Cake!

The other day (ok, the other month, but I never got round to posting it) my sister and I decorated these cupcakes.

I decorated these ones with pink strawberry flavoured icing and a whole strawberry on top. Does it matter that you can't fit it all in your mouth at once? No!

My sister decorated these with regular butter cream icing, marshmallows and edible glitter which is the best thing ever. She also hid a bit of marshmallow inside the actual cake. Genius.

Noment!

And here they are good to go.

These containers were actually the packaging from some very delicious chocolate cakes but they double up perfectly as cupcake transporters.

Shell necklace

I've had a pack of plain white shells for ages and never done anything with them. Until now.

I made this necklace by drilling a small hole in the top of each shell, which is not easy I can tell you.

Then I painted them with nail varnish so that they'd be shiny.

I think if I make another one I'll pick less random colours. Like all blues and purples. Or pinks. There's always a lot of pink nail varnish.

Canvas Dezign

This week I received this canvas print from Canvas Dezign.

They're a UK based company that offers a wide range of quality prints.

For my print I chose this photo of my sister and me in Melbourne three summers ago. (My Dad took the photo. He really wanted y'all to know that, he's very proud of it.)

I could have chosen a nice landscape photo from a holiday snap but I tend to want to paint those on canvas myself, but if you're not so artistically inclined then getting scenic holiday photos printed onto canvas would be a great way to display them around your house. 

The frames are made of thick, solid wood with the edges of the image neatly stuck down, and they come with everything you need to hang it.

My print was mailed out to me on Monday and it arrived the next day. Gotta love fast service.

The image came out really well and the colours are so vibrant and not distorted at all from the original photo.

I opted for a 16x12" canvas but there are lots of different sizes to choose from, and they even cater for custom sizes.

Canvas Dezign also offer canvas art with a wide range of images including sunsets and iconic prints.

You can even have your own photo 'Banksy-ed'.

Canvas Dezign is offering you my lovely readers a 10% discount with the code 93HEXWF35U.

Canvas Dezign gave me this canvas print for free in exchange for a review.

Re-painting

I did this painting over 2 years ago when I was on my foundation course at college.

It was a development piece to practice a technique.

My work at the time was all about close up views of part of the body. This is the inside corner of the eye.

But it's a bit weird and I have no need for it any more. It's not the sort of painting I want up on the wall.

So I painted over it.

I went a little abstract and just had fun making marks with paint and pens all over it, and you can still see some of the original painting underneath which I like.

Then I painted my face on top which looks like it's coming out from all the chaos.

In other news, I've been featured on Craftzine for the first time. So exciting!

Check it out here.

Also, if any of you are Instructables users and would like a 3 month pro membership then just leave your email address in a comment and I'll send it your way.

I've only got one to give away so the first commenter gets it.

Decorative tape magnets

I saw this great tutorial on Twirly Betty for making washi tape magnets and decided to make some for the front of my locker.

I definitely recommend checking out the tutorial.

I don't have any washi tape, and I thought regular masking tape would be a bit boring, but luckily the magnetic sheets I have are self-adhesive so I used decorative paper and made it look like tape.

I stuck on strips of paper to the magnetic sheets and cut out strips of that, and then cut the edges to be all jaggedy like real tape.

I couldn't stop as just one lot though.

It's so easy so I made a couple of different sorts with different papers.

Lavender fields

A few weeks ago I went with my parents to a local lavender field and finally got round to painting one of the photos I took there.

There's a nice little cafe there and they have lots of lavender products on sale, including lavender marmalade which I'm not too sure about. You pay to go onto the field but can then pick as much lavender as you want.

I find this photo hilarious.

Can you spot my Dad?

I spent ages trying to get a decent photo of this butterfly.

This was the best I could get before it flew away.

And the place was buzzin'.

Quite literally.

So many bees!!

In others news, I sold this painting at the Haynes Art Gallery. Yay!!

Fish craft session

Yesterday was the last of the three craft sessions at the mill.

