The Craft FantasticRecently I’ve been thinking a lot about turning our teeny tiny bedroom into a craft room. The hardest thing is coming up with ideas. Where to start? The internet, of course. Just had a quick image search to get some inspiration and thought I’d share my favourites!
First proper attempt at creating art/sculpture through book folding! Quite pleased with the result. I just did a very basic one, folding the top and bottom edges back to align with the spine, creating a point. I left a few pages free and simply tucked the pages round. Will be more adventurous next time.
I’ve been doing a lot of origami recently and having pretty much exhausted my current instruction books, am feeling a bit unsatisfied. Don’t get me wrong, I still love folding paper, I just feel like I’ve been stuck in an origami rut; I’m confident doing my existing models (my craft space is full of paper cranes, butterflies and flowers!), but now it’s time to improve.
Paper Kawaii is an amazing resource for anyone interested in origami – at any level. There’s a fantastic array of models to make, from beginner to advanced, all with clear instructions and/or video tutorials. The site is beautifully designed and easy to navigate to boot!
It’s my mum’s birthday soon and I’ll be boxing her up some handmade chocolates in a beautiful box (attempt to be made this evening!):
Check out the tutorial here. Happy folding x
Book lovers of the world, rejoice! For today is World Book Day.
But what does it actually mean? Surely every day is World Book Day? Well, according to their site “It’s a celebration of authors, illustrators, books and (most importantly) it’s a celebration of reading.” Take a look here to find out the full story.
It’s a fantastic incentive to get kids all over the world reading. Children can get £1 books via special book tokens and there are plenty of events on so head on over to worldbookday.com and check it out!
Halloween is nearly upon us and it’s the perfect time to try out some simple paper crafts to decorate your home spook out your neighbours and guests!
Here are my favourites:
There are some fantastic Halloween crafts to be found on the Martha Stewart site but these simple paper mice are my favourite.
You can find the tutorial for these simple and effective paper pumpkins over at
Bat silhouettes are easy to do and if you make enough of them they can be used really effectively:
Check out this simple template from Country Living.
Made by painting basic brown paper lunch bags- these look like they’d be so much fun to do! There’s a handy little tutorial here.
Why not try this idea for decorating the outside of your house: just cut big triangles of paper and turn the porch entrance into a giant mouth!
Have a happy Halloween!
It’s officially drawing time, as the 2013 Big Draw – The Campaign for Drawing – kicks off. Well, technically it’s already kicked off, as the official start was October 1st – but panic not, most of the events and key dates have yet to happen. Phew. And relax.
The Campaign for Drawing’s Big Draw is taking place in 15 different countries, from 1st October to 3rd November. They’re an independent charity and the basic aim is to encourage everyone to draw – as they state, drawing is a tool for “thought, creativity, social and cultural engagement.”
Want more info about them? There’s plenty to be had here.
Country-wide events
You can go on their site and search for events near you but here are some of the ones that caught my eye:
Signage populates our urban spaces, guiding us, affecting our movements around the city. We are told to ‘push’, ‘pull’, ‘return’, ‘access’ or ‘stop’ as though the city choreographs us in a dance. Claire Weetman, an artist based in the North West, will select verbs and symbols from signage around Cambridge, then jet-wash them into the pavement of the University’s Sidgwick Campus. There, you’re invited to be led through the public spaces in a playful way as though you’ve stepped into a board game, or found a new way of playing hopscotch.
If you’re unable to get to an event, you can always take part online.
Here are some key dates for your diaries – join in if you can and don’t forget you can donate anytime:
1st October: Big Draw Starts
5th October: Big Draw Day!
18th October: Family Arts Festival Starts
3rd November: Big Draw Ends- last day of Family Arts Festival
6th December: Drawing Inspiration Awards: submission deadline
Happy drawing everyone!
On a day trip to Amalfi from Positano, we walked out of the town and up the hill to the paper mill museum. If you’re interested in paper, paper making, books etc. then it’s well worth it. I was in my element! Paper making equipment and presses dating back hundreds of years.
I even got to help!
Surely I could fit one of these in my house somewhere?
I think one of the most exciting things was that everything there was basically a much bigger version of my paper making set up at home. I must be doing something right! I got some good tips from the guide on doing hand made paper with flowers in. Can’t wait to try it!
This site is brilliant. As their ‘about’ page says:
“craftgawker is a curated photo gallery that allows the visual search and discovery of handmade arts and crafts to inspire your own projects. we publish photography submitted by craft bloggers from around the world. our editors review submissions daily and choose the highest quality, most creative images to showcase.”
I hate to compare, but to give you an indication- it’s a bit like Pinterest, but specifically for links to tutorials and images of crafty things to inspire you!
There’s a wide range of crafts on here and different sections to choose from – dwelling, food, style etc. – and a great blog too. A real bonus is that as well as being full of fun projects there are also basic, practical tutorials such as how to use a glue gun, using rivets and quilling basics.
So go look, get inspired and then get crafting!
It was a close call.
The runner up letter was from my mum- she has lovely neat handwriting and used matching Miffy stationery:
She wrote about the fact that one in five children have never received a letter. Very sad indeed!
The winner, though, was my good friend Helen, who wrote in pink ink and decorated the edges of her letter with blue glitter.
She also recommended an author I’d not heard of – Emma Newman – who I’m looking forward to checking out.
For her customised prize, she has asked me to adorn her writing paper and envelopes with robots!
I’m on it – will post the finished results soon.
Pencils, too. Writing implements in general, really. Love ’em. And I don’t care who knows it! Yes, it’s National Stationery Week, here at last to help get Britain writing.
It’s actually got me thinking about my own pen collection and how I write, and I’ve come to realise that I’ve neglected things of late. Even though I write often, draw often, always carry a pen with me along with something to write on, I seem to have lost that urge to always write with a beautiful pen, on quality paper, taking the time to write carefully and neatly (though it doesn’t help that most of my writing is done on my rather rickety train journeys to and from work.)
However, I’ve decided it’s time to get back on track! Starting with a good spring clean of my pens, which are all over the place. No more grabbing the first ball-point I see and scribbling things down! To inspire me, I’ve been browsing the internet looking for… well, looking for inspiration. And inspiration I have found:
Is just an awesome pen/writing/stationery-related blog!
“Specialists in classic, hard-to-find and niche pens, pencils and refills from the world’s biggest manufacturers.” A brilliant selection, good for browsing.
Doesn’t have the most enticing website, but gets almost full marks for it’s range of writing implements and the glorious ink ‘Col-o-rama’ (they lost points due to the Americanism – ‘color’ not ‘colour’ – though I agree that they couldn’t exactly have ‘Col-our-ama’). They also have some pretty sexy ink bottles:
Plus the best pencil sharpener EVER:
Moving on slightly from pens and writing… plantable paper! Who knew? Not I. This is a wondrous site dedicated to eco-friendly paper and seed paper:
“Why do we use seed paper in our products? Because seed paper from Botanical PaperWorks is made with post-consumer material, meaning that no new fibers were used in the production of this paper. And because when the paper itself is planted, it composts away leaving only wildflowers (or herbs, or vegetables) and NO WASTE!”
I NEED to get me some paper that turns into flowers.
A lovely shop situated in Bloomsbury, with a wonderful stationery section; but don’t worry if you can’t get there in person, they have an excellent on-line store for your perusing pleasure. As well as some great pencil sets:
They have a fantastic selection of washi tape:
What are your plans for National Stationery Week?
