Another craft show....

...has come and gone, and thankfully, this one was a little more profitable.

Lauri and I shared a table at this year's Mesa County Employee Association craft show. Last year was the first time they'd done it, and I did all right. This year, I think more people came prepared to actually shop, not just look, and Lauri and I both did alright.

Lauri's items are the purses (not the squarish totes), which she had in two sizes; a cell phone or MP3 player sized pouch, or the larger shoulder bags. She also made some really cute little denim pocket purses that did very well.

We'll never get rich doing this, but we had a good time, got some good feedback, and were able to sit and stitch for a few hours.

Boxes for the craft show

These are some of the boxes I'm doing for the show. The dark grained wooden ones are some unfinished wood boxes that I have purchased at either Hobby Lobby or Michael's. Wood working is NOT my strong suit, so they are not what you'd call masterfully finished, but I did stain them and applied a varnish. The tiniest boxes, which I don't think are in the pictures, have a CQ piece that measures about 1 1/2" square on them. The smallest pictured ones are rectangular and the CQ piece is about 2 1/2" by 1 1/2".
The white boxes and the black one in a previous post were also purchased from Hobby Lobby, and were already finished. The white ones were startlingly white, so I gave them a gold wash to antique them and tone down the glare a little.

Another craft show project

I found this odd colored teddy bear and thought he'd look awesome with a CQed vest. So I made a pattern and cut the foundations from muslin.

Then I pieced the muslin with fancy fabrics. The hardest part was choosing colors that I liked with this bear. Finally I settled on purples, pinks, and navy blue, with some gold lace overlaying some of the fabrics.

It's not all together yet, but I like the way it's coming so far. The bear is odd, don't you agree? He's sort of purply-pinky tie-dyed, but he's cute, and he might just be the best dressed bear at the fair. I also have a garden variety brown bear, but he may end up in camouflage overalls. We'll see.....

Craft show products

This first is a box I bought on clearance at Hobby Lobby. I also have two white ones just like this. With a box with an inset area on the top, it is easy to make a cq piece to fit into it. I made quite a few boxes similar to this for a small craft show last year and did fairly well with them. This year Lauri and I are doing two craft shows. One is with Holy Family School, a very large and well attended show on Saturday, November 3rd. The second is the same one I did last year, held by Mesa County Employee's Association on Tuesday, December 4th at the old court house. It's an odd day, and a little late in the season, but we probably won't sell everything at HF, so it'll give us a second chance to sell some things. If you're in GJ, please come and see us at one or both shows!

I meant for these to post in the reverse order, but this is how they came out. The second photo is of the finished velvet boxes. They are pieced with fancy fabrics and embellished with buttons, beads and embroidery.

I bought these two boxes at Walmart in the after Christmas sales in January. They were supposed to be sewing boxes. They were empty, but had a strange felt and ribbon corset-like decoration on the top that was to be used as a pin cushion. I pulled those off, and that is why there is a nasty glue glob in the center of the top. I also pulled off a row of sequins around the edge of the top and covered that glue with braid trim.