craft punk

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I'm going to Craft punk next Saturday.  Can't wait.

Thanks lottielulu for the giveaway!

Tuesday through........the window

Today I'm playing along with Swedish House

as described by Julie

"TUESDAY THROUGH...THE WINDOW

ANY WINDOW

In your home, your shed, your school, your place of work, your favourite shop, your journey...

Wherever you are...Inside or Outside...

Share your view of the world!"

My image is looking through my sewing room window.

On the left is a picture drawn by Miss A, with a square of calico taped over it.  I'm going to trace it off and embroider it - a first for me!

On the right is one of my first crafty pursuits, a leadlight panel I made years ago.  Even on a dull, cloudy day like today it makes the view pretty.

Also, my giveaway closed last Friday. 

Thank you to Julie and Suzanne for entering. 

I will make a customised scarflette for each of you once you get back to me with your preferences.

Thanks for joining in.

Hope the view through your window is an inspiring one!

Coooooooooeeee

Well we're back safe and sound from our family holiday up the coast.

We managed to get out of the house a couple of times despite the absolute deluge of rain which fell over the weekend!

Beauty could still be found wherever I looked though!

Just a little reminder that my giveaway is still open until midnight tonight. 

All you have to do is link to the giveaway post on your blog, then leave a comment on the giveaway post saying you've done that and your in!  Become a follower, leave another comment, and you've got yourself another entry.

Entries have been ummm, a little on the sparse side..................so go on, odds are good you'll be the winner!

100th-ish post giveaway and tutorial

Back in June I participated in a "Craft Room" swap organised by Cass. 

Regular readers may remember the upcycled wool scarflettes I made for my swap partners.

 

I was totally thrilled with how they turned out, but even better then that, I have really loved using and wearing the one I made for myself. 

I absolutely wore it to death over winter and got so many compliments every time I went out with it on!

I took photo's as I was making them, fully intending on posting a tutorial back in July.......................... but for some reason because I'm really slack, I didn't get around to it. 

And now that Spring has sprung here in sunny Sydney, posting a tutorial for a woollen scarf seemed such a ridiculous thing to do. 

Great timing if you're reading this from somewhere in the Northern Hemishpere though!

But I really, really wanted to share this with you guys and so I formulated a cunning plan.

Last Saturday I whipped up a springtime version - this time making  it reversible. 

I used some linen and some woven cotton off-cuts I had in my stash to keep within the recycled theme of this project and also in keeping with my current "use what you've got" kick. 

I have to say I love it equally as much as the winter version! 

I'm one of those people who gets goose bumps on a summer's day if there is a gentle breeze blowing, so I can see that this scarflette will be on high rotation in my spring/summer wardrobe. 

So in celebration of warmer weather, cooler weather, 100 blog posts and life in general, I'm going to give away one Upcycled Scarflette, made by me! 

If you are the giveaway winner you get to choose whether you want a Winter or Spring version and I will make it for you.

The rules of the giveaway are:

blog about my giveaway and tutorial and once you've done that leave a comment on this post with a link to your blog to let me know you've done it.

For an extra entry in the giveaway become a follower of my blog and  leave a seperate comment saying you've become a follower.

I'm going away next weekend so I'll keep the giveaway open until Friday 8th October and I will announce the winner over the following weekend.

Good luck! 

If you're not the lucky giveaway winner, or if you're really keen and just can't wait to get yourself an Upcycled Scarflette, you can go right ahead and make yourself one with the following tutorial.

Upcycled Scarflette

What you will need:

• 
  
  1 woollen jumper in good condition
• 
  
  1 polar fleece jumper in good condition
• 
  
  buttons in contrasting/co-ordinating colours to your taste
• 
  
  all the usual sewing paraphernalia eg. pins, scissors, sewing machine etc.

Now, set yourself aside roughly half an hour - that's all the time this little beauty will take you to whip up!

Here we go.



1. Lay your jumper flat and using either a rotary cutter or scissors, cut the jumper through both layers straight across under the sleeves.  Discard the portion with the sleeves.

