The Best Way to Spend Valentine's Day

It's a little late now but we thought we'd report on our Valentine's day, celebrating our greatest love, crafting!

On wednesday we visited Gillian Gladrag's incredible 'Fluff-a-torium' shop in Dorking, and bought ourselves her new book 'Carnival of Felting' and her 'Anemone-Ome' corsage kit which we spent wednesday evening and yesterday morning working on. Felting the corsage was such a therapeutic process, we are completely in love! Gillian Gladrag's kits are beautiful, with such bright colours, and the instructions are so easy to follow that it becomes impossible to drag yourself away! We can't wait to visit the Fluff-a-torium again soon!

After finishing the corsage, I (A) began working on a project I'd wanted to start for a while, an cushion cover made from a tea-towel. Tea-towels are often so pretty and cheaper than metre-fabric if you are making something small like a cushion. Recently C received a Tunnock's 'Teacake tea towel' which was just too beautiful to use for it's primary purpose, so I decided to make it into a cushion. It was so simple to make, just turning over the top and bottom then sewing the sides to make an envelope back which I fixed with two bright red buttons. The teacake design is so classic and retro, I just adore it. Yesterday was definitely the most appropriate day to make it, and I've fallen in love with my valentine's cushion which will stay on display all year round! 

Lastly we were desperate to join in the 'Sheepish Heartbombing Day' hosted by One Sheepish Girl's Meredith, after we missed the last yarnbombing day she hosted last year. We wanted to bring a little love and fun to our little village so were really excited to create our hearts and display them for the public to see. I was a little less brave than C as we quickly hung our creations, photographed them then ran away however it was so much fun! We loved sharing a little bit of love in our community this Valentine's Day! 

Did you do any Valentine's Day crafting this year? 

New Year, New Skill?

 It was a funny thing really…..when ‘A’ disappeared off to Uni to study art and textiles, she obviously took ‘ supplies’ with her, including her sewing machine, fabric, her workbox, knitting needles, crochet hooks, yarn etc and amongst the various bags and boxes of creative materials went MY embroidery threads…..without even a backwards glance…..her need for them was greater than mine…..never in a million years did I think I would MISS them!  I had had them for years, toying with them for finer gauge tapestries on occasion and a couple of projects that required a little embroidery thread for a small detail.  However, once that little package of colour disappeared into the depths of Somerset, a funny thing happened -  I had a yearning to get them back…..not possible though, ‘A’ had far more use for them than I ever had, and was having much more success with them.

Up until this New Year, the extent of my ‘embroidery’ was chain stitching my initials onto my Secondary School PE kit in a rather fetching red when I was 11 years old.  Not the most successful attempt but it certainly singled out my sports kit from everyone else’s!

However, with the arrival of this New Year, I decided I needed to embrace a new skill…..now was the time for embroidery…..however, the required threads were not among the car boot full of boxes and bags that came home with A from Uni for the holidays.  There was nothing for it, a New Year’s Day trip to our newly opened (Hurrah!!) Hobbycraft was called for.

Embroidery hoop and shiny package of colour in hand, I headed for home with joy in my heart!  At the earliest opportunity, I stretched some linen in my hoop, threaded my needle and away I went.  I am sorry to say that my first attempt was not earth shattering and I was a little disappointed with my finished piece, it felt a bit meek and constrained but the most important thing I learnt from it was that I had thoroughly enjoyed doing it!  Loved it, in fact.  Couldn’t wait to get started on the next one…..which I did the very next evening, with slightly better success.  I was much bolder in my design, stitching letters freehand in colours much truer to my heart.  I even taught myself French knots – something my mother had lead me to believe were impossible when I was growing up!  I make no apology for including rather a lot in my second piece!

Since then, I have spent every available evening with a needle and gloriously coloured thread in my hand…..is there such an organisation as Embroiderers Anonymous??  I think I am an addict.