Printable Colour In Advent Calendar Village

Today I wanted to share some pictures of my new printable advent calendar along with a little tutorial on how to make it up.

The advent calendar is a printable, colour in village with mini house boxes which you could fill with sweets or other little gifts.  It could be used in different ways - make it with or for your children and either colour and make up the whole village before the start of advent, or colour one house a day until the whole scene is complete for Christmas day!  I think the houses would look lovely along a shelf, windowsill or mantelpiece.  Alternatively you could have a treasure hunt - hide them around your room / house and find a new one each day.

About the kit...

The kit is available to buy from my Etsy shop - it is an Instant Download, so you can download and print the sheets as soon as your payment clears.  As it is a printable you can print the sheets as many times as you like (for your own personal use only) - so you could have one for each child, or print a new one to make up year after year.

There are 13 sheets included, to make 24 houses plus 2 tree backgrounds to complete your village scene.  Instructions are included on the sheets and it is simple to make up the house boxes...

The houses and trees comes as black and white templates... I coloured mine with felt tip pens and coloured pencils.  You can have fun choosing colours for your houses - will they be pastel, traditional or rainbow coloured?!

Once the colouring is finished, cut around the outsides of the house templates. (For a neat finish with straight lines, I used a craft knife and ruler but scissors would be easier - and safer! - for children).

Then score along the dashed lines (I used a bone folder and ruler with craft foam laid under the house).

Fold along the dashed lines, then start gluing the tabs marked glue.  I suggest gluing tabs A and B first, then C and D to the insides of the house.

Then glue tabs E and F to the inside of the roof.

Fold over the remaining tabs on the roof and tuck inside the house.

It is now ready to fill with sweets or a small gift!

I will be sharing more photos of my advent calendar village through December over on my Facebook and Instagram pages.  I would also love to see what your houses look like - what colours have you used and how are you displaying them?  If you share your photos on social media tag your pictures #myhfcmakes

2 for 1 on Fat Quarters at Spoonflower and My New Designs

The results of Spoonflower's annual Tea Towel Calendar competition were published yesterday, which means it's also time for Spoonflower's 2 for 1 offer on all fat quarters.  Perfect for stocking up on tea towels, or buying fabric for making small projects and gifts!


There were so many lovely tea towel designs this year, it was nice to see some of the ones I voted for made it into the top ten!  You can see all of the entries on Spoonflower's blog.
My cats themed design came 96th out of 296 entries (with 139 votes) - thank you if you voted for it! Unfortunately you will not be able to buy my cats tea towel calendar yet as I need to order a test print first, but I have plenty of other designs available for you to take advantage of Spoonflower's fantastic offer!
I have updated the dates on my Budgies tea towel calendar, so you can use it for 2016 now...

This Dragon Cut and Sew plushie pattern fits on a fat quarter (27x18 inches) - you could make it up to give as a gift, or give it as a project for a crafty friend to make themselves...

I have over 80 different fabric designs in my shop and the range has just got bigger!  I received samples of my latest designs last week and have just been making them available to buy.  Here is a small selection of my new Christmas star and snowflake designs, Octopuses, 90s Nostalgia, a new colourway of my rabbits (on pink) - to see the rest of my designs visit my shop: Hazel Fisher Creations on Spoonflower

You can mix and match different designs from different designers to take advantage of the 2 for 1 offer (see all the details over on Spoonflower).  Spoonflower have also been sharing ideas for projects to make using a fat quarter of fabric on Pinterest.

This is also a good time to let you know about ordering dates for Christmas; to receive fabric, gift wrap or wallpaper by 24th December, with Standard Shipping, order by Sunday 6th December if you're in the US or by Thursday 19th November for everywhere else.  Full details can be seen on Spoonflower here.

If you buy any of my fabric I would love to hear what you make with it!

Spoonflower Contest - Tea Towel Calendar 2016

It's that time of year again for Spoonflower's annual Tea Towel Calendar contest!  As there is no set theme, there is always a wonderful range of subjects for the entries.  Last year I entered my Budgie design and I thought that I would continue with a pets theme for this year, so created this design with cats and kittens...


The cats design also goes with my existing Kittens with Mittens design in my Spoonflower shop.

If you would like to see the other entries to the Tea Towel Calendar contest (and vote for your favourites!) you can see them here: http://www.spoonflower.com/fabric/3710342

In other Spoonflower news...
My Microorganisms design from a few weeks ago came 59th out of 326 entries (with 179 votes) - thank you if you voted for my design!  There were some interesting and colourful designs in the top ten - you can see them on Spoonflower's blog post.
This week I also received the swatch sampler I ordered with some new designs on.  I haven't had chance to photograph the swatches yet, but I'll be sharing them soon and making them available to buy from my Spoonflower shop.