Pretty Dresses



Special Dresses!

 My friend Claire has just asked me, "Why don't you blog about the stuff you're making?" Well, the reason (or excuse) is that I'm very disorganised! I think I keep up quite a good pretence most of the time that this isn't the case, but if you saw inside our home, you'd realise that it's all just a front.
Anyway, I'll try to turn over a new leaf RIGHT NOW, and show & tell you what I've been up to over the past couple of weeks.


work in progress... a lot of blank faces!

 I have a little stash of very lovely fabrics that I never seem to get around to using, and I've had in my mind for a while that I'd make some little bunny and kitty brooches with them all wearing little dresses in these lovely fabrics.  I wanted to make something different and special for the Craft Candy Christmas craft fair on 27 November (which is only six weeks away - ARRGHHH! I'M NOT PREPARED! I will be though, I will be...) at which I will be having a stall, so if you're in the South Yorkshire area you must come along to get a bit of Christmas shopping in, Craft Candy fairs are always brilliant displays of beautiful handmade arts and crafts.

I've made a collection of nine (one has already flown the nest though... She's not pictured here), each with a different dress fabric, which is also on the backs (of course! Otherwise it would be rude for a prim little bunny or kitty to have a bare behind).

the back of one of the brooches, showing back of 'dress' and the brooch pin

I've embroidered the collars on by hand (it isn't lace) with cast-on buttonhole stitch (although the pink bunny in the strawberry print dress has a green woven picot collar, because it looks a bit like the calyx on a strawberry).


cast-on buttonhole collars

woven picot collar

 The next thing I'll be working on will be a bag or two along the same lines as my embroidered concentric circles bags (orange one pictured below)... more news about them soon! Oh and a little secret...

The orange 'concentric circles' bag

Have a good Monday everyone!

Best wishes

Joey x

Candyfloss Summer Craft Fair

Cute Little Raku Bottles from Zandra Ceramics

Goodness! What a week! What with a busy time at work, having a whale of a time with friends making sock monsters on Thursday and planning some new embroidery designs, this is the first chance I've had to tell you about the lovely craft fair I went to a week ago, run by old friends Craft Candy.

There were so many gorgeous stalls, but I only took pictures of a few (you can see the pictures on my Flickr pages here) and here's my favourites of my favourites!

Zandra of Zandra Ceramics specialises in raku and wood-fired sculptural pieces and vessels. In one of the wood-fired vases Zandra had pressed a safety-pin and because the temperature in the wood kiln gets so high, the pin had completely melted and left an interesting metal residue.  I liked the tiny raku-glazed bottles (pictured above) so much that I bought three!

Sian of Siansburys' stall looked as bright and fun as always, with her cute and so beautifully-made sock monkeys. Sian has been making her sock monkeys for a few years now, and each one is a unique work of art.

One of Siansburys' Cute and Colourful Sock Monkeys

Kirsten of Quernus Crafts makes wonderfully colourful and patterned millefiore polymer clay critters, the like of which I don't think I've ever seen before! Kirsten makes her own intricately-patterned millefiore canes and then creates cute little creatures like snails, moles, cats... and even a tiger!  They will really brighten up your day!

Little Snaily with a Beautiful Shell from Quernus Crafts

And lastly, we come to possibly the star of the show! Gemma Nemer (who runs The Button Tin craft workshop in Rotherham) won the prize for the best-dressed stall, and just look at these pictures for a bit of eye candy! I think you'll agree that Gemma's stall was super-sweet!  This is it:

Gemma Nemer's beautifully-dressed stall

Look! She even made the signs all vintage-y and cute with retro fabrics and lots of lace, with hand-stamped text.

Gemma specialises in textile accessories made from vintage fabrics and upcycled embroidered linens. She also teaches classes in her studio at Rotherham, the Button Tin and there's all sorts lovely things you can learn to make!

I can't remember whether these were brooches or hairgrips... they're lovely anyway!

Gemma made a necklace just for her Blue Bunny!

Now I'm looking forward to Craft Candy's next fair, the Christmas one on Saturday 27 November 2010. Applications are being accepted right now until the end of August, so go to their site if you'd like to be considered for a stall.

Best wishes

Joey xx

Skippity-Skip!

Hiya! It's hard to believe that the video above, with the beautiful sunshine, was only taken yesterday, as it's gone all gloomy and rainy again... typical British weather!

I had a fantastic day yesterday!  Me and my friend Louise went into town to catch a bit of the Sheffield Chance to Dance event... we saw all sorts of dancing, but my favourite was the Irish dancing, which we watched in Barker's Pool. Those kids are so energetic!! I can't believe how much they skipped and leapt around like happy little spring lambs! I think they have rubber legs, they were very springy indeed.  I took a few pictures as well...

One, two, three and - float!

Hop!

I love their turquoise skirts, they were just so... swishy!

We also went to the Craft Candy mini craft fair at the Bungalows and Bears bar on Division Street, which was very nice. There will be more Craft Candy mini fairs, so check their site for more info... you can have a drink AND shop... what could be better?? I bought a little badge from Fox Bunting, bearing a cute little illustration of a fox. I like foxes.

Then a quick trip to Hillsborough on the tram to Fine Fabrics, for a bit of fabric for the project I'm currently working on for Making Gifts magazine.  Which is all I can say about that for now... but watch this space!

I also have a slight sunburn as a free memento of the day! Whoops! Silly me...

Have a fabby week everyone! Whatever you're doing...

Joey xx

P.S. I'm hoping that the public voting for the Feeling Stitchy rainbow of stitches contest (of which my Little Tiger embroidery is one of the 10 in the final) will start tomorrow... I'll post a link to it here as soon as I find out!

J xx

The Owl and the Pussycat

Hiya everybody!
I hope you're all looking forward to Christmas, I know I am... I love the run-up to Christmas when all the lights are up in the streets and houses, and you get to ogle all the gorgeous Christmas ornaments in shops and on places like Etsy.

I've done my first ever Christmas craft fair the other week, which was organised by Craft Candy. The Craft Candy fairs are always a lovely way to spend a few hours looking at wonderful handmade things, and a great chance to buy some unique gifts. Me and my friend Claire of The Pin Factory shared a stall (click here: to look at photos of our stall) and the centrepieces of our wares were some things which we had collaborated on.

As we both like cute things, we decided to make a couple of owl and pussycat in a pea-green boat sets (which you've just seen in the picture above!). Claire made the boats, and I made the owl with his little mandolin and the cat (the ones pictured here includes Tototl the owl with Minoo the white pussycat, the other set was sold at the fair and included a green owl and pink pussycat. Very cute if I say so myself!)

This is a close-up of the tiny mandolin:
We also made a couple of sailor foxes in blue boats, the fox pictured below is called Kai; the other fox is called Sorley. I'm really pleased with this because the fox's tail is "jointed", meaning that you can move it to different positions.

I will be listing the sets pictured above in my Etsy shop very very soon, so watch this space!

Have a happy weekend!

Joey x