Yesterday my pincushion swap parcel arrived, and luckily the one I sent to Gemma arrived with her too so I can show you both!

I’m still on this craft neutral bent, so upcycling and recycling was the name of the game. The pincushion base is a (thoroughly cleaned!) little catfood tin which I covered with some giftwrap and coated in a layer of PVA glue. The cushion part is a pair of Nairn’s old jeans which had burst at the leg and which were destined for the bin until they were repurposed.

The pins were made by supergluing some tiny beads which came from a broken necklace of Erica’s. I made a matching needlebook which is actually the item I’m probably most proud of! I’ve had this binding for a while but been too scared to use it because it was so ridiculously gorgeous. I used some more of Nairn’s denims to create the needlebook, some felt for the inside pages and some felt scraps to appliqué the front. I made 12 little pins with the beaded tops and added in a few sewing needles and buttons for Gemma.

The outside, all folded up

The inside

For me, swaps are all about what I can make. I’m not sure why because every swap I’ve participated in has been really overwhelmingly gorgeous but I tend not to have great expectations of them, so when Gemma’s parcel arrived yesterday I nearly cried.

Look how cute this tortoise is! He’s filled with lavender too and smells absolutely gorgeous.

Look at his wee face!

As if that wasn’t cute enough, Gemma also spoiled me rotten with supplies:

A cute box filled with buttons:

And chocolate! This is quite the trompe-l’œil because there’s actually FOUR fingers of fudge and a large Dairy Milk caramel bar in this picture:

So needless to say I was absolutely thrilled with my swap, as were the kids with their fudge bars! Thanks ever so much to Gemma for being a fabulous swap partner and additional thanks to Claire for organising

Gemma has blogged the swap too – go, read!

Posted under Uncategorized

There is nothing worse for me than the last dregs of a project. The sewing in ends when knitting, the trimming and hiding of loose threads in sewing. The TIDYING UP part of any crafting – by the time I get to that stage, I’m just over it. I have very few semi-completed projects because I really hate having things left unfinished and I also have a mad drive once I’ve started something – I must get this finished ASAP!

This is why I’m quite surprised at my latest endeavour. You may have noticed that I’m on a bit of a knitting bent right now and after finishing up a bookmark earlier in the week I decided to try something a little more experimental.

That there is yarn made from plastic bags (also known by the hideously cutesy term “plarn”), a process which I promise to document with a tutorial this week sometime. I don’t know what it’s going to be yet but I’m rather enjoying the novelty of doing something a bit wacky and out there. The orange at the bottom is Sainsbury’s carrier bags and the green at the top is the wrapper from a pack of pampers. To be honest the pampers pack didn’t work so well, it’s very thick and not stretchy so it was difficult to manipulate and has become a far heavier fabric than the orange bags, but this is a learning curve and this knowledge in itself is handy to know.

So tell me – have you crafted with any supplies that are not exactly the norm? And do you enjoy the process of crafting more or the end result?

A reminder too that the sign-ups for the Little and Large swap are still open – it would be great to have some more participants!

Posted under knitting

I mused about this a few weeks ago and had a fairly impressive response so I’ve decided to go ahead with this.

The little and large swap of 2010
Okay, so! The premis of this swap is that we can do some crafting with our kids and get to know some similarly crafty families in the process. You don’t need to be a parent to participate but you do need to acquire a child to craft with – Aunties and Uncles or even childminders can get in on the action here – and it’s all in the name of fun. Participants will be matched as closely as possible on the number of children and their ages.

The Rules
1) Swap partners will be allocated on a build-a-relationship basis – that is to say, you will be given the email address of your partner and heartily encouraged to converse before sending your parcel.
2) Participants will encourage and assist their child(ren) to make something for their child(ren) counterpart and will themselves make something for the child(ren). Additionally, the adult participants should send a treat to their counterpart – a nice bar of chocolate, a magazine or suchlike. I would like to see letters being exchanged between the children but I appreciate that some of them may not be at a letter-writing stage.
3) Sign-ups open today and close in one week on Wednesday April 7th 2010 at midnight. Participants will receive their partner’s questionnaire by midnight on Thursday April 8th 2010 and have until Thursday May 6th 2010 to post their parcel. This date has been picked so that even UK second class post should have arrived by the weekend but international participants are also encouraged.
4) I cannot stress this enough: This is a swap to benefit the kids, if you don’t think you can send out your parcel in time then don’t join in. The idea of a child who has worked really hard on their present waiting for a late parcel makes me cry.
5) Participants should email me with the answers to this questionnaire:

Your name:
Name(s) & age(s) of the child(ren) participating:
Address:
Your blog/twitter/website/shop address:
What constitutes a treat for you:
Are sweets allowed for the little participant(s):
What is your craft discipline:
Some info about the little participant(s) – likes, dislikes, allergies etc

I’ll get to work on a swap button and a flickr group. I can’t wait to hear from you!

