Children's Craft Party

Waaaaaay back in December, I rashly agreed to run a children's birthday party at ZigZags in Coleford - obviously I was distracted, as entertaining a group of 9 year olds given I have no experience of what they can do and might like isn't something I'd usually have agreed to quite so readily!

However yesterday afternoon rolled around scarily quickly and so on I ploughed.

The girls had decided they wanted to make things for their teddies. What exactly was up to me.

I had a bit of a play with some of my the kids teddies and came up with two options for the girls to make - waistcoats or bags for their teddies.

What I should have done was come up with things that I could draw templates for so that the girls could each have had a template to work from. As it was, the 2 Mum's who stayed to help and I had to spend the first 45 mins going round each girl in turn and cut out their waistcoats because of course, all the bears were different sizes!

No-one seemed to mind, but I think next time (Nex time? Brave? or possibly just silly!) I'd try to plan activities that meant they could get straight on without everyone having to wait get started.

Despite my initial nerves and misgivings, the party went really well, the parents were happy, the birthday girl and her friends were all very happy - phew!

So, here is the result of 11 girls beavering away for an hour and a half:

They looked fab! Because I've taken the pics on my phone you can't see all the detail, but they'd really gone all out and decorated their bears' accessories brilliantly! (and now I've got the Jungle Book song, 'The Bear Necessities' in my head!)

And then after they'd gone, I turned round and this was the scene that greeted me! The chaos they left behind:

And this was after the Mum had done a good 5 mins of tidying up!!!

Still... I'm feeling brave (silly?) so I've said to the lovely owner of the shop that I will do more parties if she gets any interest. What am I letting myself in for?

As usual, I'm linking this up to the lovely Handmade Monday party over at Wendy's Handmade Harbour Blog

Tutorial....How to Make an Orange Candle

All my lovely Facebook fans, will know that I posted a pic of a recent make on Wednesday morning. This make was slightly different to my usual makes, in that it consisted of an orange and some olive oil!

I saw this first on Pinterest and for once when I said I'd seen something cool on Pinterest and described it to my husband, he'd actually already heard of this one!

So here's what you'll need:

An orange (any size)
Olive Oil
A knife
Matches (at least 5 in my experience!)

First of all, making sure you go through the skin only and not the flesh, carve all the way round the middle of the orange like so:

Then ease your thumb under into the slit and slide your thumb round the inside of the orange peel, so that you peel the skin away, without tearing into the skin.

Then you need to gently pull the peel off the orange flesh, like this:

You need to do the same for both sides, so that you have two empty orange peel halves and then you need to pour a little bit of the oil into the side of the orange peel that has the 'wick'

I've trimmed a bit of the 'wick' off as it was quite long and might have scorched the top half of the orange:

Then, although a bit of the top half of the peel has come away with the flesh, I've cut a bigger hole in the top so that again, the flame doesn't scorch the top of the orange

 Then it's time (once the oil has had a chance to sink into the pith) to try and light your candle. I usually find that I'm too impatient and haven't left it for long enough to soak up the wick properly, so it takes about 5 attempts to light!

Once lit, put the top half of your orange on:

And turn off the lights, to get the full effect!

 It should last for about half an hour, depending on the size of orange & how much oil you've used

Gorgeous!

Hope you enjoy and I'd love to see pics of ones you make.

Craft fail!

But it's sort of come good - thank gawd!

Well, what with all the lovely snow we've had this weekend in the Forest of Dean (Gloucestershire)

The view out of my dining room window

My daughter Seren (aged 4) announced on Friday morning, over breakfast and talking about snowman building, that her gloves didn't fit and could I please make her some more to go out in, TODAY! Talk about pressure!

So I drew round her hand, enlarged the template a bit and off I went. Here's the first attempt:

Possibly the right side for a doll!

That'll teach me not to make the first attempt out of the final material you want to use!!

So take 2:

Fine finger size, but the wrist opening would barely fit a newborn!

By this time, I was sweating, cursing, running out of thread and material.... the kids were champing at the bit to get out into the snow and my husband was getting bored with trying to keep them entertained inside, so I decided that mittens were the way forward. That's when I realised I didn't have enough of the original, more interesting material :-(

So out we went with Seren sporting these, tucked into her coat sleeves as I'd not had time to russle up any elastic!

The kids' first snowman

Not very happy with them though, I spent most of Friday night embellishing them, so they now look like this (still missing the elastic though!)

I'm quite happy now with them (though it would have been a lot quicker to sew the patterned bit on first!) and thankfully Seren loves them... but of course now Patrick wants some (in pink to match his sister's, of course!)

This week is the 100th Handmade Monday so keep your eyes peeled on Wendy's lovely blog for some wonderful surprises :-)

Giving up the Day Job...

... Means that I can do all those really exciting things like:

- The laundry
- The weekly shop
- Go to Weight Watchers
- Tidying the house.....

