Etsy Kids Team Treasuries

This post features some of my favorite Sept. treasuries from Etsy Kids Team members:

Baby It's Fall by Althea1326
Newborn Lovelies by Beanstalk by Yizzy
Keeps on Beating by Lil Princess Bow
 Making Lemondade from Lemons by Apple Tree Boutique
It's Game Time Baby by Baby Swank:

My 1st Craft Show

I apologize for the blurry pictures. This is a view of my Lil' Bit Sassy section.

Schoolhouse Designs Section

If you have any suggestions about how better to display my items, please let me know!

Yesterday I did my very first craft show. It was held at the local college (Allegheny) by some students. I must say, they did a great job of organizing the event. The tables were all set up for us when we got there, a student helped us unload our cars and carry our things up (it was on the 2nd floor) to the hall, and they even served us free cookies, tea, and pizza for lunch. The only flaw I did notice was that they needed more signs. They only had one sign pointing to the parking lot but no signs on the building itself to tell you what door to go into or how to get to the hall. It was at the back of the building too so made it even more confusing. Needless to say, the only people we had attending were college "kids" and some of their parents.

Unfortunately, none of us vendors did very well. I only made $27. The show was free, so that was a plus. I got a lot of "ooohs" and "ahhhs" over my things, but not really any sales. I think next year (if they have it and I decide to do it) I will focus on wallets, wristlets (I noticed a lot of the girls were carrying those) and adult sized aprons (they seemed to love my kids aprons). I really thought my Allegheny Gators would go over well but I didn't sell even one of them. If anything, this has not deterred me. I am more determined now to make my little business a success locally.

I think there were a few reasons we didn't do well. As I said, I think the signage was a part of it, plus it being the 1st year they've tried this. I did meet some other vendors and that was great. One even told me about an event coming up at our local Market House from May till September. Each 2nd Saturday of the month they will be having a little fair with certain themes (healthy living, wool spinning, etc). One of the themes in August is Kids Day and I might just do much better at it. I am willing to give it a go.

Another good thing about the day was that I won a couple of doll purses from another vendor. They had a Chinese auction and some of us donated items for it. The purses are really cute and I think I'm going to send them to my great niece. The vendor that made them didn't have a website but she did have an email address (smonkeybusiness@gmail.com) and a brochure with the purses. If you're interested in American Girl doll clothes & accessories, send her an email!

My 1st Embroidery Project

 If you had read my blog a few posts ago, you know that I recently purchased my aunt's White 3300 embroidery machine. I didn't get much of a chance to use it when I first got it due to orders I had to fill (definitely NOT complaining about that!), so this past weekend I was determined to make time to play with the new "toy".

Well, things were not as easy as I thought they would be. My first tries were not good to say the least. And whatever could go wrong, did. First needles were breaking. Then the thread was getting bunched up under my fabric. Then it would skip stitches. Then it would get loopy on top. I was beyond frustrated by Sunday afternoon. I thought I would never learn how to operate this "easy for the beginner embroiderer" machine.

Well, we did figure out some things we were doing wrong. First thing was I had the fabric in the hoop wrong. That could explain the broken needles. Next thing we discovered was that you have to have the pressure foot up when you thread your upper thread otherwise it won't go between the tension plates. That could explain the loopy, skipped stitches.  Next thing was you have to use a lightweight cotton/polyester thread for your bobbin. That could explain the bunching thread underneath the fabric.

Now you may ask yourself why I didn't read the manual. I did. But some of these things were not in it. They were on the video that came with the machine. The video that I had wanted to watch over the weekend but Mike didn't hook the VCR up so I could watch it. I watched the video yesterday--when he finally hooked up the VCR. Wow, that sure would've been helpful to watch BEFORE I decided to try this "easy for beginning embroiderers" machine out.

Regardless, we finally did figure it out and I am happy to say that I made my first project with it. Now mind you, I still have to figure out a few things, like how to center designs, but all in all, I think it came out ok.

 These cute little animal designs are on the machine already. I made two of each design.  The backs are the same fabric as the lining of the bag. I plan to make four different sets of these little match games. I have designs picked out (that are also on the machine) for boys, girls, and one for either/or.  The decorative stitching on the game pieces I did with my sewing machine (ahhh so nice to work with after The Beast). So, anyway, that's my first project. I am hoping that from here on out I won't have so many problems again. Crossing my fingers!

New Ideas for the New Year

So now that it's another new year, my resolution is to focus, focus, focus on how I make items for my shops.  I have a bad habit of making only one or two of a new item instead of several at one time--so this year I am going to try to make one new item at a time--and several of that item rather than one or two. I also want to give myself a week to make as many of a new item as possible. This may help me to achieve my goal better. We shall see.

