The Ears Of A Cat

"Dear Parent
Please send your child to school dressed as the super-hero of their choice....."

Oh yes one of those frantic moments of putting together a costume with very short notice.

Cat-woman was the heroine of choice, costume sorted (black clothes, no problem), cat ears to be made:

Cat Ears Steps:
I took a plain headband, measured out some black material,a rectangular piece, and wrapped it along the headband.
I hand-stitched it together along the inside.
Now for the ears - I cut out a square piece of black fabric, ironed on some interfacing to strengthen it, then cut out 4 ear shapes.
I stitched 2 ear shapes together, interfacing on the inside for both pieces - I used an edging stitch on the sewing machine.
The bottom edge of the ears was trimmed to match the shape of the headband, and I then hand-stitched the ears onto the headband.

And cat ears were made.

Buttons And Gadgets

One of my favourite things when crafting and creating is spending an excessive amount of time sifting through one of my many vintage button boxes to find the exact button that will marry perfectly with whatever fabric I happen to be using at the time. And when I was making a few gadget/mobile phone/iPod cases I found myself whiling many a minute away selecting the perfectly perfect button.

Here are the combinations I came up with:


Love this big brown button!



A starry affair livened up with a splash of pink wool


Butterscotch button and tweed.

Must start to put these in my folksy and etsy shops too - that's after I've spent another inordinate amount of time thinking up names for them!

Grey Flowers Looking Bright

Another of my fabric finds has been transformed into one of my clutch bags, which I've been meaning to put online for a few weeks now and finally got round to it today. On 1st description - "grey flowers, yellowish background" you could be excused for not thinking this fabric was too cheerful, but when you see how the sweet carnation-like grey flowers sit amongst little white flowers, you realise this is one sweet unique design. I like the background colour too, whether that's because I'm drawn to things that evoke memories of other eras (70's maybe?) I'm not sure, but I think it works well.



I've popped this bag into my folksy shop and called it the Grey Carnation Clutch Bag.

Now to photograph 8 ipod covers and 10 brooches......

An Itch To Stitch

Its a strange time at the moment - caught between selling and buying a house, things in boxes, things not in boxes, life in limbo. I felt I needed to distract myself from scouring the web for sites such as "how to move house in 10 easy steps" or for waiting to accost the postman each morning for any letter that might speed up the process.

So I had to find a way to "step away, nothing to see here" and embroidery was that way. Last year I was given some of Jenny Hart's Sublime Stitching books and kits and it didn't take me long to get back into the swing of a little gentle sewing. Embroidery is therapeutic, I curl up on my red chair, feet tucked beneath me, sink back into the cushions, thread a needle and sew sew sew. There is something about the order of sewing, the rhythm, that slows your breathing and thoughts down into a calmness that is so needed right now.

This is the work in progress:





If you're new to embroidery, the Jenny Hart books are excellent - they include a load of transfer patterns that you just iron onto your fabric (I love using linen and linen-type materials). The instructions for the stitches are also very well written - even the French knot can be mastered with ease!



You can find her books on Amazon, but the Sublime Stitching website has a wealth of other patterns and kits too.

Sorting Out The Stash

It was a combination of a few things that prompted me to have a fabric tidy up - new fabrics were waiting to gain entry into the fabric cupboard, and I had a few recent requests to make custom gadget covers so needed a way to show the fabric choices I have.

So today was fabric sort out day - I emptied the cupboard, grouped them into sets, photographed them, then uploaded them onto my flickr page (under the photo set "fabric catalogue"). Also along the way I discovered how to create a photo mosaic so you can see all my little fabric groups on one photo:



This isn't all my fabrics either I have to admit - I haven't included the plain fabrics or the small little pieces I collect - but sorting them out will have to wait til another day!

The Reincarnation Of A Scarf

I have lots of scarves - I knit scarves, I crochet scarves, I have scarves in all shapes and sizes (one for every eventuality/weather condition/colour of coat).

But when I stumbled across a pure lambswool scarf in a charity shop I couldn't resist giving it a new lease of life - and I didn't mean for the purpose it was created for. I began by felting it to add a touch of robustness, then cutting it into squares. Add a piece of bright fabric and hey presto, 2 little purses were made!





And last but not least one for the gadget and music lovers - an iPod/moblile phone/gadget sleeve -



They are all in my folksy and etsy shops at the moment, and I feel that this is just the beginning of a venture into upcyling for me.

Keep your iPod Warm This Winter

Our house seems to be accumulating a number of iPods, mp3 players and mobile phones, all of varying shapes and sizes, so finding compatible covers for them is starting to become a challenge. Combining this conundrum with my love of fabrics I have developed a new line in iPod sleeves/socks/cozy's - whatever you wish to call them.



I love this fabric - I've called it a Busy Ant Fabric - and it just seemed to suit the size of this iPod cover. I added a crocheted band in white and a button for the closure.



This one has been listed in my Folksy shop, I shall be displaying more at the Oxford handm@de craft fair on Sunday then adding more to my Folksy and Etsy shops next week.

