Decorating the Living Room

First of all my scheduled posts have gone out of the window. The reason for the that is we're having the upstairs bathroom redecorated at the start of May, and part of that is going to involve a wall being knocked down. In the tempt to keep my crafting stuff as dust free as possible while the work is being done I'm making an effort not to do any major crafting up there for a few weeks.

So while I've made some progress on my Crochet cushion cover and done a little bit of scrapbooking, everything else is on hiatus for a bit. I'll share some pics of those over the next week.

What I have been getting up to though is painting the Living Room, it's been a good few years or so since we last updated the colour in there and it was looking a bit tired. I managed to get 1/3 of the room done before dinner had to be started, so hoping I can get it finished off before the end off Friday.

We managed to get a bargain with the paint as well, we went for a colour called soft sand (for the top half of the room) and Warm Beige (on the bottom half). However when we started looking for the soft sand in a 5L tub we were told that size had been discontinued however it was showing on the system what they had a few tubs still in stock so the shop assistant was determine to track them down for us. It took her about 20 minutes but she finally found 3 tubs of the paint for us. Unfortunately  it was 2 matt and one silk (we was originally after the silk version) and for the size of the room/rooms we are decorating we needed more than one tub so went for the matt version instead. Then as she was checking out our paint she told us because this colour was being discontinued they had reduced the price from £22 a tub down to £6, we took a double take and then asked if that was the case with the Silk tub as well, yep it was, so we took that one as well to save it for some of the upstairs rooms. In the end we got £110 worth of paint for £40.

Making quick pages

I really like it when I have some nice quick pages to use, they are so simple, drop in your pictures and your done. So this got me thinking, why not make some of my own from the kits I have? It's great practice and I can save my work as different layer groups to make it nice and easy to work with / change if that photo I want to use in the future just wont fit.

Here's my first attempt, I've used elements from a Kellybell Designs Kit "Expedition Safari". 

This image is made up of four parts *saved separately on my PC for when I come to use it*. The top layer, which has the buttons and embellishments over the photos. The 2nd layer which is the Photo frames, I just need to slot my photos in behind them then add some shadowing. The 3rd layer which is the page boarder and the big cluster in the bottom right of the page.  The 4th and final layer (which I didn't save purposely) consists of a big picture (The Tree of Life in this case) and a paper layer set as an overlay.


I really enjoyed making this up and didn't take too long at all, and and by splitting the Quick Page into a couple of layers I still give myself some flexibility just in case i get an awkwardly sized photo to work with.

Mother's Day Card and gift bag

Mother's Day has come and gone but I though I should share with you the cards I made for mine and Adam's Mum.

The rose paper and the flower stickers are from the kit I got from the QVC outlet shop, and the Mother's Day topper I made myself in Paint shop since I had no pre-made toppers in my stash.

The Crocheted Butterfly I made using a pattern from Maries Making, however for my Butterflies I used size 16 White Crochet cotton and a size 1.00mm hook. It was pretty fiddly work but I'm really happy how it turned out. I used a bit of Beading wire and some small beads for the antennas.

I also made this little bag so I could put her gifts in, it was really simple. I used three A4 pieces of Dark red felt from Hobbycraft to make the bag and some off cuts of felt for leaves.

The Flower was  nice as simple I used a 3.50mm hook and used Hayfield Bonus DK in Primrose.

Chain 8, Join with sl st to form a ring.

Round 1: Ch 1, working in ring, 1 Sc, 1 Hdc, 4 Dc, 2 Sc, 1 Hdc, 4 Dc, 1 Hdc, 1 Sc, Sl St on the first Sc. (16)

Round 2: Ch 1, Sc in same St, (Ch 3, Skip one St, Sc on next St) repeat around, join. (8 Ch-3 loops).

Round 3: [(SC, Hdc, 3 Dc, Hdc, Sc) in Ch-3 loop, Sl St in Sc] repeat around, join (8 Petals)

Round 4: Ch 1, still facing front. Work the next stitches at the back of Round 3 petals, (Sc on the next available St from Round 1 Ch 5) repeat around, join. (8 Ch-5 loops)

Round 5: (Sc, Hdc, 5 Dc, Hdc, Sc) in each Ch 5 loop around, join (8 Petals)

Round 6: Ch 5, still facing front, work the next stitches at the back of Round 5 petals, (skip one St, Sc on the same St as the Ch-3 loop from Round 2. Ch 5. Repeat around, join (8 Ch-5 loops)

Round 7: Repeat Round 5.

Fasten off and weave in ends.

I attached my flower to the bag by using some yellow embroidery thread and then to finish it off I added some little pearl beads to the centre of the flower.

Back home

Me and Adam had a great week away, we started the bank Holiday weekend up in Warrington to celebrate Adam's birthday. I got a bit of crocheting done, continuing to work on my Link Amigurumi until I realised I had forgotten to bring my Aran coloured yarn with me and couldn't go any further. So instead I picked up my Cross Stitch magazine and started one of the patterns.

