April Craft Day...

L-r: Linda P, Me, Sara, Adrienne and Marie

Our monthly craft day was this past Saturday. We had a fun project using vintage doilies to make cute sheep. As always, each participant's personality showed through.

My Project

My piece is symbolic for Jesus as the shepherd in the story of the shepherd who left his flock to find the lone, lost sheep. 

Marie brought a crafting paper book with hymns on them. I was singing each of them in my head as I paged through to find the perfect one for my theme. It became the base of my piece. 

The butterfly symbolizes God/Jesus and the shepherd, so when I added the heart to my sheep, I used the material from one of the extra butterflies to create the heart. My final touch was the tag that says, "He left the many to save the one."

Once I completed mine, I knew it would be my Mother's Day gift to my mum. I had plans to stop at her and my stepdad's before I went home from Portage, so I asked her if she want her gift early, or if she wanted to wait. Of course, she wanted it early. 

She loved it, and before I left, she'd put it on the wall. She liked the symbolism, too, when I explained it to her. In fact, just as I had, she started singing the hymn (out loud) when she saw it. My gift this year was a home run!

It's another busy week. Bread day today, work tomorrow, classmate dinner (already) on Wednesday, lunch with Mom Grace's daughter (Sis Deb), and work again on Friday. 

In between, I'll be making this month's artist trading cards, and adding more items to my shop. Like I said, it's going to be a busy week. See you tomorrow.

Weekend Stitching...

My weekend began on Friday, stitching this pendant for a customer. I'll make another soon for my shop to replace this sold one. The new owner already has and is wearing this one.

I added the bee charm to the bottle I created on Saturday, so I took a few photos, including showing it lit up with my fairy lights. The little charm is on the neck of the bottle and has crystal wings for a bit of sparkle. 

I'm not sure why the lights cause a blue cast (in spite of my trying to edit that out), because it doesn't read that way at all "in person". It just has a soft white glow, which is much preferred to this blue cast!

At any rate, now it's completely finished and I can enjoy lighting it up for a while at night to enjoy.

After our Saturday craft session, I came home and contemplated how I wanted to make my Corgi brooch sparkle. This is where I stopped at the end of my session. I moved the nose bead down a bit, added a beautiful opal thread - couched in a brick pattern - and will do the feet next. 

After the feet are done, I'll start adding the chipping for the rest of his body. As always, I keep the first one, which is good. I'm my own worst critic, so I see where I could have done better on the white "ruff". I know I'll perfect the second one, knowing ahead of time how I'll put it together, having already done it here.

Yesterday was spent canning. I'll share photos of that tomorrow. I'm working today, so I'd better get organized so I get there with time to spare. See you tomorrow!

April Craft Day...

Last Saturday was our monthly craft day, and we decoupaged and decorated bottles this month. We were asked to bring empty wine bottles, but as I had none and wasn't willing to buy and empty one on short notice (a week), I reserved an extra empty the ladies had brought from yard sales they'd attended.

Half of the ladies chose to paint their bottles first, and then decorate them, but my bottle was so interesting in its own right that I didn't want to hide that under paint. I love how each of their bottles turned out, and the wonderful thing about our group is that we're all so supportive of each other. No competitions here. Just love and admiration.

This is my bottle. I was so taken with the shape. Isn't it interesting? I wondered whether it was a decanter of some sort in its prior life, or just a pretty bottle. Either way, I went with a floral/bee theme. I have a bee charm I'm going to add to the neck, but I haven't done it yet.

I'm going to add a string of battery-operated fairy lights with a plastic stopper with an on/off switch. I'll use that to light up my bottle at night just for fun.

Marie also showed us how to make ribbon brooches. The finished product is beautiful, but getting it there was murder on my hands. Wrap. Secure. Cut. Trim. Floof. Embellish. If you're interested, I'd be happy to show you how they're made in a future post. Just let me know in the comments.

Here's a little closer look at the details on my bottle. I'll add the bee today (now that I've reminded myself) and take one more photo that I'll share along with my other weekend projects when we visit tomorrow.

It's already Monday again. I hope you have a wonderful week, and that you make time for something creative this week. See you tomorrow!