It's a Creative World

Finished crochet Nativity Set with Free PDF downloads

Hi, Mandy here...

The crochet Nativity Set I've been working on is finally finished and all the patterns are free and downloadable PDF files with UK terms.   

There's an old  Shepherd and a younger one with a crook (crochet over wire)...

 Download Shepherds free crochet Pattern figure Nativity Set UK terms

The Angel Gabriel has golden wings and a halo...

  

View of the Angel's wings...

 Download Angel free crochet Pattern figure Nativity Set UK terms

I posted about the Three Wise Kings before...
 

Download 3 KINGS free crochet Pattern figures Nativity Set UK terms

Mary, Joseph and baby Jesus (in the manger made by my son out of balsa wood)


 

Download Baby Jesus free crochet Pattern figure Nativity Set UK terms

Download Mary free crochet Pattern figure Nativity Set UK terms

Download Joseph free crochet Pattern figure Nativity Set UK terms

The figures make cute finger puppets too...

 

... and to give an idea of their size and scale, here's the set by a tea-cup...

 

If you want USA terms, which use different stitch names to the ones here in the UK, then check my blog.

Wishing everyone a very Happy Christmas,

Mandy.

  

It's not too late ...

... to make something for Advent, if you haven't already! Hello, and it's Alexa here with my last post of the year.

Several years ago, I was inspired by this wonderful tutorial here by Tracie Hudson, on making an Advent Box from twenty-four matchboxes and some pretty paper and ribbon. I made one that year for my daughter as she began her first December as a self-supporting young adult; and last year I made one for my son and daughter-in-law, and their own little one, and thought I was done! That one, alas, got lost in the post somewhere between here and Europe, so here I am again, in November, producing this:

Tracie's instructions are excellent, so there is no need for me to do more than point you to her post and lovely photos (see second paragraph above). However, being somewhat of a veteran at these, here are some tips should you decide to make your own - either as an Advent calendar, or for storing buttons, or paper-clips/drawing pins etc.

• choose your match-boxes carefully: the sturdier, the better. I bought several sets of plain ones this year which have been a big disappointment. The card is soft and feels even flimsier after painting or inking, making opening and closing the drawers difficult. Next time, I will buy lots of full matchboxes and empty them!
• inking drawers I found quicker than using acrylic paint - I only did the outsides.
• double-sided sticky tape is a must - use copiously everywhere.
• having taped sets of three matchboxers together, I covered each stack with patterned paper all the way round, rather than simply glueing a panel down one side: this made each set firmer and easier to manage.
• if you are using rub-on numbers, make sure you have enough '1's before you start! You will need thirteen of them!

When I was a child, Advent was a time of preparation, like Lent, and calendars did not contain chocolate or sweets. As parents, we hung on to this for a while with our own children, but caved in by the teenage years to the pressure of a little chocolate-ly or sweet something. However, I have been loath to let the aspect of preparation diappear totally, and so inside each drawer I added, for my daughter's more secular Advent calendar, a small piece of paper with a task to do before the delicious mouthful could be savoured. Much to my astonishment, this was much liked by both her and her young adult flatmates! and so it is a tradition I continue every year when they calendars are replenished. Here are just a few of the 'tasks' offered down the years:

• say something affirming to someone today with whom you normally do not have an easy relationship.
• tidy out a drawer.
• next time you are offered a free newspaper or leaflet as you rush to/from work, stop, look the person in the eye, and smile nicely before either accepting or saying 'Not today, thanks'.
• ask your partner/flatmate to gently point out your most irritating habit, and stop doing it.
• send a postcard to a relative, or someone you have been meaning to get in touch with, but haven't yet.
• polish your shoes/boots. If you don't have polish, go and buy some!
• put £1 in a charity box today, or give to a busker.
• straighten the books on a bookshelf.
• ask a flatmate/partner to tell you some small task you can do for them today, and do it gracefully with no grumbling.
• phone a parent or grandparent!
• water the plants.
• clean the top of the oven, or the grill pan.
• listen to the news and write down 5 things you are grateful for. Keep it where you will see it for the next three days.
• buy a little something nice and share it with someone where you work or study.

