Tuesday 15 March 2016

For the love of crafting!

February whizzed past and I kept thinking I'll just finish these few jobs and write my blog post tomorrow and as you can tell tomorrow never came.  However February has been full of crafting opportunities for me so I have lots to share with you.

Word of the month - March = Spring
Our monthly family drop in session on the first Saturday in the month at church goes from strength to strength.  February we used God's love for us as the theme and the crafts on offer were:
  • A Love print made from finger painting spots over the page, masking off the word LOVE to leave a white space.
  • A heart arrow, using the glue gun, which caused great excitement, to stick a heart abnd a feather to each end of a straw.
  • A sun-catcher heart with words from Romans 5:8 written around the outside.
  • A paper aeroplane to colour in.
  • A hanging heart decoration made from 3 double sided (or 6 single sided) hearts stapled together.


Valentines day was during half term, so made small gifts for the boys and included Jacob's in his packing for his skiing trip to Switzerland.  The mouse shape was created from a heart folded in two and tail is a lolly pop.

A mouse for Valentine's day
During half term we had our film and craft morning at church and had over 100 people attend.  We made note holders with pompoms stuck on a peg and trees from hand prints and hand plants growing out of a plant pot (not shown).

Half term crafting
I also kept up with my Christmas card making and added some more to my stash, ready for writing later in the year. I loved the vintage images I picked up in a sale pack form The Range.

Christmas Cards -Rudolph Day jobs
First Saturday in March fell as the day before Mothering Sunday, so the them for Craft at drop in was Mother's.  The crafts included the handprint tree for those who hadn't made one in half term, a teapot gift bag containing two teabags (so Mum could have tea for two!) and two gorgeous animal pictures showing mummies and babies, put together using paper piecing from templates.

Mothering Sunday crafts
For a Mothering Sunday gift I had a quiet house all to myself while the family were elsewhere.  Josh went to Norway for the weekend with friends and to meet up with the family and scout he spent the summer with.  Andy and Jacob managed to get themselves on tele while watching Andy Murray in the Davis Cup (well I saw them as I knew where they were sitting!).  So I took the time to make some cards for my Mum, one for Mothering Sunday (as wasn't seeing her until the Monday) and her birthday card, which is later this month.  Safe in the knowledge that she doesn't use the computer I've included them below (normally I wait until an event so as not to spoil the surprise!).  Don't tell her but these came from another pack I found on sale in The Range.

Mothering Sunday cards

I'll update you on choose a university for Josh and how the Spring Cleaning challenge is going in upcoming posts.

The Bible verse for this week is reminder that through Christ, who died for us, that healing comes.  For us as Church this is quite timely as we are finding out about the Healing on the Streets movement.  It also reminds me of the healing I received at last year's Spring Harvest event for my painful shoulder, which although very occasionally still hurts, it not nearly as painful or frequent as it was.  Actually when the pain returns it often reminds me that I am trying to rely on my own strength and not God's, who has provided my healing. 

then know this, you and all the people of Israel: 
It is by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, 
whom you crucified but whom God raised from the dead, 
that this man stands before you healed. 
Salvation is found in no one else, 
for there is no other name under heaven 
given to mankind by which we must be saved.”

Our prayer as a family this week continues to be for all those displaced by war or famine, who find themselves in a foreign country just trying to survive.  We pray that our country and other around us will reach out in love and accept these people, while working to make their homelands a safe place for them to return to in the future.  

We have only just celebrated Christmas, when we remember that Christ was not born at home but in a town far from his parent's home and in a stable, who then fled to a foreign land as a refugee.  Our faith is based on this history, can we so easily forget this when the inconvenience to our lives comes knocking on the door.

With God's blessings from my family to yours,

Jo x