We’ve been struggling a little with the weather lately. We go out early in the day and then come home and play in the shade. Our craft box has received a beating as we’ve been working our way through it to keep as busy as we can. Fortunately the toddler was sent a brilliant kit from Cre8ive Kidz to make and decorate a birdhouse. He loves the garden so this was a great craft activity for him. The kit contained everything we needed, a seven piece birdhouse, 2 comics, plastic sheet, 2 paint brushes, glue, varnish and instructions, so we got to…
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We were sent a copy of Eco-friendly Crafting with Kids by Kate Lilley, who writes the hugely popular Mini-eco blog. I’ve been a fan of her blog for years, using one of her shadow puppet templates to make a Halloween tshirt for the toddler back in 2011. The book is as lovely and colourful as her blog and includes 35 projects designed for preschoolers up to and including the age of 5. The projects are split into themes: homemade materials, music, nature, recycling bin, paper and card, sewing and threading, science and a bonus section of boredom busters at 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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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…
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I’ve been dying to try my hand at felt biscuits ever since I saw them on the cover of Mollie Makes, which were designed by Ouissi Gresty. The patterns were quite simple so I bought a copy of her book ‘Felt biscuits’ but I found it a bit disappointing. It’s a small book and only covers patterns for five biscuits (pink wafer, bourbon, shortcake, custard creams and a jam sandwich) but does include a pattern for a biscuit tray and tin. Personally I would have liked more biscuit patterns (garibaldi, rich tea, chocolate digestive, etc) or the patterns which featured…
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I’ve been busy participating in lots of fun swaps lately and received the most amazing swap parcel as part of the International Craft Swap from Gina. I asked her to make Edward a personalised muslin as he loves a small muslin square to hold whilst he goes to sleep. She completely surpassed what I expected and made him a beautiful quilt which features a giraffe (his favourite animal) and his name. As soon as he saw it he realised it was for him and he’s been snuggling under it on the sofa and wrapping it around himself – very cute.…
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Edward’s bedtime routine is pj’s, bottle and climbing the stairs to his bedroom. In his bedroom he has a cuddle with both of us and we give him his dummy and a little noo noo (made from an old muslin) to take to bed. I’m not sure how it started but we’ve done this for months and it’s very cute to see. For a long time Edward has put the muslin under his chin and cuddled up with it in his cot and lately I’ve been thinking he’s ready for a pillow to lie on. I picked up a lovely…
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I signed up to the Summer 2011 Handmade Gift Exchange and exchanged a couple of emails with my partner who seems to have similar interests to me. I’ve been meaning to make something from Scandinavian Stitches for a while, the book is full of amazing projects, and I put my own spin on the birds mini art quilt. I got to use my favourite bondaweb for the bird applique (which I finally feel I’ve mastered) although missed out the quilting as I didn’t want to ruin the quilt top! I also got to try some freehand machine stitching on my…
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My latest favourite craft is cross stitch. I’ve been working my way through my copy of Cath Kidston Stitch which is full of projects which can be made using needlepoint or cross stitch. This pattern turned our bigger than it was supposed to but I’m enjoying the challenge of trying something new. It’s a great excuse to visit more craft shops too! Linking up with Handmade Thursday