Happy 2012

Happy New Year! A bit late I know, things really ran away from me over the last few weeks.


It was a very busy run up to Christmas, I began supplying several new galleries and took part in four Christmas exhibitions. But then the littlest Shepherd caught chicken pox. Its not usually a big deal, not fun either though. It became more complicated when he developed an infection in the gland in his cheek and was admitted to hospital where he was on IV antibiotics for 4 days. I stayed in with him, and Sheps came in and stayed with us each day.

This happened on the 12th December, luckily I had despatched all of my wholesale orders but my retail orders and Not On The High Street orders still needed completing and packing. I suspended both shops so that no more purchases could be made. As we were in a room of our own at the hospital - so that the other children wouldn't catch the pox - I set up a wee despatch area,
and managed to get everything out on time. We were sent home with another two weeks of antibiotics. His cheek was still swollen and very sore but he was much happier at home! Gradually over the next few days he began to feel better and the chicken pox had just about cleared up. It had been a very stressful couple of weeks so on the 23rd Sheps and I decided to take the kids to the cinema to see Arthur Christmas and kickstart the festivities. Towards the end of the film a little voice piped up "Mummy, I've got a really itchy bit on my shoulder..."
I think you know where this is going. A certain little girl got chicken pox for Christmas and was covered head to foot.

Despite all of this it was a lovely Christmas, the children really enjoyed it even though every time they turned around I was ready with a thermometer or an other spoon of medicine!

After all of that its good to get back into the swing of things, the children are back at school and I'm back in my workroom. I like January its a new year and a fresh start. I spent today working on new designs for my Seedhead brooches. Pics coming soon!

How is 2012 treating you so far?

Silver prices

Last week I had to make a few changes to my website. Some were changes I really wanted to make, such as finally sorting out the home page - a wee task I had been putting off for a while and then came the change I really didn't want to make and I've been holding off with fingers crossed for the better part of a year. A price increase. About a year ago the price of the silver components I use when making my jewellery more than doubled. I held off the price increase hoping that the price of silver would come down but it hasn't happened yet and I'm told that even if it does it will take a while for this to be reflected in the wholesale cost of components. When the price starts to fall of course I'll reduce my prices too.

I'm offering free delivery on all orders placed via the website.

On a more positive note I have begun work on a new range of brooches. These feature
reproductions of my ink drawings of seedheads from my garden. I'd love to know what you think :)

Holidays!

A couple of weeks ago we snuk away for a short, much needed break. It was a last minute thing, we found a late deal on a cottage in Seahouses, Northumberland. We've never visited this area before but will definitely be visiting again! After a bumpy start to the holiday (more on that in a minute!) we had a wonderfully relaxing time. The beaches are great, with lots of rockpools, stunning views and for unknown reasons, hardly any people! The pic below is Bamburgh Castle and beach.
We took a boat trip from Seahouses habour to the Farne Islands, an amazing sea bird sanctuary.

Where we were surrounded by thousands of sea birds. For me the most amazing part were the puffins. We were able to stand just a couple of feet from them! Whilst back at the cottage I'd been lamenting the lack of internet connection or even moblie phone signal on this tiny island in the sea I did get a call and took a wholesale order.

There were so many more things we wanted to do, and we could have done more - but for that bumpy start to the holiday....

We set off on the Saturday.

Due to a road closure we had to make a detour, it took over 2 hours to travel a distance that normally takes 40 minutes, which is when the car began to fart great plumes of smoke from the exhaust. We decided the only option was to turn around and go home, hire a car and set off again. We figured we would make it to the cottage late in the evening.

But no. When we finally made it home we started contacting car hire companies, they all closed at midday on Saturday and re-opened on Monday morning.

We arrived at the cottage on Monday afternoon. It was a 3.5 hour trip! But it was worth it.

The visit to Alnwick Castle and Gardens was spectacular. The kids loved playing in the water features - this is encouraged by the owners!
We had lunch in the amazing Treehouse Restaurant and played on the rope bridges.

So even though our short break was even shorter than expected, this is a place we all want to visit again.

The tea tray system

Its been a very busy and exciting few months here in the studio. Since making the decision to focus on wholesale work and so exhibiting at the British Craft Trade Show (BCTF) I haven't stood still.
On the third day of the fair I had to tell customers that my lead time would be 10 weeks rather than the 3 - 4 weeks stated in my trade info. Since then I've been busy filling orders. My order book is still looking healthy as repeat orders are coming in.

