Santas sleighs

A 32p chocolate bar transformed

Firstly, I bought those 32p choc bars from Asda. I also bought the smartprice foil but opened it up to find that it already had foil!!

I then set about making the letters for the wrapping. If you use Word art then literally drag the letters back to front you end up with names going backwards. This enables you to print off and when you cut out the letters are the right way round.

Cut the letters out and use pva glue to cover and sprinkle glitter on.

Pull your wrapper round your bar before adding the letters. Use double sided tape to fix, then you have your bar ready for decoration.

I used some snowflakes and the letters. It makes an amazing present for about 60p.

A Wedding Matchbook

I did get this idea from Helen at itsallfiddlefart blog. So I will not claim the glory for what I think is a fantastic idea. I bought a load of sixpences from Ebay after finding out that Hubs has a load in the loft. Doh moment. This match book was made by cutting out the bits by hand. I know that there is a Sissix matchbook die, but I ain't got it, so good old fashioned hand cutting and I used a hole punch to make the holes. You need to cut two pieces of card the same width. I folded the outer bit using 1 cm at the bottom and in the middle to creat the top fold. Then you simply fold the inside bit, punch the holes in the same places and trim so that it fits Neatly inside.


My new camera isn't particularly great at picking out the detail, but the front reads' A little something for your Wedding Day' whilst the inside reads 'Something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue and a silver sixpence for your shoe'.


I will be attending a good friends wedding soon and I felt this was a fab gift to give her on her hen night.

Christmas Decoration

Every year in October I say that I am going to decorate the tree with all natural decorations. Every year, the same old plastic stuff comes out. I dream of dried orange pieces, felt hearts, pine cones with glitter and some gingerbread salt dough decs with lots of gingham ribbon.


Maybe this year, I may achieve my dream. But I suppose that all of the stuff I have collected over the years will not go up. The little plastic balls with pics of the kids in. The special balls that the kids made etc.

I started it off anyway this year by making a stuffed heart. Cut a bit of card in half to make a heart shape, draw round and cut out two shapes. I did the embroidery first and I know it's a bit wobbly but hey ho. Then blanket stitch round leaving a gap to stuff a bit of wadding, finish sewing up and you have a nice Christmassy heart.

Easy placemats Part 1

I haven't blogged for ages as I simply haven't made anything for ages. However I watched an episode of Channel 4 'Make do and mend' and got this idea from there. Placemats. These are really quick to make and look amazing. People will be getting these for Christmas this year.

I used a tabloid newspaper as a template. One page. Fold into 4 and cut off the corners. Unfold and pin to a piece of folded fabric. Fabric is folded with pretty side in, so you can't see the pattern. Pin the paper to the fabric in each corner.

I used a biro to make some marks alongside the paper. Carefully remove each pin from the paper and re pin the fabric.

You should be left with this.


Sew and trim leaving a few inch gap anywhere (for turning inside out.

Easy Placemats Part 2

Turn inside out

Press

Press your opening flat

Machine about 1/8 inch all the way round for a really defined shape.

Right, It's party time....

So I have a little 4 year olds party this week. I decided to make these as party favours. Using Cadburys miniatures. I cut and wrapped new wrappers, stuck a jewel on and put them in pretzel bags from ebay. Each bag has cost me 50p in total, including everything. I bought the jewels from the works. Any paper will do and for the top you literally fold a bit of card in half, open it up, staple the cello back to the back bit. Glue/DS tape the front bit to the cello bag and you have these.
So that the lads who are coming don't feel left out, they got jeweled bars that were not pink!

New Year, new kitchen.

I finally got my new kitchen and I am thrilled with it. Hubs has worked soooooo hard to make it special. I haven't painted it yet or added finishing touches but I will be posting about making roller blinds

Haven't been Crafting too much lately

I have been busy this afternoon though, phew. I have been painting wooden clothes pegs. Yes, sounds really weird, but I got out my acrylic paints from the Pound shop and mixed white in with various shades to give me pastel colours and this is the result. Using a reel of magnetic tape I have put magnets on the back and plan to give these as small gifts. I also have a load of kids stuff which is magnetic on my freezer which can be cut into small strips for this very purpose.

I got this idea from http://www.itsallfiddlefart.blogspot.com/ww.itsallfiddlefart.blogspot.com/

I also got this idea from there, although I have done my own wrappers for big bars of Galaxy before now. Getting hold of Cadburys Miniatures is a nightmare and I have come to the conclusion that you can use any bar of chocolate and if it's in a plastic wrapper instead of foil, buy some cheap Smartprice foil from Asda as it's really thin and re wrap your chocolate so you can make your own paper sleeve.

Then I stuck little stickers from Paperchase or Accessorize on and placed them on a bit of card and wrapped in cello. Great table cards or in my case, something personal to add to the cash in the card. I plan to do loads of different sized chocolate using my own foil as the choc companies have obviously realised that if they stick plastic on Kitkats, it lasts about 20 years. Lol.

This card cost hardly anything to make. Some lolly sticks, sandpaper and a few little shells from the beach.

These are just cards I have made trying desperately to use up my stash. They are very simple. I really should make more cards as I used to be really good at ideas but somehow I have completely lost my mojo. Handmade cards are so much nicer.

I didn't know what to buy this couple

They got married abroad and have a house, family etc already, so I thought that some bulbs would be good. As I have written on the label, they will get a reminder every Spring of their special day.

This card isn't one of my best as my mojo was low at this point, but I think they will love it.

