New spiral garden

Just completed this tiered/spiral garden which has been in the planning stages for years!
The 'big snake' is an Alvin lift line which was used to haul the submarine out of the water by a huge A-frame winch on the R/V Atlantis .
My husband used to be an Alvin Pilot and he got these used and defective lift lines when the group no longer wanted them.
They are REALLY heavy and take a lot of muscle to move around.
 We have about 5 of them lining the driveway... you can see two of them in this picture.
The blue thing at the top of the spiral is a ceramic bird which is turned the wrong way in this picture. See below of a slightly better view.

We planted zucchini, cucumber, peas, and cantalope... all climbers.
The teepee arbor was made from a 4 stalked sasafrass we took down just for the purpose. It was getting big and would soon be shading the garden so we harvested it. I'll be adding more cross-pieces and twine to encourage the climbing.

Here's another shot of the entire 'farm' area:

 The garlic is coming up nicely and we've got 2 kinds of lettuce, 3 kinds of tomatoes, 2 kinds of peppers, broccoli, cilantro and parsley.
All is watered with a soaker system and surrounded by a simple wire fence. We're planning a nicer fence in the future.

Spring Burst

Well over a year ago, my husband helped me devise a rolling display stand. The base was an old office chair. It was a rectangular pillar of plywood waiting for my inspiration to decorate each side in a different theme.
Each side would get a mirror, a shelf, a fabric covered pouch, and 4 pegs to hang things on.
I got to the point where I'd covered three of the four pouches, I had the first side painted in a base coat(this is the 'winter' side which has snowflakes and hearts in pink and grey) but then got stuck.
I needed help attaching the mirrors and shelves. So recently my husband and I started doing just that. I ended up covering 3 sides!
Still many details to complete but the groundwork is laid and progress has been made.
Winter:

 

Night(you can see the unfinished side on the right):

Garden:

Last side will be 'Ocean' but no progress on the fabric pouch yet... maybe I should cover it with shells?

I've also been working on more bag designs. Here's the latest:

Really cute matching fabrics.
I used the tutorials here.
I really like the adjustable strap that goes with it.
I'm thinking of using the upholstery samples 10" squares might work great for a color blocked bag.

Finally today I'll share this T shirt. I used an old T-shirt of my husband's and cut off the neck band but retaining the binding at the back neck to reduce stretch.
Then I used my Sharpie marker and alcohol method to create the design, I am loving it!
Front:

 Back:

The neckline came out really cool! I used blue vertical marks all around. The sleeves got a rainbow. One sleeve one way, the other sleeve the other way. The 'sun' design on the back bled through to the front and some of the blue at the bottom of the back looks like sea and clouds which are both really great effects. The flowers on the bottom of the front are really nice too and the whole things really looks amazing.... if I do say so myself. Better than expected. Now the trick is to keep the color from fading. If this were a garment I didn't want Sharpie to stay on I probably couldn't get it out, right?

Yesterday, I took an old black T shirt and took off the sleeves and sewed up the bottom to make a shopping bag. but I just got the idea to bleach-dye it! so stay tuned!

more bags!

For a couple of years my cousin in Maine and I have been working on a bag design to use some woven fabric panels she got from a friend. A lining and a zipper were features we wanted to include. Another thing I wanted to try for was to not have to cut the panel at all, in case you wanted to take the bag apart later and use the panel in another way. not crucial but would be nice.
Another friend, who is a weaver, recently told me she had a woven panel she wanted to make a lining for. No zipper. She wanted some help with the sewing.

So I've been playing with some bag designs. Lined, some with zippers, I keep finding it difficult to make them look professional.


I started with a piece of fabric the same size as one of the woven panels (15x30).
I folded up a 12" pocket, leaving the rest for the flap. The flap seems a bit short but the actual woven panel has a long fringe and I didn't want it to hang below the bottom of the bag.
I used some upholstery samples I'd gotten from another friend. They are lovely fabrics with lots of body so I don't have to interface them.

With the two shown here I was playing with boxing the corners with different thicknesses. The black and white bag  has thinner boxed corners than the orange one.

 

I lined the bags by making a duplicate out of lining fabric, right up to the box corners.

