Flower Brooch Tutorial

Yay, the Sun is finally shining! Spring is here and when the daffodils are at their best the car-boot sales start- wonderful places to pick up some buttony bargains. It can be difficult getting up early on a Sunday morning but with the sunlight bursting through the curtains we decided to go to our first this year. It was not a disappointment. The hubby spotted a Quality Street tin, often a great sign, and sure enough it contained buttons. I love taking them home and sorting through them, it's not quite the same when they're already sorted. There was a card labelled with "Fashionable Buttons, Made in England" with 3 yellow buttons still attached priced at 6p. The best before date on the tin is Oct 1988 and it was still Mackintosh Quality Street back then.

My favourites were two sets of green buttons, similar but different so I can't decide which I like better.

I also bought some knitting and crochet bits and bobs, I'll feature them in a future post. Fingers crossed for more car-boot sale finds this year! Now on to the tutorial.

Flower Brooch Tutorial 

This brooch can be made using any a variety of fabric providing it has a bit of stiffness. Felt is a good choice, shop bought or from a wooly jumper shrunk in the wash. A previous post, "Keep Your Cutoffs", features a brooch made in the same way using left over bonded fabric. The finished example using the measurements below creates quite a large flower, approx. 10cm X 10cm. Obviously if you want a smaller one just decrease all the measurements as required. All the measurements are approximate as they don't need to be spot on, after all flowers aren't geometrically precise so the brooch needn't be either ;-)

You will need- felt for the flower in colour of your choice- roughly 20cm x 20cm, green felt for the leaves- 6cm x 5cm , brooch finding, needle and matching thread

Instructions continue after the break. . . . .

Brooch Making Frenzy

Unfortunately, we didn't have any takers for the giveaway so I am going to extend it, surely someone has something to say about buttons, for example how wonderful they are? ;-) It's difficult not to get tempted by the fabric bundle myself, they're crying out to used, some patchwork hearts or mini bunting perhaps?
All you have to do is leave a button related comment OR email craftinernest[at]gmail[dot]com mentioning buttons OR tweet @CraftInErnest, you guessed it, about buttons!

This week I have mainly been making brooches, here's a few I've made using various materials and techniques-

The weekend post will include a tutorial to make a felt rose brooch!
Also I did some button-related crafting (I think you're starting to realise how much I love buttons),

And these extremely simple button earrings. Just a case of using a strong glue (e.g. epoxy resin or E6000) to attach earring posts to a pair of buttons. I particularly like these vintage, metal buttons

I also had a great day on Saturday with my Dad out our second "Time to Knot" macrame meeting at Craft in the Bay. We arrived a few hours late as my Dad had to get a quick (not at all) round of golf in, but we still had a lot of fun. I knocked up a rather simple bracelet but haven't attached a clasp yet.

Thanks for reading! Remember to Craft in Earnest x Craftin' Ernest 

GIVEAWAY- Fabric Bundle and Vintage Buttons!

Hi there, today’s post will catch up on a few things and include the first giveaway!

In a previous post, I mentioned a small, oak table I renovated in a class with my Dad for my Mum. I didn't have a photo to hand at the time of that post but took a couple over the weekend. As I said before I don’t have a picture of it before we got cracking sorry. Just imagine a really black table barely recognizable as wood. A lot of elbow grease, a scraper, very fine wire wool and some furniture wax later…..voilà

We had some bad news on the sheepskin front :-( Seven of the ten skins were rejected by the dresser (the person who inspects and prepares the skin) as the fleece was too long and some had begun to moult. Hard to believe in the weather we've been having! To look on the bright side, at least three are going to be tanned. It would have been heart-breaking if they were all unsuitable.
On Sunday I taught a crochet class to seven beginners that hopefully have caught the crochet bug- it’s awfully hard to resist! The all did really well and were super keen, I really enjoyed myself.

So on to the giveaway….........The prize is a varied bundle of 10x10cm fabric squares (approx. 85 in total) and 5 vintage, peach coloured buttons!

All you have to do is leave a comment on this post, send me a tweet @craftinernest OR email me on craftinernest[at]gmail[dot]com (fill in the "at" and "dot" as normal - I'm trying to avoid spambots) and mention BUTTONS. The closing date is Wednesday 17^th April and I will pick a random winner on Thursday 18^th April.

Best of luck and remember to Craft in Earnest!

Sheepskin Slippers

This post probably isn't for you if you are a strict vegan! I’m most definitely a meat eater. I know there are a lot of good arguments for and against eating meat, I’m afraid I love the taste just too much to contemplate giving it up. My Mum is a strict vegetarian and has been since she was fifteen, so we’re used to veggie food although she did cook meat for us, but she eats dairy and wears leather.

Up until about 2 years ago my parents had a couple of sheepskin rugs in their house. One on the floor in front of the television and from childhood right up until they gave them away, I use to lie on it when watching TV. Here’s a good old 80’s photo (hence the poor quality) of my brother and me doing just that!

My boss, Pete, keeps sheep on his small holding for breeding and to sell the meat. They are all the same breed, Lleyn which originated in the Lleyn Peninsula in North Wales. http://www.lleynsheep.com/ He sells the ewes for breeding and the males (wethers) for meat when they are old enough. Until then he gives them everything they could want on his orchard/farm in North Somerset overlooking the Avon Valley. Here's a picture of me helping to feed some of the ewes:

Last year I went over to his during lambing season just in time to see twins being born. Unfortunately the first did not come out smoothly, it took over an hour and was quite traumatic but the second popped straight out no problem. They were both fine and healthy though. This is a picture of the first lamb:

Keep Your Off-cuts

Hi there,

It's been another busy week and electronic gadgets have turned against even more than usual! Thankfully it amuses the hubby but he’s got to get fed up of the constant cry for help at some point? (Update- this post actually went ga-ga after first posting. My apologies, as I said computers are not my thing. I hope I’ve rectified it now.)

I have had a few orders to make this week and I have, also, started things but not had the time to finish them yet. An important example is the Easter Wreath for my Mum, thankfully she’s not expecting so I've given myself until Friday to finish and if I get it done beforehand it's a bonus (but looking unlikely).

I have made booties for a baby boy this time. He’s a bit older at 9 months so they had to be bigger. I didn't have the same frustrations of last time- thank goodness. Mistakes are there to teach us and I learnt that lesson ;-)

I have been making different brooches including a specially commissioned, crocheted one to go with a wedding outfit. Fingers crossed it meets the mark. As usual I forgot to take a finished photo but here’s a pic of the flowers before they were sewn together and black beads and diamantes were sewn in the centres.

 I’ve been making different felt and material flowers such as these….

It occurred to me I could use the off-cuts for the baby boy booties to make a flower. The two fabrics fused together make it an ideal stiffness for the flower. I was quite pleased with the results and think it will look nice on a navy blazer for the Springtime, if the Spring weather ever arrives?

 I will feature a tutorial to make your own flower brooch in a future post very soon.

Remember to Craft in Earnest! 

Salt Prints with a Vintage Twist

Last year I took part in a great, day long workshop at Bristol’s Folk House making salt prints. 
The Bristol Folk House is a charity run, adult education centre which run a variety of classes from Arts & Crafts to Fitness and Personal Development. It also has a really gorgeous café which makes amazing Spanish omelette and little dark chocolate, truffle bites- simple delectable! http://www.bristolfolkhouse.co.uk

The salt printing is a process for making “photographs” using common table salt and silver nitrate. The resulting prints have a lovely, old fashioned brown hue and a vintage quality.

The process was quite simple and as it was a sunny day we used sunlight to develop some of our prints but a dark room and the paraphernalia that goes with it is also essential. We also used UV bulbs and as I have a pet tortoise we have those at home so I had every intention of doing more at home but as is so often the case even with best intentions…

Here is a link to a website I found with great instructions on salt printing which includes a few examples:

http://www.alternativephotography.com/wp/processes/saltprints/a-dash-of-salt

For some time I have wondered what to do with the prints, I also had some box frames (bought in The Range) hanging round the house. I decided to grab my box of trinkets, some lace and the obligatory buttons and put it all together. Layering things up as I thought went with the prints. Some of the lace, whilst actually old, was still quite white so I “aged” it by soaking it in some hot water with a teabag. Some of the buttons had shanks so I removed them with a pair of mini wire cutters. I stuck everything together with either double sided, sticky tape or contact adhesive.

The frames were just plain, untreated pine. I stained one with a single coat of dark oak, wood stain. I painted the other larger one with regular emulsion in “Brandy Cream”. I then scribbled all over it with a dark brown, oil pastel, rubbed that all in with a piece of cloth then sanded it down with some fine sandpaper.

I’m quite pleased with how they turned out. I think if you fancied doing something similar you could always use a nice wrapping paper instead of salt prints- there are lovely vintage ones available!

Thanks for reading! Always Craft in Earnest !-)

Kumihimo Box

Hey there, I mentioned in a previous post how great my Dad is and that we went to a craft group together. Well, he went and proved me totally correct! For the last few weeks he has secretly been making me a gift, and he didn't even know there was no need as I had been singing his praises anyway.

A few years ago, the two of us did an evening course in antique restoration. We had to buy something to restore so headed to a local collectables and antique shop. I bought a small oak table for £10 which turned out really well in my opinion, much better than I had expected. My Mum loved it so it's now in my parent's hallway. Unfortunately, I didn't take before pictures but I'll have to get a picture of it looks now to post. My Dad bought a battered wooden box with broken hinges and was completely stripped bare on the inside (sorry, again no before picture). We thought maybe it once was a cutterly box but don't know for sure. Over the six week course we scrapped them and scrubbed with wire wool before pain stakingly polishing our items. I hadn't really thought about his box since we finshed. That was until the other night when I received a picture text of the closed box asking if I remembered it...

I sure did. Doesn't it look lovely and shiny!
Another part of the back story is that in September my Mum and I went on a day long, craft tour in Somerset. It involved craft centres and private homes opening their doors to people and demonstrating different crafts and showing off their work. We had a lovely time and I discovered Kumihimo weaving and we thought my Dad would probably like it too. So I bought the two of us Beadsmith Kumihimo Disks and on the way home Mum and I called into Hobbycraft for some satin cord. It turns out he did love it and said it gave him an idea but wouldn't say what.
So we've been busy Kumihimo weaving away, I discovered the joy of adding beads- always a good addition in my opinion. Here's a picture of my first necklace using beads whilst Kumihimoing- may have just made-up a new adjective?

So after the first picture message my Dad then sent me a picture of the inside of the box which he had kitted out especially, remember it was just plain, rough wood....

How amazing is that? He's so clever. He's idea had been to turn the box into a great storage place for all the bits needed. The space in the lid on the right is for the round disk but I have a necklace on the go at the moment. It's fully lined with black velvet and I just love it. I'm so grateful he went to the effort- Thanks Dad! (He doesn't read this but he may in the future.)

I'll feature Kumihimo in a blog in the next few weeks. It's such a simple craft to pick up and doesn't cost much at all but ou can get great results from it.
Also, I don't know if they're very clear in the photograph but the front compartment contains some vintage, coloured linen thread, I bought at the Bristol Vintage Fair on Saturday. I'm looking forward to using them!

Until next time,  craft in earnest! x