D.I.Y. time at Grandmother's Joy!

Our monthly Design it Yourself custom clothing event is coming up at Grandmother's Joy! Join us Thursday, January 7th between 10am and 6pm to design your own outfit for your child!

For girls, I'm featuring an outfit that you may have seen before, but it's a good one! Available in sizes 2T - 7, this adorable dress is a great transitional outfit for our changing weather! It can be worn now with long sleeves, leggings and boots and will still be precious in the spring and summer worn alone with sandals!

Some of the fabrics shown will not be available as a design option, but there are MANY more to choose from in all colors!




For boys, we will have a cuffed pant and Valentine's themed appliqued tee. SOOOooooo cute! I don't have the sample made yet, but here are two of the applique choices that I'm totally in love with:

PUPPY LOVE!


CHICK MAGNET!

How can you not love those little appliques on a sweet little man! I'm thinking maybe some red corduroy pants or red gingham? Adorable!

The boys' pants set will be available in sizes 6months - 6 years for $48.

If you are interested in ordering either of these sets, you may call or email: anna@joychildrensboutique.com or 205-870-4027. If you are here in the Birmingham area, come by Grandmother's Joy on Thursday, January 7th between 10am and 6pm to design your own outfit!

The end of an era....and the beginning of a new one!

If you are a fan on Facebook, then you may have been aware that there was a big announcement on the way! Drum roll please.....

It's true there have been lots of changes going on around here. The new store being one of them. When I purchased the store, I never had any intentions of stopping designing for Sweet Dreams Designs. However, I did know that there may come a time when I had to either put trunk shows on hold or stop doing them altogether. Well, it appears that time is upon us! When Fall 2010 Trunk Shows would typically start in July, Jason and I will be patiently (or not so patiently!) awaiting the arrival of our first child!

Yep, you read that right! As of Christmas Eve I was 9 weeks pregnant and so excited! I heard the heartbeat at 6 1/2 weeks and we will get to hear it (and see the baby) again at 10 weeks. SO, I hope you all understand why I will need to take a break during the Fall 2010 season! I also hope you understand why I have been encouraging anyone who has ever been interested in hosting a show to do so for our Spring 2010 season. (There are still a few dates left!)

I will continue to design and sew for Sweet Dreams Designs, however, producing an entire line and traveling for trunk shows will be a big challenge until things settle down around here after the baby comes! You will still be able to order online and pick up things in person at Grandmother's Joy ! I will keep you all posted on if/when trunk shows will pick back up. Most likely, the next full line will come out hopefully in Spring 2011....who knows - that may be wishful thinking! However, spring is my favorite time for clothes, so I'll keep my fingers crossed! In the meantime (between seasons) I will continue to list things on the website - some new things probably and also some past designs that I still have in stock.

SOooo....there you have it! I hope I didn't build up that big announcement too much! If you are interested in hosting a show this season just shoot me an email and we'll set it up! I have one Saturday date left (Feb. 6) but there are many weekday show dates left and sometimes those are the best ones!

As the title suggests - this is the end of an era in a sense, but we are very excited to be starting a new one! I'm more thrilled than you can even imagine to design and sew for my very own child after sewing for so many other precious children over the past 3 1/2 years!

Grandmother's Joy - Accepting Spring Preorders!

I'm so excited to already have so many of the awesome spring clothes on the site! It is a lot of work and very time consuming so I decided to get a head start! After I got back from Market in October, I went ahead and started posting our orders from that trip on the site. (the ones I had pictures for at least!) I have decided to try something new and begin accepting preorders with a 60% downpayment. Read below for all of the details and be sure to take a sneak peek at the Spring 2010 Line-up at Grandmother's Joy!

Spring 2010 Preorders

After reading below, scroll to the bottom of this page and click the appropriate link (girls, boys or swimwear) to shop the preorder items!

Preorders are purchases for merchandise that will arrive the following season. By placing a preorder, you are guaranteed to receive the product--as long as the manufacturer is able to fulfill our production request.


When you purchase a Preorder item, you pay 60% of the list price as a deposit. The remaining 40% is charged after January 1st, once we've confirmed with the manufacturer that the order will be fulfilled.


If you cancel your Preorder, you will receive a deposit refund--minus a 10% restocking fee.


If a manufacturer fails to ship an order to us, you will be refunded the full deposit.


Whenever possible, we will accommodate requests for size changes.


