April 30th 2015 - Hedgehog craft

April 30th 2015 - Hedgehog craft

Today I was looking for "wild animal" activities for Badgers (St John Ambulance) for next week as part of their Wild Badge.  I came across this Hedgehog, but as we are in spring i'm not going to find many brown leaves about.

But it gave me an idea - Hedgehog shape on paper and glue brown triangles to it to look like spikes.  I set about cutting triangles from brown parcel paper and brown craft paper (darker).  I then covered the hedgehog template in glue and stuck the triangles on overlapping themso thepoints were not stuck down.

It looked really good and was very easy to do. This is the image I have used  as the base, the face and feet can be coloured with felt tips or crayons.

April 29th 2015 - Book Quotes

April 29th 2015 - Book Quotes

As part of the story sack for family learning I decided that I would add a Dr Seuss quote to the bag, which has been printed on t-shirt transfer paper for me to iron and and then the small book from felt with Book quotes on each page.

I hunted the net for ages trying to find some quotes that the kids would understand.  I choose the ones that are in the link (I made the pin of them).  Each quote has been written out in pencil on a small piece of material and I am back stitching the letters on each one.  This is taking longer than I thought it would but never mind, will look good when it's done and they are fixed to the felt book.

Here is 2 of the quotes - 1 drawn in pencil and the other that has been sewn

April 28th 2015 - Toadstool table n chairs

April 28th 2015 - Toadstool table n chairs

Today me n hubby nipped out to a garden centre 15mins up the road as I want a Lemon Grass plant as wasps don't like the smell of it.  They hadn't got any and didn't know what I was on about!

Well we came back via a small market town, we've been there quite a bit as they have the Factory Outlet Store.  We nipped in.  This was a BIG mistake (in a way) as cost me an absolute fortune!

Outside the front of the store was garden furniture and things and amongst it was a Toadstool Table n Chairs.  It was lovely!  We mis-read the label and price.  We walked round the store and picked up few bits and it was as we got near the till we decided we would get the toadstool table n chairs even though it meant we couldn't get any wood to do the decking this week.  The sacrifices I make for my kids!

Well we thought it was £40 for the table and chairs...... errrr no, £40 for the table and £25 per pair of chairs!  OMG!!! (bearing in mind this is NOT RRP but cheaper!)  BUT they did have an offer of table and 2 chairs for £59!  So we got them.

They are really lovely and we have been and cleared the weeds from in front of fairy garden for them, not sure if this is where they are staying permanently or not, but where they are going for now.  If they are staying here we will have to level thee ground properly and possibly put some more of the purple stone chips down.  I think we have to re-think the entire fairy garden and re-make it bigger like where it was before (where the mud is to) and place the table n chairs at the back by the fence, with the fairies and toadstools at either side.

April 27th 2015 - Golden Pants Trophy

April 27th 2015 - Golden Pants Trophy

To go in my story sack for family learning I decided I would make and add a Golden Pants Trophy like the one the Pirates are hunting are hunting for.

I picked up a pack of trophies in £1 shop, this is one of them:

I painted the bottom part and the stem with gold glitter nail varnish - I think it had about 5 coats in the end to get a nice thick gold colour.

I then hunted the net for a pattern to make underpants and found this one:
 

As you can see I cut it in half to use as I would have had problems fixing an "all in 1" pair round the trophy because of the stem etc.

I had some gold sparkly/sequin material in the cupboard which I thought would be great and look really like a gold trophy:

I drew round the pants template and cut out 2 pairs of the pants.  I also added a piece of material across the top of the 2 pairs of pants but this didn't work so I had to remove it.  I stitched the pants together leaving the crutch area open so that I could get it onto the trophy.  I added some goldish ribbon to the pants to make the "Y-front" markings.

I stuffed the middle of the trophy with pillow stuffing and wrapped some all around the handles and the outside of the trophy.  I then very carefully (and hard) got the pants onto the trophy where I added more stuffing to them to make sure the whole of the pants were stuffed and the right shape.

I finally sewed the bottom of the pants together and the finished Golden Pants Trophy looks like this:

I'm really pleased with how it turned out and so are the boys who the story sack will be for.

