Hippy New Year!

Well, I for one am very glad that 2011 is over; it was a truly rubbish year for lots of reasons. Sadly the Uberhound passed away and left a very big gap in our lives….we adopted another puppy to help to fill the void, but sadly the puppy died of parvo virus four days after we brought him home.

Our holiday to the Forest of Dean was a very subdued affair, particularly as we’d chosen it because there were lots of places for doggy adventures.  

But life goes on and we went to lots of places (although we didn’t see any wild hogs like we wanted to).

We even went on an old steam train

We also visited Puzzlewood where they film Merlin – what a great place!!

The Barefoot festival that I volunteer at with a friend was as good as usual…in a new bigger location and the usual fab cabaret and fire show.

Halloween was a fun night – we dressed up and scared all the local children

The Autumn term was really manic as usual, we had an OFSTED visit, plus observations, so that pretty much took up the whole term.

The Hafla was  great although very exhausting as I’d managed to put myself in a position where I was doing 5 dances, including my very first Tribal performance! This involved four costume changes!! *lol*

Alot of my pre-Christmas time was taken up with crafting a pair of fairy wings for my friend – I was quite pleased with the results!

Christmas was great, as was New Year. I fully intend to spend alot more time crafting this year and have kicked the New Year off to the right start by organising the first Winter Hippy Swap on Craftster, so hopefully there’ll be some more creations to show you soon!

A Happy New Year to you all!

Well, here we are, the start of another year…I hope that your Christmas was a special one, and that your year to come will be happy, and healthy, and as prosperous as it can be in the current economic climate!

I remember that I didn’t show the card that I designed for school; it’s a photograph that I took last year with a bit of Photoshop tinkering. It looks nice all printed up and glossy and it’s nice knowing that all the parents, business associates, etc will have received one this year.

 

I was very fortunate this year to receive a new computer which hooks up to the TV that I got for my birthday so that my little craft and work station is truly multi-functional; I don’t really watch telly much, but I do watch DVD’s, and stuff on the internet more, especially when I’m working. It’s such a cute little PC and it fit's right onto the shelf where all my stuff is stored. Apologies for the wires n stuff, but it’s stashed in it’s home now and I didn’t get a chance to photograph it before it was hooked up in it’s new home of Christmas day. The keyboard is usually stored on top of the tower since I usually use it on my lap.

 

 

I also got a new graphics tablet which hooks up to it and will help my budding Photoshop skills (okay, they’re pre-buds at the moment, but I’m working on it!) The PC came with PS Elements already on it so I can practice with that first. I have the main program on disc somewhere ready to whack on when I get around to it. I’ve also managed to network it with the main PC so that I can access all the files on there, so even when M’s playing a game, I can still get on with work *sigh*

I also received a rainbow maker; a handy little solar powered thingy which you sucker to a window and the mechanism turns the crystal round and reflects rainbows around the room! I already had one, but it’s old and it doesn’t turn anymore, so this one will go in it’s place and give me rainbows again!

 

 

I got a cute dragon incense burner which is guarding the telly downstairs at the moment…

 

 

What’s that he’s guarding? Why it’s our fossil collection…all the fossils we found on holiday this year!

 

 

and a make your own amethyst crystal tree (with free glue gun!)… and some lush bath bombs…

 

 

Even my Secret Santa gifts were awesome this year, I had a bundle of beads (which will always go down well with me!) and a cupcake book (which I am putting away somewhere I can’t see it for a while since it is now time to Watch What I Eat (codeword meaning I gotta shift the festive flab – you know what I mean…all those Christmas dinners…all those munchies…all that sitting around gaming!)

 

I managed to complete SuperMario Galaxy at last and also Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince which I got for my birthday (on the Wii)! I have played Wii Just Dance a few times, but it’s no fun on your own, so I’m gonna see if I can get the girlies together for a girlie night… this will be a mission in itself since both of my best friends work shifts, usually nights and most weekends! This makes it hard to see them at the same time since their shifts rarely coincide, and hard to have a weekend night with them since their days off change from week to week *sigh*   

  

I always try to do a little recap at the end of a year and reflect on what I’ve achieved because it’s really easy to look back and only see the bad things.

So here are some of the projects I’ve done this year!

I’ve learnt Tunisian crochet, I’ve made chutney for the first time, I made elderberry jam from the berries in our garden, I went fossil hunting, I danced in two haflas and I started Geocaching. We bottle-fed some baby lambs, hand fed some deer's, we went to Alton Towers, spent two weeks in Devon and a long weekend in Norfolk, I marshalled at a festival and went to the Rage Against The Machine free gig in Finsbury Park. I’ve organised and participated in some swaps, we eventually had our floor laminated and celebrated lots of birthdays. It’s been a good year!

 

 

Here are some of the photos that I’ve taken over the year that I love!

 

Hope your year has been as good as mine 

A Very Merry Yuletide…

Well, here we are, it’s nearly Christmas and I haven’t blogged for aaaages! Sorry if you’ve been a regular reader awaiting my crafty updates, but this last term has been very very time consuming! But that doesn’t mean that I haven’t been creating, ‘coz I have!

Soo, what have I been up to since my last blog, which was my Blogoversary?

Well, I went to the Barefoot Festival with some friends. I volunteer there every year; it’s a festival of dance and other goddess-y things,

There’s always a great show on the Saturday night, followed by an amazing fire show

M and I went to Lyme Regis for a holiday in the caravan. The weather wasn’t great; in fact there were alot of days when I couldn’t see my hand in front of my face! But we did some fossil hunting along the Jurassic Coast, finding lots of great fossils

 

We went to the Donkey Sanctuary, Monkey World (also a sanctuary) and lots of other great places.

