ScrapHappy October 2022

The weather is playing mean tricks on us and, instead of sunshine and a temperature of 25 deg C, we have gloomy skies and a nasty cold wind today. So much for spring. Bah! But I will use this as justification to put off my daily 10-km run and stay indoors with my beads, threads and Britbox. [just kidding about the 10-km run, by the way – that’s never going to happen unless someone puts me in a shopping trolley and tow ropes it to the back of their car].

There’s a lot of wrapped fabric cords and jewellery and bowls on instagram these days, so I thought I’d give it a bash.

I did not enjoy the process and I do not like the result, so this is definitely not my latest enthusiasm. The only thing that will save this, for me, is if I attach an old enamel pendant that came from my grandmother. The colours work well together and the pendant gives the cord the weight it needs to hang properly. In company with a few other beads and necklaces, it might get a wear – but the jury is still out on that.

I’m going to pop over to other people’s posts now and see what cleverness they’ve come up with. Here’s the list of other ScrapHappy bloggers:

Kate, Gun, Eva, Sue, Lynda,
Birthe, Turid, Susan, Cathy,  Tracy, 
Jill, Jan, Moira, Sandra, Chris, Alys,
Claire, Jean, Jon, Dawn, Jule, Gwen,
Sunny, Kjerstin, Sue L, Vera,
Nanette, Ann, Dawn 2, Carol,
Preeti, Debbierose, Nóilin and Viv

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ScrapHappy September 2022

It was time to turn a pair of hand-me-down straight-legged jeans into flares, and get rid of the bulky pockets at the back which made it look like I was growing two carbuncles on my backside.

I started with this tutorial and changed bits of it as I went along.

The inserts were cut from an old pair of jeans that had seen better days in certain areas, and were obviously never going to get mended while in my possession.

I zigzagged the inside seams because that wasn’t in the tutorial, and I also topstitched after ironing flat. Then I added a few random stitches in perle embroidery cotton. Different on each side. Because why not? I suppose I should have machined-stitched the hem in a light colour to match the original hem, but I was getting close to the end of the project and needed to finish it before running out of steam.

The horrible back pockets got ripped off and replaced with new ones from a pile of denim samples someone once gave me. I’ve been hoarding those samples for far too long and it’s time to use them up. I see now that I didn’t align the pockets when sewing – but finished is finished and it’s good enough for me.

I enjoyed doing this when I finally got around to it, especially when it came to putting a big tick next to “flare jeans” on the to-do list.

It’s only Kate’s ScrapHappy initiative that inspires me to write a blog post these days; I’m hoping to get some more creative energy flowing again soon. In the meantime, here’s a list of crafty people who also participate in ScrapHappy once a month:

Kate, Gun, Eva, Sue,Lynda,
Birthe,Turid,Susan,Cathy,  Tracy,
Jill, Jan, Moira,Sandra, Chris, Alys,
Claire, Jean, Jon, Dawn, Jule, Gwen,
Sunny,Kjerstin, Sue L, Vera,
Nanette, Ann, Dawn 2, Carol,
Preeti, Debbierose, Nóilin and Viv

ScrapHappy July 2022

A billion buttons and what to do with them all…? Some match, some don’t. I prefer it when things don’t. I don’t do matching very well and I wasn’t about to waste my time sorting them all out.
I’d seen a friend with a simple multi-coloured wrap-around necklace with little buttons hanging off it; it was very striking and looked easy enough to make. I decided to use only transparent glass beads so the buttons would be more prominent. I’d also planned to make it long enough to wrap round three times but I got the measurements wrong so I get four wraps out of it!

I hope the close-ups make it clear how to get the buttons to hang loose – in case anyone else who’s been hoarding buttons wants to try their hand.

Apologies for the lousy pics, we aren’t getting much natural light this winter. But soon, soon….it will be spring :)

ScrapHappy June 2022

Another jeans-to-skirt ScrapHappy project – or to be accurate, a denim mini skirt that I’d picked up at a thrift shop and never worn. With my legs (and, let’s be frank, at my age) mini skirts aren’t a good idea. But it was in a R10-box of bargains and who in their right mind can pass up a bargain? So I chopped off the hem and added stuff plus a bit of stitching. It’s shorter than the first one I made, just reaches my knees, but looks great with tights and boots.

Battled to get a decent photo in artificial light (Cape Town winter too dark and wet and plain bloody miserable to be outside) so these are the best I can do.

The first half of this year has been full of hurdles so far, many of which I saw coming so attempted to gird my loins, but wasn’t in sufficiently good shape to handle the unexpected ones at the same time. I’m trying to reserve what little energy I have for work-related things, for obvious reasons, and the rest is just a bit of a blur. Perhaps some clarity is on the horizon.

Here are the links for everyone who joins the ScrapHappy initiative from time to time. If you also love using up scraps, contact Kate or Gun (the first two in the list below) and they’ll add you to the group.

Kate, Gun, Eva, Sue, Lynda,
Birthe, Turid, Susan, Cathy,  Tracy, Jill,
Jan, Moira, Sandra, Chris, Alys,
Claire, Jean, Jon, Dawn, Jule, Gwen,
Bekki, Sunny, Kjerstin, Sue L, Vera,
Nanette, Ann, Dawn 2, Bear, Carol,
Preeti, Edith, Debbierose and Viv

ScrapHappy May 2022

We’re solidly in the middle of autumn in Cape Town, but we still get to enjoy some beautiful sunny days with just a hint of cold when you’re in shadow. Nights and early mornings are much cooler of course, but the winter rains haven’t set in yet. The poppies and nasturtiums in my garden are sending out their first little leaves but they’re going to have to put up with a lot of wet before they see spring!

At the Spier Craft Art market, the ground is fairly thick with autumn leaves. Below the top level of the leaves, the soil is damp. Boots are needed, despite the sun. Boots, tights, scarves, and a new furry leopard print hoodie to keep out any surprise nasty cold winds.

Love my new jacket. Nothing like fake fur!

Anyway, enough of the weather, back to ScrapHappy. Many of the crafters work with beads. It’s easy to lose a few when you’re making things – and there was once a memorable occasion when Bongani accidentally tipped over a 2-litre box of black beads that he was using for a wire elephant.

The scavenger in me can’t help but give in to the temptation to scratch around on the ground for beads. Yesterday the pickings were particularly good, and at one point I was on my knees with a stick getting at lower-level beads that must have been tramped into the soil over many years of markets. I felt like a forensic anthropologist or archaeologist or whatever you call those clever people in crime fiction.

Once washed, the beads are good to go. I turned them into three memory bangles last night, and the only rule is that there are no rules – whatever gets picked up gets used, in no particular order. I noticed that there were more white beads than any other colour then I realised that this is most likely because they are easier to spot than darker colours.

There are a few plastic letter beads in there. I didn’t find a J for Jill so I get to decide what a letter may stand for. See the G? Today that stands for Grumpy. Grumpy because some twerp was in such a hurry to get in and out of the supermarket last week that she grabbed decaffeinated coffee instead of the real thing. How is decaf even coffee? It isn’t, is the answer. It’s ground-up brown stuff and doesn’t count in my book. Never again!