Plastic Eggs ~ Napkin Decoupage Tutorial

Using PVA is much 'cheeper' than Mod Podge!

Last Friday I received an email from the rather marvellous 'Style at Home' magazine asking me about my plans for the Easter Bank Holiday.  'Blimey' I thought 'Christmas was only a fortnight ago!'.  Jen and her team have to work months ahead in order to meet the tight deadlines required to get the magazine onto the shelves for all us eager readers.  Still, that email gave me the little push I needed to start thinking about Spring and Easter projects.  I am planning to make 30 personalised and embroidered linen egg cosies as gifts for the guests at our annual party, which we hold after Mass on Easter Sunday.  I am still mulling over designs in my head (read procrastinating), so I grabbed my scissors and PVA glue and placed all thoughts of stitching aside.

Instead I decided to 'age' these unattractive plastic eggs.  We have bags of them left over from the egg hunts which the children used to enjoy when they were younger.  

 Most of the children in our social group are reaching the teenage years and an egg hunt is 'too young' for them.  So after lunch on Easter Sunday we either go for or a walk or have a retro sports day.  They're not too old for egg and spoon, sack and three-legged races!

The plastic eggs are now surplus to requirements so I got creative with an old book of quotations and some paper napkins and this is what I ended up with....

Antique Eggs!

 I wasn't sure how they would turn out, but I am really pleased with them.  They remind me of gorgeous Victorian botanical prints and book plates.  They were quite time consuming to produce, but the process was actually very easy and I am already dreaming about displaying batches of them under glass cloches and hurricane vases on the dinner table.

They cost next to nothing to produce and if you are a keen crafter you will probably already have all the supplies you need.  I used plastic eggs (obviously), book pages, watered down PVA glue, brown paint and some pretty paper dinner serviettes.

Tutorial 

I didn't prepare the eggs in any way at all, I didn't even bother gluing the two halves together and they worked perfectly, so grab your bits and pieces and jump straight in.

The first step was to stick on a layer of plain paper, I used some blank pages from the front of the book, onto to eggs using watered down PVA glue.  You don't need to worry about the exact ratio of glue to water, just aim for the consistency of very thin single cream.  I felt this first layer was necessary as the eggs were such lurid colours.  I guess you could just add more than one layer of printed book pages, but I didn't want too much print showing through.  Make sure you tear the paper rather than cutting it as this gives the pieces softer edges which blend into each other better when pasted down.

I worked in a little production line so that whilst one layer was drying I got started on the next egg.  I found that if I tried to stick too many paper strips onto an egg in one go I just ended up in a sticky mess!  I used an old, yellowed book of quotations, but if you don't have a suitable book to hand just use newspaper.

Once all the layers were completely dry, it was time to get creative with the paper napkins. I used botanical and butterfly themed versions.

Cut out your chosen image from the napkins, being sure to trim the design as closely as possible. Then separate the layers and, using the top ply only, smooth into place on your egg using more of the watered down PVA glue.  I used my finger for this part of the process as I found I had more control this way rather than using a paint brush.

 To complete the aging process I brushed some watered down brown poster paint over the eggs before quickly wiping off any excess.  A final coat of the PVA mixture will seal your finished final design and then you can simply sit back and admire your handiwork!

   

Baby Bunting Appliqued Garland

Personalised Flags with Appliqué

During the Christmas holidays we received the much awaited news that Alice's godmother had given birth to her second beautiful daughter and so I got straight down to some special stitching to mark this happy occasion.

The new arrival was a very bouncing 11lb 6oz and is pictured here with her proud big sister

I first met her Mummy when she was still at primary school and her mother was the landlord of the house whose floor I was sleeping on whilst the purchase of my own house went through.  I sometimes find it hard to believe that she is now all grown up and that over twenty years have slipped by.  She and her lovely husband are both engineers and spent the first part of their married life working out in Abu Dhabi but are now back in the UK.  Easier for visiting family and friends I guess, but not quite as warm!

I have just finished stitching each of the girls a string of personalised fabric bunting in coordinating pastel colours.  As ever the material is upcycled, this time I have used a piece of well laundered fabric which was originally a 'Next' duvet cover.  The years of washing have left it with a lovely soft 'shabby chic' feel!

