Frosty Fancy giveaway

The lovely people at Mr Kipling have used my Frosty Fancies as a giveaway in their Christmas advent calender:

 

 

 

They asked for 24 Frosty Fancy baubles, it was a little manic whilst moving house at the same time but I managed it and I was very proud of them all boxed up! Hoping the winners like them. I have loads more of ideas for baubles for next Christmas so keep checking out the Folksy shop. I also have some left over baubles from a recent craft fayre which will be reduced in January.

 

 

On the topic of my Folksy shop, I am trying to create a new banner, but just don't get enough computer time. Hope to do this over the Christmas break.

 

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Caught Kipling's eye!

A couple of weeks ago, the nice people at Mr Kipling asked to display my lemon slices on their Facebook & Twitter pages:

 

 

Obviously, I was more than happy for them to show off my lovelies! They have now given me a little Christmas commission! I shall keep it under wraps until they say so, but watch this space!

News and such

Ok guys, we're on baby countdown now, just 6 weeks left until due date, but you never quite know when they're going to decide to come out. So I am going to close The World of Pipinopolis in 2 weeks time, just in case, and will get some stock ready for reopening.

We've had a lot of business these past two weeks, which has been lovely, and I hope it continues after reopening. I am currently working on a fourth petite four, to send out to France this weekend, which should be finished tonight.

I only have 4 weeks left at my main place of work, so I can't wait to finish things up there for 6 months.

Now here are some delicious items I plan to recreate in felt:

Bakewell Slices

Macaroons

Viennese Whirls


I can't wait to have some spare time to sew...before baby of course!

Mr Kipling treats

I have finally listed those Mr Kipling treats I mentioned ages ago! Take a look:

Mr Kipling Angel cake slices

Mr Kipling Lemon cake slices

They are available in the Folksy shop. I also plan to make the Bakewell slices soon. I love working with the Tulip fabric paint used for the icing, there is so much you can do with it. I had to insert batting for the slices to keep their shape, and they worked out really well I think. I plan to put together a Mr Kipling selection in my shop, possibly containing: Battenberg slices, cake slices, French Fancies and some Viennese Swirls.

I also added a doughnut selection to my Folksy shop, made just for play:

Doughnut selection

There is a chocolate with nuts, pink with sprinkles and white with chocolate. These are made entirely of felt with no beads, so they're safe for play. The pink one is very Simpson style!

I have also been sewing on the tiny side, trying to make a brooch...but as untidy as I am, I've misplaced the brooch backs! humph! The only thing to do now is to finally organise my things and I'm sure I'll find them somewhere.

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Petit fours in my shop

I finally finished the petit fours from Ruko's design, only there are 3 instead! :)

Petit fours

They are for sale in my Folksy shop now. It was nice to make something small and delicate again, and I love using the braid trimmings. I think I might try a wedding cake next.

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Petit Fours

This week I will mainly be sewing these:

They are designs from the book: Ruko's Original Sweets made of Felt. Very tiny and detailed, but very satisfying to make. I will list them in my Folksy shop when they're done. I really want the champagne truffle box too, but can I justify £10 for a box??!! hmmmm...maybe!

I am also currently working on PDF patterns for the shop, and I just need a day to myself where I can take pictures of different stages of the sewing process. Hopefully these will be available soon.

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Pipinopolis is back!

I have finally reopened The world of Pipinopolis on Folksy. There are more items to come which I shall get listed asap, but here are some pictures of the sweet treats on offer:

Remember, if there's something in particular you're after, just get in touch and I'll have a go at making it. Here are some commissions I've made for past customers:

Thanks for reading!
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I love jelly

I have a jelly treasury on Etsy! When I think of jelly it always takes me to an image of 1950s kitchens, with those fantastic food illustrations of the time. There are some of these style illustrations in the jelly treasury. I don't seem to acknowledge how much I actually like jelly, the perfect shapes and colours of it, but one of my cats is named Jelly, so that must be a bit of a giveaway! lol! And she is perfect and beautifully coloured too!

Check out some of these retro food illustrations:

Ok, I added that last one just for kicks...looks like she'd kill for that jam on bread! (Mum: Note to self, hide that butter knife!)

Beautiful, beautiful illustrations!

Stuff I forgot to show you all!!!

Ok, there have been some things I've made recently in secret, for presents etc, that I couldn't share on here at the time, but now I can. Here is the Mother's Day present I put together for my nephew to give his mother:

Its a pastry box of felt food treats! As you can see from the pic, I made it from a cupcake box with little modification. Inside were a felt custard slice (seen previously), a felt chocolate eclair and a felt cream horn:

Apologies for the bad pics! I have also been sewing an order for my Sis consisting of two felt cheesecakes, one strawberry and one kiwi:

And finally, I have made a custom order for some felt food fish products (salmon steak with lemon slice, fish fingers and king prawns):

Well, hope you've all had a wonderful Easter Sunday! Will blog again soon!

