Crime Scene Handbags

I've been buring the midnight oil trying to finish off all that I can for Saturday's Northside Makers Market ... it's going to be a lovely 26 degrees ... so you must come down and say hello!

I am rather pleased with the way my Crime Scene Handbags came out... they will sit alongside the Crime Scene Pillows I have done. Decaptiation, Broken Heart and Vampires will all be available for purchase .. along with dismemberment (not pictured).

I've really been enjoying doing the hand embroidery on these handbags. I ended up using machine applique for the blood, faster and more effective.

 

But I still have a few more to finish, press and then tag before Saturday morning. Does anyone know the collective noun for a group of handbags?

Northside Makers Market

I'll be glad when the week is over. The first full teaching week back is always hard yakka. Lesson plans, parent evenings, very little sleep and lots of photocopying. But in between all of this, I have managed to steal some time to make some stock for my first market of the year, Northside Makers Market. As a Northside committee member, I haven't been much use at all .. and to my team mates I apologise and promise to make it up with cider and martini's!

So here is a sneak peak of what I have been doing ...Firstly, my Wizard of Oz range .... Some Market Bags ....

Each one of course has a surprise lining ... you'll just have to come to the market to see what I have done!

 Some makeup bags or small pouches and some coin purses, these ones a bit bigger than my usual ones, so they should fit a licence.

I was very excited about using the Thea and Sami  hand screen printed fabric. They are a Queensland based business and they hand print it all themselves.

The bag has a bit of a Mattt's bag's feel to it, but the pattern is all mine and it is 100% cotton and machine washable (actually, the Thea and Sami fabric is 55% hemp/45% organic cotton).

And of course some new japanese fabrics have been used as well. I love this print and the colour palette.

So come along to our first Northside Makers Market for the year and check out all the new crafters and some old and trusty ones.

A skirt for work

2010 finds me placed in another "house" at school. I have previously been in red/burgundy house, blue/silver house and now I am in green/navy house (*obviously not their real names ... but you get the idea). Yesterday was the Year 7 Orientation day and it was suggested that Green should be the base colour for attire for the day.

Given that I do not have a lot of green in my wardrobe the challenge was to make something to wear from my stash. I also have a roll of cotton drill from making my bags ... so I used that.

I had a length of "computer styled" fabric and given that I teach IT, it seemed only logical that a skirt needed to accented from this ...

I used an A-line skirt pattern as my basis. Cut 15 cm from the top to make the yoke and then created an overlapping panel for the front. The green computer fabric was a strip of fabric 20cm at the bottom and 10cm at the top and then tucked into the seam. I didn't bother with lining the skirt, I wore a slip instead. The only alterations I need to do is to take in the waist which is a little big, which is easy due to the construction of it.

I decided to put my label on the front to give it more of a casual feel. This skirt passed the road test on a hot day, now for a cold winters day with boots on.

I tend to suit A-line skirts, hides all the bumps and lumps and a wrap skirt gives me the maneuverability that I need in the classroom.

(PS, if you are using Zemanta ... it was interesting to see the suggested links and references this plug-in threw back)

Tori's Quilt Block Pairs 6 - 9

I stole some time away the other night to do some more blocks for Tori's Quilt. Even though I am swamped with everything, I stole 2 hours to do 8 blocks.

Out of all of them the orange one was my favourite.

Tempted to get more of the orange fabric as I think that it looks quite lovely with all the swirls.

Edit: Oh Fransson has some quilting bundle packs to give away, head on over to her blog and post a comment!

Tiamo's

Tori and I stole a moment on Sunday night to have dinner at Tiamo's. Just us girls ... the last time we were there, she was a lot smaller and more of a handful. This time I didn't have to take the pusher, she just walked beside me ... enjoying the hustle and bustle of a busy street.

Tori is getting quite good now at occupying herself, drawing on a business card an ideal activity.

If you know Lygon Street in Melbourne, you should know Tiamo's. Quick, yummy pasta, excellent coffee and quick turn around.

So we shared some pasta ...

And then Tori wanted to finish off mine ...

We are still learning how to smile on demand!

Crime Scene

Things are a bit slow on the sewing and craft front this week, as I have started back at school and there is a lot of preparation and organization to do for the coming term. So only essential sewing is getting done this week, orders and market stock. Tori's Quilt has indeed been put on temporary hold.

