Summer Holiday Crafts - Day 5

Whilst away on holiday we bought this book - 'Make Your Own Misfits'.

The book is full of bizarre creatures made from scraps and odds and ends. Lara decided she liked the look of Bernie, George & Denzil the worms.

We should have used an old sock to make them but not having the right colour old socks we instead made our worms from some scraps of pink fleece fabric left over from a previous craft project. 

They were quite fiddly to turn and stuff, but we managed, and after adding beads for eyes and embroidery thread mouths our worms were made

Bernie .....

George .....

 and Denzil.

Scrapology August Layout Challenge - N is for Netting

HELLO! I'M BACK!. We returned yesterday from a 2 week break on the Isle of Wight (I'll post some photos from our trip on my photography blog over the coming days) and are now relaxed, refreshed and recharged and ready to start more Summer Holiday Craft next week.

Whilst we were away a new layout challenge was launched on Scrapology. The design team took inspiration from a gorgeous layout by Toni who goes by the online name of '2dogs'. The challenge to blog readers is to use Toni's layout (or the sketch drawn by Lynn) to create a layout and as an added challenge you are asked to include NET in your layout.

For my layout I decided to scrapbook some photos taken at my niece's wedding last October.

I used paper's from Prima's 2011 Madeline Collection and an assortment of flowers - some silk, some paper and some fussy cut from more Prima paper. The circular doilie shapes were cut from paper, punched around the edges with a border punch, inked and then these and other parts of the layout were embellished with liquid pearls. I also printed and cut out some butterflies from the Swirlydoos website. 

The net I used on my layout was Bazzill Tulle. I've used this tulle loads of times before on cards and layouts and love it! it is so soft and pliable and stays just where you put it. It makes perfect bows.

Here's Toni's original layout .......... 

..... and the sketch.

Do pop along to Scrapology and see all the design team layouts. We hope you will join the fun and enter the challenge by creating a layout using the sketch or layout as inspiration and some netting. Jill at Cardinal Colours has come up with another fabulous prize this month - A4 pieces of textured netting, 2 each yellow, orange, pink and purple and liquid pearls in rouge. royal blue, cantaloupe, majestic purple and baby blue.

Summer Holiday Crafts - day 4

Today's craft was very simple. I printed onto thin card some Angry Birds models from the Little Plastic Man blog for Lara to make up. They were very easy to make and kept Lara happy for the afternoon.

Hope you have enjoyed seeing our craft activities this week. We are now going to take a little break from crafting to recharge our crafty batteries and to seek out some more projects ..... but WE WILL BE BACK SOON.

Summer Holiday Crafts - day 3

Today we had another go at a craft we tried last summer - Wet Felting. Readers of my blog may remember the felt beads we made last year. This year through Pinterest I found  some super little felt turtles on the Yours 'til Niagra Falls blog, and as Lara is a fan of turtles I thought she would like to try making some.


We used some Merino Wool Rovings bought for just under a fiver on Ebay and some scraps of felt.

We took some of the wool and wound it into ball about 1.5" round. 


We then took a tiny bit of liquid soap and some hot water and started to roll the felt ball in our hands - like you would roll a ball of play dough.

We continued doing this, rinsing the ball and our hands under the hot water from time to time and gradually the ball became thicker and smaller.

 Once the balls were fairly hard we then started rinsing the balls in cold water too. This had the effect of shocking the wool and made it shrink even smaller until we had a small hard ball of felt.

The balls were then cut in half to make turtle shells and put on a tray outside in the sunshine to dry.

Once the shells had dried we cut bodies from felt scraps and glued the shells on top. We should have embroidered their eyes but instead decided to just mark them with a Promarker pen. 

Our 16 finished turtles. A few of the shells weren't perfect but they still look sweet.

Summer Holiday Crafts - day 2

Today's summer holiday craft was a jewellery project. A few months ago I bought a Shambala Bracelet kit online and so today Lara had a go at making it.


She struggled at first to follow the instructions, but after checking a video on You Tube she quickly got the hang of it.

