paint cut paste

in the past month, i’ve been practicing with needle felting, as you might recall from my first needle felted fox project. i haven’t been able to share these creations with you yet, as they were all gifts. now that each lives with its rightful recipient, they’re blog-safe. along with these little felty friends, i’ll share some tips i’ve gleaned (often the hard way) along the way when feeling my way through needle-felting. and gosh, i’m sooo very green at this art form, so i’d love to hear from more experienced felters, too!

tip #1: purchase the thick, dense sponge to use as your work area. make sure it’s at least 12″ x 10″ as i tried my first felting project (the fox) on that tiiiny sponge that came with my needles. ack! many an injury. (those needles are wicked sharp!) here’s how i began a dove for two friends’ baby blessing ceremony altar gift…

sure, it looks like a seal at first (and i could totally begin a seal this way sometime,) but she later gets her wings and beak. (and a pretty handmade necklace, too.)

tip #2: when felting the body (the main base) for an animal, try not to make it too dense. wool roving is made harder and harder with every poke of the needle. in fact, you can make wool as hard as a rock, but then it would not be moldable once it is in that state. if the wool isn’t too dense, you can shape it easily with the needle, and sometimes even tweak it with your hands, just as you would sculpt clay. i am seriously amazed at the responsiveness of this molding medium!

owl for a 5-year-old's harry potter themed birthday

tip #3: you can create the body parts separately, and affix them to each other (or to the main torso base) easily. after they are formed, attach them to the base by poking the needle completely through the body part (head, leg, etc) and into the base repeatedly. by doing this from different angles over and over, the pieces will join. to smooth over the joint (and simultaneously strengthen it) wrap a thin layer of wool around it and felt it into place.

bunny for N's easter basket

tip #4: you don’t necessarily need a pattern to needle felt an animal. if you find an image of one you’d like to make (google image search works great for this) you can break the body down into its parts in your mind, like i did with the seal-turned-dove up there. there’s really no need to invest in a book or patterns. if you’re gonna spend money, spend it buying pretty wool roving!

improv turtle design for a sweet turtle-loving 3-year-old's bday gift

tip #5: have fun with it! the possibilities are endless!

now, please tell me your needle felting tips — like i said, i’ve only been at it for about a month (and three needle injuries) so far…

happy spring equinox! lately we’ve been on a beading binge over here. in the late 90s, i was an avid beader. i sold some of my jewelry in a small shop in brooklyn at the time. ever since then, i just bead on occasion for random gifts, as i still have lots of supplies on hand (and rarely need to buy new ones; luckily, little beads go a long way!)

i decided to pull out the beading boxes again last week and make a few spring things for myself and as gifts. N got in on the action, too. first, i wanted to try my hand at braiding scrap fabric as a base for a wooden bead necklace, sort of like one i saw on pinterest (the braided part, at least) from the cakies blog (which is so awesome, by the way!) i started by tearing up some old fabric scraps.

once braided, i strung some large wooden beads onto them and sewed them closed using my sewing machine (though you could easily tie them or  hand stitch.)

the wood was fun to work with, so i whipped up a few wooden bead bracelets on elastic cord embellished with embroidery floss, too.

and N wanted to create a wooden necklace of her own using beads a friend gave to her and some indigo hemp.

i LOVE how hers turned out (and want to wear it myself, though it won’t fit over my neck.)

i had fun with some old seed beads, gemstones, and charms, as well. they were strung into some sweet bracelets, too.

N created a warm colors/cool colors bracelet for herself while i made these.

it was fun to bead with my daughter, side by side, and i love that she takes such joy in what has always been one of my go-to handwork activities. aaand, they make for cute gifts for friends!

i think this is one of the cutest ways i’ve seen to upcycle those random buttons you might have around… make button christmas trees! (wow, i’m on a tree kick this holiday season, huh? most of our holiday artventures have been tree-oriented.)

i first saw this idea on modern minerals, via pinterest (pinned it this summer for later use.) we modified her tutorial a bit to make it more kid friendly, and let me say that it was a total hit! in lieu of using string to bind the buttons together, we used pipe cleaners – so easy for small hands to maneuver. N and i gathered up various buttons we had around (including a lot of white and green ones,) some pipe cleaners, and a few shank buttons (the kind with a loop on the back of them) we had around to use as “tree toppers.” (you can see the shank buttons on the left in the pic below.)

(yes, as you can see we've also been painting more wooden ornaments - we do this each year)

we started by bending the pipe cleaner in half, and putting the shank button on first.

then we put the two ends of the pipe cleaner through two opposing holes in each button, working from small button to large button.

it was fun to experiment with various color schemes. N was really into making pink and purple trees!

here are some of our trees before we cut the pipe cleaners off of the bottom. (they’re kinda cute like trees on sticks – i bet they could be used so many ways like this, too!)

then we twirled one side of the pipe cleaner around the other side to create a “trunk” look at the bottom. [you can also use small brown (or other color) buttons for a trunk.] i cut the extra length off of the pipe cleaners.

we tied a bit of baker’s twine through the hole of the top shank bead and hung them on the tree. (and tied a few to some lucky gift recipients, as well.)

(some of these remind me of wedding cakes – with the right color scheme and topper, this could be modified for weddings or bridal showers in some way, too!)

creating garland out of the natural beauty of autumn leaves is always a favorite activity of ours. this time, we made it even more vibrant!

we have gone on many leaf collecting walks around our neighborhood these past few week, and brought home some beauties. