Crafting with Jemima

Hi there, how are you doing? 

It's me, Fudge, and this is my home, Caramel Cottage. Why don't you come on in.

My buddy Pickles the dragon is upstairs taking a nap. Careful there, don't startle him, or he might sneeze at you.  He's got a dragon's cold and that's not the kind you would like to catch, trust me.

My best friend Jemima Periwinkle has come over to play. Well actually, not to play. Her visit is very serious as we are trying to get more points in Santa's Golden Book. I don't think Jemima needs any extra points at all..., she's a very well behaved bunny as far as I know, but Pickles and I... What I mean is, it couldn't hurt to do a little something extra...

 Here I am preparing a cup of cocoa

for Jemima and me

for when we earn our extra points.

How are we going to do that? We are helping Nina, my mommy, to make these horses a little more interesting.

Jemima told me to post this photo first, so I can show off part of my fairies collection... To the left is a picture of a fairy that Maria gave us last christmas and underneath the window is my beautiful writing desk that Mommy purchased a long time ago for me from fimobabsi. 

But let's get back to the reason we are here today.

Rocking horses.

We are going to use wooden horsies in red, white, silver, turquoise and brown.

We are also using fancy, self-adhesive paper borders

and little coloured beads.

"I love it, when you come over to play, Jemima! *Cough* I mean, to help me help Mommy with her crafting. It's the best reason to prepare a fresh batch of vanilla walnut fudge on my little stove. We'll have some later, okay?"

"Okidoki."

Ready for the big reveal? Here are Mommy's revamped rocking horses.

"Now we can have some vanilla walnut fudge, Jemima. And Toffifee."

Autumn Crafting with Hester & Fudge

Helloooo, dear readers! Maybe you have asked yourselves, "what about Nina and Hester's annual autumn crafting session??" Well, here it is!!

The only change is that it is even better this year, because it is the first official "Autumn Crafting with Hester and Fudge" (that's me!). Isn't that great? 😊

Here is the beginning. It started out with Nina and Hester and some lumps of air drying clay which they formed into pumpkins and a tea set.

 

I joined in during the second stage. We gave the pumpkins their first coat of "skin colour".

No, this is not a piece of ham I am holding - it is a particularly unhappy pumpkin. He did not react well to being painted.

 

I was sure that Nina would sort it out, though.

And I believe she did. Here are the pumpkins after receiving a second coat of colour, some glossy varnish and little shiny eyes. 

"Ham-pumpkin" is the second from the right. He's looking rather pleased with himself now, wouldn't you say?

Sooo many pumpkins... So what exactly do you do when your entire cottage is filled with pumpkins??

 Riiight - you throw a PUMPKIN PARTY!! 🎃🎃🎃

And that's exactly what Pickles and I did.  

We invited Julie Periwinkle who came wearing a party hat with ghosts on it.

And of course we invited little Jemima Periwinkle, whom we almost didn't recognize underneath her super awesome ghost costume.

Some other guests were Rona Hazelnut wearing a witch's hat and Hippolina, who wore a beautiful orange dress and brought along a magic broom.

Rona's brother Ralfie came dressed as a jack-o'-lantern, Hester Hogwart wore the most delightful little ghost headband, and her son Henry was a proud Harry Potter showing off a shiny black cloak and a wand made from Holly.

So - what exactly do you do at a pumpkin party, apart from dressing up in Halloween costumes?

 

 1. You dress up and meet your friends

2. You  W O R S H I P  the pumpkins

 and 3. You have lots (and lots) of caramel pumpkin spice lattes!!!

HAPPY AUTUMN

AND HAPPY START OF NOVEMBER, 

BUT BEFORE THAT - HAPPY HALLOWEEN !!!!

🍂🍁 ☕ 🎃 🎃 🎃 🎃 ☕ 🍁🍂

Exhibition at Caramel Cottage

Mommy has spent the past weeks making ornaments and dioramas for her friends for Christmas. She asked whether Pickles and I would allow her to show off her finished items at Caramel Cottage. Of course we said yes. 

We invited Hester Hogwart who conjured away all my furniture and conjured up her large work table to display Mommy's deer ornaments.

Hooray for Hester's magic powers. She also conjured up a beautiful grammophone so that we can listen to Christmas music. I placed cups and a pot of warm cocoa on a little side table so we'll have something to drink. 

Hester is resting in her red armchair. She conjured that up too. She has sprinkled the deer ornaments with some sort of gold dust from a large bottle. She says this will bring the new owners good luck for the entire next year. 

Now she is admiring my collection of fudges. I decided to share those, so that we'll have something to eat. I hope the others aren't very hungry... 

Look what Mommy did to Caramel Cottage. She gave it a real stone wall. What do you think? I am very excited to show it to you and if you are interested Mommy can post a tutorial on how she made it.

Birgit, my other mommy, sent me this wonderful chocolate Santa for Saint Nicholas' Day. She also sent an advent calendar filled with chocolates. Pickles is sitting on top of one of the bars. He likes his gianduja chocolate very much.

Here you can see Mommy's deer ornaments. Some have got glittery snow on top. Others have a pearl attached to it and bits of moss and bark. 

 

Mommy hopes the recipients will like them. After all, she made them with a lot of love (and sticky fingers from all the glue) and we should not forget that Hester sprinkled them with lucky gold dust.

Upstairs are the others - Jemima and Ralfie. They are looking at Mommy's dioramas. Here is a spooky looking one of a witchy tree surrounded by shrubs and fairy lights.

Mommy made tree skeletons out of wire and wooden toothpicks. Then she covered these with clay.

She also gave this tree eyes and a nose, because some trees do have them.

Here is a magical tree surrounded by fairy lights and with a little healing crystal in front of it.

Next is something Hester likes. She already told Nina she wants to have one. It's a diorama of a witch's cottage with a stack of logs and a tiny little broom leaning against a large tree. There are stones and weeds in the garden and smoke is coming out of the chimney.

This is another witchy garden, only in this one, there is the tiniest little fir tree in the left corner.

Here's another Halloween themed item that Hester approved of. A group of bats flying through the clouds in the twilight. The children seem a little taken aback by their hypnotic googly eyes.

Here is a similar group of bats. Quackie is very brave right now, as she decided to have a chat with one of them.

This is another look at the process. Did I tell you Mommy made the dioramas using matchboxes? 

I already showed you how she made the magical trees. She painted the inside of the box dark blue, stuck on the fairy lights and added a glossy varnish.

She made the witchy cottages using pieces of felt that she coloured black. She also cut tiny little windows into them and glued doors onto them using pieces of cork. The stone steps and chimneys are made out of tooth picks. The brooms were the hardest to make. They are made out of little slices of tooth picks and two different sorts of twine.

Last but not least are the tiny bats she cut out of black paper using very sharp scissors. She painted clouds and the moon and a blue-green sky into the boxes to give the impression of twilight.

Two of the bats were stuck onto the back of the box. The one in the front was stuck onto a piece of wire to make it look like it is flying above the cloud (made of cotton). 

The black tree in the witch's garden is of course hand painted. Here, Mommy chose a light blue background.

She glued pieces of moss onto the branches of the magical trees to give the impression of leaves.

Hope you enjoyed your visit to the museum. To Caramel Cottage, I mean! Quackie has decided to pose next to the witchy tree. 

Pickles and I are going to have some cocoa and fudge now...

🎅 HOPE YOU HAD A WONDERFUL CHRISTMAS. 🎅

🎄 HAPPY HOLIDAYS AND BEST WISHES FOR 2018. 🎄