Ikea Tree - prop

These were on sale! So cool, I bought 3 - with the thought in mind they would be good to use at the local craft markets to hang hair accessories from...when I get around to having a stall that is!! (before Christmas anyway). I like the orange but think I will spray them black so they are more versatile. I would have liked them in red but a lady swooped in just before me and carried away 50 of the things, including all the red! I have often wondered what she is using them for?! I love the shadow they cast on my dining room wall, I have two sitting in my window sill :-)

Weddings

I have attended LOTS of weddings! Coming from a large family this is inevitable and having a wide network of friends from all over the place has added to crazy wedding attendance over the past 16 years. Thank goodness it has slowed down for us, although we have hit baby mania now. I keep my invites and order of service from most of the weddings I go to (my little bag is due to be culled I think). I don't always keep them to be nostalgic but for friends who are getting married so they can get ideas for wording etc... We put together our invites etc this way and it was really helpful.

I loved the first invite shown above - some were green and some pink, as were the order of services! Beautiful cherry blossom inspired stationary designed by my friend's creative husband. He also made all the origami cranes which sat at each place setting!! I was most impressed. The second is my name tag plus a cute gift tag attached to the flower center piece which I was to take home as a gift.

You cannot go past Snippet and Ink for a fabulous wedding blog to sponge creative ideas from the real weddings shown on here - crazy beautiful stuff. Don't you wish you could do it all again!! I do...

Brooch for Anya

Just mucking around with some scraps!

MACRO Monday

I have been wanting to capture a whole dandelion with my macro lense for ages! And finally opportunity presented itself last week while Anya and I were spending some time in the garden. I quickly took some snaps before she discovered it!!! Anya + dandelion = no more dandelion :-) I had my fun then she had hers. More pics here!

Friday favourites

GREEN!!! Oh yes, my favourite colour.... in the apple or olive shades mostly. It's everywhere... my wallet, current baby/Amy Butler handbag, my new business cards, wardrobe, cushions on my lounge.... Small smatterings everywhere I look. One of my Aunties brought it to my attention when I got married in 03 that both my Mum and Grandmother had green bridesmaid dresses too! I was subconsciously carrying on a family tradition :-) It must have all started at the tender age of 4 (pictured above). More about weddings some other time. Enjoy the weekend!

Bluebell foam stamp

The bluebell photo was taken by my Dad at Floriade in 07, sketched onto sandwich paper then transferred onto adhesive foam from the $2 shop and printed onto plain white paper with fabric paint. Cute for a little handmade card or the like. I didn't have any blue paint or ink!! I found it hard to get intricate detail with making a stamp this way as it's super basic - so I will leave the details for a carved stamp! I also stuck two layers of foam on this stamp as I didn't want the paint that touched the wood-base, marking the page. You are supposed to use 'proper' foam from the craft store but my local was out of stock and I thought this might work in the interim. A cheap alternative for kids to make too!

Stamping - "Inspiration & Tutorial"

{Photos - Geninne Zlatkis}

I greatly admire the work of two very clever ladies, one is Lena Corwin from the US who I have mentioned before and the other Geninne Zlatkis from Mexico. Geninne's blog has a hand carved stamp tutorial on it that is very cool. I haven't tried carving an eraser just yet, in fact I haven't carved any stamps at all - just foam cuts for now (more on them later). Geninne has a lovely studio (above photos) that I would like to transport to my house including that amazing stamp draw... *sigh* Geninne has an Etsy shop and you can see a complete set of her carved treasures on flickr along with her other amazing artwork! It's a Geninne love fest today :-)

Cabinet love

I so love these drawers!! Catching up on some blog reading while hubby is out of town and found these on Desire to Inspire. I found a great old metal plan draw at the local YMCA store but they won't sell it to me, not for lack of trying :-) I really would prefer wood. I am a compartmentalizer from way back. Oh to dream and hope....

Macro Monday

I picked this little gem off a tree at the beach when I went to visit my sister last month, off some Australian native tree. Do you think they look like little 'open mouths'? I also wonder if this is where Sydney Opera House architect, Jorn Utzon got his inspiration from :-) The opera house is one cool building!

