The White Collar

Ah what a nice long weekend and it's not even over. Well, it's sort of over because a Monday is a Monday and I have Monday things to do, even if the kids have no schooling and the husband has no work. We took a lovely trip out to the coast to the Monterey Bay Aquarium on Saturday. Yes, I am aware that we do that often, but we love it out there. There's the cool weather, the Ocean and of course the aquarium itself. We visited because it was the last weekend of the seahorse exhibit and well, we really didn't need and excuse, but that was the one we chose.

Sunday was mostly recovering from the day of walking. It was more crowded than usual and that always makes the trip more stressful than we like it. I did manage to finish the white, embellished collar while we watched Lawrence Of Arabia for the first time in the afternoon. I didn't press it nor get proper photos...it's a really long movie with an inordinate amount of walking though the desert. It was dinner time by the time we were finished and there was no sun after that.

Today, despite the vacationing family, I shall get it photographed and listed. I still have yet to sell anything that needs remaking. In fact it's been well over a week since I sold anything I needed to make at all. It wasn't too bothersome as I had these collars to work on, but now that they're done, I sure hope the sales come back. I think I might be out of ideas for a while, or who knows, they do come around when I least expect them. Mostly I just need to really start making some money around here again, I have bills to pay. Here's hoping for a great day, week and month, starting now.

Well, That Was A Day

It was a long, but fairly interesting day. The first task after some extra quick schooling in the morning was a meeting with the youngest child's teacher for her benchmark assessments. She managed to not only impress her teacher, who sees her only a handful of times a year, but me as well. Child can read and spell like crazy and I was encouraged to speed her through her class assessments until something actually becomes new and/or difficult for her. Then when we got home we worked on an art project with clay and that was a pretty good time for both kids.

Then between all the the morning stuff and the scheduled afternoon trip to the vet with cat-who-pees-on-couch, I got back to work on the white version of the collar. I didn't get as far as I would have on a normal day just because of all the other things that needed to be attended to, but I should have time today to make a nice dent in it. I still have yet to sell anything this week that needs remaking so I'm focusing on this.

The trip to the vet was interesting as the cat's overall health indicated that it was most likely a behavioral problem which, aside from serious health problems, was what I was dreading because I figured there was no fix for that. Come to find out, there is a medical fix for that, kitty Prozac. We'll find out more today after the urinalysis is complete and other issues are found or ruled out. Either way, fun, but expensive afternoon.

Today's fun afternoon includes the family trip to the eye doctor. Luckily the children do not share my horrible vision, but if the adults have to go, might as well keep the kids in the habit as well. I leave you with a picture of the kittens, who are really no longer kittens, exploring the new cat tree the mother-in-law picked up for them yesterday. Here's hoping for a nice day of tatting and maybe a sale or two so I can pull myself all the way out of this funk.

In White

I'm in one of those funks again. I think most creatives must go through this sort of thing. I'd call it bi-polar, but I don't want to trivialize a very real and serious mental condition. It certainly behaves in a similar pattern though. There's a period of manic creativity with the happiness of working hard, compliments, sales, etc. Then when I finish a piece, there's this letdown followed by extreme laziness and funk especially when sales are so very slow. Everything stresses me out and I just want to push a pause button on everything, curl up in a ball and cease to be, just for awhile. Yesterday was particularly stressful, but there is no pause button and I'm still incapable of ceasing to work even when I don't really have anything that needs doing.

I spent most of the afternoon trying to take my mind off a dozen things I won't go into, by tatting up my new collar in white. I first made up some buttons and since I'm going to embellish this one, I started by adding a nice swarovski round to it.

The only great thing about tatting as a distraction is that I work faster. If I slow down I'm more likely to let my mind wander and that's when I get into trouble so I work at full speed. I got all the way though the base rows of the piece and I crocheted the button loops while tatting since this time I knew where they needed to be. I also added more pearls along the bottom edge of this section. I plan on adding just a few more to the final row. I fear too many and it will take away from the classic look of the lace, so they're just small details.

I've got a bunch of things to do soon that I'm not overly fond of doing. There's a teacher meeting in the morning, which isn't too bad, but I have to take one of the cats to the vet this afternoon and I hate doing that for so many reasons. Then tomorrow there's family eye appointments all while still keeping up with the schooling. I know it doesn't seem like much that should bother me, but when you want to pause everything for awhile, anything seems bothersome. It's all just temporary though, I should be back to what passes for normal soon enough. It does help to whine about it though, so thanks for reading.

