How to make a snowglobe?

It's been a while since my last tutorial. Snowglobes are cool for any occasion but I thought it would be cool to make a valentine themed one.

Here is what you need:
A jar, Fimo, glitters, toothpick, modelling tool,
two component glue and cookie cutters (not on the picture)

Make the Fimo soft by kneading it.
Then make a shape you like, I'm making a bone...
Then knead the red Fimo for the heart.
Place it flat between 2 wooden sticks and then roll over it with a rolling pin.
Press the cookie cutter in there.
Now you have a heart.
Of course you can also shape it yourself but I was being lazy.
Then break a small part of a toothpick and make a hole in the heart and the bone.
Use the toothpick to connect the both.
Bake it in a preheated oven for 30 minutes at 110°C or 265 °F.
Apply a dot of two-component glue to the inside of the lid of the jar.
Stick the bone with the heart on there.
Fill the jar with water and add glitters.
If you have glycerin, add a few drops to makes the glitters move about better
Twist the lid on the jar and close firmly.
Now you can shake your snowglobe.

Add a 'I love you to the bones' message for your loved one and you're done!

Are you ready...

Best friend by Toyokazu

... for weekend adventures?
Make it happy!

Merry go round

Every last friday of the month, I jump on the 'Merry go round'. What is the Merry go round exactly? Each month, a group of craftswomen from around the world join together and give their reponses to the same question/challenge.
The group has been extended with 2 new members: welcome Monika from Red2White and Laura from BlueTerracotta.The question to start off this year is: "What are your compass words for 2011".
The "Compass words" refer to a little exercise (click on Renew, Reenergize, recommit...) that you can work through.
I didn't do the excercise as I know the words I want to focus on.

This year I want to learn to let go...
Let go of fear.
Let go of pressure
Let go of stress.
Let go of things that really do not matter (only I need to be remembered sometimes).

Once I've let go, I want to balance my life a bit better...
Spend time with my family and friends.
Take a day off and not feel guilty.
Eat more healthy & excercise a bit more.
Keep work fun.

And when my life is all balanced, I can start to enjoy it even more...
Read, crochet, sew & sit in the garden taking up the sun.
Give new ideas a chance to actually come together.
Take roadtrips to nowhere in particular & discover new places.
Share & learn things.
Do something insanely crazy - or even more then one.

January is nearly over already and I haven't even started on the 'let go' thing but I soon will. No gloomy posts about being tired and stressed but happy cheerful posts because that is really what I want life & me to be. And I know that as soon as I let go, it will happen!

Want to know what compass words the other merriers came up with? Hop over to their blogs. Please bear in mind that the members will be posting at different times of the day, depending on which world time-zone they are in :)
Kim at Vilt a la Kim
Sara at Saras Texture Crafts
Fabienne at Easterya Jewellery
Mariana at Florcita
Agathe at Le Bar du Vent
Ruth at Birdland Creations
Monika at Red2White
Laura at BlueTerracotta

I feel...

...tired, pressured, stressed & torn today.
There is still lots of work on my table and I am torn between taking a day off and working my ass off. I know I won't be getting it all done today but it stresses me out that the 'to do'-list is growing instead of schrinking.
I'm so looking forward to the moment I've caught up with it all that I can relax and do some mindless crocheting or sewing.
It's a luxury problem really but to save my sanity, I definately need to feel more balanced soon.
How do you cope with stress & pressure?

Guest post: Collaboration in art and crafts - part 3

Note: If you would like to guest post @ ArtMind please contact me (mitsy@artmind.eu) and I'll send you the 'how-to-blog@ArtMind' -info.

by Shauna Busto Gilligan and Annemiek Hamelink

Part 3 of 3 (read part 1 here and part 2 here)

Shauna and Annemiek got together in Ireland to define the details of their collaboration with as few restrictions as possible so as not to impose on the needed freedom.

As they had both arrived at the same idea – a bowl should inspire a story which in turn should be the source of inspiration for another bowl – the need for inspirational freedom was decided easily.

Shauna is to start with a story and Annemiek with a bowl. They will both work on their stories/ bowls for about a year, updating progress, issues, inspirations in a blog dedicated to the project.

