Other crafts

Today I want to show some more stuff I tried during the last months...

This is a very small part of what I made during my first workshop at the potter wheel. I wanted to do this for ages and finally got around to do it. What can I say? I am hooked and will go again in February….

This was something that came to my mind when looking for a suitable pressie for my neighbour. Looked pretty with a single flower in it (plus some green) although it is not something I will do much more often. Other things are much more fun! 

And last but not least… This is the castle tower I built around the bed of my son. It is not perfect but non the less: My son loves it and I am very proud to have built it with my own hands.

Wool in work

I also do knitting and crocheting again. Why again? I learned it as a child, did all from the usual oven cloth up to own pullovers. But at some point I just knitted socks every now and then, not much more.

Through a good friend I got into a group that decorates the city I live in with crocheted stuff at special events - and I got to find out what else you can do with these kind of crafts. And got hooked again...

These two are made to sit on waterliliy-leaves (of isolating board) that were fixed on the bottom of the little river which flows through town. Sadly the anchors did not hold through a heavier rain and all I have left are these pictures:

Meet Kurt, the Frog:

And I also found out, that socks cannot only be knitted but crocheted too. My first try on that was very colourful and perfect for my little boys feet:

I am always happy about comments, so feel free to leave them. Every critic is welcome as long as it is nicely meant. :)

Old stuff

A few things that are a bit older but still too nice to NOT been shown.

Acrylic painting from 2009 at the East Sea

 One of my first cards… ever! Made for Mother's Day.

 My first wedding card - for a friend.

 The card for my boy's 5th birthday. To be opened between ship and number.

And my all-time-favourite Halloween-Card. Only as big as the palm of my hand. Small but "oho"! ;)

10 months later...

I have been absent for quite a while. But that only concerns the world wide web, not my "crafty corner" at home. And before I start in a new Christmas season I thought I show you some of the things I put my time and heart into.

This was an order by my Mom for a little girls first day at school. Mom wanted to give some money into the envelope so I left the cone open to put a folded banknote inside...

Advent calendar matchbox style

Little introduction for those of you who don't know how an advent calendar works:

People (mostly kids) get these before December 1st coz that's when you start opening it. It's got 24 little doors, pockets or alike (little drawers in this case), one for each day until Christmas. So at the 24th you open the last one.

In Germany every kid has at least one - it goes from simple bought ones with chocolate inside up to big (and expensive) ones from Lego, Playmobil, Barbie... whatever you can imagine. Of course - as it is with everything: Selfmade is the best!

Since I've seen lots of these matchbox drawer advent calendars in blogs and you tube videos I decided to try and make one. My son already had a bought one from his Grandma so I thought it would be only fair if this Grandma (aka my Mom) gets one too.

It was a big project - as it always is - coz I went far too much into detail again (like embossing the numbers on the drawers for example). But the outcome is pretty nice for a first... See for yourselves:

The drawers are pretty small of course so I had a hard time finding lots of different stuff to put in. For example: The only selfmade Christmas cookies that fit in were the little stars. I found some small chocolate Santas for 6th December (our "Nikolaustag") and the final 24th. I put in some jelly beans, some "Merci" chocolates and every of the sides also inherited a lottery scratch ticket.

Thankfully this one is not for the bin, it can be used again. But next time Moms boyfriend has to find stuff to fill it with, not me! ;)

Chrissycards

Of course I also made some Christmas cards this last year. Took a sketch, a Christmas paper set I bought (but didn't use) the year before, three Spellbinders die cuts, eyelets (although I needed two different eyelet-setter because one of the eyelets was too far in the middle for the Crop-o-dile), glue, the distresser and distress inks.

Oh, of course I used the little die cuts to create the sentiment which I attached with a bracelet.

This are almost half the amount I made. Took up quite some time... ;)

Christmas - crafty time

This year lots of my Christmas gifts to friends and family came directly out of my crafty corner. Here are a few of them.

After the woman in my fav crafty shop promised me that they really do their job well - and lasting - I bought a few of the porcellan pens and had to try them right away. First I prettified a mug for my (almost) sis-in-law, the girlfriend of the guy some call "Batman"... ;)

And I got the hang of it so I made some Cappuccino cups for one of my best friends and her boyfriend:

For my godchild I went back to the usual "paperwork" and made a cooking recipe book with her fav colours violet and green.

I obviously filled some pages with some recipes the girl likes... But those are family secrets... ;)

Pressie-Wrap

Another birthday, another crafty challenge. In my cupboard was only kiddy and Christmas wrapping-paper left so I had to think of a different way to wrap this box with lots of books in it:

Resolution: Take some thick white A3 paper (three in my case) and start stamping. One stamp up to 4 times on each paper - disarranged and criss-cross - cover those prints with paper or post-its, take another stamp and do the same thing... keep doing this until the pages look like this:

The rest is just boring business of covering the box with these papers and the edges with plain black cardbord stripes. I then made a simple closure out of black and white card stock which I attached with a sticky hook-and-loop fastener (Klettverschluss for the Germans ;)).

This is the outcome:

I think it was worth the effort - and looks like the b-day girl thinks so too! :)

Back in business... ;)

Did not post much lately and do not even have a good excuse for it. Just needed a blogging-break for some reason. But even if I do not like new years resolutions - it obviously also works without having one! ;)

So I decided to post some pictures of the many things that kept me busy in my little workshop-corner during my silent months. Starting with the most recent things, which would be some birthday pressies. I was invited to the unbelievable amount of three birthdays this weekend and two of the pressies were my duty.

Although - the first pressie is a two-in-one because this is a couple who's b-days are just a week apart. Since I was not there for the first one I brought both pressies to the second:

They got a bookmark each. For that I used the big Ranger-Tags, distress inks, masks and lots of stamps.

I also tried the Ranger crackle paint bronze with this but I don't think I am really getting the hang of that one. If anyone has got lots of experience with those inks and some tipps for me, how to use it better or on which projects I should use it - please let me know! I am happy for every hint. Thx a mil! :D