Hamburke's Bows

Marketing

2012-02-02T15:36:00.000-08:00

This year, 2012, I decided that I'd like my business to be more successful. To do that, I decided that I need to promote more. I'm not that great at self-promotion - it seems so conceited -- definitely not what I want to feel like I'm doing! But it's a part of being a retail business so I need to do it! My sister helps when she can and with what she can (she enjoys marketing) and my husband proofreads stuff to make sure that it's not braggy and not meek.

I decided to delve into the world of paid ads. This past month, I paid for a FaceBook ad. It did reasonably well gaining me 90 additional followers (wanna be 91?) and I can attribute one $8.50 sale to it (okay, so without taking into account supplies, my net was -$13.50). I'm hoping that I can at least break even without playing FaceBook games (Pa-Tooie) with my fans!

Next, I'm considering putting my business cards with a code printed on them in a local consignment sale's bag. But it's $50 plus the cost of the cards (I could do 1/4 page fliers instead to save some money) and I never look at the paper that comes in my bag and I'm not sure consignment sale shoppers are my target market (they tend to be looking for a deal)... so I'm definitely not going to make the March sale...

Finally, I'm considering an ad on a local Mommy Blog... I've gotten as far as creating an ad:

I'm still a little nervous about the cost. (fyi - this coupon code is not yet active)

Now, I decided that I need to hone down where my advertising would be best served. I started using Outright.com for keeping track of expenses and such. One of the reports I can generate is a map that shows my sales by state. Most of my sales are made to Florida and Texas and I haven't made any sales in South Carolina or much of the non-coastal western US! So, my question, dear readers, is do I focus on reaching NEW customers or do I find ways to bring customers back to my shop? I think I need a way awesome BROWNIE bow...

And if I don't write again before then, Happy Valentine's Day!!

Are we on the same page?

2012-01-17T11:29:00.000-08:00

I actually don't consult cookbooks that often - I studied organic chemistry in college and it's the same basic principle - throw a few things together, get something better! I have a couple of go-to recipes that I use in my handy-dandy red and white cookbook (you know the one, The Better Homes & Gardens New Cookbook - type "red and white cookbook" into google and it's the first thing so I'm not the only one who calls it that!) but I don't actually follow the recipes that are in that - I've made changes and wrote them down in the margins. I actually have 2 copies of this cookbook - the falling apart paperback (copyright 1996) that I got in my first apartment and the ringed binder one from my grandmother's house (copyright 1981).

When we cleaned out my grandparent's house after my grandmother passed away, I took the binder one to replace the paperback because, even though it was less than 5 years old, the spine was broken (because, duh, you need it to lay flat to follow recipes) and the pages were falling out. I was going to copy some of my favorite notes (like the for my apple pie that wins taste-tests and the secret ingredient for the topping) but found the recipes so different that I just put a rubberband around my paperback one and found some new faves in the binder. Today, I was reminded of how different these 2 editions are when the paperback edition had slid too far back to reach without a chair in the pantry cupboard. My son had requested banana bread and I was done what I needed to do for the day so I could make it for him. How different can they be?

I do this all the time - I dive into a project without thinking (or reading) it through properly... Okay, so the older edition used shortening - that's different but the rest must be close to the same, it will be fine... um - what? no cinnamon? There's now something wrong and how do I fix this without going to the store... Uh - about the only thing that's the same is flour, sugar, bananas and eggs... Time to find the other cookbook!

I sure hope my family likes this banana bread well enough to eat it but not well enough to ask for it again because I will never be able to re-create it!

Banana Bread tips:
-freeze your bananas when they are at the peak of ripeness - just as they start to turn brown. This serves several purposes but 2 notable ones 1. You can make banana bread when you want to make banana bread, not when you have extra ripe bananas (because you know, as soon as you decide that you want to make banana bread, your little monkeys will eat all your bananas) 2. Frozen bananas don't blend too well so you easily get little banana chunks in your bread.
-I sub McCormack's Pumpkin Pie Spice almost any time that it says cinnamon in a recipe and then add a little more cinnamon. It's a blend of cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg and allspice. I could probably make a better blend myself from more exotic, less processed versions of these spices (according to wikipedia, there are 4 major types of cinnamon and 7 varieties of the most common one) but honestly, they don't fit into my spice-rack and I have no room for a dehydrator in the cupboards (plus they stink).

Upcoming holidays: St. Valentine's Day and St. Patrick's DayHere's one of my favorite V-day bows:

I HEART Pinterest

2011-12-21T22:32:00.000-08:00

So I started on Pinterest, what? 2 months ago and I'm totally in love with the creativity and access to creativity that I find on there! So, back to Handmade Holiday (I promise this ties in), I found a project on there that I just knew if I did, my kids would love, love, love! Etsy seller and blogger Haddy-Grace (probably better known as RuthAnn Zimmerman) lives in Iowa which is apparently really cold in the winter so she made FLEECE fitted sheets for her kids! Look at this picture of one of her girls on their bed:

Okay - it doesn't get that cold here in the mid-Atlantic to warrant fleece sheets but my kids don't like their comforters on their beds - they prefer to sleep with a throw blanket (can you see where I'm going with this?) and then complain that it's too small or that their feet poke out. Soooo - I took RuthAnn's design and made a fitted top sheet like I had for their toddler bed! I'm calling it a "stay-put blanket".

I made a matching pillow case too although it's really just so I can use it as wrapping...

So the features of this "Stay-Put Blanket", a fitted bottom portion of the sheet

and that 3" fold-over portion that I don't really understand the purpose of on regular sheets.

Also coming along, Pixiebell Elfinwear hats for my sisters and Tangled scarf for my mom

(the dark one is purple and yes, they are cast on to the same round needles - why read directions twice??)

Not that I need to add anything to my Handmade Holiday but I did - another Pinterest find (again, I <3 Pinterest - if you want to stick with my Handmade Holiday theme, you can screen print me a shirt that says that, wrap it up in what I'm about to tell you about and mail it to me) - cloth gift bags! Reusable, ecofriendly, fun! How Does She talks about them here. The Christmas Bags seemed perfect - but I'm low on funds and don't have lots of Christmas-themed fabric just sitting around so I tore through my collection of fat quarters (okay, so this may be considered almost cheating but what really is cheating is that I left the selvage edge at the opening - also, most of my fat quarters are flowers and spring...). Wanna know what I learned? a) not all fat quarters are the same size; b) I don't use that many fat quarters and should probably stop buying them except they came in handy tonight. Anyway, I put fabrics together and had a good time sewing up a bunch of wrapping bags. They don't look as good as the photos from the blog but for a quickie craft where I didn't have to buy anything that I didn't have already, they turned out great! here's my favorite - Owls on Orange. It fits a shoe box and notice the tag (it's the only right side up owl and it has chalkboard fabric on the back - that marker on the right is ChalkInk)?

Okay, the count down to Christmas is heating up - we're getting close! Too bad I don't have an Advent Calendar - actually may have worked out by not putting too much pressure on us since someone in our house has been sick since the week before Thanksgiving, myself included. Oh! We did finally get the tree up:

See the tree skirt I was talking about a couple of posts ago? I added the angel this year and will add shepherd next year (another Pinterest project pinned by Missy again - plain as plain tree skirt and fabric paint your kids handprints on each year).

And made melting snowmen cookies from another Pinterest pin.

What's new in my Etsy shop? Not much - I've been busy and not feeling well - but, new booties!!

Handmade Holiday for the Religious Ed class

2011-12-06T15:50:00.001-08:00

I volunteer-teach for one of my kid's Catholic religious education class (used to be called CCD but this is a politically progressive - although dogmatically conservative - church - Hippy Catholics if you will - so they renamed it to be more on target with what they do - and there are no tests or grades!). Anyway, back to what I was focused on - the Winter Holiday or since we're now in the religious ed zone Advent and CHRISTMAS! We're celebrating by having a party in our classroom where the kids each bring something (including our kids) and watching a Veggie Tales Christmas movie. My co-teacher, assistant and I decided to give our students a couple of things in a gift bag like we did last year. My co-teacher picked up a couple of things from Oriental Trading (great, although not always accurate, selection of church crafts) and a Holy Card from the Catholic Shop, our assistant is bringing some candy and I'm bringing something fun and secular!

Snowman Melt and Reindeer Noses!!

I'm obsessed with Pinterest (<-- you can follow me here) these days and found the reindeer noses on there repinned by my friend Missy who always pins cool kid stuff! All they are is Whoppers and a red gum ball.

Snowman melt was the invention of another RE co-teacher although that's not what she called it - it's hot chocolate, marshmallows and a hershey's kiss in an adorable baggie I found at Dollar Tree by my house.

I've also added the little candy canes to use to stir as well in previous years although, not this time (true is that I couldn't find them at the one store I went to). I found chocolate mint marshmallows to add this year!

My kids gave mixed reviews on the marshmallows but that's about what I expected from them and all kids in general. It at least give the kids some color in the package and a medium sized marshmallow to make a snowman with if they play with their food!

What else am I up to? Booties! I now have baby booties in my shop:

http://www.etsy.com/listing/86575889/crochet-baby-beanie-skull-cap-hat-and

The Count down begins... Handmade Holidays

2011-11-29T10:01:00.001-08:00

Updates on my Handmade Holiday:
Thanksgiving cooking: I made twice baked potatoes (only one out of 13 exploded in the oven!) but forgot the sour cream at home (note to self: must find something to do with sour cream that I don't ever use) and homemade scalloped potatoes for Thanksgiving as well as the birthday cakes for the November Birthday Girls.

Advent calendar: ACK! I haven't done the advent calendar and there are TWO days until Dec 1 and technically, Advent has already begun!! Gotta get going on that!

Scarf for mom: I've ordered a cashmere silk blend that I'm going to dye to make my mom's scarf

Tree Skirt: This is totally from last year but I need to work on it. I just pulled it out - I have Mary, Joseph and baby Jesus stitched on and the angel tacked on but no shepherds or wisemen... I did redo my patterns and make a new felt board (the roll-up, stiffened felt version got smushed and now the characters don't stick so I backed some felt with the left-over peg-board instead). Here's the new felt board nativity:

I hope my mom doesn't read my blog

2011-11-14T07:40:00.000-08:00

I've never asked her if she does or not and I don't promote my posts too often(having a blog where I link back to my shop is all I really want - go SEO!) but since I'm going to be posting about her Christmas present right now, I hope she doesn't!

