Making a fabric angel

Here's my latest project, made using elements of the 'Resolutions' Quirky Kit - a festive fabric angel: The main body of the doll was made from a section of the 29x19 inch piece of heavy cotton canvas in the kit, and as I promised in the post on my blog yesterday [where there are more images] here's a quick tutorial on how you can turn your blank canvas into your own heavenly host!

To make the body:

• Pin together two layers of fabric.
• In pencil draw a basic angel shaped outline onto the canvas:

• Cut around the outline - through both layers of fabric at the same time - you should now have a front and back section.
• Pin them together.
• You can either tack around the edges or run directly through the sewing machine [or hand stitch if you prefer].
• Starting at the bottom of the skirt stitch up one edge towards and around the head and then back down the other side.
• NOTE: DO NOT stitch the bottom of the skirt closed. This must be left open so that you can turn the shell inside out and then pack in the filling.
• Turn the shell inside out.
• If you haven't any wadding you can stuff the body with the filling from an old pillow or cushion. Failing that - socks / tights could also work but may be slightly lumpy. Cotton wool could also work [but beware not to ever get it wet!].
• You can use the handle of a long, thin paintbrush [or similar tool] to help push your filling into the body. The dolls look their best and stand tall and firm when the wadding is packed in very tightly.
  
  
  


• Once the body is filled you can sew the bottom of the skirt closed. However, as I wanted to keep the raw edge of my fabric visible - I cut a disk of fabric and glued it inside the skirt to close the body and prevent the stuffing escaping!
• I used Hi-Tack Fast Tack glue which is great for sticking fabric ..and almost everything else too.

To make the wings:

• Take one piece of the golden yellow netting and make a running stitch along the centre line - from top to bottom.
• Gently pull your thread to gather the fabric together.

• Stitch the gathered fabric to the centre of the back of the doll:

• Once the wings are secure - decide on the shape and size you'd like them and trim the ends to suit.

To make the halo + face:

• For the halo you can either use the off-cuts from where you trimmed the wings or a another sheet of netting if you need to.
• Make a running stitch along the off-cuts / lengths of netting and then pull thread to gather the netting.
• Stitch the gathered sections around the outer part of the head section.
  
  


• Glue on the glitter cabochons [from the 'Resolutions' kit] and add golden / yellow buttons and beads.
• Cut a small ovel of felt for the face.
• Make a few simple stitches for eyes and a mouth.
• Cut a scrap of fabric for the hair and glue or stitch to the face - then glue or stitch this to the doll.

Finishing touches:

• You can now have great fun choosing choosing how to decorate your angel's robes.
• The second trimming down is a length of Italian cotton lace from the kit - everything else came from my own ribbon box. As this is only meant as a decorative item [not a toy] I simply glued the trimmings in place around the body.
• Again, for this I used Hi-Tack Fast Tack glue. Where the ends of each ribbon met, I pushed in some pearl headed pins [temporarily] to prevent the ends them from curling up as they dried. Once the glue begins to 'set' - remove the pins.
• You can add any other finising touches you wish - eg. you might want to add some hands amde from felt, or wrap ribbons aaround the entire length of the body and skirt.

You could attach a ribbon loop to the back so she can be hung up on a tree or simply find her a nice cosy place to stand and watch over your Christmas festivities!

Or ...you can use this as inspiration to make a doll for any time throughout the year - you don't have to create a Christmas angel. The basic structure can easily be adapted to create any style or theme of doll you wish!

If you do make a doll like mine - I'd love to see it. You can always share it, along with any projects you make using the Quirky Kits, by:

• uploading it to the Crafty Templates gallery on Flickr or;
• if you post your wok on your blog, leave a comment and include a link or;
• join the Quirky Kits thread on the UKScrapppers forum where you can chat to others who know and love the kits.

I hope you've enjoyed my festive take one the 'Resolutions' kit. Have a wonderful Christmas time, may you have good food, good company, great gifts ...and at least one moment of time to yourself! Whether you fill it with crafting or eating chocalate is entirely up to you!!

Julie :)

Further 'Resolutions'

Hi all.

In my previous post I created a layout using some of the more striking papers from the latest Quirky Kit: 'Resolutions' and I said I'd folow this up with the softer side of this versatile kit. And here it is:

In a complete contrast to the fuchsia and teal Hambly papers of last time, here I enhanced my country cottage photographs by selecting the cream and brown of the Making Memories 'Vintage Findings', Crate Paper 'Cottage Coco' and 'Cottage Porch'.

To reflect the misty atmosphere within the photos I surrounded them with the grey netting from the kit. I cut the section of netting in half, placed it under the photo [which I stuck down with double-sided tape] and then randomly gathered and folded, securing it by stitching a sequin [again from the kit] on top.

The journaling block I've used on the page below is actually the tag which the 'Vintage Chic' buttons [on sale in the Embellishments Shop] come attached to. I'd added one of the vintage buttons next to the journaling block on the left hand page and one in the centre of the bow I made from the ribbon on the kit, on the top of the right hand side page.

As my journaling mentions, the surroundings of the cottage felt very Bronte-esque, so it was especially appropriate that the vintage book pages in my kit came from a Charlotte Bronte novel! I crumpled them and swiped a Distress Ink pad over them to add a further aged feel before adding them behind my photos.

So far I've shown you three layouts which have been made almost entirely from the supplies within the 'Resolutions' kit ... and I've still got lots left over, including all that lovely white fabric which is just asking to be painted, stamped on and /or stitched!! As soon as I create somthing with it I'll share the results with you and if you get there first, let me know by leaving me a comment, a link or dropping any photos of your 'Resolutions' projects in the Crafty Templates Flickr Group.

Happy crafting.

Julie :)

Quirky Kit: Making [with] 'Resolutions'.

For me, making pages with the new Quirky Kit: 'Resolutions', has been a lot easier than making [and keeping] the kind of resolutions I used to make at the start of a new year. Partly because I'm not as self-disciplined as I'd like to be and can't really stick to rules I set for myself!! But mainly because this kit is so flexible that it allowed me to tackle scrapping with a range of photos and in a range of styles with just one new kit.

At the time of writing I have made three layouts and have two more planned and they all look quite, quite different. Let me make a start on demonstrating just how wide ranging in styles the kit actually is.

Here's the first layout in which I combined three of the brightest and boldest patterned papers. As you might be able to tell from my leopard print cardigan with stripey dress combo - I love to mix patterns! So I had great fun combining the sharp floral graphics of the Crate Paper 'Rose Garden', with the circles and houndstooth of the two Hambly papers:

The photo was taken at my parent's Ruby wedding anniversary party this October and due to a combination of my clothes and the camera it was taken on, it feels like a rather nostalgic, retro-looking snap-shot. More 1959 than 2009 in some ways.

Once I had the main body of the page completed I turned to play with the fabulous, totally retro-inspired glitter cabouchons!!! I chose the red, purple and teal cabouchons and set about forming a festive, glittery, vintage cluster down the side of the photo: The extra buttons I used in the cluster were a pack of the 'Vintage Chic' buttons from the 'Embellishments' section of the shop.

After using many of the brightest, most vivid, elements from the kit on one layout I was ready for something quieter and which used the grey netting from the kit ....something a bit like this in fact: I'll share with you very soon how I pulled out the more neutral tones within the 'Resolutions' kit for use on an atmospheric and wintry double layout.

Until then, enjoy your kit and don't forget to share your projects with us in the Crafty Templates Flickr gallery.

Julie :)

Quirky Kit - Make a Canvas Mini

Yey there's a new Quirky kit! 'Resolutions' is out now you can have a peek and grab one here.

When I was putting the Resolutions kit together I thought about all the fun things I wanted to use and try out both now and into next year. One of the main things I scribbled down a few times was canvas. I'm no stranger to canvas having studied for a degree in painting and print but I never really appreciated how chameleon like it could be. A blank piece of canvas is really that - a totally blank canvas with so many possibilities! You can keep to painting on it, you can use it to make something with maybe fashioning it into something to use or wear. So anyway if you're sitting with your kit and wondering where to start how about starting with a blank canvas? I put this project together to make a canvas mini book, when I say mini I mean mini. The one I made is 3x3 inches but the idea is totally adaptable, you could make an even smaller book or a much larger one if you wanted to. I made mine small for a couple of reasons. 1 - I only wanted to use a small amount of the canvas in the kit because I have plans to use more of it and 2 - I like small books they're less daunting and you can take them around with you if you so wish, great for idle doodling moments.

Canvas Mini

You'll need to gather some of the cardboard packaging your kit came with (The 12x12 sheets are brilliant for reusing ). The canvas fabric from your kit. A long piece of jewellery cord or other thick string type stuff, {something to tie your pages together with} and some double sided tape. Optional extras are white paint, a sewing machine and an old page protector.

Start by cutting your cardboard in to three pieces. You'll need to decide how big you want to make your album, mine is 3x3 inches so I cut out two pieces of 3x3 inch cardboard and one piece 1x3 inches that forms the spine. If you think your spine will need to be larger than 1 inch make it larger it depends on how many pages you want to fill it with. 1 inch will fit 10 pages easily.

