March Crafting Challenge Flowers and Yo Yo's

Part of my new years resolution to myself was to do a few crafting challenges, just for myself. I am wanting to do more embellishing of my items and have been mastering Kanzashi flowers, so that is my challenge to make more flowers, and since I have some ideas for them yo-yo's too.

Coin purse with 5 petal pointed flower with button embellishment

I am going to keep it realistic and try to do 2 per day in any combination, this is both to make them for items that are planned and for just because, or to stock them for future ideas. I hope to do some show and tell of these items as I get going on them.

I do not plan on blogging about this daily but hope to document all that are made and share throughout the month and hopefully do a minimum of 62 flowers and yo-yo's. I should add I am off to a good start finished my first flower just after midnight.

Show and tell, my first flower, completed March 1, 2012...now it feels very official.

And not only is it made it is already in use on this new pleated clutch, I have been adapting a keyka pattern and this is my take on it..so cute! I will be making this size as a clutch or cosmetic pouch and a smaller as a wristlet. This one will be mine, thinking it would make a good project pouch.

My Item Being Made 1: Stitch in Color Coin Purse

This marks the first of what I hope to do regularily, blog posts of items being made, I thought it might be fun to show buyers their items inspiration and in progress pictures.

I will include with the listing a link to the blog post and packed with order an card with their MIBM - "My Item Being Made" link and number so they can find the post afterwards. Kind of fun, I think.

The first is this coin purse from the new Moda line "Stitched in Color" and this collection is bright and big and has a lot in the collection. I got 14 from the collection and have already cut most of it up for quilts, totes and zip pouches. This is the first item that was completed from the collection, and was actually some leftover pieces.


Not wanting to toss any of this amazaing fabric I came up with this pieced coin purse, I used all 14 fabrics and paired it with a white on white vine print. Offset small strips pieced vertically was the idea.



This was the first pieced component I tried, a 3 x 1.5 inch piece (blue and gray) and then 3 inch white on each side, it is too big for what I wanted but it helps to get a visual, as you can always cut more off.



I did this piecing on all 14 colors, then lay out to get an idea of color placement.



Sometimes I am so happy I own so many quilting tools, in this case a 1 x 12 inch clear ruler, I used this to center the blocks.

Block laid out, then trimmed to size

Side one complete, do the same with side 2

From here I just finish as I would any coin purse, all are interlined with fleece and lined in a coordinating fabric, in this case it is all white.



While cutting for the coin I also cut long strips for a large cosmetic. Again I used all 14 fabrics I have from this line, this time simple 2 x 7 inch strips.



Functional and very colorful accessories which will are now in my etsy shop, you can find the coin purse HERE.

The cosmetic pouch is available HERE.

Forgotten Prototype Foldover Cosmetic Pouch

Cleaning out the sewing room I found this make up bag, I think this was my second attempt to make this style pouch. It is super cute, not entirely sure why I abandoned it as it is quite functional.

It is a tall pouch that simply folds and closes with a ponytail band and a button. I looked through my prototype book, the place I record notes, measurements and ideas on items and this one had nothing. So I may try this again, it is a nice size for using on the bathroom counter or would actually make a nice clutch for out and about.

I tossed a few items from around the sewing room to fill it for sizing, I actually think it would make a good project keeper. In this is a tape dispenser (yes I know you would not actually use it for this:) glue and hand lotion.

I think I might re-visit this idea and make a few to offer on etsy and off.

New Team Crafting a Home Party

I took a spin through the forums yesterday and happened onto this discussion looking for a team that focused on selling in a home show format. After a few pages of interesting conversation on a whim I set up a new Etsy team "Crafting a Home Party". Within an hour or so we had about 20 members and a few discussions underway.

While I am the captain there were a few others who volunteered to be leaders and help run the team, this is an open team so everyone is welcome to join. Hopefully this can be an active team sharing ideas and inspiration for hosting home shows.

New Fabrics Sneak Peek

I have been busy planning and buying new fabric for the new year and for new items I have planned. Here are a few lovelies that should be in my hands by the end of the week, I shall be stalking the mailbox each day!

This is just a sampling, admittedly I have ordered so much I cannot recall every piece that is coming my way. I often buy focal fabrics online then shop locally for coordinates to complete the look. I hope to hit 4-5 local quilt shops in the next two weeks.

