Another craft stall

Well i got a stall at the albert club open day again, i only just finished my exams yesterday though and the day is on saturday! I'm hoping i'l have just enough stuff to justify doing it, i sat in front of the telly making loads of hairclips last night, there soooo cute! I really love how they look all lined up like this!

I might make a few more, i want to be able to put some up on the folksy aswell but i'm going to have to wait till the sun comes back so i can take some nice pictures in the garden again, i think they came out well. The weathers so crap here atm, i woke up this morning because of the rain and thought i muvt be dreaming because there was no way it could be raining so hard! Poor postmen...
I'm planning to go fabric shopping today, if the rain goes off a bit, i have loads of ideas for my summer wardrobe and i cant wait to get started, yesterday i drafted up a pattern for a cute tunic top and tested it out, i'm planning to re-make it in pale colours with some embroidery at the top!
I love shopping!

Exams

I have been negelecting this blog... i have excuses! Its exams time, i have my last one tomorrow! Psychology, which i;m currently not revising for cos i'm lazy. It was my birthday too.i got htis shiney red laptop.
I'm going fabric shopping on wednesday, so excited, then i'm just going to go mad making stuff! excited!!

First Sale!!!

Omg the excitement of sunday morning, waking up to find i had made my very first online sale!! Somone bought the little crochet flower hairclips from my store! I sent them off on monday and they'v already arrived, got some lovley posotive feedback!
I'm so happy!
Hopfully there will be loads more to come, i feel like i have neglected my shop, i need to post sommore stuff thats more summery so try and get sommore sales!


In other news i finally finished and sent the earrings for my earring swap on craftster, i made all the earrings myself, mostly from stuff in my stash, and then made some nice little cards for them to sit on and some funky envolopes to sned them in!
These are the envolppes, made out of recycled magazines and comics, i'll post pics of the earrings when they;d arrived with my partners! And also pictures of the earrings i got in return when i reiceve off my other two partners! I got my firt pair a few days ago there sooo cute!!
x sarah

Ouchies!

Its official, i'm one of the most stupid people in existence..I'v broken my foot in two places falling down a step! So so so embarassing! And now i'm in a cast and hopping about on crutches as i cant put preassure on it for 3 weeks!

This is very annoying, as it makes simple tasks like getting a glass of water hard, and also, my college is so disabled unfriendly! I have to hop up 3 flights of steep narrow stairs to get to my psyc class because theres no lift and the doors are so heavy i need to get people to open them for me :( Thanksfully there are a few nice students out their to help! the 6th formers are nice but the younger kids are terrible!

The worst thing about it is the crutch pain! I'v pulled all my muscles in my arms and left leg froun hopping! And the handles of the crutches are really really painfull for my hands. However, being a little bit crafty comes in handy in these situations! I have fashioned myself some nice little pads for the handles!

Their quilted (never quiltend anything before, bit of an experiance) Two layers of batting, pretty purple stuff on top and felt on the back(for added grip) I then but bias tape over the edge as this is what i had for time and put some ribbons on the back so they tie arond the handles! Definatly one of my better ideas it has to be said, there working quite well, and only took a few hours to HAND sew (my sewing machine foot id the one thats broken!)


On a somewhat brighter note the lovely Ji ji Kiki (hope i got that right!) feathured me on her blog The Scavenger Bird Its a lovley blog with lots of beautiful prduct featured fromall over the net, so i suggest you check it out, especially if your looking for a treat or a girt for anyone!


I'm off to read some books and think of things i can hand sew whilst confined to my bedroom!

I'm so Productive!

I'v been so productive today! :) I finished a dress i started last night, then started and finshed another dress! With my newly fixed and re-threaded overlocker!
Woo! Its been a good week for sarahs sewing! I finsihed my txtiles as well! I rock! And now i'm just going to post alot of pics :)

Firstly, a sweater i reconned, the boys bought some to wear as band tshirts so i got one and cut it up! Were going to transfer print a band logo onto them..

A Little summer dress, first peice of my summer wardrobe, planning to make lot of clothes for the summer! I have planned next, atunic top for wearing over bikinis/ starp tops and the such. I'm going to americal and possibly to bearclona as well so i'm defintly going to get some good weather this year! Just need to go out and find the right fabric!

