Journeys Are My Diary

Life, Adventures, Entertainment and more - A little bit of everything blog!

Happy Birthday Closet Geek

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Can you believe it’s been a year? I can’t!

Yes, that’s right, one year ago today, I opened my Closet Geek store. Something that started as just sewing for my own children, for Amy and I to cosplay and for Liv to wear to WDW, turned into this tiny little business selling hair bows, pencil cases and girls dresses.

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Now a year on, I honestly can’t believe how much support and love I’ve had. I hit 1000 followers on Instagram a few months ago and I’ve had over 1500 sales on Etsy. In addition to the dresses, pencil cases and hair bows I started with, I now sell Disney ears on a fairly regular basis, bunting and cushion covers. I take inquiries for custom skirts and cosplay, along with anything else people are interested in.

Though I’m yet to crack it yet, I bought a laser cutter a while back and I also experimented with screen printing. In the next few weeks I hope to dedicate more to time to them. I’ve also signed up for 4 days of Christmas Market in Lincoln during December, so prep for that will begin soon. I made a post called “Almost a year on…” on the Closet Geek blog, discussing some of my popular items and some of my favourite.

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I’d love to explore the possibility of Subscription boxes throughout the next year, plus more fandoms that just Disney and Harry Potter. I can’t wait to be writing a post that’s “two years on” and I hope that you’re all still following me to see it! Thanks again for all the support.

Closet Geek Update

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Obviously as you probably know, I now own a small business called Closet Geek, where I make handmade jewellery, pencil cases, hair bows and clothes. I also take custom orders – which recently has led to a prom dress and a Cinderella cosplay. Because of this it means I struggle to find time to blog sometimes, but I thought I would write a quick post about what’s going on over at the store!

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First thing to note is that my website itself (www.ClosetGeek.co.uk) isn’t having that many orders! I guess if I’d thought about it more in advance, I probably would have known this – but basically it feels like I opened up a little shop on a tiny off-the-beaten-track lane and the only customers I get are few and far between. However on a positive note, my Etsy store (which basically duplicates most of my store listings), has been really busy and it’s been so much fun sewing and making bows for orders. This last week I’ve had two “Little Miss Disgust” dresses to make (one even with a neck scarf), three hair bows and four necklaces. I even have an adult Little Miss Disgust dress on order.

I’ve pretty much completed the Back to the Future Prom Dress, which will hopefully be mailed off towards the end of this week. I’ve also properly started on the Cinderella dress (after a nightmare with fabrics). I’m hoping to make a batch of Villains hair bows, which will be a sort of “Halloween” launch, but permanently in the store once they’re launched. I’d also love to do a Superhero batch but I have no set period of time for that. Probably not quite in time for Halloween unfortunately, but in the not too distant future, I’d love to do a Disney Villains inspired batch of girls dresses too – which my girls are keen to model!

On top of all that, I’ve actually started working on ideas for Christmas. I’d love to make some geeky stockings and I’m currently in the process of working with some fellow bloggers on getting some designs made and reviewed. On the topic of reviews, I was also featured on Fashion Quirks YouTube channel this week. Carley, the girl who vlogs, featured my Golden Snitch necklace, a Cinderella carriage necklace (end of line), an Alice in Wonderland bow and also a Minnie and Mickey pencil case. The video is here if anyone would like a watch!

As well as all that, I have an order for several bows and scrunchies that I’m currently working on, I recently made a Harley Quinn dress for Lily which I hope to put in the store soon and also I have a Snow White rags, Woody, Minnie Mouse and Briar Rose dress to add to the store too. It’s all busy busy busy but I absolutely love it. I only wish I had clones of myself so I could make clothes, watch TV AND blog, all at the same time.

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Week 36 – Monday Round-up

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I am so behind on everything right now that I’ve realised its Wednesday and I still haven’t rounded up last week! To be truthful it was the usual mix of nothing some days and loads the next, but I will try to recap as best I can remember!

Monday we were still in London and I posted about that day here. Since we were actually back by Tuesday, life pretty much returned to normal. The girls went to their dad’s house and Chris was at work so I had a day of sewing, blogging and watching TV (not necessarily in that order!). I made some decisions about the month (that sadly haven’t really happened yet) and tried to take a determined approach to life since it was September 1st!

In the evening I sat down to make loads of hair bows and watch Grimm. It was actually pretty awesome ;)

In the morning I got up and headed out for the girls, about the same time as Chris headed out to work. I picked them up and we headed to Asda Living to pick out some school uniform for Megan and a few last minute bits and pieces they needed. Afterwards we went home and while the girls sat and played on their computers (and Disney Infinity on the Xbox), I made more bows and watched Grimm… right up till bedtime. Other than that there was the odd bit of getting ready for school etc. but that was pretty much it.

