Nini Makes

Last minute make

Make these spontaneous patchwork angels to hang on the tree or to tie to gifts. Yet another way to use up more scraps and the unfinished edges mean these ornaments are quick and easy to make.

 Here's how:

1. 
   
   Click here to download this template and cut out the ornament pattern
2. Cut out two pieces of fabric larger than your ornament template
3. Take one of the pieces of fabric and using a small zig-zag stitch, sew scraps all over the piece of fabric going in any direction - be sure each edge of each scrap is stitched down
4. Cut a piece of felt or heavy interfacing out using the smaller, inner template of your ornament pattern
5. On the unstitched piece of fabric trace your ornament template in fine pencil or water soluble pen, then flip it over, tape it to a window so the light shines through it and trace the template on the other side (the tracing should be in the same position on both sides of the fabric)
6. Add a tiny bit of glue to your felt piece and center it in the middle of one side of the tracing and let it dry for a couple of minutes
7. Lay your zig-zag patchwork fabric on top of the other fabric (patchwork side up) sandwiching the felt shape inside
8. Pin a looped ribbon or string, loop pointing up, inside the sandwiched pieces at the top of the ornament template
9. Pin the pieces together, turn them with the plain fabric facing up and stitch around the tracing marks using a straight or zig-zag stitch
10. Trim the fabric right up to the edge of the outer stitching, finished!

Note: Try embroidering a name, message or date on the plain backing fabric before gluing the felt shape on the opposite side and pinning your pieces together.

The down-loadable template includes a few different simple shapes which can be used in many different ways. Tristan and Gracie have been colouring, cutting and gluing them today.

I hope, unlike me, everyone is very organized and ready for Christmas, then you'll have time to whip up this simple project.

Also, thanks to Annet for sharing her Tree Family wall hanging with me.

I love the ornament earrings she gave the mama tree and the spotty, snowy fabric she used. Visit Annet's blog Fat-Quarter to see more of her fantastic quilting and patchwork pieces.

Hope you're all cuddled up with your families, or your cat and are keeping warm.

Night-night!

"Winter... is the time for home"

Winter is the time for comfort, for good food and warmth, for the touch of a friendly hand and for a talk beside the fire:  it is the time for home.  Edith Sitwell

Wherever home may be, it's lovely to be snuggled up with friends and family during short days and long winter nights.

We had a wonderful weekend with friends and family back in Kent. Celebrating birthdays, the season and an early Christmas. Happily we made it there and back in the snowy conditions, only needing to be towed out by friends once during our stay. We were lucky to have a chance to meet up with lots of friends and enjoyed lots of laughs, cozy fires and more than a little mulled wine.

I caught the friendly robin above enjoying a little bird seed we set out on some unused clay pots. These are just under the apple feeders we made.

Dianne's crab apples brighten up the fresh snow.

Snowy scene at Claudia's

Back at home in Hampshire the snow fell harder and treacherous roads have kept us housebound, but we don't mind there are snowmen to be made, bread to bake and birds to watch.

Too bad we have no ice skates.

I'm also enjoying looking through some recent bookshop purchases. We have a fantastic antiquarian bookshop nearby, when I go in I have a very hard time coming back out. This is one of my recent favourites, it's about British trees but it also incorporates the plants and wildlife in hedgerows, an integral part of the English countryside.

On the craft front, if you like robins like I do, try this little tutorial from a couple of years back; it's a fun project on a snowy, winters day.

I hope you're all snuggled up and warm enjoying the season like we are!

Snowy days, winter craft and feeding the birds

The snow has come and is settling a little, just enough to get the children squealing in anticipation - it's not time for the sled just yet but the forecast says there's much more on the way.

T and G are into all sorts of making. Each year they bring out the clay for ornaments, this year the ornaments took on new dimensions. If we had any normal flour in the house we'd have tried Sonia's cinnamon scented salt dough recipe.

In addition to the clay there has been much sculpting with paper, stories written and illustrated, bird feeders made, a song written and a puppet theatre backdrop designed. It's only Wednesday - phew!