I really enjoy working on this, still have a little more to do on this piece but I'm happy I've tried with this small sample piece to get back into the swing of doing cross stitch. It's given me confidence to work on the Christmas patterns that inspired me to retry this craft now. 

I also finished reading the Hunger Games over the weekend. Despite being rather reserved about the story, I really enjoyed it. Some Mild Spoilers if you want to skip the next paragraph: 

It wasn't a perfect book by any means, I semi-dislike the whole love-triangle theme that I'm sure will be more prevalent in the next two books. I also feel that Katniss has it easy in the terms who she killed, the nice and neutral characters that would have caused her a moral dilemma for her were always taken out by someone else.

All in all though it was a good little read, and I was hungry for more once I had reached the last page. I'm even tempted to check out the film version and I never normally like seeing film versions of books I've read. (or reading books after I've seen the film version for that matter.)

On Tuesday we headed up to Blackpool for a couple of days. The moment got in the car the sun came out and even though the weather reports constantly said it would be raining all three days we had brilliant sunshine.

 I adore this windmill that's close to the holiday camp where we where staying, couldn't resist snapping a picture of it as we drove past.

On Wednesday we visited Blackpool Zoo, it's a rather nice little place, and I got some nice film on the Ipad (although it badly needs editing before I share). However the still photos are a bit lack lustre due to the fact that there is no zoom on the camera (digital zoom will never ever count).

On Thursday we had a walk down to the sea front. I snapped a couple of pics, before we had lunch on the beach. 

In the evenings we chilled out watching our way through all the films leading up the the Avengers (apart from the two Hulk films since I dozed off during both of those).

We headed back to Warrington for a few more days we visited my favourite wool shop, and picked up some more Sublime Cashmere Merino Silk DK yarn. Got 8 balls in both Buff and Treacle (which will be used for some cushion covers) and 1 ball in the colours Jou Jou, Smooch, Lido and Mango Presse (which will get me started on new ripple blanket for myself since Mutley has claimed my half finished pastel one for his bed upstairs. 

MouseScrappers Weekly Challenge #101

This weekly Challenge was a bit trickier than last week, we had to come up with things that related to the letters in the word "BINGO". On first glance I thought it would straight forward but I went through three kits before I found things I could use for each letter. My layout is below.

Here's how I used my letters.

B:Blue Background paper, Blue Flowers, Black Elements and some Bamboo (That was a easy letter I went a little over board there)
I: Ink smudge in the bottom cluster.
N: Natural Elements, Blossom's, Bamboo and Pearls.
G: This one had me for a while, but G is the 7th letter in the alphabet so I put 7 hidden mickeys in the layout.

O: Old Coins make up Hidden Mickeys. (But you'll need to look harder for the other ones).

Birthday Cards

Last week I picked up a copy of Papercraft Inspirations it had a free gift of a bone folder and scoring board on the front cover. Since I have a few cards to make/ finish off this week I thought I would get to work testing out my new gadget.

It's Adam's birthday soon so mum asked me if I could make a card for her to give to him, so I came up with this stepper card. The papers are a free download from Papercraft Inspirations website (Issue 80) and I recoloured the Star paper. The paper with the stars I turned into a little envelope with a Happy Birthday message and some spending money in from Mum.

I did add some scores on the front fold and on the envelope but it isn't showing up to well on camera, however the K&Co Stickers that I've had stashed away for ages came in handy for this. 

I also had a few little gifts to gift wrap. I am a big fan of cellophane so I simply found a small cardboard box with lid cut off and covered it with some K&Co paper. I cut a piece of cellophane to cover my gifts, and laid  it into the box then used the lid to form a base inside the box. I added some Blue tissue paper I bought from Poundland then placed in my gifts. Then to finish I put the box on top of another piece of cellophane that will cover everything then, scrunch up the cellophane and pop a rubber band to hold everything in place. Then tie a ribbon around the top to finish it off. I had a little bit of the K&Co paper left, so I made a gift tag with it to match.

The finished thing has a bit of an Easter Egg vibe to it, considering the time of year, I'm very happy with that.

 I had just a little bit of trouble getting both Adam and Mutley to look at the IPad at the same time so I could  get a picture.

I asked "Look at me" Mutley cooperated. 

For about a second. "Will you both look at me!"

Cheesy grins from the pair of them!

Template Challenge #80

This time over on mousescrappers I took part in a template challenge. I do like templates as it can get you off to a great head start with making a page if your feeling a little stumped as to were to begin.

This template was great, you could get different effects by removing some of the mickey heads or put different embellishments in there place all together. Also you can give this template a rotate for a whole new look.