The finished bracelet.

She enjoyed making the bracelet so much and hasn't taken it off since finishing it so I've ordered another kit (all blue) so she can make one again some time .... and perhaps I might get to make one too.


( Linda has asked where I ordered the bracelet kits from - I ordered from Bijoux By Me. 2 kits currently cost £7 + p&p in their summer sale.)   

Summer Holiday Crafts - day 1

Last summer Lara and I had a summer of craft. Most days during the school summer holidays we made, created and crafted all sorts of handmade goodies. Of course Lara remembered this and so has been asking me almost daily in the lead up to this years summer holiday to 'do more craft'.


So, not wanting to disappoint (and with the help of Pinterest) I have a few projects up my sleeve for the coming weeks.


Today's inspiration came from Marthaafterhours.blogspot.com . I love the chicken army on the blog and thought Lara would too. So after scouring the Internet for instructions on how to make the chicken beanbags and with a few left over scraps of fabric, a bag of split peas, some wadding, buttons and some felt we set about creating our own chickens.

Lara decided that she should make 4 chickens to spell out her name. Cute!

Scrapology - July Card Challenge

Today is card challenge day on Scrapology. Marion Emberson of Sugar & Spice Crafts has set this months challenge which is to get out your embossing powders and heat gun and create a card using HEAT EMBOSSING.

Heat embossing isn't something have done often so this challenge really was a challenge to me! Instead of embossing a stamped image I decided I would use embossing powders to emboss a die cut shape.

I found a butterfly which I had cut sometime ago using a friend's Marianne Creatables Butterfly die. I inked the butterfly quite heavily with a Versamark ink pad and then embossed it with black powder. The powder gave the butterfly a shiny almost plastic appearance. 

I printed a Word Art quote from 'Create with TLC' onto white card and after matting this on black card mounted the quote and the butterfly onto a card blank covered with black card and paper from October Afternoon's 'Fly a Kite' collection. I finished the card with Heidi Swapp small flower jewels, black ribbon and a diamante ribbon buckle from Mei Flowers.

Please pop over to Scrapology to see the rest of the Design Teams cards and hopefully you'll feel inspired to take part in the challenge.

Olympic Torch Relay

Today we braved the wet weather to go and see the Olympic Torch Relay go through our nearby town of Letchworth Garden City. It was VERY wet and umbrellas were the order of the day but we waited patiently with all the other people who had gathered to see the torch pass by. Instead of going into the town centre we chose to stand on a quieter residential part of the route and got a clear road side view.

Before the main event there was a convoy of Relay Partner Vehicles: 

Coca-Cola

Samsung

and Lloyds TSB

There were lots of police cars and motor cycles - all high fiving the spectators as they drove past. When the rain got really heavy this poor chap had to stop in the middle of the road and in front of the many people watching to put his waterproofs on. Have you ever seen a policeman try to quickly put tight waterproof trousers on over the top of his regular trousers in front of a crowd of people laughing and cheering at him? Poor chap gave a bow at the end to a round of applause.

There were also the many  BMW Olympic Torch Relay support cars and the Coaches carrying all the torch bearers for the day and the support staff.

Finally, and more of less on time, the torch passed by being carried by John Harris who was nominated for coaching sport in schools and clubs. By the time he passed by it was absolutely pouring with rain (as you can see from this photo) but he still had a smile on his face and was waving at the crowd as he ran by.

Despite the rain it was a good morning and we were glad we made the effort to go and watch.

Scrapology Layout Challenge - Y is for Yarn

Thanks to anyone who crossed their fingers yesterday for the dance competition. Unfortunately Lara's school didn't win but they had a fun day and their performance was great. Such wonderful memories created. 

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

This month on Scrapology, the team chose a stunning layout by Gabrielle Polloco as it's inspiration and challenge readers to also take inspiration from the layout and incorporate YARN in their layout.

I decided to scrapbook a photo of my youngest son taken 8 years ago whilst we were strawberry picking. 