Next lay your pieces of cardboard on your piece of canvas so they're about 5mm apart and cut out a piece that's about an inch away from the edges. Stick the pieces of card on to the canvas in the same position with a small amount of double sided tape then apply more double sided tape along the edges of the cardboard.

Next peel the backing off the tape and fold in then stick down each of the four corners of the canvas.

After folding the corners fold up the straight edges of the canvas and stick them down. Make sure the canvas is pulled around the edges of the card so it's nice and flat on the reverse side.

Next cut out three pieces of patterned paper each one slightly smaller than you cut your pieces of card. Stick these over the top of your front and back cover pieces so they cover over the raw edges of the canvas and any bits of the card still showing. If you want to, use a sewing machine to stitch all around the edge of the paper. It makes a nice decorative touch to the inside and outside of your book. make sure you test the tension on your machine so it will go though all those layers, I experimented with a spare bit of cardboard and settled on the number 2 tension setting on my machine and I used the biggest stitch on the dial (4). Because the cardboard packaging is corrugated it's nice and squidgy so sews quite well - if you're using a thicker board like greyboard or chipboard I wouldn't recommend sewing it all in one but you could sew on the canvas before you glue it to your board if you really wanted the effect. When you've finished covering the inside of your book mark two places to punch holes on the spine, one at the top and one at the bottom.

Punch out the holes then set eyelets or grommets in them. I used a cropodile but you can use any setting tool you have. You'll need to fit two pieces of your cord through the holes so make sure that what eyelets you're using are large enough.

This next part is the fun bit - deciding what to fill your album with! Because I want my book to be a blank canvas I picked out page protectors {made from one large one into small mini 3x3 inch ones with my sewing machine} and blank pieces of the canvas fabric prepainted with white paint. Mark the place the holes need to be from the inside of your album and punch them out. I worked out it made a cleaner cut in the canvas when I punched them out in a stack rather than one at a time. You don't have to have the same pages for your book, use other things from the kit or more of the cardboard packaging or other things from your stash.

Once you have your pages cut your piece of cord {or whatever you're stringing your book together with} into two pieces, keep them long - you can always cut some off but you can't add it on and the length will depend on what your page thickness is. Thread a piece of cord through the top holes and a piece through the bottom holes of your pages.

 Hold the two pieces of cord together and thread the top pieces through the top hole of your cover and the bottom pieces through the bottom hole.

Don't tie your ends together right away and don't pull them tight. Open out each page of your book in turn so each page opens out flat. The cord should billow outward as you do this like a ring. This will make sure all your pages open out neatly. Keep the cord in this position and then tie it together on the front, keep the knot lose just in case you want to add anything else. When your book is completed you can always go back and make your knot tighter or glued together to secure it. That's it your book is complete!

At least complete in the sense that it's a blank canvas. The next bit is filling it up with good stuff and that step is yours to fill. Have fun!

I've got lots more stuff planned to make, one of my next projects is a pencil case - told you I had other plans for more of that canvas! Hope everyone is enjoying the kits.

xx Leo

New Embellishy Goodies in store

I think I can say I do love to find pretty things to use in paper crafts - in fact I think I can say it's defo one of my favorite things! I've been busy picking out some of these said pretty things to put in the store. You'll notice lots of the things are packaged to not only make them look really cute in your craft space but also with a nod to another one of my favorite things, up-cycling! That's taking things that might have once had a purpose and prettifying them into new things - or to you and me cool extra freebie stuff we can use in our crafting!
The buttons come on decorative cards or tags like these that you can re-use... Most of the ribbons and laces you get dolly pegs with which you can use as pegs or you can use to hold papers together or decorate mini books like this...
I've put some of these card blanks in the store too they're from a company called Eco Crafts and they're 100% recycled. I use them a lot they're fab. They come to you from me in a little bale like this so there's no excess packaging and don't forget to reuse that lovely twine....

You could use it on one of the cards you make up like this.......
I also use recycled textured kraft paper to print up your receipts on, which you probably would have noticed if you've already got an order. You could chop out your receipt part to save and reuse the excess paper on that if you feel the need although even I think that maybe taking it a little bit too far....just a little bit... it is rather nice to stamp on to though, I did have a go at that. :)

You can check out all the new embellishment goodies in the store here. Look out for more coming in soon too.
xx Leo

P.S the new Quirky kit I'm getting asked when it's out - it should be ready around the beginning of November, there is a mailing list you can go on to be notified as soon as it's on the site, all the details on how to sign up are on the Quirky Kits page of the store here.

'Resolutions' Quirky Kit sneek peek!!

Did you know that Crafty Templates now has it's own Flickr gallery? For those of you who haven't already visited it you can find it here .