I am sure you will be able to think of your own for whichever family members your Advent calendar is destined. If you like the idea, but already have your Advent calendar made or planned, you might like to devise twenty-four little suitable tasks, write each onto a rectangle of card or the white back of pretty scrapbooking paper, fold each in two and pop them in a hat or bowl or bag. Whoever gets to open the calendar door/drawer or chocolate, also has to pick a task, and do it first!

Wishing you a happy and creative time, and thank-you all for your support this year!

Flea Market Finds

Kel here, sharing something that although not exactly crafty, certainly inspires me and fuels my creativity. I didn't really realise until a few years ago how much I love flea markets. I have childhood memories of rooting around tables with my Mum - I don't think we did it that often, but it made an impression. A couple of years ago, I suddenly realised that I manage to find at least one on every holiday and can quite happily lose an hour or two.

I thought I would share some recent finds with you. The ribbon and cake stand actually came from a shop, but it is such a treasure trove and the woman who runs it has an eye for the quirky and unique. Plus it's on the way to my favourite London market, so it totally counts - right? The spools are original, but the ribbon is new. I'm afraid the cake stand is new too, but they are so in at the moment that the ones I'm finding in markets are pricier than my pocket allows! I will use it for cake as well as photographing crafts for blogs, and I will use the ribbon and change colours as the fancy takes me.

I love books, old and new, as objects as well as for reading. The old Ladybird books "Things to Make" and "Learning to Sew" were impossible to leave behind at the market in London. I suspect I will just keep them around for inspiration and to treasure. The Canadian dictionary and "Wild Flowers of Britain" will probably become journals or artist books, as they have brilliant covers that show the titles, both of which have meaning for me personally.

When I bought these boxes at a flea market in Canada last month, the man I bought them from was minding the stall for a friend, and he roared with laughter at what I was paying for them (and no I'm not telling you, but it wasn't THAT much). "You sure must like boxes" he said. But I do think these are beautiful. I don't know if you can see in the photo, but the label on the index card box says "SHELLUBRICATION The Modern Upkeep Service" with the Shell logo beneath. The other one is an old sliding lid pencil box. I love useful objects like this that have seen a bit of life. I will probably use them for storage in my studio, they make me happy to look at them and hold them and I wouldn't want to cover them up.

 

The textile collection is out of control. It started with quilts and crochet given to me by my family, and then a couple of cheap bags full of table mats and hankies I bought once to use in mixed media work (no, no I haven't used them yet). I just can't bear to see all those hours of work abandoned and given away for a couple of pounds. I have a great pattern for making bunting from embroidered tablecloths. That's the plan for the one above. I just need to find some giant ricrac.

As you've seen, they don't always turn directly into projects, but bring beauty and joy into my life, allow me to have pretty backdrops for blog photos, and sow lots of ideas for future projects.

Happy hunting!

Kxx

Christmas Tradition

I wanted to share a family tradition with you.

My mother-in-law made stockings for all her children when they were born.

When I was engaged I was given a stocking and when our daughter was born she made one for her too.

 

 

They record events in our lives as well as having Christmas decorations.   There isn't much room on my husbands now so I just add the year.

To make one cut two stocking shapes from felt and a strip to make a gusset, then sew them together. 

You can decorate them to suit you. 

 

Don't forget to embroider Thank you somewhere so Santa knows you appreciate your presents.

 

Lynne x

Teacher Gifts

It's getting very close to that time of year ... yes, I mean Christmas. And the question lots of us have is what to get for the teachers. My daughter goes to a very small village school and works with lots of the teachers and teaching assistants, plus her 1:1 assistant and a SSEN teacher for a couple of sessions a week. Counting up, this year I will need 8 presents altogether (last year it was 9) so whatever I choose to do has to be fairly economical, both in terms of money and time.

Anyway, in previous years I have done:

Plant pot filled with shower gel and mesh sponge

 

Decorated gift bags with a couple of mini bottles of wine (this was hugely last minute but very well received lol!)

 

Paper houses decorated and containing cookies in a separate treat bag (I use the cello bags you buy for putting cards into).

 

Acrylic photo stand decorated and a calendar attached (this was last year's gift and they are all in use on the relevant desks)

 

This year I have already created treat bag toppers as part of a challenge on a digital scrapbooking site. The photo shows one filled with mints, but in reality they will either have cookies or mince pies, depending on what my daughter wants to bake nearer the time. I have to say that going digital is a big time saver (if you have some basic knowledge of digital scrapbooking) as you simply create the one document and set it to print.

I hope these have given you some useful ideas.

xxx's

Suzanne

Christmas Crafting with the kids!

For the last few weeks and friend and I have been running a craft club after school for kids, we advertised it as a Glittery Christmas Crafts club and were delighted to have an equal mix of girls and boys !

The club lasts 90 minutes and we usually work through one project- sometimes we get onto a quick project at the end if everyone finishes early!

So far we have made a large hanging decoration, a paper Christmas wreath and a spinner card. Tonight we will be making a shaker card and in the next few weeks we'll be making a Christmas Shrine and a paper angel!

We start off with a little demo of the project and then we generally work through it together, step by step.

The kids are encouraged to make the project their own and to experiment with their own look. None of the projects look alike by the end of the afternoon and all the kids have gone home happy with their efforts.

One of the favourite things is to cut out shapes with the Sizzix dies on the Cuttlebug and because of the fun the kids had, I've worked more Cuttlebugging into the sessions!

In fact any sort of crafting tool seems to have been a big hit with the kids and Hermafix runners, Paper trimmers, Xyron 150 sticker makers and die cutting have become firm favourites!

Here are some of the projects we've been teaching the children:

 

 

So don't forget the youngest crafters in the house - get them involved and be prepared to take a step back and let their creativity flow (even if it is a bit messy!). We've been having a great time with our craft group and it's been great seeing how their crafting confidence has grown in just a few weeks!

 

Happy Crafting!

Love GlitteryKatie

XXX

Stamps for scrapping

Hello - Dolly here.

I wonder how many of you are like me. I have a lot of stamps. Seriously – a lot of stamps. And all too often I seem to keep my stamps for card-making rather than for scrapping. And it is plain silly. Stamps are one of the most versatile tools we have and can be used over and over again in different guises.

Here are just a few examples for you to get those mojos out of their winter hibernation and get you scrapping some more of that never ending pile of prints.

Use those flourish stamps to act as vines and stems to ‘hold’ flowers for your page.

 

And on the same page I used a little flower stamp as a decorative dot over a letter i.

You can make the stamps work for their living by using them with different colour inks to stamp patterns on plain letters that are either die cuts or letters cut from plain cardstock.

 

Use stamps to make a customised patterned paper as in the page with the embossed snowflakes that adds pattern and texture.  

 You can stamp repeated images in different shades and tones on cardstock scraps and cut them out to use as embellishments such as the leaves on the page below. The titles were also made with assorted stamps as well. 

 
One of the ways I love to use the stamps is to create a frame round a picture as in these two pages.

 


 
And if you use a white ink to stamp on dark card I think it makes a really dramatic statement. The lettering and the journalling block were stamped with white ink. And the journalling block stamps are a really good idea. How many times do you want to add spot journalling to a page. With a journalling stamp you can make it in any colour to match your page perfectly.

So - my challenge for you all is rummage around in your stamps and use them to make your scrapbook pages.

SIMPLE THINGS NOVEMBER - GRATITUDE day 3

Hi all, Michelle here with my contribution to this month’s Simple things project and my  take on Gratitude. There are many things in my life that I am thankful for, from the big things, like my family, my health and my life in general, to the small things like having a roof over my head and being able to see a beautiful sunset, so, a project to sum all of this up proved a little difficult for me.

So I decided to create a small notebook to record all the things I have gratitude for

 

I wanted it to be an ‘oldey worldy’ looking leather bound book as I feel it fits well in my ‘treasure chest’

 
I used a small blank notebook and some woodware blank chip alphas

 
I spelt the word out, mixing up the alphas

 
And then mixing some PVA with water (about 70/30) and some loo roll (classy me!) I covered the book. The loo roll is very easy to mould around the letters and also to create a leather texture with, scrunching and folding it as I layered it up.

 
Once the papier mache covering was completely dry (an airing cupboard speeds up the process) I painted the cover with a mix of reds using acrylic paint.

 
After the paint layer was dry I then inked the cover with some walnut distress ink, catching the peaks of the papier mache creases. NB the ink will stay wet a while as it is being applied to an acrylic base, gently heating with a heat gun will heat set the ink.

 
Next came a dry brushing with gold acrylic

 
And then dipping my finger into the gold paint I picked out the letters some more

 
And that’s it, a little book I will fill with gratitude, recording the big and the small for me to look back on when the modern world get’s in the way and also a record of moments I can use in my future scrapping. What are you grateful for today? I think it does us all good to stop, take stock and have a think once in a while! Thanks for stopping by and I hope you have been inspired by all the creative girls sharing some gratitude with you this month.

Love

MJM x

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Hello, Eleanor here, without a square to show this month, but I want to have a chat and share some photos, if that's alright.

As many of my friends know, those I've met, and those I have yet to meet, recent years have been something of a struggle in many ways. And yet, still there is always something to be grateful for; admittedly hard to find some weeks, but very often it's been one online friend or another, usually a blogger, who has reminded me that that I have so many blessings.

Here is one, a simple view from our cottage window, as we settle in our new environment:

And here's another view from that same cottage:

 

We now find ourselves living an altogether simpler life, the life I used to long for, and although far, in miles, from some of the people who are so very important to me, I know that happiness can be a weekly phone call, a welcome letter in the post, an unexpected email, or just looking at some special photos on Flickr.

I am so grateful this month, indeed this year, that we have been given an opportunity to enjoy a new life and a wonderful playground for our youngest son.

I am grateful to live at this foot of a mountain:

and beside this loch:

As Simple Things - Gratitude closes today, I am thankful for the opportunity to share a little of my new life in pictures, and promise I will somehow put all these things onto my fabric square to preserve them, and show you all very soon.

Bye for now.

xx

SIMPLE THINGS NOVEMBER - GRATITUDE day 2

Hiya Claireliz here with my take on this months word for Simple Things - Gratitude.

And I'd also like to mention Dolly's lovely page from yesterday, really gorgeous, I just cannot get to grips with digi scrapping.

So gratitude means to be grateful & thankful & the dictionary definition says Gratitude: Being thankful for favours received.

I also have to say I have a lot more to be thankful for this month than usual, as my family are helping me out, whilst I recover from a knee operation, and although everyone is helping, it's my Mum I'm most thankful to as she's doing so much to help me out (& she bought me cake & chocolate to cheer me up :D)

In honour of Mum I've made this page a bit more girly this month:

 

Once again the page is made from an old pizza box. The pale pink paper is stamped with a Stampotique stamp - Hanging Hearts - its one of my favourite ones. And again I have made a pocket to put tags, notes & cards in. I do like using pockets on 6x6 pages, I think its quite effective & also very simple (so it ties in nicely with Simple Things) it also gives a bit of continuity to the album to stop it from looking too random. The whole album is looking nice & chunky too. The pink flower sticker was a Sassfrass Lass sticker cut in half & stuck to either side of the page & I drew around the edges with black pen.

