Resin Jewellery

Look what I got for Christmas...

Whilst other wives got perfume or lingerie from their husbands for Christmas, mine settled on dangerous chemicals. Specifically, all the equipment to make my own resin jewellery.

I don't think I could manage lampwork glass or polymer clay because I'm not good at sculpting but resin is mould-based so we agreed that would be a great gift for a crafty wife. Here are a few samples of what I've made so far.

I've found Helen Cant's articles on resin in Make Jewellery magazine really helpful and my husband used her supplier recommendations when doing his Christmas shopping. The polyester water clear casting resin and colour pigments came from East Coast Fibre Glass Supplies and the moulds came from Metal Clay Ltd.

Making the resin is surprisingly easy, although you need a face mask and a well ventilated (aka kitchen door open) space as the fumes are quite bad for you. You measure out the resin and then add 1-2% catalyst. I used a syringe to add the catalyst as the quantities are quite small. You've then got about 15 minutes to add colour pigment if you like and get your resin into the mould ready to set.

I've been leaving my castings 24-48 hours before removing them from the mould. The small castings seem to come out easily but the bigger items like the bangles take a bit more effort. The hardest part is then the sanding. My husband made me wet sand each item with 6 grades of sandpaper and then polish each casting with three grades of plastic polish (he's a model maker and into that sort of thing).

The bangles pictured above are my favourite make so far. I started with the plain green and pink ones and then moved to encasing stuff in the resin. The star bangle is not a perfect success as the foil stars sort of sank towards the front of the mould but I'm quite proud of the buttons one where I got each button to stand perfectly on end.

Encasing is the other tricky part - getting whatever you want to clad in resin into the right place without any air bubbles. Following Helen's advice, I found that it's best to create a coloured layer at the back of an encased piece, although the button ring you see here is entirely clear. The resin bonds really well to itself so you can add a layers quite easily. 

In terms of converting the resin castings to jewellery, for the rings and brooch, I scuffed the back of the resin and then glued on the jewellery findings with Araldite. My husband hand drilled the necklace and drop earring cabochons and inserted small pegs that I then attached using jump rings.

The sewing-relating pieces you see here are based on Helen's Stitch in Time project in January 2011 's Make Jewellery Magazine.

I'm now starting a three-layer bracelet and I've just bought some larger moulds to have a bash at paperweights. I wonder what I can encase in resin next...

Melx

Knickerbocker Glory Purse Kit

Yummy felting....

This is my second kit from the delightful Knitting Sundae. Following the success of my felted Neapolitan pencil case, I had no hesitation in making a further purchase on an ice cream theme.

I felt the kit was once again a fantastic bargain at only £7. It included variegated 100% chunky wool in pink and green, a zip and an iron-on cherry motif. Best of all, the kit came complete with a handmade polymer clay ice cream cone charm for the zipper. The kit was  presented in a lovely paper bag (I think everything should come in paper bags) fastened with ice cream design ribbon. It was a shame to break into it really.

Anyway, I reluctantly disturbed the packaging to knit the purse on 7mm needles in a single piece of stocking stitch. I soon worked out that I probably had enough yarn for two purses, so I made one in pink and one in green. I sewed each purse up the sides with mattress stitch ready for felting

The wool felted brilliantly - one trip around the washing machine at 40 degrees gave me two purses of just the right size (about 5" x 3.5"). I decided not to line the purses as it the fabric was so firm and smooth.

I hand-sewed the pink zip that came with the kit into the pink purse and a cream zip from my stash into the green one using ordinary sewing thread.

For the pink purse, I attached a Melody Ross felt flower embellishment I had in my stash to the outside of the purse and used the fabulous polymer clay ice cream cone charm from the kit for the zipper pull.

I used the cherry motif from the kit on the green purse and then added a silver cherry charm to the zipper (this was actually a little gift from Lucy at Knitting Sundae for buying a second kit).

So, two cute and handy purses for the price of one:) I also bought a Mint Choc Chip Gadget Case Kit. from Lucy that I am looking forward to making shortly.

Melx  

Fluffy Stuffy Bunny

The best things in life are free...

One of my favourite blogs is Super Cute Kawaii. Over the time I've been reading it, that blog has been responsible for me parting with more than a little of my disposable income by highlighting gorgeous purchases like this bear, which I ordered only this morning.

In fairness, though, Super Cute Kawaii also provides links to lots of freebies and giveaways, including the pattern for this delightful rabbit and her dress from Jenny B Harris of Allsorts. Jenny's blog includes a detailed tutorial for both the bunny and the dress and free PDF patterns. You might also want to take a look to see how it should have turned out :)

To begin, I glued the bunny pattern (body and ear) to stiff cardboard. The technique for both the ears and the body was to draw round the shape on the fabric and then machine sew around the outline with a small gap for turning. I then cut out the shape with pinking shears and turned for stuffing. I used a spotty red fabric for the ears and a white, fleecy fun fur for the body. I didn't do nearly as poorly as I have before with the fun fur under my sewing machine but there was still some swearing. The trickiest part was sandwiching the stuffed ears into the right place under the outline for the body.