Bunting is always well received as a gift and is pretty easy to make.  Even better it uses very little fabric especially if you alternate your flags/pennants when you mark them out.  You can even back the triangles with plain fabric if you are using a more expensive fabric for the front pieces.

Having cut out my flags, I then traced the necessary letters onto fusible web.  I used a font reminiscent of an American college alphabet as I felt the girls would be less likely to outgrow these later.  If you are having a go yourself don't forget to reverse your letters when you trace them onto the iron-on web, you won't believe how many times I have made this rookie mistake!

I created each set in the same colour palette so that they wouldn't clash if they were hung together.

Both sets are shown in these pictures, so the letters are mixed up.  In reality the owl bunting has all the teal letters and the butterfly features the pink.

Both the letters and the motifs were applied using fusible web (bondaweb) and then I simply highlighted the details by machine stitching around them with black thread.  The picture below shows the butterflies before and after the stitching has been added.

The bias-binding was made from an old pillowcase and I used a scrap of the same fabric for the owls' tummy, which really pulled the whole design together.

My first project of this year, thanks for joining me and visit again soon xx

If you go down to the woods today.....

Family time

It's hard to believe that today is the children's first Monday of school since 2013!  Christmas and the New Year seem like a dim and distant memory, so I thought I would post a couple of snaps from the holidays before I get back to my stitching.  

If you look carefully at the following picture you can just make out a lake glinting behind the trees.  We are lucky enough to live within walking distance of a nature reserve, ancient woodland, river, lakes and a stunning English Heritage site with breathtaking ruins. 

The girls had each been given a 'crossbow' for Christmas and had a wonderful time ambushing their brothers.

 If you go down to the woods today.............

Meeting these two might just give you that 'big surprise'!

Having a cosy Christmas time

We've had a joyful season surrounded by family and friends and I hope you have all had a wonderful time too.  Christmas Morning Mass was a beautifully chaotic affair and led almost totally by the children.  All three churches in the Parish come together at both Easter and Christmas and it's always lovely to see the children taking full part in the proceedings.  George delivered both the first and second readings, Alice read part of the bidding prayers, Rebecca sang the responsorial psalm and Lucy and Jenny read the Gospel.  Ayana and the girls also altar served ably lead by Joseph.  They were all fantastic and didn't seem in the least bit fazed by a congregation in the hundreds!

We only open stockings before church, so once the dinner (turkey wellington) was safely in the oven, we settled down to open the rest of our presents.  Mr Larkin and the children gave me a new hair dryer to replace the one I've had since school, as it is now inclined to cut out mid-use.  Hopefully this new one will also deliver thirty years of service!  Darling Mr Larkin also presented me with a beautiful poem fresh from his pen.

Alice was very pleased with a new school bag and complete box set of the 'Heroes of Olympus' books by Rick Riordan.  George had a couple of new games, a set of headphones and a seven book set of the 'Game of Thrones'. Mr Larkin was delighted with a Charles Tyrwhitt shirt and some new hi-vis cycling tops.

We spent the rest of the day fairly quietly as we were saving ourselves for 'Boxing Day'.  This is very much a part of a traditional English Christmas and many people chose to spend it with close friends or family.  We dragged some trestle tables out of the garage and had a full sit-down Christmas dinner with ourselves and three other families.  It was a glorious day and we built up an appetite for lunch with a walk around a local lake and ancient woodland known as 'The Scrogs'.

I was stitching right up until Christmas Eve and this year's theme was tea cosies.  The first one was for Alice's godmother who is also one of her teachers and she kindly gives up at least one lunchtime a week to teach Alice and a friend the flute.

  

As you can see I made it from a beautiful piece of purple tweed and I gave the teacup design a festive tweak with the addition of a snowflake. The back featured a personalised Christmas label.

The script was formed using free-motion machine embroidery and the black stitching used to highlight the applique pieces was applied in the same manner.  The cozy is very dinky and the perfect size to cover a pot of tea for one.  Just the thing at the end of a long day's teaching!

The next two were somewhat larger and should fit a family sized teapot.  They also had little personalised labels on the back but as the light was fading on Christmas Eve by the time I finished I didn't get any decent pictures.

 Happy Christmas!

Upcycled Cafetiere Wraps - Sew Cosy!

