nest

For this year's Freshly Blended ornament swap I made these needle felted wool birds. Eleven of these birdies flew to Germany, Scotland, Australia and many places in the States and I enjoyed each packaged hand-made ornament in return. Perhaps these birdies would make fun mobiles too.

happy 1/1/11!

Yesterday before Janet and Ben came over to ring in the new year, I made some paper horns for the big moment. I'd bought some cheap party horns at the grocery store but I didn't like their look and big lame "manufactured in" giant label.

BEFORE

AFTER

I removed the squeaker/blower from the horn and then gently peeled apart the foil paper part. I traced it onto a piece of old cardstock and used that as a template to make my own.

I found happy scraps of wrapping paper that I had in my studio room and some paper fringe as well as some vintage tinsel trim. A little glue and reassembly and voila! I think they turned out great and look so much better than the original.

the ghosts of new years eve past

It seems ironic and iconic to celebrate New Years in vintage style, and I just love these great noisemakers from the past. There are so many patterns and vibes, from kiddie to adult, circus to mod, and they're all available on etsy. They could make such a cool instant collection in a shadow box or deep-set frame. Each New Years Eve you could add a noisemaker to your collection and ring in the new year in style.




(in order from top to bottom - Tin Party Horns, Starry Noisemaker, White Tin Noisemakers, Noisemaker Collection.)

tea time posies

A freshly polished silver tea set made for perfect containers at an afternoon tea and baby shower last weekend.

oreos and owls

A recipe requiring Oreos — three bags of Oreos! This isn't necessarily a bad thing of course and I've certainly perfected my cookie twist (which is why it took three bags as I wasn't very good at a full twist resulting in one-cookie-sided icingness at first.) Thanks to a recipe in Hello, Cupcake I made these for an owlish and fun first birthday party.

photo phun

Two exciting things happened today.
1) I got some supplies in the mail before I start my 2010 Freshly Blended Ornament Swap
2) I built a light box for doing photography, resulting in these shots.
This felt came from Material Evidence Shop and it's 100% wool. The colors are so bright and cheery, I don't know how they could turn themselves into something fantastically festive. I've got to get to making some prototypes before I finalize a pattern and start crafting. I'll need some advice from Janet to work on adhering bits and pieces together, she's the wool expert after all. Oh and once I've got it refined, I'll post a little tutorial on the light box as well.

the colors of autumn

I've been painting the leaves lately. Here are two of my favorites.