Where does the time go?

Once again I have been a bit lax in the old blogging dept but I do have an excuse...honest!

I have been working on my other blog The Old Shambles Village, visiting the new shops that have opened up and getting to know all the lovely people that are now based there. There are some great events being planned in the coming months including a Spooky Spectacular for Hallowen and a visit from Santa when he switches on the town Christmas lights. Subscribe to the blog to be kept up to date on this fabulous restoration and rejuvination project.

I have also set up a second shop on Folksy.  Forest Gems is a destash shop full of gorgeous semi-precious gemstone beads left over from my days as a jewellery designer/maker. Lots of lovely colours and shapes, including a few special one-off pieces to inspire your creativity. I am selling in small quantites: singles, pairs or packs of ten so they are ideal for those of you who would like to have a go and making for yourself or as gifts for friends and family but don't want the outlay of buying whole strings of beads (which is how many semi-precious beads are sold).

I currently have some lovely rose quartz, tigers eye, moonstone, mother of pearl, jasper, snowflake obsidian, carnelian and red goldstone on offer along with some very special, and quite difficult to come by, genuine Jet beads.  Lots more to be added soon including hematite, amethyst, jade, turquoise, pearls and - if I can bear to part with it - some fabulous Baltic amber!

So do pop by and have a look!

Also with the Christmas season just around the corner me and my sewing machine have been beavering away producing some festive lovelies for your delight... But more about that next time!

August A-teamers part 2

I am afraid to say I have been a little lax in the blogging department these past couple of weeks. To be honest I have been a little lax in just about every department! The house is in desperate need of a day of cleaning, sorting and tidying. The paperwork for both businesses is piling up and really needs looking at and filing before I forget to pay people I should! We've all been laid low with a tummy bug this week too, which hasn't helped!

I have however managed to keep up (more or less) with the A-teamers at Folksy listing a new item (almost) every day! Here is a little selection of things that have been added to the Forest Flower shop recently...

I have had a few other Forest Flower developments too.

The 'Fairytale' Mini Bunting range I have been working on using the gorgeous fabrics from Makower and featuring pirates, mermaids, fairy princesses and cute farm animals is coming together nicely and will hopefully be in stock at our wonderful local independent bookshop - The Forest Bookshop in Coleford in time for Christmas!

(For a little look at the Pirate bunting click here.)

I have also been looking into increasing the range of 'scented' products I make and expanding on the actual fragrances available. After all, homegrown lavender is lovely but not to everyones taste and, besides my harvest is almost depleted! I know a little about essential oils but was concerned that just adding a few drops to the stuffing would a: not be enough and b: possibly leave oily patches on the fabrics.

So after posting a question on the fantastically helpful Folksy forum and doing a little online research I have found a great product called 'Aromabeads'.

These little plastic granules literally soak up the fragrance oil and lock it in creating strongly scented beads I can add to my stuffing. There are hundreds of cosmetic grade fragrance oils to choose from - it was difficult to know where to start but I have settled on five for now and we'll see how they go!

So keep a look out for new scented birds and hearts available from Forest Flower soon! 

(Shame we don't have a virtual 'scratch and sniff' button but you'll just have to take my word for it that they are all GORGEOUS!)

Folksy Friday - Polka Dots!

I am just a bit dotty about Polka Dots (some might say I'm a bit dotty full stop, but that's another story...). Actually I'm almost obsessed! Polka dot fabrics appear quite frequently in my work - most notably in my Spotty Cats and the 'Polka Dot and Roses' range. I have a big collection of polka dot fabrics in lots of different colour combinations so hopefully you'll be seeing a lot more dots at Forest Flower in the future.

In the meantime I had a gander round Folksy and found some lovely Polka Dots!

This gorgeous Kitty in Paris bracelet from Fluffs Stuff caught my eye - very cute and very dotty!

Kirsty Elson Designs Owl In The Moon would make a cute, quirky addition to a nursery.

Keeping with the baby theme - these adorable Polka Dot Baby Shoes by Angelic Folk are almost too cute for words!

Something pretty and practical - this glorious Pink Polka Dot Bag is from Polka - a shop so packed full of polka dots I felt I was in polka dot heaven...

Who could resist this fab photo from Miss Sugar Bone Makery.

I must find some space in my kitchen for it :)

And finally, lets not forget that boys like polka dots too...

These subtle polka dot Cuff links from Lilies and Daises will add a stylish finishing touch to a crisp white dress shirt.

I hope you enjoyed my selection - there a loads more fabulous Polka Dot pretties available on Folksy - just put 'polka dot' in the search box and see what comes up!

The Folksy A-Team!

After taking part in the June Loons and thouroughly enjoying myself, even if I did have to bow out halfway through when life kind of 'took over', I was itching to get back and do another monthly listing challenge.  July Jesters came and went and here we are in August with the A-Teamers. I have been doing my best to keep up to date, making and listing one item per day and so far so good...

