Tutorial Tuesday - Felt Flower Necklace

Happy Tuesday to you. How has your last week been? Today we are making a pretty and summery felt flower necklace. I love these necklaces because you can make them in any colours and in a size that suits you (or the person you are making it for).

You will need:
- Felt sheets
- Felt glue or hot glue gun ( I used Fabri-Tac)
- Scissors
- Ribbon or necklace chain

1. Start by choosing your felt colours. I chose to use 3 colours per necklace. You can use more if you wish, and make as meany flowers as you like depending on how big you want your necklace to be. I used our 30% wool felt that comes in 9" squares, you can use any felt you have and if you want your flowers bigger then you can get bigger sheets, or you can stick strips together to make them longer.

2. I made 2 different styles of flowers, you can make them all the same if you wish.

For the first flower you will need to cut a strip of felt approx 1 - 1 1/2" wide. Fold the felt in half width ways and stick with glue. Cut little slits all the way along the strip. Now start to roll from one end adding glue as you go to create your flower. If you want a bigger flower simple add another strip on to the end and continue to roll.

For the second flower cut a strip of felt approx 1/2" - 3/4" wide. Do not fold this time but cut slits all the way along again. Start to roll as before adding glue as you go.

Make sure that as you are rolling you keep the bottoms nice and flat to make it easier to glue later.

3. Take a scrap piece of felt (I used the lightest colour that I was using) and arrange your flowers on it how you want them to be. When you are happy stick your flowers onto the felt.

4. Cut neatly around the flowers so you cannot see any of the felt backing from the front.

5. Make sure that you also glue each of the flowers to each other, you do not want them flopping about like they are in the photo below!

6. Now you want to choose how you are going to wear your necklace. Do you want it on a chain or ribbon?

7. Which ever you are using make sure that you have 2 of the same length pieces.

8. Work out how you want the flowers to hang and add the chain or ribbon to the back on both sides with glue.

9. Cover the whole of the back of the felt with glue and then stick onto another piece of felt, sandwiching the chain or ribbon in between. 

10. Trim around the flowers again, making the back neat and covering the ends of the ribbon/chain.

11. Your necklace is now finished, wear and enjoy!

I hope you have enjoyed this little tutorial. These flowers also work as brooches, simply add a brooch bar to the back or put them on hair clips, headbands etc. You could also add gems, pearls or buttons to the centres of each of the flowers.
I would love to see your version if you create some, feel free to leave a link here to your blog or share with us on Facebook or Twitter.

Happy Crafting,
Maxine xx

Tutorial Tuesday - Mini Map Book

This week for Tutorial Tuesday I have created a video to show you how to make a mini book with a map style fold.

You will need:
- 2 sheet of 12"x12" Card or Thick Patterned Paper
- Thin Ribbon
- Double Sided Tape (or glue stick)
- Patterned Papers for decorating.

Check out the video here.




Hope you enjoyed this little tutorial today. If you make one of these books we would love to see yous, feel free to post a link here or on our Facebook Page.

Happy Crafting, 
Maxine xx

Tutorial Tuesday - Paper and Ribbon Gift Bows

Hello and welcome to our newest Tutorial Tuesday. This week I have a video for you on how to make paper and ribbon gift bows. 

You will need:
- Thin Paper (wrapping paper works well, stay away from cardstock weight scrapbook papers)
- Ribbon
- Double Sided Tape
- Staples

You need 3 strips each of 3 different lengths of paper/ribbon.
I found that 3/4" width worked the best and for a medium bow I used 3x8", 3x7" and 3x6" strips.



Hope you enjoyed the video :)
Happy Crafting,
Maxine

Tutorial Tuesday - Embellishments

Hello and welcome to our first written tutorial for a while! I have recently got into doing video tutorials and have uploaded them to YouTube. I will get around to adding them to some blog posts here as well though.

This week we are looking at making your own embellishments. These are great for all sorts of things including to match scrapbook layouts, card and tag toppers and even toppers for presents.

The idea is to just use what you have on hand. Small scraps of paper that you can punch out work well. Keep yourself a box just for your scraps and you will always have a selection of colours on hand to use for these types of projects.

Here are a selection of butterfly ones I have created. You don't have to make them with butterflies like I have, there are a few other options I have included below. What punches do you own?

You will need:
Various punches or dies
Paper and card to match your project (scraps work well)
Double sided tape and foam tape
Glitter, gems, buttons, flowers, brads, ribbon etc of your choice.

Start by punching out and gathering the shapes that you want to use. For my butterfly ones I used a large scalloped circle punch, a circle punch and a small scalloped circle punch, a paper flower and a butterfly punch. Ink the edges if desired before assembling.

Decide the order you want to assemble them in and add double sided tape or foam dots to the back. I use tape on the flowers and foam dots on the other layers and a liquid glue for my butterfly. 

Here is how it looks all assembled. The more foam tape and layers you use the more dimensional your embellishments will be.

Don't have that many punches or want to vary the designs a bit? Use brads, buttons and stickers to change up the designs. Have fun and create your embellishments to match your projects.