Whoooo Hoooo, some cardmaking

I haven't made a card for absolutely ages. Our PTA needed one as the head is leaving, so I came up with this. She loved the Barn Dance we put on, hence the photo. I used sackcloth for the backing and used my sizzix for the shapes. I did add a few more little flowers in the white blank bits. It's an A4 card, so I also added a piece of card inside to weight it properly.

No fuss Yummy Pepperoni Pizza

I have been meaning to blog about home made pizzas for a while. Because they are so easy and incredibly tasty. I used my breadmaker to make the dough, but you can buy a pack of dough and follow instructions. I bake mine for a few minutes in the oven before adding topping. To make the tomato base fry some onion, garlic and basil in olive oil. When it looks cooked, add a carton of Asda passata. Let it simmer for while.

These are the toppings I use on mine. All of these can be frozen so it makes it relatively cheap.

Spread your sauce first, then add cheese and then other toppings. Whatever you want really.

This was so lovely. Hence my taking a photo of it. Pure pizza heaven.

Some nice patchwork

Goodness, it's a long time since I did anything crafty. I had to stay home today so it seemed like the perfect moment to start a quilt I promised my niece. It's turned out really well and the 2 extra pillowcases I picked up with my Ikea 'Rosali' quilt cover have really come in handy. They lend the quilt a nice bit of Kidston.

Well the Winter is finally nearly and almost over and I am thinking of Spring

We were at a local ruin recently and I took this pic as it made me think of Spring



I decided that it was time to get my watercolours out again and have another go at painting. The reason for this is, that, this year, I didn't send any HM Christmas cards. In fact, I was really lazy this year, so I think I am going to send some Easter Cards with an apology for the lack of Christmas Cards. I was going to do some papercraft ones, but, so far, by googling 'how to draw daffodils' I have come up with these


I thought it would be nice to send someone something that I had painted. However, the recipients might not. Bless them.


They really were simple. I googled how to draw daffodils and used the templates for sketching. I then rubbed out some of the lines. You literally just splash some paint on. I used these







The mistake people make with water colours is that they think it's got to be a rich colour, when all you are doing is colouring water, see the lid, those were all I needed to paint those pics. Uh Oh you can see my lighter too, so you know I smoke. Soon to be giving up though.

I have had some health problems recently, which excuse me from posting on my blog, but thank you to anyone who reads this.

I have done it again!!

Apologies for the chronological order of my last three posts. I don't know what happened there. But thankfully, the order is self explanatory.

Long lined curtains part 3

Here you can see that I have taken off the printed edges from my fabric. I missed this bit in previous posts. Pin your PF & lining together from the top and sew down either edge. You will have a long tube. Turn inside out, IRON so the two edges are the same. You will then pin the header tape to the top. Sew the header tape along the top & bottom turning about 1cm under at either end of your curtain.

You will have to knot one end of the string in the header tape before hanging and then pull whatever gather you want through it.

Your curtains should look like this on the inside when finished.

And this on the outside!!! There you have it. I am not brilliant at explaining things, but I hope you found this tute helpful, please ask me any questions you want.

Long Lined Curtains part 2

This picture demonstrates the 1 inch hem at the top of the curtains


This picture shows where the fabric should be before you sew the sides.

Ironing your fabric before you stitch it makes it so much easier.

Once you have ironed your fabrics, you are ready to sew them together.

Sew the hems first. When you iron, create a straight hem to start with and then fold that hem over about a cm to stop the fabric fraying. You will end up with a tube along the bottom. I then sewed a straight stitch along giving a neat finish. Sew the hems on both your lining & PF. You are then ready to pin your fabrics together.

Happy New Year and a very quick tute for Lined Curtains for French Doors Part 1

This is a tutorial for making long huge lined curtains for french doors. Although you could make one of these for a single door. I made these in about 3 hours. The fabric was from ebay and was end of line. It was £2.50 a metre and I bought 8 metres. I am extremely impressed as my lining fabric cost £15.00, again from ebay and the header tape was around the £5 mark. So for £40.00 I managed a pair of curtains, that I actually like, which keep the draughts out.

You will need

Patterned/plain curtain fabric. I always buy 1/2 metre more than my measurements. If you have any spare, you can always do a patchwork cushion to go with the room.

Lining fabric. Again I always err on the 1/2 metre more than I need.

header tape. In this case I needed 104 inches. Can't remember what this is in metric.

Most fabrics come in a 54 inch width. So does the lining. You need to make your lining smaller than your Patterned fabric (PF) so that when you turn it inside out, the PF makes a hem. More of this later.

To cut my long length of PF I folded it in half longways, 54 inches became 26, then used a metal tape measure to chalk a mark either side of the width. Then I used a piece of wood to chalk a line and cut it that way. I also did this for the lining but made the lining 3 inches shorter. I wanted curtains 100 inches long, so I cut them at 104 inches. 3 inches extra for the bottom hem and an inch for the top. The top doesn't need to be as neat as the header tape will cover it.

Once your fabric lengths are cut, you will need to cut some off the sides of the lining. I found the best way to do this was to fold it again and again, measure 2 inches and use the piece of wood to get a straigt edge. You either cut both sides or just shave 4 inches off of one side for speed.

The next bit of this is quite the most important bit of curtain making for me. THE IRONING. It gives you neat hems and allows you to straighten out your hem should you have gone a bit wrong during the cutting. I love stripey fabric for this too as you can line the stripes up so it's easy, certainly easier than plain fabric.

Finally here is a mock up of my stall. All of that sewing was worth it in the end. I think it looks great.