Alive and Well

July 13, 2016mulchandmorecrafts 2 Comments

Just a brief note to let everyone know that I am alive and well in spite of the very hot weather. We have more craft shows coming up and I’ve been so busy making more inventory and sorting things out (more of some things go to certain shows than others, plus some we have to have tent weights while others we can stake)

Stay cool (if you can) and drink lots of water! I’ll write a better post with pictures when I find time to be coherent 🙂 Meanwhile I’ll read your blogs when I need a break 🙂

Time Crunch

June 28, 2016mulchandmorecrafts 3 Comments

As I warned in an earlier post, craft shows and gardening would be cutting into my blogging time. I hate to admit, I’m not even able to keep up with reading all the wonderful blogs that I’ve marked to follow, but will try to catch up this fall.

Between the last two shows I caught sight of this rainbow in our back yard.

back yard rainbow

The rest of the pictures are some of the things I’ve been up to between shows, the latest dyeing hanging on the line.

orange and leaf green now plied with the black and ready for the shows to find a new home

dyed wool top, will be my demo spinning at next show

thick and thin wool and nylon when dyed gives the most wonderful jewel-tones

close-up of colors in bright sun-shine

Hope everyone is enjoying their summer!

What Could Have Been

June 16, 2016mulchandmorecrafts Leave a comment

What could have been but THANKFULLY was not!

At last weeks show we set up Friday night and slept dry through a rain storm. Sat was hot and dry with a little wind picking up when we closed.

a part of our display.

Notice in this picture how close the large tent (which also had vendors in it) is to our 2 10×10 tents.

wind won!

We heard the wind pick up more during the night but we were snug in our trailer. The next morning this is what we found when we went to open! Luckily no damage was done to anyone’s products, but the tent was dismantled and they were relocated to two smaller tents that had remained up.

glad we weren’t closer

ours still up, but wind was billowing it.

One of the large tent poles missed our tent by about a foot. It was still so windy that we waited to open and my husband decided to sketch some of the re-en-actors instead of opening his tent. Once we put up all of our sides it wasn’t as bad, but his canvases wouldn’t have stayed hanging.

sketch of hand-sewn wigwam with trader

sketching cannon on the hill

Tweaking our Display

June 6, 2016mulchandmorecrafts 2 Comments

For our show Memorial Day weekend we had a double space with one on the end of the aisle, with woods behind us.We do change our arrangements from show to show depending on our location to traffic flow.

This set-up we were very pleased with as it gave customers plenty of room to walk in and look. Although we have two tents my husband doesn’t quite get a full one since I put my candle table in his but facing into my tent, which I share with our son. With him having the end space, he was able to hang canvases facing in and out, and as you can see from the pictures he rearranged his grid walls during the two days. (I’ve tried to pair the same views with the changes that took place)

For the other tent, the tour starts as you enter and look to the left, then continues around until you exit again by the candles.

DSCN3598-1

Forgive me for not labeling the pictures, if any need clarification just leave a comment. There’s only one picture I missed taking, the wood burning hanging on the front part of the wooden yarn shelves.

Part of a Custom Order

June 4, 2016mulchandmorecrafts Leave a comment

This is a special post to show pictures of a custom order that I am working on for a special lady. The rest of my readers will have to just look and admire the colors she chose for me to combine for her knitting projects. I’ve been wet plying the yarn and using my click reel to measure and skein the finished yarn.

The first is a 3-ply linen of red, gray and black. The actual colors are about halfway between these two pictures.

Big skeins I wind on my click reel.

red, black and gray plied

Next is a 4-ply light gray, orange, hot pink, and light chartreuse. I like the way the two bright colors joined to contrast the two lighter colors, but it’s hard to see from the picture.

gray, hot pink, orange, and light chartreuse

And then there is a picture of the first skein of the ultra thin skein that I wound, it tangled and broke when using my swift with my ball winder, I finally wound the rest of it by hand onto a cone and haven’t started plying that combination yet. I did wind another set of four cakes tonight so will soon have another colorway plying on my wheel.

really fine linen yarn, ready to ply

Apple Blossom Time

May 26, 2016May 26, 2016mulchandmorecrafts 2 Comments

It’s apple blossom time and the petals are just beginning to fall.

full bloom

With only one tree, we still might get a fair harvest, depending on what the deer and bugs decide to leave alone:)

petals are beginning to fall

And I am enjoying the fragrance and beauty of lilacs that a friend gave me yesterday 🙂 Put your nose close to your computer screen and take a deep breath! Can you smell them?

beautiful lilacs

Have a great Memorial Day weekend as we remember and thank all who have sacrificed for our country.

