Update + Penguin Skittles

Morning all!

How is everyone this morning? cold?! yep, me too! Well I promised you an update so an update we shall have.

As of Sunday 30th October I once again became unemployed, *sigh* and with no work lined up it seemed like it was going to be a dull few weeks of filling out job applications and being the personal dogsbody to my family.... but wait, here's an idea...... why not take a craft stand at the local craft and vintage fair on the 19th November and sell cards! hurrah! great idea..... except I have no cards to sell and that's only 3 weeks off and we have the church's christmas bizzare the weekend before and ooooh! eeek!  ummm.....

Well after taking a deep breath and thinking it through logically I realised I could do it if I got my act together and limited what I was making and specialised...... oh and then if I took another table on the 10th December too I could do one which is more crafty than cardy! insane? oh yes!

But insane or not, the deposit for the table has been paid and I am busy making a range of white on white cards and book cards, beaded items - pins, bracelets and hair slides and if I can master the technique, altered candles.

Am I stressed? yes! is it going to be worth it? only time can tell......

But today is my nan's 80th birthday and sadly she's still in hospital 15 weeks on from her stroke and honestly, she's only just still with us so i'm spending a lot of time visiting her with my parents and brothers. It's now in God's hands to her future.

And tonight is the start of the church bizzare and I did promise you something crafty to see, so here you have it - Penguin Skittles!

Aren't they just the cutest?! I had so much fun sewing them, although stitching onto black aida of an evening was not the most relaxing of tasks! Anyway, they're done and I really don't want to part with them, but they are for a good cause so off they go and hopefully someone will give them a good home.

That's it for now, I'll try and pop back on Sunday with some photo's of the bizzare and other things we made but bare with me, it's a mad time at the moment! I am around, just not online much!

Take care and happy crafting

Belated Spooky Soho Update

Hi all,

I'm so sorry it's taken this long to do the post but since I was made redundant again on the 30th my life has actually been insane - but i'll come on to that on another post tomorrow as today is all about the final week at work and Spooky Soho.

This year my colleagues and I wanted to make the week a little bit more authentic to the Georgian house, which is an issue when you consider that halloween as a celebration came about with the Victorians.... hmmmm. But if I do say so myself, we nailed it with the final scheme. Now due credit goes to Peter and Emily who took the lead and did all the work on the cellar, leaving me free to design the craft activites and the visitor centre/garden scavenger hunt.

But without further ado - the spooky soho experience!

When first you enter the cellar complex you are asked to 'stand and deliver!' as the highwayman greats you. In the 18th century, highwaymen were prolific and the most famous of all? Dick Turpin!

You then turn and enter the cellar system itself and are greated by the sounds of a tourture chamber (unseen)..... actually it was much darker than this, but my camera self adjusted the lighting

The next room you enter is all about the gothic, with three windows showing many of the ideas that were feared in the period......once again, we were setting history to rights as gothic symbols were the work of the 18th century, by the time the Victorian writers came along, it was already a well established genre of literature!

Moving ever onwards, you sneak a glimps to your right and come face to face with the grave robbers. With public executions become less common, medics in the period had to source their bodies for dissection and lessons from elsewhere and so the era of the grave robbers was born.

Round the corner and don't be decieved by your eyes - yes you did just see the headless lady....... again the idea of ghosts and tourtured souls was a strong idea in Georgian times and the image of the headless lady is a classic which has stood the test of time

And finally we come to the Guillotine room with its severed heads and sounds. With the French revolution in full flow and the guillotine being used in excess, the British were deeply afraid that the deeply rooted disillusionment with the system of rule would come over the water and take England by storm and with it the reign of the guillotine! eeek!

So there you have it. Spooky Soho's cellar! We even did a short promo video for it which you can find here.

It really was a great week, it went down so well with both our managers and visitors alike, so hopefully the idea will get an airing again next year - but who knows!

I promise I'll be back with another update and some crafting to share tomorrow but for now I must run.

Have a great day and happy crafting

All buttoned up

Morning all,

Just a flying visit to show you one of the many projects i've been doing for the church bizzare - these are button badges:

I had so much fun making these - I did 4 in one night so you can see how easy they are really. I think my favourite is the little owl, but I have a major thing for owls at the moment - probably because they're such a big trend.

