The joy of finding craft in the most unlikely of places…

We’ve just had a weekend away in Exmouth. It was really good to spend some time together and relax. Naturally my husband had birds on his mind so on our way down we stopped off at Hose Hill Lake in Berkshire to see a Bonepart’s Gull. Lovely as it was, it didn’t keep my interest for very long so I went for a quick wonder and found this piece of craftwork…

Each clay tile is individually moulded and painted. I don’t know which group has done it (presumably a wildlife group or primary school) but I loved it.

On Saturday we headed for Prawle Point and Start Point and went for a couple of nice walks in the sunshine. It was glorious but after a long walk around East Prawle I needed some hydration so we headed to The Pigs Nose for a swift drink before moving on. A few spots of rain drove me inside where I stumbled across a real treasure. In the far corner of the dim pub was a knitting basket and an invitation to leave my mark on this place forever.

There were no two needles the same size and some of the knitting was quite suspect but I joined in very happily. What an amazing idea!
I failed to find any craft on Sunday but my need to do stuff was satisfied as I sat in another random pub with a pint of Guinness doing some hard Mathematics! Sad but true. Once a geek, always a geek I guess!

Every superhero needs a cape!

I doubt if anyone could every accuse me of doing things by halves. If I’m going to do something, I will do it right. There was no way I was going to make seven of these for Year 13 (and they were chuffed enough with the bits I posted yesterday) but my colleague and I definitely needed capes to be superheroes tomorrow. I’m rather pleased with my upcycling of an old sheet and a couple of old pillow cases. Our capes are different colours on the front and back, have buttons and buttonholes as tidy fixings and most importantly, the feature pi truncated after 10 significant figures on the back. Perfect for these WCHS Pi-rates!

Introducing the WCHS Pi-rates – Superheroes in any classroom

This week is the UK’s Children’s Hospice Week, which culminates in Superhero Friday, a hero inspired day of fundraising. At Woodford, we will be supporting our neighbouring Children’s Hospice, Haven House who do an amazing job of looking after life-limited children and their families. 

In the spirit of day some of my Year 13s have agreed to join me in transforming ourselves into brand new mathematical superheroes who have the superhuman ability to perform complex mathematical techniques and inspire others to love Mathematics as much as we do! (I think I may be putting words into their mouths here). Anyway, for one day only, we will be known as the WCHS Pi-rates. Here is a sneaky peak at the shield-like logos that will adorn our t-shirts on Friday.

There are seven of us so they’ve taken a while to make. On the plus side, I got to use my glitter glue gun to draw pi symbols on our eye patches!

A rod for my own back??

I’m not sure how far back my gifting to year 13 goes. I honestly can’t remember when I started but it was obviously a bit stupid to also start making cards for my Year 11s two years ago. It never dawned on me that one day I’d have other commitments and priorities or that I’d end up with 69 students to make things for. However, this is a tradition and one way or another I will make time to do it all.

Whilst I’m beavering away in my new craft room you can have a look at all of the previous good luck cards I’ve made (or at least the ones I can find pictures of)…

 

Craft Room

A few days ago I decided that I’d had enough of sitting on the floor in the lounge as if I was a six year old child. There are times when a girl needs to cuddle up to her husband on a sofa in front of the telly and for six and a half years I haven’t been able to do that. It was time to move the sofa bed out of the spare room and into the lounge. It desperately needs me to make a beautiful throw for it but I have a proper lounge at last.

As a very happy coincidence (believe that and you’ll believe anything!) this meant that I needed to rearrange things between these two rooms. Surely the only solution was to make the spare room into my crafting room. Right?!

David, I’m sorry that I didn’t ask permission but I was afraid you wouldn’t let me. I promise I’ll keep both rooms much more tidy than I’ve managed before and you can shut the door on me when the noise of my sewing machine is annoying you!

Exam Season is Fast Approaching…

… that means that it’s time to start making good luck cards. Today I have started the process and have designed the card for my Year 11s. I have 24 of these to make as well as cards and presents for my 40+ Year 13s. I have to be more secretive than usual this year though as I have some regular readers in both year groups and I would hate to spoil the surprise for them. Suffice it to say that I will be very busy but I have started and this year I am using a four-leaf clover punch purchased especially.

Belle of Barmouth

This weekend I was on a hen do for one of my best friends from school. The destination was Barmouth, which was a firm family favourite for many of us in our childhoods as well as the destination of our first holiday away together upon completing our GCSEs many years ago. This weekend break was slightly more sedate and certainly much more comfortable than our previous adventure. Well, we are 15 years older (& wiser?). We hired out a big house with lovely sea views for a chilled out weekend with good food, great company and plenty of bubbly.

Anyway, during a desperate attempt to find the boiler and fix the central heating, Anny and I stumbled across this little treasure hidden away in the upstairs utility room and, for a change, I was not the only one getting over excited! Sorry about the picture quality but what a beauty…

I want one!!!

New Pyrography Set

As a very early birthday present I’ve had a new pyrography set from Amazon. I have over 40 year 13s to make good luck presents for this year so I need a better tool to help me. This also explains why I’ve had to have it a month before my birthday. I’ve spent the last couple of days playing with the different nibs and branding pieces. The only problem is that I’ve had to be very patient in allowing the tool to cool down every time that I wanted to try a new one. Yawn!

Anyway, here’s the tool and some examples of my playing around…

Old Piece… New Home… Still a Firm Favourite

Mum & Dad’s new back garden is a little gem of a suntrap. They had a patio put down before they moved in and now that the snow has finally disappeared we have started to enjoy it. We sat out for a while this afternoon so it was time to break out the bench cushion that I made Mum a while back. The bench is in need of a sand and re-varnish but all in good time. Queequeg didn’t let that bother him though and he was quick to make himself comfy while basking in the sunshine and who can blame him? Any chance that spring is finally here?!

Katryn paints Peppa

Sometime in the past couple of months I picked up a “paint your own” Peppa pig moneybox from WHSmiths for the bargain price of £2.49. Katryn finally got around to painting it this morning. I have to say, it was an unusually good kit and I would definitely recommend it although possibly not for the 3 year olds that it’s “suitable” for. There were quite a few fiddly bits that Kat wanted help with and she’s pretty good with her hands. She did the vast majority herself though…

    

 

Oops Snooze, I seem to have painted some of Peppa’s head red…

Here’s the final product…