Take a Break for Some Java and a Quick Project!

I had a great time over the loooong weekend, just hanging out at Regina's house on Saturday. We sewed some items in preparation for a spring craft show, and also got to work on some REALLY fast embroidery projects. This is my particular favorite, look at the flour sack towel Regina embroidered:

Is that cute or what!? As it turns out we have a kit for this exact pattern, and the iron transfers include 9 different patterns in ONE set! The kit also has 3 premium, 100% cotton tea towels that have a blue band, but if you see a different color in our shop, you can tell us and we'll switch out the color of the towels. We also have plain flour sack towels that look totally adorable when you do a super easy blanket stitch along the bottom as Regina did on hers. Here is what the patterns look like. Click on the picture to go directly to our shop to see the entire listing.

I always feel like I am pressed for time and was sort of getting sad because I didn't know if I would have enough time to make gifts for my family this year. But I finished one of these designs in an evening and with this kit, there are three towels which is perfect for a set for a family member or, if I were to make up all three, I could pair them with some cute kitchen utensils for a great, easy, practical and home made gift! How about adding in a jar of hot cocoa mix? There are plenty of awesome instructions around the Internet for those. Wouldn't that be adorable with these coffee themed towels? We also have some holiday towel patterns in a kit that even includes the thread. Now how can anyone go wrong with that!? Well, time to get going, I have to get to work on my second towel for this week!

Happy Stitches to You,

Anna

P.S. The SHORT STACK sale has been extended so check out the 10% discount on all short stack bundles in our shop!

Black Wednesday SALE

So is anyone getting ready to hit the stores on Friday for the Black Friday shopper mania? I, for one AM NOT planning to do that. In fact, I've never been a 4 in the morning get the best deals, get out of my way sort of shopper. Usually, Regina, my husband, and I travel an hour north to Fredericksburg to shop the town, eat at our favorite Italian place (Pasta Bella), and go to the Country Peddler craft show in the afternoon. BUT after doing that for the last four or five years, we've actually been increasingly disappointed with the offerings at the Country Peddler show, fewer crafts and more kitchy, rhinestone studded purses and not so crafty stuff. So, this year, we're going to take a day off after Thanksgiving to rest (I'm going to hopefully learn to crochet with my sister) and on Saturday and Sunday Regina and I are planning a Sew-A-Thon! We're hoping to sew up some cute stuff to get a good head start on building a handmade inventory that we can sell at a craft show in the Spring. Yes, I said SPRING (have to start early because we want to do A LOT of sales). A thought just occurred to me (that happens sometimes early in the morning). What do you do in other countries since you don't have the "official" start of the Christmas shopping season the day after Thanksgiving? Perhaps this is why it is easier to focus on handmade gifts and the less commercial reason for the season in other countries. Well, that's just a thought, if any of you out there are in other countries, I'd love to hear what you're doing this holiday season. Alright, now, for the exciting part of this post, the...

BLACK WEDNESDAY SALE

10% off ALL

Fat Quarter Bundles

The prices have already been adjusted for you so stop on by and grab some goodies before they disappear! Why is it called Black Wednesday? Well, Brandy (sorry about that), over at The Buzz decided to set up a list of all the great sales that are going on from Etsy sellers starting the day BEFORE Thanksgiving. Perhaps you're like me, and you're stuck at work instead of able to be at home prepping for Turkey day (or perhaps you don't have the Thanksgiving holiday in your country, you can still benefit), but you don't feel like working, well, why not surf on over to our shop and check out all the great Fat Quarter bundles we have for AWESOME prices! Throw in one of our great patterns and you'll have a great gift for a friend who sews/quilts or a great gift for YOURSELF!

Happy Thanksgiving and Happy Shopping,

Anna and Regina

The Crafty Girls

Do You have Unfinished Quilts?

If you have any quilt tops that you are looking to send to a better home, you should definately check out this blog: http://giveakidaquilt.blogspot.com/ They are looking for unfinished tops or even quilts that just need binding to finish and donate to children in the Portland, Oregon area. Given how incredibly generous quilters are, I thought I'd post this in case you are doing some Christmas time cleaning. This is not my personal cause, I just read about it on a blog that I read on a regular basis. I know there are so many great places to donate tops and quilts to, so here's another one for your list. Thanks! Please, please feel free to post about this on your own blogs and share with other groups and your e-mail friends or quilt guilds. Let's just flood her with quilty love! I was so touched by the description of this project. I don't live in a very cold climate and I know that when it's just barely in the 40s it's tough so I am sure that being in freezing temperatures is even worse. Children are our most precious asset and we should protect them, especially because they do not have the ability or means to take care of themselves. I hope you'll help me pass on the word. If you do find some tops you'd like to send to her, I'd really love to hear about it and I think it would encourage others, would you please leave a comment here letting us know? Thanks!

