Easter Bank Holiday Happenings

Happy Easter chaps! I hope you are all having a great bank holiday weekend!

I've been having a lovely time, with family, friends and lots of crafting!  We had a couple of our friends over on Friday night for a dinner party, and they brought us the pretty tulips in the picture above.  We ate lots and had a fun time playing Cards Against Humanity!

On Saturday I started some craft projects. I recently bought a little loom from Tiger. I think it's really meant for children, but it only cost £7 and I have wanted to give some weaving a go for a while now. I'm not sure if I like how this one is turning out yet, but we'l see how we go!

I also tried my hand at some sculpting using air dry clay. If the project turns out well I'm sure I will post a little tutorial about it. 

We spent the rest of Saturday playing the new Resident Evil game and then watching films!

Yesterday I had a nice catch up and coffee with with a friend, before heading out to have lunch with the family.  My Mother-in-Law surprised us with a build your own Sundae competition, which was great! Really we all won because we got ice cream and lots of treats!

Today I am plotting the final touches to our lounge re-decoration. As I said in this post, I was on the hunt for some botanical style pictures to hang, and now, thanks to lots of help,  I am spoilt for choice!

My friend's Mum read that last blog post, and spotted a book while she was out and about which she very kindly bought for me! It's got lots of cute little illustrations of plants, animals and trees inside with the name of each written below it.  Lots of which include the colour yellow which will fit perfectly with the yellow and grey theme we've got going on!  I love the cover of the book too! I think I'll maybe pick 4 pages and arrange them together all in one frame.

Chris also found me a book whilst visiting an antique shop which had lots of botanical pictures inside. It only cost £1 so I snapped it up and got to work ripping it (neatly) to pieces! The pictures below are just some of them, but there are a few I think would work so I might make a little picture trio to go beside our shelves.

If you remember, I also wanted some sort of botanical wall hanging/chart, and I think we may have cracked this one too! While my Mum was out shopping the other day she came across some wrapping paper with butterflies on it.  Knowing that it was the sort of thing I was after she sent me the name of the company that made it. I looked it up online and unfortunately it was an American company, but then I found a UK ebay shop which sold loads of different papers made by this company, and they were all beautiful! In the end I managed to limit myself to just buying 4 (including the one I initially wanted).

I decided that I would buy these papers and then turn them into wall hangings myself.  Whilst I was researching how I could do this, I found the most wonderful tutorial, using the very same paper no less!  What a weird coincidence! Here is the what their finished product looked like, and you can find the tutorial on the Chris Loves Julia Blog.

So it looks like a trip to B&Q is in order!

What have you been up to over the bank holiday weekend?

Laura xXx

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Doughnut Pin Cushion Tutorial

Since I made my doughnut collar the other week, I have become slightly obsessed with doughnuts! And this led me to creating my very own doughnut pin cushion! It could actually be used for a number of things, not least just sitting there and looking pretty, but as I have now taking up dress making I have been in desperate need of somewhere to store my pins!

You will need;

• Felt - Brown an Pink (I chose to use 2 shades of brown)
• Matching embroidery threads
• Variety of coloured embroidery threads (for the sprinkles!)
• Stuffing
• My doughnut template which you can download here. Make sure you download it before you print it otherwise it will come out a different size.
• A needle
• Pins
• Scissors
• Beads (optional)

Print out my template and cut it out, then pin it to each piece of felt in turn, and cut out.

When finished you should have 3 doughnut shapes like this;

The pink is going to be the icing, so you need to trim this a little around the edges to make it look like the picture below;

Now pin the pink felt on to the darker brown felt, and start stitching them together with 2 strands of the pink embroidery thread, using blanket stitch. If you aren't quite sure how to do this you can see a tutorial here.

Then stitch around the edge of the brown felt using the matching thread and blanket stitch. Keep it even and as tight as it will go without puckering. You can see a tutorial on how to stitch blanket stitch on an edge here. I'll explain later why we are doing this.

Add your sprinkles! You can use whatever coloured embroidery thread you like here, and even beads if you fancy it! Make sure the fabric stays flat and doesn't pucker as you stitch. 

The next bit gets slightly complicated.  The way we are going to attach the lighter brown felt to make the bottom part of the doughnut, is by using blanket stitch again. But, remember how we stitched around the edge of the darker brown felt earlier? This was so that we would have something to stitch on to, so that we can join both pieces together.  So start with the inner circle and do your blanket stitch, hooking it into a stitch on the other piece of felt each time.  It's quite important that you try to keep the stitches as even as possible to make sure they match up.

