I visited London last week and decided I'd use Airbnb instead of a hotel.  I've used Airbnb before when renting the entire apartment, but never a room.  I decided to take the plunge and force myself to be more sociable, something I've been conscious I need to work on lately.  Anyway, it wasn't anything like work, I thoroughly enjoyed myself and met a kindred spirit in my host Richard.  Indeed, when he told me about the Tom Dixon designer sample sale, I asked to tag along and we had such a laugh.

I got a little message from Richard after he'd seen my recent post about my kitchen refurb.  He was inspired to get crafty himself, so made over some Ikea drawers with marble contact paper. 

Next Saturday I've arranged a craft day at my place for Lorna's lovely mum-in-law Babs and her pal Ros.  Bab's in a champion knitter and lover of all things crafty, so we figured it would be really fun to have a wee day showing each other hints and tips and making things whilst we natter over tea and biccies.

I'm also meeting up with an arty pal whilst I'm on holiday in America and once I'm home, I've booked in another day with Lorna's wee cuz Ava to make her fabulous sparkly things, most likely involving unicorns!

I'll make sure to take some pics and will update the post.

I gave up my jeweller's bench a while back and whilst it's lovely to craft at home I think inserting a bit of sociability into crafting and making is always good.  Sharing ideas, top purchases and getting and giving troubleshooting help makes things so much more fun.  I'm a member of a few facebook groups and really appreciate all the help and belly laughs there too.  If you are in the UK and have a Silhouette, check out Silhouette Cameo Crafters Support U.K.  I tend to favour the UK ones as the products and shops are available, but the mainly American Silhouette CAMEO Project Inspiration is worth joining too - it's very active.

So folks, get collaborating, share any crafty projects you've been doing on my Facebook page, I'd love to see all the awesome stuff you're making! Nadine x

In my recent Kitchen Refurb project, I used my Silhouette Cameo cutting machine to make some large scale stencils and today I'll share the two techniques that I used.  For the splashback, I pieced together 6 a4 sticker sheets and used registration shapes to align them, whereas for my cocktail cabinet upcycle, I cut long continuous lengths of vinyl from a roll.

For the splashback, I wanted a gentle stencil material that wouldn't damage or lift my dark grey paint.  I decided to use my favourite metallic sticker paper from Poundland (£1 for 8 sheets).  The only problem is that these stickers are A4 in size, so I needed 6 sheets to make up the stencil.  To make sure that I was aligning my sheets exactly, I cut little squares along the sides which formed registration marks.  Once I piece the 6 sheets into one, I covered over the squares

I'm a big fan of the Whatcha Working On blog and Eff recently did a tutorial on large wall decals.  She used the same registration idea as I did, but used stars instead of squares (any shape with corners is fine).  In the wall decal tutorial, the stars are used to align then removed, in much the same way as I uses the squares to combine the sheets before then covering them.  Check out Eff's guide on How to Divide a Large Wall Decal in Silhouette Studio - the principles are exactly the same for a stencil.

My cocktail cabinet is quite narrow, so I didn't need to piece together separate stencils, but at 90cm high, it's much longer than even my biggest 12 by 24 inch mat.  I therefore decided to cut my stencil without a mat, directly from the roll.  I normally cut everything from a mat, even vinyl despite the fact it has a backing sheet so doesn't strictly need it. 

TOP TIP 1: Ensure the top of your vinyl is cut crisply and is as straight as possible

Cutting without a mat works just fine, but it's very important to load it straight.  If your vinyl doesn't have a nice clean edge it may load wonkily or not at all.  Similarly, if not cut square, you'll find the vinyl will eventually slope off it's rollers.  The back of your vinyl will likely have a grid to keep you right and I recommend using a rotary cutter if you have one. 

TOP TIP 2: Position Clear of Obstructions
I placed my Silhouette Cameo on the floor, making sure there were no obstructions

TOP TIP 3: Use Arrow Keys to Test Feeding
I used the arrow keys on the machine to feed the vinyl through and test that the vinyl would load through for long lengths without any issue.  I was tempted to buy the roll feeder, but decided I wouldn't use it enough to merit the outlay (and storage!).

For more tip's check out How to cut without a mat on your Silhouette

Oh how I yearn for a garage!  Unfortunately adding a garage to a lovely apartment in Edinburgh's city centre comes at an eye watering price, so I've come up with a slightly barmy idea that works for me!  I bought a deluxe aqua dome tent which is really quite big at over 2m tall and 1.65m square.  It's ample size for the furniture I need to paint and I don't have to worry about fumes as the paint I use (General Finishes) is non-toxic and has no odour.  My colleague thought I'd be a disaster trying to put it up, even asking me to Facebook Live it!  I defied his mockery though and was quite happy that it was up within 30 minutes.

I'd never want to make out that all my crafting projects go to plan.  Normally there's always something that goes awry!  On the splashback, I got some bleeding.  Now normally the sticker paper is perfect, giving very crisp results, but the force of the HVLP sprayer must have been just a bit much for it.  I just tided up with an artist's paintbrush.  On the cabinet, I originally tried the wet application method, but it was a disaster, I couldn't get the vinyl to stick to the cabinet and the transfer tape wouldn't come off the vinyl either!

