Fabric flag brooch wall display

The other day I was looking for the perfect brooch to complement my outfit. I have a huge brooch collection which I kept in a basket, but it wasn't the perfect solution because I was constantly digging through this basket to find the brooch I wanted and I was becoming worried about this causing damage to the brooches. On this particular day I decided I had had enough of the basket and that it was time to make a wall display!

This was super easy to make, so if you'd like to make one too, here's what you'll need:

- fabric
- scissors
- pins
- sewing machine/ needle and thread
- ruler/ measuring tape (or both!)
- dowel
- picture hanging kit
- thin wire (for hanging, you might get some with your kit!)
- electric drill
- wood saw (optional, but very useful!)
 

I pulled some cute pink fabric from my stash (leftovers from my Bee cosplay!), ironed it, and cut it into a rectangle. My rectangle was 70cm wide and 110cm long.

 

Then I measured out where I wanted the point on my flag to be. I measured to the middle of the bottom of the rectangle (i.e. 35cm from each side), measured 22cm up from the base on both sides, and then joined these marks together with a ruler.

 

Then I cut out the point and over-locked all the sides (except for the top because that was on the selvedge edge).
 

I used a matching thread to hem the over-locked edges.
 

 

I created a little pocket for the dowel to go through simply by folding down the top edge 5cm and sewing along the edge.

I drilled a hole in my wall and added the picture hanging kit. I cut a length of wire and wrapped it around the dowel once (at each end) and then twisted the remaining wire around itself to keep it secure. I found the wire kept slipping in towards the fabric and making the flag bunch up, so I used my saw to cut little grooves into the underside of the dowel; the wire sits in the groove and doesn't slip!

Then all I had to do was add all my pins and brooches to the flag! I love being able to see my brooches all at once and it's easy to add and remove them from the flag ^____^

- Lisa xx

Brooches, leather stamping, and glass painting

Hello! I wasn't sure what to show you today, as I haven't finished any new projects this week. However, I do have some little projects that I haven't shown you before so now I figured you could see all of them! ^____^

 I made this brooch for my friend Clare as a "leaving Perth" gift. I designed the image using Illustrator, printed it out, glued it to balsa wood, cut it out, coated it with mod podge, and attached a badge backing. Unfortunately, since I'm such a procrastinator, I didn't have time to take any photos of it before getting to the pub and giving it to Clare!

Luckily, she didn't mind me stealing it back for a few quick snaps ~____^ The tiny banner says "home is where the heart is", but Scott said I should have made it say "they can break a man's arm you know!" (you'll have to watch Hot Fuzz for that reference!) The brooch image is of a black swan on the Swan River (yup, that's what we called it! Clever and original, huh?), in front of the Perth skyline. I drive around and over the river on my way to work and the city, and I always love seeing the swans. I hope they will remind Clare of some fond Perth memories while she makes her new life in Melbourne ^___^

I used basically the same technique to make myself this Glow Cloud brooch. I used scrapbooking paper for the background, and a pen to write on the letters, and then mod podged it onto the balsa wood. I also coloured in the edges of the brooch with a black sharpie, which I really like the look of.

 

I made these little key ring charms for my brothers using leather, metal stamps (courtesy of Bek who knits), a black felt-tip pen, rivets (courtesy of Bec), and some large jump ring type things. As you can see, the red leather has more texture which made the stamping a little less visible; the black pen helps with that a bit, but overall the green leather worked out the best. I haven't actually given Brett his gift yet, but he doesn't read my blog so I think we're safe ~____^ Craig liked his, which was a pleasant surprise as they don't often appreciate handmade gifts.

