Saturday, July 5, 2008

What Makes Your Crochet Stand out In A Crowd?

Individual style and flair, would most probably be, what makes your hand made crochet items stand out.

I ask this as I once again return to the market tomorrow, Sunday 06.07.08.

A lady 3 stalls down from my stall last week, was selling scarves made with that fluffy type yarn you can buy for nick's. I didn't look to see if they were crochet or knit, it wouldn't make a difference any how.

But what I am getting to here is that her scarves were priced at $7.00 each and I am selling my neck warmers for $10.00 each, I originally wanted to sell them for $15.00 each, as they have buttons and use a 50 gm ball of yarn to complete.

So with the thinking cap on for idea's to keep on improving my stall from week to week, I realised that I had to be different and to stand out from other stalls. I feel I have already made myself unique, as I am a one of a kind stall where I am selling.

I did not want to make cheap fluffy scarves as every other stall can have those, I'd rather spend the same amount of time on a unique item with quality yarn.

What I have come up with can still be sold at the bargain price of $10.00, there is a little room for profit, but once a matching hat is sold along with my new scarves, the profit becomes larger.

Here are some pictures of my latest scarves with matching hats.



Thursday, July 3, 2008

Divine into Beret/Slouch

Referring back to the Divine free hat pattern, I thought it was more than possible to make a beret/slouch from this lovely st pattern. The first one I made is the light coloured grey one, I kept the increase (with out the repeat of the line before) going until I had 8 dc made in the space, then I continued the edge with the griddle st (up and down st) and slowly decreased as I reached the length desired, I thought that there was too much effort in making up to 8 dc, so the black one was done slightly different. I made one repeat of the 3 dc row and one repeat of the 5 dc, then I began the griddle st, omitting the fpdc in the first row, I made a few rounds of the griddle st before I began to decrease every 10th then 8th st. Decreasing with the griddle st and keeping the pattern correct, I decreased in a dc way, then made another dec in a sc way immediately after, hence decreasing every 10 th st then every 8th st.
Because it was mostly guess work with the decreasing, I finished the black one off with a row of sc to give it a slightly tighter finish.



I made a bow in the griddle st, which really set the grey one off.

Wednesday, July 2, 2008

Off The Top Of My Head and onto My Head

Some times I use a pattern and most of the times I don't.

Some times I get ideas from patterns and change their idea to suit me.

Below are a few examples with out patterns.

I will be taking these and more (gotta make more) to the market this week end.



Market Day 2

I believe that this week-end at the market was a better out come than last week, with triple the sales and no rain, how ever it was very windy! Regular stall holders said that numbers were down, so when I was asked if I wanted to book for next week-end, of course I said yes.
When I got home I looked up the fore cast for next week-end and it is going to be a fine winters day!
Keep reading for an eerie vision.

This was the first photo I took, I could not believe the eerie mist type shape I saw in the picture preview, so I took another straight after which is below. What do you think the mist is? I have no explanation for it, but the shape seems to me to be a giant skull. I usually crop and make my images smaller before posting them, but this time I didn't, just so I can't be accused of playing around with the image. I'm not into super natural stuff, but who knows?

As you can see by the picture, I have some novelty and apparell that I am selling at very cheap prices. I used to have a shop and still have contacts for cheap products.


This is a classic, the wind was blowing things away and over, one way to combat this was some old jumper leads that were in the van I borrowed, along with some big plastic clips and occa straps we bought on the day. I layed the occa straps across my goods on the table, you could still see the goods clearly, but they were held securely down onto the table.
I must thank my husband Terry for making up a wooden stand I can place my display heads onto. It's a simple horizontal flat board with cut down broom stick handle's, secured into a vertical position, I can take the head models off for transport and storage.