One of the first things I needed to do to be able to complete orders was re-organise the studio. Again. All of the pieces I make are finished with resin which needs around three days to dry. Drying resin needs completely level, dust free surfaces. I needed more surface areas. I also needed somewhere to store part orders while the rest of the order was drying or waiting to be finished. That's when I came up with the 'tea tray system'. I bought a set of Ivar shelving from Ikea - these are great! They are a doddle to put up and can be rearranged on a whim. I set the shelves 4inches apart - just wide enough for me to be able to slide the trays on to maximise space. Then I bought a stack of plastic tea trays. I label the tray with the gallery name and home it on the shelves. This way I can work on several orders at once without losing track.
It's not very sophisticated, much like myself, but it works, much like myself. And I make no apologies for the pics, I'm loving the iphone photo apps these are from lo-mob if you can recommend any others please let me know x

6 Days to Go!

Only six days to go 'til my favourite event of the year. For the first time ever the Saltaire Arts Trail will be held in May. Yes, May - please don't forget! I've been dishing out fliers about this for a good few weeks and so many people have commented that I'm really early, or isn't that in September? Nope its in 6 days!!
I'd love to be able to tell you that I'm ready, stock made, stall set up planned, signs printed but I'm not quite there yet! Now if you were to pop over to visit Wychbury, there you will find all sorts going on. Paula, one half of the Wychbury partnership organises the Makers' Fair and has committed to writing a daily diary of a run up to the event, crazy lady, as if she hasn't got enough going on!

Here is a link to the official Arts Trail site please click here
here is a link to the Arts Trail blog with a feature about what I do,

hope to see you next weekend!

BCTF

This is a very late post about my first time exhibiting at a trade show. It's a very late post generally as I realise the last time I wrote anything here was January oops! But I haven't been slacking it's been a very busy few months and thanks to BCTF it's a whole lot busier now!

For those of you that might not of heard of it before BCTF is the British Craft Trade Fair. It is held annually in April at the Showground in Harrogate, North Yorkshire. I visited last year to help me to decide if I should apply and to see how the stands are set up and work displayed. I took along some samples and had a chat with the organisers, they were great, they offered me some advice, and accepted my application.

So on Saturday 2nd April Sheps and I set off to put my stand together. I'm so glad he came with me, with over 500 stands you can imagine how busy it was! I've always attended craft fairs by myself, but this is a different ball game. I was exhibiting in the Newcomers section so my shell scheme stand was 2 metres wide x 1 metre deep. Tiny. And scarily white and bare. We spent about 3 hours changing it around before we were reasonably satisfied.

Then we sneaked off to Fodder for lunch. it was very good. I can vouch for the Yorkshire wine. I know, wine from Leeds!!

Here are the pics of the stand. I meant to do before and after shots but I forgot!




The show worked out really well for me. I took lots of orders during the event and they have been coming in since I got back. I made lots of contacts too and I will be following these up over the next few weeks. But definetely the one of the best things was meeting lots of other exhibitors. I was 3 stands down from Rachel Lucie Jewellery Designs I knew Rachel before this from attending the same fairs so we spent time having a catch up. Opposite my stand was Gabriella Buckingham from Moobaacluck a lovely, lovely lady, I just wish we lived a bit closer because I want another good natter! I really enjoyed talking with her and hope we can meet up again at some point. I also met some of the people I have been talking to / following on Twitter. I'll write more about them all next time.
I have already booked a stand for next year and have been thinking about how I want to change my display.

Happy New Year!

We have had a lovely relaxing few days. With the way Christmas and New Years Eve fell this year it seems to have made the whole holiday more relaxing. Do you feel the same?
Looking back to last year and considering my work goals over all its been a good year:
*sales have been much higher
*joining Not On The High Street has helped alot and I'm glad I made the leap - I was very worried about the investment needed but it seems to be paying off
*I've increased the wholesale side of my business. Working with the British Museum has been great and has spurred me on to build more wholesale links.

The main thing that I haven't done that I really wanted to do is sort out my website. It took me sooo long to build it that if I have to do it again I need to know it will be right. I want to be able to offer discount codes and postage offers. I spoke to a web designer / developer chap a couple of months ago but he wanted to host the site himself, which I will not do and wanted to charge a monthly maintenance fee plus fees for additions.... I will stick with doing it myself. So that remains a goal for this year. If you can recommend anything it would be much appreciated. I'm with Shopify at the moment, the upgrade to the package that offers all the bells and whistles is quite alot so I'm open to suggestions :)

But back to enjoying some quiet time.

Way back in July a lovely friend gave me the most beautiful knitting needles for my birthday. What?? You didn't know knitting needles could be beautiful? Take a look at these....
She knew I wanted to have a go at knitting and what better encouragment could a girl have? I haven't knitted since I was a little girl and I needed help from my mum to get going I'm loving it! I find it so relaxing. I'm pretty hopeless though. I've made two dish clothes this week. Huge and holey as they are I'm happy with them :) Not sure what to tackle next. Knitting patterns look a bit daunting so we may be swamped with dish clothes.

Heres wishing you a very happy, healthy new year xx