Happy Holiday Crafting!

We wish all our customer safe travels and many joyous holiday moments with family and friends!

Craft Land will be open over the holidays - daily 10am-10pm, Fridays 2pm-10pm - though we might run away  a bit early on Christmas Eve and New Year's Eve!

Our classes are not running over the holidays, but we do have some clinics for those of us who just can't stop crafting! Here is the schedule:

Sunday December 23 - General Clinic at 12:30-3:00pm
                                  - Knitting & Crochet Clinic 7:00-9:30pm

Thursday December 27 - General Clinic at 9:30am - 12:00noon

Saturday December 29 - General Clinic 10:00am - 12:30pm
                                  - Kids' Sewing Clinic 1:00 - 2:30pm
                                  - Kids' Crafting Clinic 2:30 - 4:00pm

Sunday December 30 - General Clinic at 12:30-3:00pm

Wednesday January 2 - Knitting & Crochet Clinic 7:00-9:30pm


Thursday January 3 - General Clinic at 9:30am - 12:00noon

Saturday January 5 - General Clinic 10:00am - 12:30pm
                                  - Kids' Sewing Clinic 1:00 - 2:30pm
                                  - Kids' Crafting Clinic 2:30 - 4:00pm

                                 
See our website for the full schedule, and have a look at the Workshops on offer in the New Year.

Happy Holidays and Happy Crafting!

Run a small business with Brother embroidery!

Brother PR1000e and PR650e machines can kick start your business - start a new business or add to an existing one with the easy-to-use, versatile multi-thread machines. And until the end of December, get PE Design Next embroidery software for free - normally 4,700dhs.

PR1000e 10-thread embroidery machine

Stop in to Craft Land any time for a demo! You'll be surprised at how easy it is to use, with the simple fabric loading and intuitive touch screen. Embroider names and monograms easily by setting up your design on the touch screen, or load designs directly from your computer or via USB. Resize, rotate and adjust colors; even align multiple designs using PR1000e's built-in camera.

PR650e 6-thread embroidery machine

Once you've bought the machine, we offer comprehensive free training at our premises or yours (within Dubai - elsewhere can be arranged). We also carry a full range of high-quality embroidery threads and stabilizers to help you give your customers the best results.

So, what will you do with a PR machine? Personalize baby clothes, golf and sports attire, home furnishings...embellish abayas and shaylas...monogram towels...create corporate gifts...create beautiful wedding fashions or decorations...the possibilities are endless!

Introducing our long-arm quilting services!

Our new Gammill machine at work

We are super excited to launch a quilting service for our customers. You know who you are...you love making the tops, but lose steam when it comes to the quilting. You can't move on to the next project, because you feel guilty about all the unfinished tops languishing in your sewing cupboard. Or you're on a deadline: the baby's coming next week and you have to work overtime!
Now you can bring your pieced quilt tops to Craft Land and we will quilt it for you! We are offering an economical edge-to-edge quilting service, as well as sandwiching and basting. We will even bind your quilt if you want.

pretty Just Leaves stitch pattern

Here's a breakdown of the quilting services:
Edge-to-Edge quilting: We will sandwich the layers for you, and quilt it with the design of your choice. We'll tell you how much backing, batting and thread you'll need and help you choose it. If your backing fabric needs to be pieced, we can do that too!
Basting: Bring us the top, the batting and the backing and we will put the layers together for you and baste-stitch it so you can do the quilting yourself. This is great for those of us who don't have the space to sandwich a quilt at home, and don't fancy crawling around on the floor pinning.
Binding (totally optional): We'll tell you how much fabric you need to give us, and we'll do the rest. We cut the strips, piece them together and sew the double-folded binding to the front of your quilt. If you want, we can also machine-stitch or hand-stitch the binding to the back.
All the info on pricing and how to prepare your quilt are available in Craft Land now.

hard at work

SEW PINK

It's time for the 2nd Annual Sew Pink event!

Join Craft Land, Brother Sewing Machines and Brest Friends in supporting breast cancer awareness in Dubai. "24 Hours of Sewing" takes place for 12 hours each day on Friday October 19th and Saturday October 20th at  the first floor Atrium in Town Center.

We had an excellent turnout last year (see: http://mycraftland.blogspot.com/2011/10/24-hours-of-sewing-huge-success.html), and we made over 300 care packs for breast cancer surgery patients. This year we hope to make even more!

2011 - cushions & volunteers

Here's how you can be involved:

Volunteers are needed for to make special cushions and bags for women undergoing breast cancer treatment; the care packs will be distributed via Brest Friends and medical networks in the UAE. We need volunteers who can use a sewing machine, but it's ok if you don't know how...we also need willing hands for cutting, stuffing, finishing etc. Last year's event saw lots of families participating - so sign up your husband and kids to help out and make a day of it! You can volunteer for as little as one hour, but you can also sign up for as many shifts as you'd like. Don't forget, there are several great restaurants in our little Town Center - lots of choices for afternoon tea or a snack.