Posted under swaps, with the kids

Last night I met up with Lisa-Marie and Jen-Y and went along to an evening organised by the wonderful Glasgow Craft Mafia about Trade secrets – basically a get-together of likeminded crafters who were looking to share the wisdom learned in the process of becoming a business. I have to admit that I was quite anxious about it beforehand but thanks to a double-shot mocha and a dawning realisation that I have some experience, I didn’t stop talking for the duration. (Forgive me, if you were there!)

Anyway, one of the subjects we explored was business promotion and the topic of swaps came up – now I do enjoy a good swap and I like to think that I have organised some enjoyable ones but as an aside to getting to know other crafters better, it’s a superb way to drive new traffic to your blog and therefore your business. Here are my tips for a great swap.

Come up with an idea
If you’ve been around the crafting community for any length of time you’ll know that there are fashions and trends which are in vogue at any given time. To make a good swap, you want a theme that complements those trends whilst being a subject that inspires you. Try not to overegg the pudding as it were, go for an original twist on a popular concept.

Decide on the format for your swap
Are you going to have your swappers anonymous so that they receive a package with no idea who it’s from? Are you planning a direct swap where you pair up crafters and they can converse before sending their swap goodies? Are you having a more tiered swap where person a makes for person b who makes for person c ad finitum? Consider the pros and cons to each and go from there.

Set an achievable deadline by knowing your target audience
I couldn’t sign up to a swap with a two week deadline – I have four children, a husband, a business and various commitments that restrict my time – so knowing who is likely to join your swap is a great tool. Ask your blog readers/twitter followers/facebook friends for their opinion. I generally go for 4-6 weeks after sign-ups have finished to give participants a bit of headspace.

Make your participants send you a questionnaire that you can send onto their swap partner
It doesn’t need to be War and Peace, but a questionnaire will not only help you to allocate partners it’ll give your participants something to go on which is especially useful if they have a less than chatty partner to craft for. Generally my questionnaires ask for:
Name:
Address:
Blog/shop/twitter address:
Likes/Dislikes (including allergies!):

Give consideration to your participants and their crafts
Generally speaking, I try to match crafters from different disciplines rather than pairing a knitter with another knitter or a resin artist with another resin artist. Let’s be honest here, if I want to knit something for myself then I will but I’m not good at jewellery making and I’m less likely to make my own things. If in doubt, ask your participants to specify in their questionnaire which craft disciplines they’re most interested in receiving from.

Keep records
I particularly like gmail’s email system because of the way it stores emails and the ability to ‘star’ emails to find easily later. Keep a spreadsheet to remind you who you have partnered up because there will always be a participant who deletes their email!

Promote! Promote! Promote!

Social networking is your friend. Post about your swap on twitter, create a facebook page affiliated to your blog and post about it there, make sure you are regularly commenting on blogs you like because if you leave a well-considered and thoughtful comment you will get traffic back from that blog’s other readers. Join and participate on craft forums that appeal to your ethics – like everyone I enjoy Craftster but it’s so big that I feel intimidated posting there. My favourite UK-based craft forum is Crafteroo. If there are others that you enjoy tell me in the comments and I’ll add them here.

Share your swap
Make an image that your participants can post on their blog (“I am participating in Vonnie’s sleep swap!”) which can link back to you. Create a flickr group where participants can post photos of their given and received goodies. Encourage your participants to talk about the swap by doing it yourself – blog about it, tweet about it and mention it so often that you worry your sole topic of conversation is your swap. The internet as an entity has a short memory span, remind people about how awesome you – and by default your swap – are.

Enjoy it!
The day you have to allocate your swap participants you’ll wish you’d never bothered, that should be the only point where it feels like hard work

So I hope this is helpful to those of you who have considered your own swaps but not known how to go about it. I promise you, if I can organise one so can any of you. Good luck!

