A huge post! (incl. cupcake walk #2 with my friend; stitch b*tch :)

Hello,



Today I bring you a very, very full post! Full of lots of lovely costumes and cakes, shall we begin....?

First up I thought I would show you all the most recent pictures of my Line and form project (collaboration with a designer :). Here is my finished toile- which basically means the mock up of the garment to get the fit perfect:

I have now started to make it up for final as I had my fittings this week and made the small alterations to the patterns needed. Now I have got to power on and get it finished perfectly! I am really enjoying this project though, as we are learning all the skills needed to interpret a designers sketch- something that really intrigues me as,  as well as bridal, couture fashion clothing making (being in an Atelier and interpreting fashion designers sketches) is something that I would really liked to be involved in in the future :)

Talking of bridal though- I did a bit more work experience on Saturday for Sharon, the lady who let me help out with the bridal fashion show. She has just opened a new bridal boutique. I was front of house in it on Saturday. I managed to make an appointment for a bride to come in to try dresses on so I was very happy! Hehe, here was my view from my mirrored desk (ooh fancy! :-):

On to more lovely things now....

....today I was walking around London for about 5 hours- no exaggeration as first I went to see the Graduate show for all the 3rd years at my college at the OXO Tower Bargehouse and then I went onto my 2nd cupcake walk of the year :P

The Graduate show was really good, lots of really high quality pieces :) And the setting of the Bargehouse was really cool and interesting- kind of like an old warehouse but nice and bright from all the windows:

The lovely pieces speak for themselves so I will just let you enjoy the photos- rather than natter on about my thoughts :P

As I was wandering round I couldn't help but think that that will be me in two years, presenting my work as a graduate! That made me feel really excited and inspired :)

Then after that, as I said, it was on to my 2nd cupcake walking tour of London of the year. I enjoyed the one I did with my mum soo much that I asked if my friend from Uni wanted to go with me on another one. She has just started her own blog recently and I highly recommend you check it out and drop her a comment or two :o) It is really interesting, and I am not just saying that because I am her friend: http://www.stitchbtch.blogspot.co.uk/. Her blog is titled stitch bt*ch, as believe it or not that is the often used nickname for members of wardrobe departments in theatre etc! :P

First up on the tour was the cupcake bakehouse- Owned and run by Lorraine Pascal:

I had a mini chocolate cupcake from there:

Then it was onto Laudree- their macarons I would say could not be improved, they are perfect:

Sweet couture had some new flavours for this walk so I was super excited, I had cookie dough, and Grace had oreo (a good choice! That's What I went for on my first walk):

Mmmmm... cookie dough was so nice!!!!!!!  I want another one!!!! (P.s. I think Sweet Couture is my fave cupcake place)

Then came hummingbird bakery:

And another delicious red velvet cupcake with cream cheese frosting:

Yauatcha is a place I am so happy I discovered form the walks- their macaron varietys are so cool!

I had another Jaffa cake one because I couldn't resist and I also tried caramel cashew and pistachio:

We got three choices there this time as Fortnum and masons was unavailable for a sample this time. I didn't mind though as I do love Yauatcha.

And finally onto Patisserie Valeire for a caramel truffle and chocolate macaron:

So lovely!

The tour went via Saville row which was cool as you could see the workrooms through the windows below the pavement level.

Hehe, you can go get a drink and have a relax now- I am finished.

I promise :P

I hope you all had a great weekend too. I am off now to watch TV with my mum and work more on my dads Paddington bear cross stitch fathers day present.

See you all soon,

Bye XxXxX

Wackiness and weddings

Hi everyone :)

Sadly I can't bring you any pictures of the wedding fashion show as it had to be cancelled due to the organiser having a family emergency so my thoughts go out to her. The wedding fair did go ahead though so the lady I applied for work experience with said I could still come for an hour or so to look around etc. The building it was held in was really lovely and historic/period and when I got home I was in a bridal mood! I decided to finally start making some of the bridal headbands I designed ages ago. Here is a work in progress picture:

 

It will be interesting to see them fully done, they are coming along as planned so far :P

 

Hehe, talking about bridal wear and bringing me on to the 'wackiness' section of this post.... me and my brother went to Ripley's believe it or not in London this weekend and they had this exhibition of wedding dresses made from toilet paper!:

 

Hehe they are soo good! My dad said they are alright as long as it doesn't rain, which is very true! :P

 

In ripleys they also had these tiny shoes called lily shoes- they do really weird stuff to your feet but I just thought they looked like cute little pixie shoes:

 

They even seemed to have a pattern for them:

 

I may try it one day but a modified version as I don't want to squeeze up my feet to be all tiny!

 

In other news it is my friends birthday coming up this weekend and we are all going to Wahaca the Mexican restaurant to celebrate. I wanted to make her a little something to go along with the rest of her gifts.

 

(P.S if you are my friend whose birthday it is you should stop reading now to prevent ruining any surprises!!!!)

