A Tour De France inspired Tuesday Tutorial

Hello,

How are you all? Good weekend?

Mine was fabulous! Seriously good. It was my birthday on Friday and I spent the day with friends and family and getting spoilt and partying. But then on Saturday the Tour De France came to my hometown, Burley in Wharfedale and seeing as my Mum still lives there we went to stay for the weekend. Le weekend I should say! ;-)

The atmosphere was wonderful. I would say about 20,000 people turned out to watch. Everyone was excited and in a good mood. It started off rainy but then the sun shone and it turned into a gloriously hot weather day. I got sunburned but don't worry I am fine now, thanks to the magic of Sudocrem. You know the nappy rash stuff - works a treat on pink shoulders and cheekbones.

We saw the Red Arrows fly over and there were helicopters everywhere, some really low to the ground. The caravan of vehicles was fun, they were throwing some stuff out to the crowds. My son picked up a spotty hat and a funky drinks bottle and my aunty caught an inflatable Ibis pillow. I saw a lot of people get tea bags but I caught na-da. I liked the Police and Gendarmerie motorbikes.

Then the tour came through. I was so surprised as they all cycled within about 30cm of me. No barrier, and we felt the rush of the bikes as they whizzed past. It was exciting and never before have I been so close to any top athletes.

Then we headed back into the village for the party. It was brilliant. There was a food village and all the pubs and shops were open and busy. There were pop up cafes in lots of buildings and a live music festival in the park. We sat in the park enjoying some drinks and soaked up the sunshine and the buzzingness. I know that isn't a word but it should be!

Here are a few pictures. I didn't take any of the race as I wanted to watch it in person, not through my phone like everyone else, but you can google it or search on instagram and there are loads of great images. Btw people have been saying how surprised they were that so many Yorkshire folk turned out to see the tour - it was free and they are Yorkshire folk. Seriously I wasn't surprised at all.

 

Yes, that's Burley in Wharfedale's very own Eiffel Tower!  

It was Grand too!



Moving on to some tutorials. I don't have something of my own to show you today, so I'm doing a round up of some of the things I've found on the web, inspired by the colours of the TDF.

For the green jersey....
1. A Green Fairy paper project (not absinthe!). Tutorial here
2. A drawing tutorial using coloured pencils to draw a green apple - here
3. A simple colour mixing tutorial is here

For the Yellow jersey...
1. A tutorial about how to stop your photos looking too yellow - digital cameras only, here
2. Why not paint your front door yellow? Tutorial here
3. Another blogger here does Tuesday Tutorials too and here is one on creating damask backgrounds for paper projects - this one uses quite a few American products and isn't that easy to follow unless you have a fully stocked craft room to hand, but us fellow Tuesday Tutoriallers (again not a word I know) need to stick together!

For the White jersey...
1. A beautiful ribbon flower tutorial is here
2. An embroidered heart tutorial
3. Why not crochet a rug? Tutorial here I really like the look of this one but I'm too practical to make it in white.

Finally, in honour of the King of the Mountains, the Red Polka Dot Jersey...
1. For the better sewers amongst us, why not try this lovely spotty red dress, tutorial here
2. For an easier sewing project, here is a scrappy heart garland tutorial
3. Or a felt mushroom? Tutorial here

I know the Yellow jersey is the one every one wants but I think I'd prefer to be called the King of the mountains, it's just a better title, non?


Merci beaucoup for reading,




Kirsty