A Perfumed Pomander

I'm starting to think about new items for my Christmas stands at shows. Yes I know, it's still summer but we have to be on to it now or it will be too late and to make matters more urgent, I am about to undergo an operation which might leave me out of the creative sphere for some time.

So seize the day. Carpe diem as those Romans would say! ;)

I'd like to show you how to make a very simple little pomander. Simple but incredibly effective and I'm sure that, perhaps apart from the pot pourri you need, you will already have most of the items needed to finish this project, in your sewing stash.

YOU WILL NEED
Silk material ( or poly-silk )
Lace or some pretty edging
Sewing thread and a needle ( preferably strong thread )
Ribbon
Stuffing or wadding
pot pourri of your choice.
Some decorative buttons or bits and bobs which you might like to use to prettify your creation.
( optional ) Some pretty flowers which I'll show you how to make over on BoxCleva.
Candle
Scissors
Glue gun

FIRSTLY
You will need to cut out a circle in your chosen material.
A dinner plate or tea plate is a good size to use. I cut mine with pinking shears as it helps the edge stay neat.

Onto this edge sew your lace or other pretty ribbon or edging. Make sure the pinked edge is inside.

Then about an inch from the top of your circle sew a line of running threads and leave BOTH ends free so that you can pull hard and tie them off when you have completed the stuffing.

Gather up a bit of wadding and into the centre place some pot pourri...not too much -not too little and make a pocket of it.

The pot pourri doesn't have to be the pretty kind as you won't see it. However, it does have to be fairly fine. If it isn't, try mashing it up in a pestle and mortar or bashing it, folded into an old towel, with a hammer! That's a fun bit!


With a little more wadding covering the pot pourri, push this into your circle and then pull up the threads. Tie it off and thread with a needle the two ends to be sure it's secure. Cut off the excess thread.

Now you are ready to add the pretty rose flower.

If you haven't done this before........ then go HERE for the tutorial on how to make silk roses.

Now you will have a sweet rose you can put into the top of your pomander.

You can make these as fluffy as you like, meaning that you can have a many layered flower or not as you wish. However, full flowers are more difficult to locate into the space in the pomander top- so be aware. Six petals are about right as you are going to push the flower in to the top of the pomander and so it will close up nicely.

In my latest creation I used a pretty pink pearl button for the centre but you could use what ever you think looks right.


Now before you attach the flower cut a small amount of ribbon, double it over and stick it ( I use the glue gun but if you wish you could sew it ) to the inside of the trim at the top. Make sure it's long enough to hang it.

You could now run a piece of ribbon around the top and tie a bow or you could, like I have done add some little flowers.

I'll show you how to make those another time.

You will just have to curb your impatience! :)
Oh well alright then ( I did promise I would do it on BoxCleva )...so HERE WE ARE....

Lorem Ipsum..... Cicero.

Gather Ye Rosebuds While Ye May, is a poem about seizing the moment...enjoying the present, doing what you can to make the life you have NOW matter to you. It's the exact opposite of - put off today what you can do tomorrow, no matter how silly small and insignificant it seems now.

None of us know how long we will be able to, as the Romans used to say- Carpe Diem...seize the day, none of us know how long we have to enjoy those things we value, those people we care about, those pets who bring us such joy and those places we yearn for when we aren't able to be there.

Above: one of the places I miss terribly...the Wiltshire Ridgeway and Downs.

Daily life gets in the way, I know. But even those things can be a source of joy if we allow them to be. Even when hanging out the washing ( as I have just done ),  I can smile to myself at the beautiful Agapanthus swaying gently under the washing line....and I hang my towels out length ways to prevent the plants getting a bashing. A little thing.

Likewise, I've just dusted the sitting room and picked up every little folderol that means something to me, dusted it and put it back and thought...what a lucky girl I am to have such lovely things around me. Even dusting can be full of memories and fun...who gave me this, where did I buy that, what was this bought to commemorate?

A beautiful early 19th century Coalport compote with applied decoration. An anniversary present from my husband.

