Bits and Bobs

I went to complete my Christmas shopping the other day and stopped in at Debbie Bryan to collect my final speed craft creations.  I love them.

Glass hanging created with Stevie Davies

Ceramic Brooches created with Katie Almond

I am getting very much in the festive spirit and cannot wait to get decorating.  The bargains I have found have not helped subdue this either...look!!

A giant Poinsettia for £1, wowee!

A jar of beautifully scented tea lights for £2.99

This evening I went to a Jamie at Home Party which was lovely, the things for sale are brilliant but unfortunately (or fortunately for my bank balance) I only have a little kitchen.  I did however purchase these for a bargain price of £20, normally £42!!

Meat, veg, fish and bread board.

Also, all the crafting I have been doing has been putting strain on my eyes and over the years I have gone from being very long sighted to having nearly perfect vision but if this progresses I will be short sighted very soon and that wouldn't be good.  Therefore I have to wear glasses all the time now to attempt to help strengthen my eyes before my sight gets bad.  Took me ages to choose but here they are.

Finally I am creating a little card for a friend, I think it looks awesome and I will be handing it over soon so I can share it.  My Christmas bits and bobs are also coming along nicely.

Make and Craft swap goodies have arrived and WOW!!

I received a tweet yesterday to say my swap gifts would be here today, the van pulled up and I shot to the door.  In my haste to open everything I did not photograph the beautiful selection of wrapped little gifts.  It was like Christmas had come early, I was so excited.

In my box of goodies was a selection of handmade Christmas decorations.  They are all absolutely beautiful and have made me even more excited about my favourite time of year.

 I tried to pick a favourite one but I just cant, they are all beautiful in their own little way.

The gift also contained some beautiful Christmas bows (I do love bows) and some great Christmas labels.  I was also sent three very thoughtful books, one to make me smile when a smile is really needed and a crochet and sewing project book.

I just Love everything and I am indescribably grateful for such a thoughtful gift.  Thank you so much George.

Edith and Sophie even love the box everything came in.

Long Eaton Art Room

Today Tom took me to a craft fare where one of his friends was going to be.  I didn't know a lot about where we were going but loved the place when we got there.

The Long Eaton Art Room is a community arts centre staffed by volunteers to offer artistic and crafting experiences.  It works on a drop in basis where you can pop in, pay £5 and spend some time learning a new skill.  I love this idea and I am so going to go to learn how to needle felt do I can put my prize to use.  There is also a monthly subscription option for £25 and you can as often as you like.  There are studio spaces, artists works for sale, a shop for supplies, you name it!

Whilst there we saw some fantastic creations.  We particularly liked the work by Kate Cloud, Helen Hallows, Louise MacIntosh-Watson and Emily Smalley amongst a number of others who's cards I didn't pick up.

I also got to meet one of Tom's friends Margi who makes amazing bakes!

A lovely place where I will most certainly be visiting again and again.

On another note...I just got to watch the water fairies put out a wheelie bin fire. What an exciting day!

Christmas cards and Yoga

I am busy stitching away to make Christmas cards for the family. I have finished 2 now but thought I would share one (hopefully my Nanna doesn't check my blog). All of them will be different and hopefully each as good as the first. I do love giving a handmade card!

Also I started yoga today, I loved it. I was flexible enough but nowhere near strong enough and I had a lot of shakes and wobbles. It was fab though so I will certainly be heading back again.

Home Decoration Make and Craft Swap

It's time to write about my second craft swap, the goods have been delivered so I can now reveal all.

The theme was Home Decorations and I was paired up with George who has a lovely blog which you can get to from HERE.  I carefully read the e-mail and looked through the blog to pull out inspiration because it is a hard theme when you do not know what sort of house the items are going to.  George loves books and hates waste so I decided that I would try to make everything using one book that would otherwise be destined for the bin.

The first stop was my local Oxfam Book Shop to see if they had any hardback books ready for the bin.  I was taken to the sorting room and showed a massive pile of boxes full of books.  Lots of them had absolutely nothing wrong with them and I was very tempted to take a lot out to bring home but that was not why I was there.  There was a collection of Charles Dickens hardbacks that had seen better days and I was offered them for 25p each.  I took 3 and donated £2.

The first thing I wanted to do was make the book cover into a storage pot, a practical item that could hold pens or more decorative items such as dried flowers.  The first step was to remove the pages at the front and back by the edge of the binding.  I then had to measure the height, width and length of the pages so that I could cut a piece of balsa wood the right size to fit.  Once this was done I had to glue it all in place so it looked just like a real book.  I was really pleased with the end result.

 

I then thought I would make some paper flowers to put in the pot to make it look more decorative for the purpose of the swap but if George wishes to use for something more practical then that was my initial intention.  I had no idea how to make paper flowers so I used the POM POM technique and stuck it onto a wooden kebab skewer.  The first attempt looked quite good for an experiment so I made two more.