Posted under general crafty updates, swaps

Chatting with Kirsty recently, she told me that her son Devin had signed up as a partner in Chrissy’s felidae swap and I thought to myself, “Why on earth have I never thought about this before?”

So! I have a swap idea – it’s a parent and child(ren) collaboration, the kids make something for each other and send it along with a letter and the parents make something for the children and send a treat for the other parent. Does that make sense? This way, hopefully we can foster penpal-type relationships between our increasingly computerised spawn whilst making friends with another parent?

If you’re interested, please comment so I can get an idea of how successful this would be. A lengthy prep time before sending would make sense, so final posting in early May? What do you think?

Posted under for the kids, swaps

A few months ago I noticed that Sam of Incy Wincy stitches had organised a button jewellery swap. I hung off joining because things are just MANIC busy for me right now, but when Sam mentioned she was one person short i decided to go for it. I was paired with Laura Figiel of She Draws and I finally got round to posting Laura’s package off yesterday. Only a couple of weeks late – sorry Laura!

Unfortunately, being as far North as we are I’m struggling to get good photographs these days so you’ll have to make do with this. Time to dig out the lightbox again perhaps!

On the left there are two brooches, in the middle there are two hair bobbles, a keyring, a ring and a necklace. I had initially made a bracelet and decided I hated it so had to start afresh. I packaged these up with a FQ of Japanese fabric and a little pouch of Daim sweeties so hopefully Laura is happy.

I will get a photo of what she sent me later in the week Thanks to Sam for hosting this swap!

Posted under jewellery, sewing, swaps

Firstly a wee thank you to everyone who has left comments, emailed and twittered congratulating us on the birth of baby Greer. It’s hard to believe that this time last week I was in the throes of labour, terrifying passers by as I pottered about the newsagents in the hospital having very painful contractions whilst searching for a decent ice lolly! She has settled into family life with ease and dare I say it, is sleeping and feeding very well.
If you’re interested in keeping up with her progress, Bob has set up a photoblog project here entitled ‘Greer’s 365′ to chronicle her first year in visual form (WARNING – Day 1′s photo was taken immediately post-birth and shows my big boob).

Secondly, the next post will feature my belated 100th post giveaway. I hope to post this on Tuesday as long as I get time to finish the prize and decide what the entry criteria will be.

Finally, considering the Time for Tea swap was finished on the 27th March I am very late in posting this list! In my defence, I have been waiting for a swap between international partners to complete before I posted and that didn’t happen until a couple of weeks ago so forgive me.

I have linked directly to each participant’s entry so that you can see for yourself what a creative bunch we have reading this blog. Additionally you can view the Time for Tea Flickr group to see photos there. A couple of participants either haven’t blogged yet or don’t have blogs – they’re nearer the bottom of the list.

Apryl and Kathryn

Julia and Tor

Megan and Kat

Julia and Eileen

Hannah and Amanda

Courtney and Chrissy

Laura and Kathryn

Ali and Izabela

Anne and Sam

Jen and Kerry

Gill and Katie

AnnieB and Laura

Sue was stuck with me!

Pennie and Emma

Erin and Helen

Nadia and Fiona (hasn’t yet blogged the swap)

Posted under family, swaps

Firstly I’d like to say thank you to everyone for your very kind comments over the last week or so. Things here are still nowhere near back to normal but as the saying goes, “This too shall pass” and in fairness the worst certainly seems to be past us. I am frantically grabbing at the door to touch wood right now!

Secondly, I would like all of you with young children to head on over to Amanda of Kitschycoo fame’s blog, in particular this post and this post. You see, a month ago I bought this pattern and Amanda also sent me the pattern for her Matinee jacket asking me to test it for her. The pattern pieces are still sitting cut out but unsewn – a month after Amanda asked, I haven’t had two minutes peace to finish it. The thing is her patterns are fantastic! Very easy to follow, beautifully put together and unlike anything I’ve seen anywhere else so when I saw she was doing a giveaway I thought, “I must let my readers know about this!”

Thirdly, I finally managed to get my Time for Tea swap goodies posted off today although I’ve missed the last collection. Sue has been very patient with me as the world collapsed around my ears and I just hope that she’s as happy with what I’ve sent her as I was with her package which Sue blogged here. I actually wore the earrings the night my package arrived and they’re just gorgeous so thank you again, Sue!

