An Extreme Wind Up

Hello everyone!

What gorgeous sunny weather we are having at the moment.  Doesn't it make you feel so much better?

I have been a bit quiet on the blogging front recently as I have been very busy trying to get ready for a 3 day food and craft fair over the Jubilee weekend.  I am going to be using the fair mainly to promote the workshops I will be running soon.  So in order to get people's attention, I am encouraging people to come along and have a go at extreme crochet.  Therefore I haven't really been making much, but I have been winding balls of yarn by the bucket load!!

I have been trying to design some Extreme Crochet kits to sell at the fair, this is what has been taking up my time and unfortunately I have come to the decision that time wise it is just not viable.  I was going to include a pattern, a 25mm wooden crochet hook (hand made by my OH) and 20 balls of yarn in the kit.  Well winding and labeling all the balls took ages to get them looking professional, on top of that you have the time spent making the hook, and the cost of the packaging!  So all in all what seemed like a good idea at the time turned out to be too time consuming, but it took me at least a week if not more to work this out!!

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After much discussion we are still going to offer the handmade crochet hooks, the yarn and the pattern, but I will be selling them separately.  Instead of 20 small balls of yarn I have been busy winding huge balls with 20 strands at a time, this reduces the labeling from 20 down to 1 and the winding is so much quicker.  Rather than measuring the length of the yarn on each ball I have weighed each one at 500g.

I added my cup of coffee just to give you an idea of scale!

So as you can see, my link to Handmade Monday this week isn't strictly correct as I haven't actually managed to make anything over these past couple of weeks!!!  But I hope you will forgive me this time :)

To finish off my post I thought you may like to see a photo of Chester that I took a while back (both him and Taffy have been a bit neglected recently :( )

I think you'll agree - he looks such a cool cat!

See you all again soon, have a good week and enjoy the sunshine! 

Alison 

x

The winner is .....

Hello folks

I have a rather important announcement to make!

Using a random number generator The Circle of Love Handcrafted Giveaway winner has now been chosen !!!!  Yaaay!

The winner is:

 Helen Small 

 Helen's blog is 'Small Things Bright And Beautiful'

http://helensmalldesigns.blogspot.co.uk/



Helen's gift from Fiddly Fingers is a knitted wire brooch!

Congratulations Helen!

Hope you like it!

Thank you to Natalie from Free Spirit Designs for organising 

The Cirlce of Love Handcrafted Giveaway

 http://freespiritdesigns1.blogspot.co.uk/

Wire jewellery experiments

Thank you to all of you for your comments on Abbotskerswell Fair I'm glad you liked my packaging unfortunately it didn't make me any sales of the bunting though!

Here is a picture of my stall (on the left) and my sil Lime Green Lizzie (on the right).  You can just about see the lovely bunting made for me by Butterfly Blossom.  We had a pleasant afternoon and made enough to cover the cost of our tables and a bit extra and I got a commission for a string of crocheted teddy bunting for a little boy who is due in August by a lady who has bought from me before.  Always very pleasing to see returning customers.

This week I have been busy 'thinking' about how to promote my workshops and what workshops to offer.  Hopefully in the next few weeks I will be able to update my Workshop page so you will all know what is going on. 

Also this week I have been planning for the extreme crochet kits I am hoping to put together.

Here I am winding just one of the twenty balls I need for each kit!  I need to work out how much space 20 balls takes up in order to work out how I am going to package them!

I have also been experimenting with crocheting with wire.  I first tried out a shape in a fine silk yarn.



And then I did it in wire.  I haven't made the shape with it yet as I want to add 3 Swarovski crystals hanging inside from the top corner and think it may be easier to attach these before I stitch the shape together.  I think I may try them slightly smaller as well.  These are all 10 chain wide, about 1.5 inches and may be a little large for some people.  Perhaps I'll halve the stitches and see if that works?  What do you think?  I have many different colours for the wire so may not go with red/pink in the end.  Haven't decided yet!!  I'll let you know how I get on!

I am absolutely shattered now as we have been to a park in Taunton for a family picnic to celebrate my sil 60th birthday.  We had a lovely day, a game of rounders and a few goes with the frisby and the little ones had a great play park to amuse them.  Topped off by singing 'Happy Birthday' and a birthday cake!  A really lovely day :)

The birthday girl is third from the left on the front row and I am sat with one of Liz's grandchildren on my lap on the right hand side of the front row.

So, before I become too sleepy, I am off to have a look at what everyone else has been doing this week over at Handmade Monday.  Why not pop along and see for yourself!

Bye for now!

X

Craft Fair, Abbotskerswell, Devon

Hello Everyone

I'm supposed to be cleaning out the inside of the car but it's raining!  So, thought I would use my time productively and talk to you guys instead!  Far more enjoyable!

As will be the norm from now on, I will start first by thanking you all for your comments on my previous post, Cirlcle of Love Handcrafted Giveaway.  I will enter those of you who have 'liked' and 'tweeted' and left a message on my blog- you have remembered to leave a message telling me what you've done haven't you?  You need to do that in order for me to enter you into the competition.   Don't fret! If this is the first time you have heard of it and haven't done it yet there's still time, just click on the link and you will be able to find out what it is all about.  Now, not 4 but 5 lovely prizes to win!

As I expect  many of us are this week, I am doing a small craft fair on Bank Holiday Monday, so I thought I would show you a few of the items I have recently made to sell.

Here is a pretty Tea Light holder I made.  I think I have made about 8 or 10 of these!

This is something a little different.  Wooden bunting with pegs on the reverse to hang notes/pictures/cards etc.  My husband cuts out the wooden shape for me and makes a simple peg to glue on the back, I paint them in whatever way I fancy and string them together using cord I have twisted to get matching colours.  I have sold a few of these now and they get lots of lovely comments but this is the first time I have packaged them up as I found they were so time consuming to display hung up and kept getting tangled etc.

Here is yet some more bunting, this time it's mini fabric bunting.  Each flag is only about 2.5cm.

Here they are all packaged up!

I have a few more bits and pieces stashed away and am having a table next to my SIL Lime Green Lizzie and she has loads and loads of things!!!  Our main aim this time is to gather names of people who may be interested in doing workshops with us.  We have now found a venue and are just

deciding what workshops we should offer!  It's exciting times, so watch this space! Liz is into textiles and me the crochet.  Got any ideas on what workshops should be! Should materials be included or should you bring your own according to a materials list?  What do you like about a workshop, what do you dislike?  Do you prefer all day workshops or half day?  Any thoughts would be most appreciated.

I was very lucky this week and received my prize from Butterfly Blossom.  She created a very pretty string of bunting for me to use above my stall.  I shall take a photo on Monday so you can all see how lovely it was.

Oh and of course Chester will be coming with me too!!  And I may even take Taffy!

Why not have a look over on Handmade Monday at what other people have been up to this week.  I'm popping over now, see you there!

Happy Bank Holiday!

Bye for now

Alison