Happy Stitches,

Anna

100th Sale-bration

We did it! We reached 100 sales and BEFORE December! We have you, our wonderful customers to thank for it. So to show our thanks, we're giving away one charm pack of YOUR choice from the following:

Plus, we'll cover the shipping, of course. We have a lot of great patterns that use charms in the shop under the Charms/Layer Cakes section. International participants are welcome to participate in our giveaway, especially since many of our sales have been to International customers. Here's what you can do to enter the giveaway, you'll get an additional entry for doing any of the following:

• Leave a comment on this post, please tell us which charm pack you would choose.
• Blog about this giveaway on YOUR blog and then come back here and leave a comment telling us you did so.
• Tell your Facebook friends about the giveaway (come back and leave another comment)
• Tweet about the giveaway on Twitter (leave another comment)
• Become a follower of this blog (leave us a comment)
• Become a fan of our Facebook page (leave us a comment)

That's at least six different ways you can enter the drawing. By leaving a separate comment, it makes it a lot easier to tally the entries. You will have until Monday, November 30 to enter the drawing. I'll announce the winner on Tuesday. Thanks again for making this a wonderful beginning for our little online adventure. We have a lot of exciting plans for the future of this blog and our shop!

Happy Stitches to You,

Anna and Regina

The Crafty Girls

Create Your Own Short Stack!

Remember these? We call them Short Stacks, sort of like a yummy stack of pancakes, they are smaller bundles of coordinating fabrics from various lines. The one shown above is from Aster Manor and we have 4 bundles in this group! We thought that with the economy how it is, you might want to grab some fat quarters but not necessarily an entire bundle of 40 which can run close to $100, so we decided to split them up. Well, it turns out that even though we created some really cute bundles of of fabrics, everyone has a different idea in their head of what fabrics they want and we've gotten many requests to pick and choose fat quarters from different bundles. Regina and I have thought long and hard about this, because it's a little more of a time investment to let people choose one or two FQs from different bundles because at that point, we'd have to rescan all the remaining fabrics and then change the listing for those bundles. But, we aim to please so we think we've come up with a compromise that will make everyone happy! That is why, if you look at any of our listings for Short Stacks, you'll see that there is a second picture that looks just like the first, except that there are labels on each of the different fabrics, just like this:

That way, if you look at this bundle for Aster Manor and decide you really only like the redish ones, you can tell us that you like AM-2, AM-4, and AM-9. And we'll know EXACTLY which ones you want! But to make this even easier for you (and for us a little) we're going to create a special listing called Create Your Own Short Stack (CYOSS), which will be for a minimum of 6 fat quarters. If you see the three red ones in the picture above and oh, say you see three more in another bundle, you can choose the CYOSS listing and in the MESSAGE TO SELLER section, just let us know which ones you want. Then you can process the sale through Etsy and Pay Pal, paying for 6 FQS (they are all priced the same at $2.75 each) and we'll pick out your FQS, package them up and send them on to you! Easy Peasy! But wait, there's more! If you decide you LOVE the bundle we've already put together, you can purchase it instead and in some cases, you'll even SAVE a little money! (There is a slight upcharge if you choose your own since we have to do the rescanning and reslisting.) The preselected bundles run between $2.50-$2.75 per FQ, so you can definately save some money if you like the entire bundle. So, does that make sense? We want this to be as easy and fun as possible for you! Oh, and if you want MORE than 6 in a CYOSS, we are happy to accomodate you, just send us a quick convo by clicking the "contact craftygirlsworkshop" link on the side of our shop. So click the following button (or look for it in our shop) and start shopping!

Happy Stitches,

Anna

General Shop Update

Are you ready? Thanksgiving is just under two weeks away! And Christmas is just a month after that, where DID the time go!? Our SPECIAL item today is a SUPER deal, a cute pattern for a stocking designed by Joanna Figueroa which is only $5, plus since it's the SPECIAL item, you'll get FREE shipping (EVEN INTERNATIONAL). We have two in stock, and we're only 7 sales away from 100! Wouldn't it be awesome if we reached 100 before the end of NOVEMBER! I think it would. Then we could do the giveaway sooner and you might get your surprise by Christmas! Our shop is taking on a Christmasy and holidayish feel. I always feel so cynical about the holidays because when I go to the store ON HALLOWEEN and I hear Frosty the Snowman over the intercom, it just grates on my nerves! Am I the only one that feels that way? Oh, and I think there should be a ban on music about snow in states or cities where it hasn't snowed in 20 years! But that's just me! Regina and I have decided we want to participate in the Black Wednesday sale for Etsy store owners which will be November 25th, the DAY BEFORE Thanksgiving. Maybe somewhere in between your preparations for Turkey day you can stop by the computer and check out the great deals we'll be having in our shop. I've moved lots of our Christmas items to the front page because as Regina madly listed LOTS of our new products all the Holiday stuff got pushed to the 4th or 5th page. That's OK, you can always go in and check out the Christmas section link on the right side of the page, but I thought I'd try to make it easier for you by putting them in the front. So that's the general shop update.

