Flooding, Revival of the Cottage Industry, My Current WIP

Over the past week the news has been dominated by the bad weather both here in the UK and in America.  We have had flooding and quite a lot of America has been gripped by snow and sub zero temperatures, which hasn't provided a lot of people with the best start in 2014.  I hope people who read my blog have not been affected too much by the extreme weather.

Copywrite of Reuters.  Chicago trucks frozen in ice

Copywrite BBC News  Flooding in England with more rain predicted

This past week I have not had chance to do much at all, last Sunday I came down with flu big time and spent 3 days in bed with no energy whatsoever. I am fortunate though, being a foster carer with my husband also allows me time (flu permitting) to work from home making cushions in between the daily school run which we share and meetings. 

 Nevertheless, whilst ill, I did get the chance to surf the net for something to do and I found a really interesting site called Planet Handmade which can be found at http://www.planethandmade.net/.   Reading some of their blogs, one piece that caught my eye on their 'A Return To Cottage Industry' blog on 29th August 2013 was that National Statistics published 16th April 2013,  2.5 million people in the UK now run business from home, representing 52% of UK small businesses using.  However, Planet Handmade do point out that this may not include craft businesses operating under the VAT Threshold    I can remember learning about the Cottage Industries leading into the Industrial Revolution and enjoyed studying that period when I did an Access Course at college prior to going to University a few years ago.

What I love about that era  was the different skills used creating items prior to the Spinning Jenny and industrial Britain with mass producing factories.  Whilst industrialisation had its good points, helping to shape the way we live today, some skills were in danger of being lost forever.  Fast forward 3 centuries and the modern day handmade crafting is very much prevalent ensuring that these skills live on.

Whilst its easy to go into town or go on-line and shop at big named stores, to me it has turned into a bore and lacks gift satisfaction.  My daughter told me and my husband once that she loves looking carefully for presents for family and friends, preferring to purchase something that the recipient would love rather than just getting something off a store's shelf.

 Like me, she loves to wander round craft stalls and has dabbled a bit in card making.  Yes, there can be a huge argument that factory made is cheaper, especially with today's shaky economy with budgets constantly being cut, against hand crafted items when you put into context the amount of time, materials and the satisfaction of creating something personal for somebody and keeping skills alive such as jewellery making, knitting, ceramics, etc for me personally, that wins my vote.

My mantra is you give gifts with love and when you buy handmade your gift is made with love, also for personalised items they are unique to the person receiving them. With my cushions I do always worry that there is something that my customers will not like with regards to the finished article but then the immense satisfaction I get when they are pleased with the finished piece totally outweighs the time I spend creating it.  For me cross stitch is an enjoyable past-time and my chill out time and whilst I enjoy what I am doing I feel fortunate that I can branch out with my own little cottage industry.

My Current WIP

 A week later I am finally getting back to good health and have spent a couple of evenings cross stitching Heavy Going Grizzly.  So far you can see the shape of one of his ears and I started on both his eyes so he could start to see.  I think this evening will see some more of him  take shape especially as there are no dreaded confetti stitches in this chart.

Happy New Year

So 2013 has come to a close and a New Year is upon us.  Welcome to 2014 and I wonder what it will bring for me with my stitching, business and home life.  Looking back to the post I did last year it looks as though I have only managed to stick to one of my resolutions which is sad but I suppose ACTUALLY sticking to one is better than none.

This also made me wonder, how many people who read what I have written on my blog actually manage to  make and stick to their resolutions and what they were.

Instead of making resolutions this year, looking on the internet I found a quote by Lao Tzu .  I do love motivational quotes, especially as starting up Created With Stitches has been a journey with many steps, hurdles and learning curves; and continues to do so.   Whilst the fostering is undertaken by both me and my husband, looking back at all the photos of the cushions  I have made, I am really pleased that this is something I can say "I did that myself", whilst continuing with a relaxing hobby through cross stitch. However, stitching aside, in our own life's course, we all have a long journey.  I hope for everybody that their own individual journey  becomes easier throughout the coming year.
  

As for the coming year, now its time to start planning for Valentine's Day and Mother's Day, especially as over here in England it will be on 15th March.  Straight after Christmas Day we did notice the supermarkets were already filling the shelves and advertising Easter Eggs (and I still have loads of Christmas Chocolate left).  So far I have started designing some small valentines cushions and will then move onto some medium sized ones too ready to advertise for sale.

