and ghani and have made it into two pretty blouses – I’m going to buy some more to make me something. At my last fair people were looking for boys bits so I’m using one of the new oliver+s patterns to make some vintage tweed waistcoats and tartan booties, I’ve also got some pretty dusky pink check flannel to make some little dresses or skirts – as yet undecided!

Craftfairiness!

So this weekend I did my first winter craft fair with mixed feelings as the summer one I did was terrible.
Anyway, I turned up, set up, borrowed a rail from my friend Susie who makes tweed bags and hung out all my baby clothes and bits and pieces. Footfall was average – I’d didn’t help that the lovely venue we were in had put out massive signs for a craft fair in a couple of weeks (they could have waited a day or two!) and sales were not exactly coming in on Saturday,
However, today was much improved – people came back from yesterday, I got some custom orders, I sold stuff! And I have people coming to see me at my next craft fair to buy things (hooray!)
So, happy happy, the only downside is now I have to do crazy stitching to make more stuff for the next one!

Ballet shoes

So last night, I finished off these bad boys – I’m really pleased with them, I wanted to make a baby shoe that looked like a ballet shoe so these are made in pink herringbone tweed with satin straps and lined in pink satin.
Making baby shoes is a bit fiddly but not really that difficult and is a great way to use up small pieces of fabric as they don’t really need that much – I forgot how wee baby feet are and had to measure them up on clay prints of my sons feet! Anyway, as with all my stuff, there in my etsy shop awaiting my upcoming craft fair (one week today!)

https://www.etsy.com/uk/listing/166286269/baby-pink-tweed-ballet-shoes-with-satin?ref=shop_home_feat

Cooking: beef casserole (it’s a chilly day here)

Listening: Brave film – I’m watching it with the kids, it’s one of our faves!

Etsy versus folksy

Here in the uk we have a sort of version of etsy called folksy. Anyway, I’ve had an etsy shop for about a year and have properly run it since late April. Since then, sales have slowly (but steadily grown) including commissions which have been arranged privately to save on extra fees.
I decided to have a bit of a trial to see if I could increase sales by using folksy as well, it’s pretty similar to etsy but only carries uk sellers, the only thing is, you can’t really ‘tag’ your products in the same way so people can search for them. This seems to make a real difference to the number of views you have.
On etsy I average 20 plus views a day on folksy, zero for a week…kinda speaks for itself really!
No more folksy!

Cooking: homemade bread (see last post) and choc chip cookies

Listening to: Gabrielle ‘come as you are’