Shopping with Purpose

I've been fabric shopping! Legitimately too, not just because I had the fabric buying itch. I needed nice, big, pretty pieces of fabric. Here's what I got:

I'm loving red and white stars, I was even wearing a red a white starry jumper today without even realising. The deer fabric is also particularly cute, and sparkly! Oooo, glitter...

I've started with hamster beds, which can be seen here, tomorrow I may move onto hammocks. I also have some gorgeous owls on the go (if I say so myself) for a lovely wedding gift, and had a bit of a practice run:

I love it! Think I'm going to add them to the Jenny Sews range. and try not to keep it.


In other news, my lovely new order book is open...

...and is this not the ugliest wall planner you've ever seen?

Jenny
   x

New Goodies

I was hoping to have a few more items made before I started posting about the new additions to Jenny Sews, but I'm just too excited.

Over the Christmas holidays I got a new hamster, a Russian Dwarf called Princess Cutie Pie.  She is ridiculously cute.  As with all new projects, I got a little bit obsessed and thoroughly geeked out on a hamster forum! It's awesome.  There are others just like me.

Princess Cutie Pie, too fast to photo.

Whilst perusing the DIY section, I discovered hammocks and the such that other members had made. An actual light bulb went off above my head. "Hamster beds, made of Spidey fabric!" You can imagine the levels of excitement. So I had a little practice and made this for Ruby's hamster Mary:

Mmm, fleecy.

So far it's been mostly somewhere to eat her treats, but she hasn't chewed it up yet, which surprises me as she does enjoy destruction.

Spoilt much?

So I'm thinking of making hamster sets, a bed, hammock and sleeping bag, all in matching fabrics and fleece lined. Small projects, perfect for my short attention span. Plus I get to order more comic book fabrics, legitimately. Boom.

Let me know what you think!

Jenny Sews Returns!

Happy new year! I hope your 2013 is off to a flying (and creative) start!

I officially start sewing again on Monday, so I thought  I'd spring clean my craft room. I thought it'd take an afternoon, max. THREE DAYS LATER, here are the results.

Before:

After:

It's looking so much better if I say so myself! I can't wait to get sewing. I have lots of new ideas for Jenny Sews, none of them sock related! I will of course still be surrounding myself in Sock Creatures, and doing the craft fair circuit. Updates on dates and times soon, I have three fairs booked already though!

Hope you had a great holiday!

Jenny

x

The Keepsake Creature Competition

It's competition time again! I never win competitions. Fair enough I don't enter them anymore, but even as a child I didn't win anything. You, on the other hand, can win your very own Keepsake Creature!

I will make a creature of your choice from your child's (or your own) old clothing, and embroider a name of your choosing on the back. All you have to do is like, comment on or share my Jenny Sews page to be in with a chance of winning. You can either search for Jenny Sews on Facebook or click here.

The competition will close on Saturday the 12th of May and the winner will be randomly selected from all those that enter.

Happy competing everyone!

Three Weeks In

So it's been three weeks now since I've become self employed and I am loving it. It's hard work, but it's so much fun and the feedback has been amazing. Last Saturday I did the Brymbo Community Market and had a brilliant day, the stallholders there are all so wonderful, as are the customers!

Sunday was a fair in Chester, which was not so succesful but I met a lot of lovely people again. When I decided to work from home, I was worried it could end up being a bit lonely, but it's been quite the opposite! I've met so many talented and like minded people already, it's such a exciting community to be involved with.

Anyhoo, fawning over with, here's to this weeks projects! I sold 34 creatues over the weekend (yay!) so I'm stocking up ready for the Garden Village Farmers Market on May the 5th. Unfortunately I have been attacked by a beast of a cold, so bad in fact, it can only be called Man Flu. It knocked me out for a day or two but I'm back on track and have so far finished these guys:

Chillaxing before a race.

Kapow!

I have lots more stuffed and waiting to be limbed, so that's what I'll be spending my weekend doing.

 I was also contacted by a lovely lady called Leanne about turning some of her children's baby grows into bunnies. Of course I said "HELLS YEAH" and immediately went and raided Ruby's old clothes.

Before:

After:

As you can see Ruby loves it!

She's called it Ruby.

What a week!

Well it's been a week since I've become self employed and it's been hectic. I have discovered a few things:

1. Only one person mans the tax office telephones. (That's why I can't get through to anyone, right?)
2. I will have to extend my overdraft to pay for the unanswered but option filled phone calls to the tax office.
3. The people at the Job centre rock. They really want me to work.
4. The folks at Trading Standards also rock. There were some button eye issues, but after breaking into a sweat trying to pull one off, I'm pretty confident they're safe. I'm going to try a few creatures with embroidered eyes though.
5. The Tax Office sucks.

I managed to squeeze 29 hours worth of Jenny Sews related work in this week, which with a 4 year old off for the holidays was pretty tough. Not much relaxing this week for me! Thankfully my mum and sister took pity on me and took my wild animal beautiful daughter for the afternoon on Thursday and Friday.I'm not even going to pretend I'm not looking forward to school on Tuesday.

We did have a productive day today though, as she helped me build the new shelves for my stall.

She does not like the sound of the drill.




I have a nifty flowery hammer which unscrews to reveal all manner of different sized screwdrivers. I actually wanted to use that one myself but I was left with the regular ol' wooden one.



Once they were up I was very pleased.




As was Ruby. They also fit the kits on really well, but I think I'm going to rethink the packaging. Those cardboard tabs are already getting a bit tatty.




Next weekend is a big one craft wise, two fairs! Saturday 21st April I'll be at the Brymbo Enterprise Centre for the monthly Brymbo Community Market, I had a great time there last month and it seems the stallholder numbers have swelled dramatically, which is exciting.

Sunday 22nd April I'll be in the Guildhall, Chester for the How Bizarre Craft and Gift Fair, first time I've had a stall with this company, but I'm hoping it will be good. For further info, have a look on my website under "Fairs".


Now to spend the week sewing like a mad woman!



Ruby picked out her own outfit today by the way.

It is Time.

It's official! As of last Friday, I am self employed.





"What do you do for a living Jenny?"

"Me? Oh, I make Sock Creatures. Yeah I do."




As exciting as it is, I'm not exactly starting with a bang. I've got lots and lots of animals to sew, and my website isn't nearly ready. I have five craft fairs booked, but that only takes me to June. My marketing goodies have arrived though, t-shirts, business cards and swish magnets to go on the side of my car. I even cleaned my car especially so I could put them on, but I'm a bit reluctant when they direct you to a website where there's nothing for sale...




I was hoping to have it ready for launch by last Friday, but it's way more complicated than I though. I'm not the biggest technology fan. Sitting in front of the computer for hours is not my idea of fun, but I need to man up and GET IT DONE. Next week. For now though, I'm going to keep sewing (I've nearly finished a very nifty cat) and get those fairs booked and then next week, (when the four year old is back in school) I am going to kick the website's buttski. Hells yeah.