Mosaic making with Jane Rose.

Last week I trotted myself along to a Mosaic making class with Jane Rose.

Now, I have done a wee bit of mosaic-ing in the past - namely my large Gecko project, which is still unfinished, but you know when you just want to put the time aside to play for a while?  It was all about that.

This is Jane, chatting through the options.

She brought loads and loads of tiles with her, many different colours, textures, shapes, material.... plenty to choose from.

But first we had to choose our shape. I picked this temple shaped cut-out, and started by sticking a mirror into the centre.

Then it was time to get to work playing with the tiles and nuggets.

As well as using ready cut tiles, I cut some pieces of glass myself to make a "crazy paving" effect.

Once it was done I had a bit of time left, so Jane invited me to make another.  I thought I would do a door number for my house.

 I used glittery black glass tiles and blue glass nuggets, filled in with chopped up plain black tiles.

And that was the first day over with.  All tiles glued in place and left to dry for grouting.

The next day we mixed up our grout.  I chose black for the door number.....

..... and purple for the temple.

Then just slapped it all over as if I was icing a cake.

After rubbing it into all the cracks and joints, it was time to wipe it all off again.

Before leaving them all to dry.

Voilà!  My house number....

.... and my temple   :)

I have to say I was pretty pleased with them, and it was such a fun day too.

If you fancy having a go, check out Jane's workshop page with her dates and times on.

Lush Carlisle, Bloggers Event

A couple of weeks ago I was invited to a "Bloggers Event" at Lush in Carlisle.

I love Lush stuff, and whenever I pass a shop I seem to be drawn in and my purse pops open and money falls out to buy things with  :)

I particularly like things like the shampoo bars and the scents, not forgetting the smell of the shop even before you go in.

So, it was a Saturday evening, 6.00pm, the shop had just closed, but of course they opened the doors to let us in for an exclusive event just for local Bloggers.

Healthy smoothies were on offer - veggies and fruits made up this colourful concoctions - I had the purple one, couldn't quite bring myself to drink something that green, but everyone who did said it was delicious.  The purple one was delicious too  :)

And cute little blueberry cupcakes... or were they muffins.  Either way, I ate one - just to be polite you know.

First we watched some "Mermaid Shimmer" being made.  A "Big Blue" bath-bomb and a little piece off "Sunnyside" Bubble Bar mixed together made this electric blue water with a gold shimmer running through it - beautiful.

Then onto the fun stuff - making a bath bomb!  How exciting, I was chuffed to be actually getting to mess about in a crafty manner.

I really wish I could remember the ingredients - other Bloggers were taking loads of notes, but I just wanted to get my paws in and start playing.

There was a big bowl of blue stuff (we were making a "Big Blue" bath-bomb) and a bowl of white stuff with sea-salt, and another bowl of white stuff.

After mixing white stuff with salt, and white stuff with blue stuff and chuck in some citric acid, which got right up my nose and made me sneeze!, it was time to press the powder into a mould.

So THAT'S how they get the names on the balls.

First the sea-salt mixure went in to give Big Blue the recognisable white top it has.  Pressed down hard to compact, it was followed by the blue powder.  Both halves of the mould were filled then it was simply pressed together - and just like that a bath-bomb was made.

Then it was time for a little pampering and to try out some summertime products, such as toners, cleansers, scrubs, massage bars....

And this unusual sun-screen powder with an SPF of 15.  Clever idea if you don't want to be gunked up with wet, sticky sun-screen lotion.

And these are the lovely shampoo bars that I like so much - have you ever tried one?  If not, do, they make seem expensive but they last for ages.

This is why I love Lush.....because they are against animal testing.   In that bag was a whole array of goodies for me to try out.  They were so generous!

The bath-bomb that I made, along with a Stepping Stone foot scrub, some Powdered Sunshine, as mentioned above, a tub of Ocean Salt face & body scrub, Breath of Fresh Air toning water soaked into some cotton pads, The Comforter bubble bar and other bits and bobs too - we were very lucky.

This was a great event, and if any of the ladies who looked after us that night are reading, I would like to say Thank You very much, it was so much fun.

A couple of colourful crochet ripple blankets

I have been rippling away of late, making colourful blankies  (small blankets).

This one I made for my Granddaughter, Hope.  It's hard to see the beautiful colours in this photo but the green is a bright vibrant green, and the rainbow is bright joyful colours full of purples, blues, oranges and yellows.

I love rippling, it's so pleasing to see the stripes taking effect.  I also love random colour changing yarns, you never know quite what pattern will pop out as you work.

