Another Day, Another Wreath

Or, I Must Stop Looking On Pinterest. Maybe I should write that out a hundred times, but then I'd probably look on Pinterest for an idea for something to do with a sheet of handwriting...

Anyway I saw all these lovely wool and felt wreaths on there so obviously I had to have a go. 
This one was easy. Doesn't even merit a tutorial, just a few instructions.
Get a polystyrene wreath base and wrap it in wool (allow yourself plenty of time it takes about a zillion times longer than you think) securing the ends with a dab of glue. 
Add some spiral felt roses and leaves, a few diamante florist's pins and ta-da! 
This one is for indoors, I don't think it would stand up too well to our Cornish weather.
I've made some bits of jewellery too, but they are for gifts so I can't post pictures on here yet

Wreathed in smiles!

I'm smiling because I got the most wonderful surprise in the post last week. Barb sent me this gorgeous stained glass penguin that her husband had made. I believe I may have mentioned once or twice that I love penguins.
The label says that his name is Percy and that he will hang in my window and watch out for Killer Whales. I don't suppose he is likely to spot any, but he's probably quite glad about that.
Thank you Barb, I adore him!
I have sent out two stitched ornaments this week, and received a very beautiful one myself, but as these are exchanges I can't show any pictures yet. Watch this space.
I can show these though. You can blame Pinterest for inspiring my recent flurry of creativity.

I am loving my new bracelet, made from a vintage tape measure I bought from Rag Rescue.  I dangled a little key from the toggle for a steampunk/chatelaine sort of look. It is incredibly hard to use your left hand to take a picture of your right hand! My fingers really aren't freakishly short and stubby, its a perspective thing. Honest.

And here is a Christmas Wreath (Aha! Now you see the clever pun in the post title) made from three packs of cheap baubles from Asda  (and a handful of teeny silver ones from the local florists), a wire coat hanger, and a lot of hot glue.
Not convinced I should have included the two larger glittery silver ones one either side. I think my snowman maybe singing falsetto this year...

A catch up post

I've been very busy crafting lately and I've got lots of makes to show today. First up is my finish for the monthly Challenge at Needlecraft Haven. We chose this design from The Primitive Hare. The album is here
Of course I made a few changes because, well when do I not? Finished as a large hanging ornament. I know it is probably meant to be for Hallowe'en but it has just kind of stayed up...

Next, the girls decided they wanted me to decorate some plimsolls for them. These are just done with Sharpie markers on plain white shoes. If anyone has any idea how to stop the slight bleeding you get when you do this I'd be very grateful.

Eloise had comic book heroes on one foot and villains on the other.
Naomi decided she wanted hers inspired by the Manga story and movie "Deathnote"

After that I bought some mini aluminium buckets and modpodged vintage labels from The Graphics Fairy onto them. 

I put button bouquets into the smaller ones, I'll use the larger ones for packaging Christmas Presents.

Everything was going swimmingly and then I discovered Pinterest. Oh dear. You could drown in the number of amazing craft ideas you can find on there. I was very taken with this idea from Flamingo Toes for upcycling old jumpers to make stylish and cosy headwraps. You know me, I'm a see it, have to do it right away sort of girl, so I dashed straight down to the charity shop and bought a couple of old jumpers, and here are the results (also a scratch on my face where the machine needle snapped whilst trying to go through three layers of jumper and flew up and hit me, but I don't have a picture of that!)

Right, back off to Pinterest to decide what I'm making next...




Linking this post to Brag Monday at the Graphics Fairy

My kids are NOT weird

I keep telling myself that. 
I came home a couple of days ago to find this giant game of Space Invaders all over my patio doors. 
How totally awesome is that? 
We won't mention the large lego model of a skull that appeared on the mantelpiece, or the bottle garden graveyard in the kitchen. No, we'll just pretend that is the perfectly rational behaviour of perfectly well adjusted teenagers...

I've been doing a bit of making myself. Some teeny tiny button bouquets (the buckets are thimbles). These now have chains added to make them into pendants.

The cuttlebug attacked last year's Christmas cards, and now I have some new ones for this year

And here we see Eloise in her new spats that she asked me to knit for her. I wouldn't have worn them over boots myself, seems to defeat the object. 
No, not weird at all!

Winner!

I numbered your comments and popped over to Random.org and the random number generator picked Julie.
Congratulations Julie! Keep an eye out for the postie :)

Apples and Pears and a Giveaway

So, the latest issue of Mollie Makes plopped through the letter box last week, and on the front cover were these wonderful cuddly toy fabric apples and pears, well I just had to make some of those so I had a rummage through my fabric scrap bag.
Result: Lots of greens - bright greens, muted greens, soft greens, vintage greens, more green fabric, in fact, than you could shake a stick at. Not so much with the reds. All my red scraps were Christmas fabrics. Now I'm definitely planning some lovely Christmas apples, but I needed Autumn apples right now!

Fast forward to Thursday. I'm passing my local knitting and fabric shop on the way home from work, and spot my friend inside, so I pop in for a natter, thinking I can pick up a fat quarter of a nice red print while I'm there.
Oh no, not so simple, instead I find myself buying an entire Jelly Roll. Honestly, I have no idea how these things happen...

Well, now that I've got my lovely Jelly Roll it'd be a pity to waste it right? Yes, that's what I thought, so this is what I've spent the last couple of days making.

Now, I'm not one of life's natural quilters, so I'm not showing you the reverse side, but I'm pretty chuffed with it.
Oh, and I've hit the hundred followers mark, so I'm thinking "Giveaway".
I'll make a cuddly pear (more green fabric than red, remember) for the winner, and perhaps include some other bits and pieces too.
No fancy hoops to jump through to enter, just join as a follower (or already be one) and comment on this post. I'll draw a winner next Sunday.

Definitely a bit on the autumn side

Last week it was summer, this week its not, almost like someone got up on Monday morning and remembered to turn the autumn switch on.

See, autumn :-

I've been busy doing autumnal things like pickling beetroot and making sloe gin and blackberry jam. One of the jars of sloe gin has had a slight leakage issue in the garage. Smells like a brewery in there!

Craftwise I've been doing a bit of knitting, here is a little jumper I knitted for a friends baby grandson, and making felt Christmassy things inspired by the book in my previous post. Pictures of those to follow.
Up to 98 followers now, I feel a bit of a giveaway coming on when I reach 100...