And a jersey dress, my first overlocker project, dead cute, although its really messy where i sewed the elastic in roiund the waist so i have to wear a belt to hide it, but i like the drapeyness of it, i'm going to make a couple of oversized tee's soon, again, trip to fabric store is needed! On my wishlist is one lightweight jersey, maybe white, maybe just whatever pretty coulder they have, and a light white(pr off white) cotton or linen for tunic top. And i want just soe other random stuff for skirts and maybe another dress!

The fruits of yesterdays labour...

As days go yesterday was pretty boring, my parents had friends round so i had to go be polite and then i was bored as the boys were banding, cant belive i'm one day into the holiday and already bored! But boredm did produce results! As i hvent been to buy black thread yet i cant finish my tec, leaving me to sew guilt free! I made this relly cute belt! I was going to paint it as its plain white but i'v decided it'l go with more this way, I'm wearing it today to town, so cute with little summer dresses!




I also had a go at working out a purse pattern, i really want a bigger more organised purse than i have now. It came out really wonky and not sturdy enough, think i need to use a thicker fabric, and be more precise instead of just cutting a load of rectangles and hoping for the best!



I'm off into town today to get some earring making supplys for the earring swap on crfster, i havent got my partner yet but i'm hoping if i go and get the important bits my stash will come up trumps! Anyway, off into the city now!

Swap with me?

Somone at my mums work recently gave me a load of quilting stuff, some of it is great, i'v never tryed quilting before and having been inspired by some of the articles in 'sew hip'(a re\lly cool sewing magazine) i would quite like to give it a go. However, some of the stuff in the bag isnt much good to me, as i'm 18 and not planning on kids for another 10 years or so, i dont really have much use for the kiddy print quilting stuff, i also dont know anyone who has or is expecting kids nd could use it. So i thought i'd offer to swap it for some fabric or stuff i can use!
Hopefully there is somone out their with kids and some fabric they havnt got a use for!



All the fabric, There are 3 squares of teddy bear stuff, one big square with some rabbits on it, one big square with tddys on it and some with strips of rabbits, there are four strips printed on one bit of fabric (if that makes ssense)











If you want better photos/ measurements ect feel free to email (notnearlyperfect@hotmail.com) or comment this post, if you dont want to lot i'll be willing to just give you a bit of it. I;d preffer to mail to the uk, but mught make an exeption :)
As to what i want, i'm not too fussy! If anyone has any lightweight white or off white linen or cotton that would be great, or really any summery fabric i can use for my summer wardrobe, alternatly, any bits and bobs of bbuttons and fastening and stuff would be nice. I dont know what this is worth so just offer whatever you have spare!


I also have, if anyone is interested, a few boxes of sewing tread, there is no way i can use all this thread (i have 2 more boxes of each colour) so if anyone wants to trade for these?




I'm trying to organise my room a bit so its nice and neat for revision, i'm startng by getting rid of the stuff i dont need :P

Please get ini touch if you think you could use any of these things!

Tea-4-1

Tea for ones are the best invention ever... The weather here is beautiful... really, i wore shorts and sunnies today, making themost of it. We;ll regert this in 2 mnoths when there is solid downpour through the whole of summer :P



I sat in the Garden this morning and had breakfast, then spent an hour in colege, got an ice lolly and came home to sit in the garden again. Now mums mowing the lawn so i came inside. Me and boys are going to do the four in hand pub quiz again tonight, i'v been brushing up on my trivia knowlegde, maybe we'l have a fighting chance this time with ben and lee coming along.
One day left at school then its easter break! Need to do alot of work. revision over the two weeks! I'v nearly finished my Textiles project so i'm hoping to get the girls over to do some photo taking duing the week, havent seen the girls in aggges!

London town!

