Cross stitch

I'm having a cross stitch renaissance! Following my Valentine crafternoon where we cross stitched a heart onto a beautiful card, I've been re-inspired.
I bought some lovely Moleskine notebooks that I planned to print onto last week but I wondered how they'd look with a simple cross stitch on the cover. It goes to show that the simplest designs work best.
I've been playing with different colour ways and I hope to sell them in the tearoom, if I don't keep them for myself!!!

They were easy enough to do. I printed out some graph paper, enlarged it and attached it to the cover of the Moleskine and punched through the holes for the pattern with a pin.
Then just choose your favourite colours and cross stitch your heart out!

A Valentine's Special

Valentine's is fast approaching this week. This is why Sunday's crafternoon was a Valentine's themed one. I'd prepared a couple for lovely little projects that could be handmade (with love!) and given to someone special this Valentine's.

A cross stitch style card and a yummy bath creamer made with cocoa and shea butter.
So first off, the crafternooners had to select a heart cross stitch pattern which I had drawn out on graph paper with a felt tip pen.

Cutting a border around the hear allows you to locate it properly on the card. A wee bit of sticky tape holds it in place for you while you get started punching holes through the paper pattern and the card. We put a folded towel under the card and used a needle to punch through.

Starting from the centre cross, begin stitching. As with cross stitch on aida, you should try to keep it uniform and stitch bottom left to top right, bottom right to top left and so on.

 Here are the results...

While the crafters were making their cards, I put together a mixture to make delicious bath creamers. I used a recipe from Kirsty Alsopp's Craft book.

100g cocoa butter
50g shea butter
50ml almond oil
2-4 drops of essential oil (we used lavender, lemon and bergamot)
Small paper cases
Decorations (we used dried lavender, lemon zest, rosemary and earl grey loose leaf tea)

In a plastic jug melt the cocoa butter in the microwave. Then add the shea butter and melt it too. Remove form microwave and allow to cool a little. Add the almond oil and your essential oils.
Pour the mixture into your paper cases. When the mixture goes cloudy (20 mins or longer if mixture is still hot from microwave) you can add your decorations such as lavender or lemon zest.

When the creamers were set, we added a little bit of packaging. Tissue and cellophane with ribbon worked well and looked lovely. The wee creamers are ready to use after 24 hours. You just pop them into a hot bath and enjoy a lovely smelling bath and super scented bathroom.

 My mixture made about six creamers and I would stress that you use little paper cases, like fairy cake ones opposed to muffin ones. They'll be too big and may take longer to set.

Printing by hand at Cushion & Cake

I was really excited about Sunday's crafternoon. I'd prepared a session on print where the crafternooners would create their own tote bags, hand printed having cut their own stencil.

I printed out lots of silhouettes from the internet, birds, foliage and flowers for the crafternooners to choose from. We were using freezer paper to get a really good result. Freezer paper is great! You can cut it just like paper and temporarily adhere it to fabric using a dry, hot iron. Being able to iron on the stencil reduces the chance of bleed onto the fabric giving a really neat finish.

Using a stickle brush to apply the paint makes sure you don't over coat in fabric paint, thin coats as always work best.

Then it's time to gently peel off the stencil to reveal your artwork! Fixing the fabric paint with a dry, hot iron makes it permanent and ready to withstand any Scottish rain shower!

Their bags look really great. Everyone had done something different and were really proud of what they'd created.