first wholly craft: complete

First and last, unfortunately. Wholly Craft! of Columbus, OH sent us a cease and desist order for future shows, apparently we were tarnishing their good name. ;) Besides that itsy bitsy snafu, we all had a great time visiting with the super nice people of Springfield, and sharing our wares. So, it's not that it won't happen again, it will just be happening under a much different name!

Here was my table...


and I'm swiping these two pics from Whitney's facebook...






Whitney and Sarah of Scissor Scouts.



Elsie's cutie pie table.



New friend Rowena and her beautiful brooches made from Spoonflower fabrics she designed herself. So cool! I was happy to see the quality of the fabric up close finally, it's gorgeous.


My friends Jenna and Ellen, hmm hopefully one of them will have a blog or etsy I can link to soon. I was kind of drooling over Ellen's Liberty of London fabrics, haha!

Annnnd...






lots more! Whew!

I'm working on getting my left-overs photographed for etsy :) so I'll let you know when the store is finally stocked with handmade goodies.

oh what a beautiful...

...craft show day!
Well, here's hoping. So far, I love today. Woke up early, had a great shower (I love changing up shampoo, don't you? new smells are so exciting!), ate eggs and toast on my back porch, vowed to finish my new business card layout before noon, and then magically did!



What do you think? The ones I'm printing out at home on cardstock are looking pretty weak, but I'm hoping it's just my cheap printer. I'll use these for the show today and tomorrow, and then get some real cards ordered online. [Psst, if you get a card from me at the show, remember, it's just a prototype! Email me with your address and I will totally mail you a "real" replacement once I get them!]

Any changes you would suggest? Of course I have it saved as a photoshop file so any minor tweaks would be easy. Unless your suggestion is "change everything" and in that case...keep it to yourself! Hah!

Left to do today:
cut out cards
finish sewing (eep!)
finish pricing/tagging
pretty myself up
help set up at the Moxie
set up my own stuff

Whewwww. xoxo

buttons+project runway=zen

I was going through my sewing notions and found a hand full of buttons-to-cover, a few sizes missing the tool you need to put them together. I thought, hm, might be nice to use these up for the craft show...so what did I do?



Ordered a couple hundred more from etsy.



I desperately needed to unwind last night, so I set out everything on the bed, pulled up season seven of Project Runway on Mark's laptop, and made button after button. So zen.

They're all made using yummy vintage feedsack scraps from my precious stash! I haven't intentionally made "sets" but a lot of them are coming together quite nicely.



I can't wait to make up some cards and package them.

Plus, look what I found in my stash!

Is that gen-u-ine Flea Market Fancy?! Nope, it's the original feedsack the design was taken from. I just knew when Ashley posted her find that I had seen that feedsack elsewhere. So happy to have them in my collection, thinking maybe they should be framed?

wholly craft! it IS spring!

Okay, so, it's probably safe now to mention that for the past couple weeks I have been working on a super special secret project that I loved....RVA's Spring clothing line! (ps if you're visiting from Elsie's blog, hiiii! come on in!)

I was thrilled to be working on such cute stuff. I more or less just consider myself the girl behind the sewing machine, but working with Elsie is so so fun, she really let me experiment and incorporate my ideas in to several of the pieces. I'm so anxious to see the collection released on RVA next week, I hope you are too!

So, what's next?



Oh only Springfield's first ever (that I know of) indie craft show, being put on by two of my favorite ladies, and being hosted by my favorite indie theater!

It's a ways off, but I'm known to let time catch up with me. Work starts tomorrow (once I get the Bernina set up!) for the show. It's going to be gooooood!

first show: bust

My apology for not posting sooner, life has turned more hectic than I ever thought it could be, and that was after the craft fair was over! But I'll get to that in another post.



Set-up didn't go too terribly, nerves let me get up at 6:00 a.m. even though I hadn't gone to bed until 12:30. I did forget to bring chairs (duh!) and had to ask a tired, sickly boyfriend to drag his butt out of bed at 8:30 a.m. to bring them to me. I have to say, formally, that I couldn't have done this thing without him.





I met a few very nice people, and talked to several others. I really appreciate all the nice comments I received, however small. I just really wish someone would have bought something.



I don't mean to whine. It looked like very few others sold anything, either, which is sad. There were some very talented crafters there, considering how small it was. Turnout was poor, that's all. And to the three people who did buy something from me (even though we already knew each other), thank you!



My mom came up from Arkansas to spend the day with me, because she is the best mom ever, ever.



She and Mark were my little helpers! And kept me from going totally insane, both from nerves and frustration.



See, we had fun, don't worry!

Now, thanks to the wonderful Whitney (Mark's big sister) all my crafts are going to the Rock'n'Roll Craft Show in St. Louis. We'll be going up there the day after Thanksgiving and hopefully it will be a really great, productive weekend away from home.

tommorrow, tomorrow!

The tables are at the venue, the last of the business cards are printed and ready to be cut out, most of the sewing is done (shhh!), and I am so, so ready for tomorrow!

Okay, I'm nervous...maybe very nervous. But however tomorrow goes, I know it's going to be great.


For anyone visiting this blog after coming to the show on Saturday, before I can make it home and write up a recap...

I know it isn't much right now, but I have big plans for this blog! I hope you'll bookmark it, or add it to your blogroll, or "follow" it, or however the internet bloggy world works. Coming soon, I hope, will be an online shop, which will include anything that didn't sell Saturday (second chance sale!), new items I'm making all the time, and some extra special items from my vintage clothing collection. I'm also looking forward to creating some really awesome and helpful tutorials on repairing and altering your own clothing.

More tomorrow, or Sunday, depending on how tired I am after the show. :) My MOM is coming up from Arkansas to see my booth! She is my inspiration for doing craft shows, so obviously I couldn't be more thrilled.

new booth banner

Who needs to have things to sell when you have this amazing banner to put on the front of your table?



I really did finish it at around 2:30 a.m. so I think that's a decent excuse for the awful photo.
I'll have a better one when it's finished (stitching around the letters, ties at the corners). And when everything else for the show is finished, so I can photograph that stuff too. You know, the stuff that will actually be for sale.

The top half is a tan, heavier linen which was once the bottom of an Eddie Bauer wrap skirt I hemmed at the shop (more upcycling!). The bottom half is a lighter weight gray linen I bought months ago when I was working at the fabric store (stash busting!). The letters are odds and ends + Steam-A-Seam2.

first post

Preparing for my first craft show. Using these for my price tags. My goal is that even if no one buys anything, stopping by my booth will make everyone's day a little brighter.

Nixa, MO's Second Annual
Fall Craft Fair
Saturday, November 14th, 2009
9 a.m. to 4 p.m.

407 Old Wilderness Road
One block west of 160, directly behind Braum's.