Solo Craftiness: funny handwash

I saw this idea on Pinterest. Oh Pinterest, how I love/hate you - you waste so much of my time, yet what a way to timewaste! Sigh.

To make these, take photos of your kids in funny "let me out of here!!" poses, and print the photos onto paper. Cut out neatly around the outline of your child's picture, then take this little fragile paper figure to a copy shop and get them to copy it onto overhead projector (OHP) film, also called transparency paper I think. Cut this film to fit your handwash bottle, roll it up, slip it in, and fill the bottle with clear handwash. I bought clear refillable pump bottles at Freedom Furniture, but it also works just buying any clear handwash bottle from the supermarket and peeling off the stickers. Kate.

Project 4: Pendant Lighting

So you must have seen these doily pendants, right?? They were everywhere, so we couldnt resist any longer. We kind of collated the how-tos from places like Real Living and Apartment Therapy, applied a bit of common sense and voile! We found the doilies on ebay (thank you wattleinspireyou). We tried a few places looking for an elusive round balloon, but we had no luck. Any ideas?? In the end we used your standard helium quality ones. I think the bigger one was almost too big, it has collapsed on itself a little. Nevertheless they look quite pretty. Too pretty for my guest bathroom???

Amanda mixed it up with some pendants made of wood veneer strips which didn't go exactly to plan (strips too thin??) but they turned out beautifully, I think. Just scrumptious in that bowl! It was a great idea to go with a lot of smaller ones rather than one big one. Nice save! Jess.

Project 3: Felt brooches

Using some of the skills and materials we used in the clip projects we thought we could try brooches. Not such a far stretch!

I thought it was time that I started building up a present cupboard. No more frantic last minute trips to the shops first thing on a Saturday morning for me! So I decided to try number brooches, as my children always loved telling everyone how old they were, especially around their birthday time. I got as far as a number 5 and a number 2...

Amanda had a gorgeous postcard of jellyfish that she found on her travels in Portland. Got to love Amanda's thinking on this. Even more impressive, this was her first attempt at felt craft. Those tentacles!

As for Kate, well, this was the night she lost her crafting sparkle. It was unnerving!

Jess

Project 2: Garlands

Tonight’s gathering revolved around pretty little circles of colour run together with thread. Old books and music scores were sacrificed along with paper, felt and gauze. The jackpot was a strange art book discovered a second hand store – page after page of glorious patterns! Working as a team and drawing inspiration from a tutorial on Curbly, we created 8 different 2.5m garlands in the space of three hours.

Here is Kate’s fantastic Random Selection garland (below left), Amanda's good old Christmas Flair garland (below right) and Jess' ethereal Shades of Grey garland (also below right).

This is Kate constructing her vibrant Colour Frenzy garland (below).

And finally, a group effort on Amanda's Symphony in Blue (below).

The strings of garlands were the start of a garland bonanza, that led to a garland rainbow-esque mobile, that flutters beautifully in a kitchen breezeway. Amanda.

Solo craftiness: a teepee for a wee girl

These fabric teepees are so expensive in the shops, so I decided to tackle one myself for my littlest daughter's first birthday. I found a teepee pattern on the McCalls website, and it was simple to follow. Ikea has such a fantastic range of affordable, heavy drill cotton, it was so hard to choose. I got something with an evenly distributed pattern, so that it didn't matter which way I lay the pattern pieces down as I cut it out. I found some clear sewing plastic (there's probably a technical name for that, but I don't know what it is) and even made windows in two panels!

I bought timber dowel lengths at the local hardware shop (they even cut them to size for me) and painted the tops pretty pastel colours using old housepaint samples. There are rubber stoppers on the tops and bottoms of the dowel to stop it being rough and scratchy, and also to help them grip the floor.

I even bought a torch, and hung it upside down from the top of the dowel, so that the teepee is illuminated, and the kids have loved this (until the torch runs out of battery, which happens quickly because they never remember to turn it off of course).

To use the teepee you just prop open the dowel until the panels of fabric are taut. Putting it away is so simple too, you just scoop it together in your hands and I store it leaning upright in a corner, so it's not in my way when the kids aren't playing with it.

I loved this project! Kate.

Project 1: Felt Clips

And so it began with felt, glue and clips.

Feast your eyes on the crafty delights that Kate and Jess cooked up at the inaugural Crafty Friday. Also a cheeky cherub modelling a mushroom design. Too divine!