 

I wasn't sure exactly what but I knew I wanted it to be cute. In the end I decided to go for a panda and then just started making and Little Tall Panda was born:

 

 

He is a brooch. I called him little tall panda as he is small but his body ended up quite long :-)

One of her favourite colours is purple so I added the purple bow and buttons to make him look all snazzy and such-like. I hope she likes him :0)

 

And my last bit of this post is just an update on my corset! This week Wednesday to Thursday is the last 3 days we have to finish our corsets (though we may get a little bit of time later on if we finish our 2nd part of this project early). I am getting there with mine, it does resemble a corset properly now and all the bones are in it:

 

Just some more bias binding, putting the eyelets in and then all the tabs which will be the fiddly and potentially time consuming bits but I hope I will get it all done :-)

 

I am off to bed now to get my beauty sleep, lol :)

 

See you all soon and thanks for reading my lovely friends!

 

Byeeeeeeeeee XxXxXxXxX

Happy new year!!! :D

Hi everyone,

I hope you all had a good New years eve/day and I would  like to wish you all a happy and healthy new year! :)

 

Normally I have a whole long, long list of new years resolutions but this year I didn't really have any that I hadn't already started before new year, so my new years resolutions aren't so much resolutions, more continuations :P

 

My first aim is to become more chillaxed and happy as exams really stressed me out for A levels and all that but now I am finished and have started uni I am trying to stress less and not be afraid of getting things wrong sometimes. It is going well so far as I already feel less inhibited in my crafting and other things now I am allowing myself to make the odd mistake, which at the end of the day is just learning- making me better at my craft and other things anyway :P

 

My second aim is to keep reading and working hard at uni an trying to learn new skills to improve my sewing and crafting abilities :) hehehw I think learning new craft/sewing skills and improving at them will be on my list forever as I want to be amazing!!!

 

And my thrid aim is to look for more lovely blogs to read, as well getting a bit better at keeping up to date on all the fabulous blogs I already read. Sometimes I miss a blog post and don't see it till the next week so my comments are late- bad me! Now I am more settled in my routine I should be better :)

 

And my fourth and final aim is to keep working on and improving my shop (and blog as usual :) and try to make some happy customers this year :D Heheh I have already uploaded some of the new stock I made for the new year:

 

>Decorate your own button monster kits! (do you remember the button monsters........:

 

 hehe :)

 

> Friendship bracelets

 

>Fimo cookie buttons

 

And I have many more plans for other items!

 

I am looking forward to the year ahead :D I even have something very exciting happening tomorrow- I am meeting my blogging/ravelry friend Eleanor from My life, my thoughts, my hobbies :) We are going to catch up and chat and do a bit of sale shopping together so that will be uber fun, I can't wait!

 

See you all again soon,

 

Bye xxxxxxxxx

Pop tab friendship bracelet - tutorial! :D

Hello everyone,

 

Today I bring you the new tutorial I made- Pop tab friendship bracelets:

 

 

A while ago my crisp packet coaster tutorial was mentioned on another blog and in the same post was a tutorial for a flower decoration made out of pop tabs- the ring pull bits of soda cans (links coming soon I just can't get them to work at the moment). I hadn't thought of using these for crafting before and it made me want to experiment with them. I collected up a few and after some playing around came up with the idea for the friendship bracelets above :-)

 

Here is how to make some if you would like to make some :P

 

You will need:

 

 

> DK yarn in any colours you want

> A 4mm crochet hook

> 9 pop tabs :)

 

How to make:

 

1. Join your first choice of yarn to your first pop tab and 4dc into the top of the pop tab.

 

2. Take the next pop tab, attach it by crocheting 4dc into the top, like for the first tab but turn the second tab the other way round as in the picture below. (This creates an interesting design in the final bracelet if you crochet one tab round one way then the next the other way :)

 

 

3. Continue along doing 4dc into each stitch until all 9 pop tabs are joined then slip stitch into the top of the last tab to fasten.

 

 

4. Turn and repeat down the other side with your second colour yarn.

 

 

5. Darn in all loose ends

 

6. Then cut two lengths of each colour yarn around 25cm long each.

 

 

7. Join one set to the end of the bracelet in the following way:

 

 

 

8. Then repeat for the other set at the other end of the bracelet (these are the ties so you can tie it round your wrist :) and Voila, you are all done! Make sure there are no sharp ends of the tabs poking through at all before you wear it though, just for safety!

 

 

You can have fun and make them in all different colours for all your BFFs, lol :D

 

I hope you like the tutorial! :)

 

See you all soon,

 

Byyyyeeeeee xxx

 

Timmy the tiny turtle :)

Hola Guys!

Allllllll the way back at Christmas when I posted about the gifts I had made my friend showed her cousin my blog, she apparently realllllllly liked the turtle I had made for another friend and when my friend told me about it I said I would make one for her cousin. Last week my friend told me it was her cousins birthday on the 3rd of feb  sooooo..... I got my hook 'n' yarn and got to work and TIMMY THE TINY TURTLE WAS BORN!

He's a very happy little turtle.....

.........but he does like to try and run away! ;)

hehhehe, sooo cute :D

Im sure hes going to a very good home!

The pattern for the tiny turtles is really fab! Its my first ever fave on ravelry. the link to it is here: http://www.crochetville.org/forum/showthread.php?t=97829

Im still working on those two free patterns and one will be cominng your way veeerrrrryyy soon :)

Got to go now,

Bye, bye, bye ,bye (sorry I got a bit carried away :)

BYE!