Last Weekend’s Show

May 22, 2016mulchandmorecrafts 2 Comments

Last weekend’s show was a morel (mushroom) festival.We set up Fri morning for the three days. Friday it was somewhat cold, but it is May in Michigan, so we prepared with our winter coats. (Problem; my finger-less gloves kept getting caught in the wool I was demonstrating spinning with.) At almost closing time the brave souls who had ventured out had slowed to a frozen trickle, so I took my wheel back to the car and we prepared to close.

An outdoor event meant my husband’s paintings needed to be packed safely away for the night, maybe a plastic over my yarn, table skirts raised to keep them from wicking ground moisture up to the displays, and finally we finished by dropping and zipping down the sides.

It started a cold rain as we finished up, so son and I sat with the car heater running to warm up. Luckily I had spoken to one of the food vendors and he was staying open past closing time. We chose a delicious smoked turkey sandwich (hot) and retreated to our warm “dining car.” (Husband had left before the rain started for his part-time job, and then home !) Son and I were “camping” in the car (actually a suburban) and the utility trailer- (I have a mattress in it!) We were “parked in” for the duration, so driving to a local restaurant wasn’t possible and we didn’t want to get wetter walking! Especially when the weather is iffy I prefer being closer to our set-up for night-time security.

Saturday I put on flannel lined pants and as many jackets as I could, happy to have brought my felted hat! High temperatures were in the 30’s (F). Whitecaps were blowing in from as far out as we could see, and by closing time we had decided to break down and lose vending for Sunday! We weren’t the only ones, as many tents were close to blowing away. (In case of weather show organizers will normally agree with that decision 🙂

Sales seemed slow, but after adding things up, better than I’d thought! Sunday we awoke to SNOW!

Those white specks are falling snow!

I did return to the town to discuss a custom order that had been initiated in a conversation on Sat. (glad she took my number to call) and I have started work on it.

3-ply, two shades of blue+one white, linen.

Sorry I didn’t take any pictures of the show, but didn’t want to freeze my camera! It took a day for us to thaw out 🙂

Here are some of my FO’s (finished objects). I have also been making prints and more magnet prints of husband’s art for the up-coming shows.

“Skewed” small shawl, shades of purple

matching purple hat.

multi-color shawlette, plied with black. Shawl pin by Cliff.

almost finished, wild-berry with variegated burgundy edge

It’s a never-ending process when re-stocking inventory means making instead of ordering, but we wouldn’t have it any other way 🙂

fungi from a friend, waiting to be wood-burned and varnished!

and a garden that needs planting.

Are you making things? Buying more local? Buying more hand made things?

Blogging Branding

May 20, 2016mulchandmorecrafts 10 Comments

I signed up for blogging branding through WordPress U . Without a posted start date, it started immediately. Checking out the tag bloggingbranding in the reader I realized why they no longer have a private commons for members of this course as they had in Blogging 101. Everyone is starting this 10-day course on their own schedule!

Now that I am three days into the course, I still haven’t done the assignment for day one; “Set three goals for your blog.” Their resource page seems to be recommending goals with a 2-3 month time-line. If you have been following my blog, you will realize that we do craft shows and that this blog is mainly to communicate with anyone interested in learning more about our retirement business of crafting. But some of our other interests will also appear from time to time.

This is the beginning of our busy summer season (as you may have gathered from my lack of posts.) Therefore I have decided that although I do need to learn more about consistent blogging/branding, my priority now needs to be ensuring everything is set properly for the craft shows, to continue growing our local business.

So as an official start to this course here are my summer blog goals;

to continue posting at least twice a month (more if I can make/find time)
collect and read all the information from the class and start to utilize it this fall.
Increase followers by 50% by the end of the year.

A heartfelt thanks to all who have made the choice to follow our blog. Keep in touch, enjoy the summer, and watch for eventual improvements.Any suggestions are welcome in comments.

Meanwhile, here is a quick look at some things started a couple of weeks ago. More editing and there will be FO’s for next time 🙂