 Recycled Wool Sweaters

Last winter I made these cafetiere cosies and lots of people mentioned how much they liked them, so this week I finally got around to making a couple more.

I purchased some Starbucks' themed 'French Press' sets and got to work.  The first thing to do was discard the flimsy red wraps they came with, (I'm thinking I might turn these into hanging 'wool' hearts for the tree) as they were made from a synthetic yarn and were way too thin to offer any insulating properties at all.

I dug out my stash of felted wool jumpers and scarves to find a far more suitable wrap.  If you want to produce your own pure wool felt, just throw some old knitwear into the washing machine on a boil wash, it's that easy!  One quick point to note though, is that if you wash a load with mixed colours, then the fibres tend to transfer to each other.  You can see evidence of this on the dark brown sweater below.  I actually quite like this effect as it gives the final wool fabric a nice artisan appearance! 

This method creates the most gorgeous tactile material which any member of the family would be happy to snuggle into.

Once I had wrestled my choice out from beneath bad kitty, I got cutting and stitching and this is what I came up with........

French Press Cozies for two of George's teachers.  

We decided they deserved a little Christmas present as they write and produce the annual 'Panto' at school.  For non UK readers, Wikipedia describes this typically British Christmas tradition thus;

"Pantomime includes songs, slapstick comedy and dancing, employs gender-crossing actors, and combines topical humour with a story loosely based on a well-known fairy tale.  It is a participatory form of theatre, in which the audience is expected to sing along with certain parts of the music and shout out phrases to the performers." 

"So now you know...........oh no you don't.........oh yes you do.........etc........etc.......!" 

The writing of a production containing 'topical humour' must take hours and this, along with numerous rehearsals, on top of their normal teaching week, represents a very impressive commitment. They take their production out, for free, to the local community and lots of primary school children and old folk get to share in this lovely tradition.

We chose a computer themed motif for the second cosy as the teacher for whom it is destined is an ICT teacher.  The other is for an Religious Studies teacher which as a subject didn't readily lend itself to a suitable design, so instead I came up with a cute coffee cup and spoon.

In homage to the traditionally British Panto I then added appliqued English biscuits to the design.  These are very different to the more American cookies and perhaps an acquired taste.  Pink wafers are a real blast from the past for me, although I'm not sure I would want to eat too many of them as an adult!

I was particularly pleased with how the "Jammie Dodger" turned out. They've been an iconic British biscuit for over fifty years, and were originally named after Roger the Dodger from The Beano.

Other classics featured are a 'Nice' biscuit, a coconut flavoured delicacy which was first mentioned in an 'Army and Navy Co-operative' price list in 1895.  A 'Bourbon Cream' introduced to the world in 1910 by 'Peek Freans' and finally the baby of the group a 'Fox's Party Ring'  created a mere 30 years ago in 1983.

I managed to rip one of the bags of coffee as I 'carefully' opened the original packaging and so I toddled off to the local supermarket to buy a couple more packs of Starbucks' grounds but as they weren't Fairtrade I refused to buy them.  So if you're reading this Mr or Mrs Starbucks I want my coffee to be Rainforest Certified and Fairtrade please!

Appliqued Sewing Journal

 Being thankful for acts of kindness

Today's journal cover is for the mother of a colleague.  I work with her son and he makes time to generate random acts of kindness as he goes about his daily life, those small things which make the world a happier place!  She is a talented needlewoman, so a sewing journal should be the perfect little gift. 

The printed fabric is a design called 'Sew Retro Montage' by Makower UK and was a gift from 'Style at Home' magazine.  I have a couple of metres of it and am looking forward to using it in many more projects.  The sage green material is from a pair of second-hand upcycled curtains.  I put them through the wash which thankfully removed the 1990's style glaze.  Do you remember when shiny cotton was used as an accent fabric in 'swag and tail' window and curtain treatments? 

'Sew Retro Montage' fabric by Makower

 As the notebook cover is for a sewing journal, I drew a vintage inspired sewing machine for the applique.  I then traced the pieces onto fusible web and ironed them into place.

Next I used black thread to outline the design which really makes it stand out.  This is the fun part of the process and I use my regular sewing machine and a technique called 'free-style machine embroidery'.

I embroidered the recipient's name using the same technique 

Happy Christmas June

 ...and Phil!