A crafty display

I've been working on displaying all of my craft fair stock (on the dining room table!). I got a flat, cream, double bed sheet from Primark which I'll be using as a nice plain 'tablecloth' and I'll be using a couple of plastic boxes covered with pretty fabric to prop cushions etc up and display things on top of. The only thing that was causing me a bit of a problem was all the buntings I'd made. (You can see them here and here.)

So 'him indoors' put his thinking cap on and went out to buy some pieces of wood.  He sneaked out the back garden early this morning and after some sawing and drilling, he presented me with my very own bunting display!

The clever thing about this is that there's also some additional hanging space at either end of the rod at the top -

Which is just perfect for hanging my mini-tote bags from!

Well done Jon, you've been promoted to Chief Carpenter ;)

Now all that's left for me to work on is pricing my stock...perhaps the trickiest part of all.  Any advice would be most welcome....


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Just because...

Do you ever come across something you just have to make?  Just, well....because?

I came across the cutest little purse the other day and I knew straight away that I wanted one!  (Not that I need one, or am even sure what I'll do with it, but it was just so darn cute!)

In one of my evening trawls of the Internet, I somehow came across this great tutorial over at Nosey Nest for a piggy bank purse.  As with most of my projects, it's a small, easy project that I managed to complete from start to finish in just a couple of hours.  Meet my little piggy -

The flap opens up to reveal a pocket...

And the view of the other side -

Too cute huh?

As with most all things I try out, the first one is a bit of a learning curve.  The seams don't quite meet for the opening of the inner pocket so I might have to try and do some hidden stitches to close the open gap, and in my haste, I didn't practice the button-hole before I did it for real...and made a bit of a mess of it.  However, I am already thinking that maybe I can adapt this pattern and come up with a cute little elephant shaped one... Something to think about, it'll probably make my brain hurt in doing so! 

I'm pretty much done with my craft fair sewing, so it was nice to take the time out to make a little something for me, it was actually quite relaxing as I sat in the sunshine tracing and cutting out the pattern. 

Oh, and I got a VERY exciting email yesterday, but I can't share much more until I've had confirmation that 'it' is going to go ahead, but lets just say I'm very, very, very excited! 

And don't forget, there's still time to enter my giveaway if you haven't already done so!


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It's finally here - GIVEAWAY time!

So, listen up you lovely peeps.  A while back I was delighted to have reached 10,000 page views (btw, it's now up past 17,000!) and as a celebration, I wanted to give something back to those of you who visit my site regularly.  So....it's giveaway time! 

I've put together this cute little drawstring bag - it's lined with pink fabric with white polka dots y'know and has pretty pink gingham ties....

It's stuffed to the brim with little haberdashery items picked specially by me, for you.  Want a peek at what's inside??

There are a few other bits and pieces buried down at the bottom of the bag, but I'll keep that a surprise until you (whoever the lucky winner is) receives it. 

So, you wanna enter my giveaway?

OK - here's what to do -  Leave me a comment on this post telling me what you're working on right now (if anything).  Don't forget to leave a link to your blog so we can all come for a visit.  PLEASE ENSURE YOUR EMAIL ADDRESS IS VISIBLE IN YOUR BLOGGER PROFILE SO THAT I CAN CONTACT YOU IF YOU WIN*.  (Or leave it in your comment to make sure)

*If you don't know how to check this, take a look at this tutorial by SewHappyGeek - it's easy peasy, I promise.

I'll leave this giveaway open until Sunday 31st July and I'll announce the winner (chosen by random number generator thingy) on Monday!

Good luck x

For me and for you....

I just wanted to let you all know that I haven't forgotten about the giveaway I promised you! I have been really busy preparing for the craft fair, but....I have managed to squeeze in a bit of time to make this....

It already contains some lovely haberdashery items and over the next few days I'm going to be squeezing even more into it!  I will post details of how to enter the giveaway later this week.  I might even let you have a peek inside!

While I was on a roll with making the button bracelet last week, I also made a pearly white version -

Gorgeous!  Now I have two - and I'm almost guaranteed that at least one of them will go with my outfit every day ;)

I had some great news over the weekend too - I FINALLY won something!  (I'd decided in January that 2011 would be my year for entering and hopefully winning some giveaways/competitions)  I entered a competition held over at SewHappyGeek, and I won, I won, I won!  Now the hard part is deciding which Jelly Roll to chose from.....


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Finally something for ME!

**WARNING - this post is seriously heavy on buttons!!**

With all the frantic crafting going on round here lately, I've decided that I'm on top of craft fair stock and so will finally be able to take a breather from the manic sewing! 

I think it's no secret to you all that - I LOVE BUTTONS!! I asked the other day for suggestions on what to do with all of my newly acquired buttons, and a couple of you suggested some button jewellery.  I liked the sound of this!  I especially fancied a bracelet, but thought it seemed way too complicated, until I found this tutorial for easy peasy button bracelets.  So, I spent an evening sewing my buttons onto my elastic, and here's my gorgeous bracelet -

I love it!  I'm also all prepared for sewing a white version tonight.  I'm tempted to even add a few to the craft fair stock.  I'll need lots more buttons for that right??