 Then I put the lining inside and turned in all of the edges and top-stitched it to connect the lining to the bag.
I used some woven nylon strapping and attached the straps to the sides slightly to the back of center of the sides.

These bags are ok but I wanted to try a zipper.
Then my friend with the woven panel said she didn't want a zipper or boxed corners.
A simple sleeve to fit inside the 'envelope' made from the woven panel.

For my next try I decided to use one of the actual woven panels.
Here it is folded up like a bag with a zipper and some amazing embroidered fabric I had (another sample) that matched so well I had to use it for the lining.

I found an amazing tutorial for how to add a zipper here
and followed it... pretty much. I found I wanted some end pieces on the zipper placket and fudged some in. Next time I'll try it a little differently.
I sewed the lining to the bag by hand as I didn't want to see the stitching on the outside of the bag where the lining meets the flap. This worked well and would be good with or without a zipper. And the way that tutorial works, you could do either.

I ended up making a kumihimo braid strap which is just ok. I don't like the way one end is attached to the D-ring. I should have left the ends long and put beads on them instead of trying to hide them and cut them off.

For this bag, the flap is not lined, just the  bag.
Here's the results. Outside:

 And inside:

And zipped:

I don't like that it has very little body. It is very floppy. An interfacing would have helped, I think.
You can barely see the way I attached the handles to the side with some fake suede tabs cut from iron on elbow patches, but they came out pretty nice.

I did these a few weeks ago.

 Today I found new inspiration. I found this tutorial by accident and made 4 of these bags in 5 hours including a break for lunch and a couple of mistakes.
Here are the darlings:

The three small ones are all upholstery samples. The two small ones are using 10"x5" pieces and a 2"x4" piece for the tab. These take only 4 seams! AMAZINGLY EASY!
To be fair, the two zipper seams are  top-stitched, so that's actually 4 seams. And the other two seams get a zigzag edge after the fact so that's actually 4 more seams.... but they are all straight seams, and if you match things properly the first time instead of putting the zipper in facing the lining and having to rip it out and start over, they whip up like nothing! And so cute!
One needs a supply of zippers. I got some when I was at Mardens (omg, what a place!) with my cousin and then bought more on ebay. Now I have a nice supply at about $.50 each. The tutorial for the pouch mentions a link where you can get the 7" zippers needed for the small bags for about that price.

So after making a small pouch I decided to make another one a little bigger with some shiny quilted fabric, lined with a linen print. The shiny fabric had grommets I took advantage of, but had to put grommets in the lining, which needed a backing to hold the grommet. I ended up sewing around the grommets to hold the lining to the outer fabric which I hope will save those grommets in the lining from pulling out.

I made the other small pouch with some of the leftover of the shiny stuff.

Then I tried making one so big(14"x28") it is more of a pocketbook out of a different type of woven panel from my cousin. Although I did a poor job of attaching the piping(which is a change I made in the pattern... I made the last two seams with the raw edges on the outside, then covered the messiness with binding. I think this would be much nicer with a leather (or maybe leatherette? ... tee hee that is such a funny word!) binding and will replace it when I find some. It is hard to see the handle which is just made by looping the binding back to the top of the zipper as long as you want.
It is a really cute bag.

These items may appear on my other blog in a more finished form but I wanted to share the process here.

Autumn colors inspire

The view outside today. A little blurry but that's fine because it is the color palette that inspires......

... here are the earrings I've made lately.... looks a lot like the same color palette and I didn't really do it deliberately!

Nifty landscape-like pendant from random vintage button

Watched a video on the Beads Baubles and Jewels their web site. They were using covered buttons.
 Aha! I thought, I have many vintage covered buttons from the button-snagging I did last winter.

 I brushed a bunch of likely candidates with Mod-Podge and this one came out looking super cool!

I adapted their design... mine is a little bigger(about 1.25" across), I used the vintage button, and my beaded bail is embellished with size 15 picots.
 I just love the way the design looks like a landscape with clouds... I think it is part of a medallion pattern but I'll never know because I just had this one button.
 
 You can find the pattern here:
http://www.beadsbaublesandjewels.com/projects/2100_Serie/2102/BBJ_2102-2_INST.pdf


I have a few more buttons to try and will update this post when I have more.

