Larmer Tree July 2012

I promised you all that I would take loads of pictures and report back about my time at the festival but I may have sort of forgotten to get my camera out quite as much as I should have. Our old friend the British weather decided to get in on the festival action by providing several prolonged heavy downpours which made the event harder work than our long-lost friend Mr Sunshine would have done.

This was my stall all laid out on the Wednesday, before being opened to customers. I went with pretty much the same layout I had used in the last few fairs I did, but having seen some of the other stalls, I think I will make some changes in the future.

Below you can see my stall in the evening. I was lent a lamp, which did make a big difference. I had not thought I would need any extra lighting as the marquee was lit, but I see now that individual stall lighting can be really effective and next time I would definitely dig out the fairy lights.

In the picture below you can see some of the other stalls. The jewellery stall in the right of the picture was to my left. It belonged to the fabulous Annette, who became my festival heroine. Annette is a Larmer Tree veteran and was full of good advice and information, not just about Larmer Tree but about running a craft business and life in general.

Annette's jewellery is made from handmade glass and is just so colourful and gorgeous that I couldn't resist spending some of my profits on a few pieces.

I even got to design my own necklace, which wasn't as easy as you might think. It took quite a while to choose which colours to include, in which size, and in which order, but I love the finished piece. Please go and have a look at Annette's website, Wild Scarlet. You won't be disappointed.

The festival itself is held in a really beautiful setting in the Dorset countryside and the organisers did a fantastic job of getting us all on site and into place. We got to camp directly behind the marquee and even had access to showers! Unfortunately for us, we had decided against taking our own marquee-like family tent as it is really huge and we were concerned about it getting ruined. We opted to take our old, much smaller tent, which turned out to be a mistake as it proved no match for the torrential rain we had over the first few days and leaked like a sieve.

Double rainbow!

Mr Magpie was understandably less than keen to spend his holiday sitting in a muddy puddle so we made the decision to return home for the night and ended up commuting to the festival daily for the duration.

Initially the rain helped to drive people into the marquee for shelter and was quite good for business; Thursday was my second best day sales-wise. However, it soon worked against us as the lush green fields we arrived to turned into a brown swamp during the first 48 hours.

To reach the Artist's Quarter you first had to cross a sea of mud, and many people chose not to do so. I don't really blame them. Indeed, I was so reluctant to cross myself that I made only a few trips into the rest of the festival and failed to see a single band or comedian all weekend, which had not been the plan at all.

Would you?

Talking to the other traders, most of whom had been to Larmer Tree before, it seemed as though business was slower for most people this year. I know that this was the first year that tickets for the festival were still available as the gates opened, and from chatting to the visitors, many were planning on leaving early because of the mud.

I didn't sell as much as I'd hoped to, but I was happy with my takings all things considered and would definitely be up for a return visit next year if invited. The kinds of things that sold well at Larmer Tree were different to my usual best-sellers and I think I'd have a better idea of what to take next time and what changes to make to the stall.

Interestingly, although I displayed my fruit pincushions with a couple of decorative pins in, I didn't label them as such. I priced each item individually instead of my usual 'Fruit Pincushions £5' sign. Last time I did a fair I sold a dozen of them; this time only about five over the five days! It does seem that you really do have to spell things out for your customers!

All in all, I found the festival experience much more satisfying than selling at craft fairs. I have been on a steep learning curve and this experience taught me loads, as well as introducing me to lots of really lovely people.

For now, I am going to enjoy the last week before the children break up. I have got a few little sewing treats planned just for myself, as well as a bit more knitting and crochet. I can now resume Granny-Striping, yay!

If you were at the festival, I hope you managed to enjoy it and would love to hear from you with any thoughts you have on my stall.

Thanks for stopping by,

Beth x

Hitching and Rippling

As predicted in my last post, I did cast on my Hitchhiker scarf over the weekend, which was easy, since the cast on row consists of only two stitches. The pattern is very clever really; you always increase on the toothless side (with a one row exception) which gives that edge the lovely curvy shape.

The pattern is worked in sets of eight rows, with one tooth being formed with every set. As you consistently increase by nine stitches in each set and only cast off five (the horizontal edge of the tooth) the scarf gradually grows outwards.

My mind is a strange world, and some things have to be ordered just so. In my said strange mind, it doesn't feel right to stop knitting until I have reached the end of a set of eight rows. This was fine when the rows were smaller, but I can see me having to have a word with myself soon to prevent myself from becoming chained to the spot until I finish a set.

Anyway, I digress. This was my progress as of yesterday. I was going great until somewhere around tooth ten, which was reached on Saturday night, whilst channel hopping and eating Malteasers (other choccies are available).

I was reminded of why I fell out with knitting. I don't possess the necessary skill to knit backwards or to retrieve dropped stitches and I usually end up having to pull the whole lot of the needles (apparently known as 'frogging' so I'm told) and starting again.

I was determined to rescue my mistake and did eventually succeed in picking up all those tiny little 4ply loops with an even teenier DPN and managed to make a good impression of a salvage job. Tooth ten looks a bit different than it's pointier brothers but nonetheless, it's staying.

I did manage to discipline myself enough to finish my zigzag baby blanket before casting on the Hitchhiker; I am really really pleased with how it looks and will be taking it with me to Larmer Tree. Thank you to everyone who has complimented me on it so far, it really means a lot.

In the end, I decided against my original plan of doing two rows of trebles along the long sides as I felt that my beginners luck in shaping the corners might not extend to a second row. Sometimes knowing when to stop can be an art form!

