Autumn rains

We've been having a lot of rain this month and I find it best to stay in doors and craft. I'm using a lot of my scraps up in various projects and have a few crafty frugal things ready in the making.

My granny squares are growing slowly but surely as I do a few a day.

 

Each day I am returning more to embroidery. I have a whole kitchen set almost done and I'm pleased I didn't have to buy any items new as most of the things I already had in my stash. This applique rooster was a kit I have had forever and now I finally made it!

 

Of course there is also time for some paper crafting as well. There's nothing I like better than to cozy down on rainy days with a crafty project, and looking through craft books for inspiration.

 

“Home is the nicest word there is.”

-Laura Ingalls Wilder.

 

Fringed flowers

To make these fringed flowers you will need the following:

 

Ingredients:

Paper strips. I used printer paper scraps for mine. But you can use any strips you have from your paper stash.

A jar lid of some kind for a template. A smallish one is better about 2 inches.

Acrylic paints. Or scrapbooking sprays of your choice. Or Inks too.

Paint brush.

 

Method:

 

 

To begin, place your paper strips around your jar lid. Start in the center and work your way around. First place a dot of wet glue on the base of the lid. Then the top of the paper strip. Continue to add a dob of glue to hold each strip in the centre. Don't use a glue gun as this makes the centre too raised up.

 

 

Once finished gently pull off the flower from the lid.

 

By this time you can paint your flowers. Add your bling centers as well. I used flat backed pearls, around 2mm. Once dry cut into the paper strips to start fringing. Cut as far down into the center as possible. You may find it is best to cut the strips a few times to get a nice looking fringe. 

And then fluff up your petals softly and you're done!

 

Have a nice day everyone.

Floral scents

Keep a reminder of Summer at home with the scent of potpourri. Potpourri recipes are infinitely variable and mixtures can be sweet, citrus or with strong spicy accents. Scented sachets, bags and little cushions offer a host of possibilities for using potpourri and the mixtures can also be displayed in pretty bowls.

 

 

If you have a microwave you can dry some of your ingredients quickly to make potpourri. 
 

Ingredients:
 

Paper towels.

Heavy microwavable plate or dish.

Blooms of your choice.

Method: 

Pull apart the blooms and place the petals on paper towels. You can stack a few paper towel layers together, I used about three or four together. Place the heavy plate on top of the top layer paper towel. Depending on your microwave the time will be different. For mine I used a minute or so (maybe about two mintues) on high. Checking regularly to see how the petals were drying. You’re aiming for a papery feel to the petal blooms when they cool down. The ones on the bottom layer might need a bit longer because it does ‘steam’. Test and try until you are getting the finished dryness.

Mix your bloom into a nice scent. I used Rose petals. Calendula. Mint. Rosemary. Scented Geranium. Thyme. And Heliotrope in my mix.

 

When finished display in pretty bowl.

 

Or, make up lovely little sachets from remants of old lace, vintage doileys, and other materials for gifts or to place in your clothes drawers. If you don't want to make a potpourri the petals dried in this way can also be used in pressed flower arrangements.

 

I hope everyone is having a good day!

Miss Cicely - Vintage camera storage photo box

 

I've been working on this paper project and finally finnished it. I think it turned out rather well. The project will probably store some photos, letters, or cards in the back. The front is for some photo storage in the pockets and journalling or photos on the tags.

 

All of the items are recycled cardboard, and items from my stash. I used a mailing box for the main part and envelopes for the front.  The ' camera lens' is a toilet roll cut down to size. Inside the 'camera lens' is a vintage image of a little girl.

 

My vintage images come from here.

The papers I used for the project is Sweet Nothings by Kaiser Craft.

 

The Lady stamp is from a Flonz stamp set and the script Stamp is from Kaiser Craft. I have a video up for the project on my youtube channel if you want to watch as well.

 

I'm entering this project in the Vintage Stamping Challenge for Flonz Stamps

 

Now onto some stitching.

 

Have a happy day everyone.

 

 

leafy things

 

The weather has turned more and more towards Autumn with rainy days and foggy mornings. With the drizzly weather out I've turned my hand towards stitching to make a frugal thrify cushion from my sewing stash.