Once I turned the bunny, I decided to use safety eyes and a safety nose for the face. I actually think my bunny is not as cute as Jenny's because of that, but it's too late now. Once bunny was stuffed and the gap sewn up by hand, I made the pom pom tail. Lucky bunny got some leftover pink baby alpaca made into a tail with my trusty Clover pom pom maker. Looking at bunny's tail just makes me smile.

To avoid bunny being naked, Jenny thoughtfully included a pattern for a reversible dress. I'm not sure mine is entirely reversible but I used a purple floral for the front and a lilac spotty fabric on the back. As Jenny suggested, I used felt ribbon for the dress yoke, fastened with a small press stud. I added two tiny purple spotty buttons for decoration.

To finish off bunny, I sewed on a small Papermania purple bow.

So, thanks Jenny and thanks Super Cute Kawaii.

Melx

Knitted Apple Cosies, Bag Charm & Gadget Case

In praise of quick knits...

I recently met another girl (if I can be such a thing in my late thirties) who started to learn to knit about the same time as me. The project she chose to start with is a cardigan and she is still working on it. Although I think it's fantastic to start with something so ambitious, I'm fairly confident the learn-to-knit project would be stuffed in the back of the cupboard by now if I hadn't started with tiny pieces like purses and chunky scarves.

Even now, when I am more or less capable of knitting something bigger and more elaborate, I just love the instant gratification that comes from making something in an afternoon or over the weekend. It makes you feel like you're making progress and seriously cuts down on the UFO count.

I subscribe to a couple of knitting magazines and Knit Today is particularly good at providing quick knit projects for the impatient knitter such as myself. The three projects I've got here all came from February 2011's issue (hence the red theme).

First up, we have the apple cosies from Val Pierce. I made the first one in traditional red and green using Rowan pure wool DK. I was so thrilled with the finished result, that I made a second one (and I hardly ever knit two of anything - heaven help me if I ever get as far as socks!). This one is done in a beautiful hand-dyed DK (the shade is called Berrylicious!) from Green Eyed Monsters.

I have had people (hubby for example) questioning the utility of an apply cosy but they are awfully cute aren't they?

The second project was this mixed media bag charm. I knitted the heart with the Rowan pure wool DK and then used the Berrylicious to make two small pom poms with my fab Clover pom pom maker. I then raided my bead stash for the pretty plastic heart-shaped beads and a couple of crochet-covered beads, which I threaded onto more of the Berrylicious. I hung each item on a different length of yarn so the ensemble would look nice and then knotted the lot to a bag clip. I used a little FrayCheck on the yarn ends to try to keep the knot safe. Sweet and super-quick I thought, although I'm going to need to keep it away from the cats.

Finally, I started what should have been Katina Killey's pretty purse. However, once I got going with the Berrylicious again, I thought the shape would be perfect to hold my 3G (I know, how very last decade) ipod, so I didn't bother with a zip and made a little catch using a crochet chain (the some total of my current crochet skills) and a button. That's another bonus of the mini knit - you get less attached to the final result being one thing rather than another.

So, all in all, I think I got bags of cuteness for very little time and yarn. I'm sure there's a cardigan in me somewhere though...

Melx

Lovely Ellie Applique Mini Cushion

Sew Hip Issue 26

With the Christmas post taking ages, it seems like I only just read the last Sew Hip and now the next one is here!

So, for my make of the month, I might have cheated slightly by turning Helen Dickson's Lovely Ellie Applique cushion featuring nine elephants into to a mini cushion featuring just the one elephant. There is a good reason for this apart from just laziness, though. A full sized cushion takes up a fair bit of room in the house and I already have quite  lot of cushions that I've bought or made. Hence, a teeny version seemed  like a time and space saving option.

A small sample of my cushion collection

For the front of the cushion, I used some lilac cotton drill I had in stash. The elephant's body is cut from a fat quarter of lovely purple fabric my mum put in my Christmas haberdashery box and I used a piece of lilac craft felt from my scraps bag for the ear. The elephant is simply appliqued to the front of the cushion using three strands of contrasting embroidery thread. Projects often have you gluing or using basting spray on applique but I tend to just pin the shape on and sew round, although I try to keep the stitches close together when using cotton to avoid fraying.

For the back of the cushion, I used some pretty cotton lawn from the Fent Shop in Skipton. I sewed the cushion together on my sewing machine, leaving a gap for turning. To stuff the cushion, I combined lavender and toy stuffing and then hand sewed the gap closed.

In the project in the magazine, two of the nine elephants were facing each other with a felt heart between them. I'm afraid my elephant is lonely but I did find a pre-cut felt heart to glue on its bottom.

The finished size is a modest 6" square. Cute, delightfully fragranced and I won't have my husband asking me where I'm going to put it...

Melx