I really want to encourage Big Brother to be crafty and get over my fear of mess by planning a couple of messy craft sessions a week. Today we made our own Valentine Day cards with some help from a potato. First I cut a potato in half and cut a heart into one half using a cookie cutter. I put a generous dollop of red paint onto an old plate and let BB have a go at printing heart shapes on a piece of paper which he loved. Then I folded a piece of A4 paper in half and…
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I’ve been feeling sorry for Little Sis as virtually everything she has is second hand from her Big Brother. Last week (before she arrived!) I was sorting through bedding and blankets and found one cream blanket which had hardly been used. So I thought I would give it a bit of a makeover with some dye! I had a packet of Dylon Intense Violet dye which was suitable for hand dyeing (my husband won’t let me use dye in the washing machine yet!). After Edward was in bed I made up the dye and put the cream blanket in the…
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I recently treated myself to a copy of Queen of Crafts, a great book full of recipes and ideas by Jazz Domino Holly. It’s a lovely book to flick through for some inspiration although there aren’t many new ideas in it. However, a recipe for button biscuits caught my eye. I love buttons, have a huge stash to decorate my sewing projects, and thought biscuit buttons would be fun to make. I used my own biscuit recipe, divided the mixture into two and added blue and yellow food colouring to both halves which I picked up at Iced Inspirations, my…
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I’ve mentioned before how much I love Pinterest and find it really inspiring, and pinned quite a few fun Halloween projects. I loved making (and eating) Halloween cake pops and wanted my son to have his own spooky tshirt to wear at our Halloween party. I saw a fab design for shadow puppets in the latest issue of Handmade Living by minieco.co.uk. I thought that my son was too young for shadow puppets but the patterns would translate really well onto a tshirt. So I picked up some cheap tshirts from H&M and copied the scary robot template on to…
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Is it too early for a glimpse of the big red guy? On my latest thrifting trip I spotted a small paper bag hiding on the haberdashery shelf. It was printed with Your Woman and Home FATHER CHRISTMAS. I can’t resist vintage Christmas decorations so took a closer look. It contained a single piece of fabric, pre-printed with a pattern for a Father Christmas decoration. I think it must have been a free gift with the Christmas issue of Your Woman and Home. I haven’t been able to find out any information about the magazine – perhaps it was related…
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We try to recycle as much as we can so always have a full recycling bin. It seems a shame to put it out for the binmen to collect but I’ve never really thought if we could use the material for anything. However with a little bit of inspiration boxes can be turned into cars or dollshouses, played with, and put back in the recycling. How? With the aid of an ingenious little kit from makedo. makedo is a reuseable connector system for creating amazing objects and spaces from recycled materials. We were sent a car kit which contained a…
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Pinterest is my newest love and I’ve been busy pinning lots of gingerbread ideas for those quiet moments I have (after my son goes to bed!). I came across a pattern for a lovely gingerbread house which I thought I would make. I amended the pattern slightly and added a couple of spooky touches for Halloween. For the full pattern take a look at craftideas.info This is my Monthly Make for October
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I know we haven’t had Halloween yet but I’ve been itching to show you our wooden Christmas tree. I’ve seen lots of variations of wooden Christmas trees using driftwood so every time we were at the seaside I would scour the beach for suitable pieces. After months of looking and not finding I gave up and decided small branches from the local woods would do just as well! I also found a piece of scaffolding wood outside our house so knew this project was meant to be. How to make a wooden Christmas tree You will need: a selection of…
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My Christmas decoration making has begun! One of my favourite craft books is Fa la la la Felt which is full of festive inspiration, from ornaments, decorations and stockings. I’ve made a couple of projects from it, including the felt bird garland, as I just love working with felt. We’re not quite sure how to decorate our house this year with a toddler who can’t help but touch everything, but I would like to have a colour scheme. Red and white always seem very Christmassy which is why I liked the look of the Christmas Candy Garland. It’s a simple…