Baby bag....

It's only 2 years in the making, after my bad attempt at making a baby bag from cheap oil cloth, but here it is my handmade baby bag. I'm very proud of it and can't believe how professional it looks. That sounds like I'm really boasting but I owe it to Lisa Lam and the Bag Making Bible, which my mum bought me for a Christmas present last year. It is so easy to follow and she gives you great tips to make it look really professional. Also I have to give a lot of credit to my mum who helped me with the free machine embroidery on the front and endless questions (baby brain second time around has hit hard).

Here it is next to the little poppet who fills it with all her extensive equipment.....

Needless to say after a few weeks in use it is now well loved and decorated with a little baby sick and mud from the park!

This Saturday.....

we can be found at The Brentwood Road Gallery Craft Market. It's been a long time since we've done a craft market so we're back with a bang and will be there with our printing press offering a make and take all day long. 

So pop along and for £1 you can print your own card from existing designs (like my stag's head below) or for £3 you can buy a kit to cut your own lino and print on a variety of papers and card. 

So if you fancy a go at printing or are looking for a gift that's a little unique from the high street then come along.

See you there....

Renovating........

When I moved into my house 2 years ago I bought lots of second hand furniture with the idea to renovate it all and have a lovely house (little did I know how much time little people took up!). This summer I finally managed to complete the stool to go with my drawers and I was so excited I had to share it. I love it and my other half dosent get as enthusiastic as me. 

I picked them both up from my favourite charity shop in Romford, the Richard House Hospice on Victoria Road. It's a little treasure trove in there and I always walk out with something (Paul has now banned me from buying any more furniture, but it's just too addictive!)

When I started on the stool I found loads of layers where people in the past had renovated it as well.....

 

Here it is in all its glory.... with my little bundle hiding in the background...... 

I've been very busy.....

As usual we're a bit slack on the blogging front but we have real excuses this time....

This is my new little addition, Bethany Hannah Adams, who has been taking up my time:

So with the other little monkey they take up a lot of my time

She came 2 weeks late which was lucky as I worked right up until my due date. I've had a great time with all the kids at work, it didn't really feel like going to work especially as the parents were all really lovely too. They all made some amazing pieces, and it was a great atmosphere where they would share ideas with each other and help one another make things!

I didn't realise how much we made until I looked back at all the photo's. It's not everything, we'd be here all day otherwise, but here's some of them:

To start of with we did some fabric painting with a cultural theme, here's my Scandinavian and Egyptian samples we used as inspiration. We also made festive cards using mono printing techniques, one little boy made a tank and added glitter I think he'll be the next .....

Here we did Banksy style graffitti bags and pencil cases using fabric spray paints and stencils. I loved using the tulip fabric pens, reminded me of making things for my baby sister:

For one session the children wanted to make Christmas stockings but I couldn't find any canvas ones anywhere for us to decorate so I bought a few metres of calico and made up some myself, these made lots of children very happy!! We then fabric painted them and used fabric glitter pens to personalise: 

 We also covered cultural crafts so I did African inspired face masks, Greek shields, dragon puppets to celebrate the Chinese New Year (which some of the families took to China town to join in the celebrations!) and pencil cases fabric painted with Aboriginal designs:

Shamballa bracelets with the teenagers, it was the dads on this workshop who came into their element with knot tying!

Handmade notebooks, using fused plastic from shopping plastic bags (from our recycling theme).

We made some hand puppets with the little ones for 'Best time is book time' where all the puppets were based on characters they had made up, here was my Muddy Maureen based on a little girl who despite her mum and dad putting her in pretty dresses loved to play in the mud with the creepy crawlies (guess who this is based on?!):

Paper based crafts with glueing and sticking for really little ones. We made reindeers using their hand prints as the antlers, the paint was a little ambitious with the really little ones but they all loved it. I was finding glitter for weeks from making the festive birds!

This was one of my favourite ones, made during the mini beast course. So along with wormeries, butterflies and insect habitats we made these wire mini beasts to go into their flower pots:

I was really chuffed on my last day as all the parents bought me this lovely baby present, at the time I was so hormonal I got really choked up. So a big thank you again to all the mums, dads, grandad and kids for making this year so enjoyable and memorable.

Long time no hear......

I've been really quiet on the blog front and not posted in months. I've been working as a part-time teacher for Havering Adult College so i've been busy doing Family Learning workshops in schools which I love. The kids are great and its so nice to see them enjoying making things i've designed and they get so proud of their creations. We've been doing a whole variety of arts and crafts including African masks, printing with found objects, Greek Hoplite shields, celebration cards and a whole lot more.

On the home front, Eloise is enjoying being creative too and loves a bit of painting, though she still likes to have a little taste whilst using daddy's favourite t-shirt as a painting apron....

We also found out we're expecting another little girl, so I was a little wiped out at first with morning sickness but luckily its stopped now, though I think I may have just tempted fate!
Kirsten x