Hope you all had a good festive season! Yes? No? Get up to anything crafty? New Year resolutions? FAB.
It’s all go here at The Craft Fantastic HQ – I’m now officially a full-time crafter! WHOOP! I’m VERY excited, as you can imagine.
First things first: this isn’t a decision I made lightly, and I’m aware that I’ll need to work hard to get this business off the ground. With that in mind, I’ve taken a few steps to make sure I stay on target.
GOAL LISTS. The idea is to have one list for each month – so far I’ve written Jan and Feb and I’ll keep adding as I go along – I’m still figuring out how much time things will take.
THINGS TO DO EVERY DAY. This is a list of activities I’m going to do every. single. day. It’s a good mix of work, work work and downtime; things like exercise, read, craft, write, catch up on emails and social media, housework etc.
Ok – so only two steps! I’m just getting started though, learning as I go- lots more hints and tips on starting out to come 🙂
After working my way up to doing bigger notebooks and sketchbooks over the years, I got the chance to try my hand at a wedding guestbook (yep, for the same friend I did the flowers for!). This was a great opportunity and I found working with a specific purpose made me push myself more.
I chose a song that was special to both of them for the inside cover. The cover itself was navy sewn with silver thread, to match their colour scheme. Opting for a Japanese stab-binding method, I found this fantastic tutorial for the spine. It’s not as complicated as it looks, I promise, and it’s well worth the effort. I’m incredibly grateful for the tutorial.
This fabulous event is ticket only and y’all will want to book up and get the date in your diaries, I’m sure. Yes, it’s the Northampton Christmas Sparkle Fair and it’s only just over 3 weeks away!
There are going to be loads of fabulous stalls there, music, food, festivities… and of course handmade goodies from The Craft Fantastic! I’ll be there with a stall full of festive paper creations, including gift tags, decorations, and present ideas. Please come and see me on November 29th!
Tickets are only £2.50 adult, £1.50 child and are available here.
It’s been a while since I’ve updated my progress on the handmade goodies I’ve been working on for my friend’s wedding. I’ve lost count of the number of kusudama flowers I’ve made, but it’s well over 100! Things are nearly finished, though; buttonholes are all done and delivered, bouquets so very near. At the weekend I fully completed one of the bridesmaid bouquets – what do you think?
These beautiful flowers are quite simple to make – a little time-consuming but well worth the effort. I’ve made a couple before, just because they’re so pretty, but a good friend of mine recently got engaged (whoop!) and wants a lot of things to be handmade, so I have been enlisted to help out! I’ll be making lots of paper flowers: one bridal bouquet, six bridesmaid bouquets, six buttonholes and maybe a wrist corsage or two! Oh, and being queen of notebook making, I’ll be doing the wedding guest book, too. I’m looking forward to the challenge enormously and have been practising making these origami kusudama flowers. Here’s what I’ve done so far:
While there are many craft stores of all shapes and sizes littered around the UK, you can’t always get to them when you need to, or find exactly what you’re looking for. And though I do love the thought that everyone shops locally in unique little boutiques, I know this isn’t always feasible. Thankfully, there are some online sites out there that stock everything your crafty heart desires. From chain brands to independent store sites, these are, in no particular order, my top picks.
A lot of Paperchase shops can be quite small, full of fun looking pencils and stocked with greetings cards. But venture to the 3-storey epic that is the Tottenham Court Road store in London and you’ll see just how much this chain can offer. You can find a good range of art and craft supplies on their website, too, which is good news for anyone who only has access to one of their smaller shops.
One of the most well-known chains I should think, but they certainly do have a good range of supplies. You can find pretty much anything you need to start your craft project, plus the site offers lots of hints, tips and tutorials.
I highly recommend following the link and checking out this store for yourself. It’s a beautiful looking site which gives you the history of how the physical store (located in Manchester) started up, waaay back in 1886. It’s a passionate, experienced and knowledgeable company that offers supplies for some of the more uncommon crafts.
Yep, that’s right – not only can you sell all the wonderful things you’ve made via Folksy, you can get supplies on there too! There’s a plentiful hoard of makers who are selling craft supplies via Folksy – often handmade. You can get buttons, beads, tags, yarn and charms, among other things.
This is a site I found while trying to source some inexpensive book cloth, when I was first testing out making hardbacks. They have a really good range and cover the basic supplies you’d need for a really wide range of crafts, from candle making to jewellery to modelling and pottery. They also have a decent ‘inspiration’ section and a place where you can share what you’ve made with other crafters.
Oh, how I mourn the fact that this lovely shop moved! I used to be able to walk to it in my lunch break, but now it’s located near Victoria it’s just too far to trek. So it’s a really good job their online store is so well stocked. The prices are a little higher than your bulk-buy sites, but the standard of the products is superb and it is most definitely worth the extra cost.
Following on from last week’s post on origami and art (yes! I actually followed up :D) I decided to have a go at some larger origami models. I have a few old rolls of wall paper which I thought would be ideal for this, as the paper is thick and sturdy; note for future reference though, take time in cutting as precise a square as possible.
Starting with something I’d made before seemed like the best plan, so I folded a Kabuto (Samurai helmet):
Then transformed it into a goldfish!
Not quite sure what I’ll do with this chap now but I’m sure I’ll think of something! It’s definitely inspired me to try more.
It is said that origami (from the Japanese ‘ori’ (folding) and ‘kami’ (paper)) is the art of folding paper. Without getting too philosophical, does that make all origami art?!
Well, no, but some of it certainly ticks that box. Personally I like making things that either look pretty or are functional (flowers, hearts, boxes – the usual, in fact); while other people have actually challenged themselves. Go them! Note to self: challenge accepted.
Of course there are some really great articles to be found already on this subject- see here for one such article from the Huffington Post.
Here, though are my favourite finds and inspirations from the wonderful world wide web.
This awesome Parisian street ‘graffiti’:
This cosmic 3D project, using folded paper, tape and lights:
This epic elephant, folded by Sipho Mabona (with a little help!) from a specially-made single sheet of paper:
This totally fabulous dress:
And finally this great example of jewellery from the linen cat: