Spring flower clay ornaments

There is something so lovely about being able to capture the beauty of nature in craft which lasts a lifetime. We have been using a lot of air drying clay lately to make a chess set (Ill save that for another post) so I thought we could use some to make some lovely clay caring ornaments. They are fun and so simple to do with even the littlest of children, an extra hand, thumbprint, creamer etc all add to the memories of the piece which is made.

What you will need

• Air drying clay, I chose white instead of natural as I knew we wanted to paint them and the colour would show up better.

• Flowers, leaves, seed pods, ANYTHING from nature , have fun, you can always knead it back together and start again if something does not work.

• A rolling pin

• A place for the clay to dry.

• Watercolour paints (optional)

The process.

Simply roll out your clay to around 1/2cm thick, gently place your flowers/ natural treasures where you would like them and then use a rolling pin to slowly roll them into the clay, gently peel the flowers and stems away. A longer rolling pin which covers the whole piece of clay works best as you risk rolling over ad losing the detail on some of the other areas if its smaller.

You can use cookie cutters to make lovely shapes, why not use a gingerbread man and make some floral fairies like we did, or simple circles for ornaments for hanging. Dont forget to poke a hole in the ornament with a chopstick so you can thread ribbon or string through for hanging.

Finally add some watercolour! We tried painting the colours of the flowers and making a mural (which we are going to frame) and single colours, the single colours look so striking and beautiful especially where the colour has sank into the patterns!

Such a lovely craft for all time of year!

Enjoy

K x

Make your own whistle from a stick.

Out of all the things we have done recently this has to be one of the most exciting for the older children, we did this as part of our Medieval learning block we started a week ago. The awe and wonder present as they whittled their own simple stick whistle was amazing, so much excitement and achievement at the end. We have a flute and a homemade Lyre planned over the coming weeks to we shall add those to the blog as and when we do them.

The original instructions for these I remember years ago vaguely from a book (I think) called a school boys handbook, it was in my grandads charity shop, an old book I think from the 1920s I was probably around 13 years old, so when I decided to have a go at these I wasn’t 100 percent sure that I had remembered the instructions faithfully. But they worked so it seems I retained something.

Please remember that these should only be made under supervision and if you are confident your child can safely use a knife, if not, make it yourself, your child will be just as amazed to watch the process and be able to play the whistle at the end

What you will need:

• A stick around 3/4 inches long, the thicker the bark on the stick the better and easier it works, the original instructions said Willow, but we haven’t any willow so I used two types in the image above, some from the pear tree (left) and a stick from the recently fallen apple tree in the front garden (right) which had thicker bark and was a lot easier to do.

• A whittling knife or Stanley knife

• Somewhere protected you can do it, outdoors is perfect but we ended up at the dining room table.

How to make it:

Firstly take your stick and at one end cut or saw at a rough 45 degree angle, this will form the end you blow through.

Then cut or saw a notch into the top of the whistle to form the hole, I found the smaller the hole the better the whistle, be careful not to cut through the whole stick. I found from making a few, you are best having the top ‘blowing’ end narrower than the bottom end if the stick is uneven, as otherwise there is a risk of splitting the bark when you move on making the whistle.

About half an inch from the bottom of your whistle score a ring bark deep around the circumference of the stick.Then using the handle of your knife or another big piece of stick, gently tap the stick all over the bark which sits above that line until it starts to come loose, you can see if it comes loose by holding and gently trying to twist it off. This was so much easier to do with the stick with the thicker bark. Once the bark starts to come loose, gently pull it off, you want it to all remain in one piece, with the handle on the bottom.

Now you should have a long piece of stripped bark on a handle and a tube of bark. Next, where the little notch was which you cut before you loosened the bark (yellow line) you need to cut the stick along the flat vertical edge of that notch (red line), so that you now have two pieces. Taking the smallest piece on the right, on the top longest edge using your knife shave a mm from the top edge (orange line) and then slide this back into the top of the whistle, it should now whistle on its own, if the air isn’t moving through, take another tiny bit off the top of the wood you put back in, replace and try again. I found that the smaller this gap for air flow was the louder and clearer the whistle.

At this stage as I slid the lower half of the whistle back into the bark, I found it easier to shave a little wood from the stick itself, as it was hard to push back into the bark. The stick allows the tone of the whistle to change.

Thats it! Now you have your whistle, have fun and try it with different types of wood! Maybe have a basket of whistles from far away adventures.

Enjoy

K x

https://video.wixstatic.com/video/fdb043_67965fd0d07e4661a9ef534cda7866a7/480p/mp4/file.mp4

Thoughts about my life on my 36th Birthday

Happy 36th Birthday to me, and a massive thank you for my family making it the most special one yet.

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You know if I were to go back and tell my 20 year old self who had ambitions of working in the very exclusive Parisian Couture Houses, at 36 I would be working with young children, have three children of my own, divorced and re-married, living in a semi detached house that seemed to be falling down around us - I probably would have cried, my life now in my 36th year is vastly different from the life I envisioned and wanted for myself all those years ago. .

Then would come the reasons...the reasons you began working with young children...you became a mother, and holding the precious life of another in your arms, you couldn’t imagine a better purpose for your days....you love children so much, the ateliers of Paris changed to the ateliers of busy children...the very best creatives and thinkers of the world. The reason you are divorced and remarried is because you stood up for what was right, for a life you and your children deserved and it was the hardest journey of your life...but then you discovered true love....and that love and your family left you needing nothing more..not the city life, the hustle and bustle of modern life - but the happiness in the simplest of days.

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And those tears of disappointment would turn to tears of joy. Yes my life resembles nothing of what I dreamt. But it is more that I could have ever wished for and envisioned in my wildest dreams.

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With that, I’m looking forward to the most amazing years ahead! Looking forward to life and all it’s surprises!

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Thank you all for the birthday wishes!

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Peace and love

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K x

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