2016 : A Year of Crafting

Hello......... I wasn't planning on doing a year in review post, this year as well I didn't think there would be a awful lot to share, 2016 was not so great here at the Summerhouse I spent most of the year trying to recover from a relapse of my ME/Lyme disease that hit in the Autumn 2015.

So instead of a general review I thought it might be good to just focus on the fun stuff and look back on all the crafts, so this is going to be a happy little post. 

  Over the past week I've been putting together 12 colourful crafty mosaics, enjoying seeing the colours change throughout the year with the different makes but all in a way still linked by the same colour palette I always seem drawn to here at the Summerhouse. 

You see she maybe a bit old and shabby but magical crafty things happen inside this grand old lady, who is known affectionately around these parts as 'the shed'

I hope you enjoy them.

January

February

March

April

May

June

July

August

September

October

November

December

So there you have it, a whole year of Summerhouse crafting fun, although I have to admit a great deal of it has take place and been created from my comfy bed.

Here's to 2017.

Happy Crafting

Clare xx

Thank you for all the kind comments left on my last post, I'm going to try my very best to stick around in blogland, I might not be able to post as often as I'd like to and I'm sorry I probably won't be able to make it round to visit all you're lovely blogs but as always I'm going to keep trying.

Patchwork February

Hello.......... As ever I'm running behind with my patchwork post here's February in review.

A month mostly spent getting things finished off for the Craft Club exhibition, I did finally get to grips with my sewing machine, only two years on from when I bought it. !!! A little bit of art too, plus lots of pacing and resting up, I also finished a course of antivirals, which fingers crossed helped my energy levels improve a little until I finished them and crashed back down,  so we're going to try them for another month, thankfully with time the nasty side effects seem to be easing.

Out in the garden the bulbs were waking up and until the frost got them last summers geraniums were still going strong, we even still have strawberries growing.

After a year of planning and making our local crafts clubs exhibition went up in the local library, as you can see, there are a wide variety of crafts on display, crochet, sewing, painting and jewellery to name a few.

Here's a closer look at our group project that represents the seasons.

Well that about sums up February, crafting, resting up, eating clean with a bit of art thrown into the mix, some new crafts too in the form of paper cutting and machine sewing.

Happy Crafting

Clare xx

Something New - Tiara

Hello........... Today's post is going to be full of sparkle, yes last month a friend and I decided we were going to attempt to make a tiara for our local craft club exhibition.  It seemed like a good idea at the time despite the fact neither of us knew the first thing about it, we were making the Tiara for one of the exhibitions themes, Han Christian Andersen.

Not just any tiara we were making a crown with the snow queen in mind !!

To make our Tiara we needed some Tiara bands and 4mm wire plus a selection of pretty icy toned beads. 

We picked a mixture of pearls and ice coloured beads and some pale blue swarovski crystals.  We had a tiara making book which to be honest just proved, to be very confusing so in the end we turned to you tube and watched a few beading tutorials to get the basics before deciding we were just going to wing it.

Cutting pieces of wire about 30 cm, we added one bead at a time then twisted the wire round and round on itself until we had made a enough for a little branch before adding in a another bead, twisting and adding beads until we had what looked like a little tree.

The tricky part came when I then had to make a second one to match the first.

We then made several sprigs with three beads

Two beads

and some with a single bead.

Assembling the tiara as we went by wrapping the remaining wire from each sprig around the tiara band to hold it in  place. As we were winging it the design evolved as we went.  Starting with three central trees at the front we then added to the design.

Once all the elements had been added to the tiara band and we were happy with the design, a long piece of wire was cut so we could add beads along the metal head band, wrapping the wire around the band then adding a bead, then wrapping the wire again before adding another bead until the band was covered with beads

and we had a Tiara that looked like this.  As new crafts go it proved much easier than both of us expected, far easier than the little bit of  jewellery I've made before.  It's definitely easier as a two person job, as someone can hold the tiara while the other person does the wiring.

As you can see we both had different wire wrapping techniques, the central tree (not made by me) is so much neater than my more organic approach to wire twisting. I made the two trees either side of the professional looking central tree.

Of course I couldn't resist trying it on.

and taking  a couple of selfies

Ta-Dah

So as new crafts go, this was a good one, the tiara came together much more quickly than expected and was also much easier to make then anticipated, so I'm for sure going to have another go, next up I'm planning on making some smaller hair pins, that will be much more wearable as I'm not sure I can pull off the tiara look, in every day life 

Happy Crafting.

Clare xx