Black Friday and Cyber Monday Sale

I rarely do sales, sure I mark things down from time to time, but an all out shop wide sale, not so much. But since I elected to not do any shows this holiday weekend I thought I would join in the online fun, well I hope anyway.

Etsy is or will be promoting 3 tags this weekend, Free shipping Etsy, Black Friday Etsy, and Cyber Monday Etsy. You can read more from the etsy November Merchandising Desk here in this blog post. I will be doing a combination of offerings; free shipping on some items and discounts on other items and in particular my BlackFridayCyberMonday section will especially be discounted.

I have been busing getting my shop ready, here is what I have done so far and what I still need to do to be totally ready.

I am using a few off etsy apps to help get ready as well, I signed up for Etsy On Sale over the summer and finally did the full read through to apply sales, and change tags in my shop. I also bought the 25.00 package and got 125 credits to use. You can use these credits whenever you like, each action you apply to your shop costs credits. A sale is 4 credits, and a tag change/addition/delete is 1 credit.

I also will be trying for the first time a few of the apps on Craftopolis there you can edit a title and the first paragraph of your listing, these are suggestions made by etsy if you are participating.

Readying my shop:

• I cleaned up my sections, condensed items and reduced the number, this was to help reduce cost of using etsy on sale. Since credits are applied by entire shop or by section having less sections will reduce that cost a bit.
• Reviewed ALL my tags, this has actually been an ongoing project but I finally went through one by one and made my tags more relevant and also made sure I had enough room to add the 3 etsy tags for this event.
• I am listing...a lot, I hope to have nearly 200 items listed by Thursday, I have been doing this since early October, I have listed about 125 items since then.
  
• Created a "Free Shipping profile" to be applied to some of my listings, this will only be for US transactions.
• Writing my new first paragraph for my free shipping and % discount that I will add via Craftopolis later this week. I like to type it out and live with it for a few days first.

I plan to have most of this and ready to go on Thursday, with EOS you can schedule so mine will begin at various times late Thursday to midnight on Friday.

You will have to check out my etsy shop for the sales and deals, and free shipping items. I hope it will be a fun sale for buyers to get some of their shopping done!

Columnists | Crafter turns fabric into practical items | The Detroit News

I am super excited about my weekend feature in The Detroit News. I had the chance to share one of my accessories and talk a bit about my selling life. I did an event Saturday at "State of MInd" it was fun to have several people say they saw me in the paper. Here is the link to the article below.

Columnists | Crafter turns fabric into practical items | The Detroit News

I still need to actually get my hands on a copy for myself, as I sort of missed it when it came out on Friday. I have a few nice folks who will be saving it for me.

New Item Stocking Stuffer Coin Purses

I have a new item this year, very Christmas like, which is unusual for my shop. I rarely sew any holiday items as they don't do very well for me...really, not everyone wants a Santa purse?

So, I have had this idea for a few years and finally did it. I was in the sewing room on Saturday and actually felt kind of bored - very unusual feeling. I remembered this idea and having a few holiday shows and stacks of Christmas fabric I finally worked up a design and started making these. I am calling them "stocking stuffer coin purses" kind of cute, huh? This way I can also legally use "stocking stuffer" on etsy and be found by eager holiday shoppers...tee hee!

A little bit of the design process, pattern pieces for the stocking and lining, then the revision, I wanted it wider and rounder, I re-drew my pattern and ended up with the perfect size.

So this is how it starts, I need a stocking shape, I have several books on stockings so I pulled those out and adapted one to the size and shape I wanted. Luckily I only had one that was done first that was not my desired size, a quick edit and I not have the sweetest stocking coin purses. Added to each a vintage jingle bell and these will great to use all season long. I plan on using mine to keep all my Christmas Receipts in ONE place in my purse.

While I am really planning these for offline events and markets I could not resist adding a few, above are the first two I added to my etsy shop.

A close up peek of these vintage jingle bells, and all the colors one last time!

Dumb Luck Supply: Jumbo Carabiners

I love bumping into a great new supply, this week I found while shopping for back to school items these great big carabiners. This is actually how my carabiner coin purses were born 2 years ago, during back to school time.


I grabbed about 20 some of these to make a new "limited edition" jumbo sized coin purse, well it can be more then a coin purse, more of a big catch-all. I was also thinking it would be great to be able to fit a few diapers in it and attach it to a stroller, well that is what I would do if I was in that time.

Above, this is how I begin the design process some fabric manipulation and folding for an idea of sizing should be.