2. Make another cut through both thicknesses of jumper 7 inches below the first cut. 

 3. Now you have a tubular piece of woollen fabric.  Cut one of the seams off so you can open up the tube to make one long piece of fabric.  Cut this piece so you have a rectangle measuring 7" by 26".

4. Repeat these 3 steps with the polar fleece jumper.

 5. Lay your two pieces of fabric one on top of the other, right sides together and pin.

 6. Using a straight stitch, sew all around the edges, using a 1/4 inch seam allowance. 

Make sure you leave a few inches open at one end for turning.

7. Turn the scarflette right way out, pin opening closed and stitch around all four sides of the scarflette to give a nice finished edge and also to close the opening you left for turning.

8.  Now to decide which way your scarflette is going to wrap around your neck, look at where the seam in the woollen side is.  Wrap it around your neck in such a way so that this seam will be hidden by the top layer of the scarflette.  The button hole should be made in this top layer and that will become your top left corner.  Refer to photo above! 

9. Next up, choose a button which you will use for actually keeping your scarflette closed (as opposed to any number of other buttons just stitched on to decorate your snazzy new scarflette). 

Now, using your button hole foot, make a button hole in the top left hand corner about an inch in from each edge. 

As you can see in the picture, on my scarf I stitched the button hole parallel to the long edges. 

DON'T do this.  Stitch the button hole parallel to the short edge and your scarf will stay closed alot better. 

Mine is still absolutely wearable but it will sit alot nicer with the button hole the other way.

  

10. Wrap the scarflette around your neck and mark where your button needs to be stitched on.

11. Stitch on button/s as desired. 

With some of the scarflettes I made little crochet flowers which I then stitched into place using a co-ordinating self covered button.  Just make sure that if you do this, you make a big enough button hole to accomodate the flower.

I can't remember what pattern I used for the flowers but just click on over to Ravelry - there are hundreds of patterns to choose from. 

You're done.  Easy peasy!

Now.  If you want to make yourself an Upcycled Scarflette suitable for warmer weather, just substitute the wool and fleece for some lovely light weight woven cotton and/or linen!

If you make an Upcycled Scarflette and post about it, drop me a line.  I'd love to see your version of the Upcycled Scarflette! 

We have a winner..........and a tutorial

Well I finally sat down today and wrote the tutorial.  It's my first, so please, please let me know what you think - constructive criticism is warmly invited! 

Especially let me know if you're having any problems following my instructions.  I'd hate to think a child out there was being deprived of letting their artistic ability run wild all because mama couldn't work out how to make that Art Satchel! 

Seriously though I think it is a pretty straight forward, simple pattern.  Give it a go, and when you're finished contact me and share the results - I'd really love to see your version :)

On to the giveaway winners.............

True Random Number Generator
Min:
Max:
Result:
6
Powered by RANDOM.ORG 
and 
True Random Number Generator
Min:
Max:
Result:
5
Powered by RANDOM.ORG
 
So that's Amelia from Duyvken
 "They are fantastic Fran! Well done. I've seen a lot of those art rolls but I think yours is the best designed. The girls look so chuffed!!"
 
and
 
Tania from Myrtle and Eunice
"Way. To. Go!
Fran - these are FANTABULOUS! They would work so much better for my kids than the rolls we have - especially with the sketchbook packed away with the crayons. Genius. Genius, I say!"

Congratulations lovely ladies and a big thank you to all of you who entered.

 This post has been edited by the author. 
The free tutorial has now been removed.  Please see this post for more info.

On-the-Go Art Satchel Giveaway

Well this project has been in the pipeline for some time now.  Since just before Christmas to be exact. 

Wanting to make Miss A a handmade gift, I was thinking about the things she likes to do.  Miss A LOVES drawing; I could wallpaper her room with all the drawings she has produced.  So I decided to make Miss A an On-the-Go Art Satchel.  I stayed up well into the night a couple of days before Christmas designing and then making Miss A her handmade gift. 

I've seen lot's of very lovely handmade drawing kits/wallets/rolls around but wanted to come up with my own unique design.  I decided I wanted to make something that Miss A could manage all on her own, from carrying it, to opening it, using the drawing apparatus and packing it away again.

