London Calling

Sorry for not writing any posts for a week or so, but we've had a busy couple of weeks, ending with my out-laws (hubby's parents who I adore - thankfully ;-p) coming to stay for just over a week.

This month's most popular item has easily been the Poppy Brooch

Which is brilliant as everyone who's bought one has helped to raise money for The Royal British Legion for Remembrance Sunday.

And tonight I am off to London! (can you tell I'm excited and that I don't get out enough?!) as tomorrow I am attending a work shop about Social Media, run by a lovely lady, Sarah Duncan of Sleeping Lions. I'm really looking forward to the workshop and will be practicing all I learn using the Blog, the Grace's Favours Facebook Page, the Pinterest Boards and Twitter account - so keep your eyes peeled :-)

And the winner is.......

Drum roll please..... Comment number 7:

Claire from Aisling Designs, who said: "Already like you on FB. And will go off now and tweet and share on FB. Lovely giveaway, and I wish you every success this coming year."

Congratulations Claire :-) I will be in touch about what sort of design you would like.

Thank you so much to everyone who entered and especially those who shared away like crazy!! And as I'm in a fab mood I'm going to extend the 20% off everything in my shop until the end of the weekend!

Happy Birthday to Me.....!

Morning campers (have various old Hi-de-hi lines going through my head today for some reason!)

So, today is my 1 year anniversary of selling on Etsy! I've had an incredible year and it has been getting better and better!

Here are some pics of the last year in the Grace's Favours household:

1st item made & sold - thankfully my photography's improved a bit since then!

The 1st campervan - now our most popular item!

1st attempt at a fascinator

A handmade birthday present

Kids modelling their crowns for the Jubilee

Learning to make fascinators properly!

New bear is MINE!

The latest campervan

I am part of some wonderful teams on Etsy, which has meant I've met some wonderful people along the way, all of whom are really supportive and friendly, which is invaluable when you're working on your own.

There is one person I couldn't have done any of this without and that's my lovely husband Brian, who not only provides all technical and graphics advice & support, but who also has taken on a much greater role in looking after the house and children - thank you Gorgeous!!

To celebrate Grace's Favours being 1 year old not only am I giving away a gorgeous Christmas Wreath but I'm also offering 20% off any item in the shop today only... so any early Christmas shopping you wanted to get started on will save you money too!

1 Year Etsy Anniversary Giveaway!!!

It's been in my mind recently to hold a giveaway as a thank you to all my lovely customers and Blog, Facebook & Twitter followers and what better time than now, for the celebration of my Etsy Shop being 1 year old!

So the giveaway is running from today, for 1 week and I'll do the magic with the random number generator on Thursday 18th October (the date of my anniversary!)

Here's what you can win:

There are 4 ways in which you can enter and each will count as a separate entry, giving you more chances to win:

Required Entry:

Become a follower of this blog & leave a comment on this post saying you've done so (1 entry) 

Optional Extra Entries:

1. 'Like' our Facebook page and post a comment here to say you've done it (1 entry)

2. Share the competition picture on your personal Facebook page & leave a comment here to say you've done it (1 entry)

3. Tweet about the giveaway & leave us a comment here (1 entry)

4. Post a snippet on your blog about our giveaway and leave us a comment here with the link (1 entry)

The giveaway will close at midnight on Thursday October 18th 2012 (GMT) and the giveaway is open to all countries.

Please make sure I can contact you via your comment - leave an email address with your comment if it's not available through your profile. If I can't get in touch with you by the 22nd October 2012 I'll re-do the draw.

Good Luck!!

There will also be a special 20% off sale from 18th October for one week, all you need to do is use the code BIRTHDAY2012 when you checkout at the shop

Poppies for Remembrance Day

So last year I was thinking about making some poppy brooches to put into my Etsy shop around the time of Remebrance Day (11th of November for those from other countries where it's not a particular day of remembrance) but I ran out of time. So this year I have been really organised and have made not only some poppy brooches, but also poppy hairslides.

 

As these are in part for Remembrance Day (they can be worn at any time, so I will keep them in the shop all year round) I wanted to make sure some money went to charity, so during the months of October & November I am donating all the profit from the sale of any poppy item to the Royal British Legion.

All profit means I will take out the time & materials cost and donate the remainder to charity. So I will not be profiting from the sale of these items during these two months.

I'll be wearing my poppy with pride (as always) but this year, it will also be a handmade poppy.

Our 1st Product Review

Ohhhhhh I've had an exciting weekend (I know - it only takes the smallest of things!)

We had a BNR in one of my Etsy teams...  a BNR is a treasury which when you buy from one of the shops featured means one of your items replaces the item from the shop you just bought from. So in order to get featured, you have to buy something from one of the other shops feaured. Everybody wins because we all get more sales and more exposure. I bought in twice and was bought out again really quickly, which is very flattering.

So not only did I have a couple of sales from that, but I have also had my first ever product review!!

Here is the link to the article

I am over the moon as the recipient of the Campervan was really thrilled with it!

More Photo Editing

Okay, so now I feel a bit daft... but since my last post I've discovered that there is a MUCH easier way to get your photos looking better... without so many stages and ending up with a better looking photo... it's called Fotofuze

It automatically imports your Etsy listings:



And then in one simple move you can take a picture from this:

to this... IN ONE STEP!!



It does turn some of the pictures a bit doolally though:

A little bit more attention required on that one me thinks!

5 basic rules for taking product photos... and more!

Last month I took part in a shop critique on Etsy and the one point that all participants agreed on was that some of my photos need improving.

This wasn't a big shock to me as I know that my photos aren't the best out there... although not as bad as some ;-)

Here are the basics rules:

1. Don't use your flash - EVER!
2. Take photos on a cloudy day (as opposed to a bright sunny day) and take them outside if possible.
3. Take photos of your products on a plain (preferably white) backgroud
4. Use the 'manual focus' button on your camera to get good close-ups
5. Don't take photos with the lights on - use natural daylight

And lastly....
Don't use your flash! (Important enough to mentioned twice!)

However, even when following these pieces of advice, there are still some tweeks that you can do on the computer to help enhance the photo (this isn't cheating - it's just making the most of your photo)

I'm very new to this digital editing of photos, so I had a play around and I'm happier with the results (although I think I still have a way to go and a proper white backgroud would definitley have helped)

First of all I played about with the exposure of the image, taking a photo from this:

to this:

And then I change the contrast, so it looked like this:

At this point it looked a little washed out and I was wondering if I shouldn't have changed the contrast, but it did make the next stage look better, when I started changing the colour saturation:

And then finally the temperature gets a little tweek:



This image above was actually shot on a pale greeny/blue window sill inside on an overcast day, but the editing has still helped the end result.

As a lot of my orders are custom made pieces there won't be an overnight change to all my shop photos, but over time, now that I know I need to spend a bit more time working on them, hopefully they will continue to improve!

PS. I made these edits using the Google+ editing tool on Chrome - have a look at some other photos that I've edited on my Google+ page

How to get started with your Google+ Business Page

I've just set up my Google+ Grace's Favours page and to be honest, I've found it a bit baffling, so I thought I would share my thoughts and do some research to see what other's suggest

In a lot of ways it's very much the same as setting up a business page on Facebook, once you've chosen the type of business that you are, you add profile pictures and some basic information. There's a very good explanation here on Craft Blog UK

Then you need to start getting your page known. I have found this bit harder on G+ than on Facebook as I rarely use G+ for personal socialising, so I don't have the same network on here as I do on FB to promote my new page.

So I started by searching on G+ for pages with the term 'handmade' that immedaitely yielded a number of results. So I followed a number of relevant looking pages and then had a peek at who's in their circles, which lead me to other pages.

However, I want to get my page seen by 'real' people, not just other similar business pages... I've not found any miracle ways to get this done, other than starting to use G+ a bit more frequently, link up with more people I know in real life and get them to do some promoting.

I have been toying with the idea of offering a giveaway but I'm wary of them as every man and his dog seem to run them and I think you probably need to have a relatively good fan base initially.

Good luck to anyone else setting up a page and I'll keep you posted about how I get on!

Updated Website

I've been trying to decide how to go about posting when I've not got much new to share with you... no-one likes a boring blog post, but I've realised it doesn't always have to be about new things that I'm making.

Today I thought I'd share with you my updated website:

I am so much happier to have pictures of all the things I've been creating over the last 10 months as opposed to the old holding pages I originally set up and never got round to changing!

I will probably need nudging though to keep the images fresh, so you'll have to shout at me if I don't do it from time to time!

Calling all winners

Phew - that was a long couple of weeks in the GF household... this was the biggest order to date and it was interesting as I'd not made the items before so I was designing the trophies as I went along (I know, I know... I'm supposed to design it, make a prototype, modify the designs and then begin full scale production - but I only had 2 weeks!)

Here are some pics of the trophies before I packaged them up to take down to the event:

The full collection - 14 in total

A Large Summer Tree Trophy

A Small Autumn Tree Trophy

A Small Winter Tree Trophy

A Small Summer Tree Trophy

A Small Spring Tree Trophy

Back of each one had a label with Grace's Favours details

A Large Autumn Tree Trophy

I decided to make the trees in the 4 seasons to give a bit of variation and as the company who placed the order is called Black Sheep Sports, there was a little black sheep on each trophy!

Now onto some smaller orders from my Etsy shop and then another large order to complete, this time for a soon-to-be-open shop in Scarborough!

So Many Ideas... So Little Time

Just a quickie today... I am still working merrily on my little forest of trees (see previous post) which need to be finished by the end of Friday! Eek!