Finally Friday

Finally it's Friday, I've only been in work 3 days this week but it has really dragged! Hope you've all had a good week?

Yesterday I discovered Toffee magazine , whilst reading Twinkie Chan's blog. Its a PDF Indie craft magazine from Australia and looked awesome, so I bought a copy for the equivalent of £1.87 (excellent price) and downloaded it to the ipad for a good read on the sofa!

It comes with a craft section for printout (this issue had craft papers and projects to use them in), as well as other tutorials on different indie crafts, interviews and features. I really enjoyed it, especially the eco friendly projects and suggestions, it is definitely a turning point in modern crafts. The interviews were also inspiring from people who have turned their crafts into a business and how. Check it out people!

In other news, Mr and I are off to London for a couple of nights next week and I'm really looking forward to it. On the agenda is:

A visit to All the Fun of the Fair craft shop in Soho.

Coffee at this cool looking place: Prufrock Cafe, so steampunk, I might die of delight!

A visit to the Tate Modern, I love the surrealist exhibit there!

An evening of Ghost Stories at the Duke of York theatre. I love scary stuff!!

Possibly a visit to Camden, a toy museum and the National Gallery

And whatever else takes our fancy! But can we squeeze it all into two days? We'll see. I will try to take as many pics as possible of any cool stuff we find and inspiration!

P.S. I just finished sewing two slices of Arctic roll last night, and am so pleased with the way it turned out, will post pics over wkend to show you!

oh, nearly forgot, I'm going to start putting the odd tutorial up on here for some felt foods and stuff, anything in particular you'd like to see?

ok, I really am going now,

Bye!

More stuff!

OK, am back from Post Office, then the supermarket. I have a shepherds pie half done and some sleepy kitties just waking up and stumbling about after attention. Here's some of the other stuff I've managed to get done:

The Ice cream cone is my favourite amigurumi so far! I felt I'd learned a lot about freestyle crochet and decided to go ahead with the shapes to construct him. He looks so cheeky! lol! My mushroom is made from a pattern from the book Amigurumi Two, he's so cute! Then I have my second cupcake bear, I thought I'd use mixed mediums with him, and added a felt strawberry to the blob of cream on his head.

After selling a couple of the toast badges I made recently, I thought I'd try out a battenberg badge. I liked the results, so will be putting these in my shop by tomorrow:

well, I'm gonna leave this there for today and make another dash out to pick up my Mr from work, I miss having a car each, but its so much cheaper and eco friendly sharing one!!!

Popular crafts and bakery delight

Ohh, a couple of days off work for me, lovely! Haven't had enough time to blog or list anything properly. I had my work pictured in the Easter issue of Popular Crafts magazine:

Its always nice to see my work printed or featured somewhere, it makes me all giggly and proud!

I have also been making more amigurumis which I'll blog about later, and have made an old bakey favourite, the custard slice. My sister has kept mentioning I should try this for some time now, so I though I'd give it a whirl between orders, here it is:

It was quite simple to do with straight lines, but took me a little while to get the custard part the right height. I haven't actually eaten one in years and Mr Catherine pointed out that there was too much custard in my first attempt, so this one was born!

I've had an order in for some fish and meat products I've not tried before, but am looking forward to sewing, so I'll put some pics up when they're all done. Must dash now and get some biccies sent out in the post, will be back wih another blog later hopefully! TTFN.

Finally, some pictures!

I finally got around to listing my amigurumi things on my Folksy shop this weekend. Take a look:

This is a trio of cupcakes! Look at their faces, they make me laugh! They're being sold individually.

This is my cupcake bear! I love these things, they're based on actual bear shaped cupcake treats available in japan, or so I believe (is this true? anyone got any pics?) If ever I get the chance to go to Japan, I think my heart would give out with pure joy!

This little cutie is Suzie, my first freestyle amigurumi! I love her so!

I actually did it! I sewed a beans on toast from felt! I was so excited making this and am really pleased with the way it turned out. I used an orange gel fabric paint to create the shine of the tomato sauce over the beans.

And finally, a new kind of item I will be selling in my shop, food badges! This is my toast badge, 'cos everybody likes a good slice of toast and a cuppa (well, nearly everyone). I will try a Battenberg one next.

So, thats my news done, what's everyone else been up to?