We also need a few Super Volunteers who would be willing to sign up for 3-hour shifts and help supervise other volunteers. Just mention in your email if you are willing to be a boss!

Supplies and instruction are provided by Craft Land and Brother UAE are donating sewing machines for the event.

To volunteer, email Jennifer Haack at: jennifer@mycraftland.com or stop in to Craft Land and sign up in person. 

Sign up today, and encourage friends and family to join in too... All volunteers will get a goody bag for helping out, not to mention the reward of feeling great for helping someone who's going through a tough time!

Pfaff offers in September

Back to school can be an exciting time of year - for the moms! Celebrate with a new sewing machine for some "mommy" time while the little ones are in classes. We have terrific new prices on older models of Pfaff sewing and embroidery machines, pop in and try one out this month!

Pfaff Hobby 1142

The Pfaf Hobby 1142 is a wonderful, reliable mechanical sewing machine with some funky decorative stitches and fantastic stitch quality. It's priced at 1,270dhs (regular 1,585dhs), and for our special offers, it comes with a sewing kit valued at more than 100dhs.

Pfaff Grand Quilter

Pfaff Grand Quilter is the standard in home quilting. It is strong, fast and simple with a huge throat area for fitting large quilts and a giant extension table too. It does only straight-stitch, but it does it really well! Piece your quilts with the included 1/4" foot, and do all your free-motion quilting with the floating foot. For 4,460dhs (regular 6,680dhs), and with a sewing kit worth more than 150dhs, it's a quilter's dream machine!

Pfaff Creative 2170

For machine embroidery, check out the Pfaff Creative 2170. It has an intuitive touch-screen for easy use, does beautiful machine embroidery, and is also an excellent sewing machine. At more than half off the original price, it's a total steal -- you get a lot of functionality for just 8,370dhs (originally 17,000dhs +), plus we will give you 500dhs worth of accessories: get extra hoops, feet, or embroidery designs for free!

Join the Club!!

Craft Land's club season is upon us. Join us for one or more of our monthly clubs and get a bonus sign-up gift!

Clubs are different from classes and clinics...at club meetings, we'll have refreshments, guest speakers, interesting demos on the latest techniques, show and tell sessions where members can share their own work,  and also a new & fun "Make & Take" activity each month. We have different clubs for different crafts: knitting, quilting, hand embroidery and machine sewing - each has one meeting per month. Meetings take place on Wednesday mornings 10am-12noon in the Town Center Atrium.

And membership has its privileges! When you join one of our clubs, you get a generous sign-up gift, reduced meeting rates, and special discounts in the shop on Club days. You'll also be the first to see new products and techniques before they hit the shelves in Craft Land!

Stop in soon to join one or all of our clubs! Membership is only 50dhs for the club year (September 2012 - June 2013); meetings are 30dhs and include refreshments and activity kits; guests can attend meetings without joining for 50dhs.

sign-up gifts

Here are the dates for each club:
Quilting Club:
19 September
17 October
21 November
23 January
20 February
20 March
17 April
15 May

Sewing Club:
26 September
24 October
28 November
30 January
27 February
27 March
24 April
22 May

Embroidery Club:
3 October
7 November
5 December
6 February
6 March
3 April
1 May
5 June

Knitting Club:
10 October
14 November
12 December
16 January
13 February
13 March
10 April
8 May

Trade For Aid 2012

Ramadan Kareem! 

Drop your unwanted craft items in our collection bins

Join Craft Land in celebrating Ramadan and the spirit of giving. During Ramadan, we are accepting donations of working sewing machines and other unwanted craft items to be donated to RAEY, a community school in Ethiopia: http://raeyfoundation.org/demo/

Trade in a working or new machine and get 10% off

For each sewing machine donated, you will receive 10% off a new machine at Craft Land. It's a great time to upgrade your older machine! You can also donate a new machine and get 10% any of our machines. That means you can pick up a basic machine from us or elsewhere and get up to 2,600dhs off a new machine! It's a great time to buy one of our premium machines and get a substantial discount.

You could get 2,450dhs off a Pfaff Creative Sensation!

Summer Discounts!

Happy Dubai Summer Surprises!

Hurry in for fantastic summer discounts:

30% off all yarn - yes, including the new stuff
30% off all fabric - YES, including pre-cuts like Layer Cakes, Jelly Rolls and fat quarter packs
30% off all hand embroidery ribbons and threads
30% off sewing cabinets (for more info: http://mycraftland.blogspot.com/2012/06/taylor-made-sewing-cabinets-have.html)

These discount prices will run from July 1st to July 30th.

