Pick of the week... Inspiring Blog

I recently stumbled across this blog; How About Orange by Jessica Jones a textile and graphic designer.  The blog is packed full of crafting projects and tutorials and inspired me to get on with some of the projects I've been wanting to do for a while (photos of those will be coming up soon!)

Treasury: A Woodland Fairytale

A new treasury I have made on Etsy; titled 'A Woodland Fairytale' it features items mostly from the UK.  You can see it in full here http://www.etsy.com/treasury/4d8a23362be76d91f4b3e572/a-woodland-fairytale

Bunnies and Birds

Two Etsy treasuries my art work has recently been included in ...

White Bunnies In The Garden by rocketbetty - I love the fresh colours and cute bunnies in this treasury :) You can see it in full here: http://www.etsy.com/treasury/4d8806000ada6d915da29495/white-bunnies-in-the-garden

From EUC Team Members 'Fly Away' by TreeCloudDesigns - lots of lovely bird items in this treasury :) You can see it here: http://www.etsy.com/treasury/4d890bf7539c6d918fcfbf9e/from-euc-team-members-fly-away

Cupcakes to craft with...

I am slowly building my collection of digital collage sheets in my crafting supplies shop...  Here are two new additions both on the theme of cupcakes.

The cakes start as pencil sketches which are tidied up and drawn over in pen then scanned.  Next I coloured the line drawings digitally and added the backgrounds, also drawn digitally.  I love playing around with the colours and patterns until I'm happy with the set :)

Bright As A Button...

I love buttons, it's amazing how many different types of buttons there are!  Amongst all the pretty buttons in my collection there are a lot of plain dark ones though.  But they don't need to stay that way...

I've tried using a variety of different paints to brighten up the buttons.  The ones above were painted with acrylic artist paints and the metallic blue/green is a tester pot from the diy shop.  I also tried a rub on transfer for the star - don't suppose it would last on clothes in the wash but should be ok on something like a card/ scrapbook etc.

The buttons below were painted with nail varnish (which comes out really nicely - especially the glittery ones!), acrylics, and tester paints for things like household wall paint.  You could experiment with allsorts of paints/ pens etc!

I thought I would have a look at some of the things other people have used buttons for, so created this treasury on Etsy featuring British sellers and items they have made using buttons from jewellery to purses...

You can see the treasury in full here.

Little Grey Elephants

Elephants are one of my favourite animals to draw and paint - so it was great to be included in this elephant treasury!  I especially like the elephant necklace and Circus print :) You can see the treasury in full on Etsy here.

Makes... Brooch and Gift Bag

It was my sister's birthday a couple of days ago and I made her this brooch and gift bag...

The bag was made from wallpaper, I wasn't sure how sturdy it would be but I folded it so the sides were double thickness of paper and it turned out really strong. The handles were left over from another gift bag - I thought the pink went well with the black and white bag!

The brooch took me a little while to work out how to make - I saw a tutorial online a while ago making a similar brooch but couldn't remember where I had seen it, so made this one up as I went along! Basically it is made from lots of flower shaped fabric pieces, each folded in half then into three. These are then sewn together until you have enough to fill the brooch out. I then added a pearl bead to the centre and a brooch pin (stitched to a piece of felt) on the back. 

New Website

The internet can be a wonderful thing, a source of inspiration and edcuation, connecting people around the world.  But it can also be really annoying, especially when it doesn't work properly!
Recent problems with my internet connection have meant that I had to look for a new host for my website.  I am happy designing and building a website but all the differnet options for hosting are very confusing, then I tried Moonfruit.  So far it seems good and I have built a new site, similar to the old, but with a few changes (and some newer work on too).  In a few days time the old site will be gone and all traffic to http://www.hazelfisher.co.uk/ will be directed to http://www.hazelfishercreations.moonfruit.com/