No when your friend who you’ve known since you were 14,
who you went to uni with, who you lived with for years,
with whom there’s been many, many, many, many, many
brilliant times, drunken nights, fits of giggles, and silly adventures
that may include breaking into our own apartment in Cannes…

Well, when she has a baby…
you know, it’s sort of special really.

So as well as buying her a present,
I wanted to make something.
For her and her baby.

A ‘welcome to the world’ if you will.

That’s what I kept saying… and that’s what it became.

A teeny tiny diy for a teeny tiny person…
cut out of vintage map paper
and strung on some baker’s twine.

1. Take one old atlas…

2. Draw your letters and cut them out

3. String together on baker’s twine.
And try to make sure the cat doesn’t
sit on it while you’re not looking.

*******

And the ‘holy moley me oh my’?
Well, I was thinking of making my own version
that says “home is wherever I’m with you’.
And then the song got stuck in my head
while I was writing this!

If anyone has any requests for one,
I still have 3/4 of an atlas to go!

On Friday night, we bought our tree
(and named him Bruce the Spruce)
then on Saturday we set about decorating.

A lot of last year’s decorations were looking
a little tired… so I decided to make my own,
using things that we had left over from the wedding,
like baker’s twine, paper doilies and washi tape.

Candy canes, word banners
and a stealthy deer!

I looked for pretty paper to make
my Joy word banners with…
I couldn’t find any so I made my own
using washi tape. (God I love that stuff!)

I even cheered up this mirror with a little ‘joy’ too.
(Yes, I was watching Home Alone at the time!)

If you’d like to make your own,
here’s how in this mini ‘how to’:

1.a Find yourself some pretty paper.

1.b Or fail to find to pretty paper
and decide to make some yourself.
I just took A4 sheet of paper
and stuck rows of different Japaneses
washi tape to it. And voila!

2. Draw in pencil your letter shapes
(I do it in pencil so I can rub it out!)
3. Then cut out using scissors or a scalpel.
4. Using a needle, thread some baker’s twine
through each letter twice. Then tie the ends
with a loop and a slipknot so you can adjust them.
That’s it!

******

I still had lots of paper doilies leftover
from the wedding so I turned them into…

… Xmasy doilies with typed phrases
and dotted ‘em round the flat.

There has to be a fox right?

I’m counting the elephant as festive since he’s red!
The rest we hung up, using fishing wire…
(it’s virtually invisible which is great for decorations,
not so good when you’re trying to find the end of it!)
We also made some ceramic hearts…
Strangely I didn’t take any pics of making them.
But I did take pics of our ceramic stars.
It’s the same theory, different shapes!
1. Basically you roll out some ceramic clay
(like you would with some pastry).
2. Then use a star/heart shaped cookie cutter
3. Depending on your clay, leave to dry or bake.

(I’m planning on making a little star banner,
that’s why they have holes in them.)

And to complete our ‘love xmas’ scene
I added my wee snowman, tree and pudding.
(The pudding makes me laugh so!)

****
The rest of the weekend was spent
doing secret crafty stuff.

Handmade presents mainly…
but also crafty things I’m making
for a book which I can’t tell you
more about until next year!

******
So I’m starting to feel a mite more
festive now… how about you all?

It is by far my favourite holiday of the year.
Blame an early obsession with Count Duckula and The Trap Door
if you like but some of my favourite childhood memories
involve me and my cousins, dressed as little
vampires, ghosts and witches, going guising,
that’s what ‘trick or treating’ is called in Scotland,
with our Nana or one of my Aunts.

(Oh yes and it’s sort of my birthday too.
Regulars here might remember we renamed it
last year to be Birthoween!)

****

Anyway, in an airport, I recently picked the Halloween magazine
by Martha Stewart. Not my normal plane reading material
but the baking and DIY suggestions were too good to leave behind.

As there’s less than two weeks to Halloween,
I thought I’d share my favourites from the mag
for those of you who fancy trying them too.

