'Diamond Geezer' Journal Cover

Freestyle Machine Embroidery

Get your thinking caps on as it's time to enter the second Cuddly Buddly design challenge and there is a lovely £25 gift voucher on offer for the best creation.  This month's theme is 'Diamonds' or 'Pearls' and you have until Wednesday 14 May to get your entry in.  The only 'rule' is that you use products sold in the Cuddly Buddly shop, but with over 12,000 products stocked this won't be a problem. Apart from this anything goes and your creation could be sewing, painting, mixed media, card making, paper crafting........etc! 

I decided to put a masculine spin on the diamond theme and stitched a 'Diamond Geezer' journal cover; 

I based it on this set of digi stamps but made a few changes so that it looked like our nephew Henry.  I wanted to stitch him a little present and, as he has recently received an offer to study History at Oxford University, a notebook cover with beer on the front seemed the perfect reflection of study and socialising!

I used Bondaweb to attach the pieces and then dropped my feed dogs and free motion embroidered around the outlines in black adding depth and definition. 

The wording was stitched in exactly the same way and this technique gives quite a 'modern' feel to projects so is perfect when creating gifts for teenagers.

I have written a full tutorial which you can see over at the Cuddly Buddly Blog and it can be easily adapted to suit any size of notebook.  The blog also has lots of other tutorials from my fellow design team members all intended to inspire you to get crafting and entering the competition! 

You also have until Monday to enter my Egg Cosy Giveaway, to take part you simply have to leave a comment on this blog and sign up to follow it either through Blogger or Bloglovin'.  The winner will receive a handmade pair of linen egg cosies lovingly appliqued in any design or colour scheme chosen from these.