Cushions, bags and coffee pot cosy

Some Magatha Bagatha items are now available in my Folksy shop: http://folksy.com/shops/MagathaBagatha

Call in for cushions, bags and a coffee pot cosy. More items coming soon!

St Meilyr's Church craft fayre

Magatha Bagatha had a very successful first ever craft fair in Clarbeston Road yesterday. There was a very friendly and welcoming atmosphere and a steady stream of customers for most of the day.

Me and my stall.

 

 

 

 

The covered sketchbooks were a popular item.

 

Finally!

Finally things are beginning to happen here - Magatha Bagatha is more of a name than a business at the moment but there's a lot happening.

Everything is very much in the planning, research and development mode - I'm planning the products I want to make, researching the market and developing how I want to do things.

I've made a few things and tested them on friends and relatives and the prototypes have been well received.

My main plan is to find a use for the wool from our 20 Lleyn cross ewes so we've been researching wool processing and waiting for it to stop raining long enough for the shearer to come and take the fleeces off.

The girls don't think much to this but they feel better afterwards.

This week the rain did stop and the shearer arrived. The job doesn't take long when there are only 20 sheep to do!

Twenty organic fleeces, picked, rolled and sorted.

With 20 different sheep you get 20 different fleeces. We lined them up in the sunshine in order of quality - softest on the left, coarsest on the right. The top right is from our pet sheep Chops who has such a lovely long staple to his fleece and his now quite a big chap so there's a lot of it! Samples have now gone off to a mill in Yorkshire for assessment and advice.

The initial plan is to use the carded wool to stuff cushions and pillows but the future perhaps holds yarn and felt - watch this space!

In the meantime I've been sewing cushion covers so I'll have some ready for filling once the wool is done. I'm using some lovely organic cross weave cottons and appliqués made from leftover fabric scraps and adding a little hand embroidery to some of them.

Wellington boots.

One of my main objectives with Magatha Bagatha is to reduce waste and to use organic materials wherever possible. I reuse things where I can and some of my other items have been made from preloved clothes and curtains. It's also a way to use up the scraps, buttons, beads and other lovely things I've rescued over the years.

There are four of these cushion covers so far - two 18" x 18" and two 10" x 10".  They now need sewing to their backs (envelope style with two heart-shaped buttons) and then I need to make the woolly inner pads.

I've also been working on a book-style Kindle cover this week. This one's for mum who road tests so many of my sewing projects. At the moment this design is padded with polyester wadding - I can't help but think that lovely soft organic Welsh wool would be so much better...