Lilac Groupies

Good Morning Folks

Well here I am as promised with some information about some of my lovely Lilac Ladies and Gents. We all have stalls at CRAFTfest  which starts on 10th March and runs for a full week; if you have missed the booking deadline don't worry there will be another one in June.

Take a look at some of the wonderful stalls and people that are in the Lilac group.

Northfield Primitives

Inspired by vintage and antique toys, I design and make animals and dolls which I stitch on a beautiful 1920's Singer treadle sewing machine. I use old Meccano wheels, vintage ribbons and buttons, traditional German glass eyes and rusty bells in my work, which adds to the vintage charm of each animal.

Website  Blog

RLW Designs

Hello!! My name is Rebecca and I am a designer/maker based in York. Working mainly in enamels I create fun, quirky pieces to brighten your day!

Days out, picnics, trips to the seaside... I take my inspiration from simple, everyday pleasures producing a collection of mixed media works using a range of materials, enamels, wood, metal and found objects... the use of stencils and naive, hand drawn illustrations add character and humour to each decorative piece.

Enamelling is the process of applying powdered glass onto metal...
I generally use a copper base, applying the vitreous enamel powders through a fine sieve...
The metal is then placed inside a small kiln for a couple of minutes...
With temperatures of between 750° and 850° the glass powder becomes liquid...
As it is removed from the kiln the molten glass solidifies to form a smooth, hard finish...
Enamels are durable and will not fade...
A wide variety of colours are available both transparent and opaque...
The nature of the materials and the techniques used ensure that each piece is unique, individual...

Website  Twitter

All Things Blankets and More

If you're a cat owner or just a cat lover then All Things Blankets & More is the stall for you.

I sell cat beds, cushions, blankets & throws all individually handmade by myself; many of which can be personalised and are all tested and approved by myself or my 4 kitties.

I have a few new product lines planned for 2012 but I am more than happy to accept custom orders.

Website  Blog

  

Dysfunction Designs

I create handmade tribal jewellery for both men and women. I use handmade clay beads, which I make myself, and team them up with a range of ethically sourced and unique wooden,bone and horn beads to create unusual and interesting bracelets and necklaces.

Website  Blog

Lionheart Stationers

The Lionheart Stationers come to share with you the whimsicality of hand drawn stationery and the vibration of personal touch. Our aim is to add excitement to your correspondence, animating words through images. We want to offer an alternative to the computerised world we’re living in, in which paper and pen have been replaced with texts, emails and status updates. We are here for those who still think that a written sentiment seems to convey something more then just a brief email that we regularly send and receive. Our products are created to warm the heart and show someone in writing that you took your time to think about them.
We do anything from thank you notes to birth announcements, christening invites to party invites, save the date or correspondence cards. Everything can personalised and one thing we love is having commissioned artwork.

Website  Blog

Handmade bespoke sterling silver jewellery

My aim is to bring you high quality handmade jewellery that is affordable, elegant and completely unique. Everything you see is made by me and based on my own designs.

Website  Blog

Dottie Designs

Dottie Designs makes personalised Keepsake Boxes, Photo Albums and Guest Books for all occasions. I like to work with the customer to ensure that they have the perfect gift and will match colour schemes to Wedding colours, or the colour of a Prom Dress. I work from my sea-side studio in Hampshire and am very lucky that I am able to pursue what was my hobby as a business.

Chasing Beads

My name is Suzanne and I own Chasing Beads. I design and sell jewellery at various events as well as my website (and not forgetting Facebook/Twitter). I specialise in beaded jewellery as well as teaching various age groups how to make jewellery at home parties and local venues.

Website

Handmade bags for all occasions.

The stall has a range of different types of bags, made from new fabrics, unless otherwise stated.
i like to make bags from a wide variety of fabrics and tend to go for bright and bold, but I am toning down my choices in response to feedback received!!
I also make bags to order.

Website  Facebook

Designs by JoJo

Over the last two years Designs by Jojo has concentrated on designing a luxury wedding invitation range, a range of greeting cards, party invitations, sourced some gorgeous favours and started making a contemporary jewellery range - so quite a busy time juggling with two children in tow!

Designs by Jojo is inspired by rich, vibrant colour, textured paper, nature, everything that glistens and especially sparkles and hopes that you will enjoy looking through the range of products available or if you have something more specific in mind, please don't hesitate to email me as bespoke designs are my speciality! 

JoSara

Contemporary Mosaic for the Home and Garden. I love to create colour palettes and pattern, and I love to create things for wildlife and the garden, as well as the home. I use mosaic because the tiles are frost proof and fade-resistant, which is perfect. I hope you like the end results.

Website  Blog

Uniquely yours

I crochet and knit to my own designs, all manner of accessories for
summer and winter., Scarves, hats, gloves, lacy wraps and lacy summer
gloves. Hairbands, earwarmers and so much more. I like knitting but
it`s crochet that`s my real passion.
I also make mug and cafeteria cosies. I paint ACEOs, mainly in
watercolours and really enjoy it.

