Friday 29 October 2010

Fabric Flower Brooch

I am still using up all my material scraps and, this week, was asked by a lady at work if i could make her a fabric flower brooch for her new pink coat. She gave me one of the spare buttons so i could match colours but unfortuntely none of my scraps were the right colour. What a lovely excuse for a trip to my favourite fabric shop!!
If you have never been to The Bramble Patch in Weedon, Northants it's well worth a visit. For me it's one of those shops that i could stand in the middle of and drift off into my dreams, i love it. They also do many quilting classes in the rear of the building and the staff are so helpful.
So finally i picked 2 fat quarters of material that would match my button. And 2 totally extremes of design i think as well. The flowers look classy whilst the dots are a bit more mad and adventurous.
So i got to work as soon as i got home. If you recall ,from one of my earlier posts in the year, the tutorial for this brooch can be found on folksy tutorial page
and is really quite a simple but effective make.
Below are the final products and she decided to keep both. They match the coat colour well.


Until next time xx

Tuesday 26 October 2010

Holidays, Hikes And Makes

It is half term this week and, for a change, i have had 5 days holiday from work and have had my sister and nieces staying with me.
On Sunday we chose to go walking and picked a walk out of my "Country Walks In The Rugby Area" by Jim Watson. This is the 1st walk i have attempted from this book so was interested to know how good the directions would be and how easy they were to follow.
Our walk was entitled Braunston, Sawbridge and Wolfhampcote and was 4.5miles long.
We started from "The Boathouse" in Braunston and along the canal before treking across
many fields and seeing many different animals, much to the kids delight.
The photo below is the view half way round as we walked down a bridleway. As well as all the animals we came across we also collected berries and conkers. And below is a photo of a mushroom we came across that i found fascinating. We did try and research it when we got home to see if edible but to no avail. The photo came out well tho i think!
Today my family are returning home but, before they left, my niece begged me for one of my new butterflies. Unfortunately her favourite colour is pink and i havent as yet made pink yet so we sat together and went thru my scraps and put her own unique one together for her to wear with pride!


xx

Monday 18 October 2010

Creative Material Scraps

Dreamstar havent done many craft fairs this year but now the christmas season is approaching we have 3 big events booked so i'm now trying to think of some new ideas to add to our stock. I've always said we need some cheaper items, pocket money items, as some call it.
Whilst trying to think of ideas last week i realised just how much scrap material i have accumulated over the past couple of years. So i had a good look through my craft box and as well as all my cotton fabric i found a huge pile of felt and bags of keyrings, key fobs, and brooch clasps. The latter items were in sealed bags, i think they must have been there years.
So i had a look around the net, through books and a bit of people watching to see what was fashion nowadays and here is what i come up with.
All of them were easy and quick to make and i'm looking forward to seeing if they are a hit at the christmas fairs.
BUTTERFLIES AND HEART KEY RINGS AND BAG CHARMS
BEACH HUTS
And for those people who need their needles keeping safe here are some lovely needle cases.


xx