Here's what I came up with, I picked the some traditional colours out from the Blooming in Adversity Kit from Kellybell Designs. I was happy with this one until I noticed I mucked up on the shadow around the bamboo (of course I only notice once I've compressed the file down into a Jpeg). On the bright side I'm happy I did this now when I'm just practacing and not in a photobook page, hopefully this will make me double check my work from now on.

Off on a hoilday

Hey Everyone, just a quick blog post to let you all know I'll be off on my holidays for the next week. I have some scheduled blog posts that will be posted throughout the week but I won't be able to update some of my tutorial links until I get back.

See you all soon.

Cross Stitch Needle Guide

I've written up a short guide as to which size of Tapestry/Cross Stitch Needle to use with your project.

Tapestry/Cross Stitching Needles

Tapestry/Cross Stitching Needles have a large eye and a rounded tip. They are generally used for counted thread embroidery including cross stitch, blackwork and hardanger. The rounded tip makes it easier for the needle to pass through the holes in the fabric without tearing or splitting the fibres.

As a general guide here are the size of needled recommended for different fabrics.

Needle Size      Fabric Size

Size 18        -   6 count Aida Fabric

Size 20        -   8 count Aida Fabric  

Size 22        -   11 count Aida Fabric / 22-25-27 count evenweave

Size 24        -   14 count Aida Fabric / 28 count evenweave   

Size 26        -   16 count Aida Fabric / 32 count evenweave

Size 28        -   18 count Aida Fabric / 36 count evenweave.

As you can see, the higher the Needle size, the smaller the needle is.

Notes: If you are making fractional Stitches into Aida fabric you my find that using a smaller needle helpful since you sew through the middle of the fabric rather than the holes.

Beading Needles


Beading needles are designed to make treading and attaching small seed or bugle beads on to your work easy. Due to needing to fit through the centre of tiny beads the eyes and body of this needle are very small, the thinness of these needles also make them rather fragile.

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You can find links to all of my Cross Stitching Tutorials by clicking on the link in my Side Bar.

How to use photo masks in Paint Shop Pro

This Tutorial will cover what you need to know about using masks in your Digital Scrapbooking Pages

For this tutorial I'll be using Coral Paint Shop Pro X, and should cover different versions of that program. (If it doesn't please get in touch and I'll update this tutorial).

What you'll need.

First you'll need a mask, for this tutorial I'm going to use some that you download for free over at Pixel Scrapper.
http://www.pixelscrapper.com/marisa-lerin/templates/photo-mask-19-image-commercial-use-digital-scrapbooking-free-download

A Photo to use the mask with. I'm using this one of the Tree of Life (Credits to Mark Barbieri, he has posted a bunch of pictures over at Mousescrappers for people to scrap with.)

Extras: If you're making a Digital Scrapbooking page you may want to use a Digital Scrapbooking Kit to go with it. I'm going to be a little lazy and just use a Pre-Made Paper stack for this Tutorial.

This was made by Linda over at MJ-AJ Designs using a Kellybell Designs Kit called "Around the Riverbend".

I'll also use some Pre-made Word Art from the same KellyBell Kit, this time it was made by
Jessica over at Handbags & Scrapbooks.

Once you've got all that open up all 4 files in Paint Shop Pro.

Copy and paste your photo as a new layer onto your paper stack. (Feel Free to resize your photo if needed.).

 Next up make sure your Photo layer is selected (silly me in the picture below had selected the wrong one).
Then go to Layers > New Mask Layer > From Image.

You'll then get a box pop up like the one Below.

In the Source Window, you'll find a drop down list of all your currently open files. Pick your Mask file in this list. 

Then in the Create mask from, choose Source opacity. Then ok.

You can see a little bit of the mask in the above picture, but it needs a little resizing. Have a play changing the scale of the mask layer and photo layer and the positions of both on the page until you get something you're happy with.

There. As you can see I've added my Word art layer on top of my work. I think I would like to change the position of my Photo just a tad.

As seen above select the Group layer of and right click. Chose Merge and then Merge Group. You can now reposition it on your page.

When your happy with that, you're all done. Make sure to use "Save As" with your file and change your file name so you don't save over your paper stack file.

You can find links to all of my tutorials by clicking on the buttons over in my side bar.

Card Making

Last night I was browsing on Facebook and I saw that Hobbycraft where looking for volunteers to test out some new card kits. While I can't say I'm brilliant at making cards from scratch (I'm too cheap to buy expensive die-cutting machines and all the accessories for them for the relatively small amount of cards I send people a year, although Adam is trying his best to convince me I do make a lot of cards compared to non-crafty peeps). I did enjoy making last years Christmas cards from a kit. It was nice that in the box I bought I have everything I needed (apart from little extra glue) and most importantly everything matched everything worked together. I could just get down and do the fun part of creating. So I've submitted them my details along with some pics, don't think anything will come of it but you never know.

 Anyway these are the pics of some of the cards I used, these are some of the birthday cards and some left over Christmas Cards.