Stitching News

Over the Christmas period, I was busy stitching..........sandbags on my sewing machine.  My daughter had a school project to make a World War 1 trench and I was cutting up a supermarket jute bag and stitching squares stuffed with wadding to help her out.  I also ended up making barbed wire for her from some picture wire and then cutting smaller pieces of wire to wrap around the long piece.  However, I did turn into a victim of my own making when it came to wrapping the barbed wire into circles.

They look like a breakfast cereal

The finished result

Close up of the sand bags, also the dreaded barbed wire

On my other stitching, I have now started Heavy Going Grizzly.  Its been sitting in my cupboard for a number of years and since we have been redecorating our hall and landing we have slowly sold off all the horse prints we had on the landing.  Downstairs now hold copies of my step-daughter's artwork on canvas and up the stairs (well 2 flights of stairs) due to the size of our house hold my cross stitches completed over the years.  We also had a mirror on our landing but that has also gone now and a space keeps reminding me to get on with another cross stitch to fill the gap.  I will start posting pictures of it as I make progress on it.  Perhaps that can be a New's Year's Resolution.......to get it completed before the end of 2014!!

Many thanks for reading this blog and any comments received are very much appreciated.

Lisa xxx

Pop Up Shops, More sales for my cushions and Christmas in the Wilson Household

Yet again its been a while since I last posted on here.  Since then things have been busy in the Wilson Household and for Created with Stitches.

Early December for my business saw me stitching away like made creating cushions for a pop up shop.  This was an idea from my local Bank where I have a business account for all small business customers to advertise and promote their business.  

Whilst there is a big push for handmade items to be sold on sites such as Etsy, Folksy, Not on the High Street, the advantages pop up shops can bring can help to promote the items for sale without long term financial commitment on rents and bills etc.   This provided me with the opportunity of market research, talking to people about their views, and spreading the word with business cards of my name and brand with potential sales, which did happen.  More about pop up shop opportunities can be found (especially here in the UK and within the London area) on www.startupbritain.com.  All in all it was a productive day with plenty of business cards given out, more Facebook likes and I even managed to sell quite a few cushions.  Now I have to start building up stock again.

At the moment, I am relying on building up word of mouth I am also rolling out online sales on my website www.createdwithstitches.co.uk and will be venturing out again with another pop up shop and craft fairs in 2014. Since my last post (a couple of months ago) here is a sample of all the stitching I have been completing.  

Whilst most of the work involved making medium and small sized cushions I even managed to make some smaller lavender cushions with relaxing messages on them.

But in order to display my name, rather than go for a banner I decided to opt for a larger cushion with my business name and contact details.  This then gave people the opportunity to see how big each size cushion can be ordered or made and sold.

The end result of my stall just before the bank opened was this.

I do have to admit though, this did give me sleepless nights beforehand, especially as this was my first time I had showcased my work.  I was nervous whether anybody would like them but managed to end the day with £50 worth of sales.   I did do my homework prior to this looking at various blogs and sites on setting my stall up but the worst part was the tables.  Whereas I practised on a standard 6' pasting table I did have some changes when I arrived to go to 2 smaller tables instead of this layout I had adapted at home with my friend Caroline who also has a small craft business.  (Just excuse the background decor as we are redecorating in January) 

All in all, my biggest fear was that people would find the prices too high for the various sizes advertised, however the majority of people accepted the amount of work put in and uniqueness along with everything being hand made were happy with the costings.

Along with all my stitching its also been busy here in the Wilson Household with the run up and during Christmas.  Buying and wrapping Christmas presents, visiting my step-son and his wife, with my husband and our own two teenagers up in Sheffield for the weekend and collecting one of our young people from Leicester University en route back home to Lowestoft on the way home to stay with us for Christmas.  As usual it was also busy at the start of the month with us decorating to produce this years Wilson Wonderland with 9 stockings on the fireplace (as our dog Evie has to be included).  Wrapping took ages for 6 children and young people along with my parents presents (and my dad's presents for my mum).  9 dozen mince pies were cooked along with 7 dozen sausage rolls

Christmas Day saw 10 of us sitting round the dining table to a 3 course meal with my son on the settee in the dining room with his dinner perched on a small table but it was a success.  

