The Wendy House - official launch today

I am pleased to announce that my sister website The Wendy House is officially launched today.

The Wendy House

To celebrate the launch, we are offering 15% discount on all purchases over £5 and a fantastic giveaway of the ORIGINAL watercolour painting of this picture by our new affiliate designer Ellie Sheffield of Fizzy Fairy Paintings. There is no purchase necessary to enter our prize draw.

Along with our other card making products, you can also purchase the "Impy Butterfly Encounter" on our website as a full A4, high quality print and as a "Quick Card" with matching envelope. While you're in there, why not take a look at all the other wonderful crafting products on offer.

Click below the picture to find out more:

Special Launch Give Away

Make your own envelopes

Here’s a quick tutorial on how to make your own envelopes.  Not only will you always have the right size envelope for your cards, but you will save money as well. It only takes a few minutes to make an envelope and you will never be caught out without one.
You can buy special envelope making tools, but I think you can make your own very successfully without
You can use any A4 paper from 80gsm copying paper to around 150gsm for a luxury envelope.  That of course will depend on whether the person you are sending to will just rip open the envelope or savour the experience of slowly unwrapping the envelope anticipating the wonderful hand made card that you have presented them with.  The choice is yours.  Most of my recipients are the former I’m afraid. If you are selling your cards you might want to make the envelopes just that little bit special as well.
I will also show you below how to line your envelopes with a contrasting paper or why not download some of The Wendy House backing papers to make them really special.
The tutorial below is for cards up to around 5” x 7”, you might be able to use it for cards slightly bigger, but I find that too fiddly.  For larger cards you will need more than one sheet of paper.

What you need

1 sheet of A4 paper

Scissors

Narrow double sided sticky tape or tacky glue (not PVA)

The card that you are going to fill the envelope with.

Instructions

Place your card on top of the A4 sheet and loosely fold the bottom of the sheet up so that the bottom of the sheet is about half an inch (1.5cm) from the top of the card.










Turn the card around and fold up the sides as shown above.  Don’t do this too tight as you need to be able to get the card in and out of the envelope.

Take the card out and sharpen the fold lines.








You don’t need to draw anything on the sheet, I have just drawn on it to make it easier to see the fold lines. The dashed lines are the fold lines.
Cut the paper as shown.  You might like to cut just inside the lines A and B to make a neat finish. Cut a V shape at the sides and at the top of the sheet as illustrated.  These don’t need to be precise but try to make them symmetrical.  If your card is quite small, you may wish to trim the side flaps a little, but leave at least 1/2” (1.5cm).










Place your double sided sticky tape along the lines as shown above, and peel off the backing sheet on the two lower edge ones.
Fold up the bottom and stick together and you are done.

Alternative Options

1.  Line your envelope

Now we can get a bit more interesting and introduce a lining if you wish.  It makes a very nice finish and give a real quality to your cards. 











Place your new envelope on top of a contrasting piece of paper or thin card and draw around it – don’t forget to include the flap at the top.








Cut out the contrasting piece. Cut a little inside the line you have drawn as you will need to fit this inside your envelope.  Snip off about 1/2” (1.5cm) from the bottom edge.
Place the contrasting sheet inside your envelope and attach at the top with some double sided sticky tape.

2.  Use a matching or decorative backing page for your envelope.

Print out your sheet on good quality paper or thin card and then make your envelope from this sheet.  Your cards will have a real luxury feel and will look very expensive, ideal for selling and for those who love to receive something special.








You can either put some double sided sticky tape on the envelope flap or why not use a piece that you have cut off to make a seal.  Simply cut a scrap piece to size and put a row of double sided sticky tape at the top and bottom.  Stick the top to the envelope flap and the bottom one to the body of the envelope, after all presentation is everything. Your friends and customers will love these.





That’s all for now – BBS

Wendy

It’s a Cracker!

Christmas starts early with crafters, so to kick off, here’s a free template and instructions for you to make your own Christmas crackers.
Apart from making your own table crackers, these are great as ornaments to brighten up your tree or to use as small gift boxes.  They are also great fun to make and really quick and easy.
Use your favourite background papers or why not pop over to The Wendy House to find some great background prints to use and some pre-printed designs for the Christmas crackers like those shown in the image above.
Download the .pdf template for free – follow the link below

Click here to Download the free template

What you need

Template or pre-printed cracker image
Scissors
Double sided sticky tape
Ruler
Paper trimmer (preferred)
Scoring tool – I used an old credit card
Christmas ribbon – about half a meter for each cracker

Instructions

Print off your cracker or template.
If you are using the template, cut out the template and draw the outline onto your backing card, then come back to this point.

Cut out the design on the cut lines (darker lines).  I prefer to use a paper trimmer on longer lines.
You don’t need to do the diamond shapes at this stage, just the outline.

Using the ruler and scoring tool, score all the fold lines (paler lines) and don’t forget the ones that join up the diamond shapes.


Fold ALL your scored lines, this makes it much easier to put the cracker together.

Fold under the end of the cracker so that the middle of the diamond shape is on the fold and with your card folded, snip out the diamond shapes and the two end pieces.  This is the easiest way to cut out the diamonds.

Put some double sided sticky tape on the tab ends, don’t forget to put this on the small tabs as well and fold up your cracker to meet the top edge.
Now you have a nice cracker shape and you can now pinch the cracker neck pieces and the cracker shape is done.

Tie a piece of ribbon around both neck pieces and you have your cracker.
Enjoy!

Which type of sewing machine to choose?

Before reading further, please understand that this is my opinion alone and I have based my choice of machine on my own selection criteria.
However you may be looking for a sewing machine and wondering what all the different types are and what the advantages and disadvantages are.
I have put together my own views but before making your choice, you may want to do some more research and decide what your own selection criteria is. 
I take no responsibility for your own choice.
The images used are for illustration only and are not machines that have been reviewed.

My Decison

I already had a wonderful Husqvarna Designer 1 embroidery and sewing machine which was getting a bit old and a replacement would cost around £4,000.  Just to update it from floppy disc to USB input would cost over £300.  This machine did almost everything that you could think of, from full embroidery to putting the presser foot down automatically when you depressed the pedal and tie off the thread at the end of stitching.
However I had a special project in mind which involved a lot of leather sewing and I didn’t want to risk putting too much strain on the Designer 1. So I started looking for another machine to do the “donkey” work.
My quest was to find a machine that:-
1.  would last a long time (Longevity).
2.  would do heavy work (Durability).
3.  would be light-weight machine so that I could take it on extended holidays and light to move around (Weight).
4.  would be good value for money (Cost).
So I started doing my research and some of this might help you if you are selecting a new sewing machine.
The types of machines available seem to fall into four categories and I have put some salient points into a table for you.
Please note that a mechanical machine is not a manual machine.  It runs on electricity but does not have any computer technology.

Machine Type	Computerised	Industrial	Mechanical	Portable
Advantages	Lots of fancy stitches Lots of different settings Quiet	Very strong motor designed to last for a long time	Not much to go wrong and easy to repair	Super light-weight Some have battery and electricity power.
Disadvantages	Computerised and therefore potential to be expensive and need specialist  repair	Very heavy, not really portable.  Quite expensive. Basic stitches	No fancy stitches Basic settings ”Clunky”.	Basic stitches. Basic settings. Not really for the serious sewer. So light that may not give good stability in use. Basic machine.

So the question now was how do these meet with my selection criteria.  Again I have marked these with 1, 2 and 3 against each type of machine – 1 being best meets my selection criteria and 4, least meets my criteria.

Type	Computerised	Industrial	Mechanical	Portable
Longevity	3	1	2	4
Durability	3	1	2	4
Weight	3	4	2	1
Cost	4	3	2	1
Overall Score	13	9	8	10

The cost of a computerised machine machine starts at around £1,000 and goes up to around £5,000.
An Industrial machine is around the £1,000 mark but can be more.  Good second hand ones can be found as they have great longevity.
Mechanical machines cost from around £100 upwards
Portable are generally under £100.
There are of course other categories of specialist machines such as quilting machines, embellishing machines, overlockers/sergers to mention some but I already knew these were not what I was looking for so I have not included these in my detailed research.
So based on the above table a mechanical machine was what I was looking for. Although the mechanical machine only came out one point better than the industrial one, the cost  and the portability elements weighed heavily for me and the difference was actually a major factor.
So a mechanical machine was for me – now which one?
My post on my choice will follow shortly.

