I stole the title of this post from my good friend, Lyndsay, who has an amazing blog of all the crafty things she creates (mostly crochet). I am hoping that she won't mind my plagiarism since I have endorsed her blog and hopefully she will get more footfall there and at her Etsy store. :) You can go visit her at: http://whowantstobemarthawhenicanbeme.blogspot.co.uk/
I would not class myself as a super-crafty person. I enjoy making things but it takes me ages to finish projects and I have to stick to the pattern otherwise disaster can and will strike (I have a half-made baby bootie to attest to this truth). I would consider myself a stubborn person, though. When an idea takes hold, I need to do it, get it, etc. So when I wanted a 3-tiered cake stand made from vintage china and the lady who makes and sells them went AWOL, I decided I was going to have to make one myself. It wasn't a hard sell, since it a) meant I would get to have a stand made from exclusively blue-and-white china (my fav!), and that b) I wold have to rummage around the car boot sale and thrift shops to procure said china. So after a month or two of hunting (and acquiring some pieces to keep in my cupboard sans holes) I was ready to get cracking (or hopefully not).
With the emotional support of my friend Megan, and with access to her hand-drill (and her help with the drilling when my arms gave out!) I was able to create my perfect cake stand.
To get started you will need a hand-drill with drill bits suitable from drilling through ceramic (£2.49 for the drill bits on Amazon), and the hardware for supporting your plates (£4.00 on Amazon).
After that comes the fun bit! (Get it, bit? You're using drill bits? I crack myself up.) Using whatever pottery you like, you get to make your very own original design. You can mix different shapes of plates or do the top tier as a bowl, or tea cup and saucer, whatever you fancy! I found that the more 'real' the pottery was, the easier it was to drill through. My knock-off Royal Copenhagen took ages to drill through, whereas my very real almost-killed-me-to-drill-through-it piece of Staffordshire pottery was a dream to get through.
 |
| You need to figure out the centre of your plate. A piece of paper can be useful for this step since the bottom ridge of the plate can be traced out, and the paper folded to find the middle. |
 |
| Then you get to drill all your holes. Be warned. This can take hours. Go to a friend's house and have a cup of tea and a chat to make the time pass by more pleasantly. :) |
 | ||
| Once you have holes in all your places, you can assemble your stand. |
 |
| One.... |
 |
| Two... |
 |
| Three! |
For about £10 (less than half of what it would have cost me if I had bought this from someone else) I got to have the fun of learning a new skill and hunting down my perfect plates (50 pence - £2). Now I just need to have a get-together worthy of finger sandwiches to christen the stand. :)