I haven't been allowed to show any more than these activities, Gracie is apparently saving the rest for her own website.

 

These impromptu bird feeders were thrown together with apples instead of the pine-cones we normally use. The friendly woodpecker at the left is enjoying one of our feeders from a couple of years back.

Tomorrow we'll be making some of our favourite seasonal gifts to take away with us at the weekend. These pomanders fill the house with lovely spicy scent, we make them every year. Here are some quick tips for making your own.

We're headed to Kent for a birthday celebration (Happy Birthday to Claudia and Ian) and also an early Christmas with my lovely in-laws. Maybe I'll return with some snowy images to share, today my ailing camera wasn't up to the job.

Enjoy a restful weekend everyone. 

 

 

It's starting to feel a lot like Christmas

School's out for Christmas break, today we got the tree and the holiday festivities are in full swing. I've had this Robertson's marmalade lid sitting on my work table for months with the aim of putting a tiny silhouette in it and today was the day. When the Christmas tree is up later it will be our newest ornament addition.

We followed Rachel's suggestion for peppermint bark earlier this week and made it for the teachers. Ours doesn't look as pretty as the batch Rachel showed us, or the one in the original recipe at Brown Eyed Baker. We used Green & Blacks white chocolate which has small bits of vanilla in it and it's very yellow – but I can tell you it was very tasty regardless of it's less than perfect appearance.

Also, I got into the habit of melting chocolate in the microwave, why, I don't know. This time because of  the large quantity of chocolate I popped it in a huge stainless steel bowl and put it over a giant pot of boiling water so the kids could do all the stirring and watch the melting process happen more easily. They loved it - probably their favourite culinary adventure to date, I highly recommend it.

We made jars like these on the right for gifting the peppermint bark, a pattern for them is coming soon ;)

Tiny tutorial
The silhouette project above was very easy but it was so tiny to cut that I gave up after several tries and decided to Photoshop her instead. It was very easy to do and I'm sure any image editing program would work, here's how to do it:

• Measure the inside of your lid to find out what size you'd like the image to be, mine was just under 2.5" or about 6cm in diameter.
• Photograph your subject in profile against a plain, light background then open the image in your image editing program.
• Reduce your image to a size that will fit within your lid and save it to 300 pixels per inch.
• Select the light background and then invert it. In Photoshop you would select the background with the magic wand then choose "Select" from the menu, then "Inverse." This step will make your subject selected.
• Lastly fill the selection of the subject with black (make sure the background is white)
• Print it out on to heavy weight paper, cut it into a circle (fitting the diameter of your lid) around the subject and glue it to the inside of the lid.
• Glue a looped ribbon to the back, finished.

Note: Gimp is a very good, free image editing program, I'm not that familiar with all of it's features but I bet it could handle the simple tasks for this project. Also, cutting the silhouette out probably would have worked with manicure scissors, my embroidery scissors were not tiny enough.

Now I'm hoping my boy will pose for his profile so we can have a matched set, but now I must make a start on some Christmas cards.

Quick advent calendar

I'm resurrecting this advent calendar idea from a couple of years back. It was first made for a craft magazine and the editor liked colourful materials so we used Christmas themed paper. I think we'll use newspaper this year (we'll sift through our recycle pile to find some without horrible headlines.) Or we'll paint newspaper or brown craft paper for a colourful but more rustic look.

For a different magazine I made these packets and a twig tree using tracing paper, that would be fun to use for the bunting too.

We like to create little activities, riddles, or jokes instead of sweets or chocolate because we find there are already plenty of sugary goodies around every where this time of year. Making up knock-knock jokes is big with my two at the moment so I think the bunting might be stuffed with several of them.

If you're as far behind schedule as I am this year and you'd like to make advent bunting here's a handy template for you. Just trace the template on paper of your choice, fold on the dotted lines and punch holes in each one to hang. Here's what you need:

long twine to tie the bunting to • paper for folding • ribbon or string to tie the bunting to the twine • small sweets or chocolate coins and/or lots of jokes, riddles and activities

Have a great Monday everyone, I think I might spy some sun peeking out from behind a black cloud - things are looking up around here but I won't be taking my wellies off just yet.