Make a lined Box Bag – free tutorial

And with no hand sewing.

I just love these lined box-bags, they are fantastic for make-up, pencil cases and any bits and pieces.  Make a matching set; a shoe bag; spectacle case; handbag a bag for so many uses. Experiment with different sizes.  And because the zip goes down the sides, you can easily get to whatever you want to keep in there.

They are great for using up scraps of fabric and recycled zips. Make them the size of your scrap.

Add some beading or a tassel to the zip for that extra special touch.

Make them for your friends but I’m sure you will want to keep them yourself.

Skill level –

Intermediate

Time to make

Less than 1 hour

What you need

Scissors
Sewing Machine
Zip – 12” (30cm)
Two pieces of contrasting fabric 15” x 12”  (38cm x 30cm)
Thread
Optional tassel or beading
This will make a bag approximately 5” long x 4” wide x 3” high (13cm x  10cm x 7.5cm).

Instructions

Cut the fabric to size.

Remember in this bag the length of the bag is the shorter of the sides (12”).
Take the outside fabric and stitch the zip to the right-side of the fabric close to the teeth

Lay the lining over the zip right sides together and stitch the zip (a little further away from the teeth).

Once stitched, if you open up the fabric, right sides on top, this is what it looks like.

Flip over so the the fabric lays wrong sides together and the zip is flat. Press the zip line if you wish.
Bring the bottom of the outside fabric up to meet the top edge of the zip (right sides together).  Pin the fabric to the edge of the zip and stitch close to the teeth.

Now turn over the fabric so that the lining is on the top.

Fold up the bottom of the lining (right sides together) and stitch to the edge of the zip (a little further away from the teeth).

Now you have two tubes attached by the zip. Press the zip line again if you wish.

Open up the top tube so that you are looking at the right side of the lining. Get a hold of the lining……

and turn the whole thing inside out

This will leave you with the bag inside out.
Now for the side seams.
Fold the bag in half with the zip at the top and pin to mark the bottom fold line. Do this at both ends.

Flatten the bag with the zip in the centre and pin the zip to match the bottom fold in the picture above.  Important - Make sure that the zip is partly open at this stage or you won’t be able to turn it back to the right side.

Stitch down the two side seams and neaten.  If you have an overlocker – great, if not use a stitched zig zag stitch.
 
Now the tricky bit  to make the boxed corners.  Take your time with this as this is what gives the bag it’s shape. Sorry for the blurred picture.
Pinch the corner, so that the seam meets the original bottom fold line (where you pinned it) as closely as you can. You can usually line this up by feeling with your fingers.

Pin the seam line to the bottom fold line and flatten the fabric.

Now mark a point 1.5” (3.5cm) from the corner down each side and draw a line across. Stitch this line and neaten the edge.  Do this for all four corners.  If you don’t take care here the box will end up a strange shape.  They must all be the same.

Trim off the corners outside the stitching line.

Turn the whole thing inside out and there you are! Push out the corners and the bag will take it’s shape.

Click below to download the printable version from our sister website.

Click for Printable version

The Wendy House

I’d love to receive your comments and pictures of your creations.  Either leave a comment below or email me.


See you soon……………………………………..

Welcome

Welcome to my new blog.

I love sewing and crafting particularly upcycling and recycling things.  It must be my crafty nature that I hate throwing anything away and end up with a stash of "things" that might come in useful sometime.

Here I will share with you some lovely crafting and sewing ideas, tips and patterns and sometimes just my opinion and thoughts on anything.

And the beauty of this blog - EVERYTHING IS FREE.

We like Free!

I hope to post weekly but sometimes other things get in the way and sometimes I just don't have anything to share, but please sign up to receive regular updates by email whenever I make a new post.

Of course if you don't mind parting with a bit of your hard-earned cash then you can visit my sister website

The Wendy House 

where you will also find free tips and ideas and also some patterns and digital downloads for sale.

There are also some FREEBIES to be found there too.  

Check out the Quick Cards, they're quick to make and ideal for when you just can't find that inspiration for a special card or you are in a hurry. And they are only 99p each to download and then you can print and make as many cards of each design as you like, even to sell.