Too Busy!

Dark Lover's Quilted Ornaments

My first custom order for ornaments this season came through, and it took forever to complete them. I've been crazy busy, as you can see in the pictures below, most of this work was done in the last two weeks.  

The Butterflies are made with cherry party in blue, with shades of light and dark wisteria and light and dark denim blue. I had to do FOUR SETS, which means 8 butterflies in total.  I just got them glued to their bobby pins over the weekend, and they turned out really well.

Kiku with Leaf

 The kiku finally managed to get its leaf attached.  It is almost complete, I just have to attach the alligator clip.

Bright Pink and New Grass Green

The pink and green piece was another order I had roll through in the made to order listings.


New Events on the Docket:  Have to finish this huge custom order, including several satin pieces I need to remake. 

I also need to take an inventory of what colors I have in supply and re-do the made to order color selections.  I never added printed fabrics, and there are very few examples of what the colors actually are.  I also want to re-work my pricing guide. 

Look for new clearance items coming soon for the holiday season!

Final Kiku and Updates

This was the final result of the kiku.  It took two more layers rather than one, but it came out really well.

I tried making a leaf piece for it, but it was too big.  Which means I will have to remake it, but I know what size I need now, so hopefully this will be the last time.

Then it will be wired on to a large alligator hair clip at customer's request.


Also, ornaments are coming back !!!

 I've made 3 so far, and this last one is being a total pain.  I still need to wrap them with ribbon to seal the fabric ends and give them something to hang from.  Maybe bells.

Also I have been working Storenvy transfer like crazy.  I have finished working most of the listings, everything except the ornament balls.  I am considering re-taking those pictures as well. But it is getting late in the year already, and my time is running short. 

All About the Kiku (Chrysanthemum)

I have to say my favorite thing to make is the kiku, or chrysanthemum, style. It is increidbly diverse and can be made with either style petal, pointed willow or rounded wistera.  The one seen here, a custom order I am working on, is china red with blood red exterior and rhinestone center with leaf piece attached to a silver alligator hair clip.

 I usually make the pointed willow style petals, I find them quicker and easier to make and I focus on side by side color patters, like swirls and stars. They work from the top of the dome, down to the bottom.  I usually point the center with a large quilting pin with a colored head. Then one by one, glue them in rings until a pattern is developed. 

However with rounded petals, they layer one on top of the other, their edges flat and not pointed.  This means in order to hide the glue and edging properly, you work this style in reverse, with the outside or bottom layer glued first, then working up to the interior. 

The pattern I have chosen here is actually of an alternating layering.  I placed about 15 petals on the outside ring, then layered the next one inside on the edges of the petals centering the top petal. This give they eye more of an acceptance of mistakes in the formation of the petals, since chirimen is kinda plush and difficult to get uniform.  Unlike silk.

This piece still has an interior layer to go, before I apply the rhinestone center.  It is wired to some 22g coated brass, that goes through the piece and then is glued under the chirimen covering.  This under layer is necessary to give the chirimen petals something to adhere to.  Straight foam does not work, and your petals will slide all over the place before they dry.  And covering the foam completely adds to the visual aestihetics to your piece, no little white holes peeking through, showing gaps in your work. 

Ok that's it for tonight.  More pictures coming soon!!

Store Updates

 Custom Order

I have been working like mad now that my kids are back in school and I have time! 

The last of the photos from the shoot in August are finally finished with editing.I still have some work to do, make up for some shots I missed and probably go back and rework several pieces that need thread wrapping for exposed wire or tape.  Then I will have to re-shoot those pieces again.

I finished my momiji custom order seen in the pic on the right.  I used all gold colored wiring where I could, and thread wrapped the end, which I did not do in her referenced piece.  But its her wedding, so hey, why not. 

I still have another custom order I have to finish.  The purple rounded petal with rhinestone center she wants redone in shades of deep red and china red.  I still have several satin pieces I started, but have decided to redo.  I didn't like the way they came out, it looked sloppy and you could see the glue in the petals, the center did not cover it  up enough.  So there's that.

But hopefully I will be finished all this by the beginning of October, when I plan to start picking up ornament balls again.  They were so popular last year, I have to continue them. It's going to mean a stop at some fabric stores for discounted holiday fabrics to work with, I should go count my coupons, lol. 

The website transfer is still postponed.  I had hoped to have opened it by now, but alas, with everything going on, it's difficult to make it a priority.  Family comes first.  And being sick doesn't help.  But things are back on track so hopefully I will get the website transferred before the year is out.

Back in Action

Its been a difficult few months at the Temple.

Some of you may have noticed I had to close the shop for a few days while attending a funeral for my husband's fraternal grandmother.  It was a difficult loss and we are still recovering.

I am also in the middle of a custom order, momiji leaves in ivory.  Its turning into a really pretty piece.  I finished making the shidare last night and all that is left is the frames and bira bira. And attachments.  And thread wrapping.  And I am supposed to have it up and listed by tuesday.

Meanwhile I feel like some larger entity has smited me and I am sick with a cold/very mild flu.  The whole family has it and I am spending half my day with doctor appointments.

I haven't had the time to work much on the site transfer and neither has my web developer.  So that is pretty stagnant right now.  And I am still going through pictures taken last month.  But now that I have my brand new Galaxy S5, which has a fantastic camera, pictures will be much improved.  And I can finish the shots I missed since I was in a rush.

I have also been diligently working on my custom order swatch book.  I have a lot of prints now, since my distributor started carrying variant packs.  So new pieces soon?

Thats all for now.

Where does the time go??

I just realized I haven't posted on here in almost a month.  Thats because my camera phone is on the fritz and pictures have been shoddy.  But there is good news.

I got a professional to come out and shoot for me the whole set.  2 and a half hours of pictures.  With lights, and professional digital camera, the works.  Now i am going through the process of editing and stamping them all with the kanzashi temple logo. 

I haven't heard much from my webdeveloper friend, he's been pretty busy, and I have been as well.

I am not adding new pieces to the Etsy stop, but new made to order listings.  By building up a variety of examples, I hope to build a different kind of business there in which I sell only custom orders and made to order, instead of paying for stock pieces that don't move.  Those I am sending to storenvy.  With all new photos, and a new website, a new face book store integration, that matches the blog.  Its a complicated network, but worth it to finially have a logo or theme i can stick with.

I will also be changing the etsy site name from lilyashes to kanzashi temple.  But i wont activate that until I get closer to opening the Storenvy site.

We are EXPANDING

OK SO!

I am working with a web developer friend of mine to get the Storenvy shop open and looking beautiful.  I am still keeping Etsy but lilyashes.com will no longer be pointed at it.  It, along with all pre-made merchandise, will be moved to the custom built site. Etsy will remain open for made to order and custom items.  I might keep a piece or two in there, but most everything will be  moved to Storenvy.  I won't be opening until middle of september, so I can do a major relaunch with new photos on the new phone.

And my friend is so wonderful, he's even going to look at the blog for me.  Because I am a css and html and ruby and liquid dummy.

I am currently working on different kind of kanzashi like barrettes in different sizes with the snowflake design.  I am also working with a new technique of satin kanzashi to bring that back into the store.  If I can master this hot glue technique without burning the hell out of my fingers (which has happened. A lot.) then I can really expand the inventory selection.  Headbands, barrettes, broaches, etc. would all be nice. 

So with all that said, I am hard at work but it will be a while before any new listings come up.  Keep checking here and on my Facebook feed for examples of the upcoming products.  I had a few up already.