Done

I had another of those, perfectly Monday, Mondays. Sure, it started out fine except for the mild headache that accompanied me all day long. School went well and I asked more folk about the collar necklace and received some more well thought out, opinions. The addition of buttons was a popular one, but I don't have any buttons around the house. Not only that, but I was really liking the idea of a completely cotton thread piece. So, I decided to crochet my own buttons and just add loops to the other side. It actually worked and people seemed to like the result so I dolled myself up a bit, got some pictures and listed the necklace.

I think it looks great facing wither direction. It either needs a low cut neckline, strapless top or I suppose it could actually work as a collar in the classic sense, layered over a high neck dress. I struggled a lot with pricing and naming it, but mostly pricing. There are quite a few tatters on the Etsy with classic collars priced so cheaply, I feel like they must be giving away their time. I mean I work fast and this took three full days of work to make not including extra design time, but I still felt bad about the high price.

So this is where the day went wrong. I got a message that a package hadn't yet been received and there wasn't even any tracking information on it. I know it went in the mail, but since it wasn't even initially scanned, I fear it was lost or stolen and I spent the rest of the evening hurriedly remaking the order for the very understanding customer waiting for it. This exacerbated that day long headache and I ended the day feeling very much like a Monday just worked me over.

I'm not sure what I'll get up to today since the new project is done and I haven't sold anything to remake in days. I was kind of thinking about doing the collar in white and trying out some embellishments, marketing it a a bridal collar. We'll see though, I might just take a little break since I always feel really letdown after I finish a big piece. At least it's not a Monday again, huh?

Free Pattern: Tatted Lace Corsage Bracelet

I'm not certain why I got it in my head to release a pattern yesterday, but I did. Even before I started schooling for the day i was hard at work making up the sample piece so I could take pictures the entire time. I know I could just publish the pattern, but I really do love the format at Instructables that allows a much more comprehensive approach so that even non-tatters can give it a go. I didn't finish writing it up until well into the afternoon, but it is published now. You can find my newest free pattern here: Tatted Lace Corsage Bracelet. The link has also been added to the sidebar with my other free patterns. The reason I chose to do this one was because a few days ago someone had asked for it in order to make a gift. Of course I didn't have it written up, but I really had no objection regarding this pattern. I suppose I felt it was the perfect excuse to get something new up. Please do let me know if I've made any mistakes or anything.

In other news, I also managed to get both the new Peter Pan collar necklaces listed. In fact I felt rather too productive for the day even though all I did was get photos taken since the camera was out anyway. I was pretty proud that they looked like they were supposed to when worn. Sometimes I'm just not sure I got it right until its really too late to back out. Once all this nonsense was taken care of I even got back to remaking things. I got some supplies in the mail that I needed to remake one piece, so I worked on that. If I hadn't had an allergy induced headache most of the day, I would have been extraordinarily happy, but I did so I was merely pleased.

Today promises to be a much less productive day. We have the last face to face teacher meeting of the year with our homeschooling teacher this morning. They're always pleasant and relatively short, but it throws my precious schedule off a bit. I'll likely use the rest of the day for more remaking and perhaps thinking on my next possible project. No, I have no new ideas, just trying to seed them by putting that out there in the Universe.

The Collar Prototype

I suppose I was overall quite pleased with the new collar/neck piece/throat corset, whatever. Then I put it on...wow, now I'm impressed with myself. Ego aside for a moment, it lays perfectly, fits well and since I am on the small side, it's worth noting that it should fit anyone so long as they're not smaller than me. Lacing it up worked just fine and yes, though it's just cotton lace it seem to have quite the posture collar effect, though no where near as extreme. My husband mocked that I am not dramatically made up enough to sport this thing. At first I was a bit annoyed, but truth be told that just means it is perfect as a photo prop and I am not a model.

I spent quite some time pouring over my fire mountain looking for the right embellishments. I wanted a bit of bling, but let's face it, this thing won't need much. I opted for sterling silver beads to adorn the top and bottom edges and peppered throughout the necklace portion. I thought about adding beads to the split ring sections, but decided that it would not only increase the difficulty level, but also make the piece slightly larger and perhaps heavy enough to slouch and we don't want that. I also ordered up some silver teardrop beads to hang from the tips. Hopefully they will be just the right weight to lay well, though I confess, I'm worried about the points on the shoulders making them hang all weird looking. Since I ordered supplies, I now get to wait patiently until they arrive.

