Craft Club - Book page art!

After I had such fun making a house warming card (here) last week it seemed a great project for Craft Club!
I loved everyone's creativity and the different approach everyone took. We found a bit of 'pinspiration' in  some designs and others took their cues from the book pages themselves such as Tara's cute dummy drawing in the parenting manual.
We also used various art materials - mainly water colours of which Jacquie educated us all on the official colour names, as well as pencils and paint markers. The outlines were done with either a fine tipped or standard sharpie.
It was also a great fun night a lovely excuse to drink wine and craft with friends!

Here are some picture and results!

Junk Art !

This is a project that has been on the go for a good few months now!
I wanted to get rid of a lot of the boys toys that weren't being loved anymore or were broken but thought they would bring some happy memories in years to come so I decided a giant rainbow art piece was the way to go!
I started by pencilling out a rainbow onto a canvas which Joplin then painted.

I then began to glue-gun the toys I had collected on to the canvas in their different colour spaces. 

 It is gradually being built up. The only big hitch though is that when it is left between gluing sessions the boys 'discover' their old toys again and want to re-love them!! See those white patches? They were once filled with toys!!

And here is the finished product!! Still a work in progress really and I am still trying to persuade Eden that he really doesn't need the purple broken toy dinosaur he hasn't played with in months! It was great fun too make although a larger project than I originally thought!

Driftwood embroidery

A lovely project for today combining drills and embroidery needle - great fun!

I found a small piece of driftwood which I then marked out the word 'home'.

I then drilled holes along the wording. I initially used my Dremel, but it struggled a little. I then tried my Grandad's old hand drill which worked perfectly! The oldies are the goodies!

When all the holes were drilled I then threaded wool onto a needle and backstitched along the wording. 

I love the end result! Simple but effective! I have popped it on the printers tray with the stones I 'sharpied' in Spain, and  the wood weaving from our recent camping trip. I think it fit's very well!

Book page drawing / greeting card art

My lovely friend has just moved into a new house and I popped round for the grand tour this evening.
I wanted to give her a welcome card / gift and came up with this artwork based around a torn book page. I have seen similar around and love the mixed media approach. My drawing ability is very limited but the paint markers providing the smash of colour around the basic line drawing on an old book page was simple yet effective!

Sweetie Wreath take 2! (Secret weapon loom bands!)

I have been making sweetie wreaths such as this pervious post here each Christmas for the last few years since a visit to Dan's sister in New Zealand who always makes one for Christmas!
I was approached a couple of weeks ago by a good friend who works for a firm wanting to put on a charity fundraiser / team-building craft workshop. As the company distributes sweets it seemed the perfect craft to take advantage of the raw materials available! As I will be teaching to a team rather than individuals however, some tweaks needed to be made to simplify it.

The first step is with a wire coat hanger. This needs to be stretched to form a circle shape.

This is followed by winding a long strip(s) of fleece around the hanger. 

Now comes the new secret weapon .... Loom Bands! After the 24 hour initial enthusiasm from my son we now have hundreds around the house and they seemed the perfect solution. 

Laminated cotton Tablecloth

I have been meaning to make a covering for the kitchen table for a while now as Dan gets a bit tetchy every time the boys use pens, play-dough of glue!

I found this green spotty cotton laminate in the sale from a lovely lady at Stratford market and it has done the job nicely! I basically just sewed and clipped at every corner and it stays on really well. The calming colour goes well with the kitchen too but brings out the green in the owl cushions.

Cupboard door blackboard

After my spice rack on the inside one of my cupboard doors I have been thinking I really should utilise the other cupboard door. I had some chalkboard cloth left over from the chalkboard / placemats, and as I'm always forgetting what I need to buy by the time it comes to setting off for Tescos, a blackboard seemed the obvious solution.
I had some left over fabric from the seatcovers (gosh - a lot of links in this post already - sorry about that!) so it all tied in nicely for a pocket at the bottom to store the chalk and a fleece cloth to wipe the board.

So here it is!   I was slightly concerned that I may have to write it all out again when I went shopping but I just took a picture on my phone of the list and referred to the picture whilst shopping! I'm really enjoying it - there's something about writing in chalk that makes you feel special! Maybe it's because it was such a treat to get to write on the board at school!!

Sewing Day - Seat covers and a monster!

I have been meaning to cover or seat pads for a while and after buying some lovely Melody Miller fabric I realised it would be a disaster for my messy eating boys and rethought! I found this lovely Robert Kaufman Owls laminated cotton on Etsy and thought it would be perfect to wipe up spills and dinner!

I pinned around the cushions inside out and then sewed them up with velcro at the back and velcro to hold them to the chairs. I made them so that 2 cushions could go inside for the boys to give them booster seats and then had enough to make an adult version too. I now need more fabric to do the rest!

 back view ....

 side view.....

Sewing must have been in the air in our house today as Joplin discovered a monster kit he was given last Christmas in the cupboard. He has never wanted to listen to my instructions before so we saved it until he was a bit older but he seemed really keen today. I held it whilst he sewed around the edge. I just let him get on with it which is why there is a mix of running stich, blanket-ish stich and a few weird and wonderfuls, but it all adds to the monster effect and he was so proud he had done it all himself! The features were stickyback felt and Joplin chose them all too (the hat is actually a beak but I think it works rather well!). Eden loved the monster too and chased us around making aaarrrgh noises! 

Spice Rack

I am so excited about my new spice rack! We have loads of herbs and spices that used to really clutter up the cupboard and I often found I would buy 2 or 3 of the same spice merely because I couldn't find it on the shelf!
So with the new kitchen came an idea and solution!
Dan cut me a sheet of metal and glued it to the inside of the cupboard door. I bought a wholesale lot of 50 tins and cut circles from magnetic sheet ( I bought this from Ebay with a self adhesive backing. I would imagine you could probably get the circles cut for you if you wanted a better circle shape but I figured as it was hidden I wasn't too fussed.) A fun hour spent with my new Dymo labelling machine later and I filled the tins and popped them on the door! They hold there really well. I was afraid they may fall with an energetic shake of the door but the magnetic force holds them well.

I am so pleased with it - not only is it easy to navigate and takes up no shelf  space, it is also hidden from view.

Cake Stand Making!

I've always wanted a cake stand and with the boys' Christening coming up it was a perfect excuse!

I had a couple of mis-matched plates but both white and floral with a gold wavy edge. 

I first drew around the plate on a piece of paper, cut it out and then folded to find the middle. 

I laid it over the plate and marked the plate in the middle. 

To drill porcelain is tricky and you really need a diamond drill bit. I picked mine up from ebay for a couple of pounds. 

I put masking tape over the middle dot on the plate to give the drill some initial grip. I then drilled at an angle until the whole began to form when I could then move the drill more upright. 

It took a few minutes of drilling before the drill finally made the full hole. It will get very hot so rinse it under the tap before you touch it!

 I bought cake stand fittings on ebay for a bargain £1.29 and they were so easy to fit. The foam washers protected the plate and the stand can easily be taken apart when not in use.

Although it screwed nicely into the base, the raised screw did leave the plate with a slight wobble and I was worried it may scratch the table, so I cut a circle and ring of self adhesive foam to pop over the screw on the base. This stabilised it really well and also left a great surface. 

I was so pleased with how it turned out I thought I'd give it another go with records from a charity shop. This was super easy as the holes were already there and so effective! 

As I wanted the bottom plate slightly raised from the table I added a base of a spare bit of junk left over from a juicer Dan dismantled! I drilled a central hole and then screwed it to the base with the stand fixings

The great thing again about this stand is how well it dismantled to be put away. 

Here's the plates in action!