I also made a key ring charm for Scott; this one is done on black leather but the stamping actually showed up quite well! Perhaps by this time I was actually using enough pressure when hitting the stamps ~____^

Emma from A Beautiful Mess painted some gorgeous cactus bottles, and I decided I simply had to give it a go myself! I don't have many colours of glass paint, but I had the primary colours so I mixed up some green and got painting. I've been using them as water bottles, which I think is much nicer looking than constantly reusing old plastic bottles. When I'm not using them, they also make a pretty little garden on my kitchen windowsill ^___^

And since I had my paints out, I decided to decorate the jars I use for making chia puddings and overnight oats in. I did some gems and an ice-cream cone, but my favourite is Space Kitty! They certainly brighten up my mornings ^____^

I've got skating tonight, and I'm sincerely hoping it's not as cold as last week - we were all breathing out fog and steam actually came off our limbs when we took off our knee and elbow guards! Brrr - think warm thoughts for me, please!

- Lisa xx

How to make stickers into brooches

Hello! I don't know if anyone else is like this, but I have a hard time using stickers. It's just like, once you use them, that's it! I know, it's weird - and I keep buying them hoping to find the perfect place to stick them to. This has resulted in me having quite a lot of stickers but I've finally discovered the perfect use: make them into brooches! Yes!

 

I started off with these two cute rollerskating stickers that I got from a Roller Derby bout (p.s. if you're in Perth you should come to the next WARD bout! I'll be on the sidelines cheering and dreaming of the day when I'd be good enough to join in! ^___^). I didn't want to stick them to my helmet because I thought they'd probably get ruined next time I hit the decks (this happens a lot) and I figured they'd be perfect for repping derby in my everyday life ^___^ I got a lot of questions at work on how I made them, so I decided to get out my sticker collection and make some more!

 

To make your own you'll need some thin balsa wood, a scalpel, jewellery hardware, E6000 glue, PVA glue or mod podge, and some fun stickers.

 

I just stuck my stickers directly to the balsa wood, but I noticed one of them moving around while I was wearing it yesterday so in future I would brush on a very thin layer of glue before adding the stickers.

Cutting them out with the scalpel is the most time consuming part! I used the time to catch up on some Welcome to Night Vale episodes ^___^

 

Lastly, use the E6000 to glue on the jewellery hardware and leave everything to dry.

 

I made three hair clips; the popcorn one has gotten a lot of lovely compliments at work ^___^

 

The larger stickers are the best ones for brooches, as you can't see the badge backing peeking out behind them. The Hello Kitty milk choco brooch was the easiest to cut out - square stickers are definitely the way to go if you want to make one of these brooches fast!

I made three sets of earrings from these tiny animal faces. The lions were tricky due to their manes, but I really love them! ^___^

 

Lastly, I made two larger earrings from some Maneki-neko stickers Pip brought back for me from Japan, and made a ring from a fan sticker from the same set.

I've still got a lot of stickers in my collection so I think I'll be making more of these in the future, and now I have an excuse to buy even more stickers ~____^

- Lisa xx

Hipster Princess Bubblegum costume

Sigh! Another Halloween has come and gone ... next year, when I'm not at uni, I plan to dedicate a lot more time to decorating and crafting and costume creation and just general Halloween shenanigans! However, I did still have a lovely Halloween, and I succeeded in making myself a costume so, without further ado, may I present ...

The hipster Princess Bubblegum! ^___^ Do people even do hipster versions of things anymore? This is how out of the loop I am. However, I have big, thick rimmed glasses and I didn't want to wear my contacts so this is the costume I went with! ^___^

 

The scarf, shorts, and shoes were thrifted (Bec actually found the shoes for me, so a shoutout to her! ^___^), and I already had the belt, top, tights, coffee cup, and bag so this was a fairly easy and inexpensive costume to put together.

 

After I made my crown, I guess I could have called it quits, but what is a hipster without some jewellery? (I actually don't even know. Do hipsters wear jewellery? I've heard they like triangles, do they wear triangles as jewellery?)

I watched this fantastic tutorial video by Nerd Burger and decided that I simply *must* have some donut jewellery. I'm not really sure if there are any donut people in Candy Kingdom, but I just couldn't resist.

They were really easy to make; make sure you check out the video as Cazz explains the process wonderfully. I already had some Super Sculpey in the beige colour that I used for the dough, and I picked up some pink and purple puff paints and blue and yellow sculpey from the craft store for the icing and sprinkles (I already had the sculpey in the other colours).

