Nearly there !

I've been working like mad trying to get the studio properly organised and also getting completely up to date on all of the orders that everyone has been placing this last week. I think that once people realised that yesterday was the last posting date for Easter, some people went into panic buying mode and tried (but fortunately failed) to completely clear me out of stock !!

However, I am now up to date on all of my orders and have also managed to get myself more organised in the studio.

The electrician came and installed the storage heater so I'm nice and toasty down there now and the carpenter came and made me the most fantastic workbench.

Most of my supplies are now on the shelves and are organised (sort of!), but .... and I knew this would happen - I've run out of space !! Arghhhhhhh. Well, when I say I've run out of space, I mean I've filled up all of the original storage that I bought and still have rather a lot of stock that won't fit on the shelves so is still living in boxes on the floor. Grrrrrrrr. So, I feel another trip to Ikea coming on to buy yet more storage so that everything will have a home and I won't be hunting through boxes for certain things.

All of my jars of felt balls are organised (they do need filling up though)

All of the felt sheets are colour co-ordinated

The ribbons, yoyo makers, crochet flowers and flat pad findings have a home (although I am planning on having a couple of wooden rails installed that will house all of the ribbons so that I can just pull them off the reel when I need to cut them, rather than unstack them all first before having to cut them) - that should hopefully free up another couple of shelves.

The wool roving, needle felting supplies and books are all organised and the buttons .... well, that's a bit of a sore point at the moment because they're not very organised.

I won't show you the other side of the studio because that's where the extra boxes are still sitting on the floor awaiting new homes and that would just spoil everything !!

I haven't had a chance to pretty the studio up yet - I've got lots of lovely pictures that I want to put up, my Blooming Felt sign (which I'm still waiting for my Dad to make !) and the wonderful pictures that I WON - yes, I can't believe it - I actually won a giveaway from the wonderful Julia Crossland's blog - you really must pay her a visit and admire her beautiful artwork. Thanks Julia - can't wait to receive the goodies !! And I've also got a number of other "projects" that I and Mrs J (my tutorial lady) have made up, all of which need to be shown off in the studio.

Actually, talking of Mrs J - she is busy working away on some new tutorials. I know I've been a bit slow in getting this month's tutorial onto the website, but that's purely because one of the main components has been out of stock. However, it finally arrived today and so I will try my very hardest to get the Tutorial on the website this week - if not, it will become the April tutorial !!

So, that's enough jabbering from me for the time being. I'm having a bit of a rest now and will be back on the 14th April, raring to go (and with lots more new stock hopefully!). The website will remain open and taking orders, but nothing will be processed until 14th April. Once again, apologies for any inconvenience this might cause.

See you soon

Love one happy lady xx

Lots of lovely new stuff !

In between sorting the new studio out, I've been trying to get some of the lovely new stock onto the website.

It's a slow old process photographing everything, then measuring it all so that I can get the correct details in the website description which seems to take me forever to think about what to write, and then uploading it all to the website, making sure it's all in the right categories etc. But I think I'm nearly there with it all. I won't go into a huge amount of detail here because my poor brain is getting a bit tired, so I'll just show you the photos which you can click on to be magically transported to that particular item on the website. OK, here goes :

New button mixes

Blushing Mushroom (what a fantastic name !!)

and Wuthering Heights

Shell Buttons available in 4 colourways

JUMBO Ric Rac in 5 colourways (with another 2 still to come - my supplier is out of stock at the moment !)

GIANT spotty buttons in 2 new colourways - pink

and teale

A new colour in wool roving - turquoise (code C2)

There are more new products still to come but I'll tell you about these when they get here.

The HUGE felt delivery arrived yesterday and I'm in the processing of updating the website with quantities of 4mm thick felt sheets, felt string/cord, felt balls, pebbles, stars, hearts and wool. All being well I should also be receiving another delivery next week which will contain grab bags and mini felt stacks and as soon as they get here, I'll update the website again with the restock.

Which reminds me .... the LAST POSTING DATE FOR EASTER IS TUESDAY 23RD MARCH. After that, the website will still be taking orders, but nothing will be processed until WEDNESDAY 14TH APRIL. I will be having a bit of a rest so apologise for any inconvenience that the delay will cause.

Things are happening in the studio - the outside step has been built and the carpenter is on the case with the workbench. Paul has put all of the Ikea units together and the electrician is due this week to fit the storage heater and then hopefully, by Saturday, I will have MOVED IN !!

I've started to put a few bits and pieces in there, but I wish I hadn't because now I'm working from 2 rooms again and it's a bit of a long walk down the garden every time I need some felt sheets or some wool ! Never mind ... not long now

More studio photos to follow next time .......

Sarah xx

Ahhh - thanks guys !!

Thank you all so much for your lovely comments and "shed envy" !!

I found out that I was featured on a website called http://www.shedworking.co.uk/ the other day and from that, was contacted by http://www.readersheds.co.uk/ and asked to submit photos to their site for inclusion in their "shed of the year" award which is apparently judged by Sarah Beeney (of Property Ladder fame). How exciting !! I have to admit now that I have become slightly obsessed with "shedworking" and may even admit to being a "sheddie". In my extensive (!) research of shedworking I came across this lady - can you believe she covered her shed in fabric ?? Probably not very practical, but what a cool idea. I don't think my new shedquarters (as Minky Magic commented in the last post) will get to be covered in fabric, but things are certainly starting to come together.

Sunday afternoon saw me (and what seemed like a million other people) traipsing around Ikea. After one of the ever so helpful Ikea staff informed me that I couldn't actually order all the stuff I wanted and told me that I would have to load it all onto my trolley (I'm on my own), pay for it at the checkout and then take it all to customer services and pay £85 for it to be delivered (I live about 15 miles from Ikea), I gave that up as a bad job and came home empty handed.

However, once I got home I decided to start painting the inside of the studio. I was in there until 10.30pm white "washing" the walls (as Ana suggested last time). So the grain of the wood still shows through and you still get that shabby chic log cabin look, but without all the natural pine colour. ( I know Richard - I'm sorry, but I didn't think I'd be able to live with all that wood.) I really can't face doing the mezzanines or ceiling though, so they will stay as they are.

I managed to get the whole of the back wall done on Sunday and then spent Tuesday doing some more - that strange man is my Dad very kindly painting the window frames for me - thanks Dad! That strange child is my daughter showing me her ballet and that strange lady is me, showing off how lovely bright colours look against a white background. You see, I can't even have a plain black jacket - it had to be lime green !!

Yesterday Paul worked from home so we borrowed a van and quickly went to Ikea (again) and this time, had a far more successful trip.

So far, the Expedit has been constructed and manouvered into place (boy - that thing's heavy !!)
and the 3 Lack bookcases, 2 Lack bookshelves, 1 x desk lamp, 2 x chairs (which will duly be painted - 1 pink and 1 blue), 1 x stepstool (so that I can reach the sweetie jars on the top shelves), 1 x filing cabinet (to keep all my packing supplies in) and 3 floating shelves (just because I've always wanted some of them and they don't "go" in our 250 year old farmhouse !) are all waiting patiently in their boxes for their turn to be put together.

Hopefully, the carpenter is coming tomorrow to make the decking step into the studio because at the moment there is a huge drop down onto the grass and I can't be doing with that ! And I'm hoping that he will also bring the samples for my workbench so that I can decide for sure which one I want. The electrician is on the case with a storage heater because it's a bit nippy down there at the moment and I'm hoping that both the workbench and heater will be done next week and then ...................................................... I CAN MOVE IN !!!

I'm getting butterflies in my stomach just thinking about it . Sadly, I found out today that my huge felt supplies delivery is sitting at Stansted Airport waiting to be released by customs. Apparently my supplier forgot to include the "Certificate of Origin" with the boxes and our lovely customs people won't, therefore, release the boxes until they receive the original certificate (that means they won't accept a faxed or emailed copy). So all of my lovely shelves are likely to stay a little bit empty until my delivery arrives - I am VERY CROSS !

But that's enough from me for the moment. I've had loads of deliveries of new stock, but with all the excitement of the studio, haven't been able to tell you about them. But if you click here, you'll see them at the top of the "Just Arrived" section. There's some photos of some of the new stock over there ... on the left of the page. More new stock is waiting to be photographed and I will try and show you photos next time. And to just totally fill what little space I have left in my brain, whilst I was painting the studio I had rather a lot of ideas popping into my head for new Blooming Felt kits, so I'm hoping they will come to fruition soon as well.

Until next time xx

Ta Daaaaaa !!!

At last ... my long awaited project is almost complete !

Just a trip to Ikea tomorrow to purchase lots of lovely bookcases and storage units, a visit by the carpenter to fit my beautiful workbench (I know, so workbenches shouldn't really be beautiful - more practical really), but it's made from lovely white gloss laminate so that it will reflect the light and brighten up the inside, and then I can move in to my new studio !!!

(The outside and windows / doors will be painted in the summer.

I have yet to decide on a colour but it will be something that will blend in with the garden)

I'm soooo excited. I have been working out of the spare room for almost a year now and things are getting quite ridiculous. I'm having to clamber over boxes and move stuff all the time so that I can reach whatever it is that I happen to need. And having 2 people working in the spare room at the same time just isn't possible. So, the time came to build a purpose-built studio ..... in the garden !

Regular readers of this little old blog will know that we are very fortunate to have a large garden, so building a studio in it seemed the obvious solution to my workspace problem. It also means that I can still work from home and keep an eye on the children, which would have been impossible if I'd had to rent somewhere.

So, at last, Blooming Felt will have a home of its very own - a fantastic studio with 2 mezzanines so that I can store extra supplies and all the kit I use at shows up, out of the way, and enough space left over to run workshops should I so wish, in the future. Finally, our house can now return to being a house, and not have masses of boxes stacked up in every (yes, every) room !

My only dilemma is should I whitewash the walls? I was really keen to have a completely white space so that it would show off all of my colourful felty goodies beautifully, but do I have the time or inclination to do it ?

If you're interested in doing something similar in your garden, I can highly recommend the company I used. Aarco are a wonderful family run company in Chester who will design and make studios / garden rooms etc to your exact specifications and then come and install it all for you. They've been here all week and as well as building my studio from scratch, had to first dismantle, move and reassemble our shed before work on the studio could begin. They managed everything in just 5 days and I couldn't have asked for a better company to come and do the work. Thank you Noella, Richard, Martin (and Vic the carpenter), without whom my fantastic new studio wouldn't exist !!

OK - I'm off to measure (yet again) the space in my studio and then look (yet again) at the Ikea website !!!

See you soon xxx