Last Sunday the Etsy Greek Street Team organized a Craft Party at the center of Athens. There were ree craft seminars (sewing, decoupage, spinning and weaving wool, recycling, kumihimo braiding, origami, hair fascinators) by the EGST members and lots of free gifts for all!
It was fun to catch up with old friends, and meet new members of the team.
Here are some photos from the event. Check out this photoset for more.
Makes you sad it’s over. We are already waiting for the next one!
Lately (means months) I’ve been experimenting with designing and digital printing fabrics at Spoonflower.
This project dates months but I misplaced (means forgot) the photos somewhere on the hard drive, so I couldn’t post about it.
It’s a men’s shirt I made for my bf. I used a kitty paw design to create small stripes and printed it on soft cotton poplin. The design of the shirt is pretty standard, men have it easy, not many variations on their clothing.
The recipient was very happy with his gift, so was Banana the cat:
kitty says “looking good!”
The fabric design is available for purchase at Spoonflower if you want to try your luck with it. In the case you’d like a men’s or women’s tailored shirt made for you, drop me a message at my etsy shop 🙂
I’m not really religious but I like to keep Christmas traditions (old or new). There’s no need for something to be centuries old to consider it my tradition. For example, the last 7 years I’ve been making the same New Year’s Eve dinner dish and I reckon it is my little personal tradition.
My Christmas tree decoration is another tradition I love. Everything in my tree means something for me, they are not random ornaments bought at random times. There are a few vintage ornaments my grandma had, there are handmade ornaments friends have made for me, handmade ornaments from around the globe that I acquired from Christmas ornament swaps, each with its own story, christmas themed softies that I’ve been collecting since my teenage years. There are also various objects that were not supposed to be ornaments but I’ve made them into one, like this Hello Kitty cookie I got from a vending machine from my trip to Japan.
Of course our cats love the tree. Not all of them. Some ignore it. Some occasionally play with the ornaments and a couple of them go berzerk ove r it and it always ends up in a christmas tree tragedy laying on the floor.
Another tradition I love is baking Traditional Greek Christmas cookies, like melomakarona and kourambiedes. You really can’t have Christmas celebrations without them. Nope.
I also love to add christmas decorations around the house, like this big fabric bow above the pantry shelf:
and random decorations that compliment my standard dustables above the fireplace:
And my newest tradition is to try and photograph all my animals wearing this Santa Claus hat for pets, including the bunny:
Hope you had good times, whatever your traditions are, and wish you all a Happy and Healthy 2012!
I made this Cat-lendar for 2012. I find weekly planners essential for staying organized, so I thought this year I’d make one of my own, instead of buying a generic one. I chose my best cat photos and added them to each month of the year – yes, there is a Christmas kitty too ;).
Here you can preview the photo pages of the 2012 Cat-lendar and if you haven’t got one for yourself yet, or if you need a great gift for the crazy cat lover person in your life, then you should consider buying this one. I make a small profit of it and all profits will help us support our 15 rescued cats in 2012. Thanks!
If the preview is not working for you here check out this link over at Blurb
August was here. And will be here for a couple of days more. I still have time to review the month before it ends. And make a list with a few resolutions about the new school year.
Weather is delightfully getting cooler, although it is still very warm compared to northern climates. But after 2 months of ridiculous amounts of sweat, multiple-per-day outdoor showers and feeling zombified in the middle of the day, one can finally work and play comfortably.
Work and play. August was all work and no play though. This summer was like that. But let’s move on.
This August I also wrote down the Karmology Clinic brand philosophy. It helps to keep things focused. One of my goals is to creatively merge the designer and seamstress status. This came after lots of thinking. Do I sell only my own designs? Am I open to custom requests? And if yes to what extend? If a customer has a design in her mind and wants me to create it, how do I proceed? I decided I am interested in creating custom designs for customers, as long as I have a certain amount of creative freedom and control over the result and I dig the design. And of course I don’t to copy any existing pattern or design. It’s a different thing to say “I want a summer knee length dress with short sleeves and narrow waist in earth colors” and a whole different thing to say “I want this Burda/Vogue/etc pattern in that red fabric”.
I also find it quite interesting to add upcycling to the above process. Meaning using previously loved clothes owned by the customer to make something new. I was happy this summer to be involved in such a request. It involved a lovely long skirt that the customer wanted to turn into a dress. We decided on a modern version of the German traditional dirndl dress. I drafted the pattern and made a muslin which I sent to the customer first for evaluating. After that I cut into the precious skirt. And the result was this:
(on the right you can see the photo of the original skirt)
(front and back)
Another custom request I got this summer was from an old internet friend of mine. She fell in love with the colors and designer fabric of my Aubergine Purple Dress and wanted a summer dress that would compliment her figure and include this specific fabric. We decided on a simple line with princess seams that follows the contours of the body with a wide neckline and the desired fabric used as a front and back middle panel. I chose a nice linen to compliment the floral fabric and got to work in drafting and making a muslin for her. I had to be very careful before cutting on to the fabric because there was a limited amount of it available. The end result was very satisfying for both my customer and me.
It’s a very flattering dress, especially for curvy girls (I made a similar one for myself too ; ) )
Karmology Clinic 