Brick by Brick is the Appeal to raise funds to build a new Hospice in Glasgow
As you may know we take voluntary crafting to the Day Centre at The Glasgow Hospice. Asking the patients beforehand if there are any specific cards they would like, we gather together all that is needed to make a complete card, in a cellophane pocket. Then on the day each patient chooses which one they would like to make up. Last time, since it is so close to Easter, we chose Tatty Teddy as the theme, but we use a variety of different styles month by month.
Collection boxes for the Brick by Brick Appeal come flat-packed ready to assemble, complete with double-sided tape, so any crafter will have no problem putting one together - it's just like origami!
Any card packs that are unused are made up and added to others to sell at Deaf Focus in East Kilbride, to raise funds for a ramp at the Atholl Centre Pitlochry. Deaf Focus is a great place to practice BSL signing.
Atholl Centre Pitlochry
We made a short video to show this.
With Video Captions for the Deaf Community when turned on in Settings.
It's birthday time again for Evan - two on 5 April. Disney Pixar Cars is his theme of the moment, so our card to him is a large 8x8" card decoupage (Craftsuprint cup457045_416) surrounded by a border of his favourite vehicles. The decoupage (papertole) is built up with silicone on the background, then matted and layered onto holographic card with the corners punched. A banner and a 2 placed on top finishes it all off.
Happy 2nd Birthday Evan
I printed an insert with still more images, from Mater's Tall Tales: a spin-off from the movies, which Evan loves, as the stories are much shorter. Mater and Lightning McQueen with (U.F.M.) Unidentified Flying Mater is so cute!
Card seen from above
Cars even made it onto the cake
Other themes running through the birthday are Fireman Sam, Lego Duplo, Brio and diggers. You can see the evidence around the room.
Plans can go awry. The craft group had in mind to decorate the second mask, but as one member was ill, we postponed that, and an on-the-wing card was churned out for us by Jeanette on her Grand Calibur using dies.
Beautiful glitzy paper was tried but proved very fibrous to cut. However, perseverance paid off and we got a result, though foil card was easier to work with.
Using Marianne Creatables dies, the birdcage and birdon branch were put through the machine and, with slender pieces of foam pad, laid on embossed backgrounds. The door on the cage actually opens, which is a nice touch. Looks like the bird flew free!
Bluebird
Yes, that did take all evening! We did an inordinate amount of talking compared with crafting, but hey, it was fun, and Ruth and I are known as Craft & Chat!
Jane brought along to the craft group all her moulds and we tried air-dried clay for the first time. The trick is not to handle the clay too much - some of us cottoned-on to the technique faster than others! The frames and large flowers are Martha Stewart moulds, the rose and sunflower are WOW moulds.
Martha Stewart Frame Mould
WOW Rose Mould
There are qualities in the clay, some more pliable than others. They were partly set by the time we finished and craftywhippet loaned me a box to carry them home. Unfortunately, putting the box on its side was not a great idea and a few got broken or bashed. They will gradually harden further over the next few days and then they should be decorated with the likes of Twinkling H2Os, Copic pens or Spray & Sparkle. We will see how they turn out! I've never been handy with clay so if they are usable it will be amazing.
As promised, here is an off-the-cuff video I took of us joining in a demo of box-making at the craft fair, now uploaded to YouTube. Charmain of Payper Box led us through the process, using flexible embossing powder and removable double-sided tape. Jeanette from our craft group was on hand to do a lot of the work, also videoing sections as I did a little bit of the crafting, while Ruth did nothing! It was a laugh for us anyway and I hope you enjoy watching.
It doesn't seem any time at all since Ruth and I were at the Craft Fair in November and here we are in March doing the rounds again! It's a great opportunity to stock up on basics and see what's new.
Alice's
I look forward to practising some Tangles with the help of a book of examples, since I am prone to doodling while on the phone. It's usually treble clefs and cubes - I guess that makes me a musical mathematician LOL - seems appropriate! I also got a cracker boxmaker which looks like it might be fun and useful!
Ruth's
With permission, I filmed rubber stamped cards at Card IO, decopatch at Damselfly, card at Ross Papers and boxmaking at Payper Box. The results of our visit can be seen in a short YouTube video.