 

 

I like the idea of combining two or more of my hobbies together. The UK magazine Get Stamping inspired this cushion and I used the free stamps from the magazine to create the project. The issue is an older issue so not sure if you can still get the first issue which is where this project came from. I no longer buy magazines new as they are too expensive. Because I used what I had I didn't follow the instructions too closely or used the colours they did. I used the colours to match the material I did have, and as always the material is thrifty store finds. Now I have a snuggly cushion to lean against while I crochet away.

 

I've been thrifting too on fine days, though not much is about to want me to take home. I do buy a few little things. And of course there is sketching away in my sketch books and more mini album things I am making. I hope to get a video up soon of the current storage box idea for photos I did. More on that later!

Have a good day everyone.

Autumn fete

 

 The first of March is the beginning of Autumn here although the official date is the 20th of March. Still the weather is looking very Autumn-ly especially after the hot days we have been having and I am looking forward to Autumn and Winter as they are my favourite times of year. The beginning of March usually sees me attending the annual Bookfest but I am trying to avoid buying more books; instead I went for a browse at a little Fete held close by.

 

I came home with morning tea and ... a book (LOL!) but for 20 cents how could I say no?

 

I also brought one of my favourite plants Heliotrope. I love the scent of these flowers. The flower also features in art by Cicley Mary Barker for the Heliotrope fairy. If you've seen this image and know the scent of the flowers it's easy to know why the fairy is shown smelling these beautiful scented blooms.

 

And I brought a ground cover - Cerastium Tomentosum, the common name is snow-in-summer. I think it will look very pretty in a pot. I was also looking for herbs for the container/dye garden I want to do for my goals but they already had what I have, but for a couple of dollars I came home afterwards with some nice items.

 

Have a great day!

paperless kitchen

 

I have in my stash the DVD of Homestead Blessings - The art of Crafting by the West Ladies. I've been going through the dvd trying out some of the projects and I gave the handmade napkins a go. I followed the instructions to make these cheerful cherry napkins using a carrot as a 'stencil' and stamping direct to fabric. They used a marker pen for their stems but I just used acrylic paint and a thin brush. ( With the acrylic paint I mixed in Jo Sonja's textile medium to make the color steadfast and washable.)

 

I think they turned out really pretty and are so easy to make. I will definetly be giving the leaf napkins a try as well. 

 

I hope every one has a happy day!

frugal inks

 

When I am inking I use Tsukenko memento dewdrop inks. Mostly because they, for the price, are a good value for me. I'd love to buy Tim Holtz inks but that is beyond my purse strings. Memento Inks don't work the same way as TH inks as they are a dye based and don't spread out using water. So in a way they are good if you are don't want your inks to run when you are using glimmer mists/water based sprays. To make your memento inks to behave like a water color and to blend there is a product by Tsukenko called Ink Potion no.9. It is a blending solution for their inks.  I buy a 2 oz bottle from overseas and I can tell you it goes fast and costs a lot to use. So I've been thinking about what I could do to make something similar.

 

A search on line gave some good blending solution tips for Alcohol inks (different product) so not really what I need. I thought I'd play around with turpentine used by artists for oil paints to see if that produced anything and that attempt was a failure. I then tried methylated spirits, and success! The colours do seem to be a little duller than what the ink potion gives and the paper does buckle a bit but nothing ironing out will do. The down side is the methylated spirits obviously have a smell about them, but I think artist brands might have a similar odourless variety. I'm used to turpentine smelly things as I painted in oils paints for years and the smell is something I'm used to. But in a pinch this is going to be my go to for trying out ideas and such for blending. It is much cheaper in the long run.

The tag I smooched ink on a TH craft matt and sprayed some Mehtylated Spirits (MS) onto it and mooshed the tag in the pool of inks. I then used a sponge to blend around the edges. I think the MS did okay for the look.

I'm off to make some cards. Have a nice day everyone.

Browns and Greens

 

The last couple of days I have been working on my granny square throw rug. The squares are building slowly but surely. I'm using yarn I brough from the thrift store so there's no real color scheme to the arrangement it is very random.