April 26th 2015 - Bird House

April 26th 2015 - Bird House

I bought 2 Bird houses similar to these from poundland the other week, I'm not sure what size birds they are meant for as the hole is smaller than a 2p coin.  I had talked about covering them in shells before they went into the fairy garden but lil man has decided he wants them in it as they are.  He has placed them on top of an old tree stump and said that they are neighbours.

He is so happy to have his little fairy garden and apart from the wind knocking 1 ornament off the fence (luckily it didn't break) nothing has been broken or stolen.  Which is really good.

April 25th 2015 - Making a felt book

April 25th 2015 - Making a felt book

For the front of my story sack I want a small fabric book, I thought felt would be the best bet.  So I started to look for a simple design that I could use.  I couldn't find one.  Then I came across this Needle holder book and it was just what I was looking for.

So I set about making it, mine will have 10 pages in total which I plan to add "reading/book" quotes to each page.  My initial idea was to stitch them on the felt, then I realised that the sewing would go through and I couldn't use the reverse side of the page.  I tried fabric pens and fabric paint but they looked really big on the felt and not very nice.  My last idea and what I am going with was stitching the quotes onto another piece of material and fixing that to the book pages.  Whether I fix with glue or sewing i'm not quite sure.

I am going to write the quotes in pencil on the extra piece of material and then stitch over them, so that they stand out.

The middle of the book where I have sewed them together

1 of the purple and green pages inside

The book folded

April 24th 2015 - Hair bobbles

April 24th 2015 - Hair bobbles


What a horrid day!  Considering yesterday I was sat out in the garden in shorts and a vest top getting a sun tan, today I am indoors in a jumper with heating on as its turned cold and wet!!!


Anyways, todays pin.  Despite being the only female in the house (the cats don't  count) I can never find any hair bobbles.  I can wrap them to handle of hair brush, put them in a drawer, leave them on the side or shelf, put them in bathroom and when I go back they are gone.  No idea where they have gone but they have gone!  Clips and slides are just as bad.

Well I found this pin about keeping hair bobbles together with a carabena clip - so this I have done today.  I took a carabena clip from the craft cupboard and have put my hair bobbles onto it and put them in a drawer.  We will see if they still there next time I want 1.

April 23rd 2015 - Decking Squares

April 23rd 2015 - Decking Squares

If you have been following any of my blog you will be aware that we are in the process of building a decking.  This has been a long process as we have had to dig out loads of soil from part of garden to move to opposite end as garden is on a slope.  Hubby says I have got to be the only person that can buy a house that is on a hillside with a sloping garden and then want a patio (we did last year) and a decking that is also flat!

We started buying the decking squares last year every time we went to the big town (we are in a harbour town with minimal shops) where b&q is.  They have varied in price from £2.52 each to £2.97 and a few were on offer at 2 for £5.  I noticed yesterday that b&q had the decking squares we are using reduced to £2 each, I know that isn't much of a saving, but when your doing a big area on a limited budget it helps. 

I transferred £16 from the savings account (now has £2 in it!) and hubby got £4 for his petrol to a meeting today, I was given £10 that a friend owed me yesterday and we were going to use £10 from main bank account so £30 in total and 15 squares, when we got there they only had 25 squares (I needed 35 to complete area) so we bought all 25, yes it cost us more than we had planned BUT we don't know when they will be getting any more in stock - its a "as and when they arrive item" according to the store. 

We are stuck however, we don't have the wood for the frame work so work has had to stop until next week when hubby gets paid so we can buy some more timber lengths and carry on again.  I will have a decking by summer, but today and the past week has been like summer - very hot, garden thermometer is reading 26C.  If we have temps like that in April what is July and August going be???  I can't wait!

Today I have been sat around in the sun doing not a lot as I have re-hurt my knee after doing lots of walking and standing yesterday.  But I can cope with lounging around in the sun!!

April 22nd 2015 - Family Learning Story sacks

April 22nd 2015 - Family Learning Story sacks

Family Learning at the school has started a new course today - Story sacks.  This envolves us parents making a story sack based on a book.

