Beaded Garland

Catching up.....

Today I am sharing with you another quick and easy Christmas craft idea: a beaded garland made of miracle beads in colours to match my Winter Wonderland Christmas.

What are "miracle beads"? They are plastic lucite beads where the core is finished in a mirrored silver plate which is then coated in multiple layers of vibrant lacquer. Light passes through the multiple layers of lacquer and is then reflected back through the lacquer due to the mirror-like properties of the plating. The reflected light radiates a glowing illusion of shimmery depth. I just love them so!

Beaded Garland
Tools and Materials

• Miracle beads
• Duck egg blue thick thread

Have a sweet day!

Winter Wonderland Dessert Table

Wishing you and yours all a Merry Christmas!

Gift wrapped

How are your plans for Christmas coming on? I am slowly but surely getting there, fingers crossed....

I have wrapped my presents in a combination of four printed rolls of wrapping paper using double side tape so no tape is visible, tied them up with velvet and raffia ribbon and trimmed them with gift tags and candy canes.

Winter bird stripe gift wrap, pink velvet ribbon

Winter bird print gift wrap, tree print wrap, pink paper raffia, cut outs used as gift tags

Winter bird stripe gift wrap & tag

Way of the birds gift tags

Have a sweet day!

Pretty Pinecones

This has to be one of the cheapest, cute decorations I have made this year. Just simply collect pine cones from your local woods, park etc. wash them in soapy water and leave to dry. Then paint them in shades of colours to match your Christmas decor. I also PVA glued a few and sprinkled them in coarse glitter to give them an icy effect.




Have a sweet day!

Christmas tree card holder

Yesterday I showed you my upcycled wooden Christmas trees, today I am sharing with you my upcycled Christmas tree photo holders that I did the same thing with. I am using them to display my Christmas cards.

This brings me nicely on to the gorgeous Christmas cards from Portuguese graphic designer, Filipa, from Kids and Babies design. Filipa wrote to me a few weeks back to ask if she could use my Winter Wonderland colour palette as her inspiration. Of course I said yes; I loved what she did for her cards and she kindly sent me a set.




After working for several years in some design studios and publishers, Filipa decided to create a personal project, the "Kids & Babies Design", a printable party shop where you can find, among other things, vintage and shabby chic custom design partyware and personalized party printables. All her pieces are unique, customized and inspired by their recipients and made to order.

Have a sweet day!

Wooden trees

A couple of years ago I bought some cheap craft wooden Christmas trees that I painted white and with the pots in bright colours to match that year's Christmas colours. This year I have up-cycled them by painting the pots in colours to match my Winter Wonderland theme and covering them in coordinating glitter.

Wooden trees
Tools and Materials

• Wooden trees
• White undercoat paint
• Pink Clematis, tester pot of paint
• Water, tester pot of paint
• Proud Peacock, tester pot of paint
• PVA glue
• Small paint brush
• Pink, teal, mint and white glitter

Wooden trees, How-to step by step


Start by painting the entire tree and pot in white undercoat paint and leave to dry. Carefully, with a small paint brush paint the pot in a colour and leave to dry. Coat painted pots in PVA glue and liberally sprinkle with coordinating glitter. Gently tap tree to remove excess glitter and leave to dry.




I loved how Citrus and Orange had styled her beautiful deer, the colours are so pretty! She inspired me to paint my wooden plaque in duck egg blue and sit my same beautiful deers atop it. With my glittered wooden trees in the background, and some needle felted acorns in the foreground.




Have a sweet day!

Needle felted acorns

Last year I collected lots of acorn cups and never got around to doing anything with them. So this year I decided to make needle felted acorns with them, which I have hung on my Christmas tree and used them in my Christmas displays. I used the same colours as my needle felted roses.

Needle felted acorns
Tools and Materials

• Acorn caps
• Undyed merino wool tops
• Antique pink roving
• Teal merino wool tops
• Pale jade merino wool tops
• PVA glue
• Martha Stewart crystal coarse glitter
• 8cm long strips of 3mm double faced satin ribbon

Equipment

• Small needle felting mat
• Pen-style needle felting tool

Needle felted acorns, How-to step by step

Start by lightly washing your acorn cups in soapy water and leaving to dry. Liberally coat them with PVA glue and immediately sprinkle on glitter and leave to dry. Gather a small ball of roving together and start to needle punch it, turning and twisting it as you punch so you keep it in a small ball.



Roll the felted ball in your hands to get the shape you want and continue needle punching the roving till you have a small, tight, felted acorn shape. Using a hot glue gun, place a small amount of glue on the inside of the acorn cup and push felted ball into the glue. Fold your ribbon strips in half and, using the hot glue gun, add a dab of glue to the top of the acorn cup. Push ends of ribbon strip into glue before it dries.



Now hanging on my tree...

Have a sweet day!

Hotel Chocolat Review & Giveaway

I was recently sent The Classic Christmas Gift Basket to review, which was filled with Tiddly Reindeer milk chocolate, Cinnamon Almonds, Orange Nice Spice Puddles, 6 Alternative Mince Pies and Winter Liquid Chocolat. After sampling all the chocolate goodies, I am now keeping the rest for my Christmas Eve party.