I'm really enjoying this custom order, it's been a lovely challenge, to come up with something completely different and I'm excited about seeing the finished product - pics shared here first :-)

It is a little frustrating though as I've got SO many ideas kicking around my head for Halloween goodies, Baby Mobiles, Christmassy things and more... I can't wait to get started on them!

However, before all of that, I'm very excited as I've been contacted by a lovely lady through my Etsy shop as she's in the process of setting up a children's boutique full of exlusive handmade British products and she'd potentially like to stock my London Bus:

 The full listing can be found here
So keep your fingers crossed that the 'Ole Routemaster makes it through the selection stage!

Can't see the Wood for the Trees!

So, last week, just as I was getting well and truly stuck into the idea of Christmas crafting and concentrating on all things cold & snowy… I got an order from a good friend of mine Trev, to make 14 trophies for a triathlon that he runs every year at the end of August. It’s called The Big Woody (actually there are two, with the smaller version called The Little Woody) so all the trophies needed to be based on a tree theme!

I love the fact that Black Sheep Sports (the company my friend Trev runs) like to hire local people to make the trophies each year and am so proud that this time they’ve asked me!

Would y’all like a sneak peek of the trophies? Course you would!

3 stages of creation... trunk, leaves & writing

Summer Tree

Autumn Tree - this is my favourite colour combo!

The races take place a week on Saturday, so I can see that my sleep to coffee ratio is going to fall dramatically for the next week and a half!

I also have a Charity Fun Day at The Crown in Coleway (Forest of Dean!) that I’m attending this coming weekend, but will have to rely on the stock I had left over from the last fayre I did as I won’t have time to make any more… as I’m sharing my stall with a friend I’m not too worried as I’m sure between us we’ll have plenty of stock!

Oh and one more thing (I always feel rather like Columbo whenever I say that!) thought  you might like to see the finished Snowman stocking:

They’re now being listed in my Etsy shop

Christmas is coming....

I know, I know, it's a little early, but you all know that I've been thinking about and working on some Christmas Goodies for a while now and in fact this latest batch of new items have been prompted by the same, very organised and very lovely Etsy customer. He was my first customer on Etsy last Autumn, ordering 2 stockings and now would like 3 more, this time for family, including a more exciting looking stocking for the baby, so here's a sneak peek:

More photos to follow once it's all finish :-)

Craft Fair

It turns out that I was a little (teensy, weensy) bit stressed before the Orchard Trust Summer Fayre last weekend... I know this because as soon as it was over I stopped shouting at my nearest and dearest. Oops. The Fayre was a fantastic event though, attended by hundreds of people, far more than I expected (given how worried I was about not doing well at it, it's probably just as well I didn't know it would be that big!) and I had a FANTASTIC afternoon... both in terms of enjoyment & also business!

The day didn't start out too well weather-wise... half an hour before I had to go and set up the rain was coming down in sheets and bouncing up so high it was hitting our windows! But then, glorious sunshine for the rest of the day... and here are some pics of my stall all set up:

It was lovely to see some familiar faces - thank you to everyone who came along & supported both the charity & also little old me :-)

I've got a stall at a charity Fun Day on Sunday 19th August but I think after that I'll give it a break until the Christmas markets get underway.... it's just too stressful whilst also trying to hold down a part time job, look after the sprogs and fulfill orders!

We also had the excitement of Patrick's 2nd Birthday last week and his party on Saturday - great fun was had by all, especially when it came to the eating of the cake:

Prolonged Holiday...

So if everything had gone according to plan I would have been writing this post on Sunday, waiting for my Dad to arrive for a couple of days (to celebrate the little man's 2nd Birthday) as we would have arrived back from holiday on Saturday afternoon... everything would be unpacked & washed and I'd be nicely relaxed. Instead it's Tuesday and none of that is done! Just as we were packing up on Friday night, Brian looked at the tickets and discovered that he'd inadvertently booked us tickets home for Sunday, not Saturday!! Oops! Still an extra day's holiday is all good :-)

We had a wonderful time in Ireland... the weather was, as always, mixed, but the kids enjoyed the rainy days as much as the sunny ones. It was great to catch up with not only Brian's close family, but also some cousins who we often don't get to see, as we headed out West to a friend's wedding and luckily for us it was very close to a number of Brian's cousins and a couple of mine, so we caught up with almost all of them in one weekend - hectic :-)

Seren had her first trip to the cinema while we were away (to see Ice Age 4 - I enjoyed it too!) and she LOVED it :-) It was such a pleasure to take her and spend some quality time as Mummy & Daughter on our own (Patrick is definitely still too young to sit still or quietly for long enough!)


The most popular things though, were the 1st of the 3 birthday cakes to celebrate Patrick's 2nd Birthday, playing at the beach & playing with their big cousins:

  

And while you might think I did nothing except for relaxing I can assure you I was busy busy busy - making this lot:

All of these are for the Summer Fayre that I'm attending this coming Sunday: