Inspired by "All That Glitters"

 My name is Jessica and this is my first post on Mum's blog.

We have been watching "All That Glitters" on the BBC iPlayer. We were inspired to make our own jewellery. I settled on making necklaces out of wire and thread for me and my friends. This is how I did it:

1. Put pegs in a board to wrap the wire around to make a design.

2. Make coils of wire by wrapping it around something round!

3. Decide how long you want the necklace to be and measure your thread so that it is twice as long.

4. Thread it all together using the coils to keep the doubled thread together. Tie a knot at the top.

5. Share them with your friends and see them smile!

The Christmas Craft Cupboard is Open!

That's right - we're beyond October half term, so it must be time to crack on with some Christmas crafting, surely!! As a result of returning to teaching and struggling to adjust to a new work-life balance we didn't do much for Christmas 2019 but I have built up a huge supply of blanks and bits in the sales over the past two years so we've certainly got enough to get us through this lockdown comfortably! 

Today we kicked off with polymer clay modelling. Jessica wanted to do a Christmas tree and snowman (again) but I think we might be ready to try something like a penguin next time! 

These lovely little creations are destined to hang on our tree in fillable baubles looking like little snow globes. We've got a few different options for the shapes and sizes of baubles and for the accompanying filling matter currently in my stores from places like Hobbycraft and Poundland and haven't decided exactly what form they will take yet but here's the general idea...

With the remaining warmed up clay, Jessica decided to also make some little marbled pendants in unusual shapes. I love how simple rolling and folding creates such beautiful effects.

We use Fimo Soft, which is smooth and easy to blend. The colour does bleed onto hands and surfaces so you have to be slightly careful and be prepared to clean your workspace between colours if you need to keep crisp colours and brilliant white. It's a lovely activity for everyone and I'm always surprised how far a little block will go.

Sharpie Decorated Cork Pendants

Oh, we enjoyed making these! One cork, seven pendants, what a shame corks aren't quite so abundant anymore! I will admit that Jessica is always excited when she's allowed to use my Sharpies but this little project involved Sharpies and jewellery making so we were onto a double winner from the start. 

I sliced a cork into seven pieces and painted front them on one surface with white acrylic. Once dry I added the screw in eyes and then we decorated the pendants before adding string to turn them into necklaces. Jessica told me what to do on each one as an outline and then she coloured in most of the charms. I've instructed Daddy not to throw away any corks in the future because these were too good to not be repeated...

 

Upcycled Paper Beads

This is my preparation for the WCHS co-curricular day tomorrow. I can’t give away too much information just yet as the girls don’t know what they are doing but I’ll explain and post some more photos after the event.

So, I’ve been making my first ever batch of upcycled paper beads. I chose a nice orange advert from an old Sainsburys magazine and cut 17 isosceles triangles from it. They are cut lengthways (to make them as long as possible) and all have a base of 2cm. I then rolled the beads using a cocktail stick to start them off. The rolled paper then needed to be secured so I varnished it. Tomorrow I will be using acrylic varnish but I only had clear nail varnish at home so I tried that. For the record, it gives a nicer shine but is not as easy to use as the acrylic varnish.

Once dry I threaded them all onto a piece of elastic to make an African-style paper bead necklace, which I look forward to wearing with my authentic Ghanaian dress tomorrow.

 

Mum takes up crafting…

My wonderful mother is trying out all sorts of arts and crafts at the moment. She’s trying to find ways of relaxing that are also great hobbies. Naturally, I am encouraging the crafting exploits and bought her a whole lot of small kits this weekend. In return, she gave me these cute earrings that she has made. She also made a beautiful bracelet for Katryn, which I should photograph and share. It seems that jewellery making is going to be one of her things. It’s a good job I’ve got a lot of the kit already!

Crafting with Katryn

I’ve had a lovely half term holiday with Katryn. She was very good at humouring me and trying out lots of crafts that were quite new to her, and one that was new to me too.

	On our first morning, Katryn found my beads and decided that she’d like to make some ear-rings for her Mum. Sarah was surprised that they were actually quite pretty!
Next job was a touch of marbling. We played around with this a couple of times and decided that it definitely looks best if you only use a couple of different inks at a time.
	We spent the day in Hyde Park and took a quick trip to John Lewis on Oxford Street where Katryn bought a princess Hama bead kit. That evening she spent ages putting the beads on the pegboard only to pull the whole lot on top of herself and have to start again! More care required!!
On Monday we made this sock bunny that came in kit form from John Lewis. It’s from a company called Sock Creatures. Having had a quick look at their website I like all of the other creatures better but nevermind! We made this for Great Nan who was 87 that day. The kit came with an insane amount of stuffing so I’m looking forward to making my own toys in the future. Katryn was a great help cutting things out and helping me with the sewing machine.
	On the topic of Nan’s birthday we decorated her a cake and as you can see, we found time to do a little face painting too…
It was John’s 30th birthday this week. Unfortunately, I couldn’t be there to help him celebrate but Katryn and I made him this card and sent it to John via David.
	Back in Wales we organised a party to cheer Mum up. We made a gorgeous banner, tissue paper balloons, party hats, paper flowers, a board game and a pass the parcel. It was great fun!!