The dictionary definition is attached to a stamped circle (Banana Frog - Circus Stories) and a chipboard heart that came on a Winnie The Pooh pencil case...

 

I inked the heart with Barn Door Distress Ink, then gave it a thick coat of Tim Holtz Rock Candy Crackle Glaze. Once the Crackle Glaze had dried I inked it lightly with some Black Soot Distress Ink, tied a ribbon through the hole & glued to the page (the glue has since dried & is no longer visible lol). 

Well thats all from me for Simple Things, Stop by tomorrow & see what else we have been making.

Thanks for stopping by & hope to see you again soon

C

xx

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Hi, Mandy here.

I am so grateful for my wonderful husband and family.  My page this month (for my fabric book) is made with printer-friendly canvas.  I opened the photo in PSE and added the journalling, then printed both together on the printer-friendly canvas.  I machine-stitched on a scallop embellie with a little crochet flower (made by my Gran, Daisy - thanks Gran!) and a bit of red felt trim.  The photo was taken in October in the Tate Modern in London, where Husb and I had a few special days together, celebrating meeting each other 20 years ago that month.  I discovered a few of the ceramic sunflower seeds in my boots and on the ground outside the Turbine Gallery and saved them to bring home.  The little canvas drawstring bag will hold the seeds and add a tactile dimension to my fabric book.  I used STAZON ink to label the bag with the artist's name 'Ai Weiwei' and the date we visited.

 

When I attatch the page into my fabric book, it'll be a pocket into which I'm going to put some newspaper clippings about the exhibit.  This sort of hybrid page is what I'm enjoying making recently.    Also, using a very short depth of field on my camera, so the foreground is in focus and the rest of the photo out of focus, is another fave at the moment.  So is placing my camera on the ground... or in this case sitting in the ceramic seeds!

Have a lovely week-end and check back tomorrow for the third day of  'GRATITUDE'.

Mandy

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Hi, Kel here, with my latest Simple Things page. I have to confess that I have not always been able to do my page on time, but I plan to finish them all. I have the pages marked out in my journal so that they can be slotted in. 

Gratitude has been on my mind a lot lately. It's partly because Canadian Thanksgiving is in October and then American Thanksgiving is so publicised it gives me a full month of thinking about giving thanks. I have also been reading a book by a Buddhist monk called Thich Nhat Hahn. He talks about breathing in and smiling to your eyes and being thankful for your eyes. What really impressed upon me was another idea - of being grateful for your non-toothache. I may be fed-up or tired or even have a headache, but I am so grateful for all that is not wrong!

SIMPLE THINGS NOVEMBER - GRATITUDE day 1

Welcome everyone. This is Dolly starting off this month.

It is so appropriate that in November, as people prepare to celebrate Thanksgiving, our word for the month is gratitude.

I thought I would start off with a few quotes about gratitude and thanfulness which might get your creative mojos moving ready for your own pages.

If you count all your assets, you always show a profit.  ~Robert Quillen

Gratitude is a quality similar to electricity: it must be produced and discharged and used up in order to exist at all.  ~William Faulkner


If you want to turn your life around, try thankfulness.  It will change your life mightily.  ~Gerald Good

Hem your blessings with thankfulness so they don't unravel.  ~Author Unknown


There are so many quotes about thankfulness and gratitude that I am sure you will find one which says just what you want to say.

Once again my page has followed the same format so that my album is cohesive. I have again used a definition.

 

Once again my photo is flower based, although this month it has a butterfly as well as to me, thankfulness and gratitude is linked so closely witht he wonder of creation and the beauty of the world around us.

 

Once again I have used word art (and this word art is available for free download on my blog this week)

 

 

And this is the complete page, printed off and already in the album.

 

 

 

Have fun with your own gratitude page and I hope your lives are filled with blessings to count.

Happy Thanksgiving.

~~~~~