So HANDMADE HOLIDAY - Mom's Christmas Present... I kind of made her a present last year for this year but I gave it to her for her birthday...

See, she bought a live flower arrangement last year for Christmas and commented that she'd like a silk flower version, so I kept my eye out for silk flower sales and went the first time I saw one so the arrangement was fresh in my mind. There's a candle that goes in the middle too.

So while we were visiting NYC and my sister,

she saw a lovely scarf that she liked on someone else that looks like leaves and it's long. I have a pattern for that! Anyway, I've never done the pattern but I'm going to attempt it... it starts with an iCord...

Handmade Holiday continued

2011-11-11T09:56:00.000-08:00

Another part of a Handmade Holiday, let's all face it, is FOOD! I'd like to come out of the holidays skinnier than I went in. Thanksgiving usually isn't a problem since I don't really like the traditional foods so there's not a lot of over-consumption going on there. This year, my parents are between houses so Thanksgiving is being held at my sister's house. Now this sister was never the one to play house or Barbies or anything that involved "domestic engineering", so the deal is that she's a venue. I got assigned birthday cake for our November birthday girls (easy peasy - they want a Carvel cake - eh, handmade only goes so far!) and potatoes. I think I'm going to make a couple of varieties. There's been a request for Au Gratin potatoes and the second is up to me. Mashed potatoes are the go to but not my favorite so I'm testing out recipes on my family.

Test 1 (Nov 9): Hasselback Potatoes
Yeah, I never heard of them either but I'm expanding my horizons with Pinterest. Here's the gist: garlic baked potatoes. These are not my pictures (I kept cutting the ends off - mine were yummy - I had to pick the garlic bits out after cooking for my kids - but I'm not sure I can cut that many potatoes like that for potentially 10 adults and 4 kids)

So this weekend, I have to come up with test 2 (au gratins from scratch?? or just go with twice baked potatoes using muffin tins to keep them standing up?)...and get ready to RUN!!

I know I've totally ignored this blog but it's time for HANDMADE HOLIDAYS again!

2011-11-02T18:05:00.000-07:00

So, I'm trying to figure out what to do for Thanksgiving (there will be 2 this year) and then Christmas - WHOZZA - Advent starts the Sunday after Thanksgiving so this has to be a priority. Okay, Advent, Advent - what do you do crafty during Advent? Jesse Tree, Advent Calendar (this is such a misnomer - it's just a countdown during December, not the whole of Advent but since Advent isn't a standard number of days, there has to be some concessions made to make it reusable), Handcrafted Christmas...

I found a really fun advent calendar idea here, here, here and here - okay, those that clicked thru, the first 3 are the really similar and that last one was a blatant promo - seems I'm late to the party on this super simple, family-centered, activity-based advent calendar! Here's the deal - you come up with 24 things that you normally do during the Christmas Season, write them down and put them in your advent calendar (the calendar can be as simple as a candy dish with pieces of paper folded up and numbered, handmade with felt and glue or a fancy store-bought drawer set), then, ba-da-bing ba-da-boom, you have a fun advent calendar AND a holiday checklist! So for the hard part - coming up with 24 things that you do (or want to do) with your family during the Christmas Season! Yikes! the obvious - Head to Snickers Gap to get a tree (okay, to get a tree for my sister since I have no room for a real tree and have the best Charlie Brown artificial tree around and it's prelit! but going to a tree farm is a tradition and we always have fun!), Deck the Halls, Make cookies, Take family photo for Christmas card, Do the Wolf Trap Holiday Sing-A-Long (note to self: when numbering the to-do list, somethings are on their own schedule and need to be numbered accordingly - this is for Dec 4). Okay, 5 down, 19 more to go... gotta go back and read those blogs for some more ideas... I still don't think that my kids would go without the daily candy so this one looks fun too:

or I could go hybrid like this one

nah - it will either be glittery like the tins or fabric so it can be store easily - decisions, decisions... if I were betting on this, I'd go with fabric!

V-A-C-A-TION in the summer sun!

2011-08-03T20:33:00.001-07:00

I've got Connie Francis on my mind b/c, well, I'm headed out on vacation shortly but I thought that I'd leave you with a challenge before I go - I'm talking a Special Olympics challenge!

Each year, the Special Olympics USA organizers ask crafters and hobbiests to knit and crochet scarves for the athletes. Here's the official scarf project website and it's sorted by state. Basically, make a scarf (6 inches wide, 54-60 inches long) out of Red Heart yarn in Cherry Red/Really Red and Soft Navy (has to include both colors) and send it to your state's scarf program by the due date (VA is Jan 16, 2012 so we've got time but get on this)

So, my gift in this challenge is that I will walk you thru my planning for the scarf I'm going to make and include a knitting pattern for the year.

So my friend Leigh puts a link on Facebook about this scarves for the Special Olympics program for 2011 but they're due in 2 weeks and I'm already swamped. So I don't do it but I keep it in my mind for the next year. Leigh posts again when 2012 colors are posted - I head to JoAnn's. I get the last SuperSaver of Soft Navy (I also get a supersaver of cherry red but there's plenty of these in stock). I run into Leigh - guess she's going to start after me when more soft navy comes in.

I have a million ideas for different scarves (mostly crochet since I do it up faster) but really think that it'd be nice to put the date on the scarf so I remember Kris Patay's knitting blog where she has washcloth patterns (love me a mystery KAL) including a 2010 1/2 sized cloth! PERFECT! I'll do a 2012 one in similar style. I've modified other people's charted patterns before and written in my stockinette knitting (almost done with my cousin's wedding present - knitted their names, a shamrock - they were married in Ireland, and the date). So I find a graph paper template on the internet and I'm off!

First I draw out my numbers

Then I write out the pattern (Kris reverses hers but I always go wrong)

I used #4 needles and several stitch markers
This ended up measuring 4.5 inches tall and 9.5 inches long before blocking

co 39 stitches

R1-4: seed stitch (K1P1 across) really, this can be done for a wider border - 6 rows would probably be better - but I was worried about keeping with the 6" width. turns out, not a problem

R5: seed stitch first 4 stitches (I think it's K1P1K1P1 but might be P1K1P1K1), place first stitch marker, P32, place next stitch marker, seed stitch last 4 stitches (K1P1K1P1)

R6 and all evens to row 30): seed first 4 stitches, knit across, slipping stitch markers onto other needle as you go, to last 4 stitches, seed stitch last 4 stitches

R7: seed stitch first 4 stitches, P32, seed stitch last 4 stitches

R9: seed stitch first 4 stitches, P2, add stitch marker, K6, P1 add stitch marker, P2, K2, P3 add stitch marker, K6, P1 add stitch marker, K6, P2, seed stitch last 4 stitches

R11: seed stitch first 4 stitches, P2, K6, P2, K4, P2, K6, P1, K6, P2, seed stitch last 4 stitches

R13: seed stitch first 4 stitches, P2, K2, P5, K2, P2, K2, P3, K2, P3, K2, P6, seed stitch last 4 stitches

R15: seed stitch first 4 stitches, P3, K2, P4, K2, P2, K2, P3, K2, P4, K2, P5, seed stitch last 4 stitches

R17: seed stitch first 4 stitches, P4, K2, P3, K2, P2, K2, P3, K2, P5, K2, P4, seed stitch last 4 stitches

R19: seed stitch first 4 stitches, P5, K2, P2, K2, P2, K2, P3, K2, P6, K2, P3, seed stitch last 4 stitches

R21: seed stitch first 4 stitches, P6, K2, P1, K2, P2, K2, P3, K2, P7, K2, P2, seed stitch last 4 stitches

R23: seed stitch first 4 stitches, P2, K2, P2, K2, P1, K2, P2, K2, P1, K4, P3, K2, P2, K2, P2, seed stitch last 4 stitches

R25: seed stitch first 4 stitches, P3, K4, P3, K4, P3, K3, P4, K4, P3, seed stitch last 4 stitches

R27: seed stitch first 4 stitches, P4, K2, P5, K2, P5, K2, P5, K2, P4, seed stitch last 4 stitches

R29: seed stitch first 4 stitches, P32, seed stitch last 4 stitches

R31: seed stitch first 4 stitches, P32, seed stitch last 4 stitchesseed stitch first 4 stitches, P32, seed stitch last 4 stitches

R32-35: Seed stitch across

Cast off in pattern I personally don't like how it seed stitch cast off looks so I just cast off the way I'm most comfortable

Now I'm going to use the Soft Navy (and a really big crochet hook) to crochet the rest of the scarf - this piece inset on one side and a cell phone/camera pocket on the other side.

Have fun and send me links to your scarf projects! Link a hosted picture in the comments, tag me or post on my wall on facebook, or send me a message on Ravelry (I'm Hamburke) but most importantly - SPREAD THE WORD!

<3, Karin

Has it really been that long?

2011-07-23T20:25:00.000-07:00

I guess it has... I did the same thing to my diary in junior high - wrote in it sporadically. Oh well!

Anyway, among this heat wave, the fall fashion season is upon us...

yeah, that's what I said! I just figured out the hot pink crab and I haven't even listed it yet! Maybe it will be a Beach-For-Christmas instead of a Christmas-in-July thing...

I mean, I get that Back-To-School is approaching (much faster in some parts of the country then here where we start after Labor Day).

And immediately following that is Halloween and Thanksgiving...

but who the heck is going to buy a ski hat when the heat index 128 degrees Fahrenheit? Hopefully one of my lovely readers, of course! Gotta favorite color scheme?

Internet Sales and Taxes

2011-07-04T08:36:00.001-07:00

Okay, today, I'm not writing a fluffy craft piece (b/c we all know that I'm so good about writing those regularly). Today is the 4th of July, Independence Day and I'm writing something a bit more - um - political - yeah, that's a good word for it.

