Day 40 Bunny Box

The template for this bunny box can be found at: http://www.marthastewart.com/article/easter-bunny-box Things you'll need are very basic: card paper, template, pencil, scissors, ruler and craft knife.

I cut the pattern using scissors, if they have a fine-tip it's better. I cut the slots with the craft knife.

The sides were bent over a fold. I find it useful to place a ruler next to the fold line and press the paper against it to form a fold. The sides with the bunny are touched together and passed through the slots.

The Bunny box is ready. It can be used as a simple gift box - small enough for jewellery or a keychain to a couple of chocolates or biscuits. It can be made larger for a book or a cake.

Take care, love x

Day 39 High Chair Cover Ready; Pin Cushion Jar

The high chair cover is completed. There are some mistakes and when I do it again I'll pay more attention. I guess I should cut the cover in one piece, cover it and then apply harness. I did this one in separate pieces and thought about the next step as I went along. I will also apply bias binding around the edges for a neater look. For now it will do, and it's not that bad considering it was done without a pattern and without any previous experience in sewing quilted material!
The other project I did today (yep I managed 2)was a pin cushion jar. It is simply a baby food jar with a piece of fabric and wadding attached to the top acting as a pin cushion. The jar is then used as storage for buttons, pins, beads, etc.
Things needed are: baby food jar (or any other smallish jar) & lid, glue gun, glue sticks, thread & needle, ruler, pencil, scissors, fabric material, wadding material, pins, buttons or beads, ribbon.
I drew a circle on the material using a bowl (approx 13cm for a 5 cm diameter lid) and cut them out. The fabric is the same but photos show different colours... sorry!

The wadding is cut a bit smaller than the fabric material and stitches are manually sewn around the outer edges, then tucking them to form a sort of ball.

Next apply some glue from the glue gun on the top of the lid. Stick the 'ball' to it. Be a bit fast as the glue dries quickly. Apply some more glue around the lid and apply a piece of ribbon leaving some extra 7 cm each side to tie into a bow.

Fill the jars, and put pins on top. The pin cushion jar is ready :-)








Take care, have a lovely evening;
LOVE, libellunina

Day 38 High Chair cover WIP

Started the high-chair cover but it needed much more work than I envisaged (wow what a word!) Here are the photos of the work so far... There are some good instructions here: http://racheldenbow.blogspot.com/2010/05/high-chair-seat-cover-tutorial.html

Day 37 Bathroom planning

We have been planning the technical and creative thoughts of the main bathroom. Though it takes a lot of time, I do not have anything to show you... sorry!

I will make it up to you by doing 2 projects tomorrow... we also bought all the things necessary for the high-chair cover. Really exciting :-)

Day 36 High-chair Cushion Pattern

The changing of the clock to summer time not only brought an hour less (yep I overslept ;-P) but also an incredibly beautiful day calling you outside to get a dose of Vitamin D! So I didn't have much time to be creative. Time... always less and less.

I need to do a cushion for my son's high-chair. The one supplied isn't exactly what I expected. I sat down and sketched a pattern.


The pieces in blue is where the harness goes. Now, I need to get the measurements right and accurate, some material and buckles for the harness. I have not decided on the material yet - if I'll buy the Dacron separate or get some proper quilted material. Maybe I'll opt for the latter option, seems more practical.

Night and sweet dreams x

Day 35 Cross Stitched Doves

Hello. Hope you're doing fine. This is the first piece of the WsIP I showed a couple of days ago, that I did finish.

The book I took the pattern from said that it was inspired from the Book of Kells... a truly beautiful inspiration!

Take care and see you soon x

Day 34 Six Word Memoir

One of the suggestions in the book 'A Daily Creativity Journal 365' was to write a 6 word memoir. This is what I have written:

Medical lab scientist wife,crafty mum

You can find it at
http://www.smithmag.net/sixwords/story.php?did=198846

Why don't you write yours http://www.smithmag.net/sixwords

There are really some interesting ones!

Day 33 More WsIP ;-)

Reorganizing the craft material today, I came across various works that have been left unfinished. Most of them – mainly cross stitch – I would have started them for a particular occassion and wouldn’t finish them in time, leave them as they are.

I will display pictures of them when they are finished!

Day 32 Knitting Scarf

This project is good for a lot of reasons; one being that I'm able to finish items that I had already started. This scarf is one of them. I attended knitting and crochet lessons when I was much younger and still remember some steps. Here is a photo of the scarf, nearly ready. It iis the first time I knitted with this type of wool and the result is really interesting!



Take care & good night x

Day 31 Necklace ready!

The necklace is ready. These are glass beads but look good enough. I found it better to work step-by-step than rushing through things. I worked slowly but still had to correct how some beads were attached. I also had to change the clasp since the one before didn't close well.


I hope you how it looks, and it's given me some work to practice on, since you have to be pretty precise and work symmetrical.




Take care
Love,
libellunina x

Day 30 Bead necklace

Yet another WIP... too little time available today!

Day 29 Polymer Clay

I’ve been meaning to work some polymer clay for quite some time. It is not perfectly easy but the more you work with it and practice, the easier it gets. There are sites to help you out, which show step-by-step guides to obtain specific figures. There are also many books to provide inspiration and help.
I managed to buy Fimo polymer clay locally, but there are other makes mainly Sculpey (by Polyform) and Cernit. Look at the links at the end of this blog for more info.
These farm animals are really cute and I got the idea from http://www.sculpey.com/projects/friendly-farm-characters

Apart from the polymer clay you’ll need the sculpturing tools, a knife and paper. The paper is needed to work the clay on, since you can stain furniture. Clean hands between different colours as when you knead the clay, some gets on your hand and transfers to the next colour you work with.