 

I've also been going through some stash stuff my aunty gave me. I love the mother dear plaque it's very retro.

 

This very odd flower belongs to the dragon fruit that is growing in our back yard. It's not fully open as it was a very over cast day and it only opens fully at night. The flowers on this plant are huge! And we are seeing the fruit form now after these bloom.

Beautiful day - video of my new homemade smashbook

I've been working away at my ever growing paper scrap pile. I keep most scraps and they end up in books I've been making. Currently I am on a smashbook/junk journal/ hybrid book making go and I use up what I have to put into the books. This book I've named Miss Edith and she is made from brown paper bags I brought from coles or woolworths, they are the lunch bags which are about a couple of dollars for a packet of 100. I cover the shinny side and split open the inside which isn't shiny to make 'signatures' then it is all joined together. Some of the pages I left to show the brown paper bag inside because I like that look.  I still have yet to do the cover on this one, not sure what else to do with the look of it. I used modelling paste over a stencil and it is all raised.

 

Creating books like this is very frugal and good way to use what you have.

 

I hope everyone is enjoying their day.

Life lived

 

With Summer coming to a close we are currently enjoying more cooler weather. This is the type of weather I like. The cool weather has me thinking of wintery type projects, currently I am working on a crochet granny square blanket using up my wool from thrift store finds. I hope to have enough wool to make a good size blanket.

The other day I looked through the recipe sheets that were handed out in the Simple Living cooking from scratch workshops. I made a favourite again, pizza using the pizza base recipe. We had this with a light salad. My favourite recipe from those workshops is still the curried sausages.

 

During rests from my crochet blanket I am also making little sketches and drawings in my small sketch book for possible paintings, but more for just practice. I'm also writing away in my scrapbook/smash book/diary book too. I recieved a notebook at Christmas and I am using that for my February diary.

 

Over summer I harvested cucumbers, beans, and radishes. These are the last of the radishes and we had the last of the cucumbers and beans a while ago. I'm learning a lot from my garden. Did you know if radish crack it means you're watering them unevenly.

Romantic things

We had some overipe bananas no one wanted to eat so I set about making some banana muffins from a cake recipe I found online. They turned out super moist and light but some of them did stick to the bottom of the baking tray. I soon found out lightly flouring the tray will stop them sticking as will adding some baking paper or placing them in patty cake paper cups. Still, they were nice to have with a cuppa even if the bottoms were missing.

 

 

There are Iris's growing around the base of an old tank stand we have in our yard. They bloomed and when they did they were all a peach-y color. So you can imagine our surprise when suddenly we had ones blooming that were purple. I think one side is peach-y color and this side is purple. Either way they are lovely. And remind me of Van Gogh.

 

 

I'm also doing little art works too. My first love, fairies and magical things, always seem to show up sometimes. I have enough ideas for some future paintings which I'm excited about. I'm more productive now that we have such fantastic cool weather back. I don't do well in heat.

 

Home style

 

My, it has been a while since my last post. The summer heat we have been experiencing wasn't something that wanted to keep me indoors at the computer. I have though been at home enjoying the quiet life of homely life.  

We've had a burst of these alpine strawberries of late and they are so sweet and juicy. I just pick them straight off the plant and eat them!

 

 

There was also a birthday or two and we made a pavlova for my sister's birthday which we all enjoyed very much.

 

While away I continued to use some journals to write down the days events. Some pages were just plain writing and others were decorated smash book style to use up the little odds and ends I usually have in my paper scrap draw.

 

 

While staying close to home, I sorted and cleaned out a lot of my stash. I started a new project to get ready for my favourite time of year Autumn and Winter. I don't know about anyone else but Summer, while lovely, can't be over soon enough. As I mentioned before I only just recently learnt how to crochet, now I want to do a granny square blanket of course I use all thrift brought items. I found a bag of wool last year, you may remember my first crochet shawl, this is the same wool!

 

And I am working on my large crazy quilt queen size bed cover. Slowly. Slowly. Years of work on and off. Maybe one day I will complete it.

 

I hope everyone is having a wonderful day and enjoying whatever it is they are doing.