Anyway, must go to work and hopefully today I won't come back with another injury! its been a bad week so far. Wednesday I trapped my little finger in the shutters whilst closing up the house and its swollen, green and purple and frankly very ugly to look at..... but then to add to the multicoloured look I managed to maim both my hands and my left knee last night, when one of the paving slabs on the road I walk down to get home gave way as I walked over it and I went flying - there's now a massive hole were the slab should be, after it sank a good 6 inches and a nice big hole in my knee and both my palms too......

Maybe I should just stay in bed today? huh?

Have a good day whatever you do and hopefully you're all having a better week then me. Happy crafting!

Spooky goings on......

Things are about to go bump in the night at work, as we're almost into our Halloween week at the house!
We're busy designing a new 18th century inspired cellar of horror, with a highwayman, headless lady and not forgetting the guillotine and severed heads......... mwahahahahahah! *ehem* sorry, getting a bit carried away!

So onwards to todays post. This is one of three craft activities we will be doing; monster mask making! I've been messing with patterns and designs for a couple of weeks and the final collection is:

The pumpkin, bat, ghost and frankenstein....... hopefully the kids will enjoy making them. I've had great fun making up the samples but frankly I'm a big kid!

As everyone seems to be running halloween challenges at the moment, I'm entering these into the following: Everybody Art, Simon Says and Fussy and Fancy Fridays

I hope you all like and i'll be sure to give you a full blog of the site with images of our finished creation!

Take care everyone and happy crafting x

Second white on white card

Hi all,

Just to show you that i'm still alive and here I thought i'd just show you the second white on white card I made for my brother's friends who are twin's (the other being the post below).

I'm sorry i've not been around more but i'm up to my neck in job applications, halloween trails and crafts and not forgetting the church christmas bizarre - 2nd weekend of November! eeek!

Anyway.... I'll stop rambling now, the design is mildly tweeked from one i've shown you before so nothing really new to say.

Thanks for stopping by, i'll be back soon with some of the other project's i've been working on!

Take care and happy crafting!

Very Subtle Sparkle and Bling for Simon Says

Good Afternoon all,

Well today is cold and miserable and utterly uninspiring! Never mind hey? The card i'd like to share with you today is for my brother's best friend. She a twin so I need to get on and make the other card for the other sister too but before I do I wanted to show you my new white on white design.

To make this card I used a Nellie Snellen Die to cut the circle, I scored the lines on my hougie board, punched flowers in 2 sizes using woodware punches, cut leaves using a sizzix die and created butterflies with my MS punch. The flowers and leaves were all embossed using the flourish cuttlebug folder and everything was layerd up. The pearls are from stash and the glitter is star dust stickles.

I really like the effect of this one and I'm so glad that the white on white design is so versatile. This one I feel is going to be repeated!

I'm entering this for simon say's challenge of sparkle and bling - even if it is quite subtle!

Thanks for looking and Happy Crafting!

Sketch and Stash Challenge Card

Hello! now before we go any further are you sitting comfortably? well I hope you are as you may just faint in shock when I tell you i've made a card and it's one for a challenge! I know...... shocking.... lol!

So, to ease myself back in to the task of making challenge cards I decided to keep it nice and simple and Sketch and Stash provided the nicest layout to ease me back in, with the added challenge of 3 pattern papers and 3 embellishments. Only I clearly can't count as I managed to add 4 embellishments - although I did manage the 3 papers! success....sort of.

Anyway, this card is for my young cousins birthday and he (as well as his brother) take Tae Kwon Do lessons and are getting scarily good at it.....hmmm they'll be able to take me on soon :S anyway - when I saw this LOTV stamp I just had to get it and so this is the stamps first outing and I love this little guy!

The image is coloured with promarkers, the shapes are nesties dies. The papers are from a stampin up pad I have, the stars punched with an old woodware punch and the pips are from stash. The inside was also decorared with patterned paper and stars but I wrote it before I took pictures so I didn't photograph it for obvious reasons.

Anyway I hope you like it, thanks for popping by and happy crafting!