Journal

Archive for the ‘Crafts’ Category

We have my cousin’s daughter’s Christening coming up soon so I made this from the Silhouette Store. They have such lovely stuff there!

I also had fun chatting with Lauren today. She came and sat on Nan’s lap and I snapped this picture:

It was overcast today and I had my kit lens on my camera like a numpty. I really should check it before I leave the house. I was hoping to catch Erin today, but she didn’t go to nan’s today. Still, I get lots of photos very soon   And of course, the best Nephew in the world, Oliver! With cute haircut from mummy and daddy.

She’s so cute!

OK, another it’s-bedtime-but-I’ll-update-quick post. At the weekend, not that I didn’t have enough to do as it was, I decided that I was going to make Rae’s Spring Ruffle Top. Minus the ruffles, of course.

I have to say, I struggled to follow the instructions. I didn’t get the strap instructions at all, and ended up doing them my own way. Took a lot of adjusting after Gareth saying it was too “puffy” (Still too puffy, apparently, but it’s comfy and those spare tyres don’t show when I sit down, so that was an immediate win for me!) There’s just something about walking around wearing a top that you made with your matching bag even though you’re actually only walking down the road to your parents house. But still, I loved it!

In my absolute madness I have decided that as I’ve done that, I totally want to make a dress using the same pattern, so fingers crossed that this weekend I can at least make a start by cutting up the bedsheet I plan to use.

I also am putting it out there that I intend to lose a little weight. Coming from someone who has, for her entire life, been in great shape… well I’ve sort of let myself go a little. And it gets me down that I can’t wear those cute little tops anymore, and that a large chunk of my wardrobe no longer fits me. Now I’m not going to do a Cathy, and take pictures and put them out there… I just have to look in the mirror and feel completely embarrassed and feel sad that I no longer have my cute little figure. That said I am no way overweight, and I can guarantee I am doing this right. I have an account at Calorie Count, which I totally think is an awesome resource… and best of all it’s freeeeee! It even pointed out to me that I am low on things such as Potassium (this is just general life for me), and calcium. So I know I really should be getting a little more of that in my diet.  I hope to fit in a bit of Yoga on the Wii Fit, and I am determined that I absolutely will complete that darn 30 day challenge that has gotten the better of me/life got in the way of a few times now.

So, here’s to hoping that I manage to do all these wonderful things I will do my best to keep you updated.

It’s almost bedtime so I’m going to be quick. Life is just so crazy you wouldn’t believe. Lots of family stuff is just taking over things, the other weekend we spent visiting my Father-in-law in hospital and the weekend before we were visiting him for Fathers day.

I really do mean to blog more, and I hope that I can do it more often than every month and a half!

For one, I never posted a picture of the finished quilt I made, and I was so incredibly chuffed at my hard work!

My current project (apart from trying to squeeze in sewing my very first item of clothing when I can!) is my “travel” binder which I made back last year:

Now you will have to excuse the poor quality Blackberry photos on these ones:

I bought some Moleskines. I just ADORE these books. Including these 3, I have a total of 5 now LOL!
I made a little pocket so I can slot the back of the book into it and have it in my binder.


and for the Moleskine which will be my travel journal, I made a cute title with my Craft Robo/Silhouette and some stickles.

I will be making some custom page protectors to fit in the binder to collect ephemera on our travels I’ll do that when I have the sewing machine out… when I get around to it LOL!

My cousin had a little girl last week, and as a little present I decided on a quilt… I saw this rainbow fat quarter in Hobby Craft and I fell in love! So much so, I’m not sure I’ll want to part with the quilt when it’s done LOL!  Who wouldn’t want a pretty rainbow to cheer them up every day?

