Pink + Blue

Such a busy weekend!

I've been catching up with a lot of odd bits of admin, and getting a couple of projects finished for a looming deadline. I wish I could show you what I've been making but alas, sometimes I must keep secrets.

I've also been sorting out a big supplies order that arrived on Friday - including making up lots of colourful packs of felt, and tying them into bundles with pretty ricrac.

Ah, how I love ricrac...

Sparkles

Happy February!

I've got lots of things I want to blog about this month - including a pile of lovely craft books waiting to be reviewed - can't wait to share them all with you :)

In the meantime, here's a quick snap of some of the sparkly sequins I've been sewing onto a secret project this week:
It's been pretty cold and dark and miserable here lately, but a nice bit of colourful sewing can always be relied upon to cheer me up!

Pink Shoes!

I am in love with my new shoes:


I feel like a total girl for blogging about shoes (and pink ones, at that!) but they are making me smile a lot this week. I'm really tempted to treat myself to the matching turquoise pair...

Packing and unpacking ... and cherry blossoms

My living room is currently a riot of colour, as I'm busy unpacking a big supplies order (mmm, lovely supplies) that came in this giant box yesterday:So much lovely felt! (and some other yumminess for my shops that I'll be blogging about soon).

I'm slowly packaging the felt up into bundles of squares, and there are rainbows of felt on the sofa and the coffee table and the floor... all over the place, basically

In between all this packing and unpacking, I've been sewing lots of cherry blossom hairbands:
They're one of my very favourite pieces at the moment and will definitely be playing a starring role in my own autumn wardrobe.

Teacup Factory

Yesterday I worked my way through sewing lots of teacup brooches, step by step until they were (almost) finished:I like lining them up in rows as I go along...

I Heart Tea (Crafting 365 day 343)

I drink a lot of tea. Many many mugs of the lovely stuff. I am totally addicted and totally obsessed with all the paraphernalia that goes along with it: teacups, teapots, teacosies, even nice teaspoons! So it seemed only right and proper that I got back into sewing after my recent break with a batch of "I love tea" badges:
Sooo many tiny letters to cut out and sew on! Very satisfying finishing that lot, but there are even more to come as I'm finally going to be restocking the other four colours over the next few weeks as well...

Thinking of tea (and you know I often am), did you know that everyday when Eastenders finishes so many British people put the kettle on for a cuppa that it almost overwhelms the National Grid? I learnt this fun little fact from the shopping blog Wee Birdy, which kindly featured some of my tea-themed brooches this month. Hurrah!

Other recent features of my work include a sweet post on I Love Hokey, my "tea taste" pin in a lovely tea-themed Etsy montage on Mon Petit Lapin (I drink plain old builders tea - Fairtrade, of course - black no sugar in case you're wondering) and in a tea themed "treasury" selection by SassaLynne, a mention of my badger brooch by Miss Frugality, kind words on Hazelnut Studio's blog ... and also a little feature on Crafty Crafty.

Any mention of my work always makes me smile, be it on shopping blogs or little mentions of my felty things on the blogs of fellow crafters (apologies to anyone I forget to mention - I love you all, I'm just forgetful!) but I have to admit to having a little giggle at CraftyCrafty's description that "These fantastic felted goodies are part of the felt 365 project, a spinoff from crafting 365." Felt 365! Heehee! I love how my Crafting 365 group is starting to get mentioned places and take on a life of its own away from me but it did make me laugh all the same :)

Catching up: batches of flowers

My month without the internet has clearly made me forget how technology works: I forgot to charge my camera batteries before trying to take loads of photos today. What an idiot!

I did at least get some photos taken before the batteries died completely...

Here's what I was working on last night (day 258) ...
... sewing together a "new" mobile (the pieces were actually cut out way back in March!) whilst catching up on episodes of America's Next Top Model missed during the past month - if anyone tells me who wins before I wanted the finale I will be very unhappy!

Then way back in mid-April, in my first internet-free week (Crafting 365 days 238-242) I made lots of batches of floral brooches:
I wasn't doing very well with my "design a day" challenge anyway, and then no internet was just the last straw so I put it on hold and turned my attention to batch-making. Some got started from scratch, and others I'd been working on for a while in spare moments and I just needed a big push to get them all finished. I worked my way through most of my dvd collection whilst beading this lot!
It's great having a nice stock of the poppies, and lovely to have a pink version in small, medium and large.
I really do love that pink, I've been wearing my pink poppies much more than I wear the red or white ones (though I do love them, they just don't match my wardrobe quite as well). I'll be taking close up pictures of the pink poppies soon and adding them to my Etsy, etc, but the battery charger must do it's thing first...

365 / 237 - Success and Failure

My bracelet experiments were a success last night - hurrah!
The elastic makes it slightly adjustable, and easy to take on and off. I tweaked the orchid design a little, too, and accidentally used the wrong shade of pink for the background so this bracelet has a different look to it than the last white one. I think I prefer the delicacy of a softer pink, but we shall see.

Unfortunately, I went babysitting last night and had to take a small kit of sewing with me so I had no materials with me for making new designs... so yet again I have failed in the "design a day" stakes. Tsk tsk. I really need to get my act together with this!

365 / 225 - Pinkness and a Nice Start to April

Last night's craftiness: a pink version of my little poppy pin...
... my very favourite shade of pink! Medium and large pink poppies to follow. I wear a lot of pink and purple so I think these will become staples of my wardrobe before long.

Today is the first day of my "Design a day" challenge - thanks for all your great suggestions (no more, please!) - so hopefully there'll be lots of fun new things to show off to you all everyday this month. April has certainly started off well, with my rainbow circles artwork turning up on the Etsy front page today and getting about 1200 views in the process! Just staggering. Thanks so much to SarahLousieDesigns for the screenshot.