I think this state of affairs has been brought home to me more this past 4 months than at any other part of my life. I have been quite poorly. And, along with feeling rotten, I lost the will to be creative. I have a room full of goodies to play with and none of them really made me want to pick them up and use them to make something.
Never in my whole life have I been like this.

The one thing that is usually my solace, one of the reasons for my being, nay the centre of my being, my biggest joy besides my husband and Delphi dog, is music.
Amazingly, that too, went by the by.
I have a huge collection of CD's - all of them of Classical Music and good two thirds of them Early music, which is my passion.
There they sat in our Canterbury....forlorn and untouched. Stephen has put music on over the past few months...but I haven't. I haven't picked up either of my instruments to play, not a note.

I MUST have been bad.

So it was quite a surprise to find that, along with a bit more energy and less pain, I felt like listening to some music this weekend. And I felt like getting into my studio and messing about with material. My brain has cleared a bit and I have had some new ideas which I will be exploring over the next few weeks....as long as the feeling lasts.

And more than anything, I feel like going out into the world at last and seizing it by the throat and shaking it.
I think it also has something to do with the fact the the Olympics are over ( oh joy! ) It's a real trial to those of us who feel it's been a consummate waste of money, a distraction ( by the Government ) from the realities of life under their neglect and inattention. I'm so glad I don't have a telly.....I might have been tempted to watch the opening and closing ceremonies....and of course, critisice and moan about it.  My friends however have been telling me about the ceremonies and I have to say my reaction was " oh dear how kitsch ".
The sport? Goodness me never....I'd be bored rigid.

And now we find that the Government are going to spend Millions of Pounds in schools ( millions we do not have for the Health Service nor the roads...nor a thousand other things which annoy us all when they are underfunded,) to promote sport.

But they don't fund music. Oh how glad I am that I am not at school now.
I did music beyond A level. I didn't have to do sport. I gave it up when I was about 8. I found it pointless, brainless ( mostly ) and unfeminine. Team games bored me. I am not and never have been a team player. I have also never been interested in the sensations of movement necessary for pushing my body to do something it doesn't really want to do. I am much happier creating something...having something to show for the time and effort, expended, be that a thing or a sound as in music. I am, I suppose a cerebral person, not a physical one.
There must be millions like me.
And now they are going to force them all to do something they don't want to do because we have had an OLYMPICS in Britain and they tell us that there's a feel good factor associated with it.
Another distraction technique I think!

Dearie me.... why can't they concentrate on Education. Those that would like to go and kick a ball around, throw a spear at something, beat someone else's face to a pulp, mess about in or on the water can do that when they have learned to READ and WRITE, have absorbed some general knowledge ( sadly lacking at the moment I fear), have learned how to go out into the world and be a good employee or a good boss. We are constantly hearing about how the present young ( in particular ) workforce is unfit for public consumption. We have all had, I'm sure examples of this right under I nose as we go about our life.

So if Britain were ever to win the Eurovision song contest. :) Would music be bumped up the curriculum...would we see everyone being compulsorily channelled into playing the Tuba or learning to read music?

I know that crafts are still taught in schools and as we know, there is a huge upsurge in people making things at home today, as evinced by the proliferation of Craft magazines on the shelves. Everything from making models with matchsticks to macrame. Thank Heavens for that creative cultivation.
Long may it reign.

I was asked a while back by a muscled young man in his early twenties, if would like to enrol in his gym. If I'd like to spend money ( which frankly I don't have ), to have him put me through my paces on this machine and that.

My answer....and I told him, I am lady of a certain age...and I stress the LADY who wouldn't be seen dead in a gym.
My answer..... So you train your body to its ultimate pitch. Do you also train your mind? Do you read, do you discover, for example, culture, history ( for as far as I am concerned without history, we cannot know where we are now and cannot avoid the pratfalls our ancestors made. ( I think Sir Winston Churchill said something profound on this subject ). Then, when...like me, your body develops something nasty which you couldn't have avoided by being 'sporty', active and trained in a gym,  and you only have your mind to fall back on,.......then what are you going to do with yourself?