 

After making this I decided to try something else I had seen on TV and in a book and make a paper bird.  I again had no clue if it was going to work and the whole thing was a try it and see experiment that worked surprisingly well.  I started by screwing up a lot of the pages from the book and making them into a general bird shape.  I then covered it in sellotape to hold the shape...a dispenser would have been helpful at this point.  Once this was done I had to figure out how to make the legs.  Here I saw the skewers on the table and some off cuts of balsa wood.  With a lot of glue and patience the birdie had legs and he stood up!  Then it was time for the messy bit, I had to cover the whole thing in small pieces of book page and PVA.  I was covered, my phone was covered and it was all over the cutting mat.  I am surprised that Tom and the Cats were not stuck to the walls and ceiling.  Here is the final result.

 Next I decided to make some hanging decorations for Christmas using the technique I was taught at SPEED CRAFT by PHIONA RICHARDS.  I made two and included pictorial instructions and supplies so George could make a third.  I think they look lovely and they are also made from book pages and an old Costa Coffee bag.  It's all about recycling and don't they look pretty.

I then packaged them all up together with the purchased gift which I saw online and just had to buy.  George makes amazing CAKES and I saw a mixer painted on a recipe book page, I thought it was quite appropriate despite the amount of pink.  I also stitched a little card because I always like to give a home made card.

I hope George enjoys the gifts as much as I enjoyed making them.

Crafting and my anxiety

I feel I am ready to share a personal story about myself and how crafting has been a bit of a salvation for me over the last few months.

As some of you may or may not be aware I have been off work for nearly 2 months now due to suffering with anxiety and depression. This is something I have battled with for some time now and something I try desperately to keep at bay. I have learnt over the years though that I cannot keep fighting it forever and every now and then I must have the strength to say enough is enough and make the best and often hardest decision for my health.

I am, and always have been a hard worker so making the decision to put myself first and call in sick was a very difficult one to make but the constant feeling of dread and exhaustion just couldn't carry on, especially with Tom being so poorly and needing my help at home. I have struggled with work for the last year but with Tom becoming so poorly it made me put things into perspective and I realised a job was not worth making myself unwell for.

I have been down this road before when I decided that a career in teaching was not for me but I refused to give up for some time resulting in becoming quite unwell.

This time however I have my crafting to keep me going. I reignited my love of crafting after reading a blog written by Mrs Crafty B, a university friend. I was very impressed with the things she had made and decided I too would take on a challenge. Initially I started cross stitching and was astounded by how much it helped me to have a focus and something to take pride in creating. I had dabbled with the odd project before this but I was not prepared for the impact that crafting would have on me.

Since finishing this cross stitch I have picked up knitting needles and I am surprising myself with the things I am knitting. I adore the sense of putting love into every stitch and knitting gives me something positive to focus on and each row gives me such a sense of achievement.

I have also learnt how to crochet, I have always loved the look of it but never been able to do it. Thanks to the support and patience of Eleanor at Knit Nottingham I have developed my skills and feel capable of taking on most things. Eleanor has been brilliant, I go to the shop to not only buy yarn but have a good winge and a giggle, she's a good girl!

On top of this I have started this blog, taken part in craft swaps and explored other mediums with which to craft.

The road is far from over for me as I am still off and awaiting further meetings at work to attempt to find a new job within the organisation and Tom is still unwell but crafting is something that keeps me going no end. As silly as it may sound it gives me something to get out of bed for on days where I feel utterly glum and unable to face the world. Expressing my emotions in a creative way prevents my panic from becoming unmanageable, prevents anger, prevents tears, prevents anxiety (to a certain degree) and provides satisfaction, confidence, a sense of achievement every day despite the fact I can often feel very useless.

I wanted to share my story because I cannot begin to explain how wonderful the world of crafting is for those suffering with mental health concerns. I would love to take it into a career and work with mental health patients to use creativity as a therapy but I have to sort myself out first and then take the time to research how and if I can do this.

I strongly believe that depression, anxiety and other mental health concerns are not something to be ashamed of. It is a part of a lot of people's lives and something we must learn to accept and deal with. I am still young and I feel very lucky to have found something that helps me so early on my journey. I hope that even if this reaches just one person it will lead them up the crafty
path to a more focused mental state.

UPDATE
Just after publishing this Stephen Fry tweeted about www.rethinkyourmind.co.uk a project that is being run nationwide to encourage creativity to help with and raise awareness of mental health issues. Fabulous!

Pom Poms!

I love Pom Poms and think paper ones look amazing and now I know how to make them!

We went to visit friends yesterday for a Children in need party but we got there a little earlier than anyone else to help.  Kate and I made big paper pom poms and they look fabulous.  They would look stunning at a function like a birthday party or wedding if they fitted the colour scheme, ours were just random collections of colours.

If you would like to see how we did it than click here to see the tutorial.

In other news I have today made all of my presents for my craft swap.  This time the theme is home decorations and I thought I would be a little experimental and try out something completely new...it all looks fab and I cannot wait to post about it on here but I must post it with Royal Mail first.