We sat and discussed ideas that we could put in 1 based on a story about night pirates and included things like a pirate hat and eye patch, treasure chest and treasure, story book, fact book, map, material for the sea, moon and stars, a boat or ship, pirate puppets/finger puppets, pirate toys etc.

By next wednesday we need to have a story book and some ideas of what we are going to include in it.  Having 2 children at the school that did the last course with me I have got to decide if i'm making 1 between them (but as different ages this could be hard), or if i'm going to make 2 which means that they may not be as good as just 1.

I think this course could turn out to be really good.

April 21st 2015 - St John Ambulance badges

April 21st 2015 - St John Ambulance badges

Tomorrow night is the presentation evening for St John Ambulance youth where I live.  This has been a few months in the planning and as far as I am aware everything is sorted.

There was one thing that needed doing and that was adding my county emblem to my dress jacket.  Not a problem, I know where it goes, however, the problem comes in that I have a different badge in that place as my old county didn't have an emblem!

So I hunted the net, didn't have much luck, messaged my officer and posted a request on facebook asking how/where it goes.  A nice lady replied with the 2015 dress regulations that show where all the badges go.  I added the picture to pinterest so that I could use it for today.  My Grand Prior that was where the emblem goes has had to be removed and the county emblem put in its place and the Grand Prior goes underneath.

All badges are now sewn back on my jacket, (but isn't straight!).  Fingers crossed no-one notices tomorrow evening.

April 20th 2015 - Free Wood

April 20th 2015 - Free Wood

Who ever says you get nothing for free obviously hasn't asked the right people or places!!!  A friend of mine told us that she got some free wood in the form of pallets from a local building firm, so me and hubby went down there and asked the lady.  Whose answer was "how many do you want?"  Me, looking rather silly replied I don't know!

I asked hubby and he said however many we can fit in the car, so the man told us to reverse the car up to where they were and we would see what we could fit in - we got 5, and the people from building firm said we know where they are if we need more!  BONUS!

Well we had dinner and then spent the next half hour trying to take 1 apart - easier said than done.  We tried hitting the pallets with a hammer, using the claw of the hammer, using a crowbar, using a chisel and all these succeeded in doing was splitting the wood, not so good.  So I did what I always do and went to pinterest to see if I could find a pin on how to demolish a pallet.  I  found quite alot actually, some said the ways we had tried but the most useful and easy way was with a metal saw and cut through the nails.

We ummed and arrred and said we didn't think we had a metal saw and then hubby disapeared inside.  I went to see what he was doing and he was reading the instructions for the electric saw we bought to cut down trees - it had a metal saw attatchment.  He fixed it to the saw and off he went cutting the nails from the pallets.  It's not quite the 2minutes per pallet as the pin says but it is working much quicker than what we tried and  the wood is not breaking.

Free wood and a helpful hint on how to break it!

April 19th 2015 - Fairy garden sign

April 19th 2015 - Fairy garden sign

A long time ago I found today's pin about making a Fairy garden sign post and thought it would be great for when we finally made our fairy garden.  Well our fairy garden is under way and today is not nice enough to go out and do more on the decking so I have started to make a sign post post ours.

I had a thickish stick I had taken off 1 of the boys (using it to hit his brothers) which I have covered in silver and gold sparkle nail varnish (this stuff gets used for crafts more than on my nails!).

the pic doesn't show the sparkle at all.

Ages ago I used my dremmel to carve words into some wooden discs (from a tree we cut out of garden), I have coloured the words using sharpie pens and again covered them in silver sparkle nail varnish.  They look really good.

Once the nail varnish is properly dry I will nail them to the stick so that it can go outside in the fairy garden.  Lil man is so pleased that he finally has it.

April18th 2015 - Start of the decking

April 18th 2015 - Start of the decking

The sun is shining again today and is actually quite hot, 1/3 kids has shorts on and I have 3/4 trousers on.  All is looking good weather wise and I hope it stays and we have it right through til the end of summer!

After we dug out mud the other day in readiness for the decking today hubby went and bought some timber so that we can start making the decking frame work in order to put the decking squares onto.  Easier said than done!  It's very easy to do if you have a square/rectangular, flat area in which to do it, I know this as we had the above at our old house.  However the garden here is on a slope (why we had to dig out) and we are building around a jagged stone wall and concrete steps, plus the garden isn't straight!