Just got back froma psyc trip to london! It was aweseome, i love london, it put manchester to shame with everything thats going on. Though it was the most exhausting trip iv ever been on, had to wake up at 5 in the morning on wednesday to get the coach, COACH! sooo would have rather payed the extra £30 and got the train! So after getting of the coach we had to walk about a mile to the lectureplace, managed to catch about 10 minuets of sleep during one of the more boring lectures, then woke up to Loftus (wicked psyc woman) and then we went out for a lovley meal! Me ems wilf greg and tom went to cafe uno, as we were given £10 each for food from the trip kitty, was lovley! then we went to a bar, got back to the hostel, somone passed out, and we enede up not getti ng to bed till one, thats after 20 hours of being awake, i'm sure i'v never been awake for that long before!
The second day we had some shopping time, i got a way cute silk scarf from a vintage shop, for £12, its from italy and has classical fugures around the edge, i loves it! Unfortunatly its too big to wear in my hair (i had my hair cut boy short so i'm having to wear scarfs so i look more girly :P) Then we went to the freud museum, which was a pile of wank. Then we got the coach back!




Heres apic of a guard at buckingham palace :P Hes on his side cos my stupic laptop wont play.

Fun with Fimo

Woo, due to major boredom yesterday i thought i'd have a play with the fimo i bought around xmas, was pretty damn fun! I made some beads and some buttons, i dont have the patience for anything really fiddily! I'm loving how they came bout, think i might just have to make a few more! I'll prbbalym mdo some bigger ones for the middle of broaches and stuff, ake them a little more unique.





Another fun acheavement from yeaterday was me and mothers mini project of re-covering the kitchen chairs, she desperatly wanted new ones because me and the boys ruined them over the past 5 or 6 years, but, unfortunatly she spent all out money on building new bits of house and holidays so she wsnt alloud. I suggested re-coverning them so she can feel liek their new, we got the fabric from abakhans on discount, so she was pretty chuffed!





I'm still in bed, but soon,(ish) i'm going to get up and do some tec work, because its desperatly overdue. And then later on today, me and ems won tickets to see lilly allen at the academy, so were going to have a few drinks and go see that! Not a huge fan of lilly allen, bnut shes okay to listen to, better than staying in on a sunday night!

Battle of the bands!

The boys were absolutly amazing in battle of the bands, seriously, i was so impressed. When we got there they were all walking around looking compleatly depressed because the sounds check fucked up, but when they gotin stage they were amazing, tom was the best, as front man, he carryed the whole thing! And ben wore his handmade (by me) summer of 69 jacket.



I got some pics before hand aswell, but his is him on stage. The jacket was made as a joke because we think he looks like brian adams, out of bens old, fallen apart jeans. It must have seemed pretty weird to the people watching as they didnt actully play anything by brian adams, hopefully they will just have a
ppriciated the brilliant craftsmanship in the jacket...
For this weekend (just tomorrow now) I'll be trying to finish off ems embroidery, making a start on my college textiles project and trying to photograph somemore stuff for folksy, headbands ect.

You lost

3 days to go till battle of the bands... i havent done bens waistcoat! I'll try and do it tonight, four of my bets man mates, my little bro, my little bros mate and my ex boyfriend are in a battle of the bands competition this weekend! I'm really excited about it, i'v made one of my man mates a ridiculus waistcoat to wear onstage, inspired by his look-a-like brian adams.... Were going to make banners aswell...

As for things i'v been making, i made some cuper super cute little coasters for my newly tidyed bedroom. It took me three hours to clean and a further half hour to clean it, i decided it was a good idea to make myslef some coasters so idont get orange juice rings all over my surfaces, pretty clever idea. I made theese out of cardboard coverd in fabric with pretty buttons stuck on, they were mega easy to do, and well fun!





I also started an embroidery last night, my mate ems is moving room and i thought it would be a nice gesture to make her a little room warming present. Not sure she'll see it the same way, seens as every time she looks at it she will loose the game, once the embrodery is done i'll tell you about the game :P



I hope she will appriciate it! The stitching so far is pretty wonky, hopfully it will work out! I started work on some spring/ summer stuff for tea party yesterday, i'm plannign to get it all done and do a proper photo shoot with it all! I'm excited, i hope it'll work out as i plan, and be as cute as i imagine!

High heel shoes - the creation of the devil?

Well its six o clock and my feel have still not recovered from last night, my head has only just beaten them. Had my cousin down for the night so obviously i had to show her the local nightlife, the men of manchester let us down sorley, far too many drunk and gropey types around, but no more than i would usually expect on a night out. We got trashed and us two em and el stayed after the others pussyed out about half 12... Hopefully i didnt do too much drunk texting :s The pictures are pretty funny though, all in al;l a good night, cant wait till its my turn to go up to hers!



