time to experiment

Life at I Heart Art is as always varied, sometimes new and exciting, sometimes dull and boring. One day I could be battling with my book-keeping and the next creating nice and shiny new things. Lately I have been researching and experimenting with some new ideas for classes after the summer. This usually involves spying on the opposition, googling, scanning etsy, going out and about to see what's on trend and pinning.

Pinning?? what's that?? You may have heard of Pinterest, and you may have thought "what's the point, it's just photos" but I found it to be an extremely useful tool for keeping ideas and tutorials I find online in one place. Often I see something online and thought "ooooh I could do that" then forget about it with the next click of ze mouse so nowadays I just "pin it" and those photos and tutorials are saved on one online noticeboard. Handy if you have a memory like a sieve like moi, my board crafty board can be found here.

So what's been getting my creative juices flowing?? I have noticed a big trend for embroidery hoop art, the hoop makes a nice frame for hanging and lots of people have been doing ones with embroidery, crochet and applique. Then I had a lightbulb "aha" moment and thought about a scrapbook version for hanging. This is what I've done thus far ...

Still to be completed, I'm thinking about embroidering the cherry blossom branches, some appliqued flowers and perhaps some text. But I can't think of any nice words or phrases that sum up the photo. I don't want love (too cheesy), dream (not dreaming), hope (what am i hoping for?). Anyone have any ideas??

Moving on .... I have also spent an afternoon making some cute snap frame purses. Quite disastrous, but I did say crafting isn't about getting it perfect and there are plenty that wont be making it to the pinterest board. My first purse was too big for the frame, appears my usual sewing motto of "you can always take away" didnt work this time with my overestimation of my seams. The second came out beautifully but when it came to glueing on the frame my fingers got burned and glued my hair resulting in a late night haircut. But I think it looks not bad if you ignore the glue, no? Hopefully like goldilocks it't be just right on my third attempt!

Finally I have also been toying around with free-machine embroidery, again disastrous on my first attempt, the machine was going too fast and fabric was sticking resulting in unsightly lines. But like a trooper I plodded on and the end result is nae too shabby. 

Applique and free-machine embroidered birthday card

All of these crafts will be featuring on my next class list, join our mailing list for updates!!