Little presents - Simply Neutrals #25

Hello dear friends, here's another Simply Neutrals party!
And a nice number too: 25.

This week I'm sharing some of the little gifts I added to the swap for Odetta.
For this, I made a little gift bag with an image I received some time ago from Marie of Lost Bird Studio. You can find her wonderful giveaway (which I won back in 2013, lucky me!) HERE.

I will show a little more goodies of the swap another time.


FEATURES OF LAST PARTY


First of all, I had been posting on my blog a couple of times after our last party and noticed that it might have influenced the number of link ups to last party. Please know that you can ALWAYS link up to the most recent party (except for a few hours before the new party starts), so you can hardly ever be too late to join. Just click on Simply Neutrals in the page section above and you'll see the most recent party on the top.

Second, my week has been a crazy one, so please forgive me if I haven't visited or replied. I will do my best to do this asap.

Here are the features:

Speaking of Marie... She painted a most beautiful vintage suitcase in a beautiful white and made a lovely vignette with it. You can find more photos on her blog Lost Bird Studio HERE.

Then there was this gorgeous card by Suzy of Suziqu's Threadworks:

I was happy to see her back on her blog and creating again after she and her husband moved.

And speaking of houses... I saw this wonderful street art, captured by Jutta of My Digital Wonderland.

I love street art when done respectfully. Especially if it brightens up an otherwise gloomy place.

Clutches, work in progress, flowers and a freebie

On my worktable are two of my (many) UFO's which are patiently waiting to be finished. I just can't work on one project, I have too many ideas that come at the same time. I don't have time to finish them, lol.

The first project is the fabric and lace book that I have posted photos of before HERE and HERE. I'm busy with the spine at the moment. Then I'm going to finish the front and back and then the last embellishments on the pages. I think.

Next is a fabric and lace heart that I'm making.

(Update: you can see the finished heart HERE.)

I will add a beautiful vintage tassel. It will hang from the bottom of the heart.

And then there are so many other UFO projects... Plus things I really ought to be doing :)

Another UFO is finally finished though!

Ages ago I started with this little clutchy like thingie below:

I didn't know what to do with it, so it ended up sleeping in the UFO box. After stitching it I tea dyed the little clutch which gave it a more aged look. Then I had fun making another one, which luckily didn't end up in the UFO box.

Some funny white fabric I bought and never used ended up being a flower.

For the base I used an old crocheted rectangle thingie. For embellishing I used old lace appliques and a piece of a doily, some vintage buttons and another of the beautiful tassels that came from the wonderful shop

La Croix Rosion from Liz

Make sure to check out her shop, she buys the most wonderful vintage pieces all the way from beautiful France where she has a cottage. I have a whole string of these tassels, so they'll pop up once in a while I'm sure.

I think the clutches are cute and I declare them finished.

Me was thinking that my blog lacks flowers lately. And I don't mean the fabric ones here. So here are some bright sunny flowers.

It's also been a while since I last posted a freebie.

So here you go, a freebie image taken from one of my antique French postcards. A sweet little girl with a basket of fresh flowers.

Wishing you a beautiful sunny day and many joyful moments!

xx Wen

Grow Your Blog 2015 plus giveaway (now closed!)

*** GIVEAWAY IS NOW CLOSED ***

Hello hello and welcome to the Grow Your Blog Party of 2015!!

Well, my spot in the party anyway :)

Dear Vicki of 2 Bags Full has generously offered to host this wonderful party again this year. Thank you Vicki!!! It's a huge party with lots of beautiful blogs participating. And it's all about sharing and exploring, having lots of fun and making new friends in the world of blogs.

So here I welcome you in my little nook, where I share with you what my blog is all about. And be sure to check out my little giveaway too! Enjoy your stay and thank you so much for visiting me!

***

My name is Wen.

When you visit me, you'll find different kinds of hand crafts. I love making books and collages.

Be it made from fabrics, laces, paper or whatever.

And of course there must be cards.

For that's what we love to send each other, don't we?

I love making little presents for friends and family.

And wrapping them carefully in sweet packages.

Making fabric hearts.

And hand made books.

Glue books too. And ATCs.

Flowers are essential to me in both my work and life.

So you will find lots of those too.

For example in my embroidery pieces, which are mostly incorporated in collages or books. I plan to make more projects with embroidery, like this brooch I made.

And hand made fabric flowers.

An example of a fabric collage:

I love to work with laces, old and new.

You'll also find here some faith inspired projects,

like this fabric embroidered tag.

Or a collage on bark and an altered jar.

Sometimes I add a little tutorial or "making of"

like here of the collage below: 

Sometimes I share my thrifty finds here too.

***


GIVEAWAY


*** THIS GIVEAWAY IS NOW CLOSED ***

 Well, this is a lot of photos already, so I better hurry to my giveaway now.

My giveaway to you is this little roses notebook that I made.

There are watercolour paper pages in it where you can add your thoughts

or memories or quotes or whatever you'd like to pen down.

I wish you all a wonderful party time!

Thank you so much for visiting me, it's very much appreciated.

Sending you big hugs and happy smiles.

xx Wen

Christmas cards

Yesterday, I managed to make another two Christmas cards.

For which I crocheted two little flowers.

Card making and Wen = Paper, glue, threads, buttons, fabric everywhere. Including in my hear.
You get the picture.

xx Wen

Christmas card

Hooray hooray! I made a Christmas card!
I even dare say it's my first ever. Many more to come, I'd say.

Although, you could use this card for many occasions.

Hmmm, so technically it's not even my first Christmas card, is it.

Drat.

***

A little PS: the link to the pattern for the tatted cross with the button from my previous post,

you can find HERE.

Wishing you a beautiful weekend!

xx Wen

A Spring Morning...

After the dark hues of my previous post
I thought it would be nice to get back to happy Spring colours!

Dearest Dorthe of the beautiful and inspiring blog

Den Lille Lade

told me she received my giveaway package.

I know she loves birds,

so I added these beautiful blue birds to the gift wrappings.

I made her a card in the same blues and creams.

The little blue tatted flower on the card I made and then painted.

Tatting is something I wanted to learn for some time but I didn't know how to and didn't have the supplies. But I do now!

The blue flowers below are tatted too.

Tatting - also known as Frivolité - is an old hand craft. Done with shuttles or special needles. I'm a newbie in this and I still have to learn a lot.

Below is a cross I tatted. Full of little and bigger errors!

But we learn from our mistakes, don't we?

Mr. AppleApricot and I are still very busy with the attic.

It will become our work room.

The rebuilding part is almost finished.

Said man carries loads and loads of stuff upstairs.

Upon seeing my doubts of whether this all is so important that it indeed must stay,

he reminds me kindly of piles of craft supplies and fabrics.

Ah yes, but that is very important stuff dear!

Very very important indeed!

After which he smiles at me
and goes on with his busy-ness.

I guess that didn't work.

Wishing you a beautiful day full of joy!

xx Wen