Bag Lady!

Love, love, loving the sewing machine at the moment (and yes I have promised my mum that once I start working full-time in September I will actually go out and buy my own!). Latest project to hit the machine...bags!

Never made bags before but I'm kinda liking it. So, my first ever bag was this little heart number for Em (we decided that, at 9, she was now too old for the Disney Princess bag thing and should get a bit more sophisticated!):

 Took me blooming ages but she loves it so it was worth it!

 Next up was this strippy stripey bag that I'd coveted for a while. Just loved doing this, lots of different fabrics, ribbons etc and I loved how it turned out:

 And this bag's function? Well I needed a bag to keep all those bits of materials in that I'm going to use to make bags with! You see, a self functioning bag, practical as well as lush!

So, I've just commandered some floral curtains from the loft, I feel a shopper coming on!

Creating

I came to a very sad realisation this morning.

Undoubtedly the Garlic's number 1 fan was Rob's Grandad. I'd often get emails from him thanking me for the blog. I think, as he lived 200 miles away, it was a good way for him to keep up-to-date with what was happening up here, especially with his much cherished great-grandchildren. Consequently there's been a few posts that I've posted with a 'Grandad would like that' tone about them. This morning I was out in the garden hanging out the washing and just thinking about how much I liked our house and where we lived. I had a quick thought 'oooh I keep meaning to blog about that, Grandad would love that'...and then the realisation hit. :( Grandad (and indeed Nana when she was alive) would say how much they loved the home we built. I thought a couple of weeks ago how nice it would be to blog about our house and how pleased Grandad would be that we agreed with his and Nana's thoughts.

End of an era.

However, in memory of our beloved Grandad/Great-Grandad we shall be carrying on with the posts today and one I think he might like as it features just how fab Emily is!

There seems to have been a lot of crafting round here lately. I was going to do this post about everything I'd been up to but I must start with how fabulous my darling daughter is getting at scrapbooking. She's scrapbooked for a good 2 or 3 years now but recently she has been producing some very grown up layouts. She's been coming up with these all on her own, matching her colours, balancing her LO etc etc and I think she's doing a great job!

Definately the makings of a professional scrapbooker in that girl!

I've done a couple of LOs lately too as my MIL bought me a scrapbooking book for my birthday so have taken inspiration from that. Firstly my Royal Wedding LO:

And a LO about the lily the kids planted for Grandad:

 Speaking of MIL, I've still got a big hankering for the sewing machine and spied a project I wanted to do. MIL is getting a much longed for new kitchen and as said project was for an oven glove (nope, no idea why I desperately had the need to make oven gloves either!) then I thought she'd be the perfect recipient. The original pattern was for a cupcake oven glove but it didn't seem MIL's type of thing but on another page of the same book I found some fab chickens, so a bit of pattern combining and voila!

 Er yes, did get carried away and had a 'need' to make a teapot cozy and apron aswell!

Oooh but I still needed to sew more and those chickens were calling to me. Hang on, chickens? Who do chickens remind me of? Maybe this woman who we just happened to be visiting last week. I feel a chook-related pressie coming on....

Chicken egg cozies! Love 'em!

And I did have every intention of putting the sewing machine away but it's still there with a new project sat on it, watch this space!

Hope the WiFi works up there Grandad! ;)

Thrifty Crafting

Don't you just love a good financial crisis? Austerity measures? Good old cut-backs? Well no, neither do I, but never to be defeated, I've actually managed to find a positive. My little old crafty brain has been working overtime to find a way to make this big old financial pile of poo work for me, and bon jovi if I haven't done just that!

So, poor Chez Gillard is looking a tad weary. For too long now it has needed sprucing up but alas, the munchkins need feeding so no spare pennies to treat our much neglected pad.

Aha, but who needs pennies when you have (de-de-dah) Thrifty Crafter to the resue!

Back in January, my mum brought me over an offcut of rather nice curtain material. Said mother then found her sewing machine suddenly disappeared (austerity measures folks, no splurges on new sewing machines! ;)) and...***drum roll***...lurverly new bolster cushions for our bed!

 

Oooh, but there's some material left, what else needs loving and sprucing up? Hmmm, how about the cheap old plain brown bedroom curtains, they now look a tad dowdy next to lovely new bolsters...

