Make: A Mini-Zine For Your Valentine (or Galentine)

These mini-zines are the easiest but loveliest gift to make for someone you love, be that a partner, friend or family member. I am by no means an artist so the simple black-and-white line drawings and DIY feel of these mini-zines suits me down to the ground.

You will need:
An A4 piece of white cardstock
An A5 piece of coloured paper
A shaped punch or a very steady hand with a cutting knife
A black fine liner

I use the technique on this how-to from Design Sponge but amended slightly: instead of the faffy folding of paper to make the zine, I use an A4 piece of white cardstock, chopped in half and then half again before folding down the middle to make an 8-page booklet.

Once your booklet is made, the fun bit begins: deciding what to write and draw! In the past I've made mini-zines for friends that tell, in scrappy and very DIY-feeling sketches, the story of our friendship. For Thomas, I've made one zine giving the many ways and reasons I love him ("more than books" was one - I know, it's a bold claim) and, to celebrate the end of his PhD, I put together a silly story about his journey to becoming Dr S.

The beauty of these mini-zines is that they're a completely personalised gift that will always be appreciated but that are actually super fast and easy to make. If you don't fancy giving a mass-produced V-Day card this year, they make the perfect alternative.

* I should probably explain that Thomas, being both very large and very hairy, has the nickname 'Bear', hence the frequent bear references!

Gift Wrapping On A Budget

I've never been a huge fan of glitzy Christmas wrapping paper, preferring to instead use the more environmentally friendly brown parcel wrap (did you know that shiny, foil-effect and laminated wrapping paper can't be recycled?). And the recent fashion for low-key Scandinavian-style Christmas decorations means my habit of using brown paper is bang on trend.

You can get brown paper pretty easily on the high street and I usually pick mine up from the Post Office, where I found a 10 meter roll for £2. I then picked up a somewhat tatty and unloved music score for 99p in Oxfam and this, combined with a couple of brown paper bags (saved from shopping trips over the year) gave me more than enough to wrap all my gifts.

The joy of plain brown paper is the myriad ways you can jazz it up with ribbons and trimmings, and this is where my magpie-like tendencies come in handy: I've been collecting bits and pieces all year for my Christmas parcels. This is your chance to get creative: in past years I've used candy canes, pine cones, and small baubles to decorate my parcels (although not all at once. Even for Christmas-mad me that would be overkill).

This year, I went for a combination of trimmings: lace on some, ribbon on others, together with clay decorations. The length of lace is actually a collar sent to me by Kezzie in a swap. Sadly it was too short for me, but it looks amazing decorating my sister-in-law's gift and, as she's far more slender than I, it will hopefully fit her.  In a local haberdashery I found grey gingham and heart print ribbon for 50p a meter. The black & white striped butcher's string was £1 from Tiger and the white clay decorations were left over from my homemade Christmas cards last year.

Finally, my gift tags were made from brown luggage labels (they're much cheaper from eBay than from places like Paperchase), which I then either covered in sheet music or decorated with a Merry Christmas ink stamp.

In total, I spent £4.99 on my wrapping supplies this year, but with way over half the roll of paper, almost the whole book of music and most of the string left, I reckon the wrapping costs for my ten gifts comes in at around £2. And, not to toot my own horn or anything, but I think they look a million dollars.

A Festive Miscellany

Lacking the time to put together any new Christmas-themed posts, I thought that instead I'd round-up a few from past years.

I adore the festive season with a love that endures despite the commercialisation, the endless sound of Noddy Holder screaming, "It's Christmas", the crowded and frantic supermarket aisles, and that creepy Elf On A Shelf popping up on my Instagram feed. To combat all of that, over the past few years I've tried to concentrate my energies into homemade decorations and gifts, a few of which feature here, as well as low-key traditions that are meaningful to me and my loved ones.

Last November I wrote about how to have a conscious Christmas: "When I talk about a 'conscious Christmas', I mean one which is conscious of social justice and the environment, conscious of the things that matter in our lives - family, friends, simple living - rather than getting into debt," and there's also a how-to about making your own evergreen wreath.

In December of 2014, I shared some simple festive home updates: from embroidery to utilising Christmas carol sheet music. As I said in the post, "If there's a flat surface, I will cover it with fairy lights and greenery. Stand still for too long in December and I might just hang a bauble on you."

