All about the detail

I've used Instagram now for a number of years, but mainly as a quick and easy editing/ 'share with a few friends' kind of a platform, never as anything more wide reaching. Recently though, a fellow crafter (the lovely Liz at Baytree Boutique, go check out her IG feed it's lush) started posting some really stunning pictures of what she makes and has started getting some great feedback and sales even. 

It's such a simple platform to use that I thought I may as well have a go for Thisel & Bean so I created my own published IG feed. So far it has been a fantastic experience, not just for the comments that people have posted or the sales (and yes I have noticed a pick up in that), but for the fact that I have started finding joy in the little details again!

When I started blogging it wasn't about selling, it was about the enjoyment of making and the thrill of finding something pretty/unexpected that I would be inspired by, be it a vintage leather button (a post about which I even found on Pinterest today and gets huge amounts of traffic!?!) or a beautiful fabric or a great color combination. Don't get me wrong, I am really happy that I have been able to share what I make and make a small amount of pocket money for myself, but the simple joy I used to get from buttons, bows and colours has gone a little in recent years. 

Enter Instagram...which from where I am sitting is all about the picture. Now I don't churn out enough crowns to be posting a new crown daily, but what I do have a ton of is all of those little bits that make the crowns special. So that's what I have been focusing on and sharing. And it has brought me a whole new level of happiness and excitement!

Preparing for Easter

Anyone would think I had children with some of the projects I pick up, but no – just young at heart I guess!

This weekend I decided to get cracking on a bit of Spring/Easter decoration and managed to persuade my ever patient husband (often referred to as Mr. T, nothing to do with a love of bling – honest!) to help me blow some eggs!

 

Lots of fun ensued...  If you’ve never done it before, make a small hole with a pin at the top of the egg (this can be a bit tough - hence Mr T's face), a slightly larger hole at the bottom and then basically… blow! Once the egg is out, rinse the egg in warm water with vinegar, then blow again. Then leave to dry and paint and tie with ribbon!

Here's my finished prototype.

It was supposed to be pink, but have turned out a bit more red than I had planned so I might need to re-paint it. I am planning to do a few more with a bit more colour variety in the next few days. So stay tuned to see the final result!

Hurrah for first comments! And more on button hearts…

In honour of my first two commentees Clare and Sol (it was a very exciting moment when I realized I had had my first ever comments!!!) who seemed to quite like the button hearts, I threw a few more together. 

They are soooo easy to make and look lovely on door handles, Christmas trees, windows etc, pretty much anything you can hang them on actually!

If you want to make some of your own:

First, gather your buttons together. Use any size and any colour. I use about 20 buttons (give or take). Smaller buttons make cuter hearts but large ones are okay too. I like the randomness of using a variety of buttons from a particular colour palette like this coral/red one: 

or identical buttons, particularly pearly or engraved type ones like this one:

Next take some florist wire and cut a length approximately 3 times the circumference of the heart you are hoping to make. There are probably tones of different types of florist wire out there so go for something strong but not too thick.

Then start threading your buttons onto one end of the wire.

Once they are all on there, you could at this point (if you wanted to) twist the end wires together and make your heart shape. I try to thread the wire through a second time to strengthen the heart up. It helps it keep its shape. You should end up with something that looks a bit like this:

Next, twist the ends of the wire together and make some kind of loop to hang the heart with. I usually make a small loop and using a ribbon to hang the hearts with, although you could just make a large wire loop. As a final step, bend the wire til you have your desired heart shape.

Finally attach a pretty ribbon, and ta da you're done! All ready to hang in the place of your choice or give to a special someone for Valentines Day!

n.b. one small piece of advice - if you plan to double up/ re-thread the wire, or if you plan to make more than one heart I'd highly advise having a pack of thick plasters on hand. The wire starts digging into your hands after a while and ouch, it hurts! If anyone has a slightly more intelligent way of guarding against blisters when using wire please let me know! :-)

Lazy Sundays

I LOOOOVE Sundays.Chilled walks through the park, pottering through the markets, meeting  the husband for lunch and afternoons full of crafting.

I’ve not been doing so much of the crafting this Sunday.  I’ve been de-cluttering and wrapping instead.  I tend to enjoy wrapping almost as much as crafting – just as much call for prettiness and ribbon as ever.

My slightly less cluttered mantle piece

My sister and soon to be brother in law's present all sewn up

A long overdue Christmas present for my friend that I've been meaning to send on for AGES!!!

Pressy for my dad. I wrapped all of my Christmas presents like that this year. Gutted I didn’t get a picture of them. They looked fab!

  

I hope you are having a lovely Sunday whatever you are doing!

Old Fashioned, but due to make a comeback I’m sure – Muffs!

A day off work means plenty of crafting and blogging. Blissful!

In December I was up in Soho in one of my favouritest (is that even a word?) cloth shops looking for inspiration for 2010 Christmas presents. I wanted something that would feel and look special but that would ultimately be enjoyable and not ridiculously time consuming to make. Now I love the Cloth House shops as they are like sweet shops for adults; pricier than some places totally, but the patterns and range of cloths are of a fantastic quality. I tend to go around prodding and poking materials to get a good idea of what they feel like and everything stopped when I came across the most enormous rolls of a fantastic chocolately red with silvery sheen faux fur. Luscious - I could have happily made a bed out of it!

Anyway with the snow and the cold and the fact that I had the nicest fabric around I figured that a muff would be the perfect way forwards. After a reasonable amount of searching and trialing I found these instructions from burdastyle the most straight forward and accurate.

This is how they turned out...

I did make a few additions/ changes of my own though:

1. Instead of using a lining fabric for the inside I just used a second layer of the fur. What’s the point in using the lovely furry fabric if you hands don’t get the tactile benefit!

2. I ended up hand stitching both ends shut. In the end my sewing machine wasn’t quite heavy duty enough to sew two layers of fur together. You cant tell it was hand stitched which is a bonus.

3. I added a length of ribbon to each end of the muff as I was sewing it up so that if you want to you can hang the muff around your neck.

As you can see the end result is quite pretty and really toasty for your hands. My mum LOVED hers and wore it out in the snow for our boxing day walk! Whilst they look quite classy without, I added a button detail to a couple of the muffs which gives them more of a vintage type feel.

If you are going to attempt one yourself my tops tips would be:

- If you have one of those olive sticks (kind of like cocktail sticks… but for olives) in the back of a kitchen drawer they are PERFECT of making sure you have no fur caught up in the stitching.

- If you are adding a detail like buttons or ribbon firstly make sure you work out where the seem ridge inside is going to be. Too high up/ low down and its annoying for your hands and secondly – make sure you have the fur facing in the right direction! In the prototype I kept for myself the fur is the wrong way up when using the ribbon – doh!