Exciting News

I really can't believe I haven't mentioned our exciting news until now... We finally bought our own home. We bought a 2 bed/study nook terrace house off the plan 2 weeks ago. Faithful hubby camped outside the gates of the new suburb for 2 whole nights to secure our place in the race, he was 10th in line!! Can I say, only in Canberra (well in Oz anyway) - do you have to do crazy things my Aunt & Uncle did in the 70's!! We paid the deposit but don't have to pay anything else till completion. YIPEE! Hopefully we can save some more cash by then. Somewhere to call my own, bang a nail in the wall anywhere I darn well please... and I simply can not believe my first home will be new and modern. I love old places too - but only if I have the cash to reno! May I point out the irony of the suburb name when my Surname is Grace!

Friday favourites - Craft Inc. Meg Mateo Ilasco

My current favourite book is this one by Meg Mateo Ilasco! What a great wealth of information to share, she has a blog and is working on "The Craft Inc. Business Planner" as a follow up to this book. I saw the book on a blog somewhere... a while back....sorry for the lack of credit to the wonderful person who blogged about it originally!! Anyway, it has lots of fantastic info and case studies to read about. The best price I found this book for was on Ebay. I also scored a book at the lifeline book fair a few weeks ago called "The Art of Selling Craft in Australia", which has a hideous cover that makes you want to run and hide but the info is great! I have attacked both with my highlighter! Have a great weekend.

Childhood wallpaper

My mum still had the remaining roll of wallpaper leftover from my childhood bedroom before we moved to Sydney!!!! We lived there about 7 years in the late 70's - early 80's and I had my very own bedroom! Oh how it brought back fond memories for me. As for Mum still keeping the roll for 20years ..... I am glad!

Japanese paper

{image - Karaku*}
Isn't it beautiful and delicate!

Finally some business cards for me - yahoo

Designed by my delightful husband (with some help from me), Grace Designs business cards arrived yesterday in my hot little hands. I had them printed by PrintTogether who do post-consumer recycled printing.... folks this is the REAL recycled paper! Don't be fooled by just the 'recycled' tag! The company only uses vegetable inks to print with, I think if we all do our little bit for the environment -it really does help in the big picture. PrintTogether were great to deal with and the cards arrived promptly. The colour is much nicer in real life too!

On the crafty to do list....

Make this lovely honeycomb smocking by Tumbling blocks into a cushion cover (sounds good enough to eat)


Martha Stewart Pom Pom delights for no special occasion or maybe a special occasion :-)


Still Dottie Make up brush bag for a gift and convert to a kids crayon/pencil holder.

MACRO Monday

I'm not sure what these flowers are but I took this photo in Roma St Parkland's when we lived in Brisbane. Gordon and I spent a day pretending we were tourists, we took photos around town of our favourite buildings, rode the jet cat up the river and wandered around taking in new sights. It's a great way to explore your own city with fresh eyes.

Baby got style is an awesome website that carries a great variety of brands! I love this little rattle by Alimrose designs - I am a big fan of their monkeys too! Being Easter, we are spending some time with my family in Sydney and I am having a bit more time to catch up on my blogs via google reader and some net time. I couldn't help post these pics as I haven't seen the Asian doll before, she is so cute! Oh and I have ordered from Baby got style before and the order was super quick, perfect condition and came with wrapping paper! sweet!

Happy Easter

Photo - *TR.iPod

Well my favourite thing about this Friday is definitely the fact that it is good Friday! Along with Easter being a lovely time to spend with family and friends and watching Anya's first easter egg hunt it is also significant in what it represents to me. Eggs signify new life which is what I believe Jesus gave us a chance for when he died on the cross. I just have to think of The Passion of the Christ to remind myself of the great sacrifice God gave just for me. Happy Easter :-)

FREE bunting template and tutorial

The bunting template I made is ridiculously easy I know but now you have an extra 5-10 minutes to enjoy a coffee or flick through your favourite magazine instead of deciding on what measurements to use! Of course, do whatever works for you but I liked the dimensions of the smaller triangle shown.