Looking for some quick Christmas makes? Teacup candles are a doddle to make and look fantastic. Or for an edible treat, spiced gingerbread cookies are just the thing (and they're vegan, too).

Finally, it might be a bit late in the season (honestly, how is it already a week into December?), but in 2012 I shared my tips for getting organised at Christmas.

Good Stuff: Links & Likes

Image from The Guardian, copyright Jenny Jimenez/www.photojj.com

This Lindy West piece from The Guardian is just about the most perfect thing I've ever read, interrogating the intersections between feminism, fat and capitalist exploitation in the wedding industrial complex. Searingly honest, West argues that the very act of a fat woman being happy and loved is a political statement. I want this piece tattooed all over my body so I can read it at any time.

I loved Laura's chair makeover; I'll definitely be stealing this idea in future!

And while we're on the subject of crafts, how amazing is this statement necklace made from recycled buttons?

I had ALL the feels while reading this piece about being bisexual at Pride. Just... so much yes.

The New York Times feature on two pairs of identical twins, in which one of each pair was swapped at birth, meaning they were raised as fraternal twins, was simply amazing.

Finally, Elise started The Buyer's Archive a while ago, I borrowed her idea, and now Donna of Polkadot Pink and Steffany of Deep Greens & Blues have joined in too.

A week of making

Having a week of making some time in spring seems to have become a bit of a tradition for me: you can read about 2013's week here and 2014's here. This year, I decided to make it a bit easier for myself and have the week during the school holidays, so my second week of the Easter break was spent beavering away on a variety of projects...

Monday
I'm really into making these cute mini-zines at the moment, after seeing the idea on Design Sponge (although I think it was Laura who originally provided the link). I've already made a couple of Thomas, and this one - as you can see - is for a good friend. I'm a pretty terrible artist so the pages of my zines tend to be text-heavy, but they're really fun and quick to make and greatly appreciated by the recipients.

Tuesday

I wish I'd taken a 'before' photograph of our extremely shabby and sad patio furniture, but a quick trip to Wilkos for some outdoor paint and a few hours in the sunshine gave them a whole new look.  So perhaps not strictly a make, but certainly a makeover, and I am thrilled with how lovely the table and chairs now look (just don't look too closely at the white primer showing through on the feet).

Wednesday

I finally finished sewing seemingly endless bunting shapes onto my quilt-in-progress. I have a feeling this piece will feature a lot this week!

Thursday

My friend Charlotte hosted a crafternoon - four of us, all working in schools and hence on holiday, gathered at her house for tea, homemade biscuits, and a spot of making. I'd been nominated to provide the craft, so took along some embroidery hoops, thread and scraps of fabric to teach them the slip-stitch technique of slogan embroidery (which I blogged about here). We all wrote our words/phrases out freehand, and as a total perfectionist I'm not entirely happy with my result, but as a teaching tool it worked really well and by the end of the afternoon we had four completed hoops.

Friday
Another makeover, but I reckon they still count. One black maxi skirt from the charity shop, one checked midi skirt from a vintage store, and half an hour on the sewing machine makes two summer skirts that are now the perfect length for short-arse me.

Saturday
A nice easy make before heading into town to go to the cinema. Two sample pots of paint, three wooden beads and one leather thong = a funky necklace to jazz up my spring uniform of skinny jeans and t-shirt.

Sunday
After yesterday's afternoon cinema date turned into a long pub session, I was feeling rather tender of head today. Not up to anything more taxing than cutting the backing fabric and batting for the quilt, then tacking it together on the machine ready for bias binding. I'm dreading binding it: it's not something I excel at at the best of times, so with a monumental hangover it definitely wasn't going to be a task I tackled today.

I love how having a semi-regular Week of Making gives me a kick up the bum to get crafting. Lots of these are projects I'd had in mind for ages but just never got round to. It's also a good reminder of how little time crafting can take: both the mini zine and the necklace were 30 minute makes, so there's really no excuse not to get crafting more regularly.

Made: Cloud cushion

Every time I eye up The Liberty Book Of Simple Sewing in The Works (basically every time I go in there - it's so lovely, but I just don't need another sewing book!) this is the tutorial I head for first. So when I signed up for the #DICraft swap with the theme of 'Dreams', I decided it was the perfect excuse to give it a go. Or is it just me for whom clouds remind them of dreams?

