Chasing the blues away

Sometimes the best way to chase the” so much to do, so little time” frustration away is to just go ahead and create something. To play around with the material without a plan or a goal and almost without thinking. I ended up making a crown from wool, scraps of metal and some buttons. The crown just “happened”.

I decided that the crown will be a gift for someone I admire but haven’t met. It’s for a female journalist in my local newspaper whose pieces about art & craft and design always are a joy to read. I admire the fact that she covers craft and craftsmanship in a daily paper and always in a way so that you understand that she actually made a thorough background search.   

I figured that a newspaper office might need a little embellishment so today I put the crown in a big box with the journalists name on it and handed it in at the reception in the newspaper building. Hopefully they won’t panic, think it’s a bomb, call the bomb squad and have it blown up!

Take care

Jeanette

New additions….or addictions…

I visited a Yarn & Fabric show this weekend. They had a lot of rubbish there but also some really lovely yarn. Naturally I had to buy some….

I bought this beautiful 1-tread wool yarn from Iceland in the most amazing colors. The yarn was quite addictive. The green is for a sweater and the bright pink and red for a shawl. Don’t know what I will use the orange for yet but it will come to me in the end.

Then I found these gigantic “must have” buttons. I might have about a zillion buttons but nothing g like these. They will brighten up many a garment in my only too black wardrobe.

I also bought a ball of Noro yarn for a spider web thin Citron and….

.....a yarn made of recycled saris. Have yet to figure out what I want to use it for but that is part of the fun….

Now I need to rearrange my workroom to get it all in.

Jeanette

All in a days work!

This is a busy time of the year for me because I have so many plants that I want sow from seeds indoors in order to develop a healthy transplant of appropriate size to then be moved outdoors. Today it was red onions (red baron) and yellow onions (Rijnsburger 5), sugar snaps ( Oregon Sugar Pod) and Isop (Hyssopus officinalis).



Sugar snaps planted in containers made of toilet rolls



Red and yellow onions



Sorting out the Isop seeds



I also set my potatoes to chit in egg trays to get good and sturdy sprouts for early planting and harvest.



hopefullu I will have poatoes at midsummers eve



In the next few days I hope to sow Brussels sprouts, Texas Salvie ( Fairy Queen), orange tiny echidnae and white big echidnae, two other kind of Salvie, one arch blue and one white. The Echidnae and the Salvie are all from seeds I collected (“stole”) in a park last year. I have never used seeds that I’ve collected myself before so it will be fun to see how these will turn out.

Last but not least I finally got down to sewing the buttons in my cardigan. The cardigan have been finished for “ages” but sewing buttons bore me to death so I have been putting it of. I think the colored buttons gave the cardigan a cheery look and my button collection came to good use.

Jeanette

My leaf and I

Here I am at the exhibition where all the 87 south Swedish leaves were shown. I look happy don’t I? It’s because it is finally finished, ha-ha. It was great fun seeing how all the artist had made different interpretations of the leaves, not a single one looked the same or even similar. I can’t wait to see the rest, all 1913 of them in Stockholm in June. Although there was a lot of fantastic stuff there the most colorful “thing” to be seen was my dear friend Anna with her amazing knitted shawl.

She made it herself of course. Know wonder she is a constant source of inspiration to me!

Jeanette

Willpower

There I stood with at least 25 packages of seeds in my hand and I wasn’t alone. All of us woken by the spring sun and a deep urge to start growing plants immediately. With an enormous act of willpower I put the packages back on their shelves again and left the shop without buying any. Telling myself with a very firm voice that it’s way too early to start planting seeds anyway if you don’t want tall and thin ones (which I don’t). With an even firmer voice I told myself that I wasn`t allowed to buy anything until I’ve checked out what I had already got...

Which turned out to be a lot! Some bought last year and never planted (guess I was out of willpower then) and others carefully collected (or stolen) in gardens, parks or the country side.

To keep myself busy with other stuff than growing seeds I selected buttons for my black cardigan. Yep, the second car knit is finished.

I also started on a new knitting project; a cardigan no less, but this time a tiny one for a little baby. I fell in love with the spring colors though so I just might knit one for myself too.

Before I had a shawl knitting problem....knitting way too many. Wonder if I have a cardigan knitting problem now....