It's raining, it's pouring

During my absence we've been hit with serious rain and wind but nothing like up north in Cumbria. Our thoughts are with all of those affected by the terrible floods.

As you can see by the dim light in the photo above, it's still raining here and this poor dolly is waiting for me to get off the computer to put on her hair and make her a dress. She's a larger version of Gracie's doll and will be going off to Oz for the Softies for Mirabel project. I hope Royal Mail won't take too long getting her there as I'm cutting it quite close.

I've kind of been Christmas crafting. A package of projects to help other crafters with their last minute  gift list has been keeping me busy. A pattern for dolly is one of the projects in development - didn't realize sewing patterns were so tricky. This little stitch-up below is also planned as part of another project.

The light on my desk has been burning through midnight and on again before the birds wake and I can't wait to show you the results (hope they look good in daylight ; )

Time just disappears like sand through a sieve this time of year doesn't it?
Last night Gracie said:
Mummy I need a cowboy hat, cowboy clothes and cowboy boots for assembly on Wednesday.
Mummy: That's okay assembly isn't until the 25th so we have a week.
Gracie: No Mummy, the 25th is THIS Wednesday (imagine a very exasperated tone in the 8 year old's voice)

Somehow I lost last week.

On the home front, Tris got this cast replaced yesterday with a fetching new blue one, three more weeks - oh my!!! It's just precautionary, he's healed but the doc says he wants it protected a while longer. A cast leads to lots of excuses for children: I can't bathe - my cast, I can't vacuum - my cast, I can't go outside it's too wet - my cast.... Mummy has come up with solutions to all of these things, except vacuuming but that's been swapped with laundry folding.

Soon I hope to get a chance to make these dala ornaments Pam shows. She uses Pendleton wool and needle felts, they'll be great fun to make. Check out the rest of her site for everything Christmas.
Pam's horse reminds me, there's also a new embroidery pattern coming up in my package.

We've cut down on buying things in our family except for the children so my Christmas gift list seems to be largely a wish list for myself. At the top are these new gorgeous cushions by Geninne. I'm really hoping the London Urban Outfitters will start to carry them, her birds are sublime.

Also topping my list is one of Margie's crochet and sea glass neckaces, but I don't think I'll be able to nip off to Paris to buy one. Perhaps I could have a word with Father Christmas.

I hope to be back very soon. Have a great Tuesday!

Making me smile

This tiny little face stitched up as a tester.

I'm making a new pattern and testing it - a birthday gift for Gracie. I love this fabric, it's from a huge piece of unbleached Egyptian cotton I bought a few years ago. It's beautiful for hand stitching but it's slightly course for turning tubes easily. I ordered some tools today that will hopefully help with this task, if not she will be scrapped and I'll try her on another fabric.

Browsing my button stash.

I've been shredding mountains of old papers, very boring work. If I were the organized type there wouldn't be mountains, just piles. The shredder keeps conking out which gives me plenty of time to poke through my buttons. These were the little beauties I brought back from Holland. Normally I know just what I'll use new supplies for, but not these, I'll probably keep them just to look at because they're so cheerful. Hand-carved wooden buttons always make me smile.

My little footballer.

And making me smile the most is my girl. Follow the arrow to see her because I wasn't quick enough with the camera and caught her with her head down. The only girl on either of the teams and it was so much fun to watch her, full of energy and spirit - I can't wait until the next game!

I hope my smiles reach all of you!

:)

Cheater's patchwork, a tutorial

Yet another project that uses up those scraps. These mini patchwork patches have multiple uses and are so easy it feels like a cheater's version of patchwork. They can be used to appliqué on t-shirts, for patching holes, stitching on to paper or cards or used as whole pieces of fabric to cover moleskines, make wallets, etc.