The internet is a great marketplace - you can find what you want at the best price and have it shipped to you without getting out of your PJ's or at 2 AM! But with our government in financial distress (National debt ceiling will be reached Aug 2), they are looking for ways to boost revenues through manipulation of various tax laws. This isn't just happening on the National front. Take for example, state sales tax. Now I know that the whole Boston Tea Party thingy was about the stamp tax on tea so sales tax has been around for a LONG time and it sort of makes rational sense (although I can see it as also taxing money twice since that money was taxed as income already).

So with that thought, how do you get around paying sales tax? Buy something from a merchant that does not have a physical presence within your state. uh... well, that's not all together true - you aren't subject to sales tax upon payment but you actually ARE supposed to pay a tax on those items. It's called Use Tax. It is only very recently that I have figured out what it is when TurboTax asks me about it. Basically, this varies state to state a little bit but you should keep track of everything you buy out of state - whether online or while traveling and record any taxes you pay on those purchases. If you did not pay taxes on an item, you are responsible for paying use tax (which is generally equal to sales tax) to your state on your annual tax return. If you did pay sales tax on an item, you owe your state the difference if your state charges more tax than where you bought it. However, this tax isn't well-enforced and most people just plain don't know about it. More info and some tax remittance forms are available on GoTo's blog

Here's the kicker now - Some states want to apply sales tax to internet purchases made out of state to in-state businesses. California is the most vocal about pushing it through but they aren't alone in exploring this. Will this help increase revenues? I'm sure it will. Is this a good solution? Is it fair? I'm not sure about that.

There is another movement called Streamlined Sales Tax Project thathttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif seeks to unify tax rules and definitions across the states. This seems a bit like Canada's HST (Harmonized Sales Tax) which Canadian Etsy sellers say is fairly easy to do. Hmmm... much to think about! Now, to keep track of my online purchases so I can comply with Use Taxes...

Happy 4th of July!

Summer product - Cozy!

2011-06-15T05:27:00.001-07:00

Okay, I have no idea how to spell it and the more I search for a standard, the more I realize that there isn't one - maybe it's regional or maybe not - anyway, here's a picture of my latest product only available this summer - water bottle koozie kozy koozy coozie cozie cozy sleeve:

Also, I have hot pink, bright blue and neon green "sleeves" available - I'm working on getting flowers and bows to match these colors (yay! a trip to JoAnn's!)

More Fabric Flowers (b/c I don't have enough variety)

2011-06-07T11:51:00.000-07:00

My sister is getting married! Yay! and I even like my soon-to-be brother-in-law, popped collar, colored jeans and all (yes, he's much more fashion-y than I am)! So while the bride-to-be (henceforth: B2B) was studying for final exams for her LAST semester of grad school (congrats to the Wagner grad!!), my other sister, my mom and I went to a local bridal show. Somehow B2B got a year subscription to Brides magazine (hehe). So yesterday, I get a notecard in the mail from NYC with a page from the May 2011 magazine enclosed (I know you're thinking, "You get real mail?" yup!

Woohoo! Boutonnieres! and I can make most of them!

So here's the tutorial:
First, cut out 5 squares of fabric. Heat up iron and get out the starch!

Next, spray the squares with starch and press in half.

Fold up the tips to form a smaller square.

Open the triangles and press them out.

Tuck the tips in.

Fold the triangles back into the center to re-make the square.

Fold the square in half.

Stick needle thru the tip - make sure to get all the layers!

Repeat and add to the same needle

Stick a second needle and thread thru the bottom of the flower.

Pull both threads snug and (separately) knot tightly (I use a surgeon's knot).

Turn the creation around, shape, fluff and VOILA!

I haven't figured out how to mount the above to the clips so they look nice but these here are now available in my Etsy Shop.

oh, and don't let your kids do you manicure the day before you take pictures for a tutorial. It's so -yeah- that even the camera didn't want to focus on it!

Recycled Art

2011-05-04T05:28:00.000-07:00

Earth Day was last week and my daugther's 1st grade class is putting on a recycled art project. She wanted to use plastic stuff from the recycling bin to make a cow so I bought some not so environmentally friendly glue (ahem - epoxy, not glue)- E6000. It's a VOC (volatile organic chemical - I'm letting my previous life as a lab rat out) and pretty much indestructible and doesn't decay over time. People use it to hold countertops on. Perhaps it was overkill but it's holding!

I tried really hard to let her do it herself but as it's due tomorrow and she was only making a mess by pulling things out of the recycling bin and putting it in a pile for the last 10 days, I decided to help her. We started with a plastic (#1 PETE aka polyethylene terephthalate) strawberry container for the body...

and cut out 4 "legs" from an egg carton (also #1 PETE aka polyethylene terephthalate).

Then we used a crushed Pepsi can (Aluminum) for the neck.

Strung the tabs from some soda cans (aluminum on several pieces of yarn (acrylic) and attached it to the body.

She then begged me to go to the store to buy AquaPods for the head. Um... no... this is a recycling project, not a collect art supplies project - use what we have. So I cut a waterbottle (also #1 PETE aka polyethylene terephthalate) that she had taken on a field trip last week in half and she got to choose what side she'd use for the head and we used a Coke can for the horns. This, of course, makes the head side heavy so we put a bag of rice in it to keep it standing up. I would have used a recycled piece of muslin for the bag but Emily doesn't have the sewing skills to pull that one off so we used a baggie that had something non-food in it previously (I keep these around for my supplies - appliques, buttons, half-finished projects).

We got it all expoxied together last night (has to sit without touching anything for 2-10 minutes and then held together for about 10 minutes and it stinks to high heaven - I still have a headache from it 15 hours later) and let it cure overnight. We have to paint it (or maybe paper mache!) tonight.

This morning, Emily says to me, "That doesn't look like horns Mommy!". oh well! I actually think it looks like a cat. Maybe I can convince her to grab some ribbon from my scrap pile and put a bow on top!

So that's why I haven't added anything new to get to 100 listings on Etsy - I'm at 98 listings! Come and visit to see my latest - kanzashi roses

UPDATE! Emily decided that it does, in fact, look more like a cat and she "pennted" (painted) her pink and named her Kitty the Cat!

more crochet

2011-04-11T08:00:00.001-07:00

Hairbows aren't exactly the more "take with you" craft you can find. Actually, the thought of using my hot glue gun in the car is tempting but I'm afraid that the leak we can't pinpoint might short it out and I'd have to buy yet another glue gun (on #3 since Christmas...) not to mention that a short stop might cause a burn... and can you imagine using some E6000 and getting stuck to the car... that's my luck! I do cut ribbon in advance and sew the bows up while I'm out but the more complicated ones need a bit of glue in the middle of the process (or the whole darn thing!).

So I've been bringing my crochet with me. Last time I posted (cough, cough, it wasn't that long ago, cough, cough), I showed you the "Nana" pattern that I created. I'm attempting to get that into good form and sell the pattern - it's coming along but I need to take pictures as I go. I bought this one pattern that used a contrasting color to point to the instructions - I like this and will employ it as it was thoroughly helpful. I also showed the "PopPop" hat that I made for A's gymnastics teacher's new baby boy - not sure I can sell it - definitely not as a pattern since I (rather substantially) modified a pattern rather than create my own - but I'm working on developing my own version.

No, what I've done today is take white yarn to a farm the day after a heavy rain storm... I made a tried and true baby bonnet for spring/Easter/Baptism.

What's left now? Making this brimmed one again and prepping to sell it... I bought the pattern and know that I can use it but I remember that she had specific wording that I needed to use in order to sell.

Contest!

2011-04-04T04:42:00.000-07:00

So I've been doing some crocheting a bit lately - enough to begin creating patterns (far from being anywhere near complete - they're written, but they need to be tested -I already found one mistake, I mean, feature, I need to take step by step photographs and I need to create PDFs of them). But enough with work - I had fun with these so I entered them in a contest sponsored by a fellow Etsian Kathy's Lace & Elastic Outlet (contest is through Kathy's Yahoo! group). From the contest rules:

Rules of engagement: Made with textiles of your choosing
the article can be anything from a stuffed animal to
an evening purse, crocheted hat or pair of yoga pants. Just gotta be
fun. Remember the clue. :-)

So I prettied up the hat that was I was working on a pattern for and made a second "grandpa" style hat (modified a pattern) and entered them as "Nana & PopPop baby hats"

I also included this story: "I was recently helping my mom clean out some boxes left from my grandparent's estate. I came across boxes upon boxes of pictures of them from the 40's and 50's decked out the the extreme! They always looked like they were having a fun so I created the "Nana" hat pattern and then modified a pattern for the "PopPop" hat from an adult pattern I have. After the contest ends, I will be listing these for sale in my etsy shop."
Now, most of you know that my grandparents aren't/weren't "Nana & PopPop" but I thought it sounded more catchy. I will, of course, need to photograph the hats again, perhaps on an actual baby... now where to find a baby who won't mind being photographed for commercial purposes and doesn't charge a lot...

If anyone wants to vote for me, you can join Kathy's Yahoo! group but it's a lot of "shop talk" about making undies!

pinwheel!

2011-03-28T12:44:00.000-07:00

So it's cold again... ugh! I like the warm weather and am hoping that it warms up again soon. But today, I'm inside and decided to post a few things - namely double ruffle pinwheel bows. I posted hot pink, purple, light pink and lemon grass (it's a musty green).

Over the weekend, I also posed an organza rosette. I saw a couple of girls at church wearing these and just thought they were the bees knees! I made a pink one and have red and teal ones to make and list.

I'm up to 78 listings! The rumor on the Etsy street teams is that the more listings you have, the more traffic you get. I haven't seen much additional traffic flow but the Etsy forums are full of experienced sellers saying that that traffic is way down!!

Oh, and finally, looking for local craft fairs - if you hear of any, let me know!!

150 views in 36 hours! Woah!