By the way, would anyone be interested in a quickie quilt along? I've just started a new project based on a pattern I created that uses 5" charm squares and a honey bun roll (1 1/2" strips). It's sooo easy and quick I bet you could get it done in a week or so! Something to take your mind off the stress of the holidays. Please comment if you are interested in participating! Until next time.

Happy Stitches to You,

Anna

Fall-ing Prices Treasure Hunt

Oh no, I think I've created a monster! I taught Regina, the other half of Crafty Girls Workshop, how to go into our shop and edit our listings. She's also recently learned how to list new items! This is GOOD for several reasons:

• She has time to list things during the day
• LOTS of new stuff will be added almost EVERY DAY!
• It takes some of the pressure off of me to do that side of things.

BUT she is sort of sneaky, she's been going in and CHANGING prices on our products! This is GOOD for you, our wonderful customers, and well, it's GOOD for us too, because we know we're going to be getting LOTS of fabric in over the next few months and we REALLY want to sell our products. SO, I guess it's a win-win situation. You get a good deal, and we move our inventory. Remember that magazine I talked about a post or two ago called Quilts and More? Well, it turns out that just as we got ours listed, the NEW issue came out for winter! But we still have 5 copies of the FALL issue! So we've decided to go a little crazy and drop the price, now it's only $5 (plus shipping)!! Also, the fall issue of Cloth, Paper, Scissors is now only $4.50!! That is SUPER crazy! Even after shipping you're getting an awesome deal! In fact, check our all of our magazines, they are priced to MOVE! Now our charm packs of CURRENT fabrics, such as Mill House Inn, Aster Manor, Simple Abundance, and Rouenneries are now only $7.00 each!! (See I told you she's crazy!) And here's a hint, I bet you can find some great prices on the Honey Buns and Jelly Rolls as well! There are lots of other specials to be found in our shop. How would you like to pick up some Beach House yardage for only $6.99 a yard or Panache (which is super hard to find) for $7.99 a yard!! These changes are sort of subtle and you'll really only notice them if you read this blog or check our shop regularly. We're not shouting this out to the entire world (although we wouldn't mind if you send your friends our way). We have a goal to reach before December 31:

WE WANT TO REACH 100 SALES BY 2010!!

Can you help us get there? I think you can! If we reach 100 sales, we'll do a FABULOUS giveaway on here, lots of great goodies for the new year. Please tell your friends and go check us out, because there are lots of great deals to be had!!

Happy Shopping!

Anna

Crafty Girls Workshop

Allow me to introduce: Crafty Angi on Etsy

Way back, before I began my quilting and sewing adventures, I dabbled in the rubber stamp and scrapbook world. I still peruse the scrapbook aisle at my local craft store, because somehow, I think that scrapbook paper is a lot like fabric, just with a different sort of fiber. In fact, I've noticed that a lot of designers' patterns for fabric are also showing up on paper, such as Amy Butler, Sandi Henderson, Heather Bailey, etc. Well, I recently met a very sweet fellow Etsy store owner who does some amazingly creative things with scrapbook papers and we decided it would be fun to do a cross promotion for our customers. She has lots of cute, CUTE, things on her site that will be most helpful in this upcoming busy season. Look at this adorable photo ready album! It's already done for you!

It's a cute 6"x6" album that has 10 pages for you to add your holiday pictures to! I don't know about you, but I think it's worth it just for the amount of time it would take me to come up with the idea for the page layout!

Here is a little more about Angi:

Angi lives in Texas. She is a Mother, Public School Teacher, a U.S. Veteran and Avid Scrapbooker. The creative bug hit her years ago and she has been desiging and creating for family and friends for years.

What made you first want to become an artist?

A friend of mine invited me to scrapbook with her one weekend. That first scrapbook event was so much fun. After that I was hooked. (SMILE)

Please describe your creative process, how, when, materials, etc.

I get ideas from things around me. Beautiful flowers, butterflies, rainbows, the sunshine here in Texas, or just about anything colorful makes me want to capture it on paper and create. Being a mom also helps me design things for my own children. Once I show the designs to others, they want me to make it for them too.

You sell a wide variety of items. What is your favorite thing to create?

My favorite things to create are acrylic scrabooks and altered tins. I love to use colorful embellishments made of chipboard or those with 3 dimensional effects. Different rub-on designs, inks, and acrylic paints are also fun to add to my creations. Using high quality embellishments really make my creations "pop" and stand out.

Stay tuned.. more about Crafty Angi tomorrow!!

Happy Stitches,

Anna

P.S. Please check out and reply to the NEW poll in the sidebar.