Lovely jumbo carabiners, they came in black, hot pink, royal blue and red, now if I can control myself and resist buying hundreds. These will most likely be at Yellow Door this fall and maybe a few in my etsy store.

Techniques and Materials Team

With the removal of the etsy forums they have shifted discussions to "teams". So far the only "team" I have joined as a result of this is the "Techniques and Materials" team. This was one of my favorite forums to hang in to get ideas, help out or find great shops.

It is open enrollment, click and you are in, this way you can learn all about glues, sewing, or any number of projects you may be interested in trying or just learning more about. You can find the Techniques and Materials Team Page right HERE.

Fourth Year Etsyversary

So I realized today is my 4th year on Etsy, so I thought I would post a few random (or maybe more then a few) thoughts on this topic. I am often saying how fast time goes by, and really for most things this seems very true, like high school was it really 20 years ago? But etsy seems to be a long road the last four years, a journey I sort of accidentally took.

I started out selling handmade on ebay, again quite accidentally, after having my daughter my stack of stuff I thought I would sell on ebay someday beckoned. I became quickly acquainted with selling and starting listing random supplies, fabric, beads, books, rubber stamps, papers really lots of stuff I outgrew, never did, bought because it was on sale, whatever I had hundreds of items to shed. I sold a lot very quickly and as I ran low on supplies to list I looked at all my quilt tops hanging in closets packed in boxes, and the many more in various stages of completion I knew I would not or did not want to finish.

Again I had scads of these many were for myself, colorways I no longer liked or used, gifts started never completed, challenges I joined in, etc I had dozens of these so I did some searching to see if there was a market and there was. Not just a market but lots of demand, I started listing these at .99 cents as I knew they would sell and then you got the lowest listing price, it was easy and my quilt tops, half completed tops would sometimes go for 50.00 (about the lowest I ever sold for a unfinished table runner) to hundreds of dollars for scrap log cabins. As I ran out of these I started to make more scrap log cabins, I love making them and used up tons of fabric in the process. However I need to make more stuff, so I dabbled in table runners and quilted table linens honestly the demand for finished projects was a lot less, and I needed to keep my shop stocked.

It was then I thought of going back to a love of making totes and purses, I made a few adaptations of bags I had made for myself and began listing on ebay, I did pretty well and could sort of keep a stocked shop. This was late 2006, it was then I wandered into the ebay forums and learned of etsy, I think it was November, just before Christmas and I knew I needed more time to get organized.

I did about 6 weeks of research and getting ready to move to etsy and joined on this day 4 years ago, it was another 4 weeks before I began listing, below is the first item I listed (cringes at early pics).

First item listed, Laurel Burch Medium Tote

First Sale - Goldfish I Have Loved Large Tote

I listed 6 items that day and day 3 made my first sale I seriously was wild with excitement, I genuinely thought I had found my home. Luckily I was able to continue listing and selling at a pretty regular pace, it was within 6-8 months I knew this could be my job. My wonderfully supportive husband agreed that a 2 year trial run was worth it, so I really committed to my shop really never looked back.

I think my pictures have improved dramatically

For the first few months it was kind of an odd family secret, I was very careful with whom I shared this info. Looking back not sure if it was insecurity or just a need to grow comfortable with this new found path. Luckily upon sharing the news with more and more people and was very pleased the the level of support and interest those around me showed.

I also found when sharing etsy virtually no one had heard of it, for nearly first 2 years I always had to find new ways to describe etsy and how amazing it had been for me.

During this 2 years on etsy I kept plenty busy enough most months selling 75-100 items, it was a lot of fun sending purses and accessories literally all around the world. I also did a lot of custom orders, some months as many as 30% of my sales were custom creations.

However like all good things they do come to an end, well for me not an end but a change. Etsy has changed like any venue that is new and revolutionary it is bound to change and in today's fast pace world Etsy is no exception. It has become a lot harder to sell and keep up with a pace of making dozens of new items every month, so I have changed too. I remind myself I am who makes and sells my items and try to not let the changes interupt my love of sewing and creating and etsy just allows me a venue to do this. Etsy also has given me the courage to move offline and into the real world, spreading eggs to different baskets has been my goal the last year and will continue to be a big part of my evolving business.

In closing Etsy has been great the last 4 years and has truly brought me to where I am today, I hope that I can continue to create and sell handmade as I would not be doing this without Etsy.

Good news is most everyone now knows what Etsy is!