As a special treat, I bought myself some Liberty Tana Lawn cotton in Kaylie Sunshine from eBay, which turned out to be a bit of a bugger to sew (my machine isn't great with delicate fabrics, it likes to chew them) but makes the finished cushion feel so soft. I won't patronise you by giving a step-by-step as it's literally the easiest make in the world - cut out two cloud shapes, pin and sew right sides together, turn inside out, stuff, stitch up the gap. If you do feel the need for more detailed instructions, there's a tutorial on the Liberty blog.

So, what do you think? One thing's for sure, parceling it up to send is going to break my heart just a little bit!

At home: An office makeover

We are lucky to have a little bit of extra space in our two bedroom terrace. But just a little more, mind you, in the shape of a 2.5 x 2m part-corridor/part-room at the end of the upstairs hall, just before the bathroom. This has been my craft and sewing room for the past few years, but with the arrival of The Boy it soon became clear that we needed a more multi-purpose office space. Somewhere I could still use my sewing machine and get my craft on, but also somewhere suitable for him to work while he finishes his PhD.

                                 Before:                                                             After:

The original layout had very little storage  - a slim bookcase aside - and a beautiful but impractical oak writing desk. And so, with a heavy heart, I bid goodbye to the desk and said hello to to a practical white desk top and legs from Ikea and lots of shelving from B&Q. As tends to happen, I had the vision and The Boy put in the hard work. This division of roles along normative gender lines bothers me less than it could: until he moved in, I put up every shelf, assembled every flat pack, drilled every hole and hauled garden waste to the tip (in fact, I still do all of that except the drilling and shelves), so it's not that I can't do the heavy labour, I just choose not to.

And what a transformation! Our formerly dingy and messy space is suddenly light, bright and tidy. My craft supplies - colourful jars of buttons and threads, spools of washi tape - are still on display and easily accessible, while the less pretty things are kept in white storage boxes from Ikea.

Meanwhile, The Boy's books and work papers are all tidied away on the highest wall shelves: at 6'3" he has no trouble reaching them when needed. I also found a kitchen vegetable trolley in a local junk shop, and it's the perfect storage solution for my vintage maps and papercraft supplies. A string of colourful ball lights, from Tiger, brighten up the space on dark evenings.

We re-used the bookcase, putting it side-on to form more of a corridor effect into the bathroom, for my craft books and fabric stash, and repurposed a faux-Eames chair from eBay, which used to sit in the living room, as desk seating.

I'm thrilled with our new-look office/craft room. Sharing the space has meant I'm much better at tidying away after sewing (where previously I'd leave half-finished projects lying around for weeks), and The Boy enjoys having a quiet space in which to work. At a total cost of £58 - £35 for timber and shelf brackets, £11 for the lights and £12 for the storage boxes - it's been a bargain makeover to a previously neglected corner of the house.

Made: Slogan embroidery hoop

I love having words - be they lyrics, quotes, slogans, or lines from books - displayed in my home. So when I was trying to think of ideas for a DIY gift swap I'm doing at the moment, it was inevitable that one of the gifts would involve words. In this case, embroidered words.

Sitting by the fire with the hoop in my lap, carefully sewing, was a lovely way to spend a cold afternoon. And although I know we all decided long ago that there's nothing inherently anti-feminist about crafts, it still felt gloriously subversive to be embroidering this slogan. After making two of these - one to send and one to keep - I'm already planning what other alliterative hoops I could make... 'Vegan with a vengeance' next, perhaps?

You will need:
1 embroidery hoop
A piece of fabric just larger than your hoop
A skein of embroidery thread, preferably in a bright or contrasting colour
2 or three buttons
Text to trace
A fabric marker
(And, of course, a needle)

1. Write out your text (I used the font English 157 BT in size 92 on Microsoft Word) and print.
2. Place your fabric over the paper and trace the words using the fabric marker. Depending on the thickness and colour of your fabric, you may need to do this against a window or light box.
3. Unscrew the hoop and place your fabric over the smaller of the two. Top with the larger hoop and tighten the screw.
3. Thread your needle with two strands of thread (or one long strand that you double up) and knot.
4. Using split stitch, stitch along your letters, trying to cover as much of the fabric marker as possible (although this will fade over time, it obviously looks a lot neater if you cover it with your embroidery). The split stitch - where you loop backwards with each new stitch to split the last one before stitching forwards - can be fiddly to begin with but is extremely satisfying once you get into a rhythm.
5. When you've finished your slogan or song lyric, choose a couple of contrasting buttons and sew onto a corner of your hoop.
6. Cut the excess fabric away from the edges of your hoop, then stand back and admire!