I did make a list for both of my stores of new items I definitely want to make this year, and I tried not to make it an unrealistic amount. Are you curious to see what I have in mind?

For my Lil' Bit Sassy shop I want to make:
  Children's aprons
  Doll Slings ( I have already made a prototype)
  Doll Blankets (also made one of these already)
  Pacifier/Teething Toy bibs (bibs that a pacifier or toy can be attached to)
  Baby/Toddler Bowl/Utensil holders (keep dishes clean in a diaper bag)
  Doll Diaper Bag Sets: bibs, diapers, changing pad, and wipes.

For my Schoolhouse Designs shop:
  Kitchen Sets: matching pot holders/hanging dish towels
  Potato Bags: use these to cook baked potatoes in the microwave
  Crochet/Knitting Needle cases
  Make-up Organizer: a small open bag with several pockets
  Book-style Kindle/iPad Covers

I don't believe that list is too unreasonable. I do have 12 months to complete it after all. On another note: I am getting an embroidery machine this spring!! I am SO excited about this. Along with this, I plan to make embroidered shirts and other items. I can also personalize items already available! I am hoping this feature will boost my sales somewhat. I've had several requests to personalize my art aprons and now I will be able to do it in a more professional way.

Creative Contest

Oh my have I been remiss on blogging!! Shame on me! I wish I could say it was because I've been SO busy filling orders, but alas that is not the case :( As a matter of fact, this is the slowest season I've had since my first year selling online. I'm not sure whether it's the economy or if I need to revamp my Sassy store.

I think after the New Year, I may try a little revamping and see what happens. Maybe more aprons for little girls (other than my art aprons). Maybe I'll even try my hand at making baby booties. I think I also might need to make more items for older children since other than my art aprons and monster dolls, most of my items are for babies and toddlers.

That being said, I have decided to have a little contest. Let's see how creative you can be! Here's how it'll work. You give me an idea of what new item(s) I can make and carry in my Sassy store and if I like the idea(s) enough, I'll make the item and give you the first one! Who knows--if I like several of the ideas, there could either be several winners or you can win more than one item! Sound like fun? Just post each idea separately (so I don't get confused or miss any ideas in the shuffle). I'll choose a winner(s) on Dec. 17th. That gives you a little over a week to come up with some ideas. So--get your thinking caps on moms and let 'er rip!

First Wholesale Order

I am so excited! A few weeks ago a seller on etsy had contacted me about making tool aprons for her son's birthday party.  She wasn't exactly sure how many she'd need or what fabrics she wanted so said she would get back in touch with me when she figured it out.  She's been contacting me pretty regularly since then. She's finally decided that she wants girls and boys aprons. Girls in pink with purple trim, boys in navy with red trim. She also wanted them personalized

So yesterday, I made one of each so I could send her a picture of how they looked.  I decided to embroider the names onto felt (heart shaped for girls, oval for boys) to match the trim colors.  I also decided that I would use decorative stitching for the pocket dividers in the trim colors just to break up the solids a bit. They turned out cute! I sent her a picture of the two I made and she loved them. So now I need to make 11 more of them. There could be a total of 18 but she hasn't heard from a couple of the invitees yet.

 

In other news, my niece requested that I make a blanket to go along with the frog pillow I made for her little boy. So, I made him a small rag quilt. It turned out so cute! These are so fun and easy to make, just a bit time consuming because of all the cutting you have to do. These may be future Christmas presents for the little ones. I think they'd all enjoy their own blanket.

Out With the Old, In With the New

As some of you know, I have a pattern/supply shop on etsy (http://www.LotsOPatterns.etsy.com) as well as my handmade shop.  I opened this shop because I decided to clean out some of my stash and get rid of some patterns I might never get around to doing. A couple of months ago I found a free selling site (eCrater) and decided to try it out. You can sell anything there--it's not handmade only--so I listed some books, some of my handmade items, and just a variety of things that I can't sell on etsy.  Since most of the items in my Lots O' Patterns shop have been there since I opened it, and obviously didn't sell, I decided to save a little money and list them on eCrater rather than to keep paying listing fees on etsy. So as things have expired in Lots O' Patterns, I've been listing them in eCrater. I only have a few items left and they should be expiring soon.

Now, I've been throwing around an idea about what to do with the extra etsy shop when it's empty of stock. One idea is to move my baby/children's items into it and make it exclusively a baby/child themed shop and to use my Lil' Bit Sassy shop for other items I make such as my purses, accessories, and household items.  If I decide to do this, I won't be able to use Lil' Bit Sassy as the name of the baby/children's shop, so I was thinking Sassy Bug for it and Lil' Bit Sassy for the mixed item shop.  AND if I go with this, should I get new business cards printed? Also--will customers lose me? I suppose I could always write a note in my shop announcement saying that if they're looking for baby/children's items or purses,etc. they are now at...and post a link.