Supplies
Sewing machine * fabric scraps * small iron * fusible webbing * rotary cutter or scissors

How to
Determine the size you want the final piece of patchwork to be, cut out a piece of fabric that size and iron a piece of fusible webbing to it.

Cut out a variety of small squares of fabric, best to use a rotary cutter for accuracy. My squares are very small, about 13 mm or 1/2 an inch; larger squares would be even easier.

Peel the backing paper of the fusible webbing off of your base piece of fabric then begin lining up your squares (right-side-up) on to the side of the fabric that you removed the paper from (the "glue" side.) Line them up horizontally and vertically with no spaces between the squares forming a grid with them.

Next begin pressing your squares with a small hot iron, I used a Clover Mini Iron but a travel iron would work too. I found it easiest to do one line of squares at a time instead of trying to line up the whole grid.

When you have filled the area you want to cover with squares secure them using a zig-zag stitch with your sewing machine stitching along the gutters of the squares of your grid. Experiment with your zig-zag stitch width and length before stitching the patchwork.

Note: It's easiest to not clip the threads at the end of each line, just lift the presser foot and gently move the fabric to your next line.

To finish, trim the edges of your fabric or cut a shape out of it and adhere another piece of fusible webbing to the back of your finished patchwork - thus creating a finished, ready-to-use patch. When you remove the backing paper from your finished patch be sure it is completely cool before gently lifting it off.

I find I can iron these patches on to paper to make cards or iron them on to fabric with equal success. You will need to stitch around the outer edge on to the fabric or paper the patch is adhered to. This is also an easy way to create quick pieces of patchwork for making small sewn items like wallets, just skip the final step and leave off the last piece of fusible webbing.

Note: I use the Bondaweb brand of fusible webbing because in the UK it seems to be easiest to come by. If you've never used fusible webbing before simply follow the manufacturer's instructions for whichever brand you use.

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I hope you give these a try. It's another project that becomes a little addictive, I started going mad with tiny squares when I first tried out this idea.

About the Clover Mini Iron
Of all the various forms of appliqué one of my favourites is using fusible webbing then stitching the edges, it makes a neat job of small pieces appliqué. I bought the mini iron mainly for this purpose. Mine was about £25 which has been a worthwhile investment as I use it a lot. Clover now make a new version (Clover Mini Iron II) which allows for different attachments.
If like me, you wouldn't need any of the attachments the new iron can accommodate there are now bargains to be found on the old models like mine - I've seen it as low as £7 on ebay.

Spinning

Let the great world spin for ever down the ringing grooves of change.
Tennyson

We are definitely in a spin, ringing the grooves of change around here. Not only the obvious changes, new home, new school but even more.

Gracie has been off school the last two days with a streaming cold. Today she was feeling better which meant a lot of artwork being made. Spin art, water colour painting, clay shape making and letter writing in calligraphy; and that was nearly all before lunchtime - clearly she's ready to go back to school.

This year she has many more options for after school clubs and has chosen all sports: netball, judo, football and gymnastics (not all at the same time.) In the past she'd have opted for the art clubs but says she gets a lot of art at home and "I finally get a chance to play football!" Changing indeed.

She wanted me to show you her special spin art machine, an old favourite that she recently rediscovered. I looked for a salad spinner at boot fairs forever to make spin art with the children but never found one, luckily Gracie received this machine as a gift.

We had a lovely visit back to Kent at the weekend for a big birthday party (happy birthday Tim.) We had a chance to meet up with lots of other friends and I finally got my chance to cuddle baby Rufus and so did Tristan, he loves babies.

And Tristan just returned from two days away at an adventure and bonding session with his new classmates. He returned full of stories and though it was late when he returned we had a lengthy conversation about his time away before he fell into bed for an early start tomorrow. As he was talking I realized that this was a new type of conversation, a little boy wasn't explaining things to me, a more mature little man appears to be emerging. Though I'm not that familiar with this little man yet, I'm very happy to get to know him. Spin on!

