Things are a-changin'...

Look a little different around here? With the re-opening of the Sugar Plum Delights Etsy shop, I decided to do a little updating. I added a new background to the blog, changed a few things on the sidebar, added some things...just general mid-summer cleaning, I guess. I was going to add a widget for Twitter, but I can't seem to get anything to work for it. Suggestions?

I also made the decision today to close down my website. I haven't had time to work on it, and it wasn't getting much traffic anyway. So, I decided to stick with free(ish) things like Etsy, Blogger, Flickr, Twitter, and Facebook. My next project is to update my Flickr page, possibly by the end of the week.

Other than that, there hasn't been too much happening in Sugar Plum Land. I work on new crafty things to add to the shop when I have a chance, which doesn't happen often with an almost-three-year-old and a three-month old! But be sure to check back though, and see what might be new!

And, don't forget that I'm offering FREE SHIPPING on everything in the shop until July 31st! Don't wait!

Coming Soon!

We'll be back soon, I promise! The last 6 months have flown by and lots has happened, but we're gearing up to get the shop open again ASAP! There will be new crayon rolls, new totes, keychains, bibs and burps, and lots of other fun stuff! Something new that's a personal favorite is...Monster Pillows!

These are the cutest things, and kids just love them. They can even be personalized, if you wish! I'm also working on Crayon Roll Party Packs, Birthday Party Packs, and Craft Kits of various sorts.

So, stay tuned, and be on the lookout for our Grand Re-Opening, happening soon! There may even be a sale...you never know!

Here's what I have been working on while the shop has been closed:

My little man, born April 16. Gush!

Baby Legs!

New! BabyLegs (r) are now available on the website! There are so many styles available that I haven't gotten them all up yet, but I'm working on it! Most of them are there now, and the rest will be added in the next few days.

BabyLegs are wonderful for babies and toddlers. They have so many uses! My own daughter loves them; she's worn them since she was just a baby, and now she's an active toddler. Here she is sporting the yellow and black stripes as part of her Bee Halloween costume in '07:

They're a perfect match for tutu's and pettiskirts, too! Okay, enough of the selling. Check out my site for more info!

In other news, I'm diligently working on the website whenever I have a chance, and will soon be adding more of my handmade items, such as crayon rolls. Custom orders through the site will also be available soon, and will include personalized bibs and burp cloths, as well as personalized crayon rolls.

Stay tuned!

Happy New Year!

I know it's been a while since this has been updated, but I've had a lot going on in life lately! No worries, everything will be back up and running very soon, with some great new products and other fun things to come!

2009 will be a great year!

Catching Up...

Wow, has it been a week since I've posted? Goodness gracious, sorry to leave you all hanging out there! I've been fairly busy with some custom orders and requests, and have finally finished up most all of it. I think I only have one more thing to complete, then I can take a breather. Whew! And did I take pictures of any of these things to show off to the masses? Of course not! Aside from orders, I've been working on Fall and Holiday craft shows, and figuring out what we might want to consider. I've never been good at planning, and have a tendency to forget things (who me?), so I figure if I get a jump on it and keep the list in the back of my mind, I might be okay.


Imagine this keychain multiplied by 20. That's what's been keeping me (happily) busy! RLAG stands for "Run Like A Girl", a book by Kathy Vick, to be released in 2009.


While I was in the middle of my pile of custom keychains (Thanks Kathy!), my sister-in-law/partner-in-crime Katie has opened up an Etsy shop of her very own, Happy 2 Knit. She's been knitting up a storm, and is really creating some super-cute knitted goodness! You'll find it hard to resist the things in her shop, but make sure you stop by. She will be more than happy to accept custom orders, too.

I think the finger puppets may be my favorite. They're just adorable.

I have a 3-day weekend this weekend, and that is making me very happy. I will, hopefully, finally be able to work on some things I've wanted to do for a while, but just haven't gotten around to yet. Or, I may just stay in my jammies all day and watch silly movies. You just never know what may happen at Sugar Plum Central...

Update! Finally!