And yet still more material left. Aha, one free quilting book from the library, borrowed to make this last month. But there's not much material left to make a full project. So, a quick rummage round in a remnants bin at the local curtain fabric shop (7 remnants, £5!) and a cheap fleece throw later (£2.99) and...ta-da...

Luscious new quilt for tired old bedroom too!

Even Cindy's impressed and nothing ever impresses her (apart from her food bowl!)

But did we stop there? Well where would the fun be in that? I'm sat here this afternoon, full of cold and it's bouncing down outside. A little rummage through the material scraps box and a little project springs to mind. I've seen a lot of these appliqued cushions about at the moment, but starting at about £15 a pop I ain't spending that on a cushion. But do we need to if we're a thrifty crafter? No! 1 hour later and here's a little present for my daughter: 

OK so I've stopped for now, rotten cold has stuffed up my head and I can't see to sew straight. But is there some left over pirate material with Xander's name on it sat on the sewing machine? You bet your bottom (carefully scrimped and saved) dollar there is! ;)

Snuggly Pirates

A couple of weeks ago, I had a half an hour to kill in the local town so popped into the library. I'd not perused the craft section for a while so went and had a look and spied this little beauty:

I've not quilted for a while now but my friend Kirsty started this year and she'd got me thinking that maybe I should make another. Plus, after the marathon crochet blanket for Em I felt like I should make Xander something similar but crochet doesn't really cut it with 4-year-old boys. So whilst flicking through I found the perfect project. Quickly I whipped out my phone to send a pic to Kirsty "we have to make these woman!" I told her, tbh I didn't meet that much resistance. The day after I popped down to Kirsty's with said book and we got planning, ordering fabric and started our quilts (mine for Xander, her's for her grandson). I even took my quilt on holiday with me last week and sat in the forest doing all the hand stitching. And this weekend...VOILA:

Lovely boyish pirate quilt, with a nice handy treasure map on the back (well, you never know when you may be in need of treasure whilst snuggled up in a quilt!):

And most importantly...the boy loves it!

So, love of quilting reinstated and next fabric-type project is in the planning....;)

Crafty Catch Up

Do you know, we've not had a crafty catch up for a while. Shall we have one? Just a quick one?

So was going to this in date order but I just can't get my head round Blogger's new picture uploader and tend to find myself fighting with pictures trying to move them, so I'm just going to leave them as they were uploaded!

First of all (well wasn't but for the purposes of this post let's just pretend! ;)) I went to my first crop in months last weekend. Only managed 3 layouts but that's 3 more than I would have got done on Saturday if I'd have been at home! First there's a couple of Halloween ones:

 And then one of Emily being enrolled in Brownies. Need to add something to this I think but it was for a challenge and I was making sure I got all the challenge elements in:

 I've been weedling a mean crochet hook a lot lately. I've made a runner for our bed using the wave stitch which I love:

And then a little baby blanket for Rob's boss's new baby:

And there's also been a couple of Fimo fairies. First of all one for Evie's birthday:

And then one for Elise's birthday who coincided with a huge funghi crop in the garden (why is it when we plant stuff it never comes up and yet these things can grow of their own free will?!):

Right back to the craft room, I have a whole pile of C******** things to get on with!

Crafting - A Rainy Day Life Saver!

Now as you know, I love any excuse to craft! But this 'summer' I've found it an absolute life saver aswell.

This summer's weather has been dreadful. All the planned 'let's get the paddling pool out and spend the day in the garden' has gone well and truely out the window. I am clinging to the hope that it's all saving itself for a mini heatwave next week when we're under canvas yet again on the East coast! However, there's only so much you can do indoors when the weather's like this and, although Xander would happily play on the Wii all day, there's a little motherly concious saying I can't really allow that.

So, we've been having a bit of a craft at ours when the weather's been bad. We'd collected a big old bag of stash before the hols so we could just pick a project and go:

The other day, Xander's little buddy Izaak came round for a playdate. It was a typical blooming grey day so no chance of chucking them out in the garden, so after a few rounds of Mario Kart and Garfield The Movie, I decided to get the crafty bag out. The boys had great fun:

And they both came away with a super dooper space rocket!

Another use for crafting on a rainy day: when Alvin & The Blinking Chipmunks is on the tv for the 375th time, sometimes it's good to go and lock yourself in your craftroom to stop your ears from bleeding! As my son has the attention span of a flea, I've used the time to try and finish off some project in my Work In Progress pile (for that read, Started It Then Got Distracted By Something More Shiny pile!). This little project is so simple and yet looks fab (now I've finally finished it!). It's a little kit Kirsty bought us all at the retreat, just some chipboard shapes but a bit of paper, ink, ribbon and gloss later and ta-da!

A nice little decoration for my hall to welcome in my visitors (well, those of you that dare venture into Chez Gillard!). We had Rob's mum come to stay for a couple of days this week and I was so pleased with mine that I made her one too:

So, the end of the holidays is upon us so I may have to pack up the craft stash bag, but watch this space around the Christmas Holidays for what we can come up with from a loo roll and a bit of tinsel! ;)

Apprentice

It's been a stay-at-home weekend round here, mainly because we had so much to do. As many of you know, we had a boiler explode on us last week, so all week we've had the plumbers in which meant this weekend we had to clear up the mess!

First and main job was to sort out the bathroom floor, which was completely ruined with all the muck, soldering, rusty water tank water etc. So, we decided on a nice laminate one (easy to mop up after a nearly 4-year-old with poor aim!). Saturday Rob had the unenviable task of lifting the old tiles which apparently must have been superglued down by the previous owners (we tend to come across that a lot round here, along with dodgy paint colours!). Sunday Rob laid the knew floor. Big job laying a new floor so he hired himself an apprentice:

This apprentice even brought his own tools for the job:

"Now what you do is you line it up like so":

"And then you give it a good whack like this":

(LOL, love how he's even practicing the builders bum!).

Now the floor is laid and looks lovely. Only trouble is it makes the rest of the old bathroom look tatty now!

While the boys were doing boy stuff, me and Em did a bit of crafting. I'd promised to make a few of her friends some Fimo fairies, so got those done:

And then found myself with a little apprentice of my own when Em asked me to teach her how to do them. This is her first attempt, a fairy for mummy:

Bless! I think she did really well and this fairy now lives in my craft room!

On other crafty news, I've been preparing for winter (can you blame me with the weather we're having lately?!). After knitting Emily's now nationally famous hat I decided to do Xander one too...then got a bit carried away with a scarf...and then some mittens (OK, so he asked for gloves but that's far too many fingers to keep count of, so mittens he got!):

I think it may be a sure sign he likes them as I've struggled to get them off him today:

So there we go, our little apprentices. Just wondering what jobs we can find for them next. Child labour? Well, times are hard at the moment, the economy needs to recover some how! ;)

Fimo Fun!

Following my new found love of Fimo, I've been doing a little more experimenting. So may I present....FIMO SLASH!!!!!!

Pages From The Weekend and a New Favourite

As promised, here's the finished layouts from the retreat this weekend. First of all I scrapped the pic of me, Joolz, Ann and Ally from our BBQ a couple of weeks ago, using this month's kit:

Then a couple of pages using June's kit which consisted of some gorgeous welly and umbrella papers:

The 2nd one of these I incorporated into a challenge set by Ali yesterday. We'd all been coveting a lovely LO she'd done with a patchwork loveheart. So she challenged us all to do a LO with a patchwork shape and 1 photo on. We put them all to a vote and woohoo, I came 2nd!

Next up a LO using some jungle papers that were on sale last week when I went to the craft shop. Ideal for scrapping the Elephant Parade we saw when we were down in London last month:

Now, I started another couple of LOs, but got side tracked by a brand new project (and nope, it wasn't the wine, though there was a bit of side tracking on that front! ;)). Kirsty has been making little Fimo fairies and we were all admiring them at the last crop. So this weekend she brought her box of Fimo for a quick lesson. OMG, I am addicted! First of all, I got all pre-planning and made a couple of models for Xmas: here's Santa and Mrs Claus:

That was all I intended to make but once I'd done them, I couldn't stop! So, I made a fairy for Em and a pirate for Xander:

How blooming cute?! They only stand about 1 1/2" high and I can't believe that I managed to do something so fiddly with my big man hands! And best of all, the wonderful Kirsty gave me some Fimo to bring home so I can do some more.

So, have a couple of LOs to finish and I can see a couple more fairies popping onto the blog before the week is out! ;)