We will succeed and I will have a decking by summer! 

April 17th 2015 - Sick & Coffee

April 17th 2015 - Sick & coffee

Last night I was awake for hours as I had a real sicky feeling in my stomach, I wasn't sick despite feeling it.  This morning lil man was violently sick everywhere multiple times!

Well I remembered I had pinned something about covering sick with coffee as it's meant to dry it out and remove the smell and make easier to clean - IT DOESN'T!  it just makes it smell like sick and coffee and makes a mess even bigger to clean up.

Poor lil man is now back in bed asleep but keeps being sick and I still feel really sick but still havent been.  Guessing its a bug we have!

April 16th 2015 - One man's trash......

April 16th 2015 - One man's trash.......

......is another man's treasure!  This saying is very true and fits today's pin really well.  Last night I had to go round the neighbours house as had left my keys at home and hubby was out.  Well the neighbour went outside to her bin and stood beside it was a small wicker shelf unit, I asked her if she was throwing it out and she said yes unless I wanted it.  Well I said yes as have been looking for a small unit for my friends apothecary/halloween bottles to go.

The neighbour put the shelf over the wall into our garden.   The shelf is wicker as I said above, it has 3 shelves and the top is arched.  It's a little bit damp and dirty from being outside but will soon dry off and then I can clean it/paint it etc and make it look older than it is.

April 15th 2015 - Family Learning trip out

April 15th 2015 - Family Learning trip out

Today was the last day of the family learning and literacy course, and this meant we went on a day trip!  We all decided early on the course that we would go to Walby Farm Park which is just over an hour away from us.

The trip had been arranged and we had the full use of the school room there - this morning the kids all had some worksheets to fill out linked to the farm and stuff, we then went on a tour where the member of staff assigned to us told the kids all about the animals and their foods etc.  They all got to stroke a baby goat - was only 2 weeks old and made loads of noise when taken out of pen away from mum!  After this we went out to see the hens and ducks, the kids all got to stroke a hen and help collect the eggs from the pen, the member of staff went through all the different types of eggs we had collected and how long eggs take to hatch - 21days (I didn't know this).  We then carried on the tour and the kids all got to bottle feed a lamb - the farm has got over 25baby lambs so far and still some not born.  My boys thought this was great.  We washed hands, had dinner and then the kids were allowed to go and play (Walby has a huge indoor play area with slides and ball pools etc).  We went and stroked the rabbits and guinea pigs and watched the sheep racing (none of us backed the winning sheep).  Sadly we then had to head back to the coach to come home.

I did take loads of photos of the day, including the feeding of the lambs, but when I got home and went to upload them it told me the memory card was corrupted and needed to be formatted.  I'm really annoyed about this, hubby has even tried to see if he can salvage the pics but the programme he uses isn't even picking them up.

This was my 2nd visit to Walby and it is a great place, has things for everyone of all ages and stuff both inside and out.  Well worth a visit if your in the area.

April 14th 2015 - Aldi

April 14th 2015 - Aldi

Prior to moving North nearly 2years ago I hardly visited Aldi for my shopping, despite there being 2 where I lived.  Both were out of town and involved 2 different buses each way - not fun or easy with kids and shopping!  So we would occassionally nip over in the car.

When we moved house, we started off by shopping at Morrisons for most things as thats what we had got used to as our regualar supermarket.  However, on the same site as Morrisons there was a Lidl, so we would nip in there and get few bits. We then had to go to the other retail park to go to Iceland for any other bits we had't managed to get.  Next door to Iceland is Aldi!

We decided that we would try and do our shopping at Aldi as they say its much cheaper than the other supermarkets.  Yes they are cheaper BUT we still found we had to go elsewhere for few things.  But on the whole we manage to do most of our weekly shopping at Aldi and Iceland.

We were sppening in the region of £90-100 a week in Morrisons and then extra in Iceland.  By swapping to aldi we have reduced the main shop down to £60-70 a week.  Which is great, this extra money comes in very handy with 3 boys who are growing out of clothes and ruining school shoes like you wouldn't believe. 