This time the kids made mini aquariums...

...and paper plate fish.

13 kids turned up which was the most out of all of the sessions, but luckily I just had enough of the containers for the aquariums.

I also have these two ideas featured in the summer issue of Creative Steps magazine.

Project Runway Silk Screen

My Mum bought me this Project Runway Silk Screen set, because she's nice like that and was leaving me all on my own to go on holiday for two weeks.

It's meant to be for silk screening clothes but until I find something I want to decorate I've been using it to make art prints.

The set comes with several screens and you just trace the image onto it and paint out the areas you want to keep white.

I started with this picture of my friend Lizzi.

I still need to figure out exactly how to get the best print, because there are a lot of cases of the paint bleeding at the edges.

For the first prints I used acrylic paint and then I tried poster paint.

Then I had the genius idea to make a glitter print!

Instead of putting paint over the screen I put pva glue, then removed the screen and covered the glue in glitter. I love it! 

Then I tried a two colour print.

I printed it four times and that one on the right is the best so far.

The one on the left is a great example of the annoying paint bleeding which make it look like my eye, nose and mouth are bleeding. Not a good look. 

But I will keep trying.

And I may even use it on clothes eventually.

Painting from a screen

The other day I was watching Dawson's Creek and there was a scenic shot of the creek and I thought, 'that would make a good painting.'

So I painted it.

I put the dvd in my laptop so that I could have it right next to my paints and just paused it on the right shot.

It's one of the first landscapes I've painted in a while where I haven't actually been to the place.

Unfortunately.

I'm sure North Carolina is lovely.

And if anyone is wondering how my goal of watching all of DC over the summer is going, cos I'm sure y'all are keeping tabs, I've just watched the 4th episode of the 4th season. Good progress.

Puppet Craft Session

Yesterday was the second craft session at the mill and the kids made some simple puppets.

 Sock puppets.

My family had been collecting old socks for months in preparation for this so the children would have a lot to choose from.

And stick puppets.

These are the two I made but the kids came up with clowns, mermaids, and even an alien spaceship.

I'm back!

Panic over people, my laptop is back.

It had a virus (eep!!) but the folks over at PC World made it all better.

Anyway, right before that all happened one of my very best friends turned 21.

Her boyfriend made her the most awesome cake. A giant cupcake with many little cupcakes around the edge.

And it tasted goooood.

Here's the card I made her.

I thought I'd give 3D decoupage a try.

I printed out the same photo four times (taken from our Cromer beach trip).

Then cut out more and more sections out of each photo and stuck them on top of each other using sticky pads.

I think it makes a regular photo look a bit more special.

Blog break

Hey everyone.

Just letting you know that I'll be taking a small blog break while my laptop gets sorted out as it's been on the blink.

Boo.

It might be good to get away from the internet for a bit anyway.

But hopefully not for too long.

Robot craft session

Yesterday I ran the first of three craft sessions at my local mill.

First up was robots.

Here's the one I made as an example. It's arms and head moves.

The magic of split-pins.

One of the kids tried to copy it exactly. I take that as a compliment.

And because there's always those kids that finish early I came prepared with some robot colouring pages that I printed from the internet.

There were some leftover so I thought I'd do one. Sometimes it's nice just to colour. And I totally kept inside the lines.

When I was younger and had a day off school because I was ill I would always get out my colouring books and wax crayons. I even had a Sesame Street colouring book. It was awesome.

Vintage dress up

My Mum recently dug out some of her old (but would now be considered vintage) dresses.

So naturally my sister and I tried them.

They fit wonderfully! 

The yellow dress I'm wearing was the bridesmaids dress my Mum wore for her sister's wedding.

Here's my Mum at 18 wearing the dress my sister has on above. She made it herself.

My Mum was around 16 in this picture (and off to a barn dance which explains the hat) and here I am wearing the same dress. Age 21 but the same size!

Notice the matching hairband which inspired the ones I made last week.

Have any of you parents held on to any of their old clothes for you to try on?