I’ve cut 96 squares, and I’ve now got to sew them all together. The backing fabric will be pink (for a girl of course!) and white bias binding. My first quilt, I’m so excited!  And not forgetting all the other cool stuff:

(1) I’ve had an e-mail about my extra bobbin case. As I have a Brother sewing machine it will not do shirring so I have to get an extra bobbin case to adjust the tension and be able to do it! I will get to have my cute top after all!
(2) Free coffee cup album at twopeas
(3) Free eBook at Ella Publishing
(4) Gossiping with Kelly Ann about hairstyles for the wedding (She’s doing my hair and nails for me), scrapbooking, sewing and the colour GREEN   I have got to make her a little something from my left over green fabric
(5) Loooong weekend! I’m going to do some MAJOR spring cleaning, and I’m completely into Martha Stewart right now, she is just my idol at the moment I have a lever arch folder where I’m gathering things from Martha Stewart’s website and putting in the folder for safe keeping and easy referal later!

I spent this morning working on my wedding invites, I was literally sat in the bedroom with the sewing machine and silver thread sewing on my invites. It seems I don’t like to do things easily!  My geocaching book arrived today so once I had done that I sat and read it for a bit.

This then got me thinking about some stuff to put in caches when I next go. I don’t have anything really on hand and I have some silver fimo I’ve not used in a long time and I got to making some pendants/charms/zipper pulls (whatever they’ll be used for lol!) In my log reading experience it’s mainly guys and their kids who geocache that I’ve seen (not saying that’s all who does it, I mean look at me exhibit A!)  so why not take something back home for mummy/wife/girlfriend LOL!

And then while uploading the image, I realise I hadn’t uploaded the photo of my 2009 xmas ornament. What a donut! It’s a bottle cap with diamond glaze

I love books, and as you know I love journals as well, so when I stumbled upon Karla Dudley’s workshop “Journal 3 Ways” I was intregued… and then I saw the journals we would be making and the fact that there were cool downloads as well… That was it. I was sold.  So all images you see contain brushes and papers designed by Karla

The first journal (I still have to cut the edges so they’re level)

Then after I finished that one, I just had to make another using some lush paper I had left over from “Express Yourself  DIY”

Week two was the Perfect Bind method. I honestly didn’t think about binding books this way. But having said that, one of my favourite books (Cathy Zielske’s Clean and Simple Scrapbooking part 2) is bound using the perfect bind method… and several pages have come away from the book through excessive use lol. Although I’d say it’s not my number one, I had a ton of fun doing it, it looks just lush and I only lost 3 pages after binding

And like a completely numpty, I put the covers on the wrong way so the book is back to front… DOH!

I seriously want to do another one of these   I’ve got the book binding bug now, and I’m seriously going to be making a few more things!

There was no contest when I decided on which template I wanted to use to carve my pumpkin this year I wanted something pretty simple as this is only my third ever pumpkin, and my second using a template, but as I was soooo proud of my witch last year, I had to at least give it a go!

Template from here: http://www.pinkraygun.com/2009/10/10/free-pumpkin-carving-templates-twilights-jacob/. Although Gareth says he prefers my witch from last year, and he just doesn’t “see” Jacob in this one. I don’t care. It took me about 2 hours from start to finish.

And I also decided on doing a paper haunted house, after seeing a few on a website and thinking how cool they were. Apart from the pumpkin, I have no halloween stuff here, so the paper house would be fun, so again I chose a nice easy one

Download and instructions here: http://www.haunteddimensions.raykeim.com/index301.html

Sadly the lighting is terrible in here. This is why we can’t play with Neville this evening. Nev is our virtual pet, as seen here:

We saw an advert for EyePet and curiosity got the better of us. So we got a copy and played with it for aaaaaaaaaaaaages lol!

Hmm, I’ve not been a big fan of Autumn. Ever. Well sometimes with the back to school stuff and getting new stationary and clothes etc, but otherwise not really. I’ve always been a summer girl myself.  But Gareth gets the Next catalogue, and I can’t help but flick through it and sigh, thinking of getting some cute new outfits now the weather is chilly and the leaves are changing colour.  I even baked:

White choc chip cookies, which got the Gareth seal of approval. When I asked him if he liked them after he ate one, his reply was: “I’d like them even more if there was another one in my mouth…”

Even reading through my September issue of Creating Keepsakes, I stopped at the lovely red and brown coloured shoes at the “Hot fall trends (Let fashion trends inspire your creativity)” and have since left it on that page.  Now I’ve downloaded a freebie autumn kit and I plan on making a cute little “ode to autumn” mini book to place on my mini easel, once I’ve finished my Cathy class

Firstly, The images can be found here at this Crafster thread by “boo-zombie”:  http://www.craftster.org/forum/index.php?topic=299075.0

I’ve done the Quileute High Protectors shirt so far, for the pricely sum of £1.47 and I’ve had the transfer paper for a while now, so I won’t count that, but the top was from Primark. It’s not 100% cotton though, so the image has cracked, and it smudged after the backing moved and I accidentally caught it with the iron… Doh!  Still, I have 2 more shirts from Matalan (£3 each) to have a go at the Forks Spartans one.

