How to make your own bunting

Last year we decided to redecorate our daughter’s bedroom and I immediately knew I wanted to add some homemade touches. Bunting looks really pretty when strung across a wall, between shelves or across the top of a reading nook - and best of all it’s really easy to make.

You need:

Fabric - you can use anything, a thin cotton material is easiest to sew and you can buy packs of ‘fat quarters’ which are squares of fabric in complementary colours or patterns fairly cheaply.

Binding tape - this is the special type of ribbon that you will sew the triangles on to.

Pinking shears - scissors that cut with a zig zag design. For some reason cutting out your triangles with these scissors means the edges won’t fray.

Needle and cotton - I also found a needle threader really useful

Paper or card to make a template

And that’s it!

To begin, decide how big your want the flags in your bunting to be - bearing in mind that you will lose a centimetre or so when you sew along the top. Draw a triangle shape on paper or card and cut out to use as a template.

Next cut out your triangles - you may find it easier to pin or tape your template onto the fabric.

Lay your binding tape across the top of the triangle and fold the fabric over. Sew along the strip to sew the binding tape into the triangle. Lay the next triangle on the binding tape - I found a gap of a few centimetres between each one was good - and repeat until you have done them all.

We used drawing pins to fix the bunting to the wall - our daughter really liked it!

How to make a Felt Christmas Stocking Advent Calendar

I'm really looking forward to my baby's first Christmas and thinking of all sorts of ways I can make it special. I wanted to have a handmade keepsake of some sort that would hopefully be in our family for years, and I hit upon the idea of an advent calendar - consisting of little stockings, each numbered 1 to 24, that I can fill with all sorts of things year after year.

Given that I haven't done any sewing in years and can't think of any time I've ever sewed for fun, I found this surprisingly easy to make. It was a little time consuming but only because I don't get a lot of free time as I have an eight month old baby, and would sew a couple of bits in the evening here and there, over the course of several weeks. If you have a sewing machine that would speed up the process as well.

The design is my own - I know there are plenty of advent calendars like this out there but I didn't copy any of them and just thought about how I wanted it to look:

• I drew a stocking shape on cardboard to cut out and use as a template
• I drew and cut out the numbers freehand though made a template for the number 1 once I got into the teens
• I decided to alternate red and green felt for the stockings; I bought the
Dovecraft Christmas felt bundle in shades of Reds & Greens, 16 Sheets, A4 sized which had a set of red and a set of green but in different shades so I alternated the darker shades with the lighter ones
• After I cut out the stocking shapes I used the remaining felt to cut out the numbers
• I used white 'ric rac' trim similar to this along the top of each stocking
6mm Celebrate Ric Rac Braid Trimming White - per 4 metre roll
• I used these Papermania 36-Piece Mini Pegs, Red/Green to attach each stocking onto a length of jute string which I then tied on to my stair bannisters.

To make them is very easy:
Cut out the stocking shapes from felt - you will need 48
Draw and cut out the numbers from 1 to 24
Sew the numbers onto what will be the front facing stockings first
Then sew on the ric rac edging onto the front facing stocking
Sew both parts of the stocking together along the edges
Attach the stockings  to some string with the pegs; you could also sew loops into the stockings instead if you want.

I'm really pleased with the way they turned out even though the stitching and numbers are slightly different on each; my husband says that just adds to the homemade effect and he thinks they will make a lovely Christmas keepsake.

My daughter will be nearly ten months old at Christmas so won't understand advent calendars and I had considered just filling it with chocolates for us this year, but I saw a set of finger puppets on a site called Once Upon a Time that are designed for a baby's advent calendar, at a very reasonable price, so I ordered them back in September. They were supposed to be with me by early November but with only a few days to go until the start of December they still haven't arrived and the site owner hasn't responded to my messages, so I'm hoping they will still come in time - she has a few days yet!

You're Sew Lovely Greetings Card

 

I recently took out subscriptions to three card making magazines – Papercraft Inspirations, Cardmaking and Papercrafts and Quick Cards Made Easy – there was a great offer to get three issues for £3, which I was going to take out with one magazine but got persuaded to take all three! Each magazine comes with some great free gifts – usually rubber stamps and backing papers or similar, which are probably worth £5-£8 alone – pretty good given the magazines are £5.99. So I’m getting 9 magazines for £9, over the course of three months – I just need to remember to cancel the subscriptions after that or it will get expensive!

I liked one design in Papercraft Inspirations that I knew would be super-quick to make, largely because almost everything you needed came with the magazine. I covered a card blank with the patterned backing paper – which was very thin as it was actually a page in the magazine – and cut out the layered flower and star shape. The “You’re sew lovely” sentiment was also in the magazine, and I just added a blue button from my craft stash. One of the quickest cards I’ve ever made!

Does anyone else subscribe to any of these magazines - what do you think?

Hobbycraft Christmas in July new product launch

The Hobbycraft press show - another Christmas in July event - was much smaller than some of the others I've been to, but much more fun - as there were things to make and do.