The reindeer are super cute and are a lovely solid milky chocolate, perfect for the little ones to have with a glass of milk as a Christmas treat. For the grown ups, I will be serving the delicious alternative mince pies, that are milk chocolate cups filled with praline and salted caramel, and mugs of hot chocolate made with the heavenly liquid chocolat which has been given a winter twist with orange, chilli and spices. The Puddles are large, subtly spiced milk chocolate buttons with the warming flavour of orange and chilli and they will be served in mini latte cups. In mini bowls I plan to serve the caramelized Californian whole almonds dipped in milk chocolate with a hint of cinnamon. A chocolatey Christmas alternative to tea and cakes!

I'm also so pleased to announce a giveaway of The Seasonal Sixty Tin of Chocolates from Hotel Chocolat, worth £50!

To enter, please visit Hotel Chocolat and then leave a comment below this post letting me know what delicious chocolates you would like to give or receive this Christmas. The giveaway ends on Saturday, January 7th 2012 at 10pm (GMT) and I will randomly select and announce a winner on Sunday, January 8th.

To increase your chances of winning this fabulous prize, you can gain one additional entry for doing each of the following:

• tweeting about this giveaway
• blogging about it
• following the Torie Jayne blog
• following Torie Jayne on Twitter

For the first two, please leave a comment below with the link to your tweet or blog post.

This giveaway is open to UK readers.

Good luck and have a sweet day!

$100 Shopbop giveaway winner

My contest ended yesterday and I just picked a winner using random.org and I am delighted to announce the winner of the Shopbop Giveaway is...

Purple Larkspur, who would like to put her voucher towards the Alexis Bittar liquid collar. Please e-mail me your details.

Congratulations Purple Larkspur, you will receive $100 worth of store credit for Shopbop.

Thank you to all of you sweets that entered, to my loyal followers and new friends.

Have a sweet day!

It's starting to look a lot like Christmas!

This week on Flickr Faves Sunday, I bring you my Flickr mosaic, "It's starting to look a lot like Christmas!", all of which I have shared, or will be sharing here on Torie Jayne. Now I must dash, as I still have plenty to do!

So, in case you missed them....

• Needle felted roses
• Advent house
• Paper chain garland
• Glittered toadstools
• Cake stand
• Felt birds

Have a sweet day!

Dee Puddy Seasonal accents

Today on label love I am sharing with you some lovely seasonal accents from online store, Dee Puddy. How cute are the little family of deer?

Have a sweet day!

Hand made felt tea bags

For Molly's birthday I made her some felt iced gems after seeing the pattern and instructions in Mollie Makes Magazine. I loved how cute they were and they looked adorable on her mini tea set. But something was missing... tea bags of course! What Brit eats biscuits without a cup of tea! So, I came up with my own pattern for mini felt tea bags. I have made some more to hide in my handmade Christmas crackers and advent house for Molly this Christmas.

Hand made felt tea bags
What you will need:

• White felt
• Brown felt
• White embroidery thread
• Pink spot ribbon
• Double sided fabric tape
• Pattern printed off on paper

Equipment

• Scissors
• Pinking shears
• Water soluble marking pen

Instructions
Start by printing out patterns and cutting them out. Then pin two pieces of white felt together and place bag pattern on top, and carefully draw around outside edge of pattern using a water soluble pen. Using pinking shears, cut around outside edge of rectangle. Then lightly dampen the pen marks on the felt with water so ink disappears and leave to one side. Place tea pattern on brown felt and draw around outside edge of pattern using a water soluble pen. With a sharp pair of scissors, cut out tea piece from brown felt.

Unpin white felt bags and place brown tea felt piece in between the two pieces of white felt, pinning to secure. Using a needle threaded with white embroidery thread, hand stitch a rectangle around outside edge of teabag, starting at the centre of the short side. Finish by back stitching a couple of times at the end and then cut thread leaving a 7cm long tail.

Next, cut a piece of ribbon 2cm long and back half of it with a strip of iron-on double sided tape. Peel off backing tape from ribbon and place end of embroidery thread tail over backing strip. Fold ribbon in half and lightly iron to seal together.





Have a sweet day!

Snowflake hair clips

I loved making the snowflake hair bobbles to put in my advent house for cute Molly: they were so quick and easy to do! I had quite a few snowflakes left and thought they would look sweet on pretty hair clips so I bought a bunch of glittery pastel hair clips to stick them to.

Snowflake hair clips
Tools and Materials

• Small hair clips in pink, lime and aqua
• Snowflake table scatter
• Ribblet punch
• Hot glue gun

Snowflake hair clips, How-to step by step

Using a hot glue gun, place a small dab of glue on the end of the clip, immediately stick a felt snowflake to the glue and leave to dry. Cut out a small rectangle of pretty card and, using a ribblet punch, punch holes in centre. Clip hair clips to card by threading through holes in card.




Have a sweet day!

Cox & Cox seasonal treasures

Today on label love I am sharing with you just a few of the gorgeous festive finds on Cox and Cox. I am in love with the sparkly mini snowflakes and the cutwork tree is so pretty and stylish.

Have a sweet day!