Crochet business thoughts around the round table ...

Let's walk into a business meeting here at Southern Gal's Crochet. The place where we (the hubs and I) gather and discuss everything is at the round table. Topics range from running the house, paying the bills, how our jobs are going and of course new plans for the business. 

Yes, technically Southern Gal's Crochet is MY business but let's get real he plays a big part in it, such as making post office runs, buying yarn and more yarn and more yarn. Haha! Truthfully though I run by ideas and use his keen eye on whether the parts look crooked, he is key to my success.   

Now to the point, several times I have had the idea of branching into products for sale. Here is what we discussed and the decisions.

This will be happening:

One of the first things I want to get going in this branch will be safety eyes. If you don't know already, I have strong opinions about them and what kind to use and how to use them. I was thinking that a good way to combat these feelings was to just go ahead and offer them in my shop. 

This may be happening:

The next item we discussed was a travel pack of  crochet accessories. I don't know about you but I am forever forgetting something like a yarn needle or scissors. I don't want to carry a bulking organizer, just something that will fit in my purse and have some of the immediate essentials. 

We have done so much research on the travel pack, it is an investment that can be a gamble of being a hit or miss. I am sure other small business's feel the same when thinking about expanding but I pointed out (and to quote my mother) "we wont know till we try". Long story short 2 days later, we are still thinking about it.

This might not be happening yet:

Next up on the table is making project bags. I have been wanting to do this for a very long time but it just never seems to come to light. Not enough time, in the day to do it all. This one might have to be put on the back burner for a little while longer. Bags may or may not look like the picture below, I won't know till I actually make some and see which style I like best.

Hope you enjoyed attending our meeting today and would love to hear your input.

Happy Crocheting!

Southern Gal's Crochet beginnings...

 

So if you missed the first part... Leading up to Southern Gal's Crochet.

Welcome to the beginning of Southern Gal's Crochet.

I left off with falling in love with making Amigurumi. This lead to exploring as many patterns as I could get my hands on and quickly realizing patterns are written in various different ways, each designer had their own style just like crocheters. I was learning heaps and had boxes filled with finished products. 

With all these finished products hanging around I needed to do something with them. So I opened a Etsy shop. The first thing they ask for is a shop name, I had no clue what name to be. That was torture for me, my family and friends, eventually it was decided Southern Gal's Crochet was good. 

Selling my finished items and making custom orders went well but I knew it wasn't where my heart was at, I knew I wanted to write patterns for all the ideas I had floating in my head. 

I wrote my first pattern in 2011, I was thrilled with myself. LOL! I laugh cause I was so naive. I had no clue about the legal stuff, protecting your work and making a quality pattern. Heck I didn't even know that you were supposed to get those patterns tested before publishing. 

Yes. Yes I did! I really released a pattern untested and with zero step photos. I hang my head in shame. I soon realized I had made a mistake when I started getting mean messages from customers unhappy with the quality of pattern they purchased. I look back and I don't blame them at all, today I would totally do the same thing, maybe not as mean.

I worked hard at making my patterns better and with a little more style. Slowly building it up one pattern at a time, in just a few years I had a about a dozen patterns. It probably would've been more but I was still taking orders from family and friends. 

One day in 2018 I decided that was it, no more orders, I was going to switch over to just patterns. 

I am glad I did. It freed my creative mind to flow, the pattern ideas were coming at me faster than I could make them. My testers were so busy I had 2 or 3 patterns being tested at once, it was crazy!

Thankfully I got control of my mania and settled into a nice groove. I still get lots of ideas and jot them down but I am not frantically trying to do them all at once anymore. At this slower pace, even if I wasn't to get another idea, I would still have enough to last a few more years. Haha.

I hoped you enjoyed getting to know me a little better and of how it all began is still going.

Happy Crocheting!
Heather Welch

Leading up to Southern Gal's Crochet...

I have always (or so it seems) known how to crochet. Haha, okay not really but I have been surrounded by it from various family members and friends growing up. 

My earliest memory of yarn was when I was about 6, my Nana knitting and my Grammy crocheting. I remember watching them but never asking anything about it.

When my father remarried when I was 7, my step mother (mom) brought yarn into my life, she was a crocheter. I just recently recalled my first toy with her and it was an octopus. Green and blue yarn wrapped around a Styrofoam ball, the legs were braids and the eyes were made with red felt. I was so proud of that thing! LOL!

When I was 8 or 9, I went to camp and learned how to make a chain on my fingers. The Christmas tree that year had lots of chains on it. Hey, my mom had to find something to do with all my practice work!

We had a friend of the family that babysat us occasionally and she decided I needed to move to the next level and taught me how to crochet a single crochet stitch blanket for my Barbie. Well lets just say Barbie got a triangle blanket but a blanket none the less. I eventually taught myself how to quit loosing stitches and also how to do a double crochet (not know that was what it was called).

After picking up crochet for a blanket or scarf now and again through out the years, life had a way of always bringing me back to crochet. Whether it be passing the time while 18 wheeling back and forth across the country or coming home and having nothing to do, so I pick up the hook once again.

Many blankets and scarves were made over the decades.

Till one day shortly after getting my very first computer in April 2008, I decided to check out the website on the label of the Red Heart skein I had. To my surprise they had patterns!, I was in awe, but sadly I had never learned to read a pattern. After picking a blanket design and saving every chart I could find, I took on the task of figuring it out. I remember calling my best friend to share with her my exciting achievement.

After many patterns, failures and frustrated tears, by 2011 I was feeling brave enough to try a toy. I saw this book in the craft store called Sugar'n Cream Bright Ideas and it had a set of monsters in it. I just had to try them!

The original pattern called for felt for the face pieces, I didn't any so I had to figure out how to make the faces in crochet, which pushed my brain to be creative.

I fell in love with making Amigurumi!

It was a love that drove my creativity to blossom.

To be continued...

Southern Gal's Crochet evolving

Wow, it has been 9 years since I started Southern Gal's Crochet!

I started this blog when I was just learning to crochet other things than the typical square or rectangular things like blankets and scarves.
First this blog was about sharing my work, complaining about my work and various pattern problems, sharing the wonderful patterns I fell in love with.
Then it evolved into just a place to store links to my favorite patterns and purse making supplies.
Eight yrs later and I still don't know exactly what I should be doing with this site but I do have it and I need to put it to good use.

Now that I have been designing amigurumi patterns for the last few yrs. I think this is a good place to talk about tips and pointers that may help my audience in making a finished product from my patterns.

Yes, that is going to be my goal.

Happy Crocheting!