I wish I had started using Aldi alot sooner than I did and would certainly reccomend it to anyone.  As I said abov we do have to get a few things from elsewhere but I would say 85% of main shop is done at aldi, 10% at Iceland and 5% elsewhere - for the reason Aldi don't sell the product or don't have it in or we don't like Aldi's version.

April 13th 2015 - R.I.C.E

April 13th 2015 - R.I.C.E

R.I.C.E - not the stuff you eat but Rest Ice Compression Elevation in a first aid sense.  When I slipped in the garden at the weekend trying to get away from a wasp I landed on my wrist!  Didn't think much of it until my wrist and hand started to swell so I removed my rings.

I was still in pain with it this morning although I can move it so went up A&E to get it checked.  The nurse prodded n poked it (as they do) and I had pains shooting up my arm and into my hand, so I got sent for an xray.  Had a long wait in xray and then back to A&E.

The doctor again prodded and poked, and said my wrist isn't broken that they can see at the moment, but there is a fracture showing on my scaphoid (bone at base of thumb) - my thumb doesn't hurt though and I broke that years ago.  As i'm not in pain with it they are leaving it for now.  They believe that I have sprained my wrist over the part that hurts and is swollen and told me to use R.I.C.E as mentioned above along with pain killers.  If i'm still in pain in a few days to go and see my GP to be referred back to A&E.

April 12th 2015 - A wet Sunday

April 12th 2015 - A wet Sunday

Where has the sun gone???  We've had a lovely week and have been outside for most of it, just started to get used to the idea of spring/summer being on the way, I even thought about getting the shorts n stuff out of the box and it rained last night and hasn't stopped today! 

So what better to do on a wet day than play Monopoly Junior with the kids.  We were going to  play my Disney Monopoly but think its too hard for lil man, who has only just got the idea of the junior version.

We have also done some jigsaw puzzles and i'm sure we will end up playing some more games this afternoon.

April 11th 2015 - Making Rockets

April 11th 2015 - Making Rockets

You need:
Rocket template  http://www.clipartbest.com/rocket-ship-cartoon
1 thin drinking straw
1 thick drinking straw
double sided tape
crayons/pens optional
printer
scissors

Me and lil man have today made rockets from paper and drinking straws like these on pinterest.  We followed the link which took you to a page of free rocket templates (see above), we had to draw 2 of them (the same rocket) off the laptop screen as have no ink to print them.  Lil man then coloured them in.

Once they were coloured in I cut them out and placed double sided tape on the back of the rockets (both) and place the smaller straw on top of the tape but left 3/4 of the straw sticking out the bottom.  This thin straw then goes into the thicker straw and using the small bendy bit you blow into it and the rocket flies.  I have a happy son that is making his rocket fly, complete with countdown.

April 10th 2015 - Fairy Garden

April 10th 2015 - Fairy Garden

Since we moved to our house nearly 2years ago and started working on the garden (which was a jungle) lil man has asked for a fairy garden in part of it.  We fenced off a section after we had cleared it and we're looking at ideas to go in it etc.  I found many on pinterest and made a whole board linked to it.

As we have seen things fairies, toadstools and such cheap we have bought them.  I have also made some small rock houses to go in it.  When lil man went on a school trip last year the shop had an ornament seagull  that says welcome under it - it was reduced to 50p so lil man bought it with his money - his teacher even asked if he was sure that he wanted that and not a toy like his friends and he was adamant he wanted the seagull for his garden and bought a pencil as well.  His teacher explained to us when we picked him up about it and we confirmed he was making a fairy garden.

We also have a statue of a big grey cat in it.  This was named phoenix after our big grey cat that sadly got killed a few years ago, he was a lovely cat and very dosile.  He was missed by us all so we got the statue.

We still need few more bits to go in it but we have plenty of time for that.  I promised lil man that we would have it done by Easter this year, sadly Easter was last weekend BUT I have sorted it today for him.

April 9th 2015 - Planting garlic

April 9th 2015 - Planting garlic

The garlic bulbs have been sat in water for a few days now and we have long roots at the bottom and long green shoots at the top that are about 3" high.  According to the websites this is when they are best to plant, so we will be going outside later to plant the garlic.

