New Door Wreath - With Some Reservations.

I've made a new wreath for my front door until the summer hits, but to be honest I'm not 100% with it!

I used my new Juliette Rose mould from Iron Orchid Designs and a red/gold coloured, wooden heart decoration I found in a Bude charity shop for £2.99 after realising that it had potential.

I dusted the mould with cornflour so that the foam clay, from Hobbycraft (£1 for 25 grams I believe) would come away easily from the sides when I was ready.

In all I used a total of 4 packs to make two mould impressions, which was fine as I really did need to get it used up.  Filling the mould wasn't my favourite activity, but then, at times, I know that I can be incredibly impatient!

It was easy to cut up the impressions into smaller pieces (although they can also be used whole on other projects) to fit around the heart ........

...... using a cheap "hard as nails" type product to fix the pieces securely.

At this point I was torn between painting it all over with a white emulsion paint or giving it more colour .........

To be honest, I now wish I'd done it all in white, I'm not really a pink and green type person (????) but hey ho.

I persevered .......... adding deeper shades of colour over several coats......

...... before gently dry brushing it all over with white to give it a more aged feel ....

....... which again is where I should have left it ..........

....... but of course, I had to fiddle fart with it some more! First with gold wax, which in my eyes was a huge mistake as it only served to make the whole thing just look grubby (?) ..........

...... so in an attempt to disguise this error and give it a look of "aged and faded splendour" I added gold flakes to the mix, which just made it look tacky!  I totally missed the mark somewhere for my own personal taste.

However, I think I could easily go back and give it a couple of good coats of white paint and then to give it more dimension (as it all looks a little flat now after all the messing) I would make another impression, or possibly two, to stick over the corresponding roses and buds, leaving the leaves in the background? 

We shall see.......  when I'm in the mood to tackle it again. 

Bertie's Cocktail Bar Shadow Box.

I don't make many cards these days, preferring instead to make a little something that can be kept as a lasting memory.  The memories behind this little tranklement is Bertie's love of making cocktails (non alcoholic of course), when he and Iris come over for a sleepover. 

The eight compartment tray came from Temu and cost £2.98, but it really wasn't worth it, as it was no better than the trays you get (free?) with wooden craft shapes

sets, but hey ho!

I started off by cutting silver mirror card to fit each compartment, putting Bertie's Bar using mini, adhesive, scrabble letters (bought at least ten years ago now) in the largest one, adding poker nail art charms (Temu, 57p for a box of at least 100) for a little extra colour and interest, especially as Bertie is currently obsessed by learning and performing card tricks.

The bottles and drinks also came from Temu (various sets and prices) ........

...... with a few more cards and poker shapes to help fill in the spaces.

I then added some self adhesive gingham ribbon round the outside of the tray ...........

 ...... before finally colouring the divider strips using a red Sharpie pen. Sooooo cute and sooooooo Bertie!

Mosaic Effect Table

I've finally finished reviving my old, battered, (Ikea) craft table and I have to say, I am rather chuffed with the results.

I used just under 16 packs (of 62) small, mosaic stickers from Temu, which cost £1.68 per pack (£26,88 in total, so not as cheap a job as I'd first anticipated), plus a lot of patience, peeling off all the sticker backs.

I know I could have used Fabon, however using the small stickers suited me better, as I would have been terrified of getting bubbles or wrinkles in the Fablon and one mistake in the positioning could have spelt disaster and money down the drain.

I'd say it took me about two hours to cover the middle part and the one leaf I hadn't yet covered, which left enough stickers to go down either side of the drawers on both ends of the table.

I was going to paint the drawer fronts (one each in pink, turquoise and purple), but in the end decided to leave them as they were, giving the whole thing a Marrakech type feel, which also fit in with all the white, built in furniture in the room.

With that decided, I gave the whole thing four coats of clear, glossy, quick dry varnish to help protect the plastic stickers a little more........

...... however, to be honest, once stuck down they were nigh on impossible to remove without a struggle.

When not in use the table sits in front of the window, with the one side very rarely seen. 

However, after all this work, I also bought a large PVC tablecloth to put on the table while I am working, which might also prove to be an easier pattern to work on and photograph projects against, rather than the very busy mosaic effect. I love it! 

Tiny Hanging Christmas Tree Domes

Another dome project today, tiny hanging Christmas tree ornaments  ........

...... made using tiny domes with a bead caps on top (both sourced from Temu) .........

...... plus the tiniest Christmas trees I could find, measuring 3.5cm tall from Baker Ross.  I've been looking for trees this size forever, when I found them on the Baker Ross site I couldn't believe it.

They weren't cheap, but I took advantage of the 5 packs offer (plus P & P) but I was still thrilled when they arrived!  https://www.bakerross.co.uk/mini-christmas-trees

I started off by gluing the caps to the top of the domes using B7000 for a really secure fix.

I then painted the top of the corks white, before covering them with ultra fine, translucent glitter for the snow.

I did the same to the trees, after removing their wooden bases.

When everything was dry, all I needed to do then was put a small hole in the centre of the snowy cork to stick the wire end off the tree into, with a little more glue to help keep it all upright.

All that was left to do after that was fit the dome.

I am really pleased with how they have turned out, I might make a few more, but this time adding a few tiny beads and a star on the top for a decorated tree, we shall see.......