Author: Clare at CatsEatDogs

Pom Pom ghost

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Halloween meets pom poms and out pops a ghost! I had the bright idea of making a ghost using pom poms this morning, so I did! Want to make your own pom pom ghostie friend? Easy peasy. You need to make two pom poms the same size. When you have two pom poms, sew them together using the same wool. Then the fun part, you get to play ghost hair stylist. Trim trim trim away to get a ghosty ghost shape. Final touch is adding the eyes. Choose two buttons and sew them where you want the eyes. Add a length of wool to hang him and you are all done. Now you can make lots of ghosts and make a spooky garland or fill a glass vase with ghosts or just run around scaring people with them.

Weekly Photos October 7 2013

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I am joining Emily at The Beetle Shack starting this week and posting a little collection of photos taken over the previous week. 1.  Bodhi decorating the porch now it is October and we have dragged out the Halloween decos. 2.  We found a toad in the woods who sat bravely while I stuck my phone in his face. 3.  Little white mushrooms in a row. 4.  Field of corn at the pumpkin patch. 5.  Corn sacks for sliding speed. 6.  Spooky owl. 7.  Bodhi conquers the hay pyramid. 8.  Giant pumpkin. That was last week, I am looking forward to the cooler weather predicted for this week and getting some lovely pictures.

New look for CatsEatDogs

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I sat myself down last week to find a font I could use for all of my CatsEatDogs banners and profiles.  I like to look at typography, but I am no expert and rarely does one jump out yelling ‘pick me’! My trawl did not go unrewarded as I found a lovely new font and I have changed my Etsy banner and my Facebook page and my lovely blog too. Now, I need you to be impressed because I managed it all on the dreaded Photoshop which I am worse than horrible at.  I was so proud of myself I even made a new personal Facebook cover, look –   Not bad! In keeping with my new font love, I made some new lovely jewelry and here are some photos with my new fancy type. I am happy with my new ‘look’ and I feel much better now that my typography is going to be consistent.   Photoshop is a little less scary too. Don’t you just love to learn new stuff then feel all …

Photo filters and apps for Halloween

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October is here and apparently so is Halloween fever!  My youngest fetched up our bag of Halloween decos gathered mainly from November sales, so it has taken us a few years to gather a spider or three. I did like that he squished a pair of skelly-bob gloves behind a drain pipe, to rather good effect I think!  So I took a snap and then I added a few (too many) finishes and got a spooky photo as a reward! For this shot, I used Snapseed and cropped and added a ‘grunge’ finish and a texture and a creepy frame.   Spooky huh? I started with this – After this one, I had to do the spider too!  An innocent giant spider chomping on a glow in the dark skelly, add a few photo finishes and creepy spider with a swarm to help him…. For this one, I started in Camera+ , cropped and added the ‘Dreamstate’ filter, then on top of that I used the ‘Pinhole’ filter.   I messed with the intensity to get …

September 2013 photo a day

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It’s nearly nearly nearly October which surely means we are all gathering pumpkins and making apple pies with freshly picked apples.  You know, with the apples you picked at the apple orchard and ended up with a quadrillion pounds even though you told everyone to only pick a few! I haven’t been apple picking yet, but I am sure we will and I am also sure we will bring home the required quadrillion pounds of apples! In the meantime, September whizzed by and brought us a few cool mornings and plenty of afternoon sunshine and here are the photos I took this month.  I have been playing with Flipagram too, so the photos are also all on Instagram zipping past your eyes in the new video format.  I am @catseatdogsmakes on Instagram, go and see what you think. Day 1. Together Day 2. My name begins with. Day 3. Lines Day 4. Alone.  Had I eaten the rest?  Or was this one the only rice krispie treat which wouldn’t fit in the box? Day 5. …

Favorite instagrammers

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Do you Instagram?  Who do you follow?  Family?  Friends?  Big corporates?  Small businesses? Celebs? I have used Instagram for about a year and a bit now and to start with there was the option to share or not, so I used it more as a filters app and not a social media app.  Now, of course it is all sharing and all social media which is fine, I just use other filter apps and think about what I want to share with anyone who cares to take a look. About that anyone can take a look thing.  How do you feel about that?  Are you careful to watermark so your photos can’t be reused?  I am not, but then I am no top photographer, so I am not too worried.  I follow @davidloftus and he interestingly doesn’t watermark his photos and he is a top photographer.  I think watermarks are only useful when they are slapped right across the middle and that completely ruins the whole point of putting a photo up in the first …

Pumpkin Spice M&M Peanut butter cookies

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I make this basic Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies all the time, so it is the recipe I went to when I wanted to make some Autumn-y cookies with the new M&M flavour ‘Pumpkin Spice’.  I intended to add cinnamon too, but I forgot, so you will have to make them and tell me if cinnamon works or if it is too much.  I must admit I don’t usually like the new crazy seasonal flavours in chocolates and sweets.  These are ok though and make good cookies!  I am not sure why the M&M guy on the front looks so sad. Peanut Butter, Pumpkin Spice M&M and cinnamon cookies                                                                                        Adapted from the recipe in ‘Relaxed Cooking by Curtis Stone’ 1 cup all purpose flour 1/2 teaspoon baking soda 1 teaspoon cinnamon 1 …

Free motion machine embroidery

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This week is ‘Selfish Sewing’ week thanks to Made with Moxie and Imagine Gnats and I promised myself I would embrace it.  One hour a day at the machine, not much to ask of myself, especially as I want to make more fabric lovelies like scarves and bags. Today’s project was my very first go at machine embroidery.  Presser foot off the machine and feeder teeth gone.   Just me and a sewing needle. I did a quick sketch of a tea cup and found instructions in my sewing machine’s manual.  The fabric went into my embroidery hoop and off I went. All of my sewing experience and knowledge was to be ignored and my sewing mind had to expand to welcome this new and strange technique. Drawing with my machine needle became easier as I practiced and practiced.  It is super weird to be able to move the fabric so freely, forwards, backwards, around corners with no stopping and starting to keep the fabric where I need it. My trust was in the embroidery hoop …