However, most of the websites say that you should plant in august and protect with straw over the winter months so that it is ready to harvest from april/may time.  I didn't know this so hopefully it will still grow, but we can plant more later in the year.

April 8th 2015 - Cinnamon and sand

April 8th 2015 - Cinnamon and sand

Lil man has been outside the past few days as the weather has been nice, and hes been playing in his sand pit, but has moaned that there is bugs in it!

Well I looked on pinterest and found this link about adding cinnamon to the sandpit as it repels the bugs.  So I added 1/2 bottle of cinnamon into the sandpit and mixed it in really well.   The sand now had a slight cinnamon smell and STILL has bugs in it a few hours later.  So i've wasted my cinnamon and not solved the problem as yet.  I will keep checking the sandpit over next few days and see if there's any change.

April 7th 2015 - Bearded Dragon Harness

April 7th 2015 - Bearded Dragon Harness

The other week I ordered a Harness for my bearded dragon so that we can take him outside in the sun without him running off.  Well it arrived today and I tried to put it on him, 1st he puffed up at me and then he tried to eat it, so I don't think this option is going to work! LOL!

April 6th 2015 - Birthday Wishes (and garlic)

April 6th 2015 - Birthday Wishes (and garlic)

Birthday Wishes

Random title for today I know, but I  have my reasons.  Today would have been my Mum's 66th birthday had she still been with us.  Happy Birthday Mum, RIP, love you always. x   I thought these 2 pins suited this bit quite well - for my Mum in Heaven and words and tears.


Growing Garlic

Lil man is loving the idea of growing his own veggies, we have carrots, sweet corn, snap peas and potatoes in the garden already, the blueberry and raspberry bush we bought from £1 shop have both died so need get more expensive ones.  And we have rocket, lettuce, corriander and basil growing in a tray indoors.  He asked if we could grown garlic as we use it in dinners.

So I looked it up, the first thing I found was placing it in fridge and leaving it for a week as it will start to grow - well it was in the fridge for 2weeks and doing nothing!  So I looked to see if I could find another way to get it to grow, and I found a way of growing it in water.  So Yesterday we opened the garlic clove and placed the individual bits in a shallow bowl of water on the window sill.  This morning we have woken up to them looking like this:


So I think a few more days for them to grow bit taller and we will be able to plant them outside in the vegetable planter.  And I think we will wait a few more weeks and then root another lot so we have more growing for later in the year.  I'm not sure how long they take before new cloves have fully grown.

April 5th 2015 - Easter Sunday

April 5th 2015 - Easter Sunday

Happy Easter to all, whether you believe the church teachings that Easter is linked to the resurecction of Jesus or if you follow the Pagan/Wiccan ways and believe that Easter is linked to Ostara and the fertitilty Goddess Eostre or if you just enjoy the weekend off work, I hope that you have a nice day and don't eat too much chocolate and up ill.

I have spent the day getting back into my Family Tree thanks to a conversation with a friend yesterday who said about trying to find her family but having no luck.  I said I would help her if she could send me all info she knew, which isn't much, but there is enough to make a start.  As I was looking for 1 of her rellies I realised that I could actually view records on the site (something i've not been able to do in ages) so I started trying to sort the 1000+ hints that I have on my tree.  And the pin link is right for what happens.

Sadly I have hit a wall on my friends tree but hopefully we can sort this if we can get a copy of the marriage cert as this *should* tell us which of the 2 charles is the father!

April 4th 2015 - Lovely day

April 4th 2015 - Lovely day

Today has been a lovely day, the sun is shining and we've all been outside.  I would like to think this weather will continue but who knows, it will probably be raining tomorrow!

Tonight is meant to be the Red Blood Moon, but according to reports they don't think the UK is going to see much of it, which is a shame.  A friend of mine in Australia has added some pics of it from what she saw.  I will be keeping an eye out this evening to see if we can see anything and get some pics if we can.  I hope we do see part of it as we missed the eclipse due to cloud and rain.

