Mother's Day cards

With Valentine's Day done and dusted, it's time to start making cards for Mother's Day!

These are the two designs I've come up with; machine appliqued letters on upcycled pink linen, stiched onto the green check paper.

Here's the large one with "Mom" which is very popular with the Brummies around this neck of the woods. I have also had a request for "Mam" which is the Welsh equivalent.

If you'd like a mum, mom or mam card you can visit my facebook page or just contact me here :)

The large ones are A5 and cost £3.50, the small ones are A6 and cost £2.50.

(Postage is £1.)

Linking up to Handmade Thursdays at www.whitelilygreen.blogspot.com xxx

Post-it note cover - tutorial

This is a super quick make which costs hardly anything! 

All you need is a block of sticky post-it notes, some card, patterned paper and glue.

Start by cutting a piece of card so that it is the same width as your sticky notes, and long enough to wrap around; ie height + height + thickness of the pad.

Make two firm creases where the card will bend around the pad, then glue the sticky pad onto the bottom of the rectangle of card.

Then you will need whatever you want to decorate it with. I'm using a square of patterned paper, a heart shape and some letters. You can be as creative as you like - space permitting!!

Stick the square of patterned paper on the front.

Then stick on the rest of your embellishments - easy peasy!!

If you make one let me know! I'd love to see :)

Playing with my new toy

My (very lovely) mother-in-law gave me her Cricut machine, which is an electronic die cutting system.

So, this morning I've been having a play and made these cards.

A birthday card for a boy. Just using printed papers.

And a card for a girl. The image is stamped and hand coloured.

I love making personalised cards, and this machine cuts out fabulous letters in super quick time.

I also made this...

It's a personalised post-it note book; really easy - I'm going to make some more, in fact I feel a tutorial coming on!!

It's mine, all mine!

(Sometimes you make something, which is supposed to be for someone else, and you are quite pleased you went a little bit wobbly around the edges, because you really want to keep it for yourself.)

I had a custom request for a make up bag, so I made this.

I love the cherry fabric. It has a layer of polyester wadding (my new favourite thing!!) to give the bag some structure, and the spotty lining is upcycled from an old dress of Poppy's.

Why am I so afraid of zips? (And buttonholes - perhaps I have developing a fastening-phobia.) They always turn out fine when I pluck up the courage to put one in.

Anyway, I'm keeping this, and I promise to make a better one for my customer :)

Book Review; 1000 things to make and do

The very lovely Book People sent me this beautiful arty children's book to review. It is Usborne's 1000 things to make and do which is aimed at children aged 5 and over. 

The book is filled with creative ideas, mostly things to draw, ideas for collage, cutting, doodling and painting. I was impressed with the range of ideas to suit older children as well as little ones. All the pages are full colour and the book is ring bound so it stays open on the table.

How to draw a jungle scene in silhouette.

There are also ideas to suit both boys and girls, and plenty of seasonal pages which would be great for both home educators and primary school teachers.

Thumbprint snowmen.

I think the illustrations are great, showing a variety of colours and styles.

How to make a collaged doodle page.

I roped in my son Anthony to test one of the ideas; he chose collage robots which involved cutting out pictures from magazines and also sticking on things like safety pins.

Greenhouse feet!

And I also used one of the pages for inspiration and made this card by cutting out rough circles and sewing a button on top.

I really like this book, and can see myself using it both for myself and for the children. It would make a lovely present for a creative child and offers great value for money.

Loving my new bag

It's the bestest bag ever!

My sister bought me some packs of small fabric pieces for my birthday. I've done a little bit of patchwork but I'm definitely no expert.

I chose 12 of the fabrics, and cut out 2 squares from each - 12 squares for each side.

And I stitched them together - remembering to reverse the pattern so that nothing was upside down. I felt very clever for thinking of that!

I decided to put a layer of wadding and used some turquoise fabric for the other side. 

So this project became my first attempt at proper quilting. It was rather awkward doing the middle stitching - not sure how you'd manage on a piece much bigger.

Here's the inside; I made the trim and handles from some old jeans. This is why the handles are quite short - I have pretty short legs!!

And I even made a tab with a buttonhole. I still have a completely ungrounded fear of buttonholing and avoid them wherever possible.

So, there it is - my new bag, it's not perfect but it's mine, and I made it all by myself without a pattern or even a proper plan.

Ready to be filled with sweet wrappers, old raisins, a biro which doesn't work, old receipts and an odd glove...