In between admiring the Halloween and Christmas ranges, I had a chance to decorate a snowflake cookie with a Wilton piping set and also to decorate a Christmas tree bauble with some Swarovski plastic beads and some ribbon. What do you think?

Some Halloween craft ideas:

 

Hobbycraft has launched some new products with craft queen Kirstie Alsopp, who was at the event earlier in the day but unfortunately I missed her as I was only able to go along after work. They also announced a partnership with 'sewing expert and fashion designer' Patrick Grant (no, me neither) to launch a range of sewing products.

I was also pleased to see Hobbycraft is stocking Sugar & Crumbs flavoured icing; this is something I came across at Cake International a few years ago and have bought from their website a few times.

There were lots of ideas for Christmas card making; I love the idea of this hole punch with a little hanging cut out shape in the middle.

Outside was a pink bus run by Libby Rose, who runs sewing classes, workshops and events and can sometimes be found at Hobbycraft stores. Follow her on Twitter for updates as to where she will be next.

 

Libby was showing people how to make little zip pouches so I had a go. I've got a sewing machine but have barely used it and I can't remember how to thread it and get started. Luckily Libby had done all that so after I chose my fabric I cut around her template and then she showed me how to sew in a zip and sew up the sides to make this. It literally only took a few minutes but I really felt I had achieved something and definitely want to get started using my own sewing machine!

 

Since I can't really sew, I'm quite pleased with this!

 

Sewing machine class

My late grandmother was a professional seamstress so it's ironic - but really a shame - that I'm hopeless with a needle and thread, and have never been near a sewing machine. I decided to rectify this last year when I took a sewing class at the Make Lounge. I learnt how to shorten and hem trousers and sew on a button, but it was still a time-consuming, laborious process, and my stitches were not exactly neat. Since then I've still taken trousers and dresses to the dry cleaner to be shortened - which has sometimes cost more than the garment cost in the first place! So I wanted to learn how to use a sewing machine, thinking it might be quicker and easier than sewing by hand. I also got some John Lewis vouchers when I left my last job, and had thought about using them to buy a sewing machibne, but thought it was a bit of a risk when I'd never used one before!

I saw a LivingSocial deal for a half price beginners' sewing machine class, so purchased the voucher.... and found I had to wait almost three months before there was a space available in a class! So last Sunday I trekked to the heart of Bermondsey - which took about an hour and a half - to get to the Creative Sewing Studio.

We each sat down in front of a sewing machine, which seemed to have an awful lot of buttons and settings!

A little daunting considering the one that I was used to seeing my grandmother use looks like this!

 To begin we were shown how to thread the machine, which is fine once you get the hang of it but it not as straightforward as you might think! And there is all sorts of terminology to get used to - like feet - and knowing which setting to use and when.

Sewing in a straight line is harder than it looks - and sewing in a curved line is even harder! Maybe that's just me though - I never expected to be a natural. When the sewing machine is going at full speed it's actually very fast, and the material zips through and if you're not careful you've gone off at an angle.

We practised sewing on pieces of muslin first, to try out the different stitches. My needle managed to come unthreaded right away and I kept forgetting to put the feet down!

 These photos are a bit dark as I didn't want to disturb the other people by using the camera flash. Hopefully you can make out some of the detail of the different stitches though.

 After learning other techniques and things like how to change the bobbin, we moved on to making our own pincushion. All we had to do was sew together two pieces of heart-shaped material, attach a piece of ribbon to hang it, stuff it with some filling and sew up the gap. I found going round the curve at the top of the heart a bit tricky so took my foot off the pedal and used the wheel to do one individual stitch at a time - which takes a lot longer but at least I could see where I was going!

 The finished pin cushion looks more of a triangle than a heart, as I didn't sew far enough down on the curve at the top. But it was the first thing I've ever made with a sewing machine, so I was still quite proud of it!

The Creative Sewing Studio - and other places like the Make Lounge - offer a lot of classes focusing on making a specific item, like a cushion, an apron or a skirt, but you need to have got to grips with the basic operation of a sewing machine first. So I definitely recommend this class! I also decided that I would indeed use my John Lewis vouchers to buy a sewing machine, so watch this space!

Sewing at the Make Lounge

The Make Lounge is a cool little craft workshop in London that has a shop at street level, and downstairs two workrooms where they run different classes.

I signed up for their "survival sewing" course last year, as I literally can't sew on a button... which is one of the things they teach! We were told to bring a pair of trousers to learn how to take up a hem as well, which was really useful as I'm quite short and can never get trousers that fit!

There were about ten of us in the class, all total beginners when it came to sewing. Over a glass of wine and some nibbles we learnt some handy tricks. I managed to get the teacher to sew a button back onto my coat for me and then do one myself, and take up the hem of one trouser leg before we ran out of time. I finished the other one off at home!

I've been back to the Make Lounge since then which I will write a separate post about. Technically I didn't make anything in this class, but I did learn a lot!

Check out the classes they offer if you are interested; they're not as expensive as you might think: http://www.themakelounge.com