Self Covering Button tutorial and making them into hair ties

I've done a tutorial for making self covering buttons then turning them into hair ties.
Enjoy!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BFSzFsI_oIA

Skirts for a customer!

A friend asked me if she could get a couple of the new skirt I do for her little girls. She fell in love with the one I made for my little one.
This time round I managed to perfect the pattern. The main downfall with the initial skirt was the waistband. Now however they are lovely.

Can't wait to make them in bulk once the silly season has passed.

Now Available!

Took a while for these to become available. Had to wait a while for my supplier to have them available.
However they are here and available for you to purchase through my madeit store. Link is over there on your right.

Self covering button kits are the 23mm variety and you get 5 in a kit along with the tool and a plastic template.
Now you can make your own custom buttons.

Holidays from here to there and a sneak peak into the future.

I'm taking a little break from full fledged JazyJae's work. First one in over a year and a much needed one. Will not be doing any markets or significant work till after Christmas.
I do however have a sneak look into a future product for your pleasure.

A fabulous giveaway in time for Christmas

A wonderful giveaway is under way over at Handmade kids go take a look here and enter for your chance to win.

Love Lawson Festival 2009

This weekend was Love Lawson Festival. For the Saturday part of it they have abig family day where there are handmade stalls,community information stalls and local food stalls. This was where I took my first steps in the world of selling my handmade goods last year.

When I started up doing JazyJae's this time last year I had no clue as to how others would react to my things. Especially as the only people who had worn them was myself and my kids. So was greatly nervous about it all. This year much more experienced in how to make my stall look good and how to give everything more of a professional look.

It was another successful year in sales and meeting some wonderful people. Including one customer who came looking for me today at Lawson Public School markets to buy more things and tell me I was her new favourite store.

Whilst there yesturday I found a WAHM who makes cloth nappies and have lined up for her to sew up some nappies for me with the nappy fabrics I have but never have gotten around to making myself. So that was a bonus.

Also got approached by a magazine for something special.......keep an eye out here for any more news on that later. Can't say more than that for now.

Featured on Madeit Wednesday handmade wonderfuls

Today was Wednesday Handmade Wonderfuls email out. One of the featured products was from 2941. I met these lovely girls on Saturday at St Finbars fete. They were in the stall next to mine. Gorgeous girls with gorgeous products.
I really loved their clutch purses if I did not have the need to pay for new glasses this week I would have bought one.
They were good company for the times that seemed to drag out. Including a good laugh for myself. Also purchased a few things from me.
So check out their madeit store. Also check out their blog.
Go girls good on you for getting started on Madeit and in your first store stocking get featured on the mail out.

Lovely Fabric

On Monday I headed down the mountain to Fred The Needle. Surprisingly I purchased very little.... never have I bought so little from there in the past. They also have a blog here.
I really love going down to the shop. Once you get past the scrapbooking things you walk out into a wide open and bright area. Bright not only because of the lighting but also the fabrics.The walls are so lovely filled with gorgeous fabrics to oggle and touch.
I recomend the store as a drop in if your in the area. If you live nearby you should go visit.

So look out for totes, shirts and a few other things featuring these.

New things, practical things!

Last night I made up some groovy notebooks. This was a test batch for how my basic ideas looked. The notebooks I used in these ones were from smiggle and now I can't get them anymore pity as I love these ones. Will have to use another style of notebook for future ones. Plus I'm testing the pattern on the thinner yearly diaries too.

I intend on adding trims and fun patches on future ones. Also playing around with a way to have a pen holder on it too. I like the combination of different fabrics. This also gives me a chance to use some fabrics I have been stashing away till I found a purpose for them. I had no clue what I'd use these fabrics for before and now I finally do.

I really like them and they are so quick to make up. The time consuming part is working out what fabrics to combine with each other. This part can be distracting as I go through my fabrics and discover some I had forgotten about or fall in love again with others.These ones here are just a few of what I made up and that were not sold today at the St. Finnbars fete.