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For Lovers of Spin Art

I'm a spin art lover. It reminds me of happy days at the county fair where I could sidle up to a booth and make my own abstract masterpiece in minutes.

Make Your Own
If you've never tried the salad spinner version with children here's how it goes:

Use an old salad spinner and put a paper plate in the bottom of it, the plate should fit snugly. Make it spin, remove the lid while it's spinning and drip paint on the plate. If your spinner stops spinning when the lid is removed then put some big drops on the plate first then put the lid on and spin.

Paint that's slightly runny but not watery works best.

I've also toyed with the idea of rigging up my electric drill to create bigger art but I haven't finished figuring that one all out yet.

Many uses for the finished art
We've used the finished artwork for collage, gift cards and framed art. For the gift cards we cut shapes out of the finished spin art. For instance, we cut lots of petals and created a multi-coloured flower.
For the framed art we lined several finished pieces of spin art up together in four stacked rows to create a larger piece of art.

If I could find any samples of these ideas in our many boxes of junk/treasure, I would show you.

And for iPhone and iPod Touch users of course there's an app. It looks fun, not as fun as real paint, but fun enough to amuse yourself if you're unfortunate enough to be on a long commuter train journey with no book to read or sketchbook to fill. Oh and of course there's a Flickr group for art made with the Spin Art app.

If I had an iPhone, I might have to get it just so I could be whisked away to my 10 year old self at the county fair whenever my little heart desired :)

Have a great Wednesday!

Summertime is playtime, indoor edition

I've been feeling a little guilty about hubby and I not taking the children anywhere for a holiday over the summer because we're moving house. Then they remind me through their actions that children really just want to play. Of course this is England, summertime doesn't always equal sunshine so playtime often happens indoors.

The image above is from the latest article for The Green Parent. It's their education issue so I created a homemade bingo game children can make themselves. Bingo can be designed to help reinforce learning things like letter forms and sounds or math, even vocabulary. Kids love Bingo, even if they're learning something.

 

I may have mentioned that Gracie is dog mad. Not as in the foaming at the mouth, rabid kind, she just loves them, all of them, even if they act ferocious or are lacking in the cute department. A few days ago she pretended to be a dog - all morning. This included walking on all fours, drinking out of a bowl on the floor and whimpering for attention. We have no dog biscuits because we have no (real) dog and she was very upset to not receive any for performing tricks, so she decided to make her own.

She had to quit her doggy alter ego to bake because, as she rightly pointed out "Dogs don't bake." We have no bone shaped biscuit cutter so we drew a template that she cut around.

 

These are made from the simplest sugar cookie recipe and Gracie loves them. She refused to let anyone have the bone shaped biscuits and saved them for the next day she decides to be a dog. 

 

A house can not be full of moving boxes without children pilfering at least one for their own devices. On this morning (may have been afternoon, pajamas sometimes stay on that long around here) Gracie decided to build a little shop with one. When her brother joined in the shop became a kind of telephone/online ordering service; he then created a cardboard computer and showed her how to make our house phones ring so they could "call" each other.

 

More than a few card games have been enjoyed these past few weeks with friends, Go Fish being the favourite.

And over the last couple of days they've spent hours drawing, tracing and colouring Pokémon characters and demonstrating their "evolution" in an attempt to make me understand the whole game. I'm not much wiser but even more astonished at the amount of details, names, facts and figures they immediately commit to memory regarding the mythological beasts. Must be a way to harness the memory power put into Pokémon and apply it to something a little more necessary, like maybe the times tables!?

 

Still eagerly awaiting a new little babe around here who is running a bit late. Haven't heard from the mummy today, hoping maybe she's in a place where mobile phones aren't allowed and next time I talk to her she'll be holding her little one. Here's a tiny peek at the gift.

 

We move on Saturday rendering me Internet disabled until around the 10th of Sept - drat! Darn that British Telecom! I didn't use such polite language offline.

Hope you all had a wonderful weekend. Sunny skies predicted for the week ahead... outdoor edition coming soon.