But it also means I can spend more time doing cool things like making these gorgeous baby booties (these are actually for a friend's baby, but they will also get listed as a made to order item in my shop):

 and then embellishing them with rockets and planets :-)

It is SO nice to be able to say 'I LOVE my job'!

Now I've got to get on with my tax return - I've been putting it off!

But in between I'll be catching up with everyone over on the Handmade Monday link up :-)

Too early to be thinking about St Patrick's Day?

Photo courtesy of Luxpresso.com

Happy New Year!

I hope you've all had a wonderful Christmas and New Year - any sore heads out there today? I'm feeling a little delicate after a great evening at our place with some good friends, homemade curry (well, as the diet started today we thought last night should be a decent blow out!) and lots of yummy wine, champagne, toffee vodka and Baileys!

So as with all good hangovers, we've been talking about future plans and the usual resolutions and I started thinking about all the exciting things I can do with my business now that I am able to dedicate all my energies (when not being a wife, parent, housekeeper, chauffeur, cook, cleaner.... you get the picture?!) to it.

So I started thinking about Valentine's and St Patrick's Days... I think I will plan some new product lines which have the same items at their centre, but each will focus on the different celebration... so far I am thinking about VW Campervans and VW Beetles as the central items - they are certainly some of my best sellers, but I was also thinking about Mini Coopers and possibly Morris Minors.

Photo courtesy of Skybluefreelance.info

Photo courtesy of Classicandperformancecar.com

What other vehicles do you think would work well in felt?

The lovely thing about the car/campervan range is that they can be personalised, which is great for gift giving and they're a bit different which thankfully seems to appeal to folk!

Anyway, right now I have to get my house guests up (for the second time - they've all had to retire to bed for the afternoon!) and find something for my kids to eat for dinner.... ahhhh the life of a working mum :-)

12 Days of Christmas... Gift Guides

The wonderful team that I am part of on Etsy have some tireless leaders who have been working very hard to provide 12 gift guides for the 12 Days of Christmas and each day focuses on a different topic.

I've been meaning to blog about the wonderful collections that Erika (one of the aforementioned tireless leaders) has been putting together, but first I thought I'd share some of the wonderful jewellery that Erika makes & sells in her lovely shop and the profits for which she very generously gives to charity:

Beaded Leather Wrap Bracelet

Sky Blue Necklace, Handcrafted Lampwork Beads & Sterling Silver

Felt Ball Earrings, Sterling Silver & Merino Wool

All the above are on my wishlist should anyone be after ideas for presents for moi ;-)

The Gift Guides that Erika has been producing are collections of items all handmade by the very talented makers within the team and you will be spoiled for choice no matter who you are buying for!

The 12 Days of Christmas Gift Guides can be found on the official Craft Britannia blog and (so far) they include 

Stocking Fillers

Gifts for Toddlers

Gifts for Little Boys

Gifts for Little Girls

Secret Santa Ideas

Cards & Gift Wrap Ideas

Gifts for Her

Gifts for Him

Decoration Ideas

Baby Presents

Sorry for the lack of pictures from the Team CB blog, but my blog knows it's Friday and wants me to stop working now!

Have a great weekend all 

xxx

PS. Although technically not so much about my handmade makes, this is going to be my post for the last Handmade Monday of the year as I haven't quite got the time to squeeze another post in on time!

So for anyone who doesn't pay us a visit till the next Handmade Monday - I hope you have a wonderful Christmas & New Year!

Felty Christmas Tree Ornaments Tutorial

I thought it was about time I did another tutorial and as I'm completely in the festive mood, I thought I'd share a Christmassy one with you... how to make a Christmas tree ornament for your Christmas Tree!

You will need:

2 squares of dark green felt
1 small square of dark brown felt
2 small squares of white felt
I piece of ribbon
Assorted sequins
Dark green embroidery thread (2 strands)
White embroidery thread (2 strands)
Gold/silver/white embroidery thread (1 strand)
Small amount of toy stuffing (you could use cotton wool if you don't have any toy stuffing)
Scissors
Pins
Templates (see end of the tutorial)

I Forgot to add the ribbon to the picture of the supplies

So here it is on its own

Step 1:

Print out the templates, there are two tree sizes, you can start with either - just make sure you use the corresponding tree trunk piece & the snow piece.

Pin the tree template to the two pieces of dark green felt and cut out. Pin the corresponding trunk template to the dark brown template and cut out. Pin the snow template to the pieces of white felt and cut out.

Tree template pinned to both pieces of green felt

Trunk template

Snow for top of tree

Step 2:

Sew white felt onto one of the green tree pieces, don't sew too close to the edge, so you have space to sew the green pieces together (see photo at Step 3) repeat for the other piece. These will now become the outer pieces of your tree ornament.

Next using the single strand of embroidery thread (in whichever colour you have chosen) sew on your sequins to both outer pieces of the tree.

Step 3:

Once you've got all your sequins sewn onto both pieces of tree, it's time to sew the tree pieces together. Take your trunk piece and fold in half, and insert the raw ends in between the two tree pieces and using a blanket stitch, sew round the outside until you get to the top.

