This year I haven't done much sewing. Things haven't been great with my shop either. In one of the last posts I made here from over a year ago, I think I said something about having 80 sales. Well, a whole year later, I have 93 sales, so it looks like I've only had 13 sales since then. There was a while when I didn't have a lot of stock left in my shop, but I uploaded a bunch of stuff in March. Usually when I upload things, they sell pretty quickly, but this time, most of the things I listed are just sitting there. The listings even had to be renewed recently because they hadn't sold, which is pretty unusual.
I haven't really been keeping up with Etsy. I pretty much never visit the site or the forums anymore. I do everything through the app. It could be that the algorithms have changed or that more people are using paid advertising, so people never see my stuff. Or it could be that I'm just not selling anything people want to buy. I haven't been keeping up with the cloth pad world either, so maybe there's some new fangled design of pad that everyone's into.
I only need 7 more sales to make it to 100 sales, but with the way things have been going, it doesn't look like I'll hit that target by the end of this year.
This is a not very good photo of some of the pads I made for my shop back in March. The red ones with the chevron print ended up coming out of the washing machine kind of pink looking. I don't think it was the red dye of the base fabric but the red dye on the actual print, which was weird. I ended up listing them as seconds. I think they were pretty much the first thing to sell. Most of the others here are still unsold.
I finally got around to making a wet bag! It's something I thought about doing for ages. I actually had a pattern for it but then completely ignored the instructions and did my own thing. I was happy with the way it turned out.
I think the strap area needed some kind of interfacing or reinforcement because this is what happened when I tried to unsnap the snap. The fabric became warped with me pulling on it trying to unsnap the snap.
In the pattern instructions, the zip went from edge to edge, but I wanted to have some... I have no idea what you'd call them. End bits on the zip so that it didn't go from edge to edge. I winged it and really liked the way it turned out.
I was limited to what size of bag I could make by the zips that I had on hand. I actually bought these ones ages ago when I was making cushions. I think I thought they were 20 inch zips or something, but it turned out that they were measured in centimetres and were far too small for cushions. I didn't want to make the bag too long because it would look off balance, so it's not long enough for my longest cloth pad. I think that's a 12 inch one. I can't remember. But you usually fold them over anyway before you throw them in.
This is the wet bag filled. I couldn't really fit much more in.
And this is what I managed to fill it with. 11 cloth pads of varying sizes, so I'd say it holds at least a day's worth.
Here it is hanging up in my bathroom. With the snap on the strap, you could hang it onto a towel rail or something too. I think I'll probably make some more of these for my shop. And if I get some more zips, I'll probably make some larger sized ones too.
During April, I did a bit of sewing for myself. I decided to change up my stash to the Versodile rounded end cloth pads. They just seem a bit less bulky, but because of that, they're also less absorbent. I made them with flannel toppers, Zorb cores, except for a couple of them. I found a scrap of hemp fleece so one or two have hemp fleece cores and one has a layer of hemp fleece and a layer of Zorb. I didn't mark them, so I can't remember which is which.
I put a hidden layer of PUL in them and then backed with some microfleece I've had in my stash forever. I decided to use the microfleece because I've heard people say that a PUL bottom layer is quite slippy and the pads can slip around. I notice that a lot of the pads you can buy, actually commercially made ones, do have PUL on the bottom. Presumably the slipping isn't that big an issue for most people, but I used the microfleece anyway, mainly just to use it up. I do think this makes them quite warm to wear, but not really that much different compared to plastic backed disposable pads.
Even though I love the different patterns, I made quite a few solid coloured ones because for some reason, I just like the way they look more than the patterned ones. I had intended to cut more/different patterned and coloured ones, but it was just more efficient to grab a bunch of material and cut a few, rather than cutting one from each piece of fabric I have. Maybe I'll cut some more and add them later, but really, this is more than enough.
These are my largest sizes ones. I can't remember if they're 12 inches or 14 inches. They all have two layers of Zorb (or hemp fleece) and wider wings with double snaps.
These are 10 inches I think. They've only got one layer of Zorb and single snaps on the wings.
This is the reason I really dislike turned and topstitched pads where you have to turn right side out through the wing or the side. Maybe it's just me and I need more practice, but after sewing around 40 of them, you'd think I would have improved. It just never really matches up right. You can always tell where you've turned the pad, and then the seam kind of gapes open slightly, because it's held closed by your topstitching, rather than the original stitching line. I have to admit, after wearing/using them for the last couple of months, it's not something I really notice. You're not really staring at the edges of your pads. And of course, it doesn't affect the function of them in any way. I wouldn't sew these to sell though, just because they don't look that great.
This is my most recent project. It's the Kelly Anorak from Closet Case Patterns. This has been on my list to sew for a long time. It's actually nearly finished now, I'm just waiting on some pins to arrive so I can keep the lining straight while I topstitch the drawstring casing. Yes, it's true. I really don't have any sewing pins!
I'm happy with the way it turned out. It definitely doesn't look like something that's 'home made'. My lovely children thought it looked like an old man's fisherman jacket though, so maybe I'll look like a fisherman when I'm wearing it. I'll make a blog post about it once it's finished. My next project will be the Ginger Jeans, also by Closet Case Patterns. I'm just waiting for some cash to hit my account so I can buy the supplies I need.
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