April 3rd 2015 - Making Army/camo cupcakes

April 3rd 2015 - Making Army/camo cupcakes

As part of his homework over the holidays my eldest son had to make some cupcakes and take photos of him doing it, well having 3 boys they "all have to do the same" or I end up with a big argument, so we all made cupcakes.

We made Army/camo cupcakes, we have made them before and they work really well.  Sadly I didnt have fresh ingredients but packet mixes.  My youngest son made the green mix, middle son made the chocolate mix and eldest made the white mix.

As you can see all 3 colours are made in seperate bowls.   From here you add a spoonful of each colour to the cake cases and then give them abit of a swirl with a cocktail stick - you dont have to mix them - if you don't you end up with 3 blocks of colour instead of them mixed more like camo effect.

 

They then go in the oven for 15-20mins or until cooked.  When they come out they look like this:

We have just got to ice them with 3 colour icing as well.  Will add a pic once they done.


 The inside of the cakes are sort of marbled and 3 tone - each cake is different, this is the 1 I had:

 The icing on them is green, white and brown but not as I had hoped - I wanted the colours mixed but didn't know how to do it so I did them each in own pipeing bag in a row.

April 2nd 2015 - Bit of everything today

April 2nd 2015 - Bit of everything today

Today has been one of those days!  It started off with a trip to docs as 1.I needed medication review and 2. My sore throat and asthma problems of just over a week ago have returned - im now on antibiotics, which doc said I should have had with the steroids a week ago.

From here me and lil man hit the shoe shop in the hope of getting him new school shoes, Bran**** had 2 pairs in sons size, 1 of which he couldn't get the velcro to do up and the other pair the stitching was ripping on it, so we left them.  I was going to go down to shoe zone but was feeling dizzy so we bused home.

Then this afternoon I got the sewing machine out (not used one since school and then I got kicked out on week 2!)  My eldest son has recently been doing textiles at school so said he would be able to help me.  Well he took 1 look at my little machine and asked what it was - nothing like the big ones they use at school!  Oh well its me on me own then.  As I have less than 2 weeks to get middle sons clown top made!

So I had to work out which way the pins went in the material, good job I checked as I had them pinned the wrong way, I had them how I would sew by hand.  I then had a play on a piece of material and seemed to go ok, so I put sons Clown tops (2 tops cut in half) under the foot and set off.

 Well I managed to sew the front and back together without too many problems, it got stuck trying to go through the collars and the bottom hems as they quite thick, and in a few places I ended up with some gaps where it didnt seem to pick up the thread:

I have gone over the gaps by hand, as have no idea why it has done it or the best way to sort it with the machine.  Had I noticed when stitching I could have gone back over it, but it wasn't until the end I noticed it.  But overall it has worked, I have managed to sew the 2 tops together, not sure if it will be strong enough and withstand daily wear but it will do for the clown party.

April 1st 2015 - Making fairy wings

April 1st 2015 - Making fairy wings

9months today will be January 1st 2016!  That is crazy, time is going to quickly.

For today's pin I have had to make it myself as I couldn't find 1 that linked to my idea.  I am in the process of making more Halloween Potion Bottles/Jars - this 1 is for Fairy Wings.  There are lots of threads about making them from plastic and celophane etc, all of which you have to buy and then buy the special paints, my way you only need go outside and find the bits.

First off you need to find some of the "helicopter leaves" - I have no idea what tree they are from, I don't even have any trees in my garden but have loads of the "helicopter bits".  Not sure what I mean,  well these things:

Unfortunately I haven't got any that are still joined together mine are all individual, but this will work just as well as "snapped fairy wings".  From the above you need to make sure they are dry (I left mine on the lizards tank for couple hours).  You then need to get some pens, I used sharpies and carefully coloured the "wing part" on both sides, some did fall to bits whilst colouring so I just binned them.

There isn''t any pictures of the coloured "wings" but once I had coloured them in on both sides, in pairs, I started with the silver glitter nail varnish and very carefully applied it on both sides, one at time allowing time to dry.  They are very delicate but the nail varnish gives them a bit more strength.

I think they look really effective and my kids said they look as though they "could belong" to fairies,  which is what I was hoping for.

They still need to go in a jar, but they are nearly done, need to get a few more made as well.