I definitely want to make the chocolate
cheesecake with the snake on it.
I bet it’s terrifyingly good!

Loving this… marshmallow skulls using chocolate
sprinkles for eyes. They’re perched on double chocolate
mini madeleines but I’m sure a dot of melted chocolate
and an Oreo cookie would work just as well!

The how-to here is for Boston ‘Scream’ Pie
but I mainly adore that bat mobile. So simple and cute.
Spooky, I mean spooky, not cute of course!

I sort of gasped when I saw these…
not sure my carving skills are up to this
but apparently you use a template for the image,
draw it on to your pumpkin, get carving
then paint the image black.
Um, easy.

Ok, this one is easy… love how simple this is.
Oh yeah and the smell of marker pens isn’t so bad!

Ok, these owls are just darn brilliant.
I love how fecked off they look.
If you know how to make a fan circle,
they’re easy to make too.

And some scared kitty cake toppers too.

I have no idea why there are witches hanging off these toffee apples
but it did remind me how that I’ve never tried making them.
Must do better!

****

How about you all?
Are there are any more Halloween
obsessives out there?

P.S. I even have a spooky board over at Pinterest.
I so want to make the ghost meringues too I’ve pinned.
Might need to learn to make meringues first of course!

Three and a half months ago, we started making our invites.

Having left no budget (whoops!) for invites,
I’d decided we would make them ourselves.

I had a rough idea that I could use
my rolling stamp in some way…

(Bought on a total whim, it came in rather handy!)

Then I came across some coloured library cards…

And thought they could tell the ‘story’ of our day…

As we’ve been together a rather long time,
I thought it would funny to stamp them ‘overdue’.

Our overdue stamp… found for me by the lovely My Spare Thoughts.

Oh yes and the map paper?

Well, we used that to make our envelopes.
(It’s actually just wrapping paper but looks the real deal.)

We made the template first and
then 130 envelopes… phew.

Then we got stamping…

And stamping some more…

(I had inky fingers for a whole week!)And there may have been ‘a bit’
of handwriting too to fill them out.

Then the easy bit… envelope stuffing!

And hopefully lots of ‘awwws’ when everyone got them. 

And maybe even a little applause!Then all we had to do was wait for the RSVPs…

Oh yes and organise a wedding!
But more of that once I have the pics.

Hope you like them.

******

P.S. To anyone thinking of doing their own diy invites,
make a decent playlist to listen to while crafting…
and always check that you’ve spelt a word right
before stamping it over several invites!

How gorgeous is this skirt? The whole tutorial is here. I so want to try this!

Amazingly pretty hair… and it looks pretty easy too.

Mine isn’t this long but I used to do something similar with
two little buns a few years ago so I think it should still work.

I currently dislike our doormat. (If you can dislike such things!)
So I’m thinking this simple project could be the answer.
Some colourful paint and a ‘hello’ perhaps?

I wanted to red and white painted stripes in our hall…
This painted floor makes me wish I had. Brilliant isn’t it?

Love this lace lamp by Dos Family.

So delicate and pretty… must cast amazing shadows too.

Looks simple-ish… might have to start collecting some doilies first!

And adorable sequin shoe clips.
(The tutorial is here.)

Shoe clips are a current obsession of mine
as I’m trying to find the perfect ones for my wedding.

Ok, there isn’t a tutorial for these amazing chairs…
but I’ve been meaning to share this for ages…

I would love to have these in my hall!

Seen any fab projects
you want to share?

****

P.S. Apologies that I’ve been a somewhat absent blogger.
Life and stress have been taking over.

On the plus side, I’m thankful to say that
I’m off to meet my little niece Grace tomorrow.

She’s a tiny mite and has arrived very early– after giving everyone
a bit of a scare for the last month – but so far everything’s looking good.

