Wednesday 30 May 2012

Bring out the strawberries

As summer may have now started, or it could have just finished, it's time to start enjoying summer fruits. Although the strawberries I bought were English I think it's still quite early for them but they were tasty in the pavlova I made.
I've had a busy time over the last few days preparing for some knee surgery which means I'll be out of action for a little while. However last week I found a bit of time to squeeze in a fun day with my sewing buddies.
I also started one of the dolls featured in the latest Mollie Makes. She is kind of finished but I think she would look good with some flowers in her hair.
I must have had strawberries on the brain as I picked some strawberry fabric to make her body with. Maybe she should have strawberries in her hair instead of flowers. I'll give you an update on what I decide.

My knee surgery also coincides with preparing for My Month in Numbers so I'll be a bit later than normal this month....... I've been keeping the all important numbers though and I'll be looking forward to catching up with everyone taking part.

Enjoy any Jubliee celebration preparations you may be part of if I can stagger about on one leg I'm supposed to making cupcakes and rustling up another pavlova. Have fun.

Thursday 24 May 2012

Simple Pleasures

Have you been enjoying the sunshine? The change in weather last weekend was a very welcome and  pleasant suprise. We had a spur of the moment morning out to make the most of it.
I used the June sketch from the Scrap 365 sketch challenge blog and some of the new Simple Stories Summer Fresh range that I'd ordered. The 6x6 paper pad had the perfect sentiments and just the right size journal blocks for the layout. The dotty butterflies were found buried deep in my stash and I handstitched the sun outline.

So my simple pleasures......

  • To feel the warm sun on your face after a couple of miserable weeks.
  • A cappucino and warm lemon and poppy seed muffin sitting in the sunshine.
  • Buying fresh cut flowers from the market
......a perfect morning. Here's to the next one.

Thursday 17 May 2012

Home Sweet Home - mark 2

Hi when I've not been busy with granny squares I've been dabbling with frames again. This one is bigger than the last one I found but I gave it the white treatment again.
No bunting this time but the flowers stuck......

.....those felt flowers, would you like to know how I make them? They are good for 3D projects and of course if you make your own  embellishments you get to choose what colour they are.
First cut five flowers shapes, I use my ever useful tattered floral die but if you don't have a flower die, circles would work just as well.
Take one of the flower shapes and fold it in half and half again so it's a quarter of it's original size. Hold it's shape with a couple of stitches at the pointed end.
Taking one the shapes as the base of your flower sew the quartered flower to the centre of the base with a couple of stitches. Repeat folding the other three shapes and sew them in position too covering the whole base shape.
Once you've finished you should have a fluffy looking flower. The felt gives it a very rounded shape and two back to back would give a pom-pom effect. (mmmmm now I'm thinking they would make lovely tree decorations.....don't get distracted!) If you make them from fabric they have a less structured look but are still as effective. It's fun to experiment with different flower shapes too.

Have fun creating.


Friday 11 May 2012

Hurray!

Crochet, it's one of those things I've always wanted to do but never quite got the hang of. My Mum patiently tried to teach me on a number of occasions but I was the impatient one and let's just say that we both thought it best if I find another way of learning. Then last week I saw Kate's lovely layout where she had crocheted her own trim. Right I was going to do this......
 ....and I did, I can't tell you how good it felt to finally get it. My furry assistant was no help at all but she is very keen on pummelling my balls of wool.
I know I should have learnt the basics first but I so wanted to be able to crochet a basic granny square. I put a gloomy bank holiday weekend to good use and tracked down some tutorials. I can totally recommend this one at Meet Me At Mikes by Pip for learning granny squares and I'm going to make a real effort to take these lessons by Crafty Minx at her crochet school to learn the basics.

So that's what I've been up to for the last week dreaming of colour combinations for granny squares.