Sparrowprimitivecrafts

Add a touch of vintage style charm to your home with our carefully crafted items. We specialise in shelf blocks, wooden signs, bunting and Primitive style products. They are all made in our studio with a great deal of attention to detail, ensuring a quality item for your shabby chic country style home.

Colour options are available from our website.

Our products have been seen in numerous national publications including Country Living, Bella, Daily Express, Sunday Express and Sunday Mirror; and we are also a BBC Dragon Theo Paphitis’ Twitter Small Business Sunday winner.

Website

I Hope you've enjoyed my preview, and I'll have some more for you soon, don't forget they will all be at the CRAFTfest from 10th March for a whole week

F xx

CRAFTfest March

Good Morning,

I promised to come back and tell you more about CRAFTfest, so here I am.

CRAFTfest is an online craft fair open to anybody across the world. This time it is running for a whole week, to give people plenty of time for browsing and shopping. Anyone can join in, it is open to crafters, artists, suppliers, ALL OF YOU. It is very easy (and cheap) to join in, simply pop along to http://www.craftfest-events.com/ and fill in the booking form. You can make payment (of only £5) via paypal, so nice and easy.
Once you've booked your stall, you create an album on the site of all the items that you would like to sell, together with a price and location where they can be bought, (website, Folksy, Etsy, even via email if you wish). There is not a limit to how many items you can include, and NO commission is taken on sales. What could be better?

I'll tell you what's better.... we have set up support groups/teams, to help promote both the event and you stall. You will be allocated to a group and told who your leader is.
This gives you the chance to join in with group discussions, follow on twitter, like on facebook etc., and the following etc. will be reciprocated.
Then whenever you promote we will share it, retweet etc. and hope you will do the same for us.

All the team leaders will be writing blogs about their team members including pictures and websites/Folksy shops etc. - so maximum exposure.
Where else could you get all this for £5?

BUT wait there's more.... Once you join the CREAFTfest you will have joined Creative Connections - what's that I hear you ask...

Well it is an amazing community of crafters and artists, we have forums, discussion groups and even a live chat room where you can go and talk to many of us, and get any help, advise or just a friendly chat.

We would love to see you there, and watch out for the next blog as I will be telling you a bit about some of my group - The Lilac Group

Bye for now

F xx

Post Decorating

Hi

and welcome back to you, sorry I have been absent for so long; but those of you that follow me on facebook will know that I have been decorating my house from top to bottom. This was all with the view of selling the house; and it has now gone on the market.  http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-36787118.html 

I am very pleased with what we acheived (my sons took time off to help me ). Every room in the house was decorated except for 2 of the bedrooms, which had been done recently.

We also managed to spring clean everything, including the loft!!.

It feels so good to know that there is nothing in the house now that we don't want.  My only regret is that we didn't take before and after pictures; for those of you that are interested; here are some of the results of all of our hard work.

Now that all the decorating is done I want to get back to sewing, however it is not easy to be creative and tidy at the same time!! I am having to limit myself to sewing at times of the week when I do not have to either go to work, or show people around the house. Please don't think I am complaining, I would love more viewings, although am having my second one tomorrow, (and the house has only been on the market for 1 week), so doing well I think.

I am going to focus very much on the Creative Connections CRAFTfest which is running in March for a whole week (for only £5), so look out for more details in my next blog. There is not much time left if you'd like to book a stall so check out their website and see what you think. http://www.craftfest-events.com/

I'll be back soon to tell you more about the CRAFTfest, and would love to see lots of you there, either as a seller or a buyer, (or both!)

Take Care

F xx

Embed CRAFTfest Stall

I saw this on the Crystal Lady's blog, so thought I'd give at a go. This is  a slideshow of my stall at the CRAFTfest


Find more photos like this on Creative Connections


hope that worked
signing off for today

F xx

Latest Creations with AccuQuilt

Hello, today I thought I'd show you some of the items I have created with my new AccuQuilt Go, before I move on to some more designs.

You may have seen on a previous blog that I made an 'Owl' cushion following a pattern from one of the AccuQuilt books, well I decided it would be better and more fun to make up my own. So I decided to start with a cushion.

For this cushion I started with a 16 inch square, and simply played with hearts. I cut a number of hearts in 3 different colours, and just kept moving them around until I was happy with the look. I placed 4 large hearts in the centre and tucked smaller ones in underneath as I worked out. I had already added bondaweb to the fabric before cutting the hearts, so I removed the backing paper, sorted my design, and then just ironed so they all stayed in placed. I then simply stitched around the edges of each heart to ensure they were secure. Finally I attached an envelope back to the cushion, inserted pad and hey presto, cushion made in record time.
I am thinking about creating kits for this cushion in different colour ways, would love to know if anyone would be interested.