Good stuff: Links & likes

Storage pot DIY: image source & © Make Do & Spend

There's been some pretty great stuff around the internet these past couple of weeks. Sometimes, when I'm putting together a links post, I struggle for material. Not so this time.

First up, Buzzfeed's piece imagining Hermione was the main character of the Harry Potter series -  renamed Hermione Granger and the Goddamm Patriarchy - is nothing short of genius. "Not all wizards, right?"

I loved E's post on getting organised, especially her super easy DIY storage pots. How great does her spare room look now?

The Militant Baker's article, about why people hate happy fat people, is just brilliant. I loved her notion of 'body currency' and the ways in which people feel ripped off, cheated, when someone doesn't participate in the expected battles with their body; when they don't strive for a media-created idea of perfection. Anyway, instead of listening to me summing it up, go read it.

Louisa's Tunnock's teacakes coasters look amazing, and simple to make too.

This piece - How Should An Abortion Be? - from Gawker is a much more nuanced and detailed look at some of the issues I raised in my post a couple of weeks ago. Essential reading.

Sarah wrote a superb take-down of the argument that feminists shouldn't care about the #NoMorePage3 campaign because 'there are bigger issues to worry about'.

Elise's series on her favourite blogs is a great source of new reading (and no, I'm not just mentioning it because she name-checked me. Although that was nice).

I know I definitely fall into a blog rut - not so much with regard to writing here (although that happens too!), but in terms of the other blogs I'll comment on or the bloggers I interact with on the regular. This post about blogging acts of kindness was therefore a welcome reminder of the nice things I can do as a blog reader (via Becky).

A MASSIVE thank you to all of you who've posted and tweeted about the Big Blog Clothes Swap. Don't forget that sign-up is open until 9th February, and we're especially in need of size 14+ swappers.

Finally, I've been having a tough time at work lately. I think all educators go through phases of wondering why we bother; feeling like the battle to get kids learning might not be worth the cost it inflicts on us. And then Humans Of New York began a series about a middle school in Brooklyn and every night I get home from school, look at his latest pictures and read the captions, and cry. It's an incredibly powerful series, one that really reminds me just why I do the job. If you haven't been following, scroll back to 20th January and look at the first photo of Vidal speaking about his principal, Ms Lopez. Then work your way forwards, through each incredible story, and the fundraising that's gone on, and I defy you to stay dry-eyed.

Lately...

TRAVELLING to a freezing cold and snowy York at the weekend. We had a lovely time wandering the streets, buying secondhand books and clothes, eating amazing vegan food, drinking cheap cider and looking at trains in the Railway Museum (this last one somewhat more lovely for The Boy than for me). Sadly, the walls were closed due to frost and ice, so I think a return visit is in order some time soon.

GETTING the best gift ever from my step-mum, who was getting rid of some old crockery and wondered if I'd be interested. I was sceptical until I opened the box to find a perfect condition Meakin coffee set! The jug has already been repurposed into a vase for some early season tulips. Also, the most exciting post ever: a parcel of books from the Curtis Brown Book Group. I've already finished one and still have three to go... better get reading.

TRYING to keep my 2015 goal of swimming and walking more. I've not really managed the walking (apart from many miles of pavement pounded in York at the weekend) but I've been swimming twice a week for the past few weeks and am really enjoying it. It is playing havoc with my dyed red hair though, so any advice on keeping up both my hair colour and my swimming schedule would be gratefully received!

COOKING some exciting vegan meals (vegan fish and chips anyone?), the recipes of which we really need to get up onto The Hungry Vegan. But with T busy with exam marking and me in the midst of back-to-school chaos, it's not been easy finding the time to blog.

PACKING up my Blogger Snail Mail parcel (a few weeks late - oops!) to send to Kezzie. It's one of three swaps I'm doing at the moment, and it's been nice to continue the gift-buying and -making into January for a change.

DRINKING the addictively delicious Belvoir raspberry cordial with soda water.

EATING some amazing meals at Goji and El Piano in York - I can heartily recommend them both for veggie and vegan food.

MAKING many many zippered pouches. To my shame, I'd never sewn a zip until last week, so now I've figured out how (and realised how easy it is) I'm making all the pouches: purses, pencil cases, make-up bags. I sort-of-winged it and sort-of followed this tutorial from Martha Stewart. It's been nice to spend some time in the craft room and has reminded me how much I like making stuff.