Well, imagine my delight when I came downstairs this morning to find that the postman had delivered an envelope STUFFED full of buttons!  A Twitter follower had spotted my button love and sent me her collection of buttons!  I was absolutely delighted, here's the lovely lot -

This row of buttons are some of my particular favourites (I'm really loving wooden and metal buttons right now).  Wouldn't these make a fantastic bracelet too?  Talk about random acts of kindness.  This totally made my day thank you Janice :)

And that's not all.....I was passing a few charity shops this afternoon and asked if they had buttons.  In one shop the lady came out from the back with a huge hamper stuffed full of buttons!  I had a good rake through and came home with a couple more buttons to add to my collection -

Again, the row above shows some of my favs.  That big metal one is lovely!  Luckily there were quite a few sets in there so I have a few the same. 

We also managed a trip to IKEA in on Friday.  It was my first time browsing their fabric department and I certainly wasn't disappointed! 

The top one is (I think?) designed by Cath Kidston herself.  In hindsight I wish I'd bought a lot more of it!  The bottom two are actually bed sheets, but for £1.99, that's a lot of great fabric!  I also got these fun/kids fabrics -

I can't wait to start crafting/sewing with this little lot, but I think I'll be slowing down on the sewing for a little while, until my sewing machine recovers from the major overuse it's had lately.  And besides...I've got IKEA wardrobes and sets of drawers to build.......wish me luck!


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I hope somebody's gonna buy all this stuff!!

Here's the cushion I made based on the same design as the personalised t-shirt I blogged about the other day.  I've used the applique hearts in various fabrics and stitched around them with the sewing machine a few times to outline them.


Applique love heart cushion

I've also put some of the lovely wool felt and buttons that I bought a couple of weeks ago to good use. I've made some mobile phone/iPod touch cases.  (This photo really doesn't do the colour of the wool felt justice!)


Wool felt gadget cases

 They're all lined with really pretty contrasting fabric and a sew, ray, me label of course! -

Spot the one I forgot to put the label in!! Oops :(

AND, I've also made a couple of really simple mini lined tote bags.  I had quite a bit of the heavier weight canvas left from some toddler bean bags I made a while back, so I teamed it with some bright fabrics for lining and handles, and ...

These are 'mini' - either child-size, or for holding small amounts of shopping, books etc.  They're fully lined and I used this tutorial (but made a different size). 

In between all this sewing we did manage a day out last week to a lovely countryside park, and somehow ended up going via a fabric shop (it must've been my inbuilt GPS fabric shop radar!).  Although I didn't actually buy any fabric, I did get this handy little box for all my bobbins -

This means that I can save my sewing machine basket for the larger reels of thread - all these little bobbins were getting lost and tangled at the bottom of it. 

Shabby chic!

Shabby chic has been the theme of today's crafting. 

Shabby chic - the use of used, worn, or inexpensive components to make stylish goods.

Now you can't argue that that doesn't sound good! 

I decided that I needed  a few small items for my craft fair so I wanted to have another go at some key rings.

But first - a bargain find, at the same charity shop I found all those delicious buttons on holiday... A great little wooden mug tree for hanging my little handmade bits 'n' bobs on -

Looks ok huh?  And it was only 50p :)

I started by crafting a shabby Union Jack key ring -

This was from the instructions in the current issue of Homestyle Sewing magazine - as previously blogged here. 

I then decided to try some other kinds of key rings, so I emptied out the bag of scraps I'd received from Julie in our recent scrap swap and played about with them putting funky combinations together.  Here's the key rings I came up with -

I think they look pretty cool.  I can't believe I made all these from scraps - I just added in some buttons and ribbons from my stash (and some key ring loops).  I joined circles of fabric together with a button in the centre, sewed a back on and frayed all the edges. 

These are my favourites -


Pretty pastels



Vibrant blues and reds

I am loving the look of all the frayed-ness! 

Phew, another item to tick of my list of stock. 


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@sewrayme

After much persuasion from my Technical Director (aka my other half), I have finally decided to set up a Twitter account.  I've been playing with it all day and I think I'm starting to get the hang of it! 

If you're on Twitter and would like to follow me, just click on the link above, or search for @sewrayme on Twitter.  Once you've done this, (and I've got the hang of it) you'll start to receive my deep and meaningful tweets (yeah right!). 

Feel free to suggest anyone I might also like to follow :)

Some crafty gifts

One of Joshua's friends turned 2 this week so it was the perfect opportunity for me to make something crafty and girly as a gift!  I decided to make a little personalised t-shirt, it was fun to be so girly with my creations for a change.  (You can see the ones I made for my son here and here.)

Here's what I came up with -

The cute gingham hearts have been outlined with dark purple stitching -

I love this effect - it looks like I've doodled around it with a pen!  I think that the dark purple makes them really 'pop' too. 

The pink spotty name is also outlined in the same purple. 

I also gave you a peek at the other gift in my previous blog post, it was actually one of these....

A crayon roll, and as you can see, I have also made a few more for the craft fair. 

The phrase 'more speed, less haste' certainly applied to me this afternoon,  I was so keen to get another cushion made for the craft fair that I ended up not only sewing the actual cover INSIDE OUT, but the wrong size too!  I really should take heed of another saying 'measure twice, cut once'!  I think I can salvadge it, but I may need to buy a smaller cushion pad and just have it as a small square rather than the rectangle it was supposed to be! Grrrrr, what a waste of a 2-hour nap time! 

I did manage to make a cushion yesterday which I'm really pleased with - it features hearts very similar to the t-shirt above and I think it's turned out great.  We are experiencing some very grey weather right now (thunder storms included) so I'll try to get some photos when the sun decides to show it's face again (please be soon!).


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