~ blog

This past decade has seen an absolute explosion of public craftiness.

Skills such as knitting, tatting, wirework, polymer clay, papercrafts, beading, crochet, etc, that had largely been left to the tender care of specialists or mothballed with our grannies & maiden aunts, have been reseeded and are growing afresh from newly fertile soil.

Crafts of all sorts are being promoted, reshaped and modernized and the Internet is full of blogs and websites bursting with ideas and information. You’re spoilt for choice really.

Sadly, few of us have enough time to learn and practise every single technique that catches our fancy (I would be alive for centuries if that were the case!). And when it comes to handmade gifts, sometimes you just don’t have the time, or skills, or inspiration to make that perfectly matched present.

But wait! Before you trot off up to the High St, off to the mall or onto Amazon.com, think about buying that handmade gift instead.

There are lots of good reasons to buy handmade. Because it bolsters the local economy. Because it’s better environmentally. Because handmade gifts are more satisfying to the senses. Because they’re individualistic. BuyHandmade.Org has a whole slew of reasons that make a lot of sense.

But where to purchase all these cool handmade gifts? And will I find something I like?

Two websites that never fail me are Etsy and Folksy.

Both sites host thousands of stores for handmade (and in Etsy’s case, vintage) goods, as well as providing a source for craft supplies.

Best of all, to my mind, instead of the sterile transaction or typically hit-and-miss service offered by online retailers or auction sites, they transform the purchase into the type of personal encounter you experience in the best bricks & mortar boutiques. The sites reconnect the buyer with the creator.

Both Etsy and Folksy also actively foster the handmade community, and have lively forums, education areas and online communities. And if, like me, you always feel motivated to go create after you’ve spent time browsing all the exciting goods on offer, then both sites have Tutorial sections where they freely offer lessons, inspiration and boundless enthusiasm.

Three pages into a book on small business taxation & accounting, and my brain throws up the dreaded Blue Screen of Death.

My maths teachers were familiar with that look of blank incomprehension on my face, and it still holds true today for anything requiring more than mathematical basics (for example, don’t expect me to deliver a correct percentage without the use of a calculator and some guesswork on what is divided by which is multiplied by whom).

Fortunately, back then my maths teachers didn’t have to suffer me past Fifth Form (and I did pass my School Certificate Maths, much to everyone’s surprise), and fortunately for now, there’s a helping hand with the tax conundrum:

Paper, textile & mixed-media artist (and chartered Tax Advisor) Lois Addy of Toot Hill Medley, has put together a series of articles on UK Tax for Small Craft Business on her blog, Lois Designs.

They range from the necessary basics, e.g. when will Her Majesty’s Revenue & Customs be interested in me? and the essential, e.g. trading periods and year ends; to the more complex, e.g. types of taxable expenses and the claiming differences.

One of the reasons I especially like the series is that it addresses questions from a growing demographic in the small craft business sector, i.e. those who have a daytime job, but who also run a side-enterprise selling their own creations. Most books give glancing reference to this faction, but if this is your situation they’re usually of little use in making it obvious what your taxation requirements are.

The series is intended to provide you with food for thought, not to be a legal guide to the UK taxation system and your rights & obligations. I’ve certainly found my understanding has grown in leaps and bounds however. Clear, well-written, down-to-earth and friendly – and with very pretty eye candy – these articles are a real treasure. Thanks Lois!

This is an ongoing series, and all posts can be seen here:
UK Tax for Small Craft Business Series (TSCB)

Sewers, Knitters and all-round Crafters, perk your ears up! One of my favourite polymer clay artists & bloggers, Lisa Clarke of Polka Dot Cottage, is going to be teaching a free five-week Beginner Button Class on her blog.

It’s aimed at polymer clay beginners (though naturally you don’t have to be), and requires only a minimum of supplies and tools.

So if you can never find the right button, would love to have buttons customised to your own creations, or are are just generally feeling creative, then go check this out. I certainly will going be following with great interest.

Further details on the Polka Dot Cottage blog:

Where now the horse and the rider? Where is the horn that was blowing?
Where is the helm and the hauberk, and the bright hair flowing?
Where is the hand on the harpstring, and the red fire glowing?
Where is the spring and the harvest and the tall corn growing?
They have passed like rain on the mountain, like a wind in the meadow;
The days have gone down in the West behind the hills into shadow.
Who shall gather the smoke of the dead wood burning,
Or behold the flowing years from the Sea returning?

- J.R.Tolkein

Sweep thy faint strings, Musician,
With thy long, lean hand;
Downward the starry tapers burn,
Sinks soft the waning sand;
The old hound whimpers couched in sleep,
The embers smoulder low;
Across the wall the shadows
Come, and go.

Sweep softly thy strings, Musician,
The minutes mount to hours;
Frost on the windless casement weaves
A labyrinth of flowers;
Ghosts linger in the darkening air,
hearken at the opening door;
Music hath called them, dreaming,
Home once more.

- Walter de la Mare

i thank You God for this most amazing
day:for the leaping greenly spirits of trees
and a blue true dream of sky;and for everything
wich is natural which is infinite which is yes

(i who have died am alive again today,
and this is the sun’s birthday;this is the birth
day of life and love and wings:and of the gay
great happening illimitably earth)

how should tasting touching hearing seeing
breathing any-lifted from the no
of all nothing-human merely being
doubt unimaginable You?

(now the ears of my ears awake and
now the eyes of my eyes are opened)

- e.e.cummings

Hello to the Year of the Rabbit!

And just as bunnies do, may your fortunes and blessings multiply likewise.