On Thursday the girls were back at school and we had the usual mad rush in the morning. After dropping the girls off I came home and started to sew. Nat came around for the day and although we mostly sat and chatted, she helped me cut out pattern pieces etc. until we both needed to pick up the kids from school. After school we all just flaked in front of the TV and computers, recovering from a busy day! Friday was fairly similar, except that I dropped the kids off at school and went on a ribbon hunt in Lincoln. I realised Nat was off so called her to meet up for coffee and we spent the morning chatting and drinking coffee/hot chocolate. I headed home as I needed to go to the post office and get a few bits done. However it wasn’t long before I was back out to get the girls. That evening I spent sewing, getting both a Woody dress done and also working on a Wendy cosplay.

Saturday morning and it was the weekend. The girls had no school and Chris had no work, so it should have been heaven – except I felt awful! I had a headache all day long and this resulted in me crying on and off through frustration. However I managed to get some work done in the end and my headache finally cleared by about 7pm. Sunday was another day of sewing and another day of everyone being off. We spent the day doing our own thing but sat down to a family dinner of fajitas in the evening.

It was a lovely week but as always, highs and lows. This week is fairly crazy so far but I’m beginning to think that’s the new norm!

Closet Geek – Store Opening

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Tomorrow my online store opens and OMG I’m nervous. Sadly I haven’t got half as much done as I’d hoped to, but probably more than I thought I realistically would. My new Closet Geek store can be found at www.ClosetGeek.co.uk and at midday tomorrow, my store will open! In the meantime, please feel free to sign up to the newsletter (I promise no spam) and you will receive a discount code to use on opening day!

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This post today is actually scheduled. As this goes live, I’m heading up to Berwick Upon Tweed, where my best friend Amy lives, in order to have a very last minute photoshoot. Her daughter Liv and my two girls Megan and Lily, will be modeling all the clothes I’ve made, in order to place them on my store. I will also have a whole bunch of hair bows, jewellery and pencil cases.

Eventually I hope to stock adult clothes as well as kids, but for now I’m concentrating on the Disney inspired stuff, with elements of other geeky fandoms. As of tomorrow my site will be live and hopefully I’ll be making up orders. Once the girls go back to school I’ll really get to grips with making new things and adding regularly to my store!

businesscardIf you have any feedback, please don’t hesitate to contact me! I probably won’t be blogging tomorrow as I’ll be busy opening my store and heading home from Amy’s. I’m always contactable via email, on Facebook, or Twitter etc. Thank you for all your support and I hope you love my store!

Week 33 – Monday Round-up

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As always, another busy week here in Casa de Smith-Lecoat. It’s been a good week though, so no complaints!

On Monday the kids headed to their dads and I ended up reading ALL day, despite having loads I should have been doing. I was reading John Green’s Paper Towns and since I was enjoying it do much, I didn’t want to stop. By late afternoon I was finished but since I had a bath that night, it sort of sucked I had nothing to read. Instead I caught up on some short stories relating to the Sanctum, Fractured and Chaos series I had been reading.

Tuesday I picked up the girls and we went into town to get change for a carboot sale and then had lunch in Subway. We did a bit of shopping too but afterwards I came home and tried on my Belle cosplay costume, just to make sure everything fitted. The evening was spent making my apron, so that everything was complete.

On Wednesday the girls and I did a carboot sale at Torksey. It was so warm and nice, though it meant we got really hot. We made almost £50 and had a lot of fun, but afterwards we were exhausted. After coming home we all just collapsed, which was rubbish as Chris had been sent home from work ill and so we were all just done!

Thursday I spent the whole day making bows. I started the morning by watching some YouTube videos and then once I decided I knew what I was doing, I made bows. I also succumbed to a guilty pleasure, putting on Glee to watch while I was crafting. I haven’t seen past Season 4 so I decided it was time to catch up. Though Chris headed to bed fairly early, I worked on bows till gone midnight before heading to bed myself.

On Friday, Amy was due to arrive but because of crappy trains, I headed out to intercept her at Retford. We came back via Clintons, stocked up on Tsum Tsums and then came home. We spent majority of the day sat at the dinning table chatting, my mum came to get the girls and later Amy and I headed out for dinner. We went to NYC Bar and Grill as we’d planned, having four cocktails between us, burgers, fries and coleslaw but still not managing to fit in a dessert! We came home, sat for a while longer and then headed to bed!

The next day was SFCC (Sheffield Film and Comic Con) so we were up early and getting ready. We finally left at around 10.30am, getting to Sheffield for around 11.30am. We had a lot of fun at SFCC, bought loads of Pop Funkos, met up with Kariss and her boyfriend Harry and then even fitted in time to pop to the Disney Store and Starbucks. Finally we headed back and picked up the girls from mum, before coming home and collapsing. While I’d planned to cook steak and chips for dinner, I was too exhausted to bother. Instead we ordered pizza and just did nothing! Amy and I spent the evening chatting again before we all finally headed to bed.

Sunday was spent lazy for the morning, then taking Amy to catch her train at lunch. In the afternoon I worked on some blog stuff and also tried to relax. Chris was finally feeling better so we managed a nice meal from M&S which I’d bought a few days before, and then just spent the rest of the evening doing our own thing.

Another busy week this week and my store opening on Saturday. I hope to update you all next weekend as to my success and of course the rest of my week ;)