How To Make A Springtime Table Runner

This easy-to-make springtime table runner will brighten up your table for Easter, or on any other Spring day for that matter. 

What you'll need:

Felt in various colours for the leaves and flowers

An oblong piece of felt in a pale colour for the runner

Embroidery thread in various colours
Buttons in various colours

A hot glue gun 

Step 1: Begin by drawing a leaf pattern on the green felt. Then cut out the leaves using a very sharp scissors to give them a neat edge. I used two shades of green.

Step 2: Using the green embroidery thread, sew a vein up the middle of each leaf, as shown in the photo below.

 Step 3: Draw petals on the coloured felt and cut them out. I used a star shaped cookie cutter as a template for the outer petals and the lid of a bottle as a template for the centre of the flower.

 Step 4: Assemble your flowers as shown in the photos below, placing a button in the centre of each. Sew each flower together using embroidery thread in a contrasting colour.

 Step 5: Lay the oblong strip of felt out flat and arrange the leaves and flowers on it in a pattern of your choice. You could bunch them all together in the centre, lay them in the form of a wreath or in a straight line down the centre of the runner. I chose to scatter mine about at random, leaving room to add dyed eggs as an additional decoration on Easter Sunday morning. 

Once you have decided on your arrangement, use a hot glue gun to fix the flowers in place. Alternatively, you can sew them into place. 

Then simply spread the runner along your dining table and admire your good work!

My Long-Awaited Kitchen Blackboard

Chalkboards are in, apparently.  I didn't really realise this. Since we moved into our house five years ago I have wanted to paint one on the kitchen wall. But The Bavarian wasn't so keen. I still bought the paint and I renovated two old blackboards, one for the kids and one to hang in the kitchen. But after all that, I still knew I really wanted a large space on the wall for shopping lists, etc. 

Did you figure out who is drawn here?
Darth Vader and Yoda

So I bought more paint and got to work on convincing The Bavarian. We recently removed the kitchen door and this exposed the awkward wallspace between the fridge and the doorframe. It was terribly marked from five years of life with small children. It needed a lick of paint, so why not use the blackboard paint?  He gave in, I got my brushes out. 

I'd been oogling 'kitchen chalkboards' on Pinterest and had a few ideas of what would suit our kitchen. (Blackboard seems to be the not so cool term these days but I can't get used to chalkboard, sorry). While a full-wall blackboard would look great around our doorframe, it would darken the kitchen too much.

Folge Fionnualas Pinnwand „A Blackboard Wall“ auf Pinterest.

In the end I settled on painting the wall from the skirting board up to the height of the fridge. The plan is to trick around a bit and add a slogan or banner with a chalk marker at the top, but I have yet to decide on it. For the moment, The Bavarian and the boys have been attacking my blackboard and leaving me little space for my own notes. But since the kitchen is the heart of our home, I'll let them away with it. For now. 

Usually I am very tempted to skip preparation and get straight to the painting, but after waiting for so long to get this project started , I wanted it to turn out well. Here is what I did:

1. I washed the wall with warm water to remove any dirt or greasy marks.

2. Using the spirit level and a pencil, I marked the size and shape of the blackboard onto the wall.

3. I used masking tape along the pencil lines as well as along the door frame and skirting board to ensure clear edges and unharmed woodwork.

4. There were a few small dents in the wall, so I filled these up with wall filler and a spatula and left it to dry overnight. 

5. The following day I applied the first coat of paint around lunchtime and a second coat just before going to bed. 

6. Getting up the next morning I was so excited about pulling off the tape and seeing the lovely clean lines of my blackboard. 

7. I read somewhere, while doing all my research, that before using a freshly-painted 'chalkboard', you should colour in the whole board lightly with white chalk and then take one of those magic eraser sponges (dry) and wipe the chalk off again to give it that chalky look. It is so much nicer than the stark black of the paint. I did it and it turned out really well. The poor Bavarian got a giving out to from me when he washed the whole board with water while I was out later that morning and put his own message on it.