What remained to be decided upon was a topic. Again, this had to be open as previous experience had shown that if this was too restrictive, it would block the inspiration and thus render the project impossible to do.

It happened (unusual for an Irish autumn!) that the weather was great when Annemiek was in Ireland. They decided to take a break from the blogging and took Shauna's children to the Botanic Gardens in Dublin where a temporary sculpture exhibition was on.

Interestingly the exhibition was called Sculpture In Context. It was during this wonderful autumn day when Annemiek took photographs and Shauna wrote in her notebook that they both realised that engaging in other types of art can lead to a feeling of freedom in ones own craft.

They decided to start from here:

We hope we inspired you to collaborate too;

Please feel free to follow our adventure on our blog dedicated to this project.

Slipper(y) sewing

A while back, I found a fab tutorial of Heather Baileys on the world wide web and I thought I could perfectly adjust it to my size. So I enlarged the pattern and it looked like this.I decided that I didn't want a slippery sole so I used anti-smip material for the sole and soft towel fabric (don't know the word in English) for the inside.
Then I put my foot on it to see it doesn't work like this. I'm not blond but I just don't have cute little babyfeet... A whopping 39 (US size 9) is what I have so it didn't really work out the way it was in my head! LOL
But how cosy do they really look? I love 'em and I really wish I could find a fun pattern to sew my own slippers. These small Itty bitty booties will be for a special baby...So if you know any good slipper patterns that use fleece or other soft fabric, please don't hesitate to share as I really want to sew my own slippers. And who knows, perhaps I even make you a pair too! :)

Flickr Favorites

1. nature morte, 2. “Age may wrinkle the face, but lack of enthusiasm wrinkles the soul”,
3. Dumpling Diaries, 4. Polka Dotted Moth

I love color but I also love neutrals.
I always doubt if I need to write 'grey' or 'gray'
Who can tell me?

Next Tuesday is the first Tuesday of the month so we play by theme if you like.
I'd love to see what your dream home would look like... So perhaps built a mosaic that gives a peak of how you would like it to look on the inside & outside...
Do you have a fun theme for next month? Don't hesitate to let me know!

If you like to play this week, make your mosaic and add a link to your to your blogpost (NOT your blog please) or Flickr. Click on the button below and fill in your name with the link to your blogpost or Flickr picture. I'll try to pop over to have a look at yours.

Workshop results

I had the first workshop in my studio yesterday. I had people come to a workshop before but then I always knew a few of them. So, I was a bit nervous to do a workshop with people I didn't meet before. You never really know what they expect but I did plan to give 'em an awesome day and I think they had...

Apart from nearly burning lunch (grilling + chatting = disaster), all went well and we had a great time. I loved seeing a creative bunch come up with ideas and trying out things that I hadn't even thought off.
I don't show much of any examples when we start as I don't want to impose ideas into anyones head. So I basicly tell people what they can do and let 'em find out the posibilities and limitations of the material themselves. I think that gives fab results and it's great to see that all styles are so different. It's a bit like getting a blank canvas and having to paint onto it: scary in the beginning but once you start, you can't stop...

Some people worked very organic and combined beautiful bold shapes with delicate textures.Others tried painting with pigments and I found that very inspiring as I never tried it myself before.
And another person had a very minimalistic approach and brought and tried lots of textures and stamps. My eyes got bigger everytime she pulled out her little suitcase to bring out another amazing texture - so much fun!This all will look even more beautiful after firing and I can't wait to see the results!

Ingthings

Quite a while back, I entered a give-away on Ingthings, a beautiful blog full of handmade and vintage goodies. Ingrid happens to be a very generous lady and always puts a smile on my face with her cheeky writing style and amazing pictures.
The blog is written in Dutch which might be a bit tricky for English readers but the pictures really tell a 1000 words. There is however a google translate button on her blog too...
Want to see what she send me?
A book about embroidery which I am thrilled about as that's one of the techniques I really want/need to learn sometime.
I love these pincushions - so vibrant and such lovely embroidery on them.
Very clear pictures on how to do it, so the garantuee for succes is a bit higher in my case...
And then she chucked in a whole lot of vintage buttons, thread and ribbons.
It was a very joyful day when I opened the package!
Thank you Ingrid for this lovely gift and for being inspiring and making me smile.

