Lavender bag DIY!

Salut! Welcome again pals, and may I remind you it is now 2014! (I still get excited every time I write the date). Of course it's nice to have a new year, new start and all that, but it is a little bit scary knowing another year is gone, and I still haven't got my Hogwarts letter. But seriously, when I had a proper think about my life and all that jazz I did end up clutching a cushion and singing Beyoncé to calm myself down get a bit emotional. I HAVE LEFT ANOTHER YEAR BEHIND! CRIPES! But anyhoo, we're all in this life malarkey together (bit o' High School Musical!) and we might as well get on with it. So, without further ado, up with the curtain and on with the show. I have, (hence title), a DIY for you today! And it is, (hence title once more) a lavender bag. These handy little bags were invented to tackle the crushing sadness many of us feel upon realising our knickers don't smell quite as lavender-y as we'd like. Better safe than sorry! To make these pretty pouches, you will need:

• 2 squares of pretty fabric, measuring any size you want, but mine was roughly 12cm x 12cm.
• Some pins, and a needle, and the usual clutter!
• Good fabric scissors
• A ribbon
• Some dried lavender (I had some left over from the bush in our garden, but if you don't you can soak cotton wool in lavender oil and use that instead!)

1. Harvest the lavender seeds. Just pull, or pluck, or brush them off the stems. (Self explanatory really!)

 When you have finished, you should have a glorious pile of fragrance!

 2. To make the bag, take one of the fabric squares, and fold the top edge down a tiny tiny bit, so no frayed edges show, and then fold it down again to approx. 1cm. This is the tu-u-u-u-be you'll be threading your ribbon through!

 3. Sew along the bottom edge of the tube with a simple running stitch. I did this by hand, but you could do it on a machine - it doesn't matter.

Fill bag with le lavender....

4. Thread up a wide-eyed needle with the ribbon, and feed through the tube, being careful not to prick the needle through the material and come out of the side! When it's threaded through, take both ends of the ribbon, pull tightly to scrunch the bag up, and tie in a bow.

Et voila!!!! Look at that beauty! I think this would be a perfect gift for a friend, or a treat to yourself! (And if you're lazy lacking in time it's also ideal, as it takes less then half an hour! Ish. By the way, ignore the fluffy black lump in that picture - that's my cat - she's a chronic photobomber. So, farewell for now, chummies, until I see you again!

Sophie

Xxx

Mince pie DIY!

Hello! School has been like a massive angry Hoover of Hate sucking up all my free-time, and turning me into a sleep deprived zombie  a bit tricky lately, so I haven't had much time to boogie post recently, also I have just discovered how to do this, so you can expect quite a few silly rad crossed out words. Rightie, so, mince pies are stupendously easy, and they are also fast, fun and festive! I am desperately trying to persuade all my friends that Christmas time HAS ARRIVED, and I think they'll believe me more with a pie inside them. To make these perfect pies, you will need:

PART ONE - PASTRY!

• 225g (8oz) flour
• 1.25 ml (1/4 tsp) salt
• 100g (40z) butter
• Cold water - about a jug

1. Sift le flour and salt into a bowl.
2. Cut the butter into rough, fairly small chunks, and chuck into the bowl.

3. Then, using your fingertips, rub the butter in, until it all looks like fine breadcrumbs.
4. Add the water gradually to the mixture, and gently draw it all together, using your hands/a flut blunt knife/a spoon/all three!
5. When it's all together, turn out onto a lightly floured surface, and knead quickly until smooth and pliable - here's one I made earlier:

BACK TO THE MAIN RECIPE!

1. Roll out the pastry to your 'desired thickness', and once you've done that, grease a mince pie tin.

2. Use a little pastry cutter-out-erer to cut out your circles of joy! (I have a designated pastry cutter-out-erer, but if you don't use a selltape roll or a wine glass or something). For each pie, you should have a slightly bigger circle and a slightly smaller circle.

 3. Push the bigger circles into the lined tin thingies, so they fit snugly.

4. Spoon as much mincemeat as you want into each one.

5. Take the smaller circles and put it over the mincemeat as a little lid! Pinch the edges together, and make two pricks with a fork or sharp knife to allow the steam to escape.



6. Bake in the oven at 220 degrees (425F) mark 7 for 20 - 25 minutes until you decide they look so darn good you want stuff them all into your mouth in a big happy celebration of festive fun and deliciousness they're done, and then you can take them out and they should look like so:

Enjoy!

DIY - Super rad retro scrunchie.

The holidays are drawing to the close, and since my days of freedom are numbered I thought I'd better squeeze a DIY in! And, as you may have guessed from the title, this DIY is how to make a scrunchie. I love scrunchies, and think they have a slightly childish vibe (In a good way) - they make me think of those little gingham scrunchies we had at primary school! They're more exciting than a hairbobble, and incredibly easy to make. I made mine out of velvet, because I have a fetish for velvet, but you could make your out of literally anything your mind can dream up - (Within reason.)
You will need:

• A piece of nicely patterned material (I normally rumage around in bargain bins for little scraps, at markets or haberdasheries) measuring 10 x 53cm, or thereabouts
• A needle and thread
• A hair bobble

So, let's get cracking! (Oh, and by the way, I apologise for the terrible quality of these photos!)

Step 1 - Fold the fabric right sides together. Hold two corners of the fabric together inside the hairbobble, so that the hairband will be trapped inside the tube, and stitch the two corners together.

 Step 2 - Carry on stitching along the same edge, with an even running stitch, so you're creating a tube with the hairband trapped inside.

When you've finished stitching, what you've created should look something like the photo above - an inside out scrunchie with open ends.

 Step 3 - Scrunch all of the fabric over your thumb, and then pull one side of the material through the tumeb, and carry on, until the right side of the fabric is showing.

 Step 4 - When you've finished pulling all the fabric through you should still have an unfinished scrunchie, BUT this time the fabric is the right way out! It should look something like this:

 Yippee! All that remains to be done is to fold one end of your fabric tube inward by about 1cm. Now push the other raw edge into it, so you've neatly joined your scrunchie/tube/thingymajig. Simply running sticth along the join, (Ignore the hairbobble - either skip it or go straight through it) and you have MADE YOUR BEAUTIFUL SCRUNCHIE! Well done!

 You can wear your scrunchie around your chic messy bun, or around a high ponytail, or...errr...anyway, I'm sure there are tons more ways! What I'm trying to say is that your little scrunchie buddy is hugely versatile, and as I've said before, the possibilities for material choice are endless! Silk,velvet, tartan,embroidered something or other, gingham, floral patterns, polka dots....anything! the sky's the limit, so go for it you little...(Can I give you a cringey name yet? Flowers! Faeries! Flower faeries!) flower faeries, and let your wondrous imaginations run wild!