I decided earlier today that I really needed to update my blog, so this afternoon I started typing. All of a sudden I had written over 800 words, and decided that it was WAY too long to post here, when basically all I was trying to say was that I bought myself a Cuttlebug. It ended up sounding like a column in a magazine, so I thought, what the hay? I'll submit to a magazine or two, and see what happens. You never know.

So, I bought a Cuttlebug! Isn't it cute?

I was looking for a quick and easy way to make nice, professional-looking hangtags for my products when I spotted this little dealie. It can do a lot of things, so I'm very excited about it. I might even try my hand at making cards, I haven't fully decided yet.

Anyway, June has been busy at Sugar Plum Central! I had a lovely vacation that was much needed, and now am back to work. I've been working on a few new things that will be unveiled later this month, hopefully. I'm very excited about them! Orders are coming in left and right for my Monogrammed Initial Key Fobs, and I introduced a new color, Lime Green. Love this one! I think it looks great with the blue thread, but I can do whatever color thread a customer may want.

I've also had orders for my badge reels from people at work. I'm waiting on a shipment of them, so I haven't posted them in the Etsy Shop just yet. But if you're interested, just let me know! Here's a batch I did last week:

They turned out great, even though the picture didn't, and I was told that the recipients loved them! I love hearing that my things make people happy.. :-) In case you can't tell, the pink and blue letters are on a brown background, on black clips.

So that's all for now. I'll try to post a little more regularly, and try to keep things interesting!

Quickie Post!

I just wanted to do a quick post to let you all know that I'm back from vacation! We all had a wonderful time, and I'm very relaxed. I really needed that break! But now I'm ready to get back to work and back into the daily groove. In the meantime, enjoy this lovely photo of the beach at St. Simons Island, where we had the pleasure of staying for the last week..

Isn't it gorgeous? I can't wait to go back. Updates coming soon!

Off to the Beach!

It's official! I'm on vacation, and I can't wait to get to the beach. We'll be heading out of town this evening, and it's not getting here fast enough!

I hope you all have a wonderful and safe holiday weekend! I'll be back the week of June 2nd.

Weekend Wrap-Up

Happy Monday! Thankfully, mine is almost over. I wanted to post a little earlier today, but was distracted by flickr, sewforum, various Yahoo groups...oh yeah, and I did do a little work, too.

The Kirkwood Spring Fling on Saturday was fabulous! The weather was beautiful, although a little windy, but not too hot, and not chilly. It was comfortable! Of course I completely forgot to take pictures of the booth setup, and I'm now kicking myself, as it looked really good! Thanks to all those who came out to see us, we appreciate you!

I debuted a couple of new products on Saturday. One, as was mentioned previously, was the Market Tote. I'm taking orders! Here is the example:

For more information, check it out in the shop. Like I said before, these are so cool! There has been lots of interest. I'm working on getting more colors and a collapsible tote that's easy to store! They'll be a little different, but it's the same principle.

I also made up some UGA Bibs and Burp Cloths. I didn't get a pic of the bib, but here's the burp:

If you're interested in products made with licensed fabric, email me. You won't see these in the Shop.

Sunday was very relaxing at Sugar Plum Central. Just did a little surfing and promotion while Pookie napped, and not much else. It was great! Now if Friday would only come faster.. I'll be on vacation next week, and I can't wait!

Promos!

close up.
Originally uploaded by queenvanna creations

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I know I mentioned doing my own clothespin promos in a previous post, but I wanted a lot of them, and I wanted them rather quickly, so I ordered these from QueenVanna Creations! Aren't they fabulous? There was no way I could have produced 100 of these babies in 2 days, which is what she did! Plus hers are 1000 times better than the ones I did, I can tell just from the pics! I can't wait to get them in the mail. So, if you come out and see us at Kirkwood, or make a purchase from our Etsy Shop, you may just get one of these cuties!

Beer, Badge Clips, and Promos...

They are three unrelated items, and I would have liked to have stuck with the alliteration, just because I think alliteration is cool, but I couldn't think of a B word for promotional items. Can you?

