Bookmarks from Clay!

I have been desperate to have a play with Fimo Leather Effect since seeing it featured on Kirstie's Handmade Christmas so I chose this for our most recent Crafterzoom session. The concept of a clay that tranforms into a leather-like material that can be sewn and cut after hardening was inticing and the stuff has not disappointed. We've only been playing with it so far but Jessica and I have enjoyed our initial experiements which culminated in these bookmarks. 

The clay can be used in the same way as other polymer clays before hardening; we experimented with marbling and dotting before rolling out our clay as thin as we could and stretching it gently by hand to add additional texture. We also stamped messages into the clay using small rubber letter stamps ahead of hardening in the oven. It takes 30 minutes at 130^oC to harden and fix into this strange rubbery material. Once this is done, it can be cut and sewn just as you would leather. I used punches to create holes and fringed a rectangle of the fixed Fimo before rolling and gluing into a tassle whilst Jessica used a paper punch to cut out a heart that she stitiched onto hers.

There are loads of ideas and tutorials online but this one, from Hobbycraft, gives you a good sense of what can be done with Fimo Leather-effect: Luggage Tag.

 

Centenary Banner

Last summer was Woodford County High School's centenary. Despite it being a few years since I had last set foot in the place I was absolutely delighted to be called upon to add to the fabric of the school once more! The school ran a competition to select a design team of about a dozen students who designed the banner that I ultimately created. It was a lovely experience to work with the students in this way. It's so different trying to make the visions of other people happen. They had the vision and the ideas whilst my role was to guide them in what could be crafted on a fabric banner and then ultimately make it happen. 

They wanted the golden ribbon to flow from the old, traditions into the modern 21st century school that they are proud to attend. The new Maths and Science building along with the observatory where key features whilst they wanted to incorporate the House colours and the green surroundings of the school which remain incredibly important. They wanted their community to be represented by a circle of hands and mark the school being named "London State Secondary School of the Year". Finally, they wanted to include an element of recycling, requesting that I use an old school shirt as part of the top band.

Here's a closer look at some of the individual elements...

It was a complete pleasure to create and an honour to be asked to do it. Countless hours, two banners and three window seats - WCHS I think that's probably your lot!

Woodland Friends Garland

I've been busy stitching this week in a desperate attempt to get this woodland garland finished before my friend, Laura, has her baby! When her maternity leave started I thought it was probably time to pull my finger out and get it done! She and her husband have a woodland theme running through the nursery and asked if I'd like to make them something like this for the baby. I jumped at the opportunity and was pleased to be able to make use of a book I bought back in May. Mollie Makes Woodland Friends is a lovely book with some fabulous, simple projects in it. I used the ideas and templates as inspiration for my own make here.

I have used felt from Hobbycraft, a single strand of embroidery silk for stitching and bondaweb to adhere the details to faces etc. The animals and toadstools are lightly stuffed and the pieces are all threaded onto a length of narrow green ribbon. Here's a closer look at some of the individual creations...

Finally, here's the finished garland hanging in my craft room, waiting to be delivered to it's new home next week...

Window Seat 3

That’s it. I have delivered the library’s third and final window seat this afternoon. As promised, this one features the iconic image of the building that adorns so many of the school banners. I decided to use two trees in the design to link each of the three seats and felt they needed a date to serve as a reminder of when the pieces joined the library. I have thoroughly enjoyed making them but, if I’m honest, I’m also not too sorry to bid farewell to this big project!

Window Seat 2

Here is WCHS’s second new window seat for the library, which I delivered and installed today. Just one to go and I’m feeling really sad about it. Given that we’re in the middle of a move to Colchester 57 miles away, I think this will probably be the last thing I do for the school that has played such a huge role in my life for the past decade. This project really does mark the end of an era [big sigh]. At least my banner and window seats will live on!

The design for this one was suggested by the new librarian. It’s quite similar to the first, which featured two trees, the WCHS logo and the Essex shield but I really like it. The third is going to be an image of the front of the school building, which is an iconic image that adorns many a banner around the school. It seems particularly appropriate to make a seat featuring the historical part of the building with the borough’s plans to expand the school in the future.

Window Seat 1

Woodford’s library is currently undergoing a facelift, which has included the installation of three new window seats. I was (happily) roped in to making seat pads for them and have finally finished the first. It replicates the design on a fireplace guard in the library. The Essex emblem and trees are blanket stitched felt and the WCHS logo is stitched directly onto the fabric with embroidery cotton. Here it is in situ…

Apologies for the poor photos, I only had my phone with me!

Small Wedding Gift

When stitching wedding gifts, I love it when I can steal the design from the bride and groom’s wedding stationery, which is exactly what I did with this piece. I enlarged the image from the wedding invitation then pricked and stitched for a couple of hours (or so). I have put the finished item in a silver plated frame from John Lewis.

Congratulations Carrie & Simon

It has very much become a tradition that I create a stitched gift to commemorate the event when I am invited to attend a wedding. This weekend Carrie and Simon tied the knot and hosted their reception at their lawn tennis club. Carrie made their invitations. They were so striking that I decided to use the design as the inspiration for their piece. This is a trick that I have used before and it usually goes down very well. Below is the finished gift and a close-up of the stitching alongside the original invitation. Sorry I couldn’t take a photo face on; I needed the flash so this was the only way I could avoid losing some of the image to flash blowout.

  

They are a wonderful couple and I wish them a lifetime of happiness and fabulous adventures together. Congratulations one last time!

Number Cushion

The inspiration behind this cushion came from an A-Z quilt in one of my mother-in-law’s crafting books. I’ve still never made a quilt and have not used blanket stitch before either so I thought I’d practise on a number cushion first. If I was going to do it again I think I would make the panels slightly smaller and border the lot before backing it but in general I’m really happy with the result.

Here are the steps I took to create the piece:

1. My cushion was 18 inch square so I cut each individual square for the patchwork to 7 inches allowing for a half an inch seam on all four sides.

2. I traced the letters back to front onto bondaweb and fused it to my fabrics with an iron.

3. Each number was cut out, placed in the centre of the individual squares and fused in place with an iron.

4. I blanket stitched each letter in place for decoration and security using two strands of embroidery silk in various colours.

5. I machined the patchwork doing a row at a time then stitching the rows together making sure that I ironed the seams open each time.

6. I cut a piece of yellow fabric 19 by 22 inches and split it somewhere along the longest side to create two rectangles each with a 19 inch side for the back panel.

7. I pinned the two rectangles to the front of the numbers, one to the top and the other to the bottom. Then folded the inside edges back to make the edges tidy but leaving an overlap for fastening.

8. I machined all four edges then turned the cushion cover the right way out.

9. I attached three poppers to the overlapped edges on the back to create a secure fastening to the cushion case after putting the cushion inside to ensure that they sit right when the cover is all plumped up.

Here’s a closer look at some of the parts:

     

Lucky Lady

I have already mentioned that our five week old daughter (where has that time gone?!) is lucky enough to have a very talented Gran and here is another example of her handiwork and incredible attention to detail. This beautiful name bunting will adorn her bedroom for years to come along with the one from the previous post.

Here’s a closer look at the individual flags of the bunting…



Oh, and this is Jessica at five weeks old carefully considering what her first crafting project will be! All in good time, Jess, all in good time!

For Mr & Mrs Webb

I spent Friday crafting in preparation for Chris and Laura’s wedding on Saturday. I must be out of practice because they took me hours – it actually took me a whole hour to decide on the design of the framed piece, which was ridiculous given the simplicity of it. Here they are:

It was a beautiful wedding for two very special people. For one final time on the occasion of their wedding, I’d like to send them all my love and very best wishes for the future.

A Christening Gift

It’s Alice’s christening today. I’ve made this little piece to commemorate the event for Bill, Melanie and Alice. I must be out of practice because it seemed to take me a really long time although watching The Great British Bake Off at the same time probably didn’t help!

Another Year, Another Special Leaving Card

We’re almost at the end of another year at Woodford, which inevitably means that a few people are leaving us. This summer we’re losing a fantastic maths teacher who is almost certainly one of the best colleagues that I will ever have. He has kept me entertained for three years and has helped me through some of the hardest times of my life. His enthusiasm is infectious and he loves teaching almost as much as I do. I’m going to miss him so much although possibly not his ridiculously creased shirts!
 

So, on my first weekend at home for a very long time, I had to make an equally special piece to be mounted on his leaving card. As usual, everyone’s been signing a blank card as I like to protect my creations until they are handed to the intended recipient. I decided to base my card on an optical illusion this year and used the following image as a guideline…
 

An hour later I had finished pricking the card and was ready to get stitching…
 

 

Four and a half hours later the piece is mounted on gold and black card and is ready to be mounted on the A5 card in school on Tuesday. What a productive Sunday afternoon!
 

Hand-embroidery on a Handkerchief

One of my best friends from school gets married today – congratulations Rhiannon and Simon!

Weddings always give me the opportunity to get crafty and this time around, Rhiannon asked me to embroider a very special message onto a handkerchief to give to her Dad on the big day. I used ordinary navy cotton doubled up for the stitching, which matches the bridesmaids. This was incredibly fiddly to do but I didn’t want the stitching to be too big and I wanted it to be obviously hand stitched. I have displayed the handkerchief in an old Radley box that once housed my credit card wallet. I do love to recycle after all!

Next skill to acquire

Within the next few weeks I need to become an accomplished hand embroiderer. I am very confident with  needlecraft on card and paper but my experience working on fabric is limited and I need my work to be impeccable on both the front and the back of my fabric. I’m a real stickler for detail (some of my students will vouch for that – I can here them groaning now as I nag them for more justification and clarity!). Anyway, I digress…

When developing new skills I generally turn to blogs and you-tube to help me out but occasionally I find that nothing beats a classic publication when the descriptions and diagrams had to be easy to follow. You couldn’t be sloppy or lack detail when you have a single diagram to accompany your description. Don’t get me wrong, you-tube is brilliant and has taught me a great deal but it doesn’t excite me the way this aged and yellowing leaflet does.

     
I’ll let you know how I’m getting on over the next few weeks.

New (old) Toy – Vulcan Senior Child’s Sewing Machine

I have no time to pass comment as I am supposed to be helping to solve the 5th round of the Alan Turing Cryptography competition before my Year 10s beat us again but look at my new (old) toy that I rescued from Mum and Dad’s house this weekend. I had no idea it was there and am very excited…

A couple of hours later (cryptography puzzle solved with little help from me) I’m back to pass comment…

Isn’t it beautiful?! A fully manual, utterly fabulous little gadget that I may have to hide from my husband for a while. It’s ok, he rarely reads my blog!

It’s in the original box with instruction book. You see how happy these ladies look, that’s how thrilled I am. Indeed I am a “lucky lady”!

    

Oddly, the machine has a single feed mechanism. By which I mean it uses a single piece of thread and has no bobbin feeding from below. As a result, the underside has a side-by-side double stitch effect as seen below.

I’m so over excited about this little toy!