2011-03-23T17:12:00.000-07:00

On this one item that has one photo:
I was ecstatic! But where, oh where were these views coming from? This is not the best bow that I've ever done, the photo is mediocre (and I'm being kind - I need to do a photo shoot, this was taken before Anna left for school) and there were no accompanying hearts or purchases. So where was it coming from? Well, turns out, someone on a forum for hair bow makers (not one that I frequent but I am a member over there) liked the applique I was using and wanted to know my supplier (which happened to be the storefront associated with the forum). Turns out, that particular color of the applique is sold out... sigh... so lesson of the moment: views =/= sales...or even hearts...

It's mid-March Already??

2011-03-12T19:01:00.000-08:00

Where has the time gone?

As I'm sitting here after a long day celebrating St. Patrick's Day at the Manassas parade (my oldest danced down the street with The Boyle School, I'm working on promoting my Etsy Shop. I'm sure that I need more diverse merchandise - more ribbon, more styles - and I think I need to find paid promotions but I do have a wonderful time with my current promotions team - SNS Saturday Night Specials Team. The rules are simple - set up a one-night-only sale/promotion that starts at 5pm Eastern and ends at midnight in American Samoa (for those who don't know where that is, I had to look it up too - it's in the South Pacific http://www.worldatlas.com/webimage/countrys/oceania/as.htm) which is 6am Eastern (fyi - I only deal in Eastern time as I'm a true mid-Atlantic gal!).

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

For those of you who want to see them dance: here you go (I'm working on uploading - just wait for it!)

New Daisy Ponytail Debut

2011-02-27T12:40:00.000-08:00

Wanted to post it here first. I'll edit a link back in after I list it on Etsy or you might catch it on the Craftcult to the right-->. Girl Scout Daisy Ponytail Steamers (pictured with the super popular Daisy Petal hair bow accessory). Now to determine a price...

Cheers!
~Karin

The promised link for the new Daisy Petal ponytail streamers

Being Featured in a Blog

2011-02-22T06:56:00.000-08:00

I recently sent a package of bows to a friend from high school including my best seller, Daisy Bow pictured here: and his wife featured me in her blog, Wisdom Comes Suddenly and added a button for me! Such a cute mommy blog and little girls too! I love catching up with people from my past!

Go Team, Go!

2011-02-19T18:50:00.000-08:00

So Etsy has made some recent changes to their forums that kind of make it more difficult to promote shops in the social forums. You now need to join a "team". I see a lot of you guys out there in cyberland saying the same thing, "what the heck is a team?" Well, I'm not really sure.

My sales and views have not been as high as last month even though I've created more and listed more and my photos are way better than before. This is my newest type of hair accessory I have available:

So I started looking into teams, admittedly, to boost my ego - hey at least someone's LOOKING at my stuff, if not actually buying it, right? I was surprised at some of the requirements for teams - location (I understand that one - shop local!), treasury curators (requiring a certain number of Etsy curated lists (treasuries) created and then using team members in your treasuries), product type (I joined EtsyBows but it's slow moving), people who love their pets (how's that related to handmade items?), ethnicity, gender, people who like computer programs (or who need help with said program), those employed outside the home, those that do this as their main source of income, those who are retired folks, those who are mothers of children aged x-y, single parents, those who are students, those who are students at X school, those who are promoting fundraisers, those who do X as a job/family member outside Etsy, those who are trying to loose weight, and my personal favorite TEAM BACON. And all of these are disjointed, not organized in any way and have just a few members each. They are also kind of hidden, requiring several click before you get there so Etsy buyers who don't know what teams are aren't going to stumble there uninvited or feel welcome when the teams are directed at sellers. Promo teams will only be as good as their members promote outside of Etsy whereas the promo forum was an on-site one-stop-shop.
I can join as many teams as I can keep up with so I decided on a couple - a local "street team" (which I have no idea what a street team means but they seem fairly social, covers the whole DC metro area and not only promote their Etsy shops but they promote local craft fairs), one for hair bows and an established team that does a weekly promo thread called SNS The Original Saturday Night Specials. So this is what I'm writing. I'm having my first SNS! A true BOGO - so tonight, February 19th from 5pm until it's no longer night in the US (6am Sunday morning), I'm offering buy one get one free (of equal or lesser value).
So now, after a lot of superfluous banter that I wish I could have crammed into high school and college essays, I leave you with another linked photo (go SEO!):

petals up or down?

2011-02-10T07:14:00.001-08:00

I've been making this bow for a long time - it was one of the first ones I sold.

So when I do this, I can flip the petals so they are either:
concave (curved up)

or convex (curved down)

Okay, I know my science background is showing. But which do you like better?

I make these is a couple of different styles
Listed as Spotty Dotty

listed as 5-petal ribbon flower

They are the same pattern, different sized ribbon (see the 5-petal sized on the spotty dotty?).

Crochet away

2011-02-04T19:10:00.000-08:00

So I really enjoyed making that crochet beanie/skull cap to match the blanket (I posted a picture recently) and also the bonnet so I've been using some Caron Simply Soft to make a few. Here are examples:

Well, I brought what I was working on to my daughter's dance class looking for a way to spend some child-free but away from home time so not really bow time). Anyway, I got to chatting with a friend and being that I'd already done the shaping and I was just working on the sides of the skull cap, I pulled it out, confident that I'd be able to carry on the conversation while getting some work done. She asked me to teach her girls how to knit (I did correct her that I was crocheting, not knitting). I can't teach my own girls how (A really doesn't take direction from me and E gets distracted easily) so I'm not sure that it will work well but I'm thinking about it. Considering that I learned a little bit from my Granny who lived several states away and then my MIL who lives several states away and then the internet (gotta love youtube!). Anyway, I think I'm going to start with teaching my friend!

It's Thursday!

2011-02-03T10:23:00.001-08:00

Thursday and Friday are really busy days for me - 4 kids to 3 different schools, some errand, home, feed & nap the little kids, get the big kids home, ballet & Brownies Thursday/Irish dance Friday, dinner, bed, CRASH! - so I was a little reluctant to commit to being a speaker at St. Leo the Great's Mother's group. I had never been to a religious playgroup (even though I went to Catholic school) or one that had speakers for the moms.

I was surprised at how this one was set up. They put on a movie for the kids and set out toys (I think the youngest was 17 mo and there were a couple home schooling moms that had older kids) and then the moms talked for a few minutes before going around and introducing everyone. Then I got up and did my thing. I told how I got into the business and then I showed how to sew my St. Patty's Day korker bow starting with how to make the korker ribbon. I took questions and then sold some bows. I think I might do it again with another group! If you have a local group that wants a 15 minute bow presentation, send me an email!

so, next Thursday, huh...

2011-01-31T17:52:00.000-08:00

Like I've mentioned before, I'm doing a demo for St. Leo the Great Mother's Group in Fairfax, VA, on Thursday so in preparation, I've made a few lined clips...

Do keep in mind that I will be using some of these to mount bows and sculptures on but by a few, I mean somewhere in the range of 150 individual clips. This photo was taken yesterday afternoon and there are about 125 clips here - some may have seen it on my personal facebook page not my business one and I made several more this morning before I got the bright idea of photographing, editing the photos and listing these 19 that I haven't previously listed (how much did that cost at 20 cents a pop? but keep it to yourself, I don't think I want to know until I sell a few!).

Here's what I listed today:
Simply Lined Clips
-Purple polka dots
-Red polka dots
-Light blue zigzag
-Birthday Set of 3
-Cake & Balloons
-Presents
-Candles
-Apples
-Snowmen
-Hot pink polka dots
-Lil Sister/Big Sister 2 pair
-Lil Sister
-Big Sister
-Green (Emerald) polka dots

Valentine's Hearts pair
-Hot Pink
-Purple
-Red

I also updated photos of the crocheted shamrocks. Typing this here, I think maybe I should put the word "clover" somewhere that SEO can find it... tags perhaps? I don't know and I'll likely forget until I read this again in a week or so when I Google my shop...

So why list so much? I want to get to 50 items in my shop. I notice more traffic when I have more items. And it makes sense - I don't want to pay for shipping for just one item - I wanna make it worth my while and ship as much as I can from one place at one time. Forum groupies swear by the 50 rule too so it's an attainable goal to set on the last day of January for the month of January... I'm not at 50 yet though. I don't like listing multiples because that seems like cheating so I've kinda gotta get going so I can finish up, photograph and list a couple more items!

Oh, and I'll leave you with a photo of my kids in the snow and a coupon code good in my shop until the kids go back to school: StirCrazy2011

Snow M. G.

2011-01-27T07:28:00.001-08:00

So, um, I shouldn't complain about predictions of snow anymore in a public forum. It started "ThunderSleeting" around 2:30 pm yesterday, turned to snow an hour later, dumped about 8 inches on us over the next 6 hours and screwed up rush hour SO BADLY that it took a lot of people several (read 6-10) hours to get home from work. Hubby stayed at work until midnight when it "lighted up" a bit but it still took him nearly 2 hours to get home.

So one thing I did to make my husband's drive home a bit more relaxed was that I moved my car so that he'd have a parking spot when he got home (I shoveled it out too!). I parked in an unmarked spot not realizing that it wasn't very smart to park near old trees during a heavy snow storm. All the way down the alley, branches broke off these trees with several landing on my car! Fortunately, there doesn't appear to be much damage to my car.

So, today, my kids are going to play outside since they woke up at FIVE THIRTY IN THE MORNING and are restless. I suppose that I'll need to supervise being that we live in a townhouse with no yard so they play in the parking lot. Hopefully, I can get some work done on some of the ribbon bows for next weeks demo/sale this afternoon when they nap... or maybe I'll nap... They'll have school tomorrow, right?

uhhh...

2011-01-26T06:13:00.000-08:00

Well, I wanted to get better at posting regularly but can't think of much to say... My kids have a snow day (it's currently raining but there's POTENTIAL for a lot of snow - insert snarky chortle - but we've been missed by pretty much every predicted snow storm this year so my confidence level is approaching zero right now) so I'm not going to get much done. Right now, I'm working on another baby cap for my friend Michele who's second baby is due very soon. I need to ramp up for the St. Leo's mother's group next week where I will be demonstrating how to make some of my bows as well as having them available for sale. I think that I'll do that this afternoon - some dance shoes (tap and ballet) as well as Valentine's and St. Patrick's Day, ooh and the sewn flower ones do very well at those things too... that's going to be a lot of work but maybe my kids will behave while I do that (or they could always nap or watch movies).

