Week #13

Well, baby hasn't made his grand entrance yet at 41 weeks, but I haven't been able to even pick up a crochet hook in the last week or so. However, many babies that I made hats for are being born awhile, and I've received some adorable pictures!

Here's some of them. These are thanks to Rachelle for these incredibly precious pictures of her sons!

Week 12

I meant to be finished completely before this week with all of my custom orders, but it didn't work out that way. I've been crocheting my fingers off to finish up now. It seems like this baby is pretty set on being late to the party, so I guess being a bit behind is no big deal.

I finished up this girly pirate owl hat this week. These pirate owl hats, with their many colors and details, take about double the time of a normal order so I was especially glad to get this one done. Since I was in a rush, I didn't get many pictures, but here's the best one. You can't see the pretty glittery swirled dots on the top of the hat, but trust me when I say they add some adorable flare!

I have one more order that I've been speeding through (it's an infant one, so it should be done in no time except for the fact that I'm using some thinner yarn than normal.). I finished the hat portion (booties also go along with the set) and was looking for the perfect pink yarn to outline it in and make a pretty rose for the side. While I was searching, some fuzzy, glittery red yarn caught my daughter's eye. She grabbed it, put it on her head and said "Elmo!" Since I already feel bad that my new baby has a grand total of ONE hat made by me and Katie hasn't had a new hat for a few months, I had to quick whip up an Elmo hat for her. Lucky for me, fuzzy hats are a quick job and I had it done within a few hours. Now, to go search for that pink yarn that I could have sworn I had somewhere! A bonus would be finding the cookie monster infant hat I made about two months back - how cute would pictures be of my little Elmo fanatic and her cookie monster brother?!

 

Week #11

Getting so close to wrapping up my great year of hat making! Just two more orders, which I'm hoping to finish by mid-next week at latest.

I just finished up my last big order, which was a sibling set of color coordinating owls! They're in size child, toddler and baby.

Also, one of the many December babies that have Homespun Dreams' hats waiting for them were born this week. I got a picture of the little darling Arabella wearing her pink minion hat within the first hour she was born!

Week #10

Another week of working on getting through my request list! I had a bit of an accident at my store and ended up having to add another custom order to my request list, which means I need to work on hats a little more than I already was, but I'm still managing to get things crossed off at a pretty good speed. I'm now down to 7 more requests plus a pair of booties that match a hat I'm making.

This week I finished up this adorable girly sock monkey set! I had a bit of leeway to be creative with this one, so I ran with it and added some very adorable touches - the pretty pink flower buttons (which are on the diaper cover, at the end of the braids, and in the middle of the flower) and the pink lining on the diaper cover. 

This Christmasy infant Holly hat was also finished and bought today!

One last hat for the week, here's a baby dino hat!

And we got another happy customer picture this week! This is little Natalee enjoying her purple daisy hat in the chilly weather!

Week #9

This week I finished a Pirate Owl hat for a toddler, the two Cowboys Helmet Hats that I've been talking about forever (those stars, I may never make a star out of felt again!), and received a happy customer picture from my Jack Skellington receiver! I can't wait to take pictures of the little Sock Monkey set I'm making for a little girl due in December! So far the little diaper cover is nearly finished of the set.

Just three more weeks to go to get through all of these orders!

Owl Ahoy!

Two little Cowboys:

 (The picture is greatly lacking, unfortunately! These were finished at 2 AM)

Unfortunately more didn't get finished this week. My husband had a week vacation, so of course I decided to take a little vacation too! But now I'm back at full force to attack this request list and get these finished before my baby deadline.

And a little Jack Skellington with his new hat right before Halloween!

Week #8

This week brings me closer to my second monetary goal for my business. I'm only $76 away from reaching that goal, which is really close.   EDIT: I've now surpassed that goal! Besides that, this was my highest grossing month to date. When originally written, I had surpassed my previous highest grossing month mark by $30. It's now by $170, so I blew that out of the water! It's so great to see my business finally taking off and getting to track each month. As we approach the cut off for making custom made hats (just six more days left), it's nice to try and break a few personal records before the hiatus.