We hope to use the Card IO (formerly Tapestry) stamps on acrylic tubes, with the Day Centre patients at the Hospice. A quick tip we were given by the demonstrator is using alcohol-free baby wipes, dried-out, to rub in backgrounds to give an ink-dusted effect. The Inkylicious demonstrator uses a wet paintbrush to drag the colour; also a spray bottle of water pointed upwards drops a fine mist onto the background colours. We both bought the plastic sun and moon stencils to make ink dusting even easier!
Card IO Samples
More Card IO Samples
Demonstrator Hard at Work
Ann of Damselfly was on hand to give us advice on our decopatch technique, which leaves a lot to be desired. Jeanette of our craft group made a neater job, as she took her time. We were glad of the rest.
If only we could Decopatch like this!
Still to come, a demo of boxmaking, with Charmain of Payper Box. That will be a YouTube video on our Craft & Chat Playlist. Jeanette was with us too and helped with extra hands, since it's hard to film and craft without a tripod! This gave us another opportunity to have a seat while we crafted.
Well Christmas is getting nearer, and in free time-spaces I've been getting some stuff pinned to my Pinterest Boards. It's a great idea to display anything and everything that is of interest to you on pinboards of your choice. You can see my links at the top of the page.
I visited Cardwell Bay Garden Centre near Gourock and was amused to find a gold lavatory on display. The clue to what they're selling is on the shelves.
A Royal Flush
Loads of candles were for sale, of course, but I liked the candle jar topper snowglobe.
Snow, snow, snow, snow, snow!
Garfield's Christmas tree is shivering with excitement...
I can hardly believe that my little grandson is
now one year old. Where did the time go?
As expected Leo liked the tissue paper despite
the fact it had no taste or nutritional value and stuck to his mouth. His
attention was upwards to the balloons that were being bounced about by the
adults. Well, who says balloons are for children only. It was a very humid day
so we all melted into the settee while Leo sat happily biting into his
favourite toy ...an empty cola bottle... calmly watching the world go by.
Leo's card was thought of about six months
ago. I suggested to Alice that she could make it for Evan's
first birthday then any mistakes would be amended when I did mine. I am
not called crafty for nothing!!
Like many of you crafters I hit a
"block" and kept thinking, "I will look at it tomorrow",
but all the tomorrows crept up and one day I knew that it HAD to be
sorted. With Alice's careful measuring and my eyeballing measuring I
finally got past the block and into what I wanted to do. It was not
however without its problems. As I said earlier we are in a heat wave, so
working with glue and double sided tape is not easy when the glue is melting
and tape has stuck to your fingers. I laid my almost finished card down and
when I lifted it two "tiny" (even "smidgens") of tape had
stuck to the two back photos. They had to be removed, as my subtle attempts at
fixing were a total waste of time. Photos were removed, reprinted, insert added
and card finished.
The card is pride of place on the birthday
boy's mantelpiece. My daughter very
discreetly pointed out a little letter is missing on the
inside verse. Ah well it happens to us all. It will be easily fixed and
anyway Leo can't read yet. I still have a couple of nice photos to add but
as yet they have not reached my laptop.
Leo 1
Birthday is over now so time to
concentrate on other cards!!
There were just three of us at the craft group but we had fun making up a Sandie Burchell craft kit from CraftsUprint (see right hand side panel on blog for link). Three pages were printed out on 160gsm white card, cut and assembled to give a decoupaged-style triangle 3D card to send to anyone who loves flowers. The personalisation is on the back and could have text boxes added via the computer before your sheets are printed out. All three of us were successful as we kept pace with each other.
Gardening x3
I have tried these kits before, making a crafting one (can't find my own photo of it made up!) and a handbag one - and they are great fun to do.
In the Garden
Handbags and Shoes
Crafting
Hope you're enjoying your crafting. It really is summer here in Scotland, we have had the most amazingly warm and sunny weather. So no complaints about not having a summer this year.
"Yarn Bombing -- or as it’s called in Europe, Knit Graffiti – has been taking hold all over the world. From fibre artists who craft covers for a water tower or bus to small community groups who cover lampposts and parking meters, embellishing the world with yarn is a celebration of beauty and a sign of hope and humour. This kind of work is joyous, whimsical, and opens up what knitting and crocheting can be. Yarn is the new paint of our time. Community groups, local knitting groups and individuals have been collectively knitting and crocheting bringing the traditional craft to life."
I visited the Village Arts Centre in East Kilbride after my daughter-in-law told me it had been Yarn-Bombed for the next day's fun. I got a few photos and thought it was a great idea -- showing off knitting and crochet in an unusual way.
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