Anyway, I added my crocheted and ribbon shamrocks to etsy. I need to take the crocheted shamrock picture again but that's for another day! Here's the pictures:

link

link

Photography Amazement!

2011-01-24T10:28:00.001-08:00

I never thought much of my photography. The items looked basically like what I photographed in regular light. Well, when I asked for critiques on Etsy's forums from my peers, I always got, "you need to take better photographs". Whatev! right?!? This is a semi-business hobby for me and I don't want to waste my time in a photography class.
Well, for Christmas, my IL's got me an OTT lamp. For those of you who don't know (which will likely be most of you), an OTT lamp is a special light that has full spectrum light so now, I can take photographs that look like they are in the sun. So I'm trying it out and WOW!! what a difference! I'll give a few examples:

Prime #1 example is my avatar and best selling bow, the Daisy bow:
before:

after:

and yes, yes, I did switch backgrounds but rest assured that it's a cheap piece of muslin over the same the same table and I'm using the same camera!

And this is just the start too! Check out the ballet slippers:
before:
after:

and the basic satin bow:

before:
after:

I was totally wrong! Well, off to retake about a bizillion photographs... anyone have anymore bright ideas for me that I might have ignored in the past (or know how to set my Canon Powershot ELPH SD1100 IS to something about white balance?)?

Valentines Part 2 and St. Patty's Day part 1

2011-01-24T05:59:00.000-08:00

Thanks to my sister who had the idea, I created new bows for Valentine's Day and St. Patrick's day (they are the same style, different colors). I'm currently working on getting them photographed and listed on etsy but I'll post some "action" pictures here.

So the problem with this new (and absolutely adorable, I might add) style? My favorite ribbon supplier doesn't have many colors and even fewer prints in the size ribbon that I use for korkers (otherwise known as corkscrew or curly q ribbon). So I'm shopping for a decent supplier for 1/4" ribbon... I think I found one but minimum orders are 100 yds a style. Tell me what you think - should I take the plunge and invest in this style beyond red, white, green and pink?

edit: Here's the photos I took today:

Valentine's Day Listing

St. Patrick's Day Listing

And remember, you can use my coupon code for January: 10JAN2011

Computer's back up & Valentine's part 1

2011-01-20T05:27:00.001-08:00

Dear Sweet Hubby rebuilt my computer (super easy with my netbook, btw - it's automatic) so I'm back up! I started working on some new bows - Tap shoes (which I've tried to get right for a while) & valentine's day (need more options). I also starting making matching hats for my baby blankets. Here they are:

more on photos...

2011-01-05T20:52:00.001-08:00

Some of you may know that my computer got a virus - a BAD virus - and I've been down-ish the last few days. But my wonderful husband got annoyed enough at me using his computer and fixed mine tonight. So here I am able to type about my picture skilz! well, the Ott light magically appeared under the tree (thank you MIL & FIL) and I have been using it but, alas, no computer to upload the pix to so I haven't yet played with them. The only one I have used was for a custom hat that I'm waiting for someone to pay for: http://www.etsy.com/listing/51777051/reserved-green-baby-blanket-and-hat-free (it's the 4th and 5th picture - absolutely no retouching was done - straight from camera to website. This is totally going to save me time!).

I'm now curious if I need to start using a diffused light box... hmmm, something to ponder... Once my photos finish being transferred ad I get the camera pictures up, I'll let you guys see the difference!

Goodnight!

Merry Chritmas

2010-12-24T07:47:00.000-08:00

That's it... just Merry Christmas - perhaps I'll see you next year (well, unless something interesting comes a long, such as a pure white light (Ott light) to retake some of my photos and you'll hear from me sooner!)

Handmade Holiday con't, con't...

2010-12-19T16:07:00.000-08:00

So the whole family is getting into a handmade holiday which is great!
A (age 9) is making scarves for her friends -

E (age 6 1/2) has just learned to sew and made this neck pillow cover (I made the muslin bag inside - no way was I trusting a 6 year old with sewing a bag that will be holding 5 cups of rice) -

M (age 3 3/4) is making paper diapers for his sister's stuffed animals (so that's where the spare roll of paper towels and bag of safety pins that I had set aside for pinning dance costumes went!)

I finished and delivered the chalkboard placemats for E's teacher and rice neck wraps and Coconut Body Scrub (Aunt Katie's Body Scrub recipe with coconut oil instead of honey) for A's teacher and both girl's RE teachers and my book club/knitting night friends. And I was cold so I made a neck pillow for our family as well and added flax filled eye pillows too! On both, one side is fleece and the other side is VSSS (shh! Victoria's Secret stretch satin - that's right, underwear!) that I purchased as a group buy from Kathy's Lace and Elastic Outlet

Hubby C, well, he was out of character this weekend and got all of our butts in gear as we, the unwilling, led by he, the uncharacteristicly tidy, did the impossible and now have an unmessy (although not yet clean, ie vacuumed, scrubbed and disinfected - well, except for the laundry room where I was...) that is nearly ready for Christmas! And tomorrow, 2 out of 3 kids go to school for several hours and C is home with me to continue the trend!

Nutcracker on Tuesday night and then the non-stressful holiday festivities can begin!

Handmade Christmas continues...

2010-12-15T06:03:00.000-08:00

So, I'm well on my way to a balance of a handmade and a store-bought Christmas. We replaced (purchased commercially) most of our outdoor decorations that were destroyed in last year's snow (December 20th's Snowpocolypse I) and our fake tree had fallen apart. We put the broken tree topper on as we've been too busy to make a new one but I did make a new felt tree skirt while waiting for kids at their activities and school/bus.

Presents were going to be the most difficult handmade part of Handmade Christmas until I realized that it doesn't have to be handmade by ME! I bought handmade items for my mom and sisters on Etsy and Chris bought a handmade item for his sister as well as a commercially available game we thought she'd enjoy. In the spirit of handmade, we bought something to help my MIL make her handmade items. The Dads were too difficult - they don't use the handmade stuff (well, my FIL may use handmade golf tees but...) so we bought their gifts at traditional stores. Teacher's aren't a problem - I made bath scrub and soaks for Anna's classroom teacher and Emily's religion teacher (my co-teacher), a flax seed neck wrap for Anna's religion teachers (no picture since it's not quite done yet...) and chalkboard fabric placemats for Emily' classroom teacher (current project). I made marshmallow snowmen with a candy cane and hot chocolate for my religious ed kids too.

I wrapped most of the presents in black burlap and used handmade gift tags from Grace Graphics. So far it's been fun but I've got to get back to work! 10 days until Christmas and I'm not done with my handmade Christmas presents!!

The Christmas Season

2010-12-05T20:35:00.000-08:00

So the Daisy bow continues to be my most popular seller rounding out to 100 sold since September. I can't say that I'm all that surprised as Daisies tend to be the girly-girl, bow-wearing crowd (it rounds out in Brownies and Juniors).

So I did my first Vendor Fair at the local elementary and I consider it a success as I made back my booth fee and then some. I did forget to take pictures while I was there - probably would have been a good idea but oh well, here's a pic of when I was arranging my table the night before in my living room (excuse the mess surrounding it - I've been one track this past week!)

We made it a REALLY busy weekend by adding in ballet class and gymnastics class to Saturday morning, a sick child to Saturday afternoon, religious ed and sick child getting worse and needing to go to the clinic on Sunday morning at the same time as Nutcracker ballet rehearsal and finishing it off with a fun evening of free holiday carols at Wolftrap. See us freeze our noses off in a favorite holiday tradition!

charitable buying

2010-11-09T19:48:00.000-08:00

Just a quickie FYI - I don't sell on ebay that often but seasonal items do fantastic so I'm taking advantage of ebay's free insertion fee and eBay Giving charitable listings and listing some bows there. 30% goes towards Heifer International. With any luck, I can buy someone a chicken... with lots of luck, I can buy a cow! HaHa - a cow from a Hambuger!! total knee slapper!

Pictures

2010-11-09T09:59:00.000-08:00

I take a lot of pictures - mostly really bad pictures of the kids, hubby, my bows, my house decorated for a holiday (eek! that 31 picture photo of the tree fiasco is haunting me at the mere mention!!) that have to be tossed to get that one decent shot but I'm actually talking about portraits right now...

Today was picture day for my preschooler. I forgot completely and let him pick his clothing out. Normally I don't mind him doin' his thing and not matching at the slightest but I got to preschool today and realized what was happening and sank... he's in a Redskins jersey that's on the small side for him and Clemson U sweats and has on crocs and poorly tie-dyed socks from summer 2009 that just look dirty/dingy... ugh! Well, at least I'll get to see the pictures before I buy them unlike my girls pictures - $25+ each for an 8x10, 2 3-5's and 8 wallets and I don't like them... E looks like she's afraid of the photographer (probably not that far off) but she's trying to put on a brave face - it's most certainly NOT a happy face. A looks smug. M is mismatched...plus he didn't want have his picture taken - his teacher called me so that I could come a bit early and see if he would do it for me (he did).

Ugh! is all I can say and if you have coupons to Picture People or Portrait Innovations, send them my way!!

Pie

2010-11-06T13:03:00.000-07:00

So I BAKED the pie...

or perhaps am in the process of baking the pie...

Enjoy! and those looking for Christmas gift ideas, it'd be great to have one of those reusable metal don't-burn-your-pie-crust thingies... My SIL has 2 different sizes for 8 and 9 inch pie plates...

Handmade Holiday

2010-11-04T16:49:00.000-07:00

Artfire is doing a DSLR camera give-away for telling how you're doing a handmade holiday... Both things sound like fun but I'm not sure how I'd implement a handmade holiday...