Here's a little collage of the items I have listed in my shop this week. Unfortunately I just haven't had the time to blog daily this time but there are plenty of fabulous items on offer.

If you want to keep up with all the new pretties being posted each day and you are on Twitter keep an eye on the #augustateamers. Not only are the daily listings posted by those who tweet but also any related blog posts.

One of the best parts of being part of the Folksy community is that we all do our best to help, support and promote each other. Folksy Friday is one way to show your own personal pick of items for sale - usually with a theme. I do one on the second Friday of the month (ooo which means there's one due this Friday - I had better get searching for goodies ;)). Another way is with Showcase Sunday - this is where we pick one seller and promote their shop to all of our friends. I post this one on my Forest Flower facebook page and this week featured the gorgeous SnailEmporium.

Whatever you do a trip over to Folksy is worthwhile if you are looking for presents that are beautiful, handmade by artists and crafters in the UK, unique and unlike anything you'll find on the highstreet.

Forest Flower is growing...

Been having a bit of a play with the Folksy shop this week. In the light of a couple of recent trade enquiries I realised I needed to adjust my prices a bit to take their necessary discount into account and not loose money on my makes. 

Putting a price on your handcrafted items is always a difficult one - you need to take into account the cost of your materials, your time taken to make the item and lets not forget the fact that generally it is something unique and special and unlike anything you'd find on the high street. Sadly a lot of people (usually non-crafters) are so used to paying peanuts for imported, mass-produced items they lose sight of the fact that each of your handcrafted goods were designed and made with love, care and attention and that this means time and time equals money - as much as I love making my stuff and love seeing people walk away with a bag of goodies and a smile on their faces, I have to put food on the table just like the next person...

A case in point... last weekend we had a little stall at a local free music festival - a family event that combined music, dance, workshops and street entertainment. I was up till 1am the night before making sure all my goods were properly labelled and ready to go. We spent a good hour setting up our stall making the most of our small space, trying to make it look as eye catching as possible...

Unfortunately for us the stall next door was being run by a (lovely) local business woman who was selling very cheap, pretty costume jewellery, imported from China. There was just no way we could compete with her on pricing and as punters were generally working their way down the line from her stall to ours inevitably the mutterings of - 'it's a bit expensive isn't it' were heard. As anyone who crafts to sell will tell you, it hurts that people show so little consideration for your time and effort...

 Now to be fair the whole event was advertised as a 'free' music festival and many visitors weren't there to spend money (although I suspect the pubs did a roaring trade that day...) but despite the beautiful weather and the good turn out we didn't even manage to cover the cost of our stall. Definitely a lesson to choose our events more carefully in future...

But back to my Folksy shop... I have updated the banner with my new flower logo and I think it looks much better - it's bright, fresh and simple. I have also updated my profile with a little help from a great Folksy Blog post that includes tips on what to include and some basic HTML tags.  I have adjusted my postage and packing charges (they are lower!) and also my prices (I hope the small increases don't put anyone off...)

Please take a look here and let me know what you think.

Sunshine Days Out :)

One of the best things about the summer months are the many wonderful organised outdoor events that offer great opportunities for fab family days out. Running your own business is not like having a 9-5 job and time off is very precious so we have to be quite picky about our family days out!

One event we never miss is the Tewkesbury Medieval Fayre and Battle Re-enactment, a winning combination of fantastic food, an amazing 'medieval' market selling everything from herbs to haberdashery and hippy dresses to full body armour. Plenty of craftsmen are there displaying their skills and most are more than happy to chat with you and answer questions.
The re-enactors take their 'hobby' very seriously and there is a wealth of stalls selling all they require for an authentic medieval experience. It makes for a fascinating insight to medieval way of life, not to mention a unique shopping experience.

A taste of the fayre...

Ye Olde Medieval Paparazzi

Preparing for battle

Lots of great stuff for the kiddies to do.
Not sure how medieval the trampolines are though...

...or the ice cream!

The Tewkesbury Medieval Fayre is just a fabulous family day out and if you live anywhere nearby and haven't been yet I would highly recommend that you make the effort to go along next year. You won't regret it!

Dilemma sorted...with a little help from my friends.

Thank you to everyone who helped me decide which way to go with the new 'Forest Flower' logo I came up with yesterday. Taking everyones comments into account I tweeked the colour one slightly, just muting it a bit and changed the text to a dark grey and this is what I ended up with...

I hope you all like it at as you helped to create it :)

I will also use the black and white one for packaging etc. I am really pleased with the result but, as one of my friends who deals with logos as part of her job pointed out 'it's a bit spikey' so maybe I will redo it again at a later date and take a bit more care over the 'stitching' (when I have some time :) )

Thanks again for all your helpful comments everyone.