Showing posts with label red. Show all posts
Showing posts with label red. Show all posts

Thursday, 11 December 2008

Salt dough



Xmas stuff is finally getting going in this house. I decided the children were old enough to attempt some salt dough decorations this year and found a recipe here*.

Salt Dough Christmas Ornaments

Ingredients
½ cup salt
1 cup flour
½ cup water
a few drops food colouring


Instructions

1. Pre-heat oven to 120 degrees Celsius (250
Fahrenheit).

2.
Mix together, salt, flour, water, and food colouring until dough is formed.

3.
Knead the dough on a floured surface until the mixture is elastic and smooth. If dough is too sticky, sprinkle with flour, continue to do so until stickiness is gone. Do not add too much flour, this will dry out the dough and will cause it to crack before you get a chance to bake it.

4.
Roll out the dough to about ¼” thick with a rolling pin that has been dusted with flour.



5.
Use cookie cutters to cut out whatever shapes you want.



6. Use a straw to cut out a little hole in each one... the straw will make perfect little circles.



7.
Place all shapes onto an ungreased cookie sheet and place into the preheated oven.



8. Bake for 2 hours.

9. Remove from oven and allow to cool completely.

10. Paint however you like.. you can even add glitter. The food colouring means you don't have to paint them if you don't want to. Allow to dry.




11. Seal with a final coat of pva glue or varnish. This seals in the glitter and means they will last longer.



12.
Thread ribbon through hole and tie in a knot to make a hanging loop.




We had lots of fun with this, and even made enough to give some as presents!




*as an aside I wrote this afew days ago, but was waiting on the photos. Before I got a chance to post it Poppy Mom posted the same recipe on her blog.... and she uses a straw to make the holes too!

Friday, 21 November 2008

Needle Case



I get so few chances to do any sewing, or even get my sewing bag out, as I can't do it when the kids are about. This means it's taking me a long time to get all my equipment in order and it's been bugging me for some time that I don't even have a simple needle case!

I finally managed to nab a copy of Sew Hip, a new sewing magazine, and lo and behold there were
two needle case patterns in there! I went for the pear one above but kind of jiggled and changed it a bit to suit some cute apples fabric I bought a few months ago.


Its actually a bit of a medley of the two patterns as the main part of the cover is material reinforced with card. I've never used embroidery thread in this way before and love the fact that you can be fairly haphazard with your stitching and it actually looks better for it! That was just as well as the added card made it tough to sew through! The centre of the apple is a scrap of red corduroy I found. Inside it has four leaves of red felt with all my needles now safely stowed away rather than rattling around my sewing bag! Now I just need to make a pin cushion...

 
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