What I covet

I want to sew sew sew, but still there is never any time. Tonight I will be baking cupcakes (from a ready made mix - I can't bake) and making one of my famous lasagnas for my Sister-in-law's engagement party tomorrow night. I'm worried about making enough portions but there will be plenty of other food there! I'm looking forward to decorating the cupcakes in pastel coloured icing and will put them on my cake stand. If anyone breaks it, they're in trouble!

I desperatley want to sew some petit fours, chocolates and detailed things. I also desperatley want this book from Japan:

It looks so fab! I'm currently hunting one down at a reasonable price. Wedding thankyou cards are on order, everything is taking ages! But we did get the official pics back and they look amazing! So happy with them! I've also been looking at getting another cake stand for myself, maybe for a Christmas prezzie to me, I love these from The Vintage Tea Party :

They will be selling at an Event in the Village Hotel in Swansea on the 18th November!

I am also cooing over loose base cake tins in Tesco, is that a new wife thing??? and I want new saucepans, baking trays, mixing bowls (can you see I am trying to learn to bake? - 50s housewife style) I also want retro weighing scales! like these from dotcomgiftshop:

Actually, thier whole vintage kitchen range is fantastic, I want it all!!!!

Weddings and Tarts!

Oh my the wedding is snowballing! We now have a Pageboy, Usher, Flowergirl and Maid of Honour. Not much more cost but a lot more to organise. And even though we are just managing to cover the cost of the wedding, my car then decides to get to a point where it will not pass it's MOT. Can't really see the bank giving me an affordable loan at the mo, so I think we're going to have to try and share the one car. eeek. oh, I can also now fit into my wedding dress with room to spare! yey! so will need it taken in now!

Anyway onto yummy stuff, I have been making a few things over this easter weekend, such as a mini banana cake, a mini strawberry roll and biscuits. I also made this strawberry tart a couple of weeks ago, which is now in my Folksy Shop.

I bought that spotted tray for only £2.50 from Tesco, bargain! I picked up a beautiful yellow china teacup and saucer for £3.90 from a charity shop on the weekend too, will get it into as many photos as I can! I promise!

I'm booked in to do a craft show on the 8th May, at the Ostreme Centre in Mumbles again. Haven't done one since xmas and looking forward to it. Starts at 10am til 4pm if anyone is interested.

Oh one more thing, I sold some biscuits to the lovely Lucie of OddgirlCreates, who has mentioned them on her blog. Thanks Lucie!

Cheesecake and Ice cream

OK, sorry it's been a while since the last post! been busy at work staying all hours just to reach the target by the deadline. Now thats over for a few months, more to sew! I've knocked up these cute bitesized ice cream sandwiches and this raspberry cheesecake! I loved doing the sandwiches, especially the biscuits as they're sooooo cute!!!

I bought my mum a book on amigurumi for mother's day, so hope she starts on those as they look gorgeous and I need to learn to crochet. Theres a Stitch 'n' Bitch group in Swansea that meet every wednesday (just read today) may be worth a look!!!!

Sew Hip feature and New Cakes

I had my Doughnut pincushions featured in the latest issue (March) of Sew Hip magazine in the 'Things we love' section, have been meaning to take a picture of it, but will do it soon.



Otherwise I have been busy sewing tiny stitches making a selection of Japanese cakes following designs from Japanese felt cake designer - Ruko. I have finally managed to get them onto my folksy shop after numerous problems with out PC at home (give me a Mac anyday). I'm very proud of them!

Blog Feature and tea cakes!

My felt full english breakfast has been featured in someone elses blog today! Thanks Jenny! Check it out at Junky Chicken.

Also, I know I said I'd post loads more things last week but have been swamped with those hot cross buns and just plain old procastination! But heres a picture of those hot cross buns I was making for my sister, and a few extra for my Folksy shop!!

Things I want to make

All day at work I'm thinking of things I'd like to make (sew) when I get home, but when I sit down after dinner, my mind is blank! So here's a list:
Broccoli
Tea
Full breakfast
i pod
Bullet Bill
Mario mushroom
Burger
Bakewell tart
Carrot
Baked beans
Toast

When I have the confidence, I shall try some fruit!!! lol
Oh roll on that week off over xmas!!!

Tea and Cake

I've just finished these slices of Battenberg cake for my Folksy shop. I wasn't too sure about the shades at first but now they're finished, I'm happy with them.

Just makes me want to snuggle under the throw on the sofa with a hot cup of tea and cake! Although, I've been eating too much comfort food of late and have put back on the weight I'd lost for the wedding! :(

Two weeks left in work now before the holidays (yipee). The Christmas tree is up, presents bought, just wrapping left! We're having lunch with my family this year, and there will be 8 of us, so am looking forward to a good old family day like they used to be.