Recycled tin shrines

I am playing with the idea of using recycled tins to make mini shrines. My first mini shrine is from a sardine tin. It’s the perfect shape.

Sardine tin shrine

You will need

Cleaned out sardine tin.

Gesso

Household emulsion

Glitter glue(optional)

Mini paper flowers with wired stems (I used 16)

Religious icon, puffy sticker, I got mine from Poundland a couple of years ago (you could used a printed image instead.)

Mini Pom Pom trim.

Glue gun

Method

Paint the inside of tin with two coats of gesso to help the paint stick.

Paint 3 coats of emulsion letting it dry thoroughly between layers.

Paint with a layer of glitter glue.

Stick image in bottom of tin.

Twist the flowers together in a small oval, with glue gun, stick flowers around inside edge.

Stick Pom Pom trim around edges.

You could glue craft felt on the back and sides but I like the kitchness of the tin.

I am now looking at my tins in a different way. My next shrine is in a lid from a pickle jar!

                          Flowers twisted into a wreath

 Pom Pom trim and braids.

Finished mini shrine, who would have thought this was from a lid off a jar of pickle!

Vegan needle felting 3

It’s been all about the vegan needle felted flowers recently, It started with making a sunflower 🌻 which took forever as there were so many individual petals. I then ironed them (tentively as I thought the acrylic fibre might melt) It didn’t ,it just turned into a flatter denser felt...result!! The middle was a massive pile of fibres which I felted down so it was smooth but still spongy. I then made another one with different tones of yellow in it.

The next flower was a poppy where I also ironed the petals this made them lovely and flat and dense, usually acrylic fibre is kind of fuzzy like stuffing Trouble is ironing the felt made it difficult to give it any shape so I made a cup of fibre underneath to give me something to push against whilst shaping the petals. I made the poppy with 5 petals underneath and 4 on top, few more than a real poppy but looks lusher. I used eyelash yarn to make the stamen’s which I hand sewed onto the centre of the flower.

The next flower was an experiment mixing colours on the petals to give an ombré effect

Today I finished making a multicoloured Zinnia, so many petals! Was worried it would be too flat if ironed the petals so this flower shows how “pouffy” the acrylic fibre is. Some of the colours I mixed myself using two dog slicker brushes to comb two colours together. Pretty pleased how the colours turned out.  

  

Vegan needle felting 2

Hi it's been a long time since I posted. And I've been busy needle felting. Not with bamboo fibres which make hard mean 3D items but with a new fibre called Aclaine from Japan. A company called Hamanaka is producing the 100% acrylics fibre for felting which means it is vegan!!!
http://hamanaka-jp-crafts.com/items/feltwool/aclaine.html

I get mine from an etsy shop called SweetPeaDolls, they are super helpful, they are what's called Embassadors for Aclaine fibre which basically means they sell it in England.

https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/SweetPeaDolls?ref=l2-shop-header-avatar
It comes in a wide range of colours, mainly pretty pastels and fresh bright colours. It felts really well to itself and makes delightfully spongy soft items. It is not so good for thin detail such as stems as the fibres seem short and it retains a lot of air not unlike wadding. I am currently experimenting with it to see what it can do and have made a few flowers, a hamster and some bird brooches.

,

The roses were made by creating a sheet of felt first by laying it over a sponge and needling it with the clover 5 needle tool, when doing this it is important to lift the felt frequently so it doesn't stick to the foam. This sheet was then cut into two base pieces per flower and a wavy long strip which I coiled and attached from the middle outwards. This technique came from a lovely new book called Felting fabulous flowers which I got from Amazon. The pansys were also from this book.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/1909397393/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Hand sewn jewel

This is the hand sewn jewel using sewn on gems and surrounded by beads sewn on sideways after realising they look so much more effective that way round. I have cut it off the enbroidey hoop and left tabs which i turned under and sewed together as the back. Using the same long thread i sewed the jewel onto the top of one of my shrines.

i think it looks really effective!

Felt shrine with hand sewn jewel and other embellishments.