Take a look at the picture below to see what I mean. I just used some scraps of fabric to illustrate the technique more clearly to you, the stitches are a lot bigger than you will sew them.

Next you need to stitch the outside circle together in the same way, but once you have done about a quarter of it you need to start stuffing it as you go, so that it is distributed evenly across the whole doughnut. It needs to be pretty densely packed, but make sure your seams don't pop open too far.  As long as your stitches were quite small this shouldn't be too much of a problem. Keep on sewing and stuffing, sewing and stuffing until you get back to the beginning, then tie off and you are done!

Here is what the finished product should hopefully look like;

I'm super happy with how it turned out, and I shall look forward to my sewing projects even more now!  I kind of want to make a whole box of doughnuts this way, but I don't think I have enough pins to necessitate it! Can you think of any other uses they could have?

I think this would make a great gift though, and they could be made in lots of different colours. What do you think?

Laura xXx

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DIY Felt Doughnut Collar Tutorial

The other day I bought a massive bundle of felt, and ever since I have been having crazy ideas of creations I could make with it. So here is my first crazy creation! (no doubt there will be many more to come)

Doughnuts are pretty good right? I mean, they taste good, but they also have the potential to look rather lovely too! Whilst mulling over felty ideas, the thought of a doughnut collar popped in to my mind. I envisioned a bite having been taken out of said doughnut, which would form the front of the collar. Luckily I had the perfect coloured felt to start putting my idea into action, there's nothing better than a pink doughnut, I'm sure you will agree!

I thought it would be nice to take you through a step by step tutorial, so if you like it, you can make your very own!

You will need;

• 1 sheet of pink felt and 2 sheets of brown felt (A4 size). You can use one lighter and one darker brown if you prefer to give the top a baked golden brown look!
• Embroidery threads to match the pink and darkest brown felt.
• My doughnut template which you can download here (you will need to download this to computer first and then print it to make sure it is the correct size.
• Scissors
• Pins
• Your choice of coloured embroidery threads (to make the hundreds and thousands) 
• Beads (optional) 
• A button

First of all print out the template, cut it out, and check that it will fit your neck. If it is too big/small, now is the time to alter it! Once you think it is a good fit, simply pin the template to each piece of felt in turn, and cut out.  So eventually you will have one pink and 2 brown doughnut shapes (as shown in the 'supplies' picture).  The pink one is going to be the icing, so you now want to cut this out in a slightly more wiggly fashion, as shown in the picture above. Leave one piece of the brown fabric aside (the lighter one if using 2 shades), as we won't need to use that for a while, it will essentially just be a backing.  

Pin the pink felt onto the darker brown felt, and then, using 2 strands of the matching pink embroidery thread, we are going to stitch it on using blanket stitch. If you haven't used this stitch before you can find a tutorial here. Try and keep it as even and near as you can. If you haven't done it before it might be best to practice on some scrap felt first.

Felt tends to warp a bit when working with it, so once you have finished this stage you may want to trim the edges of the felt to make sure they both match up.

Now for the really fun bit, the sprinkles!  You can use whatever colours you want for this but in the end I decided I wanted to stick with just white sprinkles. Embroider these evenly but randomly across the pink felt,  making sure that the fabric is not puckering in any places as you go.

I found some little blue beads in my craft stash and I decided to embellish the collar with some of these as well.  I used one single blue embroidery thread to attach these. At this stage, it doesn't matter that the back of your brown felt is getting a bit messy with stitches, as this will be covered later with the lighter brown felt.

Once you are happy that your doughnut is perfectly embellished with sprinkles, it is time to make a fastening.  Now you might want to try your own method of fastening, since mine was a bit trial and error, but it seems to work pretty well, I'm just not sure how durable it will be in the long run.

I started off by picking a button from my extensive button collection. It was a tough decision but in the end I went for a simple little while one.  Then I tied a knot in some thick embroidery thread, making a loop around the button. I tied it so that the button could just about squeeze though.

Next I stitched my loop onto the collar, underneath the pink felt, so that it would not be seen from the outside. The button will be stitched on right at the end of the process.

Now we just need to finish it up by taking our lighter piece of brown felt, and pinning it to the back, then trim the edges if needed to make sure they all line up, and again we are going to blanket stitch around the entire edge of the collar. This is slightly different than before because we are sewing 2/3 pieces of fabric together, rather than sewing one on to another, but it is the same principle. Use the brown thread on the edge with the brown felt, and the pink thread on the inside edge and at the bottom.   