Take care
Jeanette

Spring inspiration # 3

When I was looking through one of my boxes with fabric ( I have several…) for the colored leather that I new I had somewhere I found this fabric that I had completely forgotten. It is the color of spring tulips.

It will be perfect for a spring skirt. Maybe together with my black cardigan with multicolored buttons? I better hurry up and get started on both....

Jeanette

Spring inspiration #1

The leaf is off to the exhibition. Finishing the blasted thing has really been hanging over me…..so now when I am finally rid of  it I can focus on new and fun projects.

Of course I had to get started right away.

I bought black cotton yarn to make another cardigan. Not expensive yarn at all this time. I am going to mix the cotton with a thin tread of linen to give the cardigan some structure. As you can see it’s the happy color of black so I thought I would add some buttons from my collection to give it a more spring feeling!

I also bought some fabric to make a dress. Not so colorful either but I fell in love with the polka dots. They make me happy.

So if last weeks posts were the week of knits this week just might be the week of spring projects!

Jeanette

Happy Valentines Day

I forgot to wish you all a happy Valentines day this morning so I do it now instead. Playing around with some of my collected stuff....

May all your days be filled with LOVE!

Jeanette

The leaf is a FAL

This is my leaf – finished at last. I used all the stuff that I love the most. The inner leaf is made by wire covered with paper mache and then painted white. The birds and the squirrel are made from soda cans and the flowers are made of tea light cups. The heart is hand carved from a birch branch. The text around the leaf is added using decoupage and is a verse from an old Swedish love song. Last but not least I made a tiny embroidery and added to the stem. The whole leaf has sort of a love theme so when I made the embroidery I was thinking about the way lovers carve letters in the bark of a tree. So naturally it had to be J+P - the first letters in me and my husbands names.

Next week I will send the leaf off to the organizers. In March there will be an exhibition of the south Swedish leaves here in Malmö and then the big exhibition is in Stockholm at the beginning of June. Oh I can hardly wait …..It will be so much fun seeing all the other 1999 leaves made. 

Jeanette

The Friday Tutorial

Button heart
I am always on the lookout for new buttons to add to my button collection. Last year I bought 800 tiny white buttons at a jumble sale for next to nothing. I am slowly working my way down  the pile.... 

Today I managed to use a few while making a heart. Want to know how I did it? Welcome to tag along.

You need: wire, flush cutter, pliers and buttons. Any size and color will do.



Bend the wire in the shape of a heart.



Attach the buttons to the heart by using thin wire or ordinary sewing tread. Work your way around the whole heart.



Done.



Easy, fast and fun!

Now I leave you for the weekend. Hope you have a creative one!
Jeanette

The Friday Tutorial

New candle holder from an old one

I hardly ever throw anything away. What I can’t use in my art & craft work to transform into something new and useful I usually give to charity. This candle holder was an old remnant from the 80ies that I found at the back of my kitchen cupboard. I remembered that I put it there because I didn’t like it and thought it was ugly.  So my first instinct was to throw it away…..but I made a new candle holder from the old one using papier mache instead.

I tore paper from a vintage book in tiny pieces and wrapped it around the candle holder using ready made wallpaper glue. When it was completely dry ( 12 hours)  I added a little acrylic paint here and there, some buttons and a paper flower. I like it so much better now and light it everyday at my breakfast table!

Now I leave you for the weekend. Hope you have a creative one!

 Jeanette

Buttons & insanity

I had been walking home through rain and storm my mood getting fouler by each step. I was desperately trying to see it from the bright side, like how an excellent opportunity this was to try out my new raincoat. A lot of good that did!

Still mad at the lousy weather I looked in my mailbox and suddenly it felt like the sun came out – my Art & Craft Magazine that I subscribe to was lying their smiling at me, glowing like a gold nugget. I took a quick peak at the cover – oh boy, the whole magazine was devoted to fabric scraps, ribbons and buttons. It even had an entire article about buttons!

You see my teenaged daughters have been showing concern about the fact that I recently started to sort my button collection by color, hinting that some psychiatric counseling wouldn’t go amiss. But a whole article, now that must mean that I am sane right?

Soon I am going to brew some tea in my new dotty teapot and sit down for a long read and the first article will definitely be the one about the buttons!

Oh joy!

Take care

Jeanette