We also made fairy cakes during the day.... how cool are we? Ate quite a few for breakfast!

Shoes and free days

Pretty nice day :) only two lessons this morning then went out shopping and got some super sup super cute shoes! to go with my new going out dress, they will go with loads of my other stuff aswell, grey being a colour i wear alot, i have some black satin which i'm going to use with grey ribbon and buttons to make a matching bag. I also got two meters of black lace for my college textiles project, i finished cutting out fabric for the dress today, hoping to get started on it this weekend so i can do the hard stuff in college with miss!




We have a day off tomorrow because theres a careers day for the year 12's so i think i bunch of us are going to go to the four in hand near wilfs to celebrate, said i'd go back to town with greg tomorrow to get his dad a bday prezzie and to go get a big bag of buttons from the bead shop and ribbon ect :) be nice to spend some time with greg in the morning before we go to bens for 'wacky wednesday' bloody men and their bloody nonn commital bullshit.

Anyway, dissapointingly gotno time for sewing tonight (am i an addict?) made some pretty cute headbands last night though, i want to make a bunch in pretty summery colours with nice decorations for summer on tea party. I'm alos thinking about doing some colthes and stuff, but maybe in the future when i start getting sales and stuff.



I'm keepsing the blue one, i made it woth some of that pretty cintage fabrici got at the craft fair, going to do more like the purply one, its a bit too girly for me but i think others might like it!

Trying hard

Trying very hard not to neglect my blog, i guess i'm really bad at sticking with stuff! Had a pretty awesome weekend, friday night was some friends of mines joint 18th party, obviously i was complatly trashed! I think i accidentally promised to make several people capes. But oh well, anything to get the word out!

Sunday me and mum went to an antique textile fair in fallowfeild it was great, we went last year aswell but didnt get anything. This year i got some really cute ceramic buttons and some vintage fabric. I managed to break one of the buttons as soon as i got them home, br dropping them :( I'm planning to use the fabric to make pretty little hanging hearts, will need major interfacing action though!



For the rest of the day i made a bag and then on sunday i went to see my ex's band play in a scarey [art of town, they were better than i thought they'd be! Quite enjoyed the night and i got a drink and a guitar pick off paul! (woo, go me)

I'm just in the process of setting up a myspace to do some teaparty promoting, havent used myspace in years but i thinkit should be a pretty good tool for getting some traffic. Going to try and had out somemore cards and stuff aswell.

Till next time!

Folksy

Okay, i think i've nearly failed at keeping up a blog, but in my defence i've been way buisy! Been on half term so doing very little work and lots and lots of dossing about sewing for mates and for myself!



Finally got an online shop up its pretty exciting, i'm working on getting the word out at the moment and hope to get more bags and sewn items up soon.

An afternoons work

I came home intending to do my class civ coursework and yet again failed to do it, so now i have to avoid mr barry for another day and i feel well bad. Hes the only teacher who can actually make me feel bad for not doing my work!

Anyway, instead of doing class civ i came home and started to work out a pattern for a clutch bag, started with an idea and some fabric scraps, and slowly, with much swearing, unpicking and screwed up paper i got a finished pattern and a test purse. I'm planning on going back and making somemore modifications and different versions. I'm not sure the pleats work, but they might look better with a heavier fabric (the stripe is quite lightweight and flimsy) and i'm going to try a version without the pleats as well.

I have some lovely brown and cream fabric i want to try it with, with a turquoise contrast, and some bright pink. I want to try and put some piping round the edges as well, i'v never ytryed before but i think it would finish it off really nicley. I also want to made some that are alittle wider. this fits quite alot in but it would be nice to have it streched a bit.

Aside from that i just got back from my second ever belly dancing class! its so much fun! i'm going to make myself a floaty hippy skirt, the one i wore today was way too short! it needs to be floaty but not flare up so much that my ass is on show when we spin round!
I also started drafting the attern for my textiles project today, scarey shit, I'm making a long slip dress with a big train, then a lace bluse to go aver it, and a corset to go over that. I had no idea we were making our own patterns! its scarey stuff! I'm still pretty excited about it though, I love the making bit in textiles, its the bt i'm good at, it always fail at the wole, do a chart, then types up some research crap.
I really need some sleep, havnt been able to sleep for the past few nights, then had early mornings, i was so achey from it this morning, fortunatly the cow was open before collage, need the doffee to keep me going!

might go to bed now....