This one was the perfect size as a pushchair blanket - and for playing "peep-oh" with ;)  (sorry for the blurry shot, she was "peep-oh-ing" too quickly to catch her!

Babies seem to love bright colours, I was a little afraid it might give her a headache - along with the bright lime green pushchair I bought to go with it  ;)   Well, you have to buy a pushchair to match the blankie don't you?  (Just for Nana's house)

The second blankie I made was for a good friend, Shelley, who is nearly fully baked with her bun-in-the-oven.  (a wee chap).

I knew someone was making her a pram blanket so I set about doing a car blanket - one that you can chuck over baby when in the car seat in case it's a bit nippy.  So this one was, again, a small size blankie.

I used Hayfield Bonus Buzz for this one in "Sizzle", along with Hayfield Bonus DK in "Signal Red".

They work together so well, with the Signal Red picking out the red splodges from the Sizzle.

She seemed to quite like it - makes a change from baby blue I suppose  ;)

Candle Lantern Jars

I like messing about with empty jars, seeing what I can do with them, as it seems such a shame to throw them out.  (I know they get recycled, but still...)

Remember the kid's craft animal jars that I did for the Hobbycraft blog last week?  Well, these are for adults as they look quite good with a tea-light candle in once the lights are down low.

To find the tutorial on how to make some for yourself, visit my blog post featured on the Hobbycraft blog .....

http://blog.hobbycraft.co.uk/how-to-make-stained-glass-lanterns/

Let me know if you make some, would love to see photos.

Hobbycraft Videos

You may recall that in April I spent five days down in Bournemouth at Hobbycraft HQ shooting some tutorial videos for their YouTube account.  If you missed that post you can find it HERE.

Well, the videos have now gone live, so you can have a peep if you like  (although I think I need to work on my presenting skills as I am a bit wooden)

Click on the links for each video:

How to cast on.

How to do a basic knit stitch.

How to do stocking stitch.

How to knit a cable stitch.

Knitting tips.

Three basic crochet stitches.

How to crochet a hat.

Four things to make with fat quarters - part 1.

Four things to make with fat quarters - part 2.

How to hand embroider a flower.

Three ways to personalise a bag or t-shirt.

Three basic embroidery stitches.

Clanger Puppet pattern

Following on from my interview on The Clangers on BBC Radio Cumbria, I thought you might like to make a Clanger puppet for yourself?  Well, if so, here is the pattern for you  :)

You will need:  fleece fabric for the body - about 3 x A4 size.  Felt for the waistcoat, beads or buttons for eyes, yarn for hair, a little stuffing for the nose.

First of all you need to OPEN THIS FILE and print it off, then cut out the pieces.

Now, you need to cut two pieces of the side body part, and one piece of the front body part.

Time for some sewing.  Machine sewing is better but you can sew it by hand too if you don't have a machine.  

Take the single front body piece and one side body piece and lay the fabric right side to right side, with the arms matching as shown.

Sew from the centre of the top of the head on both pieces, right round the ears, arms and down the body to the bottom.

Now take the second side body part and do the same on the other side.

This time you will sew the remaining open seam - down the nose and down the tummy.

Turn your puppet the right way in and that's the basic puppet finished.

Add some beads or buttons for eyes, and some yarn for hair.  You can embroider a little nose on if you like.  I added some little claws with strong white thread.  Stuff the nose with a little toy stuffing.

Time for the waistcoat.  Cut out the waistcoat template from some felt.  Cut two neat circles for the arm-holes, then you can make your waistcoat a little different by cutting shapes into it, or by sewing things on to it.  How about some nice stitches around the hems and arms?

If you make one, I would love to see photos  :)

Animal Storage Jars

I created these funky little jars for a Hobbycraft Blog.

Really easy to make and loads of sticky messy fun for the kids - most kid's like messy crafts I find.  And the best bit, is you get to use PVA glue...... the next bit is for adults only...... which you can paint all over your hands to peel off later once it is dry  :)  (please don't tell me you have never done that!?)

Anyhooooo here is the link to the blog and the step by step instructions  :)  

http://blog.hobbycraft.co.uk/how-to-make-animal-storage-jars/

You can see they make great storage jars for other art and craft materials. 

Keep an eye out for more crafts with jars as I am working on others  :)

H2only Challenge

At the moment I am taking part in the RNLI H2only challenge.  Which is exactly that...... H2o only!

Yup, only water for 10 days. No tea, no fizzy pop, no juice, no wine, just water.

