Catch up

I have been busy in the last two weeks, honest - but I haven't much to show for it really

I made a larger fabric panel [like the ones for the fabric book] and added it to the front of a bought canvas shopping bag. I like the effect but I wish I had used a bag with long handles as I would get more use out of it. Also the layered chains and charms at the top left keep getting tangled so, although I like the movement when they are not tangled, I might have to add a few catching stitches.

I also decorated a cardboard box for my daughters friend, Debbie, who has just had a baby girl. Harriet arrived over ten weeks early so she isn't home yet but I'm looking forward to a cuddle once she is - well done Debbie.

I also had a go at frantageing [don't think it's a real word so it probably doesn't matter how it's spelt] some chipboard baubles as demonstrated by Sue from The Stampman at the Leeds Grammar School Craft Show last sunday. It is a lovely show, maybe 30 stands [so I have a greater chance of remembering why I bought what I did and also what I've seen demonstrated] and quite a variety of craft good on offer. I did mean to go back to a couple of the stalls, for heavier items I didn't want to carry round for too long, but I ran out of time [which was good for my purse I suppose] as I was due at my mums for sunday lunch.

I was talking to Kay from Indigo-blu as well and she said the best way to do ute casting is to use the melt pot as it keeps the molten ute more fluid than using a pie tray and heat gun. I have a melt pot so I'll have to actually open the packaging and try it out [I've had it years but for some reason I've never got round to using it - may have something to do with not wanting to tackle cleaning it out!]. My moulding compound arrived from Germany [no customs charges hurray] so I'll have to mix some smaller amounts and get mould making. Maybe I can salvage a few that I already made by adding bases to them.

I also finally joined the create and craft club [I couldn't resist the docrafts fairy dvd - I was obbsessed with the images when they came out last year], so I bought the felting machine Jenny Rayment was demonstrating. I obviously wasn't watching properly because I broke 4 of the needles straight away as I was feeding my material between the foot and the needles and it all bunched up in the finger guard. I was getting very annoyed with the machine and muttering rude words until I realised the material was suppoised to go under the foot - I felt [no pun intended] so stupid!. I'll have to have another go when I have got some wool fabrics to try - it might be best to get the hang of it with the correct materials before I go off piste.

Sara x

Other bits

When I was taking photos of the casts for the last post I found some other bits that I took photos of, as I don't think I got round to putting them on here before.

Backgrounds made in Art Journalling at Art from the Heart:

Using Dinah Wakely stamps

and Dyans ghosted leaves or faux bleaching technique [I can't remember which sorry].

Some more pages in my altered book - that I'm still sporadically playing with.

It is more than half done - but the other book that I started when I repeated the weekend [because I was so enthralled the first time] has been totally neglected.

I did take more but they are portrait not landscape and although I used picassa to rotate them blogger seems to pull them in with the original orientation [I haven't worked out how to sort it yet so I un-uploaded them].

And finally I tried making a card using the frantage technique that is so popular at the moment.

I quite like it but it needs more shade to make it pop a bit better.

Sara x

Moulds

We did some plaster moulding at the Artsy Craft event and Andrea [being much more organised than me] kindly sent me some buttons she made after she got home.

They are beautiful, really delicate, detailed and thin - so I was inspired to try and make some myself. I wandered round the house looking for things that might make a good cast and in the end I had about 30 objects to try. Then I couldn't find my moulding compound anywhere [I was sure I had a pack somewhere] so eventually I gave in and bought some more in Hobbycraft. Being a greedy sort of person I bought the 300g pack which was a big mistake. I was only going to mix part of the pack but I decided I couldn't estimate half acurately so I kneaded all of it together. I'm not sure if I mixed it for too long or what but before I got more than a third of it used up it went off. Another part of the problem was that I was taking too long to make each mould as I was being stingy with the compound [which is ironic given how much I wasted anyway] so a lot of the moulds I did make are not very good, they either won't stand up because I didn't leave enough material at the base or they leak.

I mixed up some plaster [too much again as it turned out] and poured it into the better moulds. Then the phone rang and by the time I finished talking to my mum the rest had set solid in the mixing jug I was using [it did come out eventually].

Fortunately I also had some purchased moulds of faces otherwise I would have wasted even more plaster.

I also had a go at filling the moulds with molten ute. This is much harder to get runny so most of my moulds are somewhat thick. My heat gun got so hot whilst I was trying to get the ute runnier that it started to melt itself!

These are my favourites - the mould was made from a small face pendant I bought at the Mind Body & Spirit show at Elland Road last Sunday.

I decided to buy some more of the moulding compound and the best deal I could find was on Amazon for 1000g. Turns out it has to come from Germany - hope I don't get stung for customs charges.

And of course after ordering the stuff I was looking for something else and found not one but two packs of moulding compound!

Sara x