Term time has been really busy; observations and OFSTED visits have been very much the order of the day…very stressy! Still, I have been able to get some therapeutic crafting done

 

 

 

Trousers have been embellished…

And brooches have been made – these are some reclaimed jumpers, felted and then needle felted and embellished.

This brooch I love, it’s made from scraps of netting with a shisha mirror and some beads…it goes really well with my black velvet swing coat!

I’ve really been getting into Geocaching this year as well. It’s a kind of treasure hunting…you follow the clues to find the cache (usually a box with some swappy things inside, and a log book to sign)

I normally go with the Uberhound…it gives our walks a purpose and I’ve been to some lovely places this year that I knew nothing about before! I usually take my camera and I’ve got some great shots!

 

We also had our annual Christmas Hafla where I ended up dancing three dances!

 

 

So, the last couple of months in a couple of photos!!

I promise not to leave it so long before I blog again…

The Happy Happy Hippy Swap…

Each year I organise the Hippy Swap over on Craftster. It’s become like a tradition; I finish school, I have more time for crafting and sitting for hours staring at a computer screen trawling through crafty sites…you know how it is! The weather has been quite nice here, so I’ve spent alot of time in my garden, digging and planting, and moving stuff around. Look here, this is the first ever water lily to grow in my tiny water garden (big water filled bowl) and it’s soo pretty! It’s a dwarf water lily.

I’ve also done a little bit of crafting for me. This was an old t-shirt that’d been sitting around waiting for me to finish. I’d done a little bit of re-fashioning on it, cutting on the crew neck (which I’m really not find of) and creating a v-neck, trimmed with pink and gold gauzy ribbon. And then I ran out of inspiration….it sat there for quite a while waiting for the right idea. Anyway, after doing a couple of refashioning workshops, I decided that what this t-shirt needed was a bit of appliqué. And so the butterfly t-shirt was born. Or rather, sewn.

 

 

I freehand drew a butterfly outline on some paper, transferred it onto Bondaweb, ironed it to some pretty pink fabric and cut out the butterfly shape. Then I ironed it onto some purple fabric and cut round it so that you could see the purple round the pink. I made a body and some spots out of the purple fabric too and ironed them on.

Then I embroidered round them using a blanket stitch and some pink and gold threads. I also added some gold sequins for a bit of sparkle. Much better!

 

So then I concentrated on my hippy swap package. I can now post photos because my partner’s received the package and I’ve received hers! Because my partner was in the UK, I knitted a nice warm hat for the cold weather which is very practical for this country. This is the Meret by Woolly Wormhead, it’s one of my favourite patterns. I made it a slouchy hat…  

 

with a combination rolled/ribbed edge.

 

I used a lovely warm brown…

I also needle felted and embellished this felt brooch, made from an old fulled jumper. It has green sequins and beads along the edge. I love needle felting, it’s so therapeutic stabbing away!!

 

Since my partner is a beginner belly dancer and wanted a coin belt, I decided to make her one. Her favourite colours were very autumnal, greens and browns and golds. It’s wonderfully jingly!

 

I also used some decorative ribbon and sequin strands for some sparkle.

I made sure that even the ends looked good!

And because you just have to wear flowers in your hair when you’re dancing, I made this lily hair clip. I used a flower from a cheap ‘pound shop’ artificial ‘bouquet’ and coated the edges in glitter glue…

 

Then I glued a spring clip underneath, making sure to hide alot of the clip in the leaves. I like to tuck flowers in my hair by my ear and I find the flowers on clips stay better than on bands.

My partner likes to write notes and lists in a notebook, so I also made her a felt notebook cover which she can take off when the notebook is full and change to another notebook. I covered it using the ‘paper fabric’ technique I learnt at a workshop a couple of months ago, and then embellished it using embroidery threads, flowers and sequins.

 

Hopefully using felt will make it quite durable…

 

I also used Angelina Fibres on it which are such fun to work with!

The notebook is just a cheap and cheerful A5 hardback notebook.

 

I sent along one of the rainbow light bulbs from my shop, because they are just so damned hippy-ish!

And in the spirit of eco-friendly hippy crafts, I upcycled an old Ferrero Rocher plastic box, and decorated it using glass paints.

 

It looks lovely in the sunshine.

I’m kind of an overachiever and I do tend to spoil my swap partners, and well, hippy crafting is such good fun, that I had to make some extras for the package, but I’d agreed with my partner that we’d do extras, so that was fine and dandy. I made a green and brown beaded necklace with a Celtic pendant, since my partner loves all things Celtic, and greens and browns….

 

I had planned to do a bit of hippy-like appliqué, but I just couldn’t find the right image, then I noticed that I had some green fabric left from my belly dance costume that would go really well with this top, and some green organza that complimented it really well, and the top sort of morphed and became a sort of woodland fairy type of top instead.

I made some ruffles by tearing two strips of fabric which were much much longer than the bit that I wanted to embellish. I sewed a running stitch along the middle of each strip and pulled so that it gathered it up. Then I sewed it into place. I did the organza one first, then the satin ruffle, the I sewed a faceted bead every cm or so. The fabrics  should fray and look pretty…. 

 

I also painted an ash catcher green, then decoupaged it with a sunflower and sparkly Modge Podge. I varnished it to make sure it was durable. This didn’t photograph so well, so you’ll have to take my word for it that there’s a sunflower on it!

To see what I received in return, click here. We were both very happy hippies!