- I already made our stocking (Grandma Cowherd made mine when I was a kid, so vintage handmade?). Anna's is crewel embroidery - trumpeting angels over a shepherd (foreground) and the nativity (background). The rest are felt applique - Emily's is a patchwork of all sorts, a little Victorian look. Mike's is...um...what did I do for him - I was looking for the Bucilla trains but it's rare and discontinued (kit sells for $150 on ebay) and I went with my second choice but I can't remember and wasn't all that excited - ah - pictures don't forget - it's a red and white "knit sweater" stocking like this one . I just did Chris's last year - it's Tigger - but I didn't get the kit until after Christmas on clearance. Mine is felt Santa going down a chimney - love you Grandma! I did add to all the kits - reinforced with flannel backed satin lining so that (a) things don't pop out the toe and heel or anywhere else and (b) easier to get things in or out (well hello there undies in the toe that got left there last year)!

- I need to make a tree skirt... I'm working on my own design based on my felt board nativity. The following picture is not a good picture - it's cropped from the background of a so-so picture, see my daughter's hair in the corner?

I'm afraid that this project will either spiral out of control or will take years like my BFF's mom's tree skirt is (although she is hand embroidering hers so a bit more time involved). A hand embroidered table cloth might not be a bad idea but it would take me a long time to do (do I hear a New Years Resolution popping up?).

- I always make some new ornaments for our tree and these usually involve the kids. One year we put glue, glitter and curling ribbon in clear glass ornaments; another year, we did 6 point stars out of Popsicle sticks and yarn (so the dog likes to eat wool...); and another year we did pony beads on colored pipe cleaners in the shape of angels, candy canes (with a little lace for the white stripe), and wreaths (did not turn out well, fyi). This year, I'm thinking about a couple of things using some of my bow designs. The tree would work - anyone thing I can get this sculpture (double-sided) into the hole of a clear glass ornament?
(you can buy this clip here).

- Outside is more complicated. We have a tiny yard so there's not much. Last year, we had lit garland swagged across our double window and wrapped around our banister and giant light bulbs in our garden. The light bulbs broke during our mega-snow storm the weekend before Christmas.

Maybe I can chicken wire together lit presents on plywood or do some thing similar... or maybe use real garland... I think that I tossed the garland b/c it was not staying together

Ideas are hard when I can't just start on a project. I'm a do-er. My husband, Chris, would be the one that really kicks butt on the planning of stuff (sometimes to the point of over-thinking without doing a darn thing). This is why we are so good together - I can have a so-so idea and he can figure out how to make it happen and better than I could imagine. Over the years, he's gotten better at thinking fast b/c if he doesn't, I can't sit still and just start doing (so kitchen remodel happened b/c I pulled out the cabinets - um, yea, so it's a good idea to turn off the water before you attempt this kind of action).

- Presents would be something to work on though... I'm still working on my cousin's wedding blanket (1/2 way done!! woohoo - she got married in Sept, I started in April...). Here's a picture of the center piece of the blanket - I can't find what I did with the newer pictures where the bottom 1/2 is knit (it's combined knit and crochet) but my ravelry account has a 1/4 finished photo.

I have a million and one ideas but I'm not sure how they'd be received and helping my kids make handmade items, well, depending on their moods, I might not make it to Christmas... I think my girls would really like this crochet purse that I bought a pattern for a little while ago and quite honestly, my son would too - he loves to carry stuff around in little bags! ooh - ooh! maybe I could get the older 2 to make plastic mesh bags for each other. I think they are hokey though so I'm sure everyone would be mad when I eventually threw away the falling apart thing they make me... okay, we're going back to making cookie ingredient jars and bath stuff in mason jars... that's safe?? right??

I think I'll stick to the table for my homemade stuff... I might visit Clay Cafe and paint some holiday pottery with the kids or paint some things as gifts... We had a great time doing the lace overlay for my BFF's bachelorette (she's all party, can you tell?). I'm already hoping my friend Jacki makes a bowl that I want for my mom. Her stuff is awesome but so far, the colors just haven't been what I'm looking for (I have the prettiest business card holder from her! looks like flowers suspended in glass!)

And you just can't beat my totally awesome pies - I'm debating if I should freeze or can my pie filling to last until the holidays...

I can't believe it's November...

Wait! one more thing - my kid's (almost) HomeMade Halloween:

It's been a month but I'm OK!

2010-10-07T09:45:00.001-07:00

So I got a sewing machine that works (yay!) and I've got a consignment deal and I'm just enjoying being busy. Those 2 days/week that I was supposed to have free while the little man goes to preschool - well, I've yet to stay home during them... which means that my house is a mess and needs to be cleaned and that I need to delegate responsibility on some of my volunteer stuff (I'm really trying but my type-A is showing!). Anyway, on to bow biz. Here's my new fav for young and old:

I call them Mini Cherry Blossom Folded Fabric Flowers - what a mouthful but it's descriptive and more SEO appropriate than what I'd like to call them! They are 1" fabric flowers on 1.75" alligator clips and I'm selling them for $4/pair.

For the Boys

2010-09-13T07:27:00.000-07:00

People ask me all the time what I make for boys. I always say, "um... I make hairbows" but I'm expanding into making capes that I'm calling It's Curtains For You Villain! by hamburke on etsy. Well, I haven't listed the first one yet but the idea is that I make superhero capes, masks and wrist cuffs out of draperies or drapery fabric. Here's my first one:

Tell me what you think!

I've been great at posting

2010-08-10T19:30:00.001-07:00

can't you tell? Anyway, vacation was tons of fun and I'm back and onto my birthday!! woohoo! Thanks to my sister, I have 2 new books to learn fabric and ribbon flower techniques. One specifically about kanzashi. I'm having a blast - take a look!

a fun one (not sure how I'll put it in someone's hair - I'm thinking of making it into a pendant):

^^yes, yes, that is a FULL inch of solid height!

and the piece de resistance - folded so nicely that I don't need a center OR Frey Check:

First Facebook only special!

2010-07-27T09:37:00.000-07:00

I'm having my first special! I'm not publishing these on Etsy until Monday but I'm having a special presale on facebook

Crocheting by Dee

2010-07-18T16:57:00.000-07:00

My MIL is awesome at yarn crafts. If you ever have a yarn related question (knit, crochet, making pompoms or even a rag-doll wig), she's the lady to go to. We're down here visiting and she has a pile of baby blankets that she made to sell at the church bazaar but weren't purchased (truthfully, some of this was our fault - she was visiting us during the bazaar so she couldn't market them properly). They are beautiful, soft and warm so I'm listing them for her on my etsy page.

The first 3 are crocheted out of Caron Simply Soft acrylic yarn. I'm using the same yarn to make a blanket for my cousin's wedding and Dee has made baby/toddler blankets for my children using this yarn - it is SOOOO soft!!

The next 4 are simple fleece blankets that Dee has added a crochet border to (also in Simply Soft). Most are scalloped shell pattern but the green one is a little different pattern. I don't know what it's called though.

I still have to photograph and list the remainder of the blankets (there's more fleece blankets and some flannel receiving blankets) but I also put up her crocheted monsters which have some hearts already!

I'm also asking her for a pile of cotton kitchen washcloths to list but she has a list of people that she makes them for already so I don't think I'll get them for a while. Some of these are really simple while other are guestroom-quality!

V-A-C-A-T-I-O-N In the Summer Sun!

2010-07-16T04:24:00.000-07:00

Love me my oldies! Gonna have a ball!

I'm headed out until the 24th but will leave you with what I made from that awesome fabric find.

Locked out!

2010-07-14T18:26:00.000-07:00

Yikes! I locked my keys in the car when I went into JoAnn's to peek at their 99 cent fat square sale! You'll love the funky kanzashi flowers I'll be making from them! May create some and list in Etsy tonight but must hurry because a new episode of Psych starts in 32 minutes!!

Getting ready for the holidays

2010-07-13T06:23:00.000-07:00

and getting distracted. Back to school!

Will have some Thanksgiving and Christmas stuff before long - I know it's way early!

long time, no type

2010-07-11T20:44:00.000-07:00

I've been busy on Etsy! I've been making Daisy bows (for Girl Scout Daisies)

Crochet Bows:

Tailey Bows:

And Kanzashi Bows:

I've also done a couple custom orders for various teams:

Come visit me on etsy or like me on facebook for product updates and discounts!

Labeling bows

2010-03-08T10:29:00.001-08:00

Under CPSIA, I need to have my bows labeled. I just came across this tutorial for making labels - it's a couple years old and directed at quilting people but not out of date and applicable to me as well: PatchworkPottery

Here's my result:

I did it!!

2010-03-02T16:01:00.000-08:00

I opened an etsy store with the ribbon shamrock clip. Here I am Hamburke.etsy.com

Ribbon Shamrock

2010-03-01T09:59:00.000-08:00

I worked out the kinks in my ribbon shamrock (ie scraped the whole thing and found another way). here I took the tutorial for a 5 pt ribbon flower from Pin Tangle's blog (she's usually WAY too advanced for me), and modified them by overlapping them to make a shamrock, added a button and VOILA! enjoy!

oh, on a side note, I'm working on opening an etsy store. Words of advice and encouragement would be helpful and I'll post the link when I've opened it up.

St. Patty's Day is coming up!

2010-02-28T18:56:00.000-08:00

So Feb is almost done -only a few more hours- whew! made it to March. Will it be a lamb or a lion? Frankly, I'm done with precipitation in general so if it would be nice fore a couple weeks, I'd be happy and then deal with rain at the end of the month - a few thunderstorms would be welcome to come wash away what's left of our now quite dirty snow!

I'm working on St. Patrick's Day bows but I only just ordered the shamrock ribbon. Here's more crocheted clips though - Shamrocks this time! :)

Just under the wire... Heart Crochet Bow

2010-02-13T20:01:00.000-08:00

It's 11 pm on Feb 13... a Valentine's Bow.

Oh, and did I mention that I've learned to crochet? Stay tuned for a St. Patty's Day bow - I've worked out the kinks but don't have green yarn yet...

Love, Love, Love!

2010-01-29T18:25:00.000-08:00

Happy (almost) Valentine's Day!

	Double 5-petal: This one is a bit bigger than the regular 5-petals and doesn't do so well on an alligator clip. This one went on a crocheted headband for a baby and I'm putting it on a ponytail holder for my girls.

Disney Vacation?

2010-01-17T16:12:00.000-08:00

Not me this time around but soon for my friend and her new bows!