Aghhhh, piece of cake....... I thought  :/

So I expected it to be difficult mentally, like talking myself out of a glass of wine on an evening, or when out for a meal, or breaking the habit of having two brews when I get up on a morning.  What I didn't prepare for was the pysical beating it would take on my body.

Day 1:
I felt grumpy.  In fact my first words were expletives as I walked down the stairs and Hubster offered me a glass of water.  I was ready, right then, to fail.  But I had hot water and grumped a little more.
In fact, I grumped all day.  I grumped at the poor nurse doing my well-women check up, I grumped at my daughter (who, incidentally, grumped back at me as we are doing it together), I grumped at Hubster then I went into work and grumped at my colleagues too, I even grumped on Facebook to anyone who would listen.

Day 2:
I was dying.  I had to get up to go and do a radio interview, I felt super grumpy, but plastered a smile and performed well (I think), but once home my head was splitting with the most excruciating pain.  I couldn't move my head a millimetre without it hurting.  I had loads to do - patterns to write, blogs to write, parcels of beads to pack, a blanket to finish and a birthday cake to make.  I couldn't do anything, so I went to bed to try and sleep it off.
I got up at 3.00pm, hurriedly iced the cake that I had luckily baked in the morning, had a quick wash and went to work to do the back-shift.  I got through that shift on two pro plus tablets (caffeine), two paracetamol and 2 ibuprofen.
It took the edge off it enough for me to work, but I was foggy, forgetful and having total blanks to performing tasks that I do all the time.

Day 3:
Didn't sleep well at all, not content with giving me a sleepless night, my brain decided to give me hallucinatory dreams in the rare times that I was asleep.  Thanks for that brain, most useful.  So I woke disoriented, foggier than yesterday and very tired.  But no headache!  Whoop!
The headache made it's appearance about 2.00pm, so at least I got the morning off.
Not feeling quite so bad today all-in-all.  I'm trying not to take any painkillers today as there doesn't seem a lot of point in giving up a drug (caffeine) to fill the space with other drugs, but they are not locked away just yet.

Only 7 days to go......

If you fancy sponsoring me, just the price of a cup of tea would be lovely, you can find my Just Giving page here.....https://www.justgiving.com/soozintheshed

Talking about the The Clangers on BBC Radio Cumbria

So, do you remember the Clangers?  If you are around my age..... how old??..... you might well do.

They are bringing them back for new episodes in 2015.

The Clangers were little knitted fellows, with very large pointy noses and odd little waistcoats.

On Tuesday I got a phone call from BBC Radio Cumbria from one of the producers. Was I free to go into the studio and make a Clanger?   Oh, sure, I can do that........ em, what was I thinking?

Tuesday evening was spent trying to come up with something that was easy enough to do a quick demo to the studio cameras, yet that actually looked Clanger like.

The obvious would be to knit the Clanger, after all, the ones in the original series were all knitted.  But knitting takes time, and there just wasn't enough to get one done.

A quick trip around Hobbycraft found me some gorgeous soft pink fleece in Clanger colour, and the idea formed to make a Clanger puppet.

He actually came to life quite quickly in the end.  I made one, worked out the bits needed to make him better, re-cut the fabric and made a second, didn't like it so went back to the first and finished him off.

I will be sharing the pattern soon, so you can make your own - watch out for it on this blog  :)

So, at the studios I was half prepared with cut-outs and patterns and trimmings.  And Kevin Fernihough, the presenter from BBC Radio Cumbria got to work making a little waistcoat for the Clanger.

You can listen to the interview HERE at around 38:00 mins in  :)

In the meantime, why not watch an old episode and bring back the childhood memories.

Enjoy  :)

A sneak peak of needlefelting... but what will it be?

Last week I decided to revisit an old friend - my box of needlefelting stuff.  I want to put some different classes on, so it was time to work on some new ideas.

First I started with a Styrofoam shape, but try as I might I just couldn't get the wool to jab into it at all.  Now, I think this may be the size needle I have as I know there are kits with the Styrofoam shapes in so it should work.... mine, however, did not.

So, chucking that to one side I just made a ball shape for a head, and stabbed it and stabbed it, then stabbed a finger, so stabbed the ball in temper, and stabbed another finger.  

Blood everywhere.  Those felting needles are proper sharp, not to mention barbed, so they really hurt.

Once I calmed down and poured a glass of wine  (it was evening time I should say, not 10am in the morning) I started stabbing again, a little more carefully.

Anyway, a nice firm ball/head later, with a little hippy headband and some striking grey hair. I had had enough.  But I am happy so far   :)

I will be back soon with a body....... hopefully  ;)