Having finished my cushion I decided to have a play with my small flower cutter. Again I added bondaweb to the fabric before cutting.

Again I cut a selection of flowers and leaves before I began, and just 'played' until I was happy, I decided it needed something more so added a butterfly to the design (again cut with my Go). I then removed the paper backing, ironed, stitched around, and hey presto a new wall hanging. With this I added wadding and the backing before stitching, so that it was quilted at the same time. Once all stitched, I bound the edges with the same fabric as the flowers, and added a channel on the back for hanging. Again I am thinking of doing kits, let me know if you'd be interested and what your favourite colours are.

What next was the following thought - well I had lots of hearts and flowers left over (getting a great collection now!) so I thought what about a Kindle cover.

I felt this needed something on the back too

I personally love the colours of this one, might have to keep it for my Kindle. There won't be kits for these, as I sell them on my website www.perfectpatchwork.co.uk

I am going to spend some time today cutting, then tomorrow I am going to a craft fair, where I will be creating new designs, so people can see how I do them. If you're in the area please pop along and say hi (Feniton Devon). I might even have a special discount for you if you mention my blog.

Hope to see some of you tomorrow, and I'll post new makes as I do them

Signing off for today

f xx

My Memories Suite plus FREE GIVEAWAY

Hi

I am doing another review today. A few weeks ago I was given a copy of the My Memories Software and was asked to do a review.

I have never used digital scrapbook software before, so this was a real eye opener for me. I had no idea what to expect, but was amazed at the capabilities of this software, you can not only do digital scrapbooks but, cards calendars, invites and much more.

I found the software navigation very straightforward to use, even for a total novice like me. It is very easy to change paper colours (or add new ones), add motifs, design layout and import photos too.

Although this software is ideal for the beginner don't think it wouldn't suit the more experienced scrapbooker, because the capabilities are such that even the experienced user would be 'wowed' by it. It has the facility to add audio and video to your creations as well, something I did not expect to find in digital scrapbooking, but I guess in the digital age this is a must for the serious user.

There are a multitude of free designs which can be downloaded from their website, and of course additional designs which can be purchased.

These are a couple of my favourites:

I think these designer packs are fantastic and give you so much to create with, there are 90 free designs which you can download, and remember that gives you much more than 90 to play with, as most of them are packs, with papers, motifs etc included.

This one is so cute and easy to produce fantastic photo cards for that favourite person in your life.

As I am not a scrapbooker I decided to create a personalised Christmas card (also due to the time of year), and this is what I came up with - remember I have never used any software like this and for my first one I only spent about 15mins - This in itself shows just how easy this software is to use.

I also decided to have a go at a Birthday card

the only thing I struggled with to start with was finding the elements that I had downloaded, but once I had found them I was away. I would recommend this software to anyone who wants to design their own scrapbooks, cards etc. And for those of you that do I have a special giveaway which you could win. A COPY OF THE MEMORY SUITE SOFTWARE FREE

All I ask is that you visit the Memory Suite Website and tell me which is your favourite free download and why. The lucky winner will be announced on Saturday 12th November.
If you can't wait that long you can purchase the software direct from the site and as a thank you for reading my blog here is a discount for you


As a special for all of my readers, Memory Suite have given me my very own Share the Memories code that provides a $10 discount off the purchase of the My Memories Suite Scrapbook software and a $10 coupon for the MyMemories.com store - ($20 value!)  Simply input the following code at the checkout -   STMMMS8902    Don't worry about delays in receiving your software as it can be downloaded direct from the site, so as soon as you purchase you can go ahead and start creating.


Hope you enjoyed my blog today, and happy browsing


Signing off for today
F xx

AccuQuilt Go

Hello again

Sorry I have not been about for a while, but been very busy. Toady I am going to tell you what I have been up to.
I have bought myself the most wonderful addition for my patchwork and quilting - The AccuQuilt GO

This machine is amazing, a MUST have for all patchwork and quilters out there. It comes with a die which had 2 different sized squares and triangles, and they are so accurate it's amazing. Makes piecing so much more accurate, quicker and gives a better finish.

I also treated myself to some additional dies:

I have plans already for this die, including a cushion cover and a wall hanging (I'll post pictures when they are done).

I bought this one to do some amazing baby quilts, and intend to combine with the round flowers (see below) to do some vibrant and batik wall hangings.

I used the 'leaf' from this one together with the circle below to make an amazing cushion today - my first real play with the Go

This is the first time I have used the Go and am really pleased with the results -

I used the squares from the value die (came with the machine) plus the circle and the feather, I cut 2.5 inch strips with my cutter (have added the strip die to my wish list) and away I went, so quick, so precise I am well impressed.

Tomorrow I plan to try out my heart die, so watch this space for what I come up with, but overall this cutting machine is so easy to use and so precise I would now not be without it, wish I found them years ago.

signing off for today

F xx