Here's some orders that are going out this week and new hats made:

Another elf hat in baby size, a breastfeeding hat and a Minnie Mouse toddler hat: 

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This polar bear hat was sent out this week. Since the pictures didn't upload last week, I'll upload them again here. He's now found his new home awaiting the birth of a little baby girl, and is sleeping next to a little matching pink outfit!

Another hat that got sent off was this awesome hat, Jack Skellington has always been one of my favorites!

I also got pictures this week of  little cutie Lucy enjoying one of her birthday gifts from Homespun Dreams - a super soft Hello Kitty hat!

Week #7

Oops, this week is a bit late, but I've been hard at work!

I finished the triplet outfits, and just in time! The day after the mommy-to-be received them, she went into labor and had her little beauties. I can't wait to get pictures of them in these outfits!

I'm also 90% finished on two Cowboys' football themed helmet hats, and just finished this Miami Dolphins inspired football hat (the pictures are dark since it's night.)

And I also did this custom requested hot pink minion inspired hat this week! 

I really enjoyed doing this one, it's absolutely adorable!

I had to make a cut off date for custom orders, as I need to make sure I can get everything done in time before my due date. October 31st will be the last day, since I currently have a 4-5 week turnaround time with the amount of orders I currently have and I'm due on 12.12. That cut off date apparently got quite a few people who've been waiting to order to make their move, as I gained 4 or 5 more orders this week! I hate to make a cut off date because it's so much fun to be getting pictures of happy customers (I'll be posting more next week) and hearing how everyone really loves their hats, but hopefully when I open back up early next year I'll still have my followers!

Week #6

It's been a busy week of crocheting!

First that had been finished were a matching set of blue ribbed cable hats for a two year old and his upcoming baby brother:

Next was a baby polar bear hat. For this one, I used two different kinds of fuzzy yarn to make the fur and another white yarn to add the details:

After that, I have been very busy doing my triplet order! As of today, I'm about 2/3rds of the way through it! The girls' outfits are finished and I'm working through the boy outfit currently:

Juliet and Genevieve Outfits:

Week #5

This week I've been working on two large orders at once, so not much is finished yet. I'm about half way through one and about a quarter way through the other. A lot of this week was put on hold trying to track down the yarn I needed - four stores later, and I have something pretty darn close to what I was looking for.

I did finish this sleepy eyed owl hat for an upcoming baby girl:

Followed by this toddler lavender hat:

I'll have much more completed by next week, since I have quite a few hats I'm in the middle of for these orders!

Week #4

This week went so fast, but I still managed to get quite a bit done! I never made baby sack sets before, so these were an adventure and I finished both on the same night.

Here's the Very Hungry Caterpillar set:

And here's the Santa Baby Set:

But I couldn't stop there! My daughter decided that she loved the new fuzzy blue yarn that I bought the other day on a whim and hadn't thought of what to make with it yet. She got into it and unraveled about half of it. I decided the best way to fix the situation was to crochet it all up! I made the hat, set it down, and completed the Santa Baby Set. As I was looking over at it while crocheting the set, I could only see the perfect Cookie Monster hat. The exact color, the fuzziness, it just fit perfectly, so this morning I ended up quickly crocheting some white half spheres and sewing them on, then adding the little black button eyeballs. I never made an entire hat out of fuzzy yarn before, but it was much easier than I anticipated. 

I just have two ribbed cable hats to make (matching for a set of little brothers!) and I'll be able to complete the order. Hoping I'll be able to get them done before the end of the weekend!

Week #3

Sadly, this was a rough week. I was sick since last Thursday to yesterday. Since I don't work on orders while sick (as a courtesy to the buyer - no one wants to think of their orders being made by someone who's sneezy and germy!) I didn't get much accomplished. I sold my biggest order yet, which I was very happy about, and I decided to work on a hat for my daughter.

This is a custom hat that is pretty unique - as it can't be found anywhere on storenvy or etsy (except in my store!). Katie loves Mickey Mouse's teddy bear Duffy, so I made one in the likeness of it and she's been carrying it around and wearing it since! She loves cuddling her Duffy and wearing her Duffy hat!

Here's my favorite little model: