An altered pinboard.

I've had this idea in my head for a while, to make Leah a board where she could store her hairbands and stuff. She tends to use the same ones over and over again or the ones she does use end up on our bed or bedroom floor. The hope was that if she has a way of displaying and storing them, she'll use different ones and keep them in one place. A person can but dream!

It took me a while to find the board. Two weeks ago I finally found one, in Wilkinsons for £2.50 I think it was. Everything else I used was from my craft stash.

The board

The (general) idea

White acrylic paint and a little water.

One coat is enough, the papers I covered it with are thin so it looks better being backed by white rather than brown.

These are decoupage papers I got while on holiday, pack of 24 for £3.99.

I got Leah to pick out just 4 colours to try and keep it simple and make it easier to work with.

I started, roughly, in the middle putting down a thin layer of mod podge and then smoothing down each rectangle.

All covered.



Faux stitch lines with a promarker pen.

Then a coat of mod podge.

Cut grungeboard for bunting and covered in the same way as the board.

I made a rosette using ribbon and sewed and glued it to the board.

I coloured the pegs with promarkers to match.

The bunting is backed by small pegs.

The idea of the rosette is that hair slides can be put on the ribbon.

It's not perfect but for a first try, I'm happy.

I really enjoyed making it.

Leah was very happy, thankfully.

Maybe, just maybe I will stop stepping on hairbands in the middle of the night.

x

Getting to where I want to be...

My crafting has been practically non-existent.

I found my self in a deep, dark, lonely, crafting rut!

Everything was in the living room, covered in a layer of dust, inaccessible, unused and unloved.

For sometime now, my crafting (when it has happened) has taken place on a small table with me hunched up and everything in a mess around me.

When you stop crafting because getting everything out just seems like a hassle is when you know it's time for a change.

After a while, a plan formed in my mind. 

To cut a long story short, this involved moving all my craft stuff down stairs, to the space under the stairs. I'll spare you the details, just know it took over a week of sorting, dusting, sneezing and thinking.

Now I can work on the kitchen table and everything has a place, amazingly.

To the left of the stairs is the cupboard which houses the unit that powers the warm air heating, the door was an ugly brown and had seen better days so out came my old friend, blackboard paint. Several coats later.

Then found a button that I bought ages ago, just because I liked it. Stuck it on the handle with a mixture of silicone and super glue.

Even Dave liked it.

Now I'm looking forward to getting more crafting done.

x

Altering mirror frames

I haven't had time to do much in the way of crafting just lately but I was just browsing through my photos of stuff I've made in the past. I take photos of most everything I make, and it's nice to look back from time to time to remember things I have made but also to get a bit of inspiration.

The mirror frames I work on are from Ikea and cost around £1.50 I think it is.

Now, I have long had an affinity with buttons. About 6 or 7 years ago I came across a stall at a craft fair at Sandown Park that sold buttons. Thousands of them! All sorts! I was in button heaven!

They did various colour mixes and sizes. I bought loads. I love sticking them on stuff.

 Something I've found from my button creations is a common thread, most people love buttons.
 Most people had a Nan or an Aunt who had a button box that they loved to rummage around as a child (yes, my Nan did too). 



This frame, I coloured first with a wash of white and dab of red acrylic paint with lots of water to thin it out. The buttons are stuck on with silicone glue.

A wash of just white acrylic paint also made a good background to dark colour buttons. I found the contrast just worked.

Other frames I have done with squares of patterned papers.  I cut the squares out with my Big Shot.

It was a happy accident that the size square I used, set out as I did gave a nice even border. The flowers were from a shop called The Works which does cheap books and stationary and I coloured them to match the papers using promarker pens.

Some other colours.

I love that you can take a "thing" and make it look very different and that it is a crafted things that has a use.

I'm grateful that all of these frames have actually been bought by people, something I still find hard to deal with.
I've been selling stuff for several years now, usually at church and school fairs and I still find it humbling that a person will part with cash for something I have made. It's also pressure, the weight of responsibility of giving people value for money.
Or maybe I just think too much.
Yeah, probably!

x

 



Harvest sheaf

I made my first harvest sheaf 4 years ago now. It didn't look great and I wasn't confident in the quality of the bread so no one got to eat it.

The second one I made was very bulky and didn't look as good as I wanted but it was edible.

I didn't make one last year, it all seemed a bit of a hassle.

With my lovely new mixer, I decided to give it a go, maybe one last time.

It was all made a lot easier because I made the dough in one batch where as with the bread machine I had to do it in two batches.

Covered in egg and milk wash.

Bake at 220 for 15 minutes then take it out, lower oven to 180 and put more egg wash on. Bake for another 30-35 mins.

This took me a couple of hours from start to finish but, to me, it's what they probably call "a showstopper" on the telly.

When I was a little kid, in primary school one year, we had one. I don't remember the whys and wherefores but I remember it, it was probably much bigger than mine because I know the teachers cut it up and shared it around the whole school.

I'll take this to church tomorrow and do the same thing.

x





My lucky day

Since my bread machine has been giving me problems, I've been dropping not so subtle hints to Dave to get a mixer. I do bake an awful lot of bread and though it would have been cheaper to get another bread machine, the other 3 (yes 3!) I've had in the past have all developed the same problem.

The first 6 months or so they gave me no problems, then for no apparent reason, it starts having black marks throughout the dough, start mainly from the dough blade. I did a bit of research on the web and it's a common problem with bread machines

After giving the bread machine another try this week and it happening, Dave just said that I should probably try getting a mixer. Well, he didn't have to tell me twice!

I went on Amazon on Tuesday and it came lunch time today.

Have already christened it by making some bread.

I'm a very lucky.

x



Blackboard paint

Blackboard paint is something I love working with.

I love that you can use on most anything and it's really not that expensive.

About 6 years ago, I decorated Leah's bedroom and painted her a chalkboard on the wall.

It was a real labour of love doing the border, I printed the flowers off on sticker paper and cut each one out, pretty fiddly work.

I've had a pot of black blackboard paint for a couple of months and have finally got around to using it.

Here's what I did.



Frame from Ikea and paint from B & Q

Three coats of paint on the mirror side and two coats on the back.

Plain wood embellishment from  craft shop.

Painted with white acrylic paint.

A nice even coating of mod podge.

Sprinkled with fine glitter straight away, whilst the mod podge still wet.
I did a second coat after the first had dried.

I stuck it to the mirror frame using super glue.
Just one or two more jobs to do on this one.

x



My signature bread

Several years ago, when I first was given a bread machine, I wanted to be able to make a foccacia.

This bread isn't strictly speaking a foccacia, it just seemed to develop into something else.

What guided me along the way was people's responses to it, if they made happy noises about it I was knew I was moving in the right direction.

Some people call it "Maggie Bread". I'm going to (in the style of the Great British Bake off) call it my signature bread.

I take 2 garlic cloves, some rosemary and a teaspoon of rock salt and give them a good bashing in a pestle and mortar.

.

 The rock salt really helps to break down the garlic and rosemary but regular salt works too.

Add 2 tablespoons of olive oil.

In the bread machine (or just in a bowl if you don't have one) put 270ml of warm water, 1 tablespoon of sugar and the seasoned oil, 3 bread machine cups (500 grams) of strong bread flour and 2 teaspoons of fast acting dried yeast.

Sadly, my trusty bread machine is on it's last legs. I used it to do the initial mix and then take it out. If you are lucky enough to have a fully functioning bread machine, just put it on the dough setting.

It's at this stage, I find Chris useful to do the kneading.

For 10 minutes.

If you've seen bread made on the TV, then you've probably seen this technique of stretching out the dough then pulling it back on itself. 

Here's Chris getting a bit cheffy.

I use a round 8 inch silicone cake tray.

I punch the dough into the tray, spreading the dough right up to the sides.

Using a clean finger, poke the bread....a lot.

I drizzle Tescos finest garlic infused oil but regular olive oil will do.

Sprinkle with rock salt.

Now leave in a warmish place to prove.

I don't bother to cover it as it is well oiled.

At least half an hour later.

Then in a preheated oven at 220 for the first 10 minutes then down to 200 for another 10-15 minutes, depending on how brown you like it.

Happy baking.

x