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Sunday 29 November 2009

Love in November

On a recent visit to my friend's home I was drawn, like a magpie is to shiny things, to her fireplace. Pride of place was a set of lovely ye oldey looking blocks, spelling out the word "Love" and I thought they were too fantastic to not snap!

So please enjoy this picture of Love.

Toodlepip xx

Wednesday 25 November 2009

Beauty of Booth Pictures

With all this grey weather we are having at the moment, I thought we should have a bright and funky project to cheer us all up before the Christmas Panic sets in.
On a mundane outing to the shopping centre with Issobelle, to pick curtains for my recently decorated bedroom (hurrah), we stumbled across a photograph booth. "How very ordinary", I hear you cry! "They're everywhere nowadays", someone shouts from the back! Well no, no, no dear readers, this was the old kind of photo machine. That glorious kind where you could do four different poses and they come out in a strip, rather than a block. Oooooo I was excited! So, back to what happened!

Issobelle was drawn to the machine almost as much as I was and with £3 and a few minutes we had captured our exciting little discovery and were very pleased with the pocket sized results. We managed 3 out of 4 good pictures- not bad when you pop a four year old into the equation- and I banked them safely in my purse until I thought of something fun to do with them. That's were this project comes in..........

The first colourful step was to select a canvas and paint it. I selected a 5x7 acid free canvass board and used paint from the little 97p tester pots I mentioned in an earlier post. I selected "Purple Victoria". Mmmmm sumptuous! I left my vivacious victoria canvass to dry and set to work on the important task of selecting buttons to frame it.



I decided to go for all the bright but not garish (in my opinion) ones as I thought they would compliment my purpley colours.

Using regular kiddie friendly pva glue, I squidged the buttons down, making sure to push them over the edge (they were very stressed and couldn't hack it hahaha) slightly to disguise the straight edge of the canvass. I them arranged our magic photo booth pictures and using my very special glitter pen, doodled all round the pictures and wrote a little caption. Ahhh!
Last but not least was was to adhere a sunshine yellow ribbon (once again calling on my old trusty pva) to enable my to hang my vibrant piece of art.

I hope this inspires you to insert a little sunshine into your crafts and of course, keep your eyes peeled for fantastic photo booths!
Toodlepip!
xx

Tuesday 24 November 2009

A Cup of Cupcakes



As you may recall from my "A Sweet Treat" post a while back, I have ordered these fabulous fymo charms from a very clever lady off Etsy. I decided to make some little friends for my bracelets and so these cutsie earrings came about. I have only shown three varieties here but I have also cooked up (ho ho) oreo, lollipop and yellow cupcake earring too!
I shall be selling these at my next craft fair and giving them to friends. I'll perhaps pop a few more photographs up of the rest of them at a later date.
Until then,
Toodlepip! xx

Sunday 22 November 2009

A Sweetner for my Sorry



A very, very quick post to apologise for my absence lately. I have been Miss Busy Bee and haven't had a chance to come on and update but I shall be posting lots and lots of exciting projects and happy list additions so do check back. My photograph is fairly irrelevant- I took it when someone bought cakes into the office and thought they looked pretty (excuse me whilst I add pastel coloured cakes to my happy list)- but are a visual delight to bribe you with, hehe!

Also, being as I simply cannot wait til December, I will be posting a variety of Christmas projects! Hurrah Huzzah!!

See you soon,

Toodlepip xx

Wednesday 11 November 2009

Hats, Sprinkles and Twinkles

Since I have been making all sorts of crafty delights lately, and telling you my secrets on how to make them (!), I decided that today we would have a rest from creating and I would elaborate on my micro happy list.

As you may know from previous posts, a Micro Happy List is a list of all the little things in life that make you happy. So not massive things like going on holiday or winning the lottery, but things like when you find a five pound note on the floor or when you get a glitzy card in the post.

A big hit on my happy list at the moment is winter wear! I love love love it when you see everyone in their new coats with colourful hats and scarves and and twinkly gloves. Mmmm cosy!



A more tangible happy list contender is this amazing donut I saw in the bakers the other day. Worrying, I'm not actually a big donut fan but I felt drawn by the sprinkles and it called out to me, "Look at my jazzy colours, don't I look vibrant? Wouldn't I look glorious in your kitchen?!". Well, I thought, it would look brilliant in my kitchen and so with a flash of cash (woop a poem!), it was in my bag and the fiance was a happy man on his return from work!



Last but not least on today's' Micro Happy List is my new spangly lip gloss- how terribly girlie of me I know. I was bit of a lip technician a while back and mixed a Boots No7 Jelly Bean (that's the colour it was called, not what it was- I don't just rub jelly beans on my lips like a fruitloop!) and MAC Dazzledust Lipglass in SugarRimmed and viola!! Sparkle-tastic-bombastic!!

None of todays list items are unusual or unobtainable and yet they all bring a smile to my (glittery!) face. :)

Toodlepip! xx

Saturday 7 November 2009

Roses are red, Violets are blue.....



This week has been spent with one of my best pals up North and so my craft box has been severely neglected and crying out for some attention. Something beady I hear you cry? No! Something glittery someone shouts from the back? No! Something with buttons you say? No, no and thrice no!

On my rummage, I stumbled across a lonely block of Fymo clay. For those not in the know, fymo is like a really colourful clay that you can buy in blocks for about £2 from most big craft stores, mine is from Hobbycraft, and comes in looooaads of colours and some even have glitter infused into them! Wowza! I got playing and made a few big circular beads (I would have written about them but I expect you are a bit beaded out at the mo) and then my hands took over and I became one with the fymo and somehow created this rosey little numbers!! I was quite pleased with myself!

To make these little nicknacks, I fear they have no purpose other than that of an ornamental one, please note the instructions below.

Now, as I always say, these are only my instructions, puurrlleeaassee don't feel you must follow these to the letter- let your creativeness take you! :)

1. Tear off a teeny tiny piece of fymo (about the size of a petit pois) and warm up between your finger and thumb until its nice and subtle. Mmm I like the word "subtle", that's another for my happy list.

2. Squish (very technical word there) the little ball into a flatter longer circle, kind of like the shape of your thumb print and roll it to make a little curl. This little curl will make the first part of your rose bud.

3. Continue the process of ripping little bits off, rolling and squishing but each time, very gently wrap the little bits round the first curl, then the second layer, then the third etc etc. Each time you create a layer, make the little bit of fymo slightly larger.

4. You will now have a pretty rose bud and all that it will need are the finishing touches. VERY gently curl the edges of the wrapped sections outwards, to create the look of a flourishing flower.

5. Poke a cocktail stick up into the bottom of the rosebud and this will make the stem. I plan on painting my cocktail sticks green for a more "stemmy" look and perhaps even add some sort of petal. Remove the cocktail stick but ensure the hole for it remains open.

6. Once you are satisfied with your bud, place it gently on an oven tray and put it in the oven for 30 minutes on 110 degrees C. This will bake and harden it.

7. Once it is baked, reinsert the stem and voila! You're done!

You can add as many or little of layers as you like to make bigger or smaller flowers and really experiment with this project. It's great if you're feeling a little whimsical and just have a spare 10 minutes on your hands.



Toodlepip! xx

Monday 2 November 2009

Mindy's Mansion



You may remember from The Puuuurrrfect Photograph a few days ago, that one of my followers challenged me to create a Mindycat friendly crafty item. Well dear follower, your wish was my command.
Out came paint, paint brushes, the craft knife, card board boxes and masking tape. The beauty of moving house is you suddenly find yourself with a vast array of card board boxes- much to Issobelle's delight!

I won't be giving step by step instructions on this project as I'm not sure you will all be rushing to make your kitty a house but I will give one top tippy.
I recently went to Hobbycraft (you know my love of Hobbycraft) and was looking at the paints and I can't tell you how surprised I was to see the cost of a single tube of acrylic or water colour paint. I only wanted general any-old paint but the kiddie range was rather limited. I put down the pricey paint and left empty handed. Ok ok, we all know I never leave there empty handed but I left without the paint at least.
Later that day I had to go to B&Q for wall paint. Well bloggerrinos, as I was juggling my decision of should I choose "River Mist" or "Frosted Blue" for the guest room, my eye was drawn to the little tester pots you can buy to try a bit on your wall if you aren't ready to commit to "River Mist" etc. These little pots come in almost every colour imaginable and, wait for it, are only 98p! Wowza! I left B&Q with "Frosted Blue" and a collection of sample pots and a smug feeling about my bargain.



If you would like info on how the cat mansion was constructed, do comment below. Mindy was pretty pleased and is currently at B&Q, choosing colours for her guest room. Tehe.

Toodlepip! xx

Sunday 1 November 2009

What a card

On a recent rummage through my box of crafty joys, I stumbled across this birthday card I had made for Issobelle aaaaaaaaaaaggggggggggggggggggggggeeeeeeeeeeeeessssssssss ago! I knew I had made her one!


Naturally I have given her the somewhat belated card now, but I wanted to share it with you anyway.

It was fairly simple to make, I think 'concoct' would be a better word! It is an amalgamation (big word there folks) of all sorts of crafty bits. When I set out to make cards, I never have a clear plan. My method it to pick a few bits and bobs in colours that compliment each other and get sticking!

Christmas card ideas coming soon.

Toodlepip! xx
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