But this afternoon, I stole a few moments while watching Project Runway, to knock over some more crime scene outlines on some Market bag fronts ...

The challenge is in finding the balance between my artistic vision for this range and using technology to get there results I need. Customers do not necessarily want to pay for hours of hand embroidery, even though they will say it is gorgeous!  So I am putting a lot of thought into deciding how to represent the crime itself and I am thinking that some clever applique work might be the trick.

I also have some new pillow designs in the works! Just to put things into perspective, the blood embroidery on the "axe" crime scene took 1.5 hours ...So what crime scene do you want to see?

Lazy Days

Today is my first day back "at school" and I would much rather be doing this ...

... meeting friends at a cafe and being served "too strong" coffee ...

... going back to their place reading some interesting books

Where did my baby go?

Sitting making a batch of baby shoes for an exciting new store last night and I found myself wondering where my baby had gone ... remembering the first pair of shoes I made for her in August 2008.

She is no longer a toddler she is a little girl with opinions and lots of attitude. At the moment her language is developing fine and every once in a while she will have a full conversation with you, but it still sounds like jibberish. At the end she will say "ok"?

Anyway, back to the shoes ... I try and do things in batches, so I was busy making baby shoe "tops" from all the material I had cut out previously. I line them with wool batting for extra warmth and breathability. I found that lined with polyester batting and they tended to get a bit stinky a bit too fast.

I love the Kokka bat fabic, the durability is excellent as it is a medium weight fabric and it looks so cute!

I still have some prototype shoes made in this fabric kicking around and except for the time when she got out onto concrete, they have survived Tori and the washing machine quite well.

I might have to make her a pair of shoes for winter, at the moment her feet are enjoying not having much on them when she is inside.

Developing direction

It is funny when I find a blog that I like, I tend to do random clicks through the archive just to get a feel for the type of person who writes the blog and whether I want to subscribe to it. I did this with the Anna Laura blog a while back and was surprised to read that she hasn't always done brooches, in fact she had done bags, hair accessories and all sorts of things.

It was fascinating to read how an artist has developed her vision for her business. Taken one idea and developed it, shelved another for a rainy day and moved on to develop another skill set. I love her screen printed bags and pouches, in amongst the pile of retro pastiche brooches!

Registered in July 2008, I originally started Konstant Kaos sewing baby shoes and baby items. I then branched out into all sorts of things within a common asthetic and feel and now I am spending lots of time making bags!

I've been doing lots of reflecting since my Happy New Year post, and I'd like to work further on my 2010 Crime Scene range and potentially 'go wholesale' on a selection of my products. Going wholesale scares me a little, but in order to build my business, I need to get sewing and get out there.

I like the idea that Jennie has of finding a theme that you can work with for the season rather than random sewing projects clumped together under business banner. I've been sketching ideas out and running a costing sheet on products t see if it is viable ... but then Jay comes along with her monthy design challenge to tempt me away from focusing on my business!

If you have gone through this hobby to business transition, how did you do it? Did you develop a story or a theme, or did you do something else? Share!

Paintbox Quilt Update

I decided to go with the current block design for the Paintbox Quilt. I spent far too long fiddling with colours from my Kona roll and the fabric I had, and then decided to take the advice of Elizabeth and go for monochrome prints. I think that they look better than what I started with, vibrant. I might not be able to use all the quilt fabric for Tori's birthday in this one, but it will look good and I have other ideas for a picnic blanket for her with the rest of the fabric.

The bat fabric is a Kokka Echino print from a few years back, I generally use this print to do baby shoes.

So I have done 5 sets or 10 blocks so far. The first one took me ages, until I found my rhythm. Now it takes me about 20 minutes to do 2 blocks, providing I don't get distracted! I am going to do the 32 colour Paintbox Quilt, with the new design ... so 5 colours down!

I do two blocks at the same time. Using two 2 1/2 inch strips I cut out 3 pattern and 2 block colour squares and then I sew them in tandem. Measure, Cut, Pin, Sew, Press, Trim if needed.

I work from the inside out and then with the left over pieces of fabric I quickly stitched them together and pressed them out so that perhaps I can make a mini-quilt from them one day.

I took the blocks along to my inlaws on Tuesday night and my daughter took a liking to the mini-blocks that I had done and spent ages sorting through them on the table and playing with them. I figure by the time the Single Bed Quilt is finished, I will have enough mini-blocks for either some matching cushions or perhaps a cot quilt for my shop.