Look for more exciting promotions coming during Ramadan and Eid!

Book a Craft Land Summer Class!

Keep cool this summer with a Craft Land class!

We have lots of great projects to choose from - like this Crazy Patchwork Bag. Learn new skills or take your talents to the next level. There's an exciting class for everyone - knitting, sewing, quilting, embroidery and crochet. Don't miss out - book asap!

Just download the schedule from our classes page for full details:
http://www.mycraftland.com/classes.html

CL x

Sewing Cabinets

The Taylor Made sewing cabinets have arrived! These fab tables let you keep your sewing machine and tools all set up - and you can close the whole thing up and have a tidy cabinet. The machine sits on a special platform that sinks into the cabinet when you're not sewing, and each cabinet has handy drawers/shelves/storage for your tools and threads. No more taking over the dining room table with your sewing projects!
Check out the different size options; the sewing cabinets come in 4 types and there is also a terrific cutting table for laying out pattern pieces, pinning quilts, etc.

 “COMPACT”
AED2,475
Dimensions (WxDxH):
Closed: 60cmx44cmx76cm
    (23.5”x17.5”x30”)
Open: 120cmx44cmx74cm
    (47.5”x17.5”x29”)

“GEMINI”
AED2,975
Dimensions (WxDxH):
Closed: 77cmx46cmx76cm
    (30”x18”x30”)
Open: 154cmx74cmx74cm
    (60”x29”x29”)

“ECLIPSE II”
AED3,595
Dimensions (WxDxH):
Closed: 110cmx50cmx76cm
    (43”x20”x30”)
Open: 178cmx136cmx74cm
    (70”x53”x29”)

“QUILTER'S DREAM”
Mark III - Large
AED4,825
Dimensions (WxDxH):
Closed: 140cmx58cmx76cm
    (50”x20”x30”)
Open: 150cmx128cmx76cm
    (59”x50”x30”)
Drawers: 58cmx47cmx60cm
    (23”x18”x24”)

“QUILTER'S DREAM”
Mark II - Small
AED3,685
Dimensions (WxDxH):
Closed: 127cmx52cmx7cm
    (56”x23”x30”)
Open: 180cmx134cmx76cm
    (71”x53”x30”)
Drawers: 45cmx12cmx60cm
    (18”x12”x24”)

“CUTTING TABLE”
AED2,995
Dimensions (WxDxH):
Closed: 51cmx100cmx87cm
    (20”x39”x34”)
Open: 180cmx100cmx87cm
    (72”x39”x34”)

Make a Wish Come True!

Craft Land and Brother joined together to make the wish of 14-year old Emirati Fatima Qambar come true. Fatima suffers from a rare disease, but doesn't let that get in the way of her dream - to make beautiful embroideries. But she missed something...a machine to make them on!

Soichi Murakami, Managing Director Brother Middle East (left) presents 14-year old Fatima Qambar (centre) with her wish. Anu Das (right) of Make a Wish UAE gives thanks.

Make a Wish UAE contacted us to see if we could help. Brother kindly donated a wondering sewing and embroidery machine and craft land donated threads, stabiliser and lessons to get Fatima on her way to making the embroideries she dreams of.

Fatima - we wish you all the best - and we look forward to seeing your creations!

And the winner is...!

Quilt Art 2012 was a wonderful display of locally crafted quilts. Thank you to everyone who took part. To view all of the quilts that were on display - head to our facebook page:

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Craft-Land/130293853665463?sk=photos#!/media/set/?set=a.451443544883824.114503.130293853665463&type=3

(sorry for the long link, but it gets you to the right place!)
FOR THE WINNERS, READ ON!

Congratulations to Suzet Pont - the winner of the Viewers Choice Award. Suzet's quilt was the overall favourite receiving nearly 20% of the total 1,000+ votes.




Suzet Pont - Winner of the Viewers Choice Award


Suzet's quilt was a technical masterpiece with fabulous crystals on top - a beautiful work of art.

The winner of the Beginners Quilt Award (that's for those who had been quilting for 1 year or less) was Alexandra Lunz - congratulations Alexandra!




Alexandra Lunz with her Happy Easter winning quilt


In the Kids category the judges had a hard time deciding; awarding Lea Smit and giving a special mention to Kara Roy and Hannah Evans - well done girls!

Lea Smit with her Winning Design

Junior Quilters Hannah Evans (left) and Lea Smit (right)

Well done to everyone who took part - the show was fantastic - start work on your entries for next year!! And remember - its Quilt Art - so it can be anything quilted - the wackier the better!!

CL xx

Quilt Art 2012 - Make and Take

Discover the joy of quilting at Quilt Art 2012. You can join the Make and Take and walk away with your very own quilted masterpiece - for just AED20 and under and hour of your time.

