Pesky Cat Designs

NY Elegant Fabrics (photo via Threads Magazine) I spent most of today perusing bolts of fabric in search of some new textiles for my fall collection of handbags. I brought my camera along with intentions of taking lots of cool photos to post on my blog but instead got swept away by all textures and colors. By the time I remembered that I had a camera with me I was already carrying several bags of newly purchased fabric rendering my hands useless for photography. I promise that next time I will have more self control. My first stop today was NY Elegant Fabrics located on 40th street in the Garment District . They have a great selection of fabric and the staff is very friendly and helpful. I purchased some fabric and headed over to a couple more shops in the area. An hour or two later I was on a bus headed downtown to Chinatown.  There are several great fabric shops on Broadway in Chinatown that have really excellent prices and I was hoping for some bargains. My favorite shop in this are

Front Page Saturday 8:30AM  Front Page Friday 8:30 PM My Equestrian Wayfarer Purse made it to Etsy's front page two days in a row! At first I thought I was seeing double. The two treasuries are almost identical. Thanks Etsy for including my purse in your cool and eclectic front pagers. I got a lot of traffic to my shop and acquired some lovely shop hearts. I got the screen shots above through H eartomatic , a site that allows Etsy sellers to see if they have been featured on the front page within the past 24 hours.  If you are a Etsy seller Heartomatic has a lot of useful tools. Also check out Craftopolis  to find out if you have been featured in a treasury and more!

Yes, there's a new bag in town! It's quite big at 15.5" wide, 12" tall and 3.5" deep. Large and sturdy enough to carry books, a laptop and more. Three layers of interface, two fusible and one thick layer of ultra firm peltex, give the bag lots of structure and durability. Three interior pockets and a pen slip keep things organized. It's made from honey yellow corduroy and adorned by two oak leaf appliques. Just perfect for the upcoming fall season! I'll be adding it to my shop along with a couple of more new handbags later this afternoon.

Yesterday my Wayfarer Purse in Corduroy made it to Etsy's front page! This beautiful treasury was created by jpulliam30 and features pumpkin inspired items. Check out Jordan's Etsy shop jpulliam30 for cool necessities for the chic mama. Thanks for including my purse in your stunning treasury Jordan! 

Custom Order Offbeat Messenger in Corduroy It's Monday and I have a busy day ahead of me. I need to finish up a custom order Wayfarer Purse and have it ready for shipping this afternoon. The Offbeat Messenger Bag posted above is a custom order I created for a lovely repeat customer and it also needs to be shipped today. I recently posted on the main page of my Etsy shop that I now take custom orders and have got quite a few requests via Etsy and outside sources. Later on today I plan to make a trip to my local fabric shop to purchase some much needed supplies and some new fabric that I can use for my applique work. So I'm off now and wishing everyone a wonderful day!

T oday my work was featured on Etsy's front page twice! The Semi-Circle Purse was featured in a list created by an Etsy adminstrator and The Equestrian Wayfarer Purse  by  TheBrassHussy . Thank you both for creating such lovely treasuries and including my work. Check out TheBrassHussy's shop for unique nature and vintage inspired costume jewelry. I was out all day but found the archived treasury lists on Heartomatic . Wishing everyone a wonderful weekend. Enjoy! List created by TheBrassHussy List created by Etsy

Every morning I make myself a cup of tea that I drink while I check my email and other things related to my Etsy shop. Well this morning I did not finish my tea since most of it ended up on my keyboard. I was quite horrified at first. I quickly unplugged the keyboard and turned it upside down to try and drain as much of the liquid as possible. After throughly drying it I was still not able to save it. I was glad that I did not damage anything else. Soon after this fiasco I headed to Tekserve , Apple specialists, and purchased a new keyboard for $30 dollars. My old keyboard was about 7 years old so I was due a new one anyway. So now I'm back home typing away on my clean crumb-free new keyboard. I probably should invest in one of those clear plastic keyboard covers though!

Above is a shot of my sewing station taken this morning at around 9:30AM. I've got a custom order to work on and some other bags in progress. At the moment the weather in NYC  is 89 degrees Farenheit and its quite humid. I'm not tempted to venture outside so I hope to complete a lot of work today.  This past weekend I added a few new purses to the shop . See images posted below. They are made from cotton corduroy, one of my favorite textiles to work with. I'll also be adding more bags from my fall collection made from cotton canvas  and twill. Stay tuned! The Wayfarer Purse in Sapphire Blue Corduroy The Wayfarer Purse in Toffee Corduroy

Today my Downtown Bag in Olive and Peridot made to Etsy's front page! The list was created by Etsy using the search term "peridot". I was recently perusing Etsy's gift guides and saw they added a new category called Shades of Peridot to celebrate August's birthstone. I noticed that many of the items that were selected had a similar hue to my downtown bag so I added "peridot" to my tags and description. I often check Etsy's gift guides so I can find categories that my purses can fit into and will tag them accordingly. If you are a seller on Etsy I highly recommend checking the guides often to see what is popular and being featured. Some of your items might be a perfect fit into one of the categories and you just might end up on the front page! 

Union Square Farmers Market (photo via Wikipedia) Today I'll be working in my studio pretty much all day. I do plan to do a few errands to break up the day such as shop at the   Union Square Farmers Market  for some veggies and wheatgrass for my sweet kitty Anni. The market is open 4 days a week year round and according to Wikipedia " 250,000 customers per week purchase 1,000 varieties of fruits and vegetables at the market." You can also buy homemade pies, breads and other baked goods. I better get going because it can tend to get crowded later in the day. Wishing everyone a wonderful Wednesday! Anni Eating Her Wheatgrass  

I was out all day and returned this afternoon to find several convos from my friends on Etsy letting me know that my Offbeat Messenger  made it to Etsy's front page! Thanks so much Lunasa Designs for curating this stunning treasury and thanks Etsy for selecting it for the front page. Check out Lunasa Designs etsy shop for beautiful and unique jewelry. I have her shop marked in my favorites!

I completed some new corduroy purses this week that I plan to add to the shop either later today or tomorrow. Weather conditions, being partly cloudy outside, are not optimal at the moment for photographing my purses in daylight. I prefer to photograph them using daylight  as I find the colors are most true to life. So I am at the mercy of mother nature concerning my photo shoot. I'll try to make the best of it and continue creating some more handbags in the meantime. Posted above from left to right is The Wayfarer Purse in Caramel Corduroy, The Nautical Wayfarer Purse in Deep Sea Blue Corduroy and The Wayfarer Purse in Autumn Spice Corduroy. 

I just discovered that my Linen Shoulder Bag is on the front page! This front page was created by an Etsy administrator using the search term "flower". I love all the selections. Thanks Etsy! You made my day. :)