In order to blanket stitch close the tree at the top, where the white snow has been sewn on, fold back the white felt as you go round the top, like this:

This is why you don't want to sew the white piece of felt too close to the edge.

Then take your piece of ribbon and fold in two, then place it inside your trees. (Sorry - I forgot to take a photo of this bit!)

Then continue to sew round the tree until you get to the bottom corner:

This is where you poke in your toy stuffing or cotton wool, so that the ornament is lightly padded.

Then you sew up the opening and tie a knot in your thread... and Hey Presto!

If you follow this link to THE TEMPLATES, you will find both templates, at full size, although of course you could enlarge them if you wanted to.

I hope you enjoyed this tutorial - it is for personal use only, so please feel free to make as many of these as you like for friends and family, but please don't produce trees to sell or reproduce any/all of this tutorial without crediting it back to me. Thanks :-)

I am linking up to the Handmade Monday over at Wendy's fabulous blog, sorry for missing last week, but I was struggling with getting my stock up and ready for the Handmade Makers Market in Oxford! The event took place yesterday... so watch this space for pics of my stall and the low-down on how it went.

Christmas Wreath Giveaway Prize

Do you remember, many moons ago, (nearly a whole month ago - when I wasn't entirely grey!) I held a giveaway, to celebrate my 1st year anniversary?

Well I have finally finished the prize! The prize was for a wreath, based on whatever theme the recipient wanted... Claire, the lovely lady who won the giveaway, said she would like a 'wintery scene' on her wreath, so this is what I came up with:

I am totally in love with it and will be making another one, which will be taking pride of place in my living room for the festive season!

I have listed it, as a made to order item in my shop and can be ordered for posting within the UK up to December 18th.

Final posting dates are up in my shop announcement and there is also a special sale happening this coming weekend... it's something that is very popular in The States, and because Etsy is an American site, they are heavily promoting all who take part. It's call the 'Black Friday & Cyber Monday' sale. Black Friday being the day after Thanksgiving and when traditionally a lot of Americans start thinking about Christmas in earnest, having got Thanksgiving out of the way.

The sale runs from 9am (GMT) on Friday 23rd November until 9am (GMT) Tuesday 27th November 2012 and using the code CYBER2012 you can get 10% off all purchases in my shop.

I'm off now to check out all the lovely Handmade Monday posts

Simmi xx

Shall I Tell You A Secret?

A really BIG secret?

Are you sure you're ready????

I'VE JUST HANDED IN MY NOTICE AT THE DAY JOB!!!!!!!!!!!

J

Can you tell that I'm pleased and rather excited?!

I've got a million and one things to do before I go at the end of December but I just want to dance about and sing!

I was planning to leave in the Summer as that'll be when Seren's gearing up to go to school and it'll be all change, so it seemed like a good time, but I've been getting more and wound up and stressed about not having enough time for every aspect of my life, so we've managed to work the finances out so that the kids can carry on at their nursery (with slightly reduced hours) and I will have 3 days a week to dedicate to the business come the New Year.

I am really looking forward to it as I get very frustrated to have so many ideas and not enough hours in the day to achieve even half of it!

Sorry for the lack of pictures and lots of waffle!

Handmade Makers Market

Yikes! I've just realised that I've got just over 2 weeks till the Handmade Makers Market in Oxford and I'm in a little bit of a panic about having enough stock!

I haven't done a craft fair or a market since the summer one, but to get the stall looking as full as this:

I had to spend every spare minute of my 2 week holiday in Ireland, with the out-laws (nah, my lovely in-laws!) designing and sewing.... HOWEVER.... for the next 2 and a half weeks I'm working, looking after my kids and going away for a child-free weekend to London! The words 'Oh Bugger' are currently reverberating round my head!

I think I'm going to have to start geeing myself up with lots of coffee and because sewing seems better done in the mornings.... lots of early alarm calls!

Photo: www.etsy.com/shop/HopePhotoArt

Belatedly off to join the Handmade Monday link up and visit all the other lovely blogs (when I should be making!)

Handmade Monday

I've decided to take the plunge and join something I've been reading about for a while - Handmade Monday which takes place, yes you guessed right, every Monday on the fantastic Handmade Harbour blog.

This post is to join in on the 91st Handmade Monday and it was after reading the gorgeous blog post from a fellow Etsian, Natalie from Free Spirit Designs which also featured my Poppy Appeal Brooch that I decided to join in.

Poppy Broch - all proceeds of sales during October & November are going to the Royal British Legion.

But today I wanted to share my newest VW Campervan, which has been designed for a wedding! The lovely customer who's bought it is the sister of the Groom and she was able to sneakily find out what colour Campervan the couple have hired to be their wedding car and so I've been commissioned to match their cuddly camper to it! Such a lovely idea.... what do you think?

Wedding car to hire from Beetles About

My Campervan complete with ribbons

It would seem a lot of people are choosing to incorporate Campervans into their wedding plans, so I'm hoping this will become an integral part of the VW range.... watch this space for more news!