Here are some simple ones I created a few years ago with book papers, flowers and buttons.

I hope you have enjoyed this little DIY embellishment tutorial and I would love to see if you create any of your own from these ideas. Feel free to share pics on our Facebook page and leave links here.

Happy Crafting,

Maxine

Tutorial Tuesday - Air Dry Clay 2

This week I have some more projects for you using air dry clay. This is such a great product for adults and children alike because there are just so many different things you can make with it. Take a look at the tutorials below from other fab bloggers for some great air dry clay projects.

Don't forget we stock 500g and 1kg air dry clay in our shop here.

1. This blog is in Spanish but the pictures are pretty easy to follow.
Find the blog here.

2. These are similar to the clay tags that I showed you in my first tutorial but I love the addition of the tissue paper! Find the blog here.

3. This is a fun projects to do with the kids. You could also add buttons and beads instead of shells.

Find it here.

4. Get the kids to make their own beads. Adults can do this too!

Find it here.

5. Make some magnets.

Find the blog here.

What else have you found to do with Air Dry clay? Feel free to share your projects with us on our Facebook page or leave a link below.

Happy Crafting,

Maxine xx

Tutorial Tuesday - Folded Box

This week I was supposed to share with you some more air dry clay projects. Unfortunately I have been unable to fully complete this ready for this week so I have a quick little folded box tutorial for you this week and the other air dry clay projects will be with you next Tuesday instead!

You will need:
2 squares of paper/card

This week we are making a simple origami style folded box. You can use this as a little basket or if you make 2 then you have a box with a lid. They are great for using to give little gifts and are quick and easy to make once you know how. They can be created in any size you would like.

All you need to remember is that one square will need to be 1/4" smaller, so if you use a 6"x6" piece of paper then the other piece will need to be 5 3/4" x 5 3/4".

1. Start by folding your piece of paper in half both ways, so you end up with a cross in the middle of your paper.

2. Fold each corner into the middle.

3. Fold 2 sides into the middle.

4. Unfold the 2 sides you just folded and the triangles. Leave the other 2 triangles folded in.

5. Now fold the 2 long sides (with the triangles) into the middle.

6. Fold up one of the pointed ends on the 3rd fold line down. 

7. Stand up one of the straight folded sides and fold along an existing fold line to make a neat corner. 

8. Repeat for the other side of the box and then the other end.

9. Fold in both the triangles to finish off your box.

10. If you want a lid for your box then make another by following the above steps.

Now you can fill with goodies!

If you are using a patterned paper then you will want to make sure that the pattern is facing down while you are making up the box so that it ends up on the outside.

Have fun making boxes!

Happy Crafting,

Maxine

xx

Tutorial Tuesday - Air Dry Clay

Hello, hope everyone out there is well. Welcome to Tutorial Tuesday again, sorry for not getting one done last week but I was totally thrown out to sync with the bank holiday! Hope you all had a lovely one.
This week I have been having a play with some air dry clay. I have 2 things to show you this week and will have some further projects for making with air dry clay next week!

So this week you will need:
- Air Dry Clay (I used the 500g block but we also do a 1kg)
- Rolling Pin
- Small and medium sizes bowls
- Stamps
- Ink or Paint
- Cookie cutters

Start by rolling your clay out to about 0.5-1cm thick, making sure it is just bigger than the size of your small bowl.

Now take your stamp and a dye or permanent ink pad and stamp all over your piece of clay.

Then take your small bowl and place it on the clay. Using a knife cut off the excess clay.

Place the cut out circle inside the larger sized bowl and gently press down to make it into a bowl shape. 

Now leave to dry over night. The pack states 24 hours to dry.

In the morning I gently removed the clay from inside the bowl and while it had dried enough to retain it's shape it was still damp and I could tell that it was not completely dry. 

I gently sanded the edges of the bowl to make it slightly more rounded.

Then I added some silver paint to the edges.

It will need to stand for another 12 hours to be completely dry.

Mine is not perfect but I like the charm of it. If you want the edges to be more even then you will need to take more care when you place the clay into the bowl. I kind of just plonked mine in!!

You can also see that the colour ink I used faded over night. If you want a more vibrant colour then you will want to use a darker ink or you could also use paint. 

With my left over clay from trimming around the bowl I made some cute clay tags. For these I just used some cookie cutters to cut out the shapes. Then I used an un-inked stamp and just pressed it into the clay to give a de-bossed impression. In the morning I used some coloured chalks on the 2 scalloped circles to help the impressions stand out more. You can see the difference doing this made compared to the plain circle tag. If you want to make them into tags like this make sure that you make the hole in the top while the clay is still wet!

Hope this has given you some ideas that you can do with air dry clay and if you do make any of these projects we would love to see. Feel free to share a link here or on our Facebook Page.

Happy Crafting,

Maxine xx

P.s. If you like the bows and earrings that are shown in my bowl above then I make these too! Pop on over the my handmade Facebook Page to see more bows and to purchase! https://www.facebook.com/ButtonBowBoutique