A while back, I contacted Baillie Signs asking if they had any offcuts of vinyl.  They generously gave me a few big rolls!  Whilst not the colour I'd use to directly decorate items with, they work perfectly for stencils.  Many crafter pals I know have struck up friendships with their local sign makers.  It might be a handy way to buy smaller quantities instead of ordering online and if they are happy for you make pretty things from what would otherwise be waste, I think everyone wins :)

After a long hiatus, I'm glad to share with you my kitchen makeover - dark grey and Orla Kiely themed!  Whilst my kitchen before wasn't terrible, I really disliked the mix match of wood colours and it wasn't my style.  I had actually picked a new kitchen (acrylic gloss) with a  U-shaped layout, but decided to cancel the order when I separated from my partner last year.  The total cost of this project including all the Orla Kiely accessories was under £1000 and I'm surper pleased with the results.

I'd seen upcycle projects using my favourite General Finishes Milk Paint on Pinterest and thought it might be a fun project to try.  I originally thought I'd go with the paler Seagull or Driftwood, but I kept being drawn to projects that used the darkest Queenstown Gray, so decided to be brave.  I used the High Performance Flat Topcoat.  The worktops were sanded back and stained with GF wood stain in Walnut.  For the walls, I used Johnstone's who colour matched to Farrow and Ball Ammonite

As you can see from the above photo, I have 12 cupboard doors of varying size and 6 drawers. I boxed in some pipes with MDF and painted that along with a freestanding shelving unit. There were also the kickboards, cupboard sides, wall shelves and backsplash, not to mention random stuff like my doggie door stop and even some picture mounts! I opted for 1 large (gallon size) tin of the milk paint and 2 of the top coat. I painted 2 -3 coats of milk paint on both sides and 3-4 coats of topcoat. I opted for the smallest tin of wood stain for the worktop. The total price for all the paints, topcoats and stains was £241.

I wanted a perfect finish, so decided to abandon trusty foam brushes and set about researching a paint sprayer.  Bamboozled by options, I spoke to the helpful guy at General Finishes Edinburgh who said a HVLP (high volume low pressure) sprayer would be best.  I was set to hire one from Glasgow, but managed to get a bargain on EBay for £107.

OK, so I did go a bit overboard with the whole prep thing!  Life would have been infinitely easier with a garage, but alas, I don't have one *sigh*.  I needed to fully protect the floor and window area and spray inside the room.  I got the dust sheets, overalls, mask and floor protector  all from Screwfix.  When a friend told me that the orange mask filter looked like a massive tongue that photo gets even more ridiculous!!  I ended up ditching the overalls, the sprayer really wasn't that messy.  The floor protector however is really an excellent product, I ended up hoovering and mopping it and it was very durable but peeled back without damaging the floor or leaving residue.

I did quite a full coverage on some of the first coats, but then decided that it would be better to layer up the colour more gradually.  I had a scrap of cardboard about 60cm by 30cm that turned out to be very handy when blocking any overspray, as this was the size of my full and half sized cupboards/drawers.

I started the project over the Easter weekend and thought I'd prep the room Friday, paint on Saturday and Sunday and be finished and relaxing on Monday.  Pah-hah-hah, what wishful thinking! I was still doing topcoats each night after work and then when I got a horrible lurgy-flu it was just grims-ville trying to paint whilst coughing and spluttering into a mask. I'm glad I painted the fronts and backs, but it certainly added more than double to the time as each side had to be completely dry before I could flip and paint the next layer. 

In a distressed call to my close pals, they wisely told me to get some help in for the final push.  My lovely Polish decorator Gregor and his friend Paul came to my rescue.  The lads boxed in an ugly pipe left by nightmare plumbers, did the emulsion and sanded and stained the worktop along with other jobs around the flat.  I was honestly am so indebted to them for all their hard work and for rescuing me from my mini meltdown!

I love the Poundland metallic sticker paper for stencils. It cuts well with the Silhouette and has a washi-tape like stickiness, never taking off even the most delicate of paint finishes. This time though, the force of the Earlex sprayer meant there was a little bleeding. No biggie, I just tidied up with an artists' paintbrush, but a repositionable vinyl may have been better in this instance.

One of my major bug bears of the kitchen is the tall cabinet in the middle of the wall.  It splits the kitchen in two, reducing worktop space and would have been much better at either end.  I therefore ordered bespoke hob covers from Hob Covers Direct for just shy of £100.  I was very impressed - the technical drawings came back same day (Sunday) and the covers were with me a few days later.  They do scratch easily, but overall have been a lifesaver for giving me much more worktop space.  They lift up when cooking and so have the benefit of also shielding the splashback from splashes and splatters.

I made the window seat myself but ordered the blind from Lilac Tree, who I was very pleased with. I ordered the foam cut to size from efoam and opted for the dacron wrap with stockinette, so the total came to £48. I actually had issues with my first attempt - the continuous zip kept splitting and I didn't like how the seams on the side panel looked. So I managed to reuse the fabric for the bases of the shelf boxes and started again. This time I wrapped a continuous length of fabric around the cushion and just boxed panels at the angled sides. This time I used thick width velcro instead of a zip. I used the exact dimensions of the foam width and depth for the fabric. The only change I made was to use a cushion thickness of 10.5cm in my calculations rather than the actual thickness of 12cm to give a nice and full plumpness.

I didn't intend on this post being quite so long, sorry!!  I'll come back and talk about the large stencils I cut with my Silhouette machine for the cocktail cabinet upcycle project and also the backsplash in my next post.  Until then here is a slide show of before and afters.