Materials

• 5m of 1 inch wide bias tape (buying off the roll is cheaper)
• 1m fabric (I used 3 different types of cotton)
• cotton thread
• Cardboard for template
• Download template PDF

Instruments

• Tailors chalk
• Rotary cutter
• cutting mat
• Scissors
• Ruler
• Pins

Step 1

Cut out preferred triangle/flag size, trace and transfer to heavy cardboard, cut out.

Step 2

Mark 36 single triangles or 18 double sided triangles with tailors chalk onto your fabric.

Step 3

Cut out triangles with rotary cutter on your mat (there are plenty of video's on U-Tube re: using a rotary cutter if you are a virgin user).

Step 4

Lay out your triangles, working out your pattern if you are using more than one pattern / colour material.

Step 5

Match wrong sides together and sew down both left and right sides of your triangles (making them double-sided). I did a simple zig zag down both 26cm sides and left the 19cm top-stitched. (You could also cut them out with pinking shears at step 3 and straight stitch down the sides instead).

Step 6

Lay out your 5m of bias tape, finding the middle and marking it with tailors chalk or a pin.

Step 7

Working from the middle of the bias tape out to the ends, space your triangles approx 4.5cm apart folding the bias tape in half to secure the 19cm edge of the triangle in the tape and pin (the point of the triangle being opposite to the bias tape). I left 45cm at both ends for ties.

Step 8

Sew the triangles into the folded bias tape using a simple straight stitch or get all fancy. FINISHED - hang and admire your handiwork!
Variations - sew/applique letters onto your triangles for kids door signs or happy birthday banners etc..

Ed note:  See an update of this project here.

My first hand-printed gift

I made this little travel pouch for my sister-in-law, Elizabeth along with a sweet little hair clip for her birthday. The hair clip is made from left over fabric from my wedding dress and veil. The pouch was the first project I have completed from Lena Corwin's book. The book is full of many lovely ideas and comes with a pocket of design templates. The design I used on Elizabeth's pouch was Lena's. I made my stamp out of adhesive craft foam from the $2 shop and a wooden block from Spotlight. But I will write more about how I made my stamps and the book another time (the book is worthy of a good review on its own.) I can't wait to print something that I have designed myself... I have two stamps in the wings... waiting to hit paper or fabric sometime soon. Oh and I would use the pouch to put lingerie, large costume jewellery or anything of a delicate nature you might want to keep separate!

MACRO Monday

This was the first macro photo I ever took with my macro lens and it is perfect to me! It makes me smile for a few reasons:

1. I took it in Brisbane when we lived at New Farm (very happy memories)
2. The yellow stamens have the tiniest of dots on them (hard to spot with the naked eye)
3. The texture in the petals are cool
4. It looks almost good enough to eat

I hope you are smiling too :-)

Friday favourites

I LOVE real living magazine - Home / ideas / shopping / food / you. I have had a subscription for the last year or two... I can't bear to part with them. I was also very happy to grab a few for .50c each at the Lifeline book fair recently. I also enjoy Inside Out which feature some very inspiring homes. Real living is pretty down to earth as far our budget is concerned and I love a good project, the editor has a blog too! I really wish Australia had good flea markets where you could pick up cool old stuff that hasn't been horribly over-priced. I think antique stores stink, I can never spend long in them and they are mostly over-priced! Anyway.... this was about favourites... so here's to a good magazine enjoyed with a good coffee!

Felt necklace

I cut out some little circles from all my felt scraps ages ago with the intention to make Anya a necklace or bracelet. I liked the idea of using felt instead of beads for an 18m old! This really didn't take long at all and it could double as a bracelet anyway for any savvy young girl or (big girl)! I have a pretty basic machine with not too many options for stitches - but have used a smocking stitch here. I singed the ends of the ribbon too so it wouldn't fray. The ribbon doesn't need to get too close to the flame to seal nicely. It seems I like red and pink as a colour combination! I painted a sign for Anya's wall when she was born in the same colours :-)