Rose Petal Ornament

Here's what you'll need to make this beautiful ornament:

• Styrofoam ball (I used a 70mm ball)
• Artificial rose petals
• Hot glue gun & glue sticks
• 2 sewing pins
• 30-35cm satin ribbon

First, glue one petal to the styrofoam ball.  This will be the top centre of the flower.

Start attaching rose petals, overlapping them as you move the ball around.  Try and work in circles, starting from the top and moving downwards.

 

Ensure that the petal at the base of the ball is glued in place completely.

Attach the ribbon using two sewing pins.  Put them in place and try hanging the ball to ensure you have the ribbon centred.  When you are happy with its placement, put some hot glue over the pins and ribbon to stick them in place.

Cut a small slit in an extra petal and thread the ribbon through it, pushing the petal right down onto the ball to hide the pins.  Glue in place.

The List

A few people have asked what sort of things we're preparing for the street stall, so here's a summary of my ideas so far.  Hopefully I'll get time to prepare even more!


For Babies
Stencilled bibs, soft toys


For Kids
Little Monster kits, ribbon sticks, Candy Cane reindeer, hair clips


For the Tree
Felt heart ornaments, angels, stockings, various other ornaments


For Her
Earrings, necklaces, needle cases


For Him
?  What do you make for him?, wine bottle gift bags


For the House
Christmas trees, plaques, candle holders


Food
Honey biscuits, shortbread, biscotti


I'd be glad to hear if you have any other ideas!  I'm looking for small gifts that are easy to make and can be sold for under $10.  Leave a comment, or send me an email at streetstallblog@gmail.com

Keep open house; be generous with your lives.

   Matthew 5:15,16

We've just spent the weekend in Sydney with some wonderful family and friends.  As much as it's difficult to get away with two small children, it's worth it to visit people who are special in our lives.


I love these verses from the Bible.  They're a reminder about our purpose in life - to know God and help others to know him, too - and that the best way to do that is to share our lives by walking alongside people and sharing the ups and downs of the journey.


I want to encourage you at the start of this new week to make the most of the relationships around you.  Think of a way to be especially kind to someone whom you take for granted.  Get in touch with a friend you haven't talked to in a while. Write that note or email of encouragement that you've been dwelling on for over a month.   Invite someone into your house for a cuppa, a meal, a chat.  Keep open house, be generous with your life.  It's your chance to make a difference!

Shortbread Stars

One of the best parts about Christmas is the food - and I love Christmas baking! Most shortbread recipes call for rice flour, but this recipe from my mum makes it too easy to whip up a batch from ingredients I have in my kitchen every day!

Shortbread

Ingredients (makes about 75 biscuits):

1/2 pound (225g) butter, softened

3/4 cup caster sugar

2 cups plain flour

1/2 cup cornflour

Cachous for decorating

1. Preheat oven to 170 degrees Celsius.

2. Mix butter and sugar together.  It doesn't need to be creamed, just given a bit of a workout.

3. Add sifted flour and cornflour and mix to combine.  At this stage, the mixture will be quite crumbly.  Using your hands to mix and knead the dough will help warm up the butter and get the dough to come together.

4. Roll dough out to a thickness of about 5mm.  Remember, this isn't a 'stretchy' type of dough, it just needs to be kind of pressed together (that's what makes it melt in your mouth!).  Cut out shapes and use a knife to transfer biscuits to a baking-paper-lined trays.

5. Decorate with cachous (little silver/coloured sprinkles) as much as you like.  Place trays in oven for 10 minutes or until biscuits start to turn brown.

6. Remove from oven and let biscuits sit on trays for five minutes before transferring to a wire rack to cool.

Quickly give them away as gifts!  Otherwise, you might eat too many when you sit down with your next cup of tea!

Glue gun goodness

I'm getting to know my glue gun.  I purchased it about 15 years ago, and never really used it until now!  I have already learned a few things - it is hot, it leaves stringy bits of glue like spiderwebs everywhere, and you need to keep loading little glue sticks otherwise it won't work any more.  And it can use up lots of glue sticks quite quickly!


Anyway, here's a simple stocking stuffer that I made today using my hot glue gun:

With lots of different projects on the go, I have pins and needles everywhere. This is a very lovely way of keeping them close to where I need them!


Instructions for how to make them can be found here.

You learn something new...

I broke my sewing machine last night.  I was trying out a type of embroidery that I'd never done before, and fiddled with my machine.  When my experiment failed miserably, I tried to 'unfiddle' the machine and the threads kept getting caught.  I pulled it apart as much as I dared, cleaned it, tweaked it, tried this and that.  I went to bed cranky with myself and upset that I'd wasted a whole evening on something that didn't work.

Today, I dropped the boys off at a friend's house (I couldn't imagine trying to get a baby, toddler and sewing machine all out of the car and into a shop), and took my machine to the repair lady.  After looking at it for three seconds, she said "it isn't threaded properly".  Ahh, that would do it!

Instead of feeling silly in front of a whole shop of ladies doing their sewing classes, I walked out feeling thankful that it was such a simple solution.  And I decided not to drink any wine before using my sewing machine tonight.

So, a few lessons learned:

1. When it doesn't work, go back to basics.  Is that computer mouse plugged in when it doesn't work?  Is the car in 'park' when it doesn't start?  Is the sewing machine threaded correctly when it gets threads caught around the bobbin?
2. KISS - Keep it Simple, Stupid.  Great rule for someone like me who is lying in bed at night thinking of more and more things I can make!  Stick to what I know, what is simple and easy, and things I can do well.  There's time for learning and experimenting, but is that time now? (When I have three hundred more decorations to make before December 4th?!)

I feel lucky - I learned two new things today!

Felt Heart Tutorial

I'd like to share a few tutorials on the site just in case you're inspired to make something for someone this Christmas!


Here are some instructions for a felt heart ornament:

Cut out two heart shapes from felt.  Add the decorative stitching: I used 4 strands of embroidery thread and a running stitch in two different colours.
Attach a button to the middle of the heart.

Cut a ribbon approximately 30cm.  Place felt hearts wrong sides together and whip stitch around the outside, sewing the hearts together.  Make sure you sew in the ribbon when you get to the top centre of the heart.  Leave a gap to insert filling.  I like to use Polyester Fibrefill.


Sew up the gap and knot the end of the thread.

Try them in lots of different colours!