Market and Fair Apron

I finally got around to sewing up my apron to use when I'm doing markets and fairs. Very simple with saved selvages from some fabrics and a bit of black fabric along with a ribbon I had sitting in a draw un-used. The selvage pocket has been backed with a bit of calico.

close up look

A little coin purse to match

Bunting

This is my first custom order bunting. I actually really enjoy making bunting so simple and easy. I have another to do in a girly theme of pinks and blues.

New Fabrics

Today I took the trip down to Penrith to visit a couple of stores to stock up on some fabrics. I plan on making some cute summery skirts to add to the stock.Plus some more Jazy tops in readiness of summer weather and that allows for cutely dressed girls enjoying the sunshine.

No sewing machine makes Xena not so happy!

My machine decided yesturday whilst I was trying to get the stock for the weekend done that it was time to stop working well and to be taken for a service. Tension is out and nothing I do helps make it better. Wish I could just give it a Bex and a good old rest.
Nope! Not as much stock as I anticipated has been replaced for the weekend. Why could it just not wait till this time next week?
So apologies in advance for not having some of the things I had wanted to be done in time.
However next month expect loads of Christmas themed stuff to be available.

Bloomers are done

I completed most of the bloomers I had cut out last night. All ready for the markets this weekend. Lets hope the weather is kind.

What I recomend week 1

I've decided to do a blog a week on featuring a local designer. By local I mean someone who is in the Blue Mountains NSW.


So First cab of the rank will be Plus 1 design.

Plus 1 Design is all about beautiful and practical bags, purses, homewares and accessories made by a girl who is just a little bit pedantic about making sure things are top-stitched, sewn straight, reinforced, centered, spaced evenly, and as perfect as she can get them!

All her designs are beautiful. I love her stuff and hope to get to buy something one of these days.

She has and Etsy store here. You can buy one of her fab items and fall in love with it the moment you have it in your hands.

She also has a blog too.

A little busy here!

Not much to post about in what's hapening here in jazyjae's land in the way that I have taken photos anyway.
However I am busy trying to get things prepared in time for the weekend of markets at both Glenbrook and Lawson.
Plus I have a card order to complete as well.
Lately I have had people asking aboutt he bunting I use on my gazebo at markets and if it's for sale or they can buy some. So yes soon I will have a few for sale but will be moe doing it as a custom order thing. In that people can give me colour scheme ideas and possibly themes as well. This way it will match where ever they want to put it. Have been toying with the idea of doing birthday and Christmas ones as well.

Other things going on include washing and ironing of fabrics for JazyJae's products.

both pics from Eloise Wilkin book We Help Mummy

Birth Fair report!

Yesturday was the Blue Mountains Birth Fair.
I had a stall there with most of my stock. It was a wonderful day indeed!
It was such a pleasure to be in amongst all the wonderful people there. The other stall holders were all lovely. The people attending the event were just as lovely and wonderful. It was so good to see that parents were allowing their kids to be kids instead of yelling at them constantly for running about the place. None of this rushing about that sometimes happens at other market/fairs.
A truelly wonderful day even if the weather was cold and overcast. The rain was good to us and waited till we all had pretty much packed up.
I finally bought myself an Ergo Baby carrier. Master J is now way to big  for a sling and still prefers to be carried over the pram. Wow they are fantastic, I should have got one of them instead of the sling I did in the first place. So comfortable it's almost like your not carrying a toddler at all.
Unfortunately I did not get any photos of my stall or the other stall holders.
Miss J had a ball running around with a couple of the other kids about, playing with hoola hoops and play dough, she also watched the Belly Dancing and thought that was great. She thought it was great to have her face painted like she was a rainbow too.

I did leave my bunting behind though so need to hope either an organiser retrieved it or the community centre has it.

On the desk right now!

On my sewing desk right now is a stack of nappy covers/bloomers. they are waiting for their sew up to be complete.
Some funky designs in there and there are some vintage inspired ones as well.