BUYING yet more books: I found four books I'd been looking for, including a beautiful Penguin Classics edition of a Jeeves & Wooster novel, for the princely sum of £2 each from the local secondhand bookshop, and then I picked up a few more in York from the lovely Little Apple Books (with a Christmas book token so I haven't broken the spending ban, don't worry). I've otherwise been pretty good at not spending much, although my winter coat has just given up the ghost with both a broken zip and a huge rip in the arm, so I may need to splash the cash to replace it.

SEEING lots of friends for meals, which has been great fun if rather hard on the wallet. But January is so grim that I feel justified in spending some cash on catching up with mates for evenings of good food, a few drinks, and lots of laughter.

FEELING tired: very very tired. I'm almost completely better now - apart from trouble with my voice at work - but am still feeling like I could sleep 12 hours a night if I had the chance! Any evening not spent out with friends has been spent in my pyjamas, hibernating on the sofa and watching bad TV.

Some simple festive home updates

It's fair to say that I love the run-up to Christmas just as much as the day itself - possible more. The school carol service; the excitement of my pupils as we watch Shrek for the nth time; putting the final decorative touches to my home; baking up a storm; packing the car to visit family. 

Sadly, all of that fell by the wayside this week after I was taken down by severe bronchitis. Four days in bed and I'm only now able to sit up for longer than 15 minutes at a time. Luckily I'd already written my final festive post, about a few simple home updates I've put together this year. 

I am emphatically not one of those too-cool-for-Christmas people (true story - a couple of weeks ago The Boy came into the spare room to find me draped in ribbon, jingling my bells (not a euphemism) and giggling with happiness. He calls me 'Elf' when I get like this, after Will Ferrell's character in the eponymous film). Instead, the whole house undergoes a transformation. If there's a flat surface, I will cover it with fairy lights and greenery. Stand still for too long in December and I might just hang a bauble on you.

As a result, just putting up a tree and a wreath isn't enough for me: the whole house needs to be Christmasified, and preferably with stuff I've made or upcycled. A few years ago I whipped up gingham heart decorations; last year it was the turn of some needlework in the form of appliqued cushion covers and my 'Let It Snow' embroidery hoops; this year I decided to turn an old and unloved mirror into a festive blackboard.

All you'll need is an old mirror or picture frame. I used white paint (just some standard white emulsion I had in the shed) to give the silver frame a distressed, vintage look. Once that had dried, I applied a couple of coats of blackboard paint onto the mirror itself (if applying to a standard picture frame, I'd suggest removing the glass and painting the blackboard paint onto a piece of thick cardboard to sit inside the frame). Chalk pens made the slogan a doddle to write and, together with a jug full of eucalyptus branches, it makes for a very stylish display in our kitchen.

One of my bargain tips is to search out books of sheet music in charity shops. A couple of years ago I hit paydirt in Market Harborough Oxfam, picking up ten books of music that had seen better days together with a volume of Christmas Carols. The framed sheet music from Silent Night makes a simple but beautiful picture, and I also use sheet music to make gift tags, to wrap presents, and to make garlands to hang on the tree.

Do you have any favourite home updates at this time of year?

Made: Evergreen wreath

For me, nothing quite says 'Christmas' like bringing boughs of evergreens into the house. From pagan yule logs to modern wreaths, the custom of using holly, ivy and other evergreens to decorate the house in December is an ancient one that has lasted thousands of years. Wreaths made from fresh foliage can be crazily expensive to buy - understandable, as they're time-consuming to put together. But with a bit of foraging for free greenery plus an hour of patience and sore fingers, you can make a wreath that's just as beautiful as a store-bought one.

You will need:

A wreath base (usually made of moss over a wire ring - I found mine on eBay for less than £2)

Armfuls of greenery - at least two different kinds but the sky's the limit. I used cypress, holly, eucalyptus and hebe

Florists wire

Secateurs or strong scissors

3 metres ribbon

Assortment of decorations - I dried some orange slices and teamed them with foraged pine cones and some fake holly berries 

1. First, forage for your greenery. You don't need to live in the countryside for this: I picked up the pinecones from under a tree on a nearby industrial estate, the holly and eucalyptus were from my mum's Bradford back garden, the hebe from a shrub in my yard, and the cypress from a friend's garden. 

