A beautiful new fashion accessory

Oh what a beautiful new fashion accessory for the crafty lady!

It really adds a special something to this outfit.

Should I do a vlog?

This is a question that I've been musing on for....oh all of a week. Basically - I quite enjoy watching other people's videos. Such as those over at Musings from the Pigeons Nest. It seems a nice and fun medium.

Also, I'm quite nosey. One of the reasons I like reading blogs is that they're an effective (plus easy and legal) way of peering into other people's lives. Vlogs step this up a notch.

So I've been wondering if I should maybe make some videos. I had a spat a few summers ago of making stop-motion videos. I'm definitely going oto make some more of those but the question is - should I also make some vlogs? Featuring me?

I've been being pretty careful about showing my true face online or revealing anything too personal. This is because I currently work in a school and have been actively trying to avoid the little darlings being able to find me online. But... I finish my job in two weeks. So.... should I vlog? What do you think oh 9 followers of mine?

Embroidering the hot-house

The Hothouse at Kew Gardens

A few weeks (months?) ago I went on a school trip to Kew Gardens. As well as ushering year 8s around the gardens I also took some photos. I was particularly inspired by the outside of the hothouse where the plants were pressing to the glass. I really liked this effect and decided to christen my new sewing machine by making an embroidery based on it.

I dug through my piles of fabric scraps for green fabric. Turns out I don't have much green fabric. I assembled six pieces of greenish fabric (including one scrap of green chiffon scarf).

The third picture is me free-machining trailing leaves. Woo-yes! This was my first time. During the process I wore sunglasses as shields for my eyes because I was afraid of the needle snapping off and embedding itself in my eye. Actually I ended up taking them off because it was evening, dark and frankly the glasses were making it difficult to see.

And then I broke the needle.

But it stuck in the fabric and not my eye! Huzah!

For some reason the free-machining Gods then decided to revoke my free-machining prowess. So I had to do my bigger leaves with the foot on. The bigger leaves I then cut through to reveal the fabric underneath.

I also sewed on felt leaves and machine embroidered leaves onto the fabric. Then I covered the whole thing in some plastic table-cloth I bought at a local shop and sewed it down.

This is when I broke the second needle.

I wanted to give the whole thing the impression of being through glass.


This is the final result:

Some close-ups:

It's eeeeever so slightly wonky. Oops. It feels nice and weighty though.

xxx

On Repeat....'In my Mind' by Amanda Palmer

I'm in a bit of a glum mood (NOT because of the football) so am listening to this song on repeat and singing along.

Ah, it cheers me.

I Spy.....Magnetic Wallpaper

Image from Confessions of a Design Geek

Sian Zeng makes this amazing magnetic wallpaper, inspired by fairy tales. You can move the magnetic characters around the wallpaper, adding speech bubbles as you wish.

I discovered her after reading an interview with her on Confessions of a Design Geek.

I love this idea. It's such fun!

Happy Fathers Day

Yesterday was Fathers Day in the U.K. So I made a portrait of my father as a present for him.

My father

This one isn't one of my best. Somehow it doesn't look too much like my father. I think he is hard to capture. I also made him a card. He's a fan of Science Fiction so I found an old book cover for War of the Worlds and used it for inspiration.

I used pen and colouring pencils to make this.

Crochet Monster Blanket

Monster blanket

Last week it was the second birthday of my Fairy-Godson. Inspired by this tutorial I decided to make a crochet monster fleece blanket. I have loads of kindle-reject fleece lying around (it sheds and gets trapped in the edges of the kindle) and so thought this would be an excellent project to use some up.

I'm quite please with how it turned out. It's super cuddly. Unfortunately the fleece was quite thin and I think the crochet edging may be easily pulled out by child hands. But we shall see.

The tutorial was really easy to follow and took me about six hours. I will definitely make some more. Luckily as lots of my friends have been having babies recently I have lots of children to gift them to. I think I will try adapting the pattern slightly and make a robot too.