Too little...too late.

So I shall grab it whilst I can.
For none of us knows........

Wonderful Weather for Weeds!

I have been away as you know and then almost immediately upon my return, I went into hospital for a small op.
Two weeks and a bit away and the garden has 'jungled'! There is no other word for it.
Good job I have my very own tame gardener ( in the shape of my husband Stephen, whom you may or may not know, is a professional gardener.)

The roses are over but, although they are supposed to be the once a year type flowerers, are budding again.
All the trees which have finished flowering are sending up huge extension growths.
We have four hydrangeas of varying sorts and they are doing marvelously.

Stephen will have to cut back the Erodium and the Phuopsis which will spring again in the late summer.

The glory of the moment is the Hollyhocks and the Agapanthus. They are magnificent. The Hollyhocks aren't quite as tall as we have had them but they are full of flower and we have many colours, including the hard to grow ( or rather hard to re-grow ), yellow ones.

In between we have Linaria in three colours, Valerian in four colours and the ubiquitous field poppy whose bright red is a welcome foil for the softer colours of the lower plants.


Pale pink Anemones are scattered here and there. The flowers are smaller than in previous years but they have had to struggle to get above some of the other plants including the Penstemons and the Pinks.

Now this all sounds rather idyllic I'm sure and I do love a full garden where there is hardly a centimetre of soil showing.
But in amongst the flowers which are intended to be there are a lot which aren't.
WEEDS.

You can almost hear them straining to squeeze themselves up through the soil and then wriggle upwards through the other plants, towards the light.
I think they just poke out their heads....look carefully to see if there is anyone about - and they KNOW when you have gone away, oh yes they DO, I'm sure, before muscling their way in.

Haha! < wicked gleam in the eye > They haven't contended with my super duper eagle eyed husband who knows his weeds from his Wisteria.

This afternoon ( if it doesn't rain...again), he will be out there wending his way through the jungle...machete in hand, topi on head and Jungle formula insect repellent on skin, to attack the little blighters and bring the garden to order.

Then he will tie in the Hollyhocks, chop down the dead, disentangle the Lathyrus ( Sweet pea ) from the Laburnum and the garden will once more be tamed.

All this whilst waiting for our new oven to be delivered.

Then he will cook the dinner in it. ( We hope ).

And what will I be doing?
Well I'm not allowed to do much but I do have a very serious role to play.


I will be supervising and making sure things go smoothly!

Ah.....no perhaps I won't..... I think that job falls to another! :)

Fruits of the Fingers.

I shall be off for my Summer Holiday soon. So I shall leave you with some rather nice photos of some of the work I have done over the years. When I return...I hope to have a new one to show you.

I'll be sitting in the ( I hope ) sunshine at my friend's house, in the very middle of the countryside, surrounded by sheep bleating for their lambs and horses neighing to each other, the calling of the curlew in the evening and the hooting of the owls by night. Bliss.

I hope to be able to get my creative self back - it has definitely gone walk about, since I was ill a massive EIGHT weeks ago.

Yes I have dabbled here and there but nothing like my usual fully functional creative self.

So I shall take my paper and stamps and my material and threads and see what I can come up with. 

Meanwhile...here are some items I made a while ago...

I discovered wool on wool embroidery when I went to a large show at the NEC some twenty years ago and have loved it ever since. It grows very slowly and there are a lot of stitches to learn. It's rather like Stumpwork ( yes I've tried that too), in that it's three dimensional and raised from the surface of the material.

Before this, the only work I'd done with wool was in crewel. Thinner strands of wool worked in intricate patterns on a cotton ( usually ) base - very beloved of those early sewers of the 16th and 17th century who needed to make thick, warm curtains for bed hangings. We don't have the bed hangings today in the normal run of things, but we can still do crewel.

This is crewel on wool... and I'll tell you more about it another time.

