Season Of Mist & Mellow Mushrooms!!

Posted on October 5, 2010 by Abi

Autumn seems to have arrived with a bang recently. It was only a few short weeks ago that summer was still with us and yet my children are now enthusiastically collecting conkers and mushrooms have taken over the garden!

I should probably call them toadstools but being in no way shape or form a mushroom/toadstool expert I’m a bit ignorant as to which is which.

Autumn is always a strange sort of time, I’m definitely not a fan of the increasing rain, or trying to judge if now is the time to pack away the summer dresses and resurrect the winter woolies. But it definitely causes an increase in colour, the streets are already littered with yellow/red leaves as they begin to fall. For us it has also meant the invasion of mushrooms in many shapes and sizes, from the little brown fellow seen above to….

This beast of a mushroom actually grew in my Grandparents garden, but just like it’s smaller cousins it appeared in record time and to the amazement of all.

This rather odd looking one has been mostly eaten, but by what?!

I don’t remember this many mushrooms last year so I can’t help but wonder what has caused this sudden influx. If the trend continues then next year we’ll be overrun!

Thankfully they are rather pretty to look at, even if some are probably deadly. They have even been a source of creative inspiration for us. You may remember me mentioning exciting new items on the horizon. Well we are expanding into craft kits! The first to make it onto the website is our Mushroom Badge.

They are £5.50 and so far have been very popular when taken to fairs. Everything is included (bar a sewing needle) to make your very own Mushroom Badge, it is perhaps preferable to the garden invading kind, and looks much prettier on a coat!

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Fabric Flower Tutorial

Posted on July 29, 2010 by Abi

Today I thought I’d share a fabric flower tutorial with you all, we’ve been making these for years and they are so much fun. This is a really useful little technique to know as the flower can be made into a badge, sewn onto a hairband or hairclip or anything else you can think of. You can also vary the size with eaze and the end result looks very impressive.

What You’ll Need

Cardboard

Fabric for petals

Fabric for flower centre

Felt Fabric

Buttons and beads to decorate

Step 1

First you need to decide on the size you would like your finished flower to be. The one in the picture above is about 9cms across. Next draw a circle onto your carboard the same size as the flower and cut out.

Step 2

Place your cardboard circle onto your petal fabric and draw around six times (to make six petals). Cut out the six fabric circles.

Step 3

Fold each circle of fabric in half, with the right side of the fabric showing. Now you need to gather the raw edges of your petals, sew small running stitches along the side.

Step 4

Pull the stitches to form your petal. Repeat with the other five circles using the same piece of thread going from one to the next.

Step 5

Join the first petal to the last and sew firmly together to form your flower.

Step 6

Cut a small circle from felt or a woollen material that doesn’t fray and sew onto the back of your flower.

Step 7

Now we need to make the centre of the flower. I chose a contrasting blue material for mine. Once again use your cardboard circle and cut out a circle from this fabric. Gradually sew a running stitch round the edge of the circle turning the raw edge to the centre as you go.

Step 8

Pull your thread so that the gathers end up in the centre of the circle.

Step 9

Place this circle with the gathers facing down so they can’t be seen into the centre of your flower. Next you will need a button to secure it. Sew it right into the centre to hold everything together. At this point you can add beads or whatever embellishments you fancy.

Step 10

Now your flower is finished you can sew a brooch back onto the back if you like, or add it to a fabric hairband or hairclip. I think I may add one onto a bag I’m sewing, really the ideas are limitless. Have fun!

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To London & Selvedge

Posted on June 27, 2010 by Abi

Yesterday morning both members of Angel Eden plus one daughter/grandaughter got up at a very unreasonable hour and made our way to the train station. We were off to London to visit the first ever Selvedge Magazine Summer Fair.

Once we had walked back and forth several times trying to work out the tube (the Northern line wasn’t running from St. Pancras) we made our way to Archway tube station. We had a map book of London which quite cleverly showed everwhere apart from where we were and none of the locals seemed to be able to help. We were getting a bit desperate when finally a European tourist pointed us in the right direction.

We arrived with 15 minutes to spare and the queue was already building. The fair was being held inside an old church which had white balloons tied to the railings. Up the stone steps were jam jars holding pink roses (I made a special effort not to knock these over, but I wouldn’t be surprised it they hadn’t lasted the day).

The first 200 visitors received a goody bag. We were a bit over excited when we both got one. It had in it a Volga Linen Company teatowel, a burt’s bees pack, a Burda badge, pen and measuring guide and some bath scrub.

By this point we’d been awake & travelling so long that we had an unreasonable need for a cup of tea. So we headed straight for the stage area which had been transformed by ‘Vintage Party’ to look like a village fete. We had to make the difficult choice of which cake to have.

Then we sat on a pew and talked to other visitors who came to sit near us. I loved the decorating, it was like something from my childhood (I grew up in a quaint country village) mixed with tea at Grandma’s. The decorations and flowers were all beautiful & I congratulate everyone who put hard work into the ‘look’ of the event.

Once we made our way back down to the stalls it got ridiculously busy, completely understable of course, with so many wonderful artists under one roof the guests had piled in. Unfortunately this made viewing all the stallholders a bit difficult. My daughter led us determindly to The Black Rabbit, she seen them on the way in and we had to buy two ‘blobs’ I’m not sure of their real name, but they are now affectionately nickednamed the lavender blobs in our house.She also wanted a hair clip kit from RoseRed & Blue.

We spoke to many of the stallholders and they were all very friendly and relaxed. I wish I could have bought more, but it was a bit difficult to see with so many people. However I grabbed all the exhibitors cards as I compiled my mental Christmas list (I hope Santa’s feeling flush this year!) If Selvedge hold another fair make sure you visit, although hopefully next time the venue will be bigger with even more to offer!

Here’s a list of my favourite exhibitors and their websites: