With my first 2019 fair under my belt, I thought I’d pop a post with details of upcoming Christmas Markets where you’ll be able to find Ellie’s Treasures.
2019 Christmas market venues for Ellie’s Treasures
You may have read my past posts on tips for selling at craft fairs (over four parts), and I think I should have had a little catch up read before the market last Sunday as I felt a bit rusty packing everything up and making sure I hadn’t forgotten anything. I’ve updated my to do list with a few things that came to light this time.
It can take a remarkable amount of time to prepare for a craft market
The pop up event on Sunday was lovely, although the weather was atrocious. The heavens opened from dawn to dusk and driving an hour and a half to Reepham in Norfolk at 7 in the morning wasn’t fun! Having said that, the venue was superb, warm and undercover, and it was great to meet and chat with such a wonderful bunch of sellers. We were all amazed how many people braved the weather, despite talk of local roads being closed and cars being abandoned in flooded areas. A big thank you to the organisers, Kerri’s Farmhouse Pine – a fantastic venue to visit at any time with plenty to browse and buy, wonderful tea room and country walks right on the doorstep.
During GCSE years (or O’level as it was in my day), one of the subjects I took was Fine Art. I always remember feeling I wasn’t very good at it but did, on my third attempt, secure a grade B having previously received two grade Ds! I seem to remember we were taught to draw or paint in a particular way and could never quite master it. I have since realised that art isn’t about conforming, there is no right or wrong, it is your own personal interpretation, your way to express what you see and how you feel.
Texture has fascinated me since junior school, my first memories are of making paper collages and weaving materials by using a hand made cardboard loom.
gorgeous textures: rust on burnt steel, feather and wood
I have finally rekindled this love by sewing tactile and colourful artwork for Ellie’s Treasures. I have to admit, it was daunting at first and actually quite frustrating, as I knew how I wanted things to look, but didn’t have the confidence to get there. All I can say is, if this sounds like you, whatever you long to do, keep practising, keep experimenting and you’ll be surprised how quickly you progress.
After initial fabric and charm framed pictures I moved on to sewing with material scraps, ribbon, trims and embellishments to “build” my first mini canvas. It took me an absolute age!
Now I love the planning stage and really get stuck in trying this and that until I begin to see something lovely develop. Although there are many times when work is put on the back-burner for a few weeks, I know I will return to it with fresh eyes and be able to finish and be happy with the end result.
When a piece comes together, the sense of achievement is wonderful. That feeling grows even more when someone else shows an interest in your hard work by way of comments and sales – it boosts your confidence no end and pushes you to keep doing what you love.
Oh my goodness, where has the time gone, it seems an age since I updated you on life in my corner of the world.
This is a year of big number celebrations! My 50th back in May, our 25th wedding anniversary in June and the forthcoming 10 year Ellie’s Treasures celebration in November. What a year!
One of many streetwise cats of Rhodes, doing exactly what we planned to do, relax.
To celebrate, the Mr and I decided we really needed to get away for a “proper” holiday, one that involved boarding a plane and heading off somewhere hot for a week to unwind, so we jetted off to the Greek island of Rhodes. It’s been an absolute age since we’ve been on an overseas holiday – put it this way, the last time this happened we used a holiday brochure and booked through a travel agent! Everything was done online this time and I think it was the most stressful part of the whole affair, but we got there in the end (and have learnt some tricks for next time).
Rhodes harbour, deserted beach, sunset over Ixia, windmills of Mandraki
We stayed at the Dionysos Hotel in Ixia, just outside Rhodes Town, and highly recommend it. Superbly run with an excellent choice of restaurants and snack bars (and an fabulous breakfast spread), wonderful pools, well stocked shop and a fridge in your room. We were lucky to be allocated a top floor room with a corner balcony giving us views over the gardens, swimming pools and the sea.
Dionysos Hotel – main bar and reception area across the pool from one of the restaurants, our room was in the block behind, top floor, which meant amazing views.
After a couple of days we were itching to start exploring further than the pool and local beach so we hired a car for a few days to tour the island. During this time we managed to get lost in the mountains (I’m not sure how, as there’s only one main road around the island), discover a deserted beach and spend time taking in the history, culture and beautiful surroundings of various landmarks including Lindos, Rhodes Town, Prasonisis beach and butterfly valley to name a few.
Lindos – full of history with its cliff top acropolis, winding streets, fantastic shopping and restaurants and amazing beach.
Our flights were excellent and with a window seat both ways, I was able to enjoy stunning clear views going out, and twinkling night time lights on the way home.
Leaving the UK with the Essex coast and Southend Pier in the distance.
