Sugar sweet

Hear, hear, there's a new girl in town! Or at least in blogland. Her name is Lena, and she bakes. And she makes the most amazing cake toppers in sugar paste. She blogs in Swedish, but pictures are universal. So go have a look! Her site is called sockersött wich means sugar sweet. Her blog is brand new, but in the gallery you can see some of her beautiful creations. I clearly recommend this blog to swedish readers, since you can order toppers and take courses. Now, go see her!

In the future, you can find her among the Blogs I like to read, on the left side of the blog. Wish I could have posted one of her pictures too.

Old lamp, new look

I have told you about not having enough inspiration or energy to create. Well, I guess the tide has turned! Suddenly I wanted to be creative again, and found that I had both time and energy. 

When my daughter was ill, we also tried out this tip I found on Pinterest. To mix glue and foid colouring, and paint jars with it. I intend to show you the result, but today I want to share a special creation. I had this old lamp in glass that I wanted to alter. I really wish I had taken a picture of it before... Anyway... The original idea was to crochet a cover for it, but I never got to it. So when we played with colour and glass, I remembered this lamp, and was really excited to get started. I mixed blue colour in the glue, and started painting. The result was much better than with the jars we had painted.

It looks almost turqoise. And suddenly I knew exactly what to try for the lamp shade that was stripped to bare wire. I dug out some turqoise, white and grey effect yarns waiting for the perfect project.

I cut off a piece of yarn, tied it to the wire and started wrapping. Round and round... The edges was tricky to start with, but I found a strategy that looked good and kept the yarn in place. The finished shades gives a soft light. I used a bulb that uses very few watts, to keep it cool. So cool actually, that I can hold the lamp in my hand even when it has been lit for some time. Since some of the yarns were a little fluffy, I was afraid that it might melt or catch fire if the bulb got to hot.

At first, I didn't know where to put this strongly coloured creation, but my daughter really liked it and was thrilled when adked if she wanted it in her window. So that is where it stands, in all its glory. Keeping here company during dark nights.

Playing with beads

I have tried to make this post once before, but the pictures didn't work with me so I trashed it. This time I accidently deleted one of the pictures, but nothing will stop me now! :) I use my tablet with touch screen, and some of the tools simply aren't touchable! Annoying, but since the blogger app isn't any better, I guess I'm stuck with it. But I'm telling you, it would be much more fun blogging if it went smoothly. Anyway...

Some weeks ago, I went to a blogg called pysselbacken to check it out. I found that she had made a fun and very colourful little bowl from melted hama beads. I had never heard about this before, and started looking around to see what was possible. As my daughter was ill a few days later, this seemed like the perfect thing to do together. The picture I deleted showed single beads placed on a baking sheet just like the flowers below. In the oven they went for six minutes in 200 degrees Celsius.The beads just flattened out, to beads perfect for bracelets.

To make the flowers, we simply put five beads close to a yellow bead. Put one on a hair clip, or where ever you need some happy flowers.

We also made bowls. Use a bowl that stands the heat of the oven. Grease the inside of the bowl, I used some cooking oil. It keeps the beads from melting onto the bowl forever, and it also keeps them in place during the process of placing them evenly in the bowl. The beads should cover the bottom, only one layer of beads. I put the beads with the hole up in my bowl. Very time consuming.

My daughter simply spread the beads out evenly, no matter what side was facing up. Much faster and it created a more interesting surface. I can really recommend this, if you want to craft with kids. Even fairly young children can spread out beads in a bowl. Give it a try, it's really fun! And since these beads are made to be melted together with an iron, there are no toxic fumes when they melt.