You can adjust the clay as you need before baking, but once the figure is baked you cannot alter the shape or look of your project.
Fimo colours can be blended with each other to form a new colour, like yellow & blue gives you green. It is somewhat time consuming so it might be practical to buy the correct colour right away – it all depends on the amount you need.

I still need to make these figures nicer before baking, so this project might be considered WIP.



Happy claying!

Links:
http://fimo.com/creative_tips_for_FIMO.Staedtler
http://www.sculpey.com/
http://www.jacquardproducts.com/products/cernit/
http://www.cforiginals.net/

Day 28 Courgette (Marrow) Cake

This is rather interesting. Yesyerday I prepared & cooked some filled Courgettes (the round ones) and reserved the inner white pulp for this cake. The cake is really moist and tasty, you would never imagine having courgettes in it. I don't know if it contributes to the 5-a-day of fruit and veg, but to make you feel less guilty for eating cake, let's say it does!

I got the recipe from http://allrecipes.co.uk/recipe/8114/marrow-cake.aspx

Ingredients
3 eggs beaten
400g caster sugar (I used 350g and I guess even 300g would have been enough)
250ml vegetable oil
2 tsp vanilla extract
375g plain flour
3 tsp baking powder
2 tsp ground cinnamon
2 tsp ground nutmeg
225g grated marrow (used about 300g, chopped roughly)

Method
Preheat oven to 170C or Gas mark 3. Grease two 1lb loaf tins, or one 20x30 cm baking dish. An ungreased silicon dish works just as fine.
In a large bowl, beat the eggs until fluffy with an electric mixer. Beat in the sugar, oil and vanilla. Gradually mix in the flour, baking powder, cinnamon and nutmeg. Fold in the marrow, do not mix it with the beater. Transfer to the prepared baking dish.
Bake for 45 minutes (mine needed 55), until a knife inserted in the centre comes out clean.

Enjoy with a nice cup of tea, coffee or hot chocolate... yummy!

Day 27 Easy envelope

Sometimes you need an envelope and can't find the right size. There are templates to design your own envelopes. There are also some useful tools on the internet and one such site is Canon Creative Park, which I mentioned earlier. I downloaded and printed the patterned envelope from:
http://cp.c-ij.com/en/contents/3206/10052/downloads/e-flower0022_s09a4p.pdf

Apart from the pattern you will need:
Scissors
Glue
Double-sided tape or photo stickers
... and a pen and stamp to send!


Cut out along the lines and fold over the dotted lines. Spread some glue on the glue tabs where shown and stick the sides together.


On the printout, there are some circle icons you can cut out and use them to close the envelope. I applied a photo sticker to attach to the envelope. It matches the design on the envelope and looks pretty!



Take care and have a lovely weekend x

Day 26 Iris Folding Clover

Happy St. Patrick's Day to all :-)



Iris folding is something I only tried since starting this project. It is very easy to do, especially if you have the pattern! I decided to do the clover through inspiration of St.Patrick's Day.

As before you'll need patterned paper, scissors, card for background, craft knife, pencil and ruler. You will also need a hologram paper for the iris piece. I put a nice shiny sequin with a bead in the centre for iris.



The work doesn't look astonishing from the back but once you turn the card over, you're in for a surprise!



For more info go to http://kermesse365.blogspot.com/2011/03/day-21-iris-folding-teddy-bear.html

Have a lovely day x

Day 25 Cross Stitch Sailing Boat Ready!

Finally, the cross stitch piece is finished. It has been defined with backstitch - as per pattern after all - and you can see what difference it makes. Who could have imagined that a yellow splodge would turn into a star?


Also, I'm adding a picture I found on to show how the cross stitch is worked.



Take care and if you have any questions, I hope I can help you x

Day 24 Cross Stitch Sailing Boat

I have not been able to finish the cross-stitch piece I started yesterday, too busy doing chores and caring for Gabriel, but still managed to do some stitching. You can see the difference between the left and the right side in the photo. The right side is complete with cross stitches while the left side has only half stitches ready. The half stitches are used for tapestry. I started doing tapestry before cross-stitch and I like them both. Cross stitch tends to look more dainty (can't find a better word!).


I'm not a professional cross-stitcher, but there are some points and tips for the work to be tidy:

• if possible keep the same tension in stitching throughout;
• stitches have to face the same way, all this way / or \;
• cross stitches are worked in double strands while backstitch in single strand - always follow instructions on pattern;
• clean hands and working area is highly recommended;
• if you need to cut or trim threads, preferably use embroidery scissors;
• if stitching from left to right, start the stitch from the lower box;
• if stitching from right to left, start the stitch from the upper side;
• this will give tidier work and in the long run save you thread.

Hope that this has been of help, and I will try to show you the finished piece tomorrow.

Good night :-)

Day 23 Cross Stitch

I'll be doing some cross stitch next. I used to do this craft for quite some time but had stopped mainly due to lack of time. I enjoy doing it and it gives fantastic results.

I have a kit which includes everything you need for the cross stitch piece, usually Aida fabric, thread and needle. You will also need a pattern which I produce a second copy of to be able to mark on it as I stitch along.

Have a lovely evening x

Day 22 Iris Folding Fish