Season Specific Information for Spring 2010:

Items will ship between 2/15 and 3/30. This year, Easter is on April 4th - Easter outfits may not arrive at your residence before 3/20, so please plan photos/events accordingly.
Items not shipped by 4/30 will be canceled and your card immediately refunded.
Enter coupon code PREORDER in the discount voucher box during checkout to pay the correct deposit amount. If you fail to enter the coupon, the entire amount will be charged; no refunds (40%) will be processed if this happens.

By entering the code PREORDER, you are affirming that you've read and agreed to the terms on this page.

20% off Spring 2010 Preorders! Monday only!

Wow - 2009 has been another crazy busy year for me and for Sweet Dreams Designs! With the addition of a brick and mortar store, continuing with the designing of the Spring 2010 line, taking our Boy's Line to the Atlanta Apparel Mart, and many more exciting things, each year just seems busier than the last!

All of these things have also kept me from sending a Sweet Dreams Designs newsletter in a while! So, in celebration of Cyber Monday, I invite you to take a look at our Boys and Girls Spring 2010 line! Place your preorder before midnight tonight and receive 20% off! Enter code CDN091130095215 at checkout.

Are you interested in hosting a show this season? Please contact me as soon as possible to be added to the calendar. Dates are limited this season and there are LOTS of you who have already mentioned being interested in hosting a show! Let's schedule it now!

I hope you all had a fabulous Thanksgiving and are looking forward to a beautiful holiday season! Thanks, as always, for your continued support!

Warmly,

Anna Garner

Our first "DIY" at Grandmother's Joy

I'm getting really excited about our first Design It Yourself event at the store! On Thursday from 4pm - 7pm we'll be serving wine and some yummy snacks as well as having a little "mini trunk show"! (Plus 20% off all other purchases!)

For girls I am featuring this cute little bell sleeve tunic with optional leggings. The size range is huge! It is available from 6 months to 12 years! Here are Chloe and Halle modeling the sample for me again!


UPDATE...Well, this never got published before the event, so here is the followup!

We had a great turnout for the Open House! Of course there was too much food, as there always is, but I've been doing my best to polish it off today!

Here is a picture of Lela, the daughter of my store manager, sitting with our DIY display - ready to place her order!

I love our little hot pink and lime green tree! My mother in law, Jeanette, made my bows and streamers. I'm hoping she'll make some for my tree at home when I get it up too!

A closeup of our DIY samples. I LOVE the way the little puppy tee turned out! If you like it too, the sample is for sale in the store in a size 4T for $48.00.

And lastly, here's a picture of me (completely wiped out!) and my cousin Krysta who has been helping out at the store lately. We had a good time and I'm really looking forward to the next one in January!

Talented friends

I'm so thankful that I have so many talented friends!

So, I totally stole this photo off of Facebook so that I could share it here....I haven't picked up my disk of images yet and I just couldn't wait another minute to share this awesome picture taken by a high school friend, Misty Haggard. Her daughter Chloe, on right, is so cute and probably sharing some fabulous secret with Halle, the daughter of another high school friend! I can only imagine what these two are giggling about, but it made for a fabulous picture! Not to mention, they both totally rock these two new outfits from Sweet Dreams Designs Spring 2010 collection!

On the left, Emma top with Bella capris and on the right is the shirred top and ruffled shorts shown in the Flights of Fancy fabric collection. The shirred top and the ruffled shorts don't have a cute name yet, any suggestions?

Southern Lady

Do you love this as much as I do?

This is our ad for the Jan/Feb 2010 issue of Southern Lady magazine! To be perfectly honest, I had really never read the magazine until I was approached about purchasing an ad. But, it didn't take long for me to decide to subscribe. It is a magazine that I actually READ cover to cover. I think it helps that it is Birmingham based so the articles aren't too out of reach and neither are a lot of the advertisers. That part is pretty cool. It has some YUMMY sounding recipes, and darn it, it's just pretty!

So, after I fell in love with the magazine I decided to purchase a 1/4 page ad for three issues next year. This is our first ad! Rob Ingram did our photo shoot for it in his amazing studio. Let me just tell you, it's not easy to get three kids of varying ages, no matter how well behaved, to look at the camera and smile all at the same time! Though we were able to capture some of those moments, that's not what I was looking for for this ad and Rob knew this. I wanted different. Modern, but vintage. Rustic, but crisp and clean. I know that may not make sense to some, but he made it happen and I'm completely in love with the results. I can't wait to share some of the others from the shoot that I'll be using for my Birmingham Kids' Directory ads as well as hanging in the shop.