Just a quick post to show yesterdays Christmas journal page. It was about Christmas cards. I took the front of one of the cards I made this year to decorate it.
My first two pages are done. Every day we are given a prompt for that days page. Day 1 was for the declaration. Why we are keeping this journal and what we hope to gain from it. I wasn't feeling very creative that day so I just copied out the declaration that was sent along with the prompt. Day 2 was about Christmas weather. You can see that I have been using my beads and felt again. Both pages took me a little longer than they normally would. I had a little mishap with my beads. I leaned over to look for a smaller needle when the box upturned and landed on the floor. It took me hours to sort them all out. I was tempted just to leave them mixed up but then I remembered just how much I had spent on all those beads. Also I thought of how annoying it will be to sort through them when I want to pick out all the same colours. I would eventually get fed up and sort them out anyway. So frustrating and a total waste of a day off.
So far the class for this journal has give some tips on preparation and some sketches of different layouts to try. The preparation is mainly common sense things such as tidying your workspace and having a routine. It also recommends that you tell people that you are doing this. You are more likely to finish it if people know you are working on it. I have already done those (although who knows how long my workspace will remain clear). I am hoping to post each days page here. Two years ago I had a question every day in the run up to Christmas. I wanted to do something similar again and have decided on this.
There are less than 40 days until Christmas. It really doesn't sound a lot when you hear it like that. Once again I am counting down the days. I finished the wall hanging I was making for my mum yesterday. Once I had done all the stitching I put off the backstitching. It doesn't take long but it's just so boring. I finally decided that yesterday I wasn't going to put it down until it was all done. Actually putting it all together was fairly simple and the instructions were easy to follow. My mum was very pleased with it. She is a collector of all things Santa. This year though she has been good and hasn't added to her collection. I decided to do it for her with this.
My sister has been turning her hand to crafts of late. Since moving out she has had to put herself on a strict budget and has turned to crafts to make extra gifts for everyone. She has been making lots of cute Christmas decorations using lovely beads and felt. I was in a craft store recently and that had lots of packs of sequence. I couldn't resist and made these tree decorations using those, felt and beads. I am posting them out to my sister so that she can use them as another idea. The green is my favourite as it is edged in pink beads (the photo doesn't show it too well).
I have a few other Christmas projects that I am working on. I have joined a class to make a Christmas scrapbook journal which I am very much looking forward to. I am making a scarf for myself and once it is finished plan to make one for my gran. I am making one of those banners for my sister (hers has snowmen). I am putting together my own Christmas crafts folder and I still have a few Christmas cards to make. I am going to be busy this month.
It's been over a week again since I last posted on here. Truth is that it hasn't been because I haven't had time. About a month ago my Digital camera decided it wasn't playing anymore. I have been borrowing my dads since then. He has one of those big fancy ones that I would probably need lessons to use properly never mind just reading the manual. Since I only wanted to borrow it to log my crafts I didn't see the point in asking for help. Actually stubbornly refused (ask my dad a question on one aspect of it you would be sitting there for hours). So I managed the few poor photo's you have seen already but after that the camera wouldn't work. Or rather I couldn't get it to do what I wanted it to do. This morning it hit me that I actually had to pay attention to lighting. Didn't have to do that much with my last camera (it was pretty much just point and shoot). So here I am with some slightly better pics and an actual update.
As you can see I have been once again working on Christmas items. The drum tree decoration I finished a while back. That was the first thing that refused to be photographed. I am really pleased with the way it turned out and I think I prefer it over the trumpet. I think it's the bold colours of the base of the drum that makes it stand out more. My mum liked it too which was the important part. I think it's her favourite so far too. Myself and my sister had brought her a whole load of tree decorations back from Amsterdam and with all the ones we have made for her over the years she is thinking of getting rid of all the less sentimental decorations. She's very excited about decorating her tree this year. When it comes to it I might have to take a pic of it.