Never a patient person, I have already begun work on another collar in this same family. The neck corset section will be the same, but I'm adding different edging. If it works, I have one more to try after that as well. I also discovered that the same motif combination makes a bold wrist piece as well. So there may be sets coming. Of course these spine motifs are time consuming and each piece needs several. I still find it amusing that I created it just to avoid working a vintage pattern with thread spaces...I hate thread spaces. I might take a bit of a break today to make up some smaller pieces just to keep the store fresh since the silver flower piece has already sold. When ordering supplies, I went though my box of 'stuff' and saw a bunch of random beads that could certainly make for some sweet one off items, particularly some green beads. So busy day ahead

More For Your Feet

It was a fairly downbeat weekend so I managed to work out another pattern for my impending line of anklet footwear. This one started with a 40's era pattern for a centerpiece edging. Then I added matching motifs across the top and used my In Bloom motif in the center. The last time I went ahead and made the prototype in black thread because it's based on an existing piece and I knew that it would work out. This time I made it in ecru thread since I had no idea if it would work. After a few final tweaks, adding some floating and split rings around the bottom edge of the design. I have started on one in black, but it is not ready for a closeup just yet.

I always seem to forget that there are differences in the ecru and black threads I use. My vintage size 10 ecru thread is a bit thicker than the same sized modern black. This means that the final piece in black will be noticeably smaller. I think that I will have to add an edging on the sides of the final black one to make the size work as well as give me a better edge to lace the piece. I'm having an internal debate about the price of these corseted anklets too. I am personally very cheap when it comes to shoes and to price these for the time would be more than I think I would pay for a pair of shoes. Of course they should make quite a statement and it's always hard to remember that I am not my customers.

I should have a pair of the new design done in a few days and then I'm just waiting for my ridiculous stiletto shoes to arrive so I can get proper pictures. Hopefully I will have also worked out a proper name for them as well. Suggested terms have been 'spatlet', which brings to mind a tiny spat, and 'spanklet', that frankly sounds a little dirtier than I'd like. I'd prefer something a little more corset related, I think. Ideas from you are of course very welcome. Then I still want to work out a design for a barefoot sandal design as well. Things have been fairly slow etsy wise, so I've had some much needed time to create new things as well as get most of the pieces I had listed as custom orders made up so they're ready to ship.

In other news, this Sunday, I got a google alert to an interesting feature of my Order of Ecclesia Victorian Lace Collar. It was based on a video game character and suggested for creation my husband. Apparently, the gamers have finally stumbled upon it. My husband was so proud that it was his idea, he kept reminding me that I should be thanking him for the idea. The feature was picked up by two other gamer sites, nothing huge, but still pretty cool to have some unsolicited attention.

Finished

Oh, joyous day! I have finished the custom order collar I've been working on for what seems like forever. The piece was based on the Victorian Lace collar that I made to match a character in a Castlevania game. I was asked to make a caplet in the same style and I foolishly agreed to do so. Don't get me wrong, I love the way this piece came out, but I failed to take into account the ever increasing rows of the design. I quoted what I thought was a reasonable price for the amount of work, but as the caplet got longer, I realized that I should have thought of the piece more as an enormous doily than a collar.

I made most of the piece in a free form style, which is a fancy way of saying that I just made it up as I went along so i can never make another exactly like it, even if I wanted to. Now I just have to wait for the customer to see the piece and I have to tell you that I am more than a little apprehensive about that moment. I sent a message last night when I finished it, but I'm sure I will be waiting a while to hear if it passes muster. The wait will be murder.

I've just got a couple more pieces to list from the Steampowered stash and I should get that done today. I'm still not sure if I'm going to offer any kind of holiday offer this season. I'm thinking about offering a free priority shipping upgrade to all orders over a certain amount, but I don't know if that even appeals to people. I personally like cheap shipping, but I don't think it has ever swayed me into buying something that I wouldn't have otherwise.

I don't know if I'll write tomorrow, so if I don't have a great Thanksgiving, eat much and be merry.