My friends birthday was coming up and I was trying to think of what to get her. She is quite a 'crafty' person herself and loves making her own cards in particular, so I thought she might appreciate a 'home-made' pressie!

So I set about making a tote bag (since this was my latest achievement - see previous post!). This time I decided to follow a tutorial and found a brilliant one on Skip To My Lou, which is actually reversible - bonus! Again I had to use what material I had to hand, this time it was very sturdy fabric from Ikea (white with black 'bunting').
I was a bit stumped as to what to make the lining with as nothing I had really went with the Ikea fabric. After a bit of searching around I found a flowery scarf which I had bought from Primark, but not yet used, and thought I might as well use that!!!


I was a bit nervous about making the straps, as it requires you to fold the fabric over 4 times, and I was worried my needle might break. So I adapted it slightly and only folded it three times. However, I think I should have stuck to the 4! Saying that, it worked out fine anyway. I really liked the method for finishing off the opening of the bag, and actually using this as the place to turn the bag the right way round. It ended up looking very professional (well...in my opinion anyway!).

As an added bonus I decided to make a pretty fabric flower brooch out of some of the remaining lining fabric. I found a very good tutorial for it at Wise Craft. The button is just one I had in the house. I recon the brooch turned out very well and I know my friend really loved it.


xxx


P.S. Since I used Skip to My Lou's tutorial, I thought it would only be appropriate to join in in her 'Made by You Mondays'! Click the link above to check out loads of other things people have been making! :)

This weekend I hosted a bit of a Christmas dinner party for 4 of my closest friends. I worked super hard for it but I have to say that it was a huge success and everyone had a lovely time. To ease the load (work wise and expense wise!) one of my friends brought the starter (a delicious cauliflower and three cheese soup) and another brought the ingredients for dessert (Eton mess, made with raspberries). The main course and other bits and bobs were left to me. I made us a big roast ham dinner with roast veg (parsnips, carrots, butternut squash, red onions and garlic) and roast potatoes (par boiled then drizzled with olive oil and paprika before putting in oven - lovely!). There was a bit of stressing on my part that I would either under or over-cook everything, but I am very pleased to say that it all turned out perfect.


We then a bit of a break to enjoy the X-Factor final (I know, you gotta love it!) and I then served dessert, fresh coffee, cheese and biscuits, homemade mince pies and we had crisps and dips dotted here and there as well. I can tell youthat we could hardly move an inch by the end of the night! But I would rather there was too much to eat than not enough. There was so much food that we didn’t even cut the Christmas cake I had made! Here is a pic of the cake anyway, I guess I may save it for Christmas day itself (unless my boyfriend discovers it first!):

Just a quick post to say isn't my banner cute! Its taken from one of my photos from my holiday in Greece earlier this year.

Really fell in love with Greece. First time I have ever been there - I would definitely recommend for anyone to go - especially try a sailing and diving holiday like I did. I went through Mystic Blue.

Speaking of which - there are some amazing holidays on Responsible Travel - all with an ethical twist to them...which is always good for the conscience ;)

One of the motivations for starting this blog are the number of really great craft-related blogs out there. As I say, I'm only just getting into the world of blogging (work is slow these days!), but I have come across some really great ones.

I'm sure everyone has heard of Etsy, but I've only just discovered it - what a revelation! The site is amazing. I hate the way the high street turns us all into clones and everyone ends up wearing pretty much the same thing - where is your individuality! One of the problems over here in Belfast is there is little choice other than whats on the high street. Unfortunately we don't have many independent boutique-y type shops, so this website (Etsy) offers us a bit of that.
Another site similar to that is Coriandr - and the great thing about this site is that its UK based!
My dream would be to have a wee 'shop' on either of those sites.

Blogs which I find inspiring are:
Peapods
Small Measure
Cloth.Paper.String
Brinja

Finally, a great site I have just discovered is Design*Sponge - full of great crafting ideas as well as design inspiration and tasty looking recipes too!