The Princess and the Frog

2009-12-16T11:00:00.000-08:00

I've been promising since my first post that I would design a bow for the new Disney movie, The Princess and the Frog and here it is!!

While shopping today I saw the costume at The Disney Store: Here's the pic:

and here's the picture I used during my design

More about Nutcracker

2009-12-15T13:09:00.001-08:00

I think I said it before but my daughter is dancing in the Nutcracker next week (she's 5 and is a guest in Act 1 - this is her first dance). I made her hair bow and one for her friend too. Here they are on mini French clips:

Still time to make these for Christmas!!

No Sew Blankets

2009-12-06T18:52:00.001-08:00

These are fun and easy (well, easy if you are good at measuring small amts over and over again). I'm searching for a picture but here's the story - Last year, my dad got Redskin's season tickets and so, naturally, since he's hard to shop for, we all got him something Redskins. To be honest, my dad had hinted (ahem, sent a list that included the words "Redskins Snuggie") at wanting a Redskins-themed Snuggie but my sisters and I agreed that he's enough of a dork without that (don't worry Dad, I've got you covered this year!). I wanted to get him a fleece stadium throw blanket but turns out, they were hard to find. Everything out there was either the woven cotton-stringy-fringy one or that fuzzy, sherpa-like, suck-the-moisture-right-out-of-you ones. The problem is that neither of these actually keep you particularly warm and they cost quite a lot for a smallish blanket. So my girls and I made him a no-sew blanket with Redskins burgundy and gold heavy-weight fleece. We made it bigger than a typical throw (I used my 8x10 rug as a guide). I ordered iron-on Redskins decals but they turned out too small and I've yet to come across the patch ones that I really wanted. Anyway, the point of this story is that he finally used the blanket today! It was pretty cold to be sitting in a stadium thru overtime but this blanket is huge and warm. Mom and Dad even shared it with one additional person. Mom gave away all my business cards too. So, if you are reading this and want a no-sew blanket, shoot me an email with color choices.

Jingle Bells...

2009-11-30T13:55:00.000-08:00

How was everyone's Thanksgiving?? I had a decent one - the low point was not sleeping well Wednesday, Thursday and Friday night partly due to a 2 year old who couldn't remember where he was (in a sleeping bag not 18 inches away from me) and partly due to the futon cushion that we were sleeping on...

Okay, so no bells but here's a short list of my holiday bows:

Those of you who know me, know I LOVE my angels so I'll probably be making more angels and snowmen are definitely on my list of things to make... reindeer... sleigh... a better santa...

Remember, if you are interested in buying bows from me, just email! You can click on the photos to see a full list and prices.

Hiatus Over - Nutcracker Started

2009-11-18T11:12:00.000-08:00

So I've taken a bit of a break from new bows for a while as you may have noticed - well, since Halloween costumes were completed,

a lot of crafts have been put on hold until I felt like doing them again. But I wanted to start making some bows for Christmas. I'll need a bit of a supply and some good photographs so that I can have them ready for Thanksgiving

So without further ado, Clara, Nutcracker, MouseKing and The Sugar Plum Fairy.

I do need to do a bit of tweaking of these but I'm fairly happy with them right now.

yup, haven't done a thing

2009-10-30T17:22:00.001-07:00

Since making the Halloween bows, I haven't done a thing (except make Halloween costumes). I'm going to get hopping on the Thanksgiving ones but I really need to start on the Christmas ones as that's the season that people tend to really fancy it up with bows. I'll need to find some skinny gold ribbon without wire but I think I have a lead - perhaps I can find some fat gold ribbon without wire too to make those big flat bows - I'll need to order some french clips as well but I know where to get those that have passed their lead test...

(by the way, I do only use clips that have been batch-tested for lead content. I can produce documentation if requested.)

Halloween Bows

2009-10-12T18:33:00.001-07:00

I have been working, despite this awful cold. here's a bunch of Halloween ribbons (not yet on clippies). I'm still working on perfecting these - I'm not happy with either spider and the cat needs work but I LOVE the bat and all 3 pumpkins turned out pretty well too.

More Fall Bows to come...

plush turtles

2009-10-06T21:05:00.000-07:00

So, I've been doing a lot of sewing this week (bow are me; sewing is me on Halloween. I start embroidery before Christmas and I'm thinking about taking up underwater basket weaving for Easter). Anyway, I came across a beautiful pattern on BurdaStyle for Canadian smocking - never heard of it before nor tried any smocking but the dress was beautiful and it said that this kind of smocking was easy so off to search for a tute for smocking. I found several but the one that seemed easiest to follow was on Patchwork Underground's blog (she does some awesome things). She used it for a corduroy turtle. I thought to myself - BABY SHOWER GIFT! and heck, why not, I've been to enough lately - so I went and pulled out a cloth diaper formerly used as a burp cloth (no, I didn't cloth diaper - I can't keep up with the laundry as it is!) and voila! Canadian smocked turtle!

With eyes:

yeah - I think it looks dead too so I pulled the eyes out

So whadaya think?

another post not about bows...

2009-10-05T07:31:00.000-07:00

So my friend's daughter wants to be Hello Kitty for Halloween so I made her a hat. It's cream instead of white but it's a mock up with stuff I had.

Here it is:

And here with my wearing it:

And me being silly:

And here's the same pattern made into a knight's chainmail hood:

Projects...

2009-09-30T19:58:00.000-07:00

I'm a goal-oriented person. I need a goal or it really doesn't get done. Before I had kids, I had goals like "stop tailgating" or "lose 10 lbs" and they were basically monthly and fairly idealized goals - tangible and attainable but still requiring high-level thinking (yes, losing weight is a mind game for me at least). Then I had kids and I needed to have daily goals like "shower" and "get dressed". When I was able to take care of myself and my children, I moved on to the house and had a week-daily chore (gardening/poop, grocery shopping, dusting, vacuuming/mopping, bathrooms) - this worked a lot better when I didn't allow myself to leave the house until my chore de jour was done but the school system frowns upon tardy excuses like "I hadn't finished vacuuming". So now, I can take care of myself, my children and my house, I'm trying to get back into the higher-level thinking goals. I set one for myself here (ahem - a new bow a week - I still haven't posted all of my repertoire so technically, I'm not failing you although almost nothing posted here is "new to me").

So, I'm working on a fall line of bows - leaves, pumpkins, turkeys, cornucopias. Can anyone think of other autumn things to make into bows? Thanks!

Bow organization

2009-09-27T18:18:00.000-07:00

Since I'm so organized with my ribbon (I used to be, really, but I've started getting orders in and putting everything away quickly so we can have dinner), how do I keep my girl's bows from living under the couch with the rest of the little things and singing, dancing dustbunnies? I made a bow hanger. I saw this at a craft fair and decided to make my own to match the girls room. It went well. I bought a wooden shape, painted it, attached the wide ribbon to the back, hung it in the girls room and put the bows on it. Well, the girls don't put the bows away so I brought it downstairs and hung it in the dining room. It totally doesn't match anything on this level but any time I find a clip, I can conveniently hang it up - no more stepping on them, no more random piles taking up my (very limited) counter-space, no more "MOM!! WHERE"S MY _____ BOW??" Okay, so maybe this isn't 100% effective but I'd say it's about 90%. And the girls figured this out too so they do put them away more often so they know where it it when they want to wear them.

Brownie Points (and maybe a fun-sized Hershey's candy bar I found in my pantry left over from diet s'mores this summer) for listing the bows in the second picture that I haven't listed in this blog yet...

The last princess in my "collection"

2009-09-27T17:28:00.001-07:00

So I recently realized that I did not have a picture of my Ariel, The Little Mermaid clip. That realization came to me while I was out of 3/8" red ribbon so it took a while (um - yeah, first, I'm out of yellow, now I'm out of red. Truth be told, I have been out of red for a while. I'm getting more organized, I promise! I got my ribbon order on Friday) but here's Ariel in her mermaidy glory:

So now, I'm working on Disney's new princess - The Frog Princess which isn't even out in theaters - and I think that I'll have the entire princess collection. Please correct me if I'm wrong. (see the comments button? you can click and comment - I promise to read them!)

As always, if you have a question about my bows, please send me an email (see about me) or call me if you have my number.

New (to me and you) Princess bow

2009-09-23T06:49:00.000-07:00

well, almost new - I did this one over the weekend and it was in the "Life without Yellow" post but I haven't posted it separately. So here it is in it's official unveiling: Jasmine!

As always, if you want to see all my bows, you can click here.

Life without Yellow...

2009-09-20T14:11:00.000-07:00

So here it is - the princess bows without yellow. Turns out that I need to order A LOT more that yellow now (purple, white, red, tan, royal blue and probably some pale pink too). I'm totally out of the tan which I use for Jasmine's and Pocahontas's skin and Belle's hair- less than an inch left! But I should be able to make Snow White, Alice, Tink, Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty. (I won't be able to make Little Mermaid until I get the second order since I'm also down to 1.5 inches of red and I need almost 3 to make Ariel).

ETA: Here's the princesses with their blonde coiffures and frilly frocks:

Princess Hold Up

2009-09-20T05:51:00.000-07:00

Soooo... ummm... well... there's been a hold up on getting said princess bows done - I ran out of yellow ribbon! Do not be alarmed. When I realized it at 8am yesterday morning, I immediately ordered some and it should be here by Wednesday. I was so flustered that I just made more 5-petal flowers (about 20), some minibows (see pic below) and thought about how to make a nutcracker... Hopefully this afternoon, after Religious Ed and Mass, I'll make some princesses and post a picture of a pile of hairless princesses and you can all stare is horror...

Back to School Night

2009-09-17T19:32:00.001-07:00

Been a busy week and tomorrow is busy again with Nutcracker tryouts (I told E that she had to go to tryouts before she could make a decision about whether she wants to dance in the Nutcracker). But while I was at tonight's Back To School Night, I promised both teachers a set of princess bows for their treasure box. I also need a set for Movie Night so I'll be a busy bee bowmaker over the weekend. I'll post a picture of the pile of bows over the weekend.

Tag, You're It!!