So what would you do if you were faced with this? Any opinions or suggestions would be most welcome!

Challenging Children

My great niece and nephew are the sweetest kids in the world, however, when it comes to gifts, they can be quite the challenge! I don't mean that they are difficult to please, I just mean that they really love to challenge my creativity. Not that I mind. I love a good challenge.
When asked, Tyler said that he wanted a bat doll for his birthday. Ooookay. Who knows where five year olds come up with their ideas. So, to the drawing board I went to try and create a bat doll for him. I actually used a Bit of Whimsy Mollie Monkey pattern for the body but still had to come up with a face, wings, and legs. So, I did manage that quite well. I made the body with black suede and the ears, wings and legs from black cotton that has a gray swirl pattern. I think it came out rather cute!Tyler's sister Kayden's birthday is next week. I asked if she'd like a girl doll with a couple of skirts. Nope. Not at all. But what she WOULD like was a robot doll. Yellow. A big doll. A girl one. Here we go again! This time I used my robot blankie as a template for the head. I made it a bit smaller because the blankie pattern was a bit big. That was the easy part. Then I had to figure out how to do the arms and legs. I looked around on etsy to see how people were doing their robot hands (I already had an idea for the legs/feet)and saw that most were doing claw-like hands. I'm not very good at drawing (can't even draw stick people) so even something so simple as claws were a challenge for me, but I managed. And so here is Kayden's big girl robot doll in yellow.

Can hardly wait for their next birthdays to roll around.

Art Aprons

I decided to take a break from my Christmas crafting (yes, that’s right, I said “Christmas”) to try something new for my shop. I hadn’t listed anything new yet this year and thought that I really needed to do that. So, I perused my ideas list and decided to try my hand at making art aprons for kids.

Normally when I start a new project, I get a bit excited and nervous at the same time. Excited because I love to create. Nervous because there is always that fear that things won’t work out how I would like and I will be forced to give up. Not that I’m a quitter! It takes quite a few tries at something before I will actually give up on it. Mostly because I’m stubborn and I. MUST. WIN.

With this in mind, I was quite surprised at how fun and easy these aprons were to make! So fun in fact, that I’ve made three of them in the past two days (all three are listed in my shop) which is pretty good for me since I’m usually a one- project-a-day kind of person.Oh, and not only were they fun, but they were a great way to use the HUNDREDS of fat quarters I have in my stash J Ok, that last was a bit of an exaggeration, but you know what I mean!

The Art Case

Last year I had made my little great nieces and nephews coloring totes for Christmas. They were tote bags that were the perfect size for holding a couple of coloring books and a box of crayons. They absolutely loved them! Being the person I am, I always look for ways to improve some of the things I make (either I'm a perfectionist or just plain anal--you be the judge).

While getting a cross stitch project all ready to work on, I took a look at my project case. Inspiration! Why couldn't I take this same idea and make an art case for kids? Maybe instead of just holding a couple of coloring books and box of crayons, it could hold a bit more. I have had this idea brewing for some time now, but of course as usually happens, it got put on the back burner while I worked on other projects.

A couple of nights ago, I thought to myself: Christmas is coming. I have a few baby items in my shops now, so I should work on something for older children. What about that art case idea?! Sure! Why not? So the other day, I made a sketch of my idea. Then I proceeded to figure out measurements, etc (all the "fun" stuff!). And walla! I have made my first art case! I must say, it turned out quite well--the first time! I know, right? When does anything ever turn out right the first time lol.

So here is the finished product! It will hold 12 crayons and markers (each in it's own pocket), coloring book(s), activity books, or whatever books you choose to put in it. It also has a pouch so your budding artisan can store scissors, stickers, glue, etc. I had planned to put a sketch pad in it, but not quite wide enough. It will hold coloring books and other books though so I'm debating whether I should make it wider for a sketch pad.

So, let me know what you think! I would love to get these listed in the shop ASAP so any suggestions or ideas for improvement will be very much welcome! Also, should I include the supplies (crayons, markers, coloring books) or no? Or should I make that up to the buyer? And most importantly, how much would you be willing to pay for something like this (with or without supplies)?

Monsters

I am very quickly whittling down my sewing list! These little monster dolls were one (or three) of the items I needed to make before I left on my trip. Two of them are belated b-day presents and one is a Christmas present. The pink and green go to a brother and sister (the b-day presents) and the little blue one goes to my 16 month old great nephew.

I think they're too adorable! They are another pattern from Bit of Whimsy Prims. Just love them!