Create a gradient slinky in Illustrator
Author: Irish Bees Don't Do Mondays
A blog for me, about the things I like. After Effects, Procreate, Illustrator, Photoshop, Drawing, Painting, Paper Cutting, Sewing, Embroidering, up-cycling old furniture. Whatever grabs me in the moment/
Moving anchor points simultaneously in Illustrator
Overlay text with gold foil effect
Create seamless patterns with Photoshop and Illustrator (CS5)
*Reposting from original blog The Singing Tree*
Create a wirework effect with Photoshop and Illustrator (CS5)
Use the Width Tool in Illustrator (CS5)
* The Width Tool was a relatively new addition to Illustrator CS5 when this tutorial was originally posted on my old blog, The Singing Tree.*
The Width Tool is easy to use and a very handy little widget. I used it to make some tapering shapes with curls on the end – see below. They look like a set of Victorian surgical accessories but they have their own charm.
They make for wonderfully squirly-shaped elements! 🙂
Make a jewel in Photoshop
Jewels are easy to create in Photoshop – follow the tutorial to create your own.
Make fun swatch patterns in Illustrator
Make patterned swatches for a simple and fun way to fill empty objects. Once you have created a swatch you can use it to fill any shape you like.
Peanut Butter and Raspberry Goo Cupcakes
Made a batch of Jemma Cupcake’s PB & J cupcakes and they turned out lovely.
No raspberry goo drizzled over the top but there is a secret, sweet jammy centre. Apple corers are perfect for taking out neat holes from the cupcakes for filling with a nice blob of sweet raspberry goo.
The icing nozzle is a large open star, twisted one way then the other as I piped giving them a sort of fossil top.
10 simple things we can do to help the bees
The destruction of green space or chemically rendering those spaces barren, devoid of flowers, is taking its toll on bee colonies around the world.
” Earth provides enough to satisfy every man’s needs, but not every man’s greed.” Mahatma Ghandi
We can all do something and the help they need is pretty simple.
- Don’t use pesticides or chemical weed killer. These are wiping out thousands of bees every year.
- If you have lawn flowers like daisies or clover, let them flower before mowing the lawn. Bees love them and isn’t a meadow garden pretty before it gets too tall and straggly?
- Buy local, raw honey. Raw honey is becoming more readily available from farmers’ markets than ever. This is great for your own health, too, as it won’t have been treated with chemicals.
- Plant flowers in groupings. Bees like to focus on one family of flowers at a time. Leave an area of the garden to grow a bit wild. There are ground-nesting bees, like Mason bees, that will use it for their homes.
- Plan your garden so that you have something in flower all year round. but avoid hybrid flowers that are often sterile and have no pollen.
- Plant a tree. Tree blossom is a useful source of pollen, too.
- Make them a little rock pool bath. Get a small dish, fill it with water and add lots of stepping stone pebbles. The bees will be delighted to take a break and have a refreshing drink of water before flying off to carry on their foraging and gathering duties.
- Get kids interested. Remember that great quote that nobody seems to know who to attribute it to? ‘We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors; we borrow it from our children’. Teach children to love their world and respect all life upon it.
- Put up bee hotels on a south-facing wall. Garden centres now stock them regularly.
- Sponsor a bee! 🙂 Join a wildlife trust that supports bees, eg, https://iwt.ie/people-for-bees/ or https://pollinators.ie/. There are many organisations around the world all taking up the challenge of saving our bee colonies.
I love to see the garden full of colour and buzz with the sound of happy bees going about their day.
Help the bees. Bee happy 🙂
No More Mondays 