Miss A has certainly been putting her's to good use, toting it everywhere with her including on the bus, in the car, to the doctor's, when we eat out - it even comes to church with us! 

She discovered she could hang it over the headrest of the front seat in the car and have her crayons at her fingertips for when we are out driving....clever little chook.

• I settled on twistable crayons as no sharpening is needed and I don't have to worry about texta's marking the car seat/tablecloth  etc.
• I used a standard A5 visual arts diary due to it's availability (readily available at every art supplies, discount variety store, department store out there)
• I settled on a button/loop style closure to make it easy on little fingers who may not have mastered the art of tying yet
• The shoulder strap makes it easy to carry around - wherever! 

So yesterday Miss B expressed interest in having her very own On-the-Go Art Satchel. 

What better way is there to spend a rainy Sunday Valentine's Day, with a couple of kiddies nursing colds, then behind the sewing machine making something for someone you love?

We picked out some fabric together and I got stuck in.  After all the cutting this comes together very quickly - I'd say an hour or two depending on the number of interruptions you have :-D

So you like it?  Think you know someone who might put one to good use? 

Great, 'cause I've knocked out a couple of extra's just for two lucky reader's.  And to show these are not a gender specific gift I've made them using fabrics which work equally well for boys - yay!

So all you have to do to be in with a chance to win one is leave a comment here on this post.

To increase your chances of winning and get extra entries in the draw just become a follower of my blog (worth 1 entry) and/or blog about this giveaway(worth 1 entry), that'll give you three entries all up!

edited to add: if you are already a follower of my blog, post a separate comment saying so and you will also get a second entry into the giveaway!

Make sure to leave a separate comment for each of the entries you qualify for.  I'll be using random.org to pick the winners so if you don't leave a comment for each entry that you qualify for you will only get one chance instead of three (or two, whatever the case may be).

Entries for this giveaway will close next Monday evening, say at 8pm (Sydney, Australia time).

A couple of notes: the Art Satchel will not include the crayons or Visual Arts diary when posted to the winner's - to cut down on postage costs for moi.  As stated above the Art Satchel is made to fit a standard A5 Visual Arts Diary and a pack of 10 twistable crayons, both relatively cheap and easily available - eek, hope this hasn't put you off.................
Also, as this item includes a button I'd say it is not suitable for children under the age of 3, please bare this in mind.

And don't despair if you don't win because I will be posting a tutorial on how to make your very own On-the-Go Art Satchel in the next couple of days...........................

Good luck!!

drum roll please........

and the winner of the little sweetpeas gift bag as generated by the lovely little sweetpeas assistants is.....

the very talented and amusing Gemma of loz and dinny fame. Congratulations Gemma, I'll send you an email soon to get your mailing details.

Thank you to all of you who entered my humble giveaway and read my blog, what a great crafting community!!

my first giveaway

Like the looks of this tote bag? If you'd like to call it your own just enter my very first giveaway by leaving a comment here before 8pm Sydney time tomorrow.

The bag will also contain a couple of goodies, including a fabric covered notebook, a patchwork clutch purse and a lavender scented heat pillow.

A giveaway, a birthday and some 'whale watching'

My favourite Aunt celebrated her 60th birthday last week. We got together with some of the family yesterday to celebrate (I'm the one on the right in the grey cardi for anyone wondering) .

I made her a little sweetpeas gift bag, consisting of - a fabric 'green' shopping bag, a fabric covered journal, a lavender scented heat pillow with removable cover and a patchwork clutch purse embellished with jet lignite buttons passed down to me from my great grandmother (my Aunts grandmother).

I originally made the heat pillow using some Amy Butler fabric but then decided the vintage florals might be more my Aunty's style. So I've decided to have my first giveaway! I will make a little sweetpeas gift bag - all in Amy Butler fabric - to give to one lucky person who leaves a comment on this post. The winner will be drawn next Sunday at 8pm (Australian EST), at random. Good luck!!!

Today we went whale watching at Kurnell. We didn't see any whales but that didn't stop us from having a whale of a time (boom boom!). After walking out across the rocks on the peninsula we had some lunch followed by beach cricket, sand castle building and an ice-cream chaser.