Brrr Autumn is here

Well here we are again - another Friday and another blog and now I know that I'm not talking to myself it makes it all a bit more real.   First is the family stuff - my youngest daughter has been moaning that I don't mention her very often so a big hello Wendy!!  On your right is our grandson David on a school riding lesson - because he goes to a special school he gets riding lessons as part of his curriculum - he loved it but unfortunately we don't have a back garden big enough for a horse!!  The big tree has been taken down from the back garden and it seems really bare now - i'm going to have to start looking at gardening mags to get ideas on what to plant in its place.  The back garden is still a mess though and it will be a while before things can get organised to how I think it should look.

I've done a few ATCs to post off for an October swop on one of the craft forums - hopefully Anne has got them by now so I can put photos on next week hopefully - the theme was flowers so nice summery ATC's that are in lovely warm colours.   But that's for next week so back to this week's crafty work.

  I found an old box at the car boot sale - now I know that all the experienced crafters will throw their hands in the air when I tell you what I did to it - and it is probably everything that I shouldn't do so be warned - this could be shock horror time!   The box had shells glued to the top of it so the first thing I did was hack off all the shells and sand it until it was smooth - then I got my distress ink out and rubbed it gently all over the top and sides.   Silicone glued lace and ribbon on the side and added a couple of die cut paper daisies and put a blob of  yellow stickles in the middle of them.

I then chose a nice background paper and silicone glued it into the middle of the lid, then built up the die cut decoupage and stuck it down where I thought it looked best.   I added stickles fine glitter glue over the aprons to give a bit of shine.  I had some flower pots that I didn't really know what to do with for a long time and thought I would add it onto the lid to make it look summery - I blobbed green stickles on the leaves and the fine clear glitter glue over the pots and flowers to make them look shiny.   This is the first time I have tried anything like this and I like the look of it - I think I will have to read some blogs and use utube to see how to alter boxes properly as this was a real stab in the dark and not knowing what I was doing type of thing!!  typical of me though!!

 The last couple of things I want to show you is a cross stitch key-ring - it may look small but it took me 5 hours to do over a couple of days - I really like the celtic knots but it does hurt the eyes with all the small counting - I think I prefer big cross stitches but I've got a few more key-rings to make as extra stocking filler pressies - this one is for my friend Ann-Marie - oops sorry Ann-Marie I know you like to keep all your pressies secret until Christmas Eve ha ha ha (wicked laugh)

The very last thing is a knitted flower brooch - arghhhh this is my first attempt at knitting and I used an Usbourn How To Knit Book - ha ha - I'm not going to tell you how many times I ripped it apart and googled instructions but....I did it and like it enough to use as a present for someone.  It is simply (for other people not me!) knitted as 5 leaf type shapes that are sewn together to make the flower shape - I added 2 buttons for the middle and a large brooch pin at the back. I kept trying to flatten the petals out until one of the ladies in my craft club said it looked more realistic as a flower with the bent in petals.
I've started another knotted flower now but using a different method - I will probably have it done by next week.................so until the next time (if i'm not tied up in wool)