WOYWW.....

Where did that week go? As you can see from my work desk I cleared it at the end of yesterday and there is no sewing on it. Since clearing it though I have had a couple of jobs in so please don't imagine I will be putting my feet up today :-)
You can see my new set of drawers below my work desk. These are now full of my threads of every colour. My old set of drawers were far too small and used to get stuck when the cotton reels got trapped at the back so the new ones save me a lot of time and temper :-)
On the top at the left of my machine you can see my customer cards in the two index boxes. All 901 of them :-)
At least 2/3 of them have become regulars and the rest are mostly Wedding dress customers although many of these have also come back for other sewing jobs.

In the front of the one index box are my Christmas vouchers. I decided when I first set up my business that giving out £1 vouchers to be used in January would encourage folk to come, maybe, at a time when I would be a little less busy and to wish my customers a Happy Christmas. They are received gratefully and although I give out very many only a handful are normally used so they work very much as a good will gift but cost me little.

I now have to tackle taking in the bodice of this little party frock. Its boned so I will have to unpick it all to take out the boning before taking it in and then replace it after so it's rather a tricky job and will take me a while to do. Just another challenge for me to fill my day :-)

This is one of the several stockings I have been asked to make this year. Just thought I would share it with you and brighten up my blog. I'm not sure I will get round to blogging my WOYWW next week cos I am on holidays so here's wishing all my WOYWW buddies a very Happy Christmas and a Happy, Healthy and Prosperous New Year.
Love to all, A x

What's on my desks?...

Good morning. I was asked by Julia to describe what was on my desk because I had left a message on another blog that the job I was working on yesterday was a wedding dress and that I wouldn't want to put photos of it on my blog 'cos it was of course a secret to be kept for her special day. I decided I could do better than that and could pop a few photos here of areas of my room where I spend my days.

This is my computerised machine that I do the clever jobs on. I sew all my gorgeous wedding dresses on here and do any decorative stitching on my greetings cards on this one. As you can see I look out onto my bird feeders and even have one attached to the outside of my window so often have birds just literally inches away from me while I sew...bliss. This window faces south so I get all the sunshine here through my window.









This one is my overlocker. I hadn't used an overlocker 'til I did my tailoring training and now I couldn't imagine not using one. It finishes the seams off professionally and makes hand made garments look so much better. On the wall at the back you can see a few of my rubber stamps. I use these for my card making but only have room to display these few [there are many more in the drawers above].








This is my work horse. It's my industrial machine that I do all my everyday jobs on. It travels quickly through any job and I'm sure would be very unforgiving to any fingers in it's way [dare I say I've never had the pleasure of finding out?]. Below the table you can see draws full of threads of just about every colour available. My motto is "if I haven't got it you probably cant buy it .










This is my blind hemmer. It's the machine that puts that thread in trouser hems that little boys sit in school pulling and undoing their hems. This machine must have saved me hours over the years. It sews up hems pretty much invisibly in a fraction of the time I could do it by hand. It does have it's limitations and it has days when I have to talk to it very nicely to get it to do the job I am asking of it but, when it works, it works well. Of course you can see the boxes of material and the bits and pieces everywhere but what craft/ sewing room wouldn't have these. The boxes in this picture are full of the fur fabric I use for my puppets so if you fancy one just let me know :-)