I used patterned papers from Simple Stories 100 Days of Summer Collection as well as a jounalling card, title strip and cardstock stickers also from the collection. The 'PYO Sweet & Juicy Strawberries' picture was downloaded from the internet and I think it co-ordinated with the Simple Stories papers perfectly. For my yarn I pulled some threads from a piece of hessian and used this to make some bunting, tie on a button and also to tie the title strip to the layout. To add some dimension to the layout the title strip was mounted on 3D foam and I cut the cloud from the strip and mounted this on some more foam. 

My layout is very different from Gabrielle's original layout and probably more like the sketch which is also available as inspiration.

Gabrilelle's layout .................

............. and the sketch.

Once again there will be a fabulous prize for the challenge winner so hop on over to Scrapology and join in the fun.

Dance Make Your Move

Please cross your fingers for my daughter today. Last weekend her little village school competed in the Red Cross 'Dance Make Your Move' dance competition. They won their heat and today they are competing in the Regional Finals. If they manage to win today it means that in 2 weeks they will be off to the O2 for the National Final.

My New Car

I have become a really sloooooow scrapbooker. This layout was started in April and has only just been finished! It was almost finished in April but has been sat staring at me ever since. I felt it needed something else and it wasn't until this week after I added some chevrons that I could finally say it was finished. Still not entirely happy with it but its done and I am putting it away.

I used Doodlebug Crushed Velvet Patterned Cardstock, Bazzill Cardstock, a page torn from an outdated road atlas (shhh don't tell DH!), road signs and journal boxes printed from the internet and self adhesive gems. The chevrons and title were cut on the Craftrobo.

Thank you My Minds Eye

Today I am a happy bunny!


A couple of weeks ago I was lucky enough to win a giveaway on the My Minds Eye Blog and it arrived today all the way from America.


I had been told I'd won a 'collection pack' of my choice (I chose 'Sunny Side Up') and was expecting a paper pack. Imagine my surprise and excitement this morning when this lot turned up! The complete product line.

As well as 12 x 12 papers there are TWO 6 x 6 paper pads, 1 12 x 12 sheets of die cuts accents, 1 12 x 12 sheet of chipboard accents,  a pack of decorative brads and a pack of layered stickers. I'm in heaven!

My Minds Eye have always been one of my favourite manufacturers but after this generous gift they are now firmly placed at the top of my list. Thank you My Minds Eye.

Scrapology - June Card Challenge

Today is Card Challenge Day on Scrapology and this month Hels Sheridan has challenged the design team and blog readers to 'Make it Vintage'

My card was inspired by a vintage image I downloaded from the Internet. 

I added the image to a tag which I had already covered in script paper and then decorated the tag with an assortment of butterflies, ribbon and lace and a sentiment printed on the computer. Machine stitching was also added to add some interest.

The tag was then put onto a 6x6 square card to which I had added a sheet of papers from Websters Pages. The card was finished off with buttons, faux pearls and more machine stitching.

The challenge will run until the 15th July, so pop on over to Scrapology and check out the details.

Awww , who says romance is dead?

I saw a link to this video on May Flaum's blog and  after watching it I just had to post it here. Enjoy.

Scrapology Layout Challenge - W is for White Space

Today is new Challenge Day on Scrapology and this month we scraplifted a great layout by Rô Phillipsen which was based on a sketch from Pagemaps. The layout featured White Space so that is the featured technique. 


I choose to use some very old photos of Lara taken when she was only about 18 months old and was very interested in some Sunflowers I had bought.

I used Bazzill Cardstock and patterned papers from Echo Park's 'Life if Good' and 'A Walk in the Park' collections. The leaves were cut on the Craft Robo and the sunflower seed packet was downloaded and printed from the internet. I also added a few buttons and the pre-made sunflower embelishments came as part of a kit I bought from QVC years ago.

Here is Rô's original layout ............

........... and the Pagemaps sketch.

Please do go and visit Scrapology and see the rest of the teams layouts and  perhaps join in the challenge. Just use the sketch to create a layout with some white space.