Yep I missed it!

Missed yesturday's posting but hey I was out all morning, then home briefly working in the yard. Then went out looking for building materials for backyard things. So nothing to do about the day that I could post here.

Last night though I made a pile of cards and now my display box is nearly full again. Busy cutting and glueing whilst watching Celebrity Master Chef.

This display box my mum made ages ago. Has a bunch of storybook pictures all over it.

Perfect for these cards I think.

MiniTote-ing-along bags Done

Last night I got to actually get these little cuties done. With Christmas coming up so soon lots of little girls could see these in their stockings come Christmas morning.

They are small enough to make a great stocking stuffer.
So cute! I've seen little girls about with these after they have been purchased from my market stalls and they look so pleased to have a little bag just like Mummy does.

A Recipe for you!

You can't have creative juices flowing without a belly full of good food. So here is a recipe of mine for you. Now I'm one of those cooks that experiment and rarely do true measuring. So forgive the use of dollops and handfulls etc. This recipe is enough for 3 genorous adult serves and 1 childs serve

Xena' Spaghetti Meatballs

Ingredients

For meatballs
You can use what ever mince you like I flitter to what is on special or looks good.
500gms of minced meat
2 medium sized eggs (free range are best especially if you can get your hands on fressh eggs)
2 heaped dessert spoons of ricotta
2-3 cloves of garlic finely chopped (depends on the size of the clove or your taste)
a pinch of freshly ground sea salt and black pepper
a handfull of torn parsley
a few leaves of basil roughly chopped or torn
1 slice of brown bread crusts cut of and wizzed up into crumbs
A good handfull of freshly grated parmesan
For tomato sauce

1 medium onion finely chopped
2 cloves of garlic (you can ommit if your not much into garlic)
2 tins of chopped tomatos
3 bay leaves
1 1/2 cups of stock I use beef stock when cooking up lamb or beef and chicken when using chicken, pork or veal

Plus enough spagehetti to feed your tribe or whom ever its for

Method

Throw all the meatball ingredients into a large bowl and dig in with your hand and mix it away till well combined.

Look at the orange of those yolks my chookies are good chookies

Once all mixed up together form the meatballs into size that suits you, mine is about a 5cm or so size

Place the balls on a plate then cover and chill in fridge for about an hour or so

In a frying pan with high sides and a lid put the chopped onions and garlic with a splash of olive oil and cook till onion is clear.
Remove from pan and set aside.
Add a little more oil heat up pan then add all the meatballs evenly spaced apart. Brown on all sides. Then throw in all the sauce ingredients. Bring to a slow boil. Reduce heat to a low simmer. Then keep on low simmer for about half an hour stirring the sauce occasionaly, only slightly moving the meatballs to minimise the break up. After this put the lid on and continue a further half hour.
Once you have been simmering your sauce for the hour cook up your spaghetti.
Serve the meatballs and sauce on top of the spaghetti and add some freshly grated parmesan.

ENJOY1

This comming Saturday The Blue Mountains Maternity Coalition is holding a Birth fair. At this event you can see local stalls such as myself. There will be face painting, Ruby Bloomers Circus Playspace for kiddies or the young at heart. Information on Katoomba Maternity Unit, Doulas, Independent Midwives Child and family Health, Australian Breastfeeding Association ond health organisations of the Blue Mountains. Loads of activities and things of interest that are family related and that support the Community especialy services related to birthing in the mountains.
Also you can indulge at the Slow food Cafe, chai and sweets.
Come along for a fun day to Lawson Community Centre from 11am till 3pm.

Crafty goodness through the eyes of a 4yr old!

Earlier today whilst i was waiting for a cake to cool before turning out I got to the cards.

Miss J asked if she could take some photos of me working.

So through her eyes this is what card making looks like.

On the go...

....are some projects waiting to be made.