Make and Take Sessions:

Monday 21st May 11am – 2pm


Wednesday 23rd May 11am – 2pm

Friday 25th May 12 noon – 5pm

Saturday 26th May 10am – 4pm

Accuquilt Now In Stock!!

Our wonderful Accuquilt cutters are now back in stock. Don't miss out they sell out fast!

And don't miss Quilt Art 2012 - display of locally crafted quilted items - closes Saturday 26th May!

What's in a Name? Enter...Quilt Art 2012!

Same show, new name. Dubai Quilts 2012 is now Quilt Art 2012 - don't miss it!! Starts this Friday!

CL x

Hannah and Kara Finish their Quilt!!

Craft Land's craziest kid sewers, Hannah Evans (11) and Kara Roy (10), yesterday completed their amazing quilt!!

The best-friend team of two worked diligently on the quilt for months - putting the final touches to their masterpiece just in time to enter Dubai Quilts 2012!

Hannah Evans and Kara Roy - exhausted from their quilting endeavours!

The girls will enter their quilt in the under 16s category of Dubai Quilts 2012 and stand a good chance of winning the category's best quilt prize...a cool Brother sewing machine!

Don't miss Dubai Quilts 2012 - runs from Friday 18th to Saturday 26th May at Town Centre Jumeirah!

CL x

Brother Sewing Machine Award!

Craft Land was proud to be presented with the Brother award for Sales and Marketing 2012.

Riana Auret - General Manager Craft Land receives the award from Brother's Managing Director Middle East - Mr Soichi Murakami.

Craft Land is a distributor for domestic Brother sewing machines in Dubai. We stock only the tried and tested models and offer our customers the opportunity to try out different machines before they buy. We also offer free classes for customers who buy a new sewing machine from us, and we offer maintenance and technical support.

CL xx

Husqvarna Expert in Town - One Day Only!!

For all you Husqvarna fans out there (and for those who just fancy trying a Husqvarna) - don't miss our special guest from South Africa - Marcelle Dos Santos!

Join us on Wednesday 2nd May for Make and Take workshops with Marcelle Dos Santos. Marcelle is going to be here to share her knowledge of and passion for the Husqvarna machine - guiding you through new techniques and applications with the use of special feet and accessories.

For more information - or to book your space (hurry, spaces are limited and going fast!) come to the Craft Land store, or call us on Dubai 04 342 2237 for further information. Workshops are AED75 each and there are three to choose from.

CL xx

5 Days Left to Enter Your Quilt!!

To enter your quilt to Dubai Quilts 2012 send a picture of the quilt (finished or unfinished) with dimensions to jennifer@mycraftland.com - please send your entry by May 1st!!

You can also submit quilted garments and other quilted items - like quilted bags and cushions.

PLUS: Everyone who enters the show (whether selected or not) gets a chance to win a trip to Tokyo to visit the Tokyo Quilt Show!!

DON'T MISS OUT!! :-)

Special Event! Husqvarna Make & Take Day

Pillowcase, oven door hanger and needle keeper

 Join us Wednesday, May 2nd for three fun and interesting classes with special guest Marcelle Dos Santos. From 10am - 12 noon, learn heirloom sewing on a beautifully trimmed pillowcase - learn to use a pin-tuck foot and other twin-needle stitches. From 1pm - 3pm, you can free-motion stitch a handy oven-door hanger, and from 4pm - 6pm, make the cute and useful needle keeper, trying some alphabet stitches and a binding foot.

Each class is only 70dhs, and includes all materials. And the best news -- you don't have to bring a sewing machine! We will have a variety of Husqvarna Viking sewing machines all set up and ready to use. If you already have a Husqvarna, you can bring it along if you'd like to try the new feet out on your own machine.

Space is limited and classes are only happening on May 2nd, so don't miss this chance -- Take one class or take them all! Register in Craft Land now.

Marcelle will be visiting us from South Africa

Special Embroidery Clinic

Calling all embroiderers:
By special request; at next Monday’s clinic (23rd Jan) Christine will be showing a couple of embroiderers a different stumpwork technique called needle lace.

She will show them how to set up the work and create a detached lace leaf using perlé cotton.

If you would like to come and learn this wonderfully versatile technique, bring along two pieces of plain cotton or calico to fit into your hoop, perlé cotton and your needles.

As a bonus, Christine will also demonstrate and teach how to make simple and beautiful delicate beadwork embellishments to add to her embroidery from our new collection of Mill Hill beads now available for purchase at Craft Land.

To join this clinic, simply drop in Monday at 9:30am and sign in for the clinic. The cost is 50dhs as always.
 
Looking forward to seeing you on Monday!