A Bag for a Flower Press and WOYWW

  My microwave flower press has been sitting on a shelf in it's original cardboard box for years, the box is not only falling to pieces but is also rather unattractive in colour and design, so in my quest to 'pretty up' the book shelves I decided to make a little padded bag for it. 

Oh my goodness, I really could have done with Lunch Lady Jan on hand  - I thought it would be straight forward but what a complicated business!

I made the entire padded shape beautifully, got ready to turn it inside out and realised the wadding would be on the outside!  That was discarded and I started all over again.  This time I made it successfully but when I folded it up to make the bag shape I realised if I stitched the sides together and turned it inside out I'd lose width, and the fold over flap would be too wide and ruckle up.  So I hand stitched it down each edge and although it's not very neat, I can live with it!

Oh and I used up more scraps of fabric so extra points awarded for stash busting!

 

I'm linking up with Julia over at WOYWW this week.

A Summer Tag and WOYWW

The mojo is still going (just!) and I made a tag this week.

Well, I made the background for the tag last year, I pressed the Mombretia flowers earlier this year, then this week I glued one to the other, added enamel dots and a ribbon and Hey Presto - creativity at it's minimum!

However, having had raging toothache and a course of strong antibiotics I feel pleased that I achieved anything at all!  

It is still sitting on my desk like this as I haven't had the impetus to tidy up yet and put things away - maybe that will come later, you can't rush these things!

I'm linking up with Julia over at WOYWW this week.

Lace Bobbin Painting

I've finally been doing a little bit of arty stuff after quite a long break from it.  The mojo went, life got in the way and some good and not so good things needed most of my attention!

However, at last I've picked up a paint brush and been creative - I've painted a few lace bobbins and here they are sitting on my desk in an old teacup while waiting for the varnish to dry on their little heads.   

For anyone interested I posted about bobbin painting a few weeks ago here.

I'm linking up with WOYWW this week.

Flower Casting

After a couple of not so good weeks I'm on the up 
and have been doing a little more flower casting to try and lift the spirits 

and improve my techniques!  

You can see my first attempts here.

 Brambles, Angelica, Chives and Heuchera.

   

Freesias and Heuchera  

A little Welsh Poppy.

  

A coat of grey paint, but I think I preferred it white!

The dining room table has been my desk during lock down, and here are some more castings waiting to be sanded, sealed and in some cases have a little colour added if they need a little more definition.  

I'm linking up with Julia over at WOYWW this week.

The Most Beautiful Little Painting and WOYWW

I am thrilled to show you what is on my desk this week -

a most beautiful water colour sea urchin by the incredibly talented Sandra De, plus a card and some little stamps and sea urchin spines.

I sent her one of my Victorian cabinet card collages and she kindly sent me this - how lucky am I!  I love her work and I'm always in awe of her amazing ability to paint with such delicateness, reality and beauty.  I can't wait to get this framed and up on my wall.

The beautiful leaf card is also going to be framed and the stamps and tiny sea urchin spines are just delightful and filling me with inspiration.

A huge thank you to you Sandra.

I'm linking up with Julia over at WOYWW this week.

Bobbins and More Bobbins

 This week I have been busy successfully squishing my lace-making equipment into a space half the size it was originally in!  I also made a new bobbin roll for my bobbins as the old one was on it's last legs - I found a lovely William Morris off-cut for it in my stash so also made a little space in my fabric box -  woohoo - double space-saving success this week! 

Many years ago I used to paint bobbins and sell them - it was quite a success and I had lots of lovely ladies who collected them.  The designs had to be easy to replicate and not too detailed as I could easily be painting 50 of the same design at any one time!  During my sorting I came across my collection of Honiton bobbins that I painted for myself and thought I'd share a few of them with you - I don't make Honiton lace anymore as it's very fine and my 'old' eyes struggle with it, but I've held on to the bobbins 'just in case'!

If you wondered why these don't have beads (spangles) on the ends, Honiton bobbins don't as the lace is a lot finer than other laces so they would be too heavy and also there can be a fair amount of threading the bobbins through loops which would be much more difficult with spangles on the end.

I'm linking up with Julia over at WOYWW this week.

Never Ending Sorting and WOYWW

I decided that I needed to move my lace making equipment off the book shelf it had been sitting on for years to make way for a pile of books that are currently homeless - what should have been a simple job has taken two weeks of re-shuffling and re-organising virtually all my belongings!

I have eventually made a small gap on the book shelves and the lace stuff is being sorted to see if I can stuff it into a much smaller box that will fit on another shelf!  Why oh why did I start this!

So this week my desk, unusually for me, is an absolute mess - old bobbins that need new spangles (spangles are the beads that hang on the bottom end), a large jumble of beads and all the supplies that go with the job.

I'm linking up with Julia over at WOYWW this week.

Plaster Cast Flowers and WOYWW

In between all the usual lock down stuff like gardening, housework and competitive backgammon with the hubs I have discovered a new obsession - casting plants in plaster!

Sitting here on my desk are my first attempts - it's been a steep learning curve but hopefully I've learned from most of the numerous mistakes I made!

  I'll start with my favourite (and most successful so far!) The brambles are from my front garden and I think they look quite beautiful here although in the garden they promote swearing and frustration on a regular basis.

Chives on the left - dropped on the floor and smashed.
Baby ferns on the right - had to be chiselled out of the mould as I forgot to use mould release!

Pyracanthus buds

A rose with Lavender and dried grasses - I enthusiastically sanded off some of the stalks!

It's quite a long process, letting the plaster set then letting it dry out for days on end, but I did remember to take a desk shot earlier in the proceedings!

I'm linking up Julia over at WOYWW this week.