Hope everybody had a good Christmas, and I would like to wish everyone a Happy New Year and hope 2014 is happy and healthy xxx

Why do I feel a right Twit over Twitter? Latest cushions completed and the big project

Twitter

I am in desperate need of a lesson on how to use Twitter.  Don't get me wrong, I am not bothered about using technology, in fact I must be one of the first people in our family to purchase new technology that's out.  When it comes to Facebook, I can use that easily, Pinterest I am getting used to - uploading new photos of cushions created, even creating a website for my online business........but Twitter........I feel such a twit over it!!!!  Am I the only one?

Like Facebook, I have both a personal account and an account for Created with Stitches, but I struggled with not only my personal Twitter account but also the account I set up for Created with Stitches, that I deleted the Created with Stitches account.  One person I do know who is well used to (Twittering?)  is Anabel, one of our ex-looked after children young person who Twitters away constantly.  Now she is away at university, it looks like I am going to have to wait until the Christmas break when she returns home for Christmas to have a lesson off her.....and hope I can master it and get my Business Twitter account back up and running again.

Cushions completed

This week, I have been busy making more cushions to upload onto my website www.createdwithstitches.co.uk and my Facebook page.  Along with this,  I have also used this week to revamp my website to give a more professional feel to it and have added some photos of them.    My aim was to be able to take them into the garden yesterday afternoon (when I started to write my blog) to photograph them in natural light, but unfortunately over here in England we were expecting Jude to blow over the southern and eastern parts of the country so I had to wait until today.

I also managed to complete some small cushions that can be hung.

Now the storm has blown over (excuse the pun) and all the photos are taken I can upload them onto my website.

The Big Project

This week has also seen me manage to get some time on my big project.  I have to admit  I am finding the last part on the left hand side a bit tedious so have moved onto the middle working my way down. Last night I managed to get 500 stitches done and if I can manage my time effectively I will soon have the remainder of both Ben and Natalie stitched.  I'm looking forward to seeing how much more I can complete by next week, whilst I aim to post a new blog post on Sundays it is now looking like being a Monday supplement.

I need a break from this section.

I know it may seem strange why I have chosen this spot to start more stitching but my aim is for Ben and Natalie to be seen on here.

Since this photo was taken we have changed the decor once and are in the process of redecorating the house so it was interesting to see how the stitching brought back memories of the colours.

Lisa xx

Hectic week, a happy customer and back on my big cross stitch

This week has been tough, everything has seemed to go wrong with kids coming down ill, misbehaving, totally taking no notice of anything Steve and I have said.  Whoever said about working children and animals was totally right and this week I have felt that I should have taken notice.  However, by Friday evening, just in time for the weekend the household descended into peace and tranquility.  I suppose looking back, now it is peaceful, I would not change a thing - well sometimes I might.

On top of my Christmas orders for cushions, I also had an order for a birthday cushion via Facebook on a local crafts page.  Combining a busy family life with my hard working husband, illness and meetings regarding some of our looked after children, the end result for Heidi's birthday cushion came out on time and provided me with another happy customer, a happy recipient and more likes on my Facebook page.

This week, I finally got out my large cross stitch and have restarted it.  Although it had been put away in a safe place, it was beginning to look a bit grubby, so with fingers well and truly crossed, I put it into a pillow case and into the washing machine on a hand wash on a 30 degree temperature.  I have to admit, I was really worried on how it would turn out, but the end result was brilliant.  Victoria's christening dress and the shirts Stephen and (half of) Ben's shirt came out white again.  

Came out of the machine so fresh and clean, more than I expected!!!

Still plugging away at those dreaded confetti stitches.

Whilst I do find cross stitching my way of relaxation, stopping me from raiding the cupboards etc, even though I wash my hands before stitching and put the stitching back in a protective cover.   Its amazing how much you, well I try to keep it clean, it can get dirty from time to time, especially with how long this is taking me to complete.  Part of me wants to finish this little piece, but its driving me crazy.  I am wondering whether of not to leave this piece until later on and to start concentrating on getting the rest of Benjamin on there and most importantly, Natalie.