2. Soak your ring [snigger] in water before squeezing out any excess.

3. Your wreath will be made up of multiple bundles of greenery, each affixed to the base. If, like me, you're using 3 or 4 different types of foliage, gather a small piece of each type and pull together to form a bouquet. If using more, you could vary the contents of your bundles, aiming for 3 or 4 pieces of foliage in each.

4. Bend a length of wire to form a U-shape at one end, approx. 1 inch long. Place the U at the base of the bouquet (with the remaining wire pointing away from it) and then wind the wire around the bundle two or three times, to hold the bundle together securely. You should be left with about 15cm of wire still pointing away from the bouquet.

5. Push the long piece of wire through your base, bend and push back in again to secure. 

6. Repeat, laying each bundle of greenery so it points in the same direction and overlaps with the previous one, until the wreath base is covered.

7. At this point you may find some bundles need another piece of wire looped around and pushed into the base to ensure they're completely secure.

8. Again using wire, attach the decorations at intervals. 

9. Cut 2 metres from your ribbon and loop it through the inside of the wreath. Tie the remaining metre into a bow around the hanging ribbon, trimming the ends neatly.

10. Once it's hanging up you may need to trim some edges: I found my eucalyptus especially needed a bit of a prune.

11. Step back and admire your work! Wreaths made from fresh foliage will survive for about three to four weeks if hung outside in the cold. 

Made: MERRY & JOY Christmas cards

Being a massive Christmas obsessive, every year I pick up a few of the Christmas magazines from the supermarket to indulge myself, and it was in the Ideal Home Christmas* mag that I saw the image that would give me the idea for these cards. Their suggestion was to use air-drying clay to make personalised gift tags (I think they'd also make great place settings for a DIY wedding) but I had the idea to make them into cute hanging decorations to put onto the front of Christmas cards.

* I know, I really am rock & roll till I die, aren't I!

You will need:
- White air-drying clay (mine was from eBay)
- A flat surface, such as a glass chopping board or clean worktop
- Rolling pin
- Biscuit cutters
- Alphabet stamps (a lot of tutorials specify metal stamps, but I used standard rubber stamps from Paperchase and they were fine)
- A skewer or chopstick
- Very fine sandpaper
- Thin ribbon
- Washi tape
- Coloured card

1. Pull out a good handful of clay and knead for a minute or two. Roll out to approximately 4mm thick - too thin and the shapes will tear or warp when you stamp them. As you roll, keep lifting and flipping the clay or it will adhere to your work surface.

2. Use the biscuit cutters - I used two sizes of hearts and stars - to cut out your shapes. Remove excess clay and lift the shapes off the board again, to prevent sticking. I can't emphasise how important this is: not lifting regularly will leave you will lovely, neat shapes that are thoroughly stuck to your work surface!

3. Use a skewer or chopstick to make a hole towards the top of each shape. I found this easiest to do if I held the shape in one hand while pushing the chopstick through with the other.

4. Placing the shape onto the board again, use the stamps to spell out your message. I used MERRY for my larger shapes and JOY for my smaller ones. You could also personalise these by stamping the recipient's name.

5. Flatten out any slightly curled edges and leave to dry. This will take upwards of 48 hours.

6. Once completely dry and set, use the sandpaper to very gently remove the rough edges from your shapes.

7. Thread some pretty ribbon through the hole and use a small piece of craft or washi tape to affix to the back or inside of your folded card, leaving the decoration hanging over the top onto the front of the card. I used red card, because it's what I had to hand, but I think they'd look stunning hung with silver ribbon onto dark blue card.

Made: Personalised tote bag

It's safe to say that I adore anything personalised, and I recently had the notion to make some personalised tote bags as gifts for Christmas this year. I found a great deal on plain cotton bags on eBay, so they worked out at less than 80p apiece, and raided my fabric stash for small, colourful scraps, to make gifts that are not only pretty and personal, but thrifty too.

I can't say that this make was simple ('What I wish I'd realised' below), but even allowing for my panics and mess-ups (I had to unpick the first section a couple of times) it only took an hour from step 1. to completion.

You will need...