It's a place for anyone to upload and share photos of projects they've made using any kits past, present ....and future. Yes, the eagle eyed amongst you may have noticed that Leo sneakily uploaded to Flickr a peek at the upcoming 'Resolutions' Quirky Kit:

Regarding the kit Leo says: "I've been getting inspiration from fashion for this kit which at the moment is a little bit modern retro - 50's pattern with 80's colours. The colours are mauve, chocolate, teal, lime, peach (only a little bit but trust me it works) and grey. It's going to have canvas too so start collecting your paints together Hoping to get it all done for early November, might even be a bit earlier than that."

I'm really looking forward to using this kit, particularly as those colours are some of my favourites right now and,as Leo says they're also strong colours in the fashion world too. In fact, if you want to see just how 'on trend' the next Quirky Kit is don't just take it from me or Leo ...let Elle magazine demonstrate it!! I've just blogged about it all here.

Once the kit is out we'll be back, sharing our Quirky 'Resolutions' projects with you. Until then .... do pop over to the Crafty Templates Flickr group and share your projects with us.

Julie :)

Mixing it up with your kit leftovers!

So when you have delved into your crafting kits you always end up with a bunch of stuff leftover right? So what do you do with it? Well don't consign it to the waste paper basket - jam all your leftover bits and bats together, sprinkle a little bit of something new in and see what you can come up with. Not only is it handy to use up your leftovers it also gives you great inspiration putting things together you might not have thought about before!

Here's a quick idea making a bracelet and using up a small square of fabric this one is from the Hot Date Quirky Kit. I also added some my leftover pearl beads from the same kit and added some wooden beads from my stash........How to:
To make the fabric bead you'll need a piece of fabric, here I've cut a piece out so the motif is in the center. Cut it out as a square and then snip off the corners. A piece of thick card cut into a circle the same size as the motif on your fabric or if you;re using an all over patterned fabric make it the same size as the bead you want to make. A needle and thread and a piece of wadding.
Turn the fabric over and make a running stitch around the edge of your fabric piece. Put the wadding in the middle of it then put the card piece on top. Push everything down and at the same time pull your needle to make the fabric tight around the edge. Add more stitches running across the back from side to side and top to bottom until the bead is formed and the fabric is nice and tight.

Cut another piece of fabric out to cover the back of your bead. To make a space for your thread to go though make two holes in the fabric and thread through a piece of elastic then tie it tight and trim it down.


Sew or glue the piece of fabric to the back of your bead.

Thread some beads on a piece of elastic threading on your fabric bead in the center. Make sure it;s the correct size for your wrist then when you're happy tie the elastic ends together in a double knot and trim the ends.
Want to make a piece of jewellery as a gift? You can also reuse your Quirky Kit packaging, not just pretty for being pretty but pretty useful too!

Cards are a great way to use up leftovers. Here I mixed up a piece of the wood grain sticky back plastic from the Hot Date kit with a cut out embellishment and a scrap of Bazzill card from the Juicy Fruit kit plus some American Crafts Thickers alphabet stickers from my stash....

How to:

Cut a piece of card to 4x12 inches and fold in half to make a 4x6 card blank (will fit a C6 size envelope).

Cut a piece of wood grain sticky back plastic to 2.5x4.5 inches and stick it to a piece of thick card packaging. Cut it out then add the letters and the cut out pear from the Kitschy Digital sheet stuck on with 3D foam pads to give it dimension to match the Thickers.

Stick this panel to your card blank to finish.

Add an extra finishing touch by stitching a vintage button to the flap of your envelope. The envelope used here is from the 'Fresh Baked' card kit, vintage buttons are available here.

Scraps are a great way of making up a quirky scrapbook layout. Collect together some pieces from your past kits and play around with them on a page. Here I used the leftover Bazzill card (from making the card above) notecards and buttons from the 'Note to Self' Quirky kit, wood grain tape and fabric from the Hot Date Quirky Kit plus stamps, paint and American Crafts Flair from my stash. How to:

Trim down the green card then sew it to the pink card with a sewing machine (or you can doodle fake stitches). Apply pink acrylic paint to the edge of a notecard with a dry brush. Brush over the stitching with more paint, again applying it with a dry brush. Layer the painted norecard with another notecard on your page and stick down once your happy. Cut out two pieces of the wood grain tape, tear one end and cut the other at an angle then apply a piece to the top and bottom of your notecards. Add your photo to one corner of the notecards and embellish further with buttons, fabric and the Flair button badge.

Add journalling to the note card to finish. I've done my journalling with stamps and tape to add more texture and interest.

So grab your kit leftovers mix them up together and see what combinations you can come up with. Have fun!

xx Leo