The Friday Tutorial

An Easter flower arrangement

Are you having dinner guests at Easter? Why not impress them with a flower arrangement on the dinner table. It’s dead easy really ! I made two…but I will show you the other one next Friday.

You need:

Twigs, tulips – I used birch, apple tree and parrot tulips (my favourite). You also need oasis and something to build your arrangement in. I used an old tin bowl, a jumble sale find.

First soak the oasis in water and then place it in the bowl.

Add twigs around the rim of the bowl.

Then add tulips in-between the twigs.

I always use an uneven number; I think it looks better that way.

Finish the arrangement by placing one tulip in the middle of the bowl and four tulips around it. Keep the first one a bit taller than the other four to get a variation in height. Finally add a few more twigs but this time in a more upright position.

Done! I think it will look stunning once the tulips are in full bloom and the twigs has got tiny little leaves.

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

Jeanette

PS If you look closely at the last photo you can see the pillow cover I made using celery. The turorial from two Fridays back.

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

Tag Tuesday

The theme for this weeks Tag Tuesday was EASTER EGGS. I love bunnies ( as you may know by now...) and when I found these little lovebirds sorry I mean "love rabbits" at clipartandcrafts.com I thought they fitted the theme perfectly. I used some feathers from my collection too. The tip of the feathers has the same blue color as the background but you can`t really see it very well on the photo.

Jeanette 

The Friday Tutorial

Sock Bunny

My family suffers from the SdSE-syndrome. That’s the Spin-dryer Sock Eating syndrome for you who didn’t know. We are quite convinced that the fluff you find when you clean the spin-dryer in fact are not fluff but leftovers from the tiny munching little aliens that hides in your spin-dryer and lives of eating socks. They are picky little buggers though and never eats two of the same kind leaving you with lots of ill matched socks. This is when your glass is either half full or half empty. Since mine is usually half full I enjoy the fact that this opens up lot of opportunities for making sock bunnies.

I think there are just as many ways of making sock bunnies as there are socks but this is how I do it:

You need two socks, a scissor, needle and tread and some stuffing. I use wool but you can use pretty much anything you like.

Cut the foot of one of the socks right down the middle, but don’t cut all the way to the heel. This will make the ears.

Cut the other side of the sock down the middle. This will become the legs.

Cut the foot off the second sock and divide it in two by cutting it right down the middle. This will become the arms.

Turn the bunny body inside out and sew the ears and legs together. Leave a hole in the crotch for turning it right side out again and for stuffing.

Stuff the bunny’s body and legs. I usually don’t stuff the ears because I like them floppy. Many people use the “heel-side” of the sock for the face but I like to use the heel for making a bunny bottom instead. That way it sits much steadier. Fill the arms with stuffing too, not to tight. 

Use a tiny ball of stuffing and to shape the nose.

Sew the hole together.

Shape the neck and head by tying a ribbon around the neck. The sew the arms to the body just below the ribbon.

Then make the face. I used fabric markers but you can do some embroidery or have buttons for eyes if you like.

Tadah – done! Meet Sally the sock bunny !

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

 Jeanette

You may not believe this

While I visited the Yarn & Fabric show I did not only buy a lot of yarn but I also attended a half hour workshop of Amigurumi. Now anyone who knows me would probably not believe this due to the fact that I with great stubbornness swear to the fact that I can’t crochet. I hated it in school and could never get my kettle-holders nice and square. The mere thought of reading a pattern, increase or decrease made my head spin. But what do you know? Miracles do happen!

After the half hour work shop I had made a crocheted cup cake in bright pink and I was hooked. I bought two patterns and when I got home I started on the first one – a rabbit! Now I have two feet and a paw to go and then I am finished.

Oh you may laugh thinking that a cup cake or a rabbit is no biggie. Well maybe it isn’t for you but for me its right up the same shelf as changing tires, sew a zipper or repaper your living room. It might not be rocket science but I still say - Wooohooo way to go Jeanette!

Jeanette

Tag Tuesday

This weeks theme in Tag Tuesday was GOOSEY – geese and ducks. That made me think of Jemima Puddle Duck from the tales by Beatrix Potter so Jemima it had to be.

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

The Friday tutorial

Playing with food

Did your mum tell you not to play with your food as a kid? Well here is your revenge. Who could have known that the celery stem looked like the perfect image of a rose? and that you can use it as a stamp? I didn’t anyway. I got the tip and a tutorial in this magazine.



Bonnier 101 Ideér Nr 1 2012



They used celery to stamp on paper but I went for fabric instead. I really had a lot of fun and like to chare it with you all. Here is how I did it:

You need: fabric, fabric paint, a brush and celery.

Cut the stem off the celery.

I wanted both a big and a small rose so I cut one piece quite near the end and one piece higher up. The smaller piece didn’t hold together so I secured it with a rubber band.

Add paint to the celery using a brush. Now doesn’t that look exactly like a rose? Amazing!

Start stamping!

I didn’t get as clear an image as I thought I would. I think it’s because my celery had spent a while in the refrigerator and was a bit soft. It would probably have worked a lot better with a really fresh one.

I ended up making a “spring lady” . She looks like she is wearing gigantic Carmen curlers more than roses but what the heck. I think I will use it for a pillow cover.

Well, I knew it as a kid and I know it now – playing with your food is fun!

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

Jeanette

Tag Tuesday

The theme for this weeks Tag Tuesday is MAD MARCH – March hare and rabbits. I had so much fun when I made the recycled Easter egg bunny for the Friday tutorial so I decided to do another one. Technically speaking it’s no tag but it is a rabbit so I guess it’s okay anyway.  

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

The Friday Tutorial

Recycled Easter egg bunny

When the candy is all eaten I always save the Easter eggs. I never remember where I put them though so each Easter I end up buying new ones anyway. But if I find an old one then the two halves usually don’t fit and I throw it away. Yesterday as I was looking through one of my kitchen cupboards I found an old Easter egg hidden at the back….and what do you know the halves didn’t fit. Standing there and looking at it I suddenly got an idea…how about making an Easter bunny mask to hang on the wall.

This is how I did.

I painted the two halves with white acrylic paint.

I printed some different women faces until I found one with an OK shape and size. I glued it to the egg.

Then I cut out a pair of bunny ears on aquarelle paper.

I glued the ears to the back of the “mask”.

I added a tiny bunny nose ( printed that one too) and a touch of red to the cheeks and mouth. I also painted the ears with white acrylic paint so they would get the same color as the rest of the egg.

Tadahh here she is!

For Easter I think she will get a blue ribbon.

It was so easy and fun! Can’t wait to make the other one too….might make it without a bunny nose though....not quite satisfied with how it looked....but now I will leave you for the weekend. I hope you have a creative one.

Jeanette