Sunday 25 September 2016

Vintage Tea Cup Candles


I'd like to share my latest makes with you - some vintage tea cup candles!  I had wanted to give this a go for a while to make some Christmas presents, and recently I saw a new show on The Craft Channel with Chulo Naturals - they sell their own brand candles, soaps and bath bombs all made with natural products from a shop in Kent, and have now started making kits for us to make some of these things at home.

The tea cup candle kit comes with one bone china tea cup, a bag of soy wax chips, 2 wicks, wick holders and a colour/fragrance tablet - oh and full instructions!  The guidance is that you can make 2 tea cup candles, though I guess it depends on the size, but I was able to make 3 tea cup candles and 1 expresso cup candle from one kit (just needed a couple of extra wicks).

I used the vanilla scented kit, and as I type this blog post the candles are sitting on the desk next to me, and without them even being lit I can smell a gorgeous warm vanilla smell.  

Now all I need to do is make or find some boxes to put them in to give as gifts at Christmas or even birthdays! Though the little expresso cup candle is mine :-)

I hope I have inspired you to have a go at making your own candles - I am off to find some more old tea cups! :-)

Materials Used:
The Craft Channel - Chulo Naturals vintage cup and saucer candle making kit
Other tea cups, expresso cup and saucers

Sunday 18 September 2016

Happy 1st Birthday to The Craft Channel!


This week The Craft Channel celebrated its 1st Birthday, and I was lucky enough to be invited to a cocktail party in London to mark the occasion.  My other half Steve came with me and we had a great time, even though we did not know anyone there - of course I recognised all of the presenters but had never met or spoken to them before.  Julian Ballantyne was there to greet us and made us feel very welcome, and by the time I had checked our names in with the lovely Debbie Kershaw and Beccy Seddon they were already talking football!

The invitation said that there would be some special crafting guests, but we did not know who - all I kept thinking was "please let Anna Griffin be there" as I love her products and am so happy that she is back on our screens in the UK!  So... guess what?!  Yes, amongst all the other lovely craft guests and presenters Anna was there!

By the time I plucked up enough courage to speak to her she must have spoken to a ton of people (not that she is scary at all, the complete opposite - I was just in awe about being able to meet her!), but she was still kind enough to spend about 20 minutes with me, listening to me ramble on about all of her products that I have and how much I love them! So thank you Anna for making my day! Not too keen on having my photo taken, but here I am with the lovely Anna!

I think I managed to spend a few minutes with most of the presenters, as well as many of the behind the scenes staff - buyers, graphics, producers, even the CEO and founder James Doak - lovely man!  All such lovely people and more than happy to spend time with us chatting about craft (well that was me anyway, Steve just kept saying he was the "plus 1" when asked if he crafted! LOL!)

I don't want to miss anyone out in my thank you, though I am sure I will (sorry!)  I met Dawn Bibby, who I have been watching since her days on QVC which really got me back into crafting (picking things up from childhood when I was always making things at home with my Mum - sewing, baking, colouring...)  Rosella, Dawn Wheeler, Wendi Rhodes, Lesley Wharton, Debbie Kershaw, Beccy, Kevin and the lovely Jaqui Joseph - she was wearing the most amazing sparkly trousers and was so fun to chat to!  There were a few people missing, but maybe I will get to meet them one day.

I also met some lovely fellow crafters that I hope to meet up with again soon!

So thanks again to everyone at The Craft Channel for a year of crafty goodness and a lovely evening to celebrate!  Looking forward to many more years of shows!

Of course my Happy Birthday card had to be made with Anna Griffin goodies, and I am adding this card to the following:
Through The Craft Room Door - Anything Goes 13/09/16 - 19/09/16 

Anna Griffin Materials Used:
Fantastic flips card making kit, fantastic flips sentiment stamps, pink & green ink, flourish die from the spring seasonal die set, metallic card layers & papers

Wednesday 14 September 2016

Anna Griffin Pinecone Christmas Card and Gift

Hi!  Today I have a Christmas card and gift to share!  As I am sure you will have seen from recent posts I have been in a bit of an "Anna Griffin" crafty mode, so no surprise here is another project using her fabulous goodies!

I used my Cricut and an image from a gorgeous Anna Griffin cartridge, and had a go at something that I had wanted to try for ages - making a stencil on my Cricut for glass etching.  I would have to admit that the design I chose for the stencil was a bit fiddly because of all of the bits I needed to make sure stayed on the glass to create the full image.  Given this was my first attempt I am very happy with the results, and will definitely have another go.  My top tip here is if you have not done this before use a very simple outline design for your first go! :-)

Having decorated the glass candle votives I made a card to match, and then decorated the box the candles came in.  I also put some gold mirror card inbetween the candle and the glass so that you can see the design (the candles are white!) which would obviously need to be removed before lighting!

I am adding this to:
Through The Craft Room Door - Anything Goes 13/09/16

Materials Used:
Anna Griffin - Anna's Christmas Cards & Embellishments Cricut cartridge, Holiday metallic cardstock layers, Holiday Trimming II card kit, Scattered Holly embossing folder, perfect bows, Christmas paper from stash
Armour Etch - glass etching cream
Cricut - Explore Air Gold machine, vinyl and vinyl transfer tape
Tiger - candles and votive holders