I’m all for recycling, so when a close friend asked me to make some bunting from an old, tired cushion to brighten up her daughter’s bedroom, I was more than happy to. The cushion had originally been made from a lovely pink, spotty fabric left over from the curtains in the room. It was just a bit unloved and she wanted to add a touch of colour to the white walls.
The small, soft cushion and colourful bunting I made have really brightened up the room, pulled the scheme together and put a smile on a beautiful little girl’s face. It’s amazing what a bit of recycling can do!
I have finally set up my gilhoolie shop on folksy! HOORAY!
You’ll find a few gilhoolie things on there so far but I’m still working on adding some more including my bags, bunting and the rest of my lampshades. So please come back in a week or so and have another look (don’t worry, I’m sure I’ll put another update on here anyway to remind you!)
I spent the day in front of the computer yesterday as well as taking lots of photos for my folksy shop (nearly there, promise!) and really, really missed doing something creative. So I took a trip to the sewing shop this morning and bought some red cotton fabric to make some more hanging Christmas trees.
This time they are filled with polyester filling rather than lavender so they’re all soft and cuddly! It was so nice to sit down in front of the sewing machine and listen to the radio, I will definitely be making some more soon…
Luckily the postman has just delivered some things I ordered so I can get on and make a lampshade and pouffe for one of my first customers, thank goodness!!
I had lots of fun a couple of weeks ago taking photos of my friend’s beautiful little girl sitting on a gilhoolie beanbag and pouffe (with some bunting in the background). Thank you so much Sandi, I may ask again if that’s okay!
I know the model looks gorgeous but I’m also hoping these photos show my products well enough to start selling on-line now. I must admit I did get a bit carried away and didn’t always manage to get the whole of the beanbag in shot, oops! Ah well, I still have lots to learn. Thank you also to James for playing around with the photos in Photoshop; I think they are very professional and just the look and feel I was going for.
It’s taken a bit longer than I expected to set up my folksy shop but I think the photos are incredibly important. I’m going to take some more of my lampshades this week too as I’m not happy with the ones I already have. When you work for yourself it’s easy to not set deadlines and just go with the flow but I promise these will be on folksy by the end of the week, cross my heart and watch this space for details!
I’m ALWAYS looking at houses; windows, chimneys, brickwork, pretty details, I just can’t help myself. So when I visited a friend this week I left feeling I had to go straight home and draw their beautiful home. This is the third one I’ve completed (see my earlier post ‘Our house in ink and collage’) and it’s another thing I absolutely love doing.
I wanted to experiment with the sky this time, so instead of making a collage of bits of blue paper from magazines I used one of my gilhoolie patterns. It has a bit of a retro feel, which I love, and contrasts with the Victorian house. I just hope my friend likes it too!
If you would like me to draw your house just leave a comment on here and I can send you the details. Great for a Christmas present with a personal message added at the bottom!
I had some spare time today so I decided to make a few more lavender decorations for tonight. As it’s a Christmas shopping event I thought pretty Christmas trees would be just the thing, ahhhh!
I might have to keep one of these for myself though…
This week I’m putting the finishing touches to things and I thought I’d practice arranging all my creations ready for Thursday evening. I put this display together in half an hour before I rushed off on the school run, but you get the idea! As you can see, I got the bunting bug last week and made some more out of scraps of fabric from our bedroom (Romo Quadra Dahlia and John Lewis chevron in sulphur).
I guess it isn’t a coincidence as I’ve made lots of things from the same fabrics, but it does feel like gilhoolie has some kind of identity now don’t you think?
My next task is to take some more professional looking photos so that I can sell gilhoolie things on-line; I might need some little models to pose on the beanbags and pouffe!
Like I said yesterday, I’m nearly there now and even made some bunting today to go on my stall to make it look pretty. I used scraps from the other things I’ve made so it all ties in together and it was the easiest thing to do. Honest, if you like bunting (which I do) then there aren’t many easier things you can sew; all in less than an hour; so satisfying!
The birds, owls and hearts are all filled with lavender (took a while to do, thank you Caroline for donating the lavender!) Again, that was a bit of a family activity at the weekend as the boys enjoyed pulling the heads off the dried lavender plants in between painting their chalkboard signs and riding round the garden on their bikes!
I’ve been busy making things to fill my stall next Thursday and I think I’m nearly there, thank goodness. Here are two of the gilhoolie pouffes. The bright one on the left is made from Amy Butler fabric (I have some left over so will probably make a lampshade with that) and the one on the right is made from fabric I already had from our hall curtains and cushions. I’d like to be able to make them from the fabrics I have in stock for lampshades as well as bespoke to match an existing colour scheme, perhaps in a living room or child’s bedroom.
gilhoolie bag
Also, some of you will be pleased to hear…. I made another gilhoolie bag. This time I went back to the simpler design but I incorporated some of the details from the Tabitha bag I made last week with a coloured trim and patterned inside of the handle. I had a play with making flowers and bows to decorate the bag but ended up going back to the covered buttons to keep the look simple. The bows and flowers are always an option though as they did look pretty.
Now that’s all done I’m ready to start putting some things on folksy ready to sell, well almost. I just want to finish off the birds and hearts I started making last week and some bunting to decorate my stall, oh yes and a gilhoolie sign. We had lots of fun at the weekend, James cutting MDF and myself and the boys painting the boards with chalkboard paint; they even have one each for their rooms, one in the shape of a car and one a guitar!
I’m still not entirely convinced about making bags but as this blog is like a diary I thought I should put this on here anyway. It’s a ‘Tabitha bag’ and the pattern is by Flossie Teacakes. I like the end result but boy did it take a long time to make! There are 20 pattern pieces, some with interfacing hence just cutting them out took a couple of hours and I’m not sure I have the patience to do it again, in fact I definitely don’t! However, it was really good sewing practice and now it’s done I’m glad I persevered. The pattern itself is brilliant and incredibly easy to follow with great diagrams all along the way. I really like the patterned fabric in the pleats and the handle so I could incorporate these ideas into an easier bag at some point.
The blue flower picture in the background is a cross-stitch I completed a month ago by the way. Again, I love the picture but it took an awful lot of patience to finish; I’ve decided I much prefer projects that can be completed in a day, life is far too short!