This little trumpet is a Mill Hill beads tree decoration. I know it is very early but I can feel the Christmas spirit building already. I love Christmas and every year I seem to be starting earlier and earlier. I was on the sew and sew website buying threads for a design I am considering stitching (funnily enough a Christmas one). While there I thought I would take a look at their Christmas decoration kits. Not really expecting to see anything new. The first thing that appeared on the page was these lovely Christmas musical instruments to hang on the tree. I tried to say no but I couldn't. Next thing I know four of them were in my basket. As soon as they arrived I made a start on this trumpet and finished it that evening. I thought they were a little different to the usual Santa's and snowmen (not that there is anything wrong with those, I love Santa's and snowmen). There are two more in the series which I didn't buy but I think I am kidding myself when I say that I will probably leave those. My mum is very excited to get a hold of them and put them on her tree when finished. I am just looking forward to getting them all stitched up.
I haven't forgotten about the little witch that I was stitching. I have just about finished and she should be ready to be attached to a pillow over the weekend. So expect a photo soon. Actually it might be a week or so before I am able to post again. I have a lot going on at work just now (nothing bad but I have a big project to do which is going to take up most of my time). It don't think that it will take me much more than a week. When I come back, as well as a pic of the finished witch, you can expect me to be talking about Dr Who, 4400's, DS9 and possibly more book reviews.
Yes, I have actually finished off some crafts. Lili you will be pleased to know that I finished stitching the frog trio. I have attached it to the front of my paper journal. It was actually very easy to stitch and had I took the time to do it I could have finished it in a couple of days. There are no fractional stitches and the majority of it involved half stitches for the shading. I quite like the way it turned out. It also brightens up my boring notebook.
Yes, another frog. This is the lovely pin that Lili sent me for my birthday. I loved it so much it really didn't take me long to stitch. I couldn't put it down. I love kits which involves a lot of bead work. Thank you again Lili. I think Mr Sparkles will wear her for me.
Lastly, a friend of mine gave me a beautiful Christmas card making set which will keep me going for at least a couple of Christmas's. I had to try it straight away and put this one together fairly quickly. The candy cane and the snowman are made from clay. They can both be removed from the card so that the candy cane becomes a tree decoration and the snowman becomes a fridge magnet. I am thinking of attaching these to most of my Christmas cards this year.
And just for fun I came across the Simpsons movie site. It allows you to turn yourself into a Simpsons character. You can either design your own or you can download a photo and have them do it for you. I used a photo as the one I did myself didn't really turn out.
Timewarden, I have noticed they seem to be bringing out the poorer episodes too and they are bringing them out so much more quickly too. I just wish they would go back to bringing out some favourites. The one I really want them to bring out is "War Games" with Patric Troughton. It's a family favourite that we once had on VHS but was lent out and never returned.
Lili, I agree that Fforde still came up with great ideas. It's the little things that I seem to really enjoy about his books. While I feel that maybe he is now just producing them because they have proved to be popular I would still read any future ones. It would be interesting to see what else he comes up with.
I bought some Fimo clay a few weeks ago with the intention of having a go and hopefully making something I could add to my Christmas cards. The plan was to make little stockings and attach them to the front of the cards with those glue dots. They would also have ribbon so that the stockings could be removed from the cards and placed on the recipients tree. Well I attempted a stocking and it went disastrously wrong. Should have started with something simple. So I next made some candy canes and I am thinking of attaching this to peoples gifts. These are fairly easy to make and I did have fun doing it. Here is my top tip if you want to try using clay. First of all have a packet of wipes handy. Colours transfer to other colours just through touch alone. This isn't exactly ideal when working with red and white. The black is the worst for it though. You need to wipe your hands, clay knife and surface before starting on a new colour. I also advice that you work with the paler colours first. One other tip which is probably just common sense, keep your window open while baking the clay and then air your oven after words. The smell is awful. It's not pungent but you will be aware of it. Other than that it is a lot of fun though.
Another reason to look forward to the Christmas season is that a few weeks ago I finished another scarf. I used another pattern from the knitting bible. This one is called eyelit rib. The pattern was very easy to follow. I quickly got into the rhythm of it and knitted away while watching the last of the Star Trek episodes. This scarf I have decided is for myself. I have knitted many scarves since taking up knitting and this will be the first thing I have made for myself. I'm looking forward to wearing it as the yarn is so soft.