Buisy bee!!

Feel like i'v done alot today! even though i had a lie in this morning! did my lessons in collage, went into town got bits for peoples presents and then came back and made some stuff!! Greg and wilfs birthdays are coming up next week, so i'v made them both ties.... I also found for them, in the pound shop, what i tink are some of the greatest DVDs i have ever come across... for wilf - 'The Wrecking Crew - time to clean the house' Starring Snoop Dogg as the overlord, watching over the 'hong kong style martial arts action set against state of the art special effects' while Ice-T tryes to stop him. And for greg 'Born2Bgangsta?- A RAPumentary' Featuring Coolio and Ice-T.

Its not often you find hilarious gems such as these....

And these are the ties that will be overshadowed by the DVD brilliance. I do still really like the ties though, marroon for greg and pin stripe for wilf. I'm going to make greg some fake mustashes to go with this stuff, as he cant grow one of his own.I also managed to get hold of some hair clips today so i could finally put together my flower clips! i think they turned out pretty cute although i burnt my self REALLY badly on the tip of my finger while gluing them, and another pair of vintage earrings. Stuff i'm getting ready for when my debit card arrives and i can set up an etsy shoppe. I also started work on Chloes birthday present, im making her two stuffed elephants from the S.E.W book, and i'm going to think of somthing else cute to go with them as well.

And i got my Swap partner for my first ever Craftster swap today. its an hand bags and clutches swap, she wants a going out bag, i already know what i'm going to make!! I'm excited about this! Going to try out some new techniques, and try and new style of bag which, in my mind looks really really good... we shall see how that turns out.

I must remeber to do my Class civ coursework as well! funny how school work is so much less important to me than my sewing :P

Happy New Year!

I'v been buisy over the holidays, and now i'm back at collage so i havnt had much time to go online (i also forgot my blogger password) I'm ment to be using today to revise for my textiles re-sit tomorrow, but its excrucitingly boring reading over the unit one stuff, i know all the info i just have trouble amswering the quiestions because you never know what the examiner want from you!

I thought i'd post pictures of the christmas gifts i gave some of my friends, as they have them now, i think they all liked them, now i have to think of new ideas for birthdays.

I made these gloves for ella, i love how they came out, except there a bit big at the top. They didnt take too long to make, i might do a few more pairs to sell, they just look so much nicer for the simple decorations. I got the ribbon from this little shop in cornwall which sold craft supplys, homemade stuff and vintage things, its pretty much the greatest shop ever if you ask me, i got a pair of antique hand crocheted gloves there as well, there framed in my room now.

And for em i did some customised knitting needles! i used mums old woodburner from when she went through her crafty phase, it was pretty scarey, the cord was too short and there were no instructions and all the wirting on the box was in german, i know i took german for 5 years, but i dont speak a word of it. However em loved them, and i think there pretty cool too!

I also did a hat for chloe and a purse filled with random stuff for laura, i got a load of new craft stuff for x-mas so after this exam and all my coursework i'm gonna be pretty buisy!!

Embroidery?

Totally addicted to embroidery at the moment. Its really relaxing and really easy to get nice results! Problem is i dont really know what to do with the stuff once i'v finished... I might fame some of the stuff i've done so far but i need to find things to embroider so i dont have random samples lying around without a use!

This is prbably my favourte little one so far.... i got the image off google and thought it was really cute! I'm probably going to frame this one, i'll prbably eather sell it for give it away, it doesnt really go in my house but i'm sure it would look cute hung on a wall somewhere!I'm really looking forward to christmas now! Cant wait to get my overlocker! and my random crochet and sewing books! and other goodies to play with! I'm going shopping on friday to get the last of my presents for mum and my bro and i need to finish off making my mate presents, i'v just been slaving over a wood burner customising knitting needles for em! I'll post pics of all my handmade presents once there finished!And here are some cute trees for a very merry christmas!