I nominated Ingrid's blog for the Handmade Olympics on RikRak studio's blog. In the category 'your favourite nicey/nicies forwarding kindness thru handmaking'
I'll let you know when the voting starts so that you can go and support this amazing lady!

Update packaging & listings

About a year ago, one of my customers let me know that the display boxes that I used in my Etsy listings were not available in IKEA anymore. I had used 'em to show off some display ideas for my feelings. Bugger, that meant I had to change all my listings, description & pictures and I put it on the 'to do' list...

Then later this year, my supplier told me that the lime green boxes I use for packaging my feelings, would be taken out of production. So that meant that I needed to think about a new way to package 'em. I bought all the available boxes and hoped they would last me a while...
I'm down to my last 5 boxes now so I quickly need to change my packaging and my listings.
This will be the new packaging from now on. I loved the lime green boxes as they brought a little color to my work but I do like the natural kraftpaper look too.
Earlier this week, lots of editing took place in my Etsy shop: description, tags, price & shipping profiles and pictures. It's been a major job but it was long, long overdue.
Too bad that the mosaic pictures turn out to be so small in the Etsy listing. I have no idea why that is as I saved 'em as before.It will have to do for now as changing 99 listings is no small feast...

Guestpost: Through The Viewfinder

Note: If you would like to guest post @ ArtMind please contact me (mitsy@artmind.eu) and I'll send you the 'how-to-blog@ArtMind' -info.

By Jenya from Evaforeva

When I got my DSLR it was like a new beginning for me - beginning of discovering photography and a new way of expressing myself. But I never stopped loving the old polaroids and beautiful photographs that were shot by Diana and other vintage cameras. The outdated retro look just captivated me but the inability to edit the pictures afterwords was a big turn off. And then I found Through The Viewfinder (TTV) technique! How brilliant? You get the genuine old looking photograph in a digital format! You get to bake your cake and eat it too!

There is a lot of information about TTV on the internet and it is becoming more and more popular. If you want to try it you will need a digital SLR (most people recommend macro lens but I am using 18-55mm that came with the kit and it works just fine), an old twin-lens reflex camera (it doesn't even have to work as long as the viewfinder isn't broken), and a contraption. I bought my twin lens reflex from Canemah and my father built a contraption for me and he really did an amazing job with it.
The hardest part is determining the length of your contraption and Russ Morris has a great website that helped me a lot. Once you are done with that step - you are ready to start!

Now, shooting through the viewfinder can be challenging. You need to learn how to manipulate the whole structure (both cameras and contraption) in order to stage the shot you are looking to get.
After downloading my images to the computer I crop them in Photoshop. Sometimes I like to keep the black frame and sometimes I like how light and fresh the images look without it.

If you are interested to see more of my TTV experiments feel free to stop by and say hi.

Flickr Favorites

1. blow, 2. cloud cocoa., 3. Untitled, 4. I am alive (Explore)

It's not that cold anymore here but I still fancy a cup of hot chocolate with cloud marshmallows.
And I love the letterbox with the papercuttings. Fab idea!
Haven't played scrabbles in ages and I used to love it. I have the English version of the game at home so that's probably why we don't play it...

I'd like to do this in my street sometime soon...

If you like to play this week, make your mosaic and add a link to your to your blogpost (NOT your blog please) or Flickr. Click on the button below and fill in your name with the link to your blogpost or Flickr picture. I'll try to pop over to have a look at yours.

Spreading the love...

I had planned to make more of these for Valentine but I just don't have enough time nor hands. So I end up with a sample of a small porcelain heart/lace nesting bowls.
Too little stock to put 'em in my shop so I'd like to spread the love by giving these away to whoever fancies them.
All you need to do is to leave a lovely comment below...
A winner will be picked next monday! :)

Give-away closed!

Jetty from JKphotography picked a number via Twitter.
Congratulations, Evelyn from Sumikoshop.