a picture from my last crafty xmas fair

My stall

I had my last fair before Christmas and I had a VERY SMALL table so I only displayed a few pieces this time concentrated mainly on the chalkboards. There was a bit of a poor turnout so really it consisted of sellers buying from sellers! but we kept up the morale until an hour until it finished and we decided to pack up and go home! So came home with a profit but a bit of a meagre one! Never mind will keep the ideas stacking up ready for the new year. I'm introducing loyalty cards next year where you have a card and after you buy a certain number of my gifts you get one free! How splendid! Well I hope you are all ready for the Christmas celebrations and I wish you all a very merry Christmas and a PROSPEROUS new year!

******And a special thanks to all my customers and my family mainly SHADANN for his hard work helping me after his own hard days work and my friends especially CARA for helping me and supporting the HANDMADE world!

How to make chalk boards

paper template

MDF/wood

chalkboard paint

any shape

First of all you get your design, I think about  roughly about foot square is an ideal shape to start with and draw it onto paper. Then you get your obliging partner or yourself whoever is handiest with a jigsaw cutter and get them to cut out on 12mm (1.2cm) MDF your shape.
Then once you have your shape give it a good sanding on the edges so there is no rough pieces, then I found that using a small roller is a great way to get even coverage onto your board, first roller the edges, getting into the crevices with a paintbrush, then just simply roller the front side, leave for a couple of hours and roller the back side, make sure you give them at least 2 coats of the chalkboard paint.
Next when the boards are dry, I drill 2 holes into the top edges and attach some plaited twine to make an ideal hanger.
There you have an original chalk board perfect gifts for any occasion.
(on the rectangle shape ones I buy rub on transfers and decorate them round the edges making sure I leave room for someone to be able to chalk onto the board)

making gift wrap paper

Today I brought 20 sheets of plain paper for £1.20 and have stamped them with various designs to use as the tissue paper to wrap my craft gifts in for when they sell.

Plain paper before they are stamped

green leaf design

heart design

words and hearts

I am hoping that wrapping in these pretty papers will just add a finishing touch to the way they are presented, especially when I post gifts off its nice to recieve something well presented and after all its "handmade"

I am getting ready for 2 more craft fairs that are coming up so we have new shapes for chalkboards and have to get a move on blacking them up and have an array of aprons to get stitched up.