Forget-Me-Not Brooches & a Raincloud Mobile

Thanks to me finishing a batch of them at the weekend... forget-me-not brooches are now back in my shops! You can find them in my Big Cartel shop & in my Etsy shop.

This batch has slightly different colour leaves to the previous ones I've made (a mossy green instead of a spring green), for the simple reason that I cut them out from the wrong colour felt! Oops. I think they still look great though!

I've also added a felt cloud mobile to my Etsy shop. This is the sample I stiched for my raincloud mobile tutorial. If you liked the tutorial but don't fancy sewing your own cloud, now's your chance :)

Making Cherry Blossoms & Forget-Me-Nots

I've been quite busy the past couple of days with lots of computer-based tinkering. I've been getting lots of important stuff ticked off my to do list (yay!) but I've not been doing much that's especially blog-worthy (boo!).

My main crafty project this week has been slowly cutting out lots of felt flowers and leaves. As always, all these pieces are cut by hand so they take a while...

I'm making forget-me-not brooches, cherry blossom brooches and cherry blossom headbands.

The cherry blossom trios are currently only available in pink, but I'm hoping to get some white & peach ones (like this single blossom brooch) sewn and listed soon. I almost got a couple sewn last night actually, but I wasn't 100% certain that the thread I'd picked up was actually peach so I thought it best to wait until daylight to double check!

New Things + a Nice Mention

I'll be adding lots of new things to my Etsy shop this weekend - hurrah!

There are lots of new spring flower brooches...

Pale yellow primroses:

And burgundy auriculas:

When I work on new designs I often end up with a few prototypes where I've tried out slightly different stitching/colours/etc before finalising the design. These will be listed at bargain prices, so keep your eyes peeled :)

There's also a new cherry blossom headband, with three pink flowers sewn on a long ribbon. This is an extra-fancy version of the elastic headbands with single cherry blossoms which are already available in my shops - for parties and summer weddings, or just for people who like their hair accessories to make a bit more of a statement!

As with the spring flowers, there are a couple of cherry blossom prototypes which will be listed at special prices... including a very fancy headband with five pretty cherry blossoms. 

I've also been playing around with a few forget-me-not designs. There's a mini brooch with a trio of forget-me-nots...

... and a sweet headband too:

Finally, there are a couple of owl masks. These have been in my "work in progress" box for months and months so it's very satisfying to have them finally finished to share with you!

This was my prototype design...

... and this is the almost-finalised design that I'll be adding to all my shops just as soon as I can get hold of some more of that light brown embroidery thread!

All these new pieces will be popping up in my Etsy shop over the next few days, just as soon as I can get them all listed. Remember, if you mention my blog during checkout when ordering anything from my shops this month your order will ship with a free gift.

In other news... my book got a mention in the 250th issue of Cross Stitcher magazine which came out this week. Yay!

Cross Stitcher are having lots of cool giveaways to celebrate their 250th issue (and 20 years of cross stitch goodness), visit their blog for all the details.

Cherry Blossoms and Forget-Me-Nots

I added a couple of new felt flower brooches to my Etsy shop this week. Each brooch features a mini "bouquet" of flowers - all hand cut and hand stitched (as always!) with seed bead centres.

Pink cherry blossoms:

And blue forget-me-nots:

You can find them in the felt flower brooches section of my Etsy shop.

Tiny Flowers

Ah, I had such grand plans for this week. I'd get up early! and be so efficient! and tick so many tasks off my to do lists! Alas, it was not to be. Instead, I've been feeling a bit ill and my schedule has been rearranged to fit in lots of tea-drinking, sofa-sitting, tv-watching, etc.

I may not be being super-efficient, but one of the "perks" of my job is that there are always simple tasks I can do even when camped on the sofa feeling groggy.

Yesterday's crafty task? Cutting out lots and lots of teeny tiny felt flowers for my forget-me-not brooches...


... and then sewing them all in position. I cut them all out completely by hand - I don't use a template or a mechanical cutter, I just cut them by eye using a small pair of embroidery scissors.

They take a while, but they're the perfect task to do while watching TV. I cut this batch out while watching Audrey Hepburn in "Sabrina" which amazingly I'd never seen before.

Special Requests (C365/355)

Yesterday I finished all the teacups from the day before, then drank a celebratory cup of tea and settled down to work on some custom orders... I've had a sudden flurry of them recently, and they're proving a nice bit of variation from batch-sewing. Last night I worked on a special fawn-coloured version of my squirrel pins ...
... and a pincushion version of my forget-me-nots brooches:
I made a bit of a mess of the kitchen table in the process!

365 / 157 - Pastels for Spring

I continue to be springtime-obsessed, eagerly awaiting the flowering of my spring bulbs and doodling all kinds of floral patterns. My work pile for yesterday evening was suitably spring-like, as I had to finish the mobile strands I started last week (lovely soft pastels) and then spent several absorbing hours stitching batches of primroses and embroidering teeny forget-me-nots.
I am absolutely determined this year to make things in small batches, so I have a bit more stock to play with and I'm not having to re-make things in a rush when I don't really feel like it because they've sold out. I made a list yesterday of all the things I need to make batches of, and there are rather a lot to catch up on! My itch to make exciting new patterns all the time won't help much, either, but at least I am making a start.
Making batches can sometimes feel like a chore, but for the moment at least it is proving enjoyably soothing. The newness of the designs must help - I may be totally sick of forget-me-nots in a few weeks time but right now I am entranced, and embroidering them all is keeping me totally absorbed.