There are Storybook Greeting cards. My Storybook Greeting Cards are blank cards with a picture from vintage storybooks on the front. Some of the pictures are from books that old that the feel of the picture is like fabric. Each card has a matching envlope. With the envelope I put a little matching picture on the front. very cute little cards I think. Need to cut out some Christmas themed pictures as well.
Plus there are mini tote-ing-along bags all cut out ready to be sewn together. When I first started to make the tote-ing-along bags I used to put a plain lining in but for the last few months I have been doing a vintage fabric lining instead. Doing that just makes the bag all that much better and suits the style of patches I usually use. The mini style ones have ribbon handles instead of the denim with ribbon trim the other sizes have. I hope to get to them tonight.

Cute fabrics are so yummy

These fabrics I picked up whilst on holidays in Melbourne. They were found in the great quilting shop Amitie.
I think the yellow ones will make great dresses and maybe skirts too. Those chicken are so cute!
Then the black and white rock print will make great patches for tote-ing-along bags and shirts I think.

Blogtoberfest at our doorstep!

Yes it's blogtoberfest time again. Me I'm in on the action......and I'm going to be trying to be ambitious and do it here and on over at my personal blog too! Hah could be a disaster but oh well that's part of the fun and the challenge. Over  here in JazyJae's blogland I'll be doing posts about JazyJae's things and also about what inspires me. inspiration could be as little as a fabric to as big as a designer.
The way to sign on up is over here

A Fab. new shop called......

"Lark" is the name and don't you forget it.
Another stop in JazyJae's travels was to visit Alison's new shop.  Lark is located in 4a Duke Street Daylesford.
It was a wet and dreary day. What else could be expected on the 27th September. After all it is that way every year Mr JazyJae's and I want to spend that day outdoors. Hmmmm yes a special day for us. "Tis the day we were married and that day was a wide range of weather conditions from gale forced winds to sleat.
Once we arrived in Daylesford we headed drove about to see if we could spot the store. I had left the Blue Mountains before any final details were posted on The Lark blog of where she was located. Could not find it. So went to the Information centre...they had no clue what i was talking about. So we went up to the markets, hoping that some crafty lady would be there who could tell me where I could find Lark. Nope no such luck ther. Next idea was go back into the centre of town and just ask a local shop owner. Of we went. By pure luck the first store that looked as though they would know what this " crazy gal" was talking about happened to know exactly where I should head. Thankyou Ex Libiris lady!
Stupid me was so bedazzled by the cuteness of the store and chatting to Alison I forgot to pull the camera out to take a couple of photos.
I did buy things though!

Homemade a book to aid the Black Saturday bush fire victims and Salvation Army

japanese tape very cute soon to be JazyJae's packaging tape and more

what was inside my bag of goodies Alsion gave me see her blog entry below

Alison also took a photo of me to post on the blog wall of fame and on her blog.

I'm at The Local Shop

Last week the JazyJae's family took a road trip down south to Melbourne. One of our stops was to pop on into a lovely Shop call Local Shop which is located at 262 High Street Northcote.
The lovely Gale runs the quaint little shop. Inside you will find a gorgeous array of flowers at the front. What a way to entice people in but through the beautiful smell of gorgeous flowers. Past the flowers then a lovely water feature you will spy just to the left some JazyJae's tote-ing-along bags. I was there to not only take a gander at the store but to drop of the latest order for the shop. Twelve more bags in total with two new designs in there. All of which I forgot to take a photo of.

JazyJae's Tote-ing-along bags

Further down in the store are a large number of various handmade Aussie designs. Gale has done an amazing job of making all these Aussie designs look so fab. in the store.

In the back of the shop up on the wall are snailblazer bags

Pity I did not get to catch up with Gale on the day however her lovely employees were great. Especially the girl in there who kept Miss J entertained with her curiosity of what all the flowers there were called.
If your ever near Northcote pop in and see all the great things inside. You will not be disapointed.

Cute little purses and wallets plus lots of accessories

See at the front there those little alphabet broaches I bought one a letter X