I’ve actually bookmarked some freezer paper on ebay, although someone has mentioned that Hobby Craft do it, so I might just check out my local HC sometime.  The best news is we’re moving to nice clean offices, within walking distance of HC. I can imagine I will spend many winter lunches there!

In the meantime, I’m about to jump in the shower and put on some new PJs.  My favourite pair (I’ve had since 2002) have got a hole in the knee. They’ll last a little longer but I have a new pair and a Nightie… I don’t do nighties lol, so want to give it a go, and some new fluffy white slippers. Then I have a Yankee Candle wax tart burning in the background.  Been a pretty good Sunday!

I ended up doing the buttercup bag again

and I made some accessories

Ok, so I had the jelly bracelets already from my Primary School days when we all used to trade them up, and for a pack of black jellies I ended up with purple and day glow green (one is glittery) which go well with my bag

This morning it was down Attwools again, this time with mum and dad. Saturday afternoon dad put the Lichfield/Kelly tent up for us, and for a few days it will do us alright but I’ve been saying for ages the living area is a bit of a push as it’s not quite what I would consider big enough should we have traditional British Summer weather and be stuck in the tent (I suppose we could head to the club house in normal circumstances, but our £1 a night deal doesn’t include entertainment passes…) Don’t get me wrong, it’s a good tent But more of a weekender than a holiday tent.

So at Attwoolls, dad was buying some more guyline pegs but was, as it turns out, eyeing up some tents at the same time. He very nearly bought this lovely tent called the Tetbury. Only the gap at the bottom was quite horrific – there was no little flaps at the bottom to let water run away from the tent and to keep out drafts otherwise he would have bought it. Right next to that tent was my beloved Chatsworth which he really liked too – only the price was as off putting for him as it was for us.  We browsed at one in the Argos catalogue, the Lichfield Mohawk. But upon closer inspection, realised the living area wasn’t all that great as it sloped and was on a diagonal as well (but in my opinion, still better than the one he has).  Back at my parents house we browsed online, but seriously cannot find a better tent to suit than the Chatsworth… or a tent like the Tetbury but with a sewn in groundsheet.  Ugh.

Still, dad seems convinced that we’ll have a new tent to go away with, which in itself is really funny as he had told me and Gaz that we didn’t need to buy anything as he had it all already. Maybe when he put the tent up on Saturday he realised what I had been saying about the living area size? Who knows lol.

On Thurday we had a power cut.  Luckily Big Bang Theory had just finished and we were getting ready to get up and start going to bed when the TV switched off. I assumed Gaz had sat on the remote lol, but upon closer inspection the power had gone off completely. Dad gave us a wind up torch for when we go camping, so it came in handy! The bedroom was lit by 3 tealight candles, and I went outside to check on neighbours and see if their electric had gone too as the power on the other side of our cul-de-sac was still on.  Turns out my cousin 2 roads over had lost her power and the near by hotel was out too. We woke up to 3 mobile alarms, although our main alarm powered by electric still went off, dispite the fact I haven’t changed the back up batteries since I got it a good 7 years or more ago lol. It just wasn’t displaying the time, but the radio still worked and so did the alarm (note to self – change batteries!) We woke up the next morning at find the power was still out. We couldn’t use our landline either as that’s electric so everything was done by mobile, so I rang mum who came up to put freezer packs in our fridge/freezer – we had only gone shopping on Thursday evening and filled it up… We were petrified we were going to lose all that food!!

The power did come back on eventually at 11am… 13 hours after it had gone off. Yikes! Luckily everything in the fridge was fine