2013 - A few of my favourite things

As it's nearly the end of 2013 I thought I would have a little look back at my favourite things of this year....

My favourite scrapbook page

This was inspired by a tutorial video from Creative Jumpstart 2013. I am very excited that Creative Jumpstart 2014 will be starting tomorrow. I love the comic book look of this page

A Breakfast fit for a superhero

 My favourite new craft

I have had fun starting to discover felting this year (and I only managed to stab myself in the finger twice! ). Father Christmas even bought me a lovely new needle felting brush mat, so I won't have to felt into a sponge and peel it off afterwards anymore. I think Father Christmas may have had advice from my Mum.

A celebration postcard

My favourite photo

I took this photo while we were on holiday in Paris and I managed to get all three kids looking at the camera and smiling - hurray! How did we achieve this? My other half was standing behind me and licking my head to make them laugh!

Can you see a resemblance...

My favourite song

My favourite song this year is "Little talks" by "Of Monsters and Men". I love all the different instruments used in this and I think it is definitely a "jangly" song ( This word has been used to describe other music I like).

My favourite kids craft

This was the most fun. Paper plates + paint+ salad spinner = spin paintings!

Spin painting

My favourite book

A perfect blend of modern policing with a large dose of fantasy.

Rivers of London

 My favourite quilt

A pirate quilt for a pirate themed nursery, with my own pattern for the paper pieced boats.

A pirate quilt

 My favourite film

Star Trek:Into Darkness - A fantastic sci-fi film with the added bonus of Mr Benedict Cumberbatch!

And a New Year's Resolution to finish the year... I will try to finish all the online craft workshops I am halfway through!

The Great Big Stitched Postcard Swap update

 A little while ago I made a felted image for a postcard as part of the Great Big Stitched Postcard Swap. I was very excited to receive the postcard above from my swapee (is that a real word?) Eleanor Reilly. 

She has put in so many lovely details (according to her blog, the red headed lady is inspired by me).

The theme is "Celebration"and Eleanor has cleverly included a whole miniature book of quotes about celebrating.

I love the texture elements she included.

Thank you Eleanor. It looks lovely pinned up on my inspiration board in my craft space xx

(P.S. I just wanted to add that Eleanor posted this on time for the swap and it's just me who's late adding it to my blog)

 

Wednesday Love: Crayon Love

This week I bought a little box of happiness - also known as Crayola crayons. I saw this box of 96 crayons on special offer for only £1.50 (in Tesco). How could I resist! The smell of a new box of crayons takes me back to childhood and I remember so strongly reading the labels on the crayons and loving all the different names for the colours...

There are lots of ideas for using crayons and I've started collecting some on a Pinterest board called "Crayon Love".

We've just got the new book "The Day the Crayons Quit" and it's great. The book is illustrated by my favourite illustrator, Oliver Jeffers. My kids know that all the Oliver Jeffers children's books we have are actually mine and I am letting them borrow them! You don't have to be a child to enjoy a good story and fabulous drawings.

Wednesday Love: Pinterest

I've been on Pinterest for a while and I feel like I am just getting the hang of it. I have now organised my boards instead of having one huge board just titled "inspiration". 

My Boards are now...

Inspiration

Scrapbooky Things

Polymer Clay

Banner Thoughts (inspiration for my church banner group)

Brownies Ideas

Using up fabric scraps

Quilty Quilts

I heart words

Yarn, threads and woolly loveliness

I do love Pinterest - there are so many great ideas out there. If only someone could pin the instructions on how to make a time machine, I might be able to have a go at making some of them!

Back to basics - designing and drawing

I have signed up to an online class called "Reign Repeats" with Majo Bautista V which is all about designing repeat patterns (for textiles?) using Adobe Illustrator on the Skillshare website. I decided to sign up as my IT skills are extremely lacking and I need to get back to basics with my drawing and designing too. It's a really fun class with some super students sharing their work. So here's my project so far...

We had a project brief of "Picnics" and so I started with a brainstorm...

Then I explored the wonderful world of Pinterest and came up with these mood boards, putting the images together on Picmonkey.

(Loving the bright colours, the tupperware and the cute faces in the Bento boxes)

Then I got out my watercolours and started doodling...

This is still the very early stages of a project and my other half has some big work stuff going on at the moment so I won't be able to get to the computer to do the Illustrator side of things for a little while. In the meantime I can just keep doodling :)

A rainbow card

I made a card for a friend's birthday this week using scraps of patterned paper. I discovered I have hardly any red papers - do I use a lot of red in my scrapbooks or do I have an aversion to buying red papers? I'm not sure what the answer is here. This was supposed to a rainbow but I realised after I had cut out the papers that I had got the orange and yellow mixed up - oops.

I've been inspired to try this pattern out from various sources and I really like how it turned out. It may be appearing on a scrapbook page soon. Here's where I got the idea from...

A piece of art from You had me at Bonjour

A scrapbook page by Lisa Truesdell
( I love the chevron details on here)

                                                                                 

A scrapbook page by Kelly Purkey
(this has been done with mists)

80's Glam Sharpie happiness

I was really excited to receive these new Sharpies in the post this week. Of course I am excited - it has a pen labelled "Legwarmer Orange". I am an 80's girl at heart. My favourite all time band is A-ha and I have loved them since I was 7. Ah... neon socks, leather straps around the wrists, big backcombed hair, I even had a royal blue wool dress with shoulder pads and a big black plastic belt.

I keep seeing Sharpies mentioned on craft blogs and Pinterest and so decided I needed to expand my collection, When I saw these on special offer, how could I resist?

Here are some Sharpie projects from around the web, firstly from one of my favourite craft bloggers, Alisa Burke...

Doodle Easter Eggs by Alisa Burke

Wooden key fobs from How About Orange

Leopard Tote bag from P.S. I Made This

Shrinky Dink Pendant from ModPodge Rocks

Red Shoes from The Hidden Seed

Tie Dye T-shirts from Sun Scholars

Wellie Boots from Giverslog

For more Sharpie inspiration, check out their blog. And if you are in need of some true 80's glam, click HERE

Stamp Carving

I have seen some really interesting examples of stamp carving this week. I am tempted to have a go at this technique. I even have the right v-shaped tool left over from my lino-cutting A-level days. There is an adorable tutorial over on the Mollie Makes blog here.

Julie Fei-Fan Blazer is running a stamp carving class at the moment too. I love Julie's style. There's a Flickr pool from her class too, to see the fantastic work from the students. I am very tempted with this class, but have quite a lot on at the moment, with half term coming up soon too. Julie's classes remain available on her blog even after the "live" class has finished so I think I'll save this one for a bit later in the year.

Millefiori - inspiration and beads

While we were at the "Power of Making" exhibition at the V&A, my friend and I had a little look at the glass gallery. I was very pleased to find traditional glass millefiori as I have spent a lot of the past month teaching people how to make Fimo canes. I am always amazed at how the glass makers can produce the canes as I am used to making my canes in a malleable clay, not boiling hot melted glass!

I love the stripy edges of these canes.

This plate is made using large stripy canes.

And here's my version! I took the Fimo canes I had made at classes and demonstrations recently and made them into beads. It's my new favourite necklace and when people ask about it, I get to do my Fimo sales pitch. The assistant on the coach to London my be coming to one of my classes after our chat about my necklace!

The Power of Making

This Saturday was an unusual day for me as a friend and I got on a coach early in the morning and headed off to London. I had been reading articles about an exhibition currently at the V&A museum called "The Power of Making" and after mentioning that I'd love to see it, my husband suggested taking the day to go and have a look.

It's a fantastic exhibition. I found it inspiring to see so many things that have been crafted in lots of different ways, using creativity and imagination. There is a great range of made items, from traditional crafts, using wood and leather to a range of 3D printers - which still seem like something from Star Trek to me!

I was particularly impressed by the computer-y items that were designed to be hacked and improved and shared. I loved the openness and appreciation of other peoples talents.

I'm afraid I haven't got photos I can show you as cameras aren't allowed - as the kind assistant told me! However the image above comes from the V&A website and it's of the astounding pencil tip sculptures of Dalton Ghetti. It took him two years to make this series using a razor blade and a sewing needle. The preciseness of the letters are mind blowing.

I came away from the exhibition feeling affirmed as a maker. My friend pointed out the following quote...

For many people, making is critical for survival. For others, it is a chosen vocation: a way of thinking, inventing and innovating. And for some it is simply a delight to be able to shape a material and say ‘I made that’. The power of making is that it fulfills each of these human needs and desires.

The exhibition runs until the 2nd January 2012.

Hexipuffs

While browsing the Mollie Makes blog I saw this. It's so fabulous. The pattern is called "The Beekeepers Quilt", it's made with hexipuffs and I would love to make some. The pattern is byTiny Owl Knits and it's available on Etsy.

Could someone please invent a time machine so I could do all these craft projects in my head?

If you find yourself in Frogmore Street in Abergavenny tomorrow, then pop in to The Initiative and say hello. I will be doing a Fimo demonstration all day.

Inspiration - Doily street art

Through the wonderful world of friends on Facebook talking about interesting things, I've just found a website all about an art festival that has been happening in the Italian town of Grottaglie. It's called the Fame Festival. which is doubly interesting as a title as fame in Italian means hungry, so it adds a double meaning to the English version. It's a group of international artists who work in ceramics, printmaking and installations and who translate their work into street art around the town. It's not all to my taste - but the world would be a very boring place if we all liked the same thing.

This post here is about the work by a Polish artists called NeSpoon. She has created some beautiful ceramic doilies and also used doily stencils around the town.

A doily stencil - so lovely...

Creating ceramic doilies...

A ceramic inlay in a tree...

You can see more of NeSpoon's fabulous work here

Amazing Fimo

Yesterday I spent the day demonstrating Fimo at my local craft shop (the most wonderful Spinning Weal). It was a really good day and one of the staff members referred to it as "standing room only" in the afternoon. The fish brooch above was one of the pieces I took with me as I think it shows the amazing potential of polymer clay. I cannot claim to make anything as fantastic as this. This beautiful brooch was made by the most talented artist Sarah Shriver. I was lucky enough to go to some workshops taught by her a few years ago.

Can you believe these pieces are made from polymer clay! (I know this post is titled "Amazing Fimo", but I'm not sure which brand of clay Sarah uses!)

This is why I love playing with Fimo so much. My kids think it's great and love making models, just like I used to, but the creative potential is limitless.