I made one purple donut into a brooch, and two smaller pink donuts into earrings, just by gluing the pin/earring backs on with E6000.

I also made this brooch using some of the light blue shimmery clay; mostly because I had this song in my head the entire time I was crafting things for this costume.

I also had a go at making a little Peppermint Butler brooch; it's not perfect (I need to work on making sure I don't leave nail marks on everything and I think his head stripes are too raised ...) but I think it's pretty cute anyway.

And, speaking of cute, you may have noticed that in the pictures above I have a little friend riding on my shoulder - Science the Candy Corn Rat! Yay! Pops de Milk made an adorable Science, and even shared the pattern for her so I knew I had to make one too ^___^

Patricia's pattern was lovely to follow; very simple to understand with with lots of pictures! (I always like to have photos to refer to so I can tell if I'm on the right track with a pattern!)

 

I did my Science's face differently in that I sewed on small felt shapes instead of using safety eyes and embroidery for the eyes and mouth respectively. I did actually have some 7mm safety eyes that I was going to use but when I put them in they just didn't look right. I didn't have any smaller ones, and I was too lazy to go back to the craft store, so I used felt instead! ^___^

One thing I must get better at doing is making the legs for amigurumi - mine always come out slightly bigger at the base than at the top and I think they are meant to be the same the whole way through. Practise makes perfect, I guess!

 

My Science also has more of a curly tail; this is probably because I crochet too tight. However, it may loose its curl in time so I'm not too concerned about it.

I also crocheted two more brooches (one can never have too many brooches, right? ~___^). For the lollipop I used a pattern by Twinkie Chan, but used part of a wooden skewer instead of crocheting a stick. For the sweet, I crocheted a rectangle, sewed it into a tube, put a scrunched up bit of paper in the middle, and then tied yarn around each side of a ball. Then I just glued brooch backings onto both of them ^___^

 

As always, there is so much more things I could have crafted for this costume (Peppermint Butler handbag, Lady Rainicorn bracelet, science glassware charm bracelet ...) but I think I did pretty well considering I was also finishing off an assignment ~___^

The zombie project I was planning has pretty much completely fallen through at this stage so I'm not sure if that will be appearing on here anytime soon, which is a pity since I still think it's a cool idea! I might keep working on it. I've still got eight tiny donuts to make into something though (plus three major essays, blah!) so I've got enough to keep me busy. I'm thinking maybe a bracelet? Or magnets? Or more hair bows? Hmmm.

Until next week!

- Lisa xx

Foxy face brooches

Hello! Do you get any craft magazines? I get *a lot* ... probably too many! ~___^ Mollie Makes is one of my favourites, but I almost never get around to making any of the projects that come in the free kits. Which is a pity, as they are totally adorable!

But, this week, I realised that I couldn't show you any of the three long-term projects I've been working on (yet! I will show you soon!) so I pulled out the train case I keep full of magazine kits and decided this one was the perfect one to make ^___^
 

The felt in this kit is a lot stiffer than the felt I normally work with, but it worked really well for this project. The cream part of the fox face is just one thickness of felt, so having the stiffer felt means that it retains its shape very well.

 

The pattern for the foxes included the design for the sleepy eyes, as seen on the orange fox, but I gave my pink fox some happy eyes - just for something different! ^___^

 

Also, I had absolutely no idea how to do the stab stitch in the way the magazine had pictured, so I did a running stitch instead. It worked out fine! But I do want to know how to do the stab stitch now; any stitching experts out there who could give me some pointers? 

I reckon I'll wear these cuties as sweater clips, because it's finally getting cold enough here to actually wear cardigans! I'm so excited! Last night I was wearing pants, socks, a jumper, *and* a hat - it was actually lovely ^___^ Anyway, I best get back to my knitting - I can't wait to show you this project! But I have to finish it first; hopefully with practice I will one day be able to knit faster than at a snail's pace! ~___^

- Lisa xx