Doggie Bandanas, Craft Fairs and Holiday Napkins!

As you may recall, Maddy and I took on
special little project recently -- sewing and embroidering.
I almost felt like Ma Ingalls from Little House on the Prairie -
but I admit, I did have electricity and sewing and embroidery  machines!

After a couple weeks of nearly non-stop sewing in the evenings-- well, we did
take bathroom and school/work breaks, the craft fair took place last

Saturday!

Mads and I were so excited and had quite a bit of inventory including

doggie bandanas, a few dog collar scrunchies and holiday embroidered napkins.

Yes, the napkins would go into the category of 

"what one thing doesn't belong with the others?"

but

we wanted to include them, as we loved them.

Yes, we are  those people who think whatever we

make (especially homemade) is fabulous!  :)

You probably can't tell, but these bandanas are really well made, have soft

coordinating-color flannel on the back for doggies and do not tie.

 Instead, we sewed a channel for the 

dog's collar to go through.  So, you slide the collar through and then clip

 the collar shut around your pup's neck, voila - the bandana cannot fall off!  

Doggies - beware -- there is no sneaking out of this bandana!

Back to the craft fair report - guess when the weather decided to change and snow 

decided to fall???  Last Saturday!

Soooooo, I'm attributing poor turnout to the weather 

and the people who did visit either didn't have dogs, had never

seen anything but paper napkins before and had no intention

of purchasing anything at the craft fair.

We sold maybe 5 bandanas and 1 scrunchie in 6 hours!
Big disappointment!  :(

While we were bummed, we decided we would try again some other time,
but NOT at that craft fair!

Dog collar scrunchie!

It really was not a waste of effort or time as Maddy told me

her favorite part was the time we spent on the production

line with her cutting and me sewing!

Some evenings she had me sewing up to 10 PM!

Maddy designed her own logo and
had a business card printed
We have an entrepreneur on our hands!
Shark Tank here we come!

Hello December - Hello Craft Fair!

For the past month, Maddy and I have been

getting ready for a craft fair that will be held  tomorrow (EEK)
on

Saturday, December 3rd!

Maddy and I will be selling homemade doggie bandanas (sizes mini and standard) and
dog collar scrunchies!
We have been sewing like crazy and spent over 3 hours
of Black Friday shopping at JoAnn's fabrics waiting in line
for holiday fabrics!

Some of our inventory!

We are also selling embroidered holiday napkins!
If you have a chance, please stop in.
Our napkins are similar to the one below - however, that one
was silk screened and ours are embroidered.
We've been so busy sewing, embroidering and ironing along with
all the usual school and work stuff that we failed to get
photos of any of our napkins!
No worries, we'll get some later!

Since we've never done anything like this before, we have no
idea how it will go, but Maddy is fairly certain we will
be super successful.  So much so, that
she designed a business card
for her Happy Hound Collection!
That girl!  She's such a little entrepreneur!
Sorry for the bad photo of her card -- believe me, it is super cute!

Wish us luck! 

Weekend Update on Wednesday

Yes, I am wee bit behind on
 just about everything lately, sooooo
the weekend update is posting on Wednesday!

And it was a busy weekend!
Maddy's junior achievement group was selling their
wares at the Church craft fair on Saturday.
Friday night, Mads and I ran around gathering
materials for more inventory!
Her products included Santa and Snowman mugs
with a corresponding pot-holder or towel and
packet of hot chocolate.
She also made up bottles of holiday candy!
In addition, she had some of the remaining sugar scrubs for sale.
It was a busy morning and the team did fairly well!
They also sold some hand-painted ornaments and room deodorizers
made by other team members.

With the afternoon off, we did a little Christmas shopping
and then it was time to get ready for the 8th Grade Honor Choir performance
singing the National Anthem at our local ice hockey team game.

The choir did a fabulous job and they all  
loved watching the hockey game ---
especially exciting were those moments when a little "fight"
between opposing team skaters would break out!

8th Grade Honor Choir and Music Director - Miss H.

Sunday meant yard work!  :(
But, we really couldn't complain too much as it is
somewhat rare to have temps in the 50s in December!
Fingers crossed that NO more leaves blow into our yard!

Happy to report that we are still enjoying the warmer than normal
temps though I just heard accumulating snowfall predicted for the weekend!
Someone (Maddy, not me) is very happy with that forecast!