2009-09-16T19:20:00.000-07:00

So I haven't come up with a name for it yet (and I can't use Taggie since that's been copy written and I can't get the other cute taken name out of my head Tag Me Along Dino from EarthSoulJar on Etsy). Anyway, I saw a kid with one at Barnes and Noble a year or so ago and I said, "I can make that!" and I did. I gave it to my cousin who was having a baby boy and she wants more for her friends. This isn't strictly a "bow" but it's still a ribbon craft and that counts for something. So, here's how I make them:

1. Draw a dinosaur on cardboard. I like a stegosaurus because, well, it make sense when it's all put together - the tags are the plates... what's shown here is a stegosaurus (or stegosaurus wannabe at least - the missing link perhaps?) Also, stegosauruses are fairly easy b/c you can fold the pattern in half and all you have to do differently is flatten out the tail a little bit and make a curve in the neck.

2. Trace pattern onto fleece using a water or air soluble pen. I like plain simple fleece but you could use your favorite sport's team fleece or tinkerbell fleece as well. You'll need to pay attention to what part of the background you are cutting out though because, heaven forbid, you cut off Tink's wings!!! and more practically, you'll have to pay attention to right side/wrong side. Cut out double thickness (this means you'll have 2).

3. Cut ribbon to 3 or 4 inches. I do a little arranging as I go to know how much I'll need but I can have a few as 5 pieces of ribbon and as many as 21 (I haven't done that many but I could arrange it - and did you notice that these are both ODD numbers? yup, things just look better when arranging an odd number of items).

4. Fold ribbon into "tags" and pin to top layer of fleece (make sure the side showing is the side you want to be on the outside).

5. Put bottom layer of fleece on the top (again, make sure that the side you want outside in facing the ribbons), align layers of fleece meticulously, and pin together.

6. Sew layers together at 1/4 inch (align material with outside of the foot on my 1970's Singer FashionMate - yes, it's ugly, yes, I like fully mechanical sewing machines, yes, I can thread the darn thing - it's not that complicated, no, I will not sell it so don't even ask! Well, if you offer $1Million, I'd consider it.) I usually just sew the top together and look at how the ribbons turn out before going on. Anyway, part b of this step is to sew even closer to the edge and backstitch over the ribbons to hold the very tight to the fabric - I go over the ribbons 3x (forward, back, forward) in this stage. On to part c - sew another seam about 1/8 inch inside the original seam. You have now gone over the ribbons 5x and they will be securely held. Make sure to leave a smallish opening on the belly to turn the dino right side out and stuff it.

7. Trim and heat seal ribbons, clip corners and curves and turn Dino right side out. Make sure to push out the head and tail. I use a plastic turner and a Sharpie.

8. Stuff!!! (yea, yea, no picture)

9. Hand stitch belly together. After tying off, put needle in belly and pull through about an inch, pull tight and clip - the end of the string will now be inside the dino!

10. Wash, hang dry and give to the first kid under a year old you see.

If you don't like these directions, give me a call or send me an email and I can make one for you (for a small fee)!

since I haven't given you any new bows in how many posts?

2009-09-15T07:05:00.000-07:00

okay, okay, I haven't been playing with bows!! I have other craft interests too... I've been working on some diaper cakes (mine are WAY better the 1800Flowers!) and now I got a message from my cousin asking for taggie dinos like I made for her son... And I've got PTA responsibilities (I'm co-VP here and there's LOTS to be done - membership drive/back to school night, bingo night, movie night, fall festival and fall Sally Foster wrapping paper fundraiser) so I'll show you a bow I did for my oldest when she got her green belt in karate:

There! Are you happy now?

bows on a short day

2009-09-14T18:40:00.000-07:00

Here in Fairfax County, we have short school days on Monday. Our school has gotten even earlier this year too - last year was 12:35 and we're now out at 12:10. I like this time better as it works with our typical nap schedule (12:30 to 2:20 - times are firm as we got home from preschool last year at 12:20 and, being in a walk zone, we need to leave to pick up elementary school kids at 2:20 so no real wiggle room).

So this morning, I was invited to a friend's house, who I had made bows for but had run out of clip grips on, to repair her bows and for some company. Our "babies" are about the same age - 2 1/2 - and play nicely with each other so it was a nice visit and it's always nice to get out and walk a bit in crisp autumn weather. So, sorry gentle readers who love my pictures, my camera battery was charging so I didn't get pictures but I made a couple just plain bows for her daughter while chatting.

After that, it was home, lunch and off to pick up the girls from their first Monday of the school year! We ended up having an impromptu playdate this afternoon with friends of my school kids and I got nothing bow related done after that. So I'll leave you with a tip - beady Contact shelf liner works great as clip grip.

not so long but still tiring day

2009-09-13T13:07:00.000-07:00

I haven't made any new bows for you guys to see today. We started Religious Ed at Church today - I was teaching (and not feeling well - think I'm getting what's going around) and the girls were in class so that made this morning a little longer. Then the real fun began when we got home - the girls need to clean their room and don't want to. This began yesterday after breakfast. We (as in C and I) moved everything from the hiding places (corners, under beds, back of closets, tucked on beds) to the center of the room so they don't have to guess what needs to be done but all we got was a lot of whining about how much they have to put away - I'm ready to hold a yard sale with their junk but that seems like a lot of work and I'd probably want to go thru MY stuff and add stuff to the mix, you know, to be fair (and make some pocket money). I reminded them that tomorrow IS trash day and I have plenty of trash bags but as of yet, not much has been done.

This is the current state of their room:

I hope that I can edit back tonight with a much nicer picture of what their room should look like.

25 minutes after posting the original thread and C standing in their room - we got a CLEAN ROOM!

and it's even clean under the beds!!

Now to vacuum since I know it will at least be a few days before I'll be able to have this again!

The real beginning of Hamburke's Bows...

2009-09-12T19:18:00.000-07:00

So, I have 2 girls ages 7 and 5. They are darling (see the purty picture from a couple days back?) and they have my very straight, silky hair. This is pertinent to my story because if you have straight, silky hair, you'll know that clips don't stay in very well. So I went about looking for a clip that would stay in their hair. I tried plastic barrettes, snap clips, my favorite metal Goody barrettes (the kind w/ 2 lines that we used to braid ribbon into as kids - I started early decorating barrettes with my best childhood friend Jennifer Mabe - haven't seen her in forever so I hope she finds me here), Stay-put barrettes, french clips in various sizes, beaded bobby pins and finally alligator clips. Some worked, some didn't so I started searching for a way to make the barrettes that I had stay in better (bows can be expensive). That's when I found a free craft forum on bowmaking and ribbon sculpture. Most of the ladies on there made their own bows as a business and they often discussed products and methods of making bows stay. So I found something that worked and hung around the forum to learn how to make these bows. My girls saw the pictures and begged for some princess bows. My plan was to simply make bows (pinwheel, boutique, loopy and other just plain bows) to match their outfits but they liked the sculpture stuff - well, okay, I'll try. I found a free instruction and bought all the right color ribbon. It was so much fun and from there, I was hooked...

So as a tribute to what lead me to make bows, here's some just plain bows:


Stacked Bows:

Different Sizes:

I honestly prefer making sculpture barrettes now. If I'm not too wiped out tomorrow, I'll make some bugs for you guys to enjoy!

No new bows today.

2009-09-09T20:30:00.000-07:00

I just finished an order - lots of 5 petal flowers and daisies so nothing that I haven't posted already.

I'm putting together a couple posts about just plain bows and bugs... check back tomorrow!

First day of school

2009-09-08T14:54:00.000-07:00

Anna wore one of my bows (3" pinwheel) but Emily went with the Gymboree clips that match her new dress...

End of Summer

2009-09-07T07:47:00.000-07:00

I try to do seasonal bows - they are fun - so for the summer, I did watermelons and various bugs. I only took pictures of the watermelons and ladybugs. I'll have to make some more butterflies and dragonflies (probably next year unless I'm asked for them otherwise).

So here's 2 different watermelons:

and ladybugs both mid-flight and landed:

(and did anyone notice that I got the pictures next to each other? html - it's just like riding a bike!!)

I think I promised flowers too...

2009-09-05T18:05:00.000-07:00

Here's the 5 petal flowers (they are a big hit - I can do pretty much any color combo too):

The daisy (also fun and any color):

I wish I had full sun on either side of my house because I would have a TON of real flowers. I guess I have to settle for bows...

More Princesses!

2009-09-05T06:09:00.000-07:00

Okay, on to more princesses. I love Disney so I've made almost all of the princesses in their line. Here's what I have taken pictures of:

Tink:

Sleeping Beauty (Aurora):

Mulan:

Snow White (I need to order the correct blue):

and my most recent princess added, Pocahontas:

I haven't gotten around to doing the Frog Princess (Disney's new movie) but that will be a project for next week when the kids go to school. Am I missing any princesses? Let me know!

Princess Bows

2009-09-04T21:34:00.000-07:00

On to the bows...

Let's start with the ABC's, so Alice:

And Belle:

And Cinderella:

Next Time: More princesses and maybe some flowers...

Bows - the beginning

2009-09-04T21:06:00.000-07:00

Hi, I'm Hamburke and I make bows for fun (and a little pocket money!). I've recently become a fan of blogs (hi cakewrecks and mommywantsvodka) and my husband said I should start one of my own (he thinks I'm funny), plus hamburke.blogspot.com would fit on my bow business cards.

So, about myself. I'm a wife and Stay-At-Home-Mom of 3 - a second grader, a kindergartner and a 2 1/2 year old. I'm the PTA VP#2 and I teach Sunday School (technically, Catholic Religious Education but it's ON Sunday!). I have a bachelor's degree in chemistry and technical communication and I'm one (very time consuming) class away from my master's in secondary ed (my career dream is to be a textbook editor, and no, I'm not kidding) but like my kindergartner, I need some creativity in my life so that I only make controlled messes. Cooking didn't work out so I make bows, and now, apparently, I blog.

I'm sure that I won't immediately be blogging about bows everyday but my goal is to add at least one new bow a week and to talk about my inspiration or some other feel-goody thing. So, now, I get to learn about how to add photos... come on 3 college level courses - taken 9 years ago - on html, don't fail me now...