About the beer...there is an awesome seller on Etsy named Tracy, and she has a shop named The Homespun Raven. She makes really nice signs and shelf sitters with fun sayings, and I had to have one. My husband is an avid beer drinker; not just a casual, hey I'm going to have a beer-type drinker, but he really gets into the science of it, and actually brews his own. So I thought, a sign with the famous Ben Franklin quote would be a perfect "just because" gift. Aren't I a swell wife? Here is what Tracy produced for me:

Isn't it great? We just got it in the mail yesterday, and I love it, and more importantly, my hubby loved it too. Go visit her shop! She has lots of great stuff, and does custom orders, too. http://thehomespunraven.etsy.com/.

Badge Clips: In my day-job, I work for a large corporation here in Atlanta, and we're very secure. We have to scan badges to get into each building, and there are lots of them. So that means that everyone here has an id badge, and most likely a badge clip to go with it. They're all pretty boring, at least the ones that I've seen, whether they have a company logo on them, or not. Poking around Etsy, I've seen some pimped up badge reels, so I was like, I could do that, with my embroidery machine (I think it needs a name) by my side. I formulated a plan yesterday while I was at work, then when I got home and after putting Pookie to bed, I went to work. This is the end result:

I like it so much better than the ol Security logo that was on there before. Adds a little splash to something I have to carry around constantly. I'm thinking of offering them to employees, and a few may show up on Etsy, I haven't decided on that one yet.

Promos: Since we have a few markets coming up, I've been trying to think of something good to use as a promotional item. I would love to do magnets that are big enough to put the biz name and website on, but I want a Tecre button machine to do that, and those are expensive (I do have a birthday coming up - hint, hint). I do have my lovely Xyron machine that can make anything into a magnet, so my dream of magnets may still be realized. Still working on that one. Anyway, my new fascination with Mod Podge yielded some fun art clips (clothespins with pretty paper on them), so I wrote the website on there with one my many trusty Sharpies, and glued on a magnet. Ta da!

I love Sharpies. They can do anything. Now we have pretty clothespin magnets with the website on them to giveaway. I need to break out my stash of paper and make up some more. They can't all be purple. Or can they?

It's Almost Grilling Season...

I know this doesn't really have much to do with the main focus of Sugar Plum Delights, which is stuff for babies and kids, but I thought this design was cool, and I couldn't wait to stitch it out. So, I present the "Grill King" Apron:

And a closeup:

Isn't it fun? I thought this would be a perfect gift for Father's Day! There are so many wonderful embroidery designs out there that I'm finding it hard to limit myself to items for children. I might have to move "other" items to another shop. We shall have to see! Anyway, this apron is not currently available in the shop, but if you're interested, please email me. I'm thinking of offering customization on these as well. So your Grill King can have a personalized apron of his very own! Keep an eye out for towels with this design coming soon. Birthday season is coming up in our family, so this might be a winner all around (Katie: shhhh!).

These aprons, as well as some I'm working on for the ladies, will be available at upcoming markets. Come and check us out!

Stickers!

We're beginning to look almost like a real business here at Sugar Plum Delights. In preparation for Spring markets and festivals, I decided that we needed a bit more of a "presence" you might say. So, I whipped up those clippy cards that I posted about a little while ago, made some matching hang tags to add to tutus, bibs, and whatever else we have, all to look a little more uniform. Then I started thinking, well people are going to need to have bags to take away their many purchases from our booth, and what good is giving them a bag with no business identification on it? We want other people to see where our customers are getting their great products. So, I picked up a Xyron 510 at Michaels (using a 40% off coupon, of course), played around on PrintMaster, and....Voila!

It's our very own sticker! I slapped this on some nice white shopping bags and now we look professional. It would have been better if my circle cutter would have cooperated, but I'm still working on that.

The Xyron machine is really cool, I can't believe I waited so long to get one. If only I had known that I could put anything in there and make it into a sticker, I would have had one years ago. I'm still playing around with it to see what all I can do, but I hear you can actually put fabric in there. I 'm not sure what I would do with sticky fabric, but you better believe I'll find a way to use it!

I also whipped up some cute new clippies in the last few days. They're available in the shop now!

On a personal note, we're still recovering from the crud here at Sugar Plum Central, but I hope everyone out there is feeling well!