Crafty As L

A few years ago, I did a willow weaving day with my friend, supposedly making a chicken.   Mine took on a life of its own and turned into rather a large rooster, that you can see here .   For my birthday, my sister bought me a voucher for a local willow weaving session run by Jacquie of  www.willowandcrafts.co.uk where we would be making a penguin. After a quick introduction to the materials and some penguin photos for inspiration, we began by making our penguin’s feet.   They turned out roughly the same shape and size and looked vaguely like a pair - so far so good! The next job was to make the body base.   After making a couple of teardrop shapes, these were joined together with a ring, the size of which would dictate the size of the penguin’s belly.   I was aiming for a short, squat guy rather than a tall Emperor penguin. More rings were made in different sizes to complete the base frame.   After weaving a few bits onto the body frame, it...

Is it me or is the run up to Christmas going at break-neck speed this year?   I’ve barely even started my Christmas shopping and suddenly there’s only 10 days to go.   Aaargh!! I’ve not made any cards this week but I have been creative none the less. We had an extension done last year and moved our lounge to the other side of the wall.   The log burner then needed to be moved so we got the builders back to turn the fireplace around. Luckily, they managed to get the granite hearth pieces out whole and they were re-laid on the other side.   When it was in the other room, the fireplace was lined with brick but I’m not a big fan so took the opportunity to change that.   After the fireplace was dry lined with fireboard, Mr L and I then tiled it with porcelain tiles.   It was Mr L’s first experience with tiling so he was on the tile cutter whilst I was doing the sticking! After the grouting was complete, I filled the holes around the edges, sanded and painted...

My crafty friend, Lorie, and I like to go and have a bash at new crafts now and again and this time Lorie found a willow weaving course so we could weave our own chicken. Well why wouldn't you? The course was run at Farnham Maltings by Judith Needham, who teaches basket making and willow weaving in Surrey and Hampshire.  She was a very knowledgeable and encouraging teacher with a structured but relaxed teaching style.  Most of the time she just left us to get on with it, which both Lorie and I appreciated. Judith had models on display for inspiration; pecking chickens and a cockerel.  You could also choose a design or other animal if chickens weren't your bag.  We chose cockerels! After a brief explanation on the types on willow we could use, we were presented with our metal hoops (to become chicken legs later) and a big wooden block to support our creation. We started off by making a rugby ball type shape as the building block for the bod...