Altered Art

I'm part of a group of crafters that meet about once a fortnight and each time, as well as making something, we have a "mingle". We are given a challenge to come up with something on a common theme. This week it's altered tins. We were given a M&S mints tin to alter and this is what I came up with.
A little tin that holds two Yankee Candles and says around the inside "If you have knowledge, let others light their candles in it."
We take them to the next meet and swap them.

Cupcakes for Mothers Day

This is what we made yesterday, The plan is to make four of them and put them in a cupcake box from the pound shop and the children can give them to their Mums for Mothers day. It's very easy to make them the ones above were made by a five and a six year old.

This is what you need:
 I bought a pack of 12 fairy cakes from Aldi for a pound, you could make them using a Victoria sandwich receipe but we wanted to do this quickly. A bag of mini marshmallows, 40p from B&M's, some granulated sugar coloured with a few drops of food colouring, some food pearls or silver dragees and some butter icing (4oz butter mixed with 8oz of icing sugar).
.

First of all cut the marshmallows in half diagonally

Then remove the disc of icing from the fairy cake and eat it. Cover the top with butter icing.
Place three pearls or dragees in the centre of each cake.

Then dip the cut side of each marshmallow in the sugar and place six around the centre pearls then another twelve around those.






Finished!

Something for Free

Just had to post this. It's a gift card from Marks and Spencer. It is the most exquisite cut work on three layers and it's free when you buy a gift voucher! I don't know what I will do with it but I'm sure I'll think of something.

Half term activities

I'm also a Childminder and yesterday the children played with coloured rice. I bought kilo bags of rice from Asda for 40p each and coloured them with food dye, about half a teaspoon. I mixed them by hand and it was surprising how quickly they mixed, although my hands were a bonny colour by the end! Then I left them on trays, spread out, to dry over night. Yesterday I gave them a tray each, some scoops, spoons, and containers and they spent ages experimenting with the rice. Next, when they get bored with this we will make pictures with some glue and the rice. Then who knows what we might think of before I probably end up boiling it up to feed to the hens!

Bereavement Card

I made a bereavement card yesterday for a friend and because I was cutting out a lot of inchies I made two at the same time. I put the first together too quickly and realised I should have inked the edges. I did that on the second one and you can see the difference it makes in the picture. I also printed off the verse "Do not stand at my grave and weep" by Mary Frye for the insert as I don't think there is a more beautiful verse than that for a bereavement card.

In the begining......

This will be my second attempt at a blog. The first one, about two or three years ago, ended up with only two posts as I was time poor even then. Hopefully, this will be more successful. It will be a bit about me, my family and my crafting.