Since I managed to complete this project in under a month by utilising time that would normally be spent just sitting (on the bus, in the park, waiting for a train, watching rubbish TV with a bag of sweets) I decided that I should have enough time before the festival to hook up a sister blanket.

The pattern I decided on for this one is from Lucy of Attic24. You can view it here. I decided I would have to learn the mysterious tr2tog stitch and it turns out that it's really not that difficult, especially following Lucy's excellent instructions.

So here is what we have so far:

I'm using Rowan Handknit Cotton again, which I have really come to love working with, it seems to suit crocheting perfectly. This time I am using less colours, and dividing each colour strip with a half-stripe of a lovely crisp white.

I have done a thick wedge of the gorgeous mauvey-purple shade at the bottom, which I will repeat at the other end and the around the sides at the end. There is also a green shade to be added (the same one as the darker green of my first blanket).

This pattern will not be random like the first, but a repeat. I didn't consciously plan to used red, white and blue together in the design, but I think my aforementioned scrambled brain carries on blithely without me sometimes, and sometimes things work out all the better for that.

Next week we are camping in the New Forest and it has been pointed out to me that it might be unwise to take a crochet project that involves a beautiful white yarn to a place where cleanliness may be somewhat compromised. With this in mind I have decided to take my Granny Stripe to work on, and no doubt some other little portable bits of stitchery that are festival-bound.

I wish you all a lovely Bank Holiday weekend however you are celebrating (or not) the Jubilee and look forward to updating you on festival and non-festival progress again soon.

Thanks for stopping by,

Beth x

This Week in the Nest

Finally the littlest Magpie has recovered from all his mishaps and we had a great time yesterday celebrating his birthday. As you can see, cake decorating is not one of my talents, although I can confirm that it tasted delicious and was speedily devoured by the clan.

Another little one in the family is having her birthday next week. so today I have been stitching up a teddy bear sleeping bag (designed by Florence), like the one I made one for her sister in February. This time I used another Annela Hoey fabric, from her new range 'A Walk in the Woods'. I love this fabric, and treated myself to a very restrained three half-metres from Alice at Backstitch.

Since writing the last post about my blanket, I have added another half-dozen or so rows, including my rainbow section. Work on this has got to slow down now though so you won't be seeing it again for a while.

This new granny square has taken the place of the blanket. the idea is to turn it into a cushion, along with the two other fronts already made, as these can be sold at Larmer Tree. This way I get my crocheting fix without the guilt that I am not making stuff to sell. Perfect!

I know I mentioned that I went to Ikea a few weeks ago, but I didn't show you any pictures of the fabric I bought. Ikea fabric really is great value for money, especially from the children's department. These fabrics work out at £2 per metre and they are really popular with my customers.

  The idea is to turn these into more drawstring wash bags like the ones below.

I have also been busily cutting out felt shapes to turn into brooches. At last year's craft fairs I sold pretty much every one I made, the bird design in particular was a big hit so I am planning on sewing lots of these to take with me to the festival. I'm not sure that the photo does the colours justice, but please can I have your thoughts on the colour combinations?

Well, I had better be off to feed the family. I'm hoping to go to Stitch and Bitch tonight as it seems like it's been ages since I went to a knitting group and I'm really missing it. Pop back next week for some finished brooches and that look around the craft room I've been promising!

Thanks for stopping by,
Beth x

Exciting News!!

For those of you who don't know, I only started sewing seriously last year and took part in my first craft fair in September. In the run-up to Christmas I took part in several more fairs, during which I met some fantastic fellow crafters and got lots of lovely compliments on my work from members of the public. I always feel very honoured when someone chooses to spend their hard-earned cash on something made by little old me.

The rest of the Magpie clan have been very understanding about Mum's new hobby. Mr Magpie has taken the younger two out for days out without me so that I can 'make' in peace, the attic, and then the dining room have been cluttered up with ever-increasing amounts of supplies and stock, dinners have been less exciting and there has been a constant whirr (or clunk) from my sewing machines, not to mention some choice expletives inserted at regular intervals.

My daughter has been brilliant at accompanying me to fairs (although she usually manages to spend some of the profits for me at other stalls) and the other Magpies have coped very well in my absences, although I have missed them.

One excursion Mr Magpie took with the younger two boys to give me craft time was to Latitude Festival. Walking around the market place, he noticed a distinct lack of the type of things I was making and texted me to say that I should be selling there.

As a family (and occasionally as a couple)  we have been fairly regular visitors to Glastonbury Festival, our last time being an ill-fated family attendance in 2007 (gallons of mud, not much sleep and lots of bands missed due to that). On the whole though, we love the festival experience, and decided that it would be great if we could combine festivals and sewing.

We thought carefully about where to apply for this year and decided on Larmer Tree as it is fairly local to us, but also a long-established and successful event. The cost of having a stall is very much more than you would pay for a normal event, but comes with entry to the whole festival for two adults and two children. The idea is that one of us will man the stall while the other spends time enjoying the festival with the children.

The application was a pretty nerve-racking experience for me as it was a little more involved than for the other events I have done.Then there was a nail-biting wait for a decision, as applicants are told that stalls are always over-subscribed.

This morning, I am deliriously happy to announce, I received my confirmation email. I'm in!! Miss Magpie will be off to the festival come July, installed in the Artist's Quarter no less!! I am really, really looking forward to the event and a new chapter of Miss Magpie. Even if I don't sell a thing, just to be at the festival, with my family in the English summer time will be brilliant.

You may be hearing a little less from me for a while as I have to get busy creating the stock I want to take with me, but I will still blog little bits of my progress. Wish me luck!!

Thanks for stopping by,
Beth x