Hope you all have a great weekend xx

****

1. BurdaStyle (via Say Yes to Hoboken)
2. A Cup of Jo 3. Lisa Leonard Designs
4. better homes and gardens (via you are my fave)
5. dos family (via pinterest)
6. Say Yes to Hoboken (& Momtastic)
7. James Hopkins (via pinterest)

(I’m pretty lucky at the best of times
but this occasion involved presents!)

I got lots of lovely things, too many to share,
but here’s a few iphone pics of my favourites.

This is my buffalo print from my Dad and his girlfriend.

(It’s by Paul of Navarone in case you’re wondering.)

It’s a. gorgeous and yellowy,
b. taps into my Japan obsession
and c. just makes me laugh.

My other half gave me this tiny bunting dish
(from a place in Glasgow) to keep my jewellery in.

I like it too much to put anything in it.
(I’m strange like that!)

I also got this wonderful typewriter necklace
by boygirlparty from my Dad’s girlfriend.

It’s my ‘oh hi, did you know I’m a writer’
necklace and I’m pretty chuffed with it.

My little sis got me this super gorgeous wedding book.

I’ll share a few of the DIY suggestions this Weddingnesday.

A good friend got me this yummy posh jelly book.

We can’t wait to try and make one of them…

… but I’m betting our first attempt will look nothing like this!

And now to share one of my
absolute favourite presents:

My adorable fox picture handmade by my little cousins.

Isn’t it absolutely fantastic?

(I think they might have been reading my blog!)

************

Of course my little cousins weren’t the only ones being crafty…

As I mentioned before, we had loads of Craftmas plans.

And we sort of, nearly, kind of made them happen. Eventually.

This is me at 2am on Christmas Eve Eve,
stitching away on my handmade cards.

This is the start of our ‘perch on a mug’
gingerbread houses production line…

Baked house segments… it was so hard not to just eat these!

One of the first assembled gingerbread villages…

And yay… proof that the gingerbread houses do perch on mugs!

Last but not least, the snowmen pinatas we made for my wee cousins.

My other half made the ‘shells’ and I did the illustrations.

He’s threatening to make more next year so
I better work on my drawing skills by then!

Hope you were all suitably spoiled too?
(Did any of you manage a very crafty Xmas?)

I may have mentioned my obsession with a certain coffee brand’s hot chocolate.

Turns out that little cardboard cup is pretty good for making ‘snow art’ too.

All you need is a yummy cup of the hot stuff…

And once you’re done, use the empty cup to make a ‘snow coffee’.

They’re great for making snow castles too…

(It’s 4pm in this shot – how dark is it?!)

Oh yeah and if you’re travelling round Edinburgh any time soon,
don’t worry too much about any dino prints you might spot!

Happy snow day Sunday everyone.

(I took snaps of our festive decorating this afternoon
so will hopefully get a chance to blog them soon.)

Right now this cat is me.

Well, not literally but I’m not exactly full of festive cheer.

All our wonderful, idyllic plans of making and baking while
watching old Christmas films… look like they’re going
to be squeezed in on Christmas Eve. Eeek!

(Why does Christmas start earlier each year
but there still seems to be less time for it?)

But I don’t want to be all bah humbug about it.

So here’s a few crafty Christmasy ideas that have made me
smile recently… and that I’m hoping to get time to try.

(Correction… I am going to try!)

Christmas photo booth accessories!
I adore these… especially the Rudolph ones.

Strawberry Santas! These look so easy and fun to make.
And they’d make a nice alternative to all the chocolate indulging!

Gorgeous spool wreath!
This looks a bit trickier it has to be said but so pretty.
I currently have a wire heart shape to make our wreath
with but that’s as far as I’ve got for the moment.

And since I’m still obsessed with hot chocolate…
these darling little gingerbread houses!

Aren’t they lovely?
The challenge will be not eating them straight away.

How festive are you all feeling?
Are you all ho-ho-ho-happy?
Or a little grinchy about the whole thing?