Here's a photo of the view outside here today:

Blizzard of 2015! Good day to stay inside and create!



Doesn't 'Random Vintage Button' sound like a good name for a rock band?

Marketing

I've been having so much fun creating and am backed up on my ideas for posts but I wanted to write about the thing that has kept me occupied for over a week.
In order to assess the ability to sell from my home, I decided to have what I ended up calling a 'marketing party'. Who knows if I thought this up or was inspired by something I saw on the web but I can't point to a particular source.
Here's how it worked ...
I turned my library into a 'showroom' where I displayed several of the items I've made.
I made 'stations', one for each type of item. I wrote a short description of the source/inspiration for the item and asked 3 questions at each station. There were about 8 stations.
I then asked some friends over to go through the stations and provide their feedback on little forms I made up(example below).

For their 'trouble' they got a free pair of earrings. I also provided 'light fare' which consisted of some apps, quiche, salad and wine and cookies and dried fruit for dessert.
It worked pretty well! I didn't make any sales, but that wasn't the main point. They all loved the items and I'm hopeful they'll be back to make purchases in the future.

I also described a 'custom' service: I could make a switch plate to match a shower curtain(for instance) or make up a style of earrings with different metal or beads.
The trick will be timing. I need to be available when they are in need. I'd love to be known as the 'go to' lady when a decorating or jewelry 'emergency' occurs.

I learned SO much from the first small party with three friends from work.
First there were either too many stations, too many items at each station or both.
It took them WAY longer to go through the room than I thought it would. This means they were really engaging and putting some thought into their responses.... so I think that is some measure of success. However, if there had been 10 people there, it would have taken AGES as I think only about 3 people can be in the room at once.

Also, it might have been better to have some food first and then send them in.With only 3 of them they could take a break but another challenge will be organizing a larger group.

Another thing I learned was that I can host a party, prepare the food, and prepare the displays, without feeling like it was WAY too much work. It was a lot of work but it was doable.
I think I'd change the menu next time. Something less greasy, maybe finger sandwiches... and I made 3 kinds of hot savory apps which were cold by the time anyone ate any. My husband and I ended up eating them... not so good for the diet!
I want to figure out something more healthy to offer.

Here are some of the 'posters'  from the display:

 The three questions fall into these basic categories:

• Style
• Display
• Price

 I told the participants they didn't have to go to all stations. I also said they didn't have to answer the questions exactly if they had something else to say.
What I wish I had done was make sure they did the 'final stop' station. None of them got that far.

The feedback I received was good but I didn't really learn anything earth shattering I didn't already know about my products. One of the main benefits was their reaction to my pricing. I also learned a lot about hosting this type of event! Even without the 'final stop' feedback.

Here's the starting point:

 Here's the feedback form:

I've got some more people to ask to go through the stations.
I want to get some of my artist friends to come and see what is going on, also some teenagers and college students. I have a cousin who works in marketing and want to ask her how I've done.

Eventually I envision the 'showroom' would be a room for selling things and the 'marketing' display might move up to the studio. The marketing party would only happen occasionally. A 'sale' day could be an open house for one day every few months.... maybe more often if there is more demand. I'll post updates when I have digested the results after a few more showings.

Stay tuned for more posts:
- the new 4-sided display project that is under way but on hold for the marketing party and Christmas.
- tote bag using 'tube' method (like pillowcases)
- more ideas all the time!

Creative burst

Two very successful creative attempts this weekend.

First a pair of shell button earrings:

I loved these buttons when I got them in a batch of buttons last year. They are so full of character. I have enough to make 6 more pair. I made the oval jump rings myself. I think I might try a heavier gauge. I wonder how they'd look in silver?

Then I made some clay things for the first time in over a month. This one stood out:

It is about 1.25" x 1.5". I used a rock to make the texture, then mica powder of various shades sort of trying to mimic mother of pearl.
I'm very pleased with it although yesterday I glued a metal 'button back' to it to wear it as a pendant and I used E-6000 glue. Maybe I didn't give it enough time to set but it didn't hold and seemed like rubber cement. I was expecting something hard. I guess the E6000 is good for bead jewelry where it needs to give a little. I'll investigate other types of glue.