This is what I sent to Sue – the candle is made from beeswax and is made in a vintage teacup with matching saucer. This was my first attempt at candle making and in fact I made another to burn myself and make sure it was okay! The silver caddy is filled with Faerie’s blood tea from my favourite little teahouse and there’s also a packet of shortbread fingers as I believe shortbread to be the best biscuit in the world

I also made a little bag with a felt cupcake appliqué and Japanese knot-style closure which I’m very proud of!

What do you think?

Posted under general crafty updates, sewing, swaps

So I have a list of 23 people interested in joining the Time for Tea swap which is just thrilling! I’m very excited about this and I will be looking for some more information from everyone over the weekend.

In the meantime, I’ve had a few questions which I’m going to attempt to answer.

I would like to do this but I has no crafty blog. Can I still play please?
Of course! The reason I asked for a link to your crafty endeavours is purely so I can make sure everyone involved in the swap is legit and unlikely to welch on their commitment. If you don’t have a blog/folksy/etsy set up, you can still get involved if you are either known to me or known well to someone else involved in the swap who will vouch for you.

Sounds good but I’m mainly a coffee drinker and not much of a tea drinker…
Then we can either match you up with another coffee drinker or with someone sympathetic to your requirements (you heathen!)

So, would a lace doily, a teapot cozy, or a take-out cup cozy apply for the “time for tea-related handmade item”?
The “Time for Tea-related item” is totally open to interpretation. Maybe you would like to send something you’ve drawn or painted that represents time for tea. Maybe you make jewellery with little cakes and teacups involved. Maybe you’d like to send an apron, or coasters. Maybe you’d like to send a massive stuffed teacup. The crucial thing is that you have discussion with your swap partner and that you answer your questionnaire fully in order to help your swap partner.

I’ve thought about doing a swap for awhile but I don’t really know how it works.
In terms of how it works, you will be emailed with your swap partner’s contact details and answers to their questionnaire. You then have until the 27th March to put together your package and send it off to them and you can also get in touch with your partner for more information or inspiration. The general idea is that you and your partner will co-ordinate your parcels so you should hopefully receive on the same day.

I’d love to take part in a swap….i’m scared I’ll be rubbish though!
Relaaax! When I took part in the Owl Swap I told my partner that I was so nervous about what I was making, but in the end it’s all meant to be fun and an opportunity to get to know another crafty type. Besides, your partner’s questionnaire should give you all the help and support you need to make your swap ace.

Also, do you mean a crafting supply of some type when you say “Something your swapping partner can use in a crafty fashion”?
Yes. Some fabric, some yarn, stickers, some buttons, a canvas – something that your partner can use to create something.

Are there usually min-max value/costs for these types of things?
Yes, for this swap you’re looking at a retail value of around GB£10 I’d say. Anything above that is down to your generosity.

For inspiration I would definitely recommend searching flickr, a simple search for “swap” will bring up lots of groups and images to inspire you. Craftster has a whole sub-forum dedicated to swaps with a section just for people to post what they’ve sent and received for you to peruse.

If you would like to participate there is still time. Email me using this link to note your interest (PLEASE use this email address as it is one I have set up purely to deal with the swap and it’ll save me getting confused!) by Monday 2nd March 2009 at 12noon. I will send out the questionnaire email on Monday evening to all participants and I’ll need it returned by 8pm Wednesday 4th March in order to delegate swap partners on Wednesday night.

Posted under swaps

I’ve been contemplating running a swap for a while now, and since I’ve wrapped up the Owl Swap with the fabulous AnnieB which was organised by Apryl from Meridian Ariel it’s about time to get something else started.

So! I am proposing a swap entitled “Time for tea”. Participants should be prepared to send their swap anywhere in the world although I suspect most if not all will be UK-based going by my readership. Please Email me in the first instance to express an interest, ensuring that you link me to somewhere I can view your crafty endeavours (blog, flickr, etsy, folksy – that kind of thing). It will be a direct swap (ie you will be matched with someone else and you will swap with each other) which will be completed in time to post by Friday March 27th 2009 and should include as a minimum:
A time for tea-related handmade item
Tea (loose tea, tea bags – or if you’re not a tea fan, hot chocolate?)
Something your swapping partner can use in a crafty fashion

I’ll be back by the end of the week with more information and links for inspiration if this proves to be popular.

Posted under swaps