Best-laid plans...

theMADEmarket on Saturday wasn't much good for me from the selling point of view, but I met some very interesting people and laid the foundations for what might turn into some commissions. The main issue seemed to be lack of marketing - the organisers (though very lovely people) seemed to be relying mostly on passing trade (Saturday shoppers in the centre of Gloucester, many quite elderly, who weren't generally wanting to spend much money, and often seemed rather bemused by the items on sale) rather than having targeted their advertising at the kind of visitors who would appreciate the very high standard of art and craft on sale, and be prepared to spend, for example, £80 on one of my framed felt textile art pieces. It has been a learning curve for me - in future, before I sign up for a stand at a large fair which involves a lot of travel costs for me, I will enquire about the organisers' marketing strategy. Especially in these straightened financial times, if exhibitors are going to go half way across the country for a fair, we need to know that the right kind of potential customers are likely to be there.

I had taken my Folksy shop down for a few days to avoid duplication of sales, but it's now back up, and surplus stock from Saturday will go on as soon as I have got it photographed.

However, this week (as well as tidying up my workspace which has become a bit chaotic in the run up to Saturday) I HAD planned to start scouring and preparing some of the fleeces in my garage, towards the Felting British Wool project (which seems to be going nowhere fast at the moment as I keep getting distracted by other things!). However, my plans have been thwarted by the weather - in the absence of an Aga, washed fleece really needs to dry outside on a warm day (like the ones we had recently, when I was too busy doing other things to wash wool!) and the forecast for this week is rubbish - rain, or at least showers, all week. So I'll scrap that idea and try again another time. Meanwhile, my spinning wheel is calling, the trouble is I really do need to do some tidying up of the workspace before I reward myself with some spinning time!