Let me know if you’ve planned an exciting trip away this year, or have just returned from one, we’re looking for suggestions for future holidays – we definitely rekindled the bug to travel.
As felt is one of the textiles that I use to produce my items I thought I’d let you know a bit about this amazingly versatile fabric. I chose felt as my main medium because of its vast colour range and the fact it is a forgiving, easy to use fabric. I can gently pull it into shape should I need to (although it isn’t elastic, so over pulling means it can completely mis-shape), it’s easy to cut and needs no hemming making it the perfect base for layering fabrics and embellishments.
Customers requesting commissions have a choice of felt colours for their creations.
Felt is a man-made fabric which has been created from natural materials and is thought to be one of the oldest textiles around. Said to have been created in Asia, the Nomadic people are still using traditional methods to product felt for practical uses including tents and clothing. There are tales of St. Christopher and St. Clement, when fleeing from persecution, stuffing their sandals with wool to ease their feet and finding the wool had turned into felt socks due to the mix of continuous movement and sweat.
The traditional process of making felt is a combination of matting, condensing and pressing the fibres together. When I was home educating my two children, we went along to a workshop where we turned wool roving into felt using hot soapy water and rubbing the fibres in a circular motion with our fingers to eventually end up with a small pieces of felt (you can read my blog post about it here). It was a time consuming but worthwhile exercise with an end result of colourful artwork having combined felt and roving to make patterned pieces. An easier way is to pop an unwanted pure wool sweater or similar in the washing machine on a hot cycle – the heat and water will shrink and combine the fibres to produce felt.
Being a popular medium, felt is now manufactured to use in many areas of life, including the automotive industry, musical instruments, home construction and fashion, to name just a few, and there are different types of felt for different types of use.
Synthetic felt, mainly acrylic, polyester and viscose.
100% synthetic is a man-made felt using mainly acrylic, polyester and viscose (rayon). As it is widely available and produced in an array of fabulous colours, including glittery and self-adhesive, it is ideal for general crafting. This felt is stiffer to the touch, strong and easier at keeping its shape.
Blended felt, a mix of wool and viscose.
A blended felt is a mix of pure wool and viscose making it softer than synthetic felt. Again, you can source a good selection of colours including “heathered”, an effect produced from wool fibres being interwoven. The majority of my items are sewn using this type of felt as it has the softness of wool felt combined with some strength of synthetic.
“Heathered” a type of blended felt.
Eco-friendly 100% wool comes in a choice of thickness and has a lovely soft feel. The different thicknesses mean this natural textile can be used for different mediums with thicker felt being good for sturdier creations like wall coverings or art.
100% roving is wool that has been combed and twisted to hold the fibres together ready to be used for needle felting, a process where fibres are combined using a continuous stabbing with a very sharp needle to produce delightful ornaments, decorations and dolls.
I mainly use a blended felt (usually 30% wool, 70% vicose) with a good weight to create my items, occasionally using synthetic should I fall in love with the colour or need to make something sturdier. I will be adding 100% wool felt items in the near future and, if I am happy with how these work for me and able to find a good selection of colours, aim to move over to this eco-friendly felt in the long run.
Thought I’d give a little insight into how my items begin life and evolve to become a finished product. This journey can take several weeks, especially once I reach embellishment stage and my own quote, “an artist can’t art unless they feel artistic” rings true many times!
Although I’m not a night bird, never have been and most probably never will be, I do find my brain gets a spurt of energy around 9:30 in the evening and it starts to fill with new ideas, colour schemes and what not. It’s a little annoying to be honest as there’s no way the rest of my body can start to put these thoughts into practise as I’m physically too tired. Before hitting the sack I’ll jot down any light bulb ideas and perhaps pull out a couple of fabric squares or embellishments to remind me to pick up the inspiration the next day.
Sometimes a new product will come from something I’ve seen or heard that day, or perhaps from a client with an idea for a commission. My first port of call is either the felt colour or the fabric choice, or perhaps the combination of both. I have a cheerful selection of felts to choose from and an even bigger collection of fabric which has surprisingly stayed in it sorted divisions by colour. The vast majority of fabrics have been donated ready to be recycled into something new but I can’t help but buy a few pretty offcut squares or fat quarters to add to my collection.
Once the initial colour scheme has been decided and the charm or main feature has been picked, then it’s down to finding embellishments and having a good old play around to get a feel for how I’d like my new piece to look. This will include ribbons, lace, buttons and seed beads, perhaps with printed words too, but I’m toying with idea of including other media in my work in the near future – building up the confidence for this one.
Neatly sewing everything in its right place is the final stage, often with additional stitching or further decoration as I move things along. I love the process and how everything gradually comes together, producing a totally unique item with many hours of love and attention given to it.
