Floral cats

More crazy cats, this time in floral prints - though this is not apparent from the photo, I'm afraid.  If you want to see it in real life you will have to find me at a sale - and hope that the bag has not already sold!

Tissue monsters

This very quick project always sells out rapidly.  I made several tissue pouch monsters this last time, but have run out of the tissues to put in them!

Flying high

This colourful balloon design was one of the first I embroidered.
I have to say the process is much easier on a multi needle machine!

New line - or should that be new lion?!

Newly completed, another wonderful pattern from Funky Friends Factory.
I'm loving this pattern.  It is a bit fiddly; there are lots of pieces - but the result is fabulous.
Here are the first 6 of my new pride of lions:

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New bib slogan

In the latest bib restock, I indulged myself by purchasing some new slogans.  Some were not necessarily designed for bibs, but I felt would work well.  Here is one example, to add to my "geek" line of items.

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Giraffe number two

Maybe this one should be Gerald - or Geraldine?  Of course, his / her owner may have their own name.

Rather funky, with the purple (yes it is purple) accents.
Made from a Funky Friend Factory pattern: http://www.funkyfriendsfactory.com/ 

Linked at
A Bowl full of Lemons  A Little Bird Told Me
 and

Two for the price of one!

Two more elephants for you.  I've lost count, now, of how many I have made and sold.
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Hippos yet again

These are the last three of my latest batch of hippos.  I particularly like the last one, with the pocket on the side.
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Poor photo of a good bag!

This long bag makes good use of a pair of cargo pants with interesting straps.

I did try to edit the photo to remove all traces of the crumpled sheet I used as a background, but my attempts were pathetic, so I have returned to the original photo!

Final square in a square bag

... this one in bright colours.

Looks very cheerful, I feel.
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Return of a favourite slogan.

This one always sells rapidly, so I have tried to stock up.
"I can only please one person each day.
Today is not your day and tomorrow doesn't look good either."

Ickwell May Day 2015

This is a wonderful event, which has become one of my favourites (and also one of my most profitable).

For my first visit last year, the weather was glorious and the crowds were out in force.  Although the weather was not quite as glorious this year, the crowds were out and my new animals lines were extremely popular.

I had a slightly different position this year - conveniently next door to the main food stall, which did the most fabulous bacon rolls!  I was still not close enough to see the maypole dancers, but my lovely husband did take some photos and share them with me on Facebook!

I was also visited by a few work colleagues - current and moved on.  Many thanks to Nik and Jo (and the chocolate brownie was fantastic!), to Lisa and to Karen. 

Blue flower bag

Another flower bag.  As I have said in a previous post, I tend to make these in a variety of shapes and sizes.  This makes them a little more time consuming in terms of cutting the lining to individual sizes, but has proved popular with customers.

This version is a little shorter in length than most, but big enough to hold a folder.
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Making plans...

With just over a year to go till I go out to Kenya to work with women and help them to develop businesses, my plans are starting to firm up.

I am in the process of taking the first steps in terms of donations. This will entail providing solar lamps to two schools in Utange - a total of eight for each school.   I intend that some of these will be given to the staff, and some will be used as prizes for the most improved student in each class. 
The lamps I have chosen are the Sun King Pro 2:

This not only provides quite a powerful light, but also allows phones to be charged and can run a radio as well.  I hope this will enable some of the families to "sell" phone recharging to their neighbours, providing an income.  In addition it will, of course, do away with the need to buy kerosene for lighting fuel, and make it possible for children (and adults) to study in the evenings.

My intention is that these prizes will be awarded annually, and possibly extended to other schools in Utange as well.

Stage two will take place during my visit - I am finalising plans to teach some of the women to sew items to sell.  I hope to run courses, each class lasting for a week, for two to three hours each day.  I will provide each woman with a unique pattern - for soft toys, bags, or phone cases.  Some will be from recycled fabrics and others from African fabrics.  Over the course I will teach them to make the items.  For their first items, made during the course, I will provide all the materials.  At the end of the course they will receive a certificate (apparently they love these!) and a gift of needle, thread and possibly scissors.  I hope local hotels can be persuaded to stock some of these in their shops, to sell to tourists (when these return to the area).

Stage three will be grants to local women to develop existing businesses.  This will be harder to facilitate, but I hope it will be possible.  My hope with this is to enable expansion of local industry, so that their owners might need to pay other villagers to do their washing, or collect wood, or maybe even employ them in their business.

Stage four (possibly alongside stage three) is to provide other training - such as training in effective crop growing.  A local organisation based at Haller Park can facilitate this.

There are yet more plans - cashew nut farming, with a cooperative processing plant; bee keeping; a market for tourists to buy hand made items direct from the women; getting some of the handmade items brought back to the UK to sell here; possibly even online ordering.... - but those are a long way in the future.  For now it is the lights, the training and the business grants.

Exciting times!
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and

Motivation Monday

Sunset elephant

I'm loving the fabric on ears of this elephant.  Such lovely African sunset colours.

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Roger Rhino

Please welcome the latest addition to the rhino clan.

There is a distant family connection with Reginald - you may notice the similarity in colouring!
Made from a Funky Friend Factory pattern: http://www.funkyfriendsfactory.com/ 
Linked with

Restocking the bibs

I spent a lot of time running the embroidery machine over the Easter holidays (which currently seem a VERY long time ago!) to restock bibs.  Unfortunately it took me a very long time to finish these off by adding the velcro fastenings.  I did manage to achieve this in time for the Ickwell May Day event.  Here are some of the "tried and trusted" bibs I restocked.

More hippos

Here are two more versions of my "almost final" hippo.

Both have ears from the African fabric I was given - I am getting close to using it all up, sadly.

Shared at A Round Tuit.

Grey cargo

These cargo pants had some lovely pockets, which unfortunately don't show too well on this photo.  They turned into an attractive and very usable bag, I feel.

Floral print bag

The fabric on this bag has also been very useful for some applique projects; I have used it for a bag which is a similar shape with applique pigs, and another with cats.  Here is is used in the Square within a square pattern.