Butterfly Wings

Woodland Scene - Spring/ Summer Makeover!

 Belle is obsessed with spotting blossom trees at the moment ( we have a pink one in our garden) and after a visit to Tyninghame House Garden open day on Sunday, we were inspired to give our woodland scene a seasonal makeover, to add a bit of life and colour to it.
The only things we needed were various colours of tissue paper, some green pipe cleaners, plasticine and PVA glue. It was quick, easy and simple for Isabel to carry out each stage ( even making the bluebells and daffodils by carefully gluing tissue paper 'flowers' to the pipe cleaner 'stalks'). The flowers were then stuck down and held upright with plasticine blobs. The 'blossom' was made by scrunching small pieces of tissue paper and then gluing them on to the twigs.

Woodland Scene

 This idea was inspired by the toadstools, which I found in the Hobbycraft sale for 99p. Belle spotted them and took to them instantly and we decided to make a woodland scene together. So, a couple of days later, we went for a walk in the woods to collect cones, twigs and leaves for our scene.

The 3D box shape was made from card, I measured it out and folded it to the size I wanted it. Belle helped choose the background colours, from a range of coloured and patterned papers that I already have at home. We then added the 'trees', using brown play dough ( just mix green and pink to make brown) to hold the twigs in place. The rest was glued down with PVA, including the toadstools, which I had cut the wires off beforehand.

I was really pleased with Belle's composition, she chose where she wanted everything to go and only needed a little help with the sticking down. This is a really easy thing to try at home, and you can do it with whatever you find in your garden, in the woods or even try a beach themed one instead. I do think that the toadstools really finish it off though, so try to find a 'feature' for your one.

Birth Announcement

I made this birth announcement for my brother's Christmas, to commemorate his daughter's birth in November.

I was inspired by these birth announcements on Etsy. Which were done using a printing method and the art of typography. I found printing from my computer quite limiting, so decided to combine typography with collage to give it a more individual look.

I got the variety of patterned papers ( and some of the fancy lettering) in a scrapbooking kit, which I bought from Paperlace in Dalkeith and used Word to type then print the names. I spent a long time trying out different fonts, colours and sizes and arranging them on the page to get the best layout. All of the paper was hand cut using a craft knife, a metal ruler and a cutting board.

I wanted a little motif of some sort, one which would match Rachel's bedroom decor, so I found out the name of the website which Derek and Nicola bought their wall stickers from and sourced miniature pictures of two of the images in the set, a rainbow and a tree with a little bird sitting on the top.

One of the trickiest things about making this was subtly trying to find out Rachel's exact time of arrival so long after her birth, without Derek or Nicola realising something was afoot!

Lavender Bags

I made these lavender bags for my sister Louise's Christmas, using material bought from John Lewis and crocheted flowers which I found in Ikea's fabulous fabrics and sewing department. The ribbons and buttons came from my sewing box ( I always save the ribbons I cut off the inside of dresses).
Louise loves all things bright and prefers blues and greens, but I  also added in pinks to make it a bit different and to tie in the material from John Lewis that I loved. 
To make one, I cut out two CD sized circles from  the material and sewed a ribbon loop on to one circle with a button to disguise my amateurish sewing. I pinned both circles together inside out, with the crocheted flower in between the two layers. I then sewed the three parts together, leaving a small gap to turn the bag right side out again. Before sewing the bag up, I stuffed it with cotton wool pads and dried lavender ( not from my garden, sadly there just wasn't enough at this time of year- I'll have to plan ahead next time) and then stitched up the hole. Finally, I decorated the outer of one the bags with three matching buttons.

Rachel's Stocking

This year I made a stocking for my niece's first Christmas. It was made in the same style as Isabel's one was, but having learned from making that one I've made some improvements. I made sure this one was a bit bigger and also I didn't use any fabric glue this time as I found it made messy marks and made the fabric go a bit hard in places. Also,this time the backing was made from a lovely, shiny teal quilted material that Louise gave me ( it was her old quilt) and this made a better base to sew on to than felt, which I used last time.

I'm extremely chuffed with this stocking, and I think Rachel and her parents are too!

Gift Tags

We've been making our own gift tags this year. Belle helped by stamping ( her choice of)  three different Christmas sponges in metallic paint on to white paper, which I then cut out and mounted on to coloured card. I then used a shape cutter to cut out stars/ snowflakes which were threaded on to the gift tag ribbon.

I really liked coming up with different colour and pattern combinations for the tags and I'm really pleased with the outcome. I would've liked to have come up with a quicker method for cutting out the two circles needed for each of the 20 tags I  made though as it took several evenings to make them all!