- A plain tote bag

- A letter template (I used Commerce SF in font size 700)

- A scrap of patterned fabric

- Iron-on interfacing

- Contrasting cotton thread

1. Using a hot iron, first iron your fabric flat and then affix the interfacing (shiny side facing up) to your fabric.

2. Pin the template to your reinforced fabric and cut round neatly using fabric scissors. 

3. Carefully pin the fabric letter to the front of your bag (not through the whole bag, as I initially did!). I used a measuring tape to ensure it was exactly centred.

4. Set your sewing machine to the correct setting - you want very tight stitches for the applique to look neat and tidy.

5. Placing the edge of your fabric in the middle of your presser foot, begin sewing slowly. You may, like me, panic that your fabric isn't moving. Don't worry! The tightness of the stitches means it moves through the machine very slowly.

6. Take extra care around corners. The straight lines are simple but I struggled with guiding the fabric neatly around curves and in the corners where two lines met. Remember: less speed more haste.

7. Once the sewing is finished, give the bag a final press with the iron to neaten it up. It will have been squashed and folded while sewing.

What I wish I'd realised...

- That maneuvering the bag around the needle - and ensuring I didn't sew it shut - was going to be a tough task. But persevere - it is possible. This could be solved by making your own bag in the first place, which is a longer - but not difficult - process. That way, you could sew the letter onto flat fabric before assembling the bag.
- That sewing curves was going to be such a bitch: I apologise now to whoever receives this one for Christmas as the bottom curve of the J is a hot mess. I think in future I'll stick to letters with entirely straight edges!

The best books for crafty girls (and guys)

There are a seemingly endless amount of books being published to cash-in on the ongoing trend for all things homemade, upcycled and hand crafted, and sometimes I feel like I own most of them. Despite rarely having the time to actually make anything, when I'm browsing in a bookshop I always seem to feel the need for just one more craft book. But which books are really worth the money? Here are five of my favourites...

Queen Of Crafts by Jazz Domino Holly

Subtitled, The Modern Girls' Guide to Knitting, Sewing, Quilting, Baking, Preserving & Kitchen Gardening, this is a great one-stop shop for beginners. The author is the daughter of tock royalty (Joe Strummer of The Clash) and she also founded the achingly hip Shoreditch Sisters branch of the WI, so this is very much a hip, rock & roll craft guide. Nevertheless I fell for the appealing layout and the fact it covers so many crafts. People with more experience may find it frustratingly basic, though.

Most inspiring make: How can you fail to fall for the donut and cake pin cushions, pictured above?

The Busy Girl's Guide To Sewing by Carrie Maclennan

A fantastic and beautifully presented introduction to sewing. I love how the projects are divided into how much time they'll take to make, and the chats with crafty women, professional makers, and bloggers are inspiring. There are beautiful photographs of each project and I found the instructions really simple to follow (not always the case with sewing instructions, which I am easily baffled by).

Most inspiring make: Either the patchwork pouffe, pictured, or the simple pleated skirt. Now if I could only learn how to sew in zips...

The Bust DIY Guide To Life by Laurie Henzel & Debbie Stoller

American feminist mag Bust has been running DIY and craft features since its inception in 1993. The DIY Guide To Life is an enormous collection of every project plus hints and tips for living. From a DIY on how to make a floating bookshelf, to a guide to unblocking a sink; a beginners how-to skateboard, to how to travel alone (including a project to make your own luggage tags), this guide has it all. 

Most inspiring project: So many, but my favourite is this awesome pants & vest set made from an old band tee.

Public Service Announcement: I've just found this for £4.99 on The Works website. Bargain!

Recraft by Sara Duchars & Sarah Marks

I picked up a copy of this from my local Oxfam in the sale, setting me back a whole £1.49, and I'm so glad I did because it's a treasure trove of ideas. Centred around the idea of upcycling and, well, recrafting from everyday items you can pick up secondhand or for free, the book has tons of creative and simple projects, from making toys out of old jumpers to fashioning a satchel out of a tweed jacket.

Most inspiring make: The homewares, pictured above, are probably my favourite projects due to their simplicity. 

Craftivism: The Art Of Craft & Activism ed. by Betsy Greer

Not a collection of craft projects, this one, but a series of interviews and essays with/by craftivists from around the world. Craftivism is the using of craft in activism, for example yarn bombing, AIDS quilts, or prison sewing projects. This is a truly inspirational book and will make you want to get your needles out and engage with craftivism locally. Greer also wrote the brilliant Knitting For Good, which I heartily recommend to any yarn fans out there.

Most inspiring make: All of them! But I particularly like these Suffragette banners.