The Howies Competition

Folksy, (the fabulous new UK online site for all things handmade where you can also purchase my crafty goods!) recently teamed up with Howies - the gorgeous clothing brand - to launch a competition for designers and crafters. The brief was "Life is complicated. Sport is simple" so many of us busied away sketching/sewing/crafting to create our representation of the theme.

I was inspired by my fabric cupboard and came up with this little purse:



Contemplating Cowboy Pouch -
Hand crafted from a retro style cowboy print fabric, one side features a cowboy perched on a fence deep in thought, with hand embroidered words "Just Ride" floating down from the clouds. The reverse of the purse shows a cowboy riding his horse.

This pouch is a unique way of stashing your phone, keys, anything to tidy away the baggage of life and remind yourself to look at the clouds and Just Ride.




9 items were short-listed and you can guess the excitement and whoops of joy when my cowboy purse was chosen as one of the 9. For the next week, until the 26th September,the short-listed entries will be on display in the Howies Carnaby Street store in London, where the general public can vote for their favourites.

You can see all the entries on the Folksy blog, but if you're near London within the next few days why pop down to support the handmade entries!

Coffee And Cream

Maybe the sandy beaches of my recent trip to Northumberland have still been on my mind for my latest creations seem to be in shades of cream, beige and sand. It all began with a rummage in my material cupboard to find a piece of this flower print fabric in subtle shades, which just had to be made into this little clutch bag.



Then with the same material I used one of the flower prints to make this brooch, I also added a few machine stitches to highlight the centre of the flower.



And last but not least I crocheted this wrist cuff in pure wool, and added some surface crochet in brown wool.



I've divided them up between my Etsy and Folksy shops and listed them there today.

Wind The Bobbin Up

A few blog posts ago I let out a cry to the universe - "Please help me sort out this tangle of a thread mess!". And the Universe heard me. And replied. Firstly another Etsy seller, djbebe, kindly commented and sent me a link to a picture of a very organised thread box, then family members (my mum) became aware of my plight and sourced the land to supply me with the tools.


Firstly I was provided with this brilliant thread winder, simply slot in your piece of cardboard and wind, wind, wind. I found this strangely relaxing. Untangling knots was not. A knot was definitely not. Not to the Knot....oh - enough of the knots!





Then, much thread winding later, they were all given a new home. A shiny new thread box. Neat. And Tidy. No knots.


Spurred on by this strange state of neatness and order, I then developed an urge to tackle the abundance of buttons that were spilling out of my sewing box. As a small girl sorting through buttons would have given me immense pleasure, and I wondered if this was a genetic trait. I suggested my daughter join in the fun to test this theory. Not only did she join in but took complete charge of the Button Box, sorting by colour, texture and size.








Finished result? Buttontastic.

The Many Uses Of A Brooch

Have realised today that I haven't mentioned for a while what I am actually creating at the moment, and as those in the know (IE anyone who lives with me) can testify I am pretty busy everyday, armed with a crochet hook, a needle, a ball of wool or buried beneath shrouds of fabric. The sounds of "ouch!" that emanate from our house tend to belong to other people treading on a pin that I seem to have dropped on the floor. (Funnily enough I never seem to step on them myself.....well I find that mildly amusing anyway).

At the moment I'm having a bit of a brooch phase. Fabric and felt. Buttons may also be involved. And lots of thread. And having created quite a few (most are heading for a craft sale, some will veer towards Etsy) I began to deliberate on the many uses of a brooch. I shall begin with the obvious:

• wear it on your coat
• when the weather is too warm for a coat, wear one on your t-shirt
• stick one on your hat (winter hat, summer hat, who cares!)
• adorn your bag with one
  
• attach one to a plant label and stick it in your house plant (trust me on this one, house plants need accessories too)
• frame one (who else will have a brooch on their living room wall?)
• wear one on your skirt
• got a dull scarf? Then it needs a brooch!
• decorate a pillow or cushion with one

So there we go, the 1st 10, I shall add more as my mind allows.`Please post any other suggestions too!

Happy brooch wearing.

A Stitch In Time

I'd been thinking about making a bag for some time that would incorporate hand embroidery, but didn't want to to look - well, twee .

So for many a day I have sat with a piece of grey fabric, some sparkly bag handles and a tub full of embroidery thread until I was inspired by the theme of circles - and this is the finished result.I've listed it in my Etsy shop and, depending on how well it does there, I may do more in the range of hand embroidered bags.

I learnt to sew some many years ago in school (yes, there was a day and age when teachers would arm a hoard of children with needles, pins and thread and not worry about a law suit for a pin injury to a thumb) - in fact my mother still uses an embroidered mirror which I made at school - the french knots have remained intact!

Two of my favourite embroidery books are Sublime Stitching, by Jenny Hart, and Doodle Stitching, by Aimee Ray. Neither of which have any hint of tweeness about them. Great instructions too if you've never held a needle before and need some guidance.


And now to my embroidery thread stash - I need some inspiration on how to store all my threads in some kind of order. The Order Of The Thread is in a state of instability.