There are only so many things you can make for the house, so I decided that I'd have a go on a wool cardigan. I was pleased with the result. 

 Can't wear it any more...it's a size 12! But I keep it.

I didn't knit the cardigan, though I might have. I had a splurge of knitting many years ago when Kaffe Fasset brought all those wonderfully colourful items he made to exhibitions in the U.K. and eventually, into books.

I tried to get as many shades and patterns into my work as possible, though I did limit the colours.

 Honestly I did! I was trying to achieve the look of a millefiori paperweight.

My hands won't let me knit now.

I love wool tapestry too and have made many a cushion but can't do that either now because of the shoulder effort of pulling thrums through the canvas... so my only outlet for this kind of work is free embroidery, where it's an action of the wrist and not the shoulder.

Perfectly alright as there are many many variations on a theme. And I never get fed up.

So between reading lots of books and doing some craft work...and eating things I wouldn't normally eat ( well it's obligatory on your hols!) I think I might just have a very nice break. See you all when I return.

 

The World at our Fingertips.

It's incredible what you can do when you are not allowed to do very much at all.

At the moment, a health problem, ( soon, I hope to be resolved ) is keeping me indoors, quiet, still and practically comatose.

Have I been bored?
Well no not really.
But I have been creatively challenged. When you think about it, it might have been the perfect excuse to sit around playing with paper and fabric and bits and bobs. However, because I have been feeling particularly short of oomph, I have actually achieved very little on the creative front. And that is sad as, if I can't be creative ( I've said this before, ) I might as well not be here.

I have managed to write. I can sit and do that, for a while. Words have always come easy to me. I hardly need any oomph for those. In fact I shall probably die gabbling! ;)
I do feel as if I have lost about two months of my creative life though and although the spirit is most definitely chafing at the bit, the flesh is decidedly dicky!

One thing it has done for me, is allow me to sit at the computer and surf. Now, this is not something I am very good at. I tend to use the web as a tool for finding things and knowing things but not really just looking at things.

I have over the past few weeks been looking at things. Just for the sheer pleasure of it. I think they call it eye candy. I like the word Eyesmile......it does.

So I am going to present to you, some of the lovely things, ideas and creations I have discovered whilst letting myself, virtually, roam the world.

My starting point was of course...flowers.

 And my favourite of all sweet smelling flowers - violets. This one was a postcard.

And I ranged through quite a few nice sites on postcards and Vintage imagery.
This lead me to Victorian paper scraps.

From there it was an easy journey to Victorian paper working ( a topic I've actually searched before ).

Then, a little side step - and we are in the realms of fabric.

This one prompted me to become a friend on Facebook and set me off on a new tack creatively ( or it will soon)
The Vintage Drawer.
Inspiration comes from many sources. The idea is, however not to slavishly copy....but to adapt.

From there, it was back to flowers...in the flesh.
Some of them I have in my own garden This one is Rosa Mundi.

...and some which are representations on paper.

The rose Koenigen Von Danmark.
from the Botanical artist
Then a blog I follow posted some ravishing photos of flowers. My Romantic Home

And yet another one posted some lovely bouquets. SO off I went on a silk flower trail.

Polka Dot Closet

These flowers reminded me of a frock I once saw in a costume museum....
I suppose it's the colour and all the ruffles. :)

Now I love the 18th century ( especially the bit where this type of dress was fashionable ) and so of course my mind went off on frocks and then the late 18th century....and Mozart and then...... another lovely dress, a wonderful set and an absolutely ravishing voice.
Marriage of Figaro

The very best. Gundula Janowitz.
And there is a hybrid musk rose called Mozart! We have it in the front garden.

Then I found a very pretty picture..lots of flowers!
Then back to paper flowers...not my creations.

But some I could easily do. Had I the oomph.

The it was back to violets and those calling cards, trade cards and postcards.

So whilst I wasn't allowed to step outside the house, I roamed the world and back again. :)

And all without leaving my seat.... well I did once - to make a cuppa! :)
Thirsty work surfing.
;)