Fimo class fun

Last weekend I spent a fun day teaching Fimo workshops at a local craft shop called Spinning Weal. It's such a lovely shop with a wealth of fabric , wool, felting, spinning and or course Fimo. It's also a great place to go for advice and help and has a fantastic "have-a-go" atmosphere.

I had 9 pupils across two workshops and we spent the day making millefiori canes from Fimo, particularly looking at kaleidoscope techniques, and how to make beads and buttons. This came in handy when one lady cut into her rose cane to reveal the finished design and was immediately convinced it looked like intestines instead of a rose! I showed her how to cut up the cane a transform it into a repeating pattern, which she was more pleased with (phew!)

I have classes coming up in April and June if you'd like to come and play. The information is all here.

January craft-along challenge

There is a new monthly challenge over on UKScrappers titled "& Now For Something Completely Different". Shimelle is running the challenge and on the 10th of each month she will post a supply list and then on the 20th she will post a page tutorial. You can see her fab tutorial here.

I am so happy with this page. I have been struggling to scrap these firework photos for over a year. I've combined the photos with a piece of patterned paper which I loved (Anthem from Sassafras Lass) but had no idea how to use effectively. So from two scrapbooking items I was stumbling over, this page has been produced - Thank you Shimelle!

I don't always have a lot to say on my pages but there was lots to write about these photos. It was my daughter's first trip to the fireworks and she had been learning about Bonfire Night at school. She happily came home to tell us all she had learnt about "Guide Fox" and the new poem too..."Remember, remember the 3rd of October"!

Christmas gallery

I have completed my Christmas scrapbooking marathon. My desk has returned to a tidy (ish) state and the festive sparkles have been filed away for another year. Here's a little gallery of my last few pages. The page above is a scraplift from Louise Nelson's fantastic article about using twine in issue 2 of Scrap365.

This layout about the gingerbread house features papers and die cuts from the "Colorful Christmas" collection from My Minds Eye.

The angel page used up some of the pieces from the latest Quirky Kit, along with some papers from the "Mitten Weather" collection by Cosmo Cricket.

Christmas Scrapbooking -Part 3

Hurray, I've started scrapping this year's Christmas photos now. All this Christmas scrapbooking has been great, but I wanted all the pages to feel individual and not like they had been rushed all together. I took some time out and I had a hunt around for ideas. I didn't have to look far. I love, love, love the page above. It's a scraplift of Mahlin Wiggur's fantastic layout that featured on the cover of the first issue of Scrap 365.

I used some foam Thickers for the title , but they looked a bit neat compared to the paintyness of the rest of the page. A little white paint put on with a dry brush soon sorted it out.

Another great place for inspiration is Shimelle's blog, with her Starting Points series and regular sketches and tutorials. I started with her current starting point and this is what I came up with.

I used Cosmo Cricket papers, some fab snowman tape, bought in the sale at Cox and Cox, and some felt Christmas trees from Paperchase.

Christmas scrapbooking - Part 2

My task of completing my Christmas scrapbooking from 2010 continues. My desk looks like an explosion of Christmas, with papers, snowflakes, stars and tinsel all over the place (I still haven't found the right layout for that tinsel though).

I received my Nov/Dec Quirky Kit at the end of November and I've been waiting until I can properly have a play with it. It was perfect to scrap the photo of my daughter as a Christmas fairy in the school play. I added in this pearly earring, which I bought for £1 for the pair at a flea market last year.

I love the photo on the page below as it is a great reminder that we actually had snow at Christmas last year! I hope the page does it justice.

I used my favourite Christmas stamp from Crafty Individuals again - although I stamped it onto textured Bazzill cardstock and so had to colour it in with a black pen - whoops.

Back to scrapbooking

Hurray, I've finally got back to my scrapbooking. I have missed it while I've been sewing and crocheting over the past couple of months.

Just like this time last year, I am scrapbooking christmas photos that are a year old, because I don't feel in the mood to scrapbook festive pages when it's hot and sunny outside.

I love this page as I think it feels very christmassy without using traditional colours. I used distress inks and a piece of die cut cardstock as my stencil. The felt snowflakes come from Paperchase, along with a Jenni Bowlin bingo card and some Maya Road trinket pins.

I found the photos on the next page quite tricky to scrap. Opening stockings is such a great part of Christmas Day, but the photos are never brilliant. Making the photos quite small has worked OK on here.

I had to make the page a bit messy with some inky splodges.

More Christmas pages to follow soon - I'm on a roll now and I may even scrap some of this year's photos.

Bird bags

I made some bags to sell at the craft fair way back in November and I had this idea in my head to make bags with appliqued birds on. The pattern for the basic bag comes from Amy Butler's book "Amy Butler's Style stitches" . It turned out much bigger than I though it would be! The original bag had a bluetit on one side...

and a goldfinch on the other side...

I love how these birds turned out. There was a lady called Louise who had a table on the other side of the craft fair who was enamoured by this bag and asked if I could make her some commission bags with different birds on.

So one bag became three bags...

The first bag had a robin on one side... (This was my favourite bird of all. It turned out so well)

... and an owl on the other side.

The third bag had a pheasant on one side...

... and a partridge on the other.

I love these birds and I will definitely be using this technique again. I think about cushions and aprons at the moment, but not for craft fairs for now, just for me.

2011 - a crafting year in review

I was having a little look around on blogs and I saw a great review of the year on the Attic 24 blog and so I thought I'd have a go as well. It's been a very interesting exercise.

I can see that...

- January and September aren't great months for crafting, usually as I am trying to get the house back on track after school holidays.

- I'm happy that my August photos aren't about crafting but about getting out and about, building sandcastles, watching balloons and finding gorillas.

- I really enjoyed my scrapbooking from June onwards as the things I had learnt in online classes with Donna Downey, Julie Fei-fan Balzer, Christy Tomlinson and Emily Falconbridge all started to come together on my pages.

- It looks like I did little crafting in November or December, but actually I was crafting non stop making things for a craft fair and to sell to raise funds at church. My conclusion is that I can't manufacture items for sale like that at the moment as I don't have enough time.

- My kids are very photogenic!

You may notice a little robin just above - there's more on him to come soon.

Wishing you all a very happy crafty 2012 xx