Ephermera

Ephermera: 

things that exist or are used or enjoyed for only a short time.

"there were papers, letters, old boxes—all sorts of ephemera"

I love this word and what it conjures up apart from 'a short time' as feel that the fripperies that I make can be kept as keepsakes for a long time. As you can gather been making more fripperies this week, firstly some rose gift tags:

Vintage image mounted onto kraft card, decorated with lace, chandelier and dress form die cuts, roses, butterflies and faux silk ribbon. A perfect thank you gift or thinking of you.

Had a card making session, not made some in a while to sell mainly for friends and family. Have been asked lately for some, thought about time made some for my stock.

As you can see not done much this past week, next week pretty much the same. Have workmen in doing the hall tongue and groove, changing the doors for oak ones etc. I will be in charge of the dog, now that is going to be fun.

Have a good week

Going crazy with Patchwork, Father's Day and Fripperies

I love crazy patchwork with embroidery and whilst have done by hand before, my new machine can do it for me. Saw this design and just had to make up in the muted colour fat quarters in my stash.

The patchwork hearts are an old make but still love them, something vintage about the styling

The good thing about crazy patchwork is you can use all those odd shape scraps of fabric that often get thrown out. Another excuse to hang onto everything.

Father's Day

Mug Rugs, and Cards

Never sure how popular this day is but saw the mustache and loved the design. Can be done as Happy Birthday as well on the mug rugs


Fripperies

Alice in Wonderland Watch Fobs

Vintage styling with an image printed onto fabric, pearls, crystals and roses.

Shabby Chic decos all hand sewn with cheesecloth, lace, ceramic button and a pearl

Check out the other blogs at Handmade Monday

That is all for this week hope to see you next Monday

My Literary World

I love books and I mean real books not the iBooks or Kindle variety, whilst I understand they do have a place and in particular for holidays or commute travels they are ideal. For me at home have to have a proper book to open.

Over the years my reading has changed from Kathy Reichs with Temperance Brennan and gory murders to Debbie Macomber and Cedar Cove, with more authors in between. Still love the Agatha Christie murders with Miss Marple or Tommy and Tuppence as these let's be honest are gentle murders.  Also the murder books by Joanne Sheen, the lovely lady who produces fantastic CD roms for card making from Create and Craft.

My Latest read is The Teashop on The Corner by Milly Johnson

This book is about a teashop, yes on the corner, the lives of the people that meet up there but for me the most interesting part are the gifts sold in the tea room, all literary based. A light bulb went on for me and thought why not interpret into some fabric creations and jewellery. A new notebook started and filling up with ideas and sketches. May take a few weeks to complete but my brain is working overtime with ideas, let's hope I can pull it off to produce something that is of interest to other lovers of books. 

Funny the way things happen and I am a great believer they happen for a reason, this book found it's way into my online basket along with others similar and just clicked.

As you gathered this is my theme for May. The new plan and super organised me (lol) is to think of a theme for the month,start planning and ordering the month before, that way have everything to hand and don;t have to spend ages waiting for deliveries. 

I work well with themes as can focus my attention which does tend to be like a butterfly, flitting from one thing to the next. How do you work best? Themes, let the flow take you, structured. I have to have a passion and be fascinating in what I make and normally where possible to follow life or in my case the past as love vintage from Victorian era to about the 50's.

Well back to the makes done so far for the Literary theme starting with Alice in Wonderland. I am sure most of us have read the books and dreamt of falling down a rabbit hole to a new world, with all sorts of adventures. Well I did as a child, always the dreamer and wanted to go to Narnia.

Showed this length of fabric to you the other week, now all made up:

Frame Clutch bags with vintage gold tone A in W charm and a blue bow.

Pin Cushion books, fun to do and drafted my own pattern, plus worked out first time, miracles.

Mad hatter Tea Party tote bag

Lavender Sachets with faux silk crushed ribbon and a teacup or teapot charm

Couple of mug rugs one monotone the other design coloured

Alice in Wonderland Cards, printed onto fabric and mounted onto kraft cards

Vintage style Bookmarks

These will have more of a home in the Jane Austen collection, which will be coming soon, I hope. I say I hope as I get distracted and move on

Check out the other blogs at Handmade Monday

That's all for this week, hope to see you again next week,

May week 2

Hope you all had a good bank Holiday, as I am home all the time each day merges into one and makes no difference to what I do.

We decided to visit the Longstock Nursery in Leckford on Wednesday, been on our 'To Do' list for some time, have now done and will be going back. The plant nursery was fantastic and the farm shop? well had to buy some of the tasty goodies on display. Leckford Estate is part of John  Lewis. Can remember my Mum saying when she worked for JL back in about the 30's, they always used to treat there staff to a charabang drive and a picnic lunch in the garden at the big house once a year. The water garden was beautiful and somewhere worth  return visit. Only about 35 miles from home and we had a good journey cross country, delicious coffee and cake at the cafe. A trip worth doing.

Now what else have I been doing? well never seem to get as much done as would like but hey ho not the end of the world. Bought some plants which had to be planted. Lee is staining all the fences and there are a lot of them. Had my 'new' notebook and been brain storming ideas, more details next
week along with my inspiration.

I will leave you with a picture of our cherry tree in full bloom, a bit late this year as normally comes out about 21st April, just in time for Lee's Birthday.

Check out the other blogs at Handmade Monday

Have a good week

May has arrived, now where's summer

Welcome to May, just need a bit warmer weather to go with the sun, drop the Artic winds and should be perfect.

Been busy this week, actually got my self into gear. Sorted and tidied 2 chest of drawers of clothes, a huge bag of unwanted stuff winging it's way to the charity shop. Some of the stuff was new, still with labels but could not remember why I bought it in the first place. So bad.

End of April makes:

Macaron fabric, love this in the two tones, already made two half aprons a while back out of the cream, added a frame clutch bag with a tiered cake, tissue case and 2 babies sun dresses.

Also from a local online supplier, walked over and collected on Thursday, a length of Alice in Wonderland words fabric. Now what do I have planned for this? may be able to show you in the next couple of weeks.

A lady where I get a lot of my embroidery designs from did a show in the US, now that is what I call a display, stunning. Love the cloths rather than flat but not sure how that would work. I suppose if you stitched the ruffle onto velcro. Added negative velcro to the top cloth and wrap round the table, adding some safety pins for extra hold. Not sure how it would travel though as would have to be kept flat and uncreased. She set up the day before and collapses the day after the event. This makes things less rushed and just turn up on the day to sell, sell, sell.

Check out the other blogs at Handmade Monday

See you next week and take care