Now all you need to do is sew on your button and you are done!

Here is what it should look like when you have finished...

I am super pleased with how it turned out, what do you think?

I really enjoyed sewing this and it has given me lots of ideas for other felty embroidery projects. Have you ever made anything from felt?

Laura xXx

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DIY Quote Pennant - I've Got Blings!

Hey chaps! Today I want to try something a bit fun.  I'm currently on the hunt for pretty things to hang on the wall in my study, so I thought I'd give making my own little pennant a go.

There were so many quotes I could have used, I thought about all the usual motivational ones, but in the end I went with something that had tickled me recently and would make me smile every time I looked at it.  A couple of days before we and been to see the film Chappie, which is about a robot which develops a consciousness, but essentially he has to grow from a child. Unfortunately he is being brought up by a bunch of pretty gangsta' criminals, so he learns a lot of funny stuff. At one point they give him some chains, and he gets very excited that he's 'got blings!'  It was a very cute and funny moment, and its definitely a film worth seeing, Chris and I have both said it has been our favourite film so far this year by far.

Anyway, back to the DIY. It's a pretty simple one, all you will need is the following;

• Your choice of coloured card
• A paper straw
• Sticky letters. (I got mine here)
• String
• Pencil
• Craft knife and ruler

First up we need to cut the card into the right shape.  The one I made measured 18cm by 25cm, then to cut the triangle in I drew a line on the back 8cm up form the bottom, and then marked the halfway point (9.5cm) and drew lines to join it up to the bottom two points, then I cut it out with my craft knife and ruler.

Next, you want to very carefully cut as straight a line as possible through one side of your straw using the craft knife. Then measure your piece of sting to about 75 cm, and thread it through the straw. This is how you will hang your pennant.

Then you can simply slide your card inside the slit you have made in the straw. It should hold it easily, but if it feels loose you may want to stick it down at the edges with some glue. Lastly you just need to arrange your sticky letters into your chosen quote and you're done!

Now it is hanging happily in pride of place on my pin board alongside lots of other film and TV related goodies!

Laura xXx

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My first homemade dress!

Hi guys, I'm baaack! You might have noticed that I've been out of action for a while on the blogging front. I'd sort of run out of enthusiasm and ideas, so I decided to have a little break and give myself some time to replenish my creative brain bank! I am happy to say that I am now brimming with ideas and I can't wait to share them with you! I hope you have all been well, let me know what you have been up to!

I'm going jump right in to something I've been really excited about today, dressmaking!  During my time away I have been following The Great British Sewing Bee with eagle eyes. I love everything about it and it has really made me want to give sewing a proper try.   Back last year you may remember I spent a lovely day at The Handmade Fair  where I bought a dressmaking pattern from Sew Over It! The pattern was for a rather pretty 1950's/1960's style dress inspired by Betty Draper from Mad Men. The great thing about Sew Over It, is that as well as the little instruction booklet you receive with the pattern, you can also view a step by step guide on how to make the dress on their blog! Perfect for beginners!

However, in the end I didn't need to refer to their blog, as I had a little bit of real life help!  A couple of weeks ago my Dad went away Skiing, so my Mum and I, and her neighbour, decided we would have our very own Great British Sewing Bee, and each make a dress in a couple of days.  It was handy to have their help, as they were both fairly experienced in dressmaking, whereas this was the first ever garment I had attempted to sew! (Aside from a project I attempted whilst at Uni, which got halfway finished and then I had to give up through complete confusion!)

Aside from the invisible zip, and sewing the shoulder straps together, this dress was actually very easy to make! It only had 6 pattern pieces which made it pretty simple to keep track of.

I was really chuffed with how it turned out, it is actually a wearable dress, and a pretty nice one at that! There are a couple of tweaks I could make if I make the same one again, just to get it fitting perfectly, but as far as a first attempt goes, I am super pleased with it. I was worried I would struggle and that it would put me off sewing for life! But because it went so well I can't wait to get stuck in to more!  Here I am doing the 'I'm a little teapot' pose to  show off its lovely skirt.

It goes well with a nice belt too. It's definitely a twirly kind of dress, so I thought I'd better demonstrate!

This project, along with my constant watching of The Great British Sewing Bee, has really got me in the mood for more sewing! I shall definitely be sewing up a storm in the near future, so watch this space!

By the way, it was a total coincidence that I bought the exact same fabric as is shown on the drawing of the dress pattern! I didn't realise until I got home!

Laura xXx

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