I completely failed to make as many handmade gifts as I wanted too this year. As I got nearer and nearer to Christmas I persuaded myself to move items from my little handmade list into next year! Which means instead of rushing to make things I will be able to spend more time making handmade gifts in the New Year. There’s not much to report in my Monthly Makes. I made one wall hanging for my sister which I can finally share with you. I used a pattern from Home Quilt Home by Janet Clare, which is one of my…
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I have a brilliant craft to share with you today, cookie cutter gift tags which is a great way to recycle Christmas cards. For some reason I packed away last years’ Christmas cards, fully intending to recycle them into gift tags. Today I finally found the time to make them. Equipment needed to make cookie cutter Christmas gift tags: Christmas cards Festive cookie cutters Pencil Scissors Hole punch Ribbon How to make cookie cutter Christmas gift tags: Pick a part of each card that you want to keep and position your chosen cookie cutter over it. Draw around your cookie…
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Today seems to be a great time to tell you about our felt gingerbread house. This is one of those projects that has been waiting to be finished for a while. I’m terrible at starting something and not finishing it! Felt Christmas Cookies and Gingerbread House I made it as much for myself as the children and we’ve all had fun getting it out and looking at it. Here’s our Felt Christmas Cookies and Gingerbread House I purchased the pattern from Jeanette Lim at umecrafts a while ago, she’s also the author of Big Little Felt Universe which is one…
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We survived Big Brother’s first term at Reception. This week we’ve had parties, lunches and just so much that I’m grateful for a 2 week holiday from all the running around. Let’s ignore the fact it’s Christmas and we have a household full of guests, at least I don’t have to go outside! Over the weekend I made a wreath for the Winter solstice. I like it’s simplicity compared to our Christmas decorations, just a ring of intertwined branches and a string of lights. I placed it in the dining room and put one of my new house-shaped tea light…
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As we’re hosting a family Christmas I really wanted to add as many handmade touches as I could. This year I’ve made some super sweet clay tags to hang on everyone’s cracker. When they’ve finished with the cracker they can remove and keep their tag and hang it on the tree. Equipment needed to make easy personalised clay tags: Sculpey oven-bake clay Small cookie cutters Acrylic paint and brush Small letter stamps How to make easy personalised clay tags: Roll out your Sculpey clay until it is 2-3mm thick. I rolled it between two sheets of greaseproof paper so it…
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A couple of weeks ago I was asked to take part in a collaborative quilt with some other crafty bloggers. The idea was that we each made a quilt block which would get sent to the next blogger via InPost. They would then attach their block to the quilt and send it on to the next person. I made a couple of blocks as I couldn’t decide what to make. This morning I received a text message to say our #CraftTheParcel was waiting to be collected at the locker I designated. I scanned the QR code I had been sent…
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This evening I’ve been playing around trying to pretty up some Christmas presents. I love wrapping my presents with simple brown paper but they are not always well received. I remember last year my father in law looking a little puzzled when I handed over our presents, he asked if we had run out of wrapping paper! This year I made sure to wrap his presents in the brightest Christmas paper I could find. I wanted to re-visit my idea of simple brown paper for some gifts but I thought I would embellish them to show I’d put some effort…
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I love crafting with styrofoam baubles. We’ve made a styrofoam snowman, styrfoam pumpkin, and even a styrofoam spider. I have lots of them so am always trying to think of different uses for them. Today I’m sharing my tutorial for stash buster Liberty scrap baubles. This is the perfect activity if you have any left over fabric scraps, but I think Liberty fabrics are exceptionally pretty. Equipment needed to make Liberty scrap baubles: scraps of Liberty fabrics PVA glue water bowl and brush styrofoam balls How to make Liberty scrap baubles: Cut the scraps into small pieces about 1cm square.…
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I was hoping to make some seasonal doll quilts for my quilt gallery wall but I’ve only managed to make one. However it’s one I’m really pleased with. A few weeks ago I finished the final seasonal stitching club from Mollie Johanson – the Winter Stitching Club. As usual each week a new embroidery pattern was introduced. They were all fun seasonal patterns like this sweet thermos flask. I enjoyed stitching them so they came together really quickly. Each hexagon became a puffy hexie. I used fabric from Moda’s “In From the Cold” which is so pretty. There was plenty…
