Category Archives: selling

Christmas is Upon Us

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Apologies to all the “Bar-humbug-ers” trying to take the ostrich in the sand approach until Dec 24th, but Christmas is officially just around the corner… It must be!…The supermarkets are stocked to the rafters with Christmas treats, I have been discussing the logistics of making Christmas stockings with the same group of children who made the autumnal pictures and I attended my first Christmas fair this weekend.

I have 3 more fairs before the end of November and keep running out of stock (granted this is a much better problem to have than having stock that refuses to sell!)

This was my corner of the West Surrey Guild of Spinners Weavers and Dyer’s table at the Christmas Fair, it was a fun day out with Elaine and Heather, who you can see in the photo, and I sold the beret and snail hat you can see on the top shelf. The snail hat went to a young lady who I think will actually wear it around town, not just to music festivals which is brilliant, I am so happy he found someone to love him 🙂

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The bathrooms at this site were less than wonderful portacabins, but when I happened to look up I saw this and thought it rather pretty, it reminds me of eco-dyeing:

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Today was spent furiously making scarves and another hat to replace some of the sold stock so I don’t have to turn up to the next few fairs empty-handed. This will be a beret and the scarves I made are busy cooking in the dye pot.

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A few weeks ago I saw an advert for a short millinery course at my local college and on a bit of whim signed up for it, I’m not sure the cut and sew techniques we have been using so far will replace the more contemporary felt-making techniques I normally use but it is interesting to see how some styles are constructed and of course the engineer in me is already trying to work out how to make similar shapes in seamless felt…. 🙂

This is the first hat from that course, I would call this an “Andy Capp cap” after the well known British cartoon but this probably doesn’t translate very well across the Pond, what would you call this style of hat?

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From above

Are you ready for Christmas?

Exciting News!

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Yesterday I was offered a sales table at my work’s annual Xmas market / fair. I am so excited, this is the first time I have tried to sell my work face to face, I have been bouncing around like a child on Xmas eve! At first I was worried that I would not have enough items, but looking around I realise I have loads of very saleable felt and willow goods that I have made, it is just that most of them need final details or care labels. I spent most of last night stitching care labels onto toys, scarves and hats so I had about 20 items ready to go.

This morning I sprayed 5 willow sculptures with wood preservative, they will take a few days to dry but are also good to go. This afternoon I have been mounting textile art onto mountboards and canvases and putting the pieces on mountboard into cellophane envelopes, that’s another 20 pieces ready to go. I am amazed by my own nervous energy, there are things that have been sitting in “nearly finished” piles for months that are suddenly finding their way to the finished pile. It is amazingly cathartic to see so many pieces finally complete.

I also found time today to repeat the wet felting of my stags at sunset picture that I have been needle-felting recently, the black is much more black now and repeating the wet felting has removed the fuzziness and tiny holes you get from needle-felting. I just need to decide how to hang it now…

One of the pictures I mounted was the sea hollies wall hanging, I think it looks great mounted on a canvas slightly smaller than the felt, giving the impression that it is floating away from the wall.

And I even managed to finish felting a handbag: