Stuff, stuff and more stuff!

[martelvonc]

I spent most of the day today straightening the basement and doing laundry. I need to prep my sewing area for the onslaught of new garb making. We all need some new outfits but me in particular. So I sorted, tossed, piled and otherwise put SCA things away that had accumulated at places except where they needed to be.

I did make two small projects today. In one of the gift baskets I received at investiture were 4 heavy cotton commercially made napkins that looked hand woven. I sewed one in half and then ran a seam down the center to make 2 pockets for my nice glasses. Then I took the other 3 and sewed them all together along 3 sides. This then made two large pockets that will hold 2 place settings (a plate, a charger and a napkin). Hopefully this will protect them a bit better from sliding around in my box. I have my utensils in a nice bag but I think I will make one of those fabric things with individual pockets for each utensil that can be rolled up and tied.

In my searches I found bunches of beads that I can use for tokens. They aren't baronial colors but nice none the less. I do need to make more baronial business cards though. I've already attached tokens to all of the cards that Baroness Molly gave me. Hmmmm I need to do the math, Vista Print wants $50 for 500 business cards if I upload my own image (the baronial arms). I'm going to check staples for print-my-own business cards and compare the prices. I'm not sure I want to commit to 500 business cards though. You never know when your phone number might need to be changed.

Token and largess making proceeds at a good clip. Now that I've found/unearthed more supplies I can use up what I already have and not buy more just yet. Last week I made these very cool coiled wire spacer beads for viking necklaces to give as tokens. They were quite fun to make but I need to pace myself with those as my hands and the CTS felt like heck the next day. This project started to use up a roll of gold colored wire I had laying around. This is good for the pocket book!

But I need to close up shop now and get ready for fighter practice.

Comments

[ladypyrate.livejournal.com]

Another suggestion is to find a locally-owned print shop, and see how much a small batch of cards will run. I bought some business cards from Kinko's for my Temari stuff and my Mother in Law was appalled at the price I'd paid.

About those beads...

[stitchwhich.livejournal.com]

... if you are leaving them as "the Baroness", consider running some floss/thread through them in your baronial colors and knotting or braiding the ends. THen it wouldn't matter if they were in your colors or not. The recipient can use it as a bookmark or snip the bead off of the thread to use elsewhere. And you can use up some of your 'too short to use in a project' threads.

Re: About those beads...

[martelvonc.livejournal.com]

Yes, I did that too! That way it's all together in one neat little thing and I don't have to dig for a card AND the token.

I like the tradition of tokens and largess. It's fun and nice way to thank people. I also get to make little medievalish things but that's just me. :-)

[luscious-purple.livejournal.com]

Last week I made these very cool coiled wire spacer beads for viking necklaces to give as tokens.

Ooh, how exactly did you do this? Did you just wrap the wire around a small mandrel? What gauge wire? Is there any trick to making the coil "hold together" and not stretch out?

Thanks in advance! (You can tell I'm thinking of making another necklace for KASF, right? *grin*)

[martelvonc.livejournal.com]

If you will be at KASF I can show you there. You'll need 20 guage wire, gold or silver, a small pair of those round nose pliers, a pair of small wire cutters and a small pair of flat nose pliers.

The pliers and wire are sold at joann's, michaels etc. in the beading department. None of this is expensive either. Sweet!

As for the uncoiling, these are pretty sturdy unless you catch them on something. They are quite addicting to make.

[folo1.livejournal.com]

If you have a color printer (laser or inkjet), Office Depot has its own cards (you can use an Avery setup template). There are 300 cards for (if I remember right) about twelve bucks. Significantly lower than brand name and good for inkjet or laser. I learned my lesson after recycling hundreds of cards that seemed like such a bargain until some information changed... :(

[martelvonc.livejournal.com]

I don't mind it when I recycle the 4.99 ones but 50 buck ones are a bit steep. Yes that was my thought to just use the "print your own". That way I can print only what I need at a time and there is little wasteage.