Headboard

We decided to buy a kingsize bed a couple of months ago and went for a divan. The headboards on the market were not what we wanted and I was looking for something to go with the cream suede blanket box and curtains, so I decided to make my own headboard. Here's the result:

Rachele

Pan Pastels

I am loving the pan pastels new to the market and am going to have to start saving to buy some and try them out. Problem is I want all the colours!
Check them out on Lin Brown's blog where she is giving some away to one lucky person:
http://yoursartfully.blogspot.com/2011/09/pan-pastels-giveaway.html

Rachele

Jacobs Ladder

Back in August I went on a workshop with Tina and made this Jacob's ladder book. The cute pictures of my nephew covering it make it even better :) I love it and have made another 2 since.

It still amazes me how jacob ladders work even after constructing one!

There are 6 double sided blocks in total.

Rachele

Penguins

I've been creating loads recently, but never get round to finishing anything properly so that I can get some photo's on here! My sister came to stay in August and we had a week of decorating and crafting. Whilst she sewed an amazing rabbit, I made a penguin - my favourite animal :)

I do seem to have a thing for penguins. Over the summer I taught myself to crochet and here is the result of my first project. Not a bad first attempt I reckon :)

Loads more pictures to add for my latest creations, so hopefully I won't leave it so long before I blog again :)

Rachele

Paper Artsy Weekend

I've been so busy doing workshops that I haven't had chance to blog over the last couple of weeks. Last weekend I went to Warrington for a whole weekend of crafting fun. I learnt some new techniques and made some great pieces and now I'm bursting full of inspiration.

I then had a lovely holiday in Scotland this week visiting Glasgow and Loch Lomond and thoroughly enjoyed visiting the House of an Art Lover and Hill House, seeing examples of Mackintosh's amazing work. His attention to detail is amazing. Dark dining rooms to allow the colours in men's dinner suits and ladies dresses to show better, colour coded panels on doors to indicate male or female presence and curved ceilings to give a nicer feel to the space are just a few examples.

Back to the craft weekend. The first piece I did was a wooden canvas with grunge board pieces stuck on and then layers of paint built up, darkening the colours to build shadows:

Each word, letter and number has a meaning making this piece truly personal

I finished my piece in plenty of time so was able to do another smaller piece for my little sister. I love the crackle paint effect on the bird and letter c:

The next project was to paint some bottles, which although pretty, was not as rewarding for me as there was not so much creative freedom in the process, but I do love the flowers on the top:

Finally we played with some plaster. Originally I didn't think I was going to like this project looking at the samples, but now I love it and have so many more ideas of things to try with this technique. We covered a piece of MDF in plaster, set in some pieces we made from moulds and then once dry painted and added metallic paints for final effect:

I'm now on the look out for decorative items to take moulds from to make more pieces like this :)

Rachele

Flowers

Last night Katya popped round and we made some flowers out of metal and grunge paper. Here's my attempts:

Rachele

Moulds & Resin

I took advantage of the nice long bank holiday weekend with lots of crafting. Saturday I went on a workshop to create an album on Tim Holtz techniques, which was great, but ended up with black fingers by the end of the day, which wasn't ideal seeing as I was going to my friends wedding that evening. I ran out of time to complete so will post pictures once finished.
Monday, Susan came over for more resin experimentation. I got some mould making material to try and took a mould from some mini F1 car magnets. I used hearty clay and pink resin to see how well it worked and was very impressed with the result, so now I'm looking out for lots more things to take moulds from.

Magnets that I made the mould from

Resin and hearty clay pieces made from the mould.

I also tried a technique in a pendant with resin. I glued in wire and then filled with different coloured resin. I put a little too much resin in so it spread over a little, but it's given me some ideas to play with.

Rachele