Making your own fabric labels

When I started thinking about setting up my business and starting to sell my bags and pillows, one of the things I started looking for were labels. Labeling your work will help people recognize your products, making it easy for them to find your shop or website and refer you to their friends.

I wanted something simple and smart looking, with my logo and shop url. I wasn't ready, however, to invest a lot of money and end up stuck with 500 labels. What if I want to change the logo, or the colors?

So I turned to the Internet and found a few tutorials on how to make your own fabric labels!

I ended up using a combination of this tutorial by Allyson Hill and this one by Bonnie from Going Home to Roost:

First I created my logo/label using Photoshop. Then, with Word's Envelopes and Labels, played around with the format, number of rows and columns per sheet. It's important to know how you are going to used them so that you have enough space between them. I wanted to be able to use them individually or double sided.

When I was happy with the format, I hit print. You may want to test it first on paper, to check the size of the labels and make sure the image is sharp enough. I had to go back to Photoshop and adjust my logo a few times until I got it right.

 

Finally, I was ready to print my labels onto fabric, cut them up and following the manufacturer's instructions, apply them to my items. Easy peasy!

For the eco-conscious crafter, check out this blog post from Crafting a Green World. It has some good ideas on how to make your labels greener!

There are tons of tutorials and resources out there so  take your time, have a look and choose the one that works for you. 

Grand opening!

My Etsy shop is open! After weeks of preparation, sewing, fretting and stressing, I finally started listing.

It's been really exciting, and I keep going back to check the number of views, number of hearts, or just to look at the pretty pictures! 

It is taking me a some time to list all the items I made for this batch so expect a few more things in the coming days and keep checking the shop or my fan page for updates!

iCandy

1 - Threes A Crowd;
2 - Constellations Polar Bear;
3 - Happy birds cushion on linen;

4 - Minty Peach Necklace

I have been really busy setting up my Etsy shop Etsy shop and I am thisclose to start listing but until I do, here are a few pretty things I spotted online in the last few days!

The Handmade Marketplace

I have been sewing like mad for the last few weeks, trying out new patterns, deciding what I want to make and sell. The plan is to start listing next week.

Along side this work, I have started reaching out to the online community. I am tweeting (@b_lota), plan to launch my Facebook Fan Page soon(b*lota), and I am reading TONS of websites and blogs directed at small businesses, crafts in particular. The amount of information out there is immense and sometimes it's hard not to get lost.

Enter "the Handmade Marketplace: how to sell your crafts locally, globally and online". This book condenses the information you need if you are starting out or even if you are already established. It's full of tips and tools that you can easily apply to your business and it does it in a fun, fresh way! The author, Kari Chapin, has invited about 30 successful bloggers, entrepreneurs and designers to contribute and the result is an indie craft bible which will help and inspire you get your small business to a new level. For a full review click here.

I heart Facebook

A few days ago, on Facebook, I came across a group of Alumni from my old school and decided to join.

It is a catholic school, at the time, an all-girls school un by nuns, and I joined when I was 2 and left just before turning 14. The environment was very special, not just beautiful and spacious but with small classes, where mind, body and soul were equally developed and nurtured. I made some wonderful friends there but after we left we lost touch, over the years, as we each followed our own trail, moving to different cities, different schools and paths.

 I am sitting in the bottom row, fourth from the left.

Once I started tagging myself in photos, all these girls I had been such good friends with started sending messages, friend requests, was it really me? I hadn't realized that, by using my married name and without any info on there I am pretty hard to find!

It has been wonderful to re-connect with old friends, look through all the photos and remember such a wonderful period in my life. Hopefully, with Facebook, it will be easier to stay in touch, this time around.

My blog is carbon neutral!

As I was scrolling down my reading list on Blogger, a post jumped up from a blog: "My blog is carbon neutral, is yours?". Well, no, I thought. Can it be? I clicked through to read the entire post and found out that, with just a few clicks, yes, yes it can.

How it works:

Just write a short blog post about our programme “My blog is carbon neutral” and include one of the buttons below on your site (ideally in the sidebar). Send the link to your blog to CO2-neutral@kaufda.de and we plant a tree for you, neutralising the carbon dioxide emissions of your blog. The trees will be planted in the spring of 2010 by the Arbor Day Foundation.

So, this spring, somewhere in Germany, a tree will be planted for B*lota, making the world a little greener!

To find out more about this initiative and how to participate, click here.

First listing all set to go up!

 

I am getting ready to launch my Etsy store! I finished making the first two items yesterday, and will be sewing like mad in the coming days so I am ready to start listing before the end of the month!

It has been a busy week for us. I have registered my company, opened a bank account, upgraded my PayPal account andam almost done with the shop policies. Once I have my bio ready to go, I am all set. At least for the first stage. 

On a later stage, I want to go live with my website, Facebook fan page and post more consistently on the blog. So, I have a lot of work ahead of my! If my daughter cooperates and sleeps solid 3h naps each day and my husband picks up the slack in the weekends, I might be able to get it all set by May. Wouldn't that be something! 

Of course, with all the excitement of opening up the shop comes a lot of insecurity. There are so many talented people out there, selling wonderfully crafted things that it is hard to not get discouraged and give up! What if no one buys anything? What if they come back and demand their money back? What if, what if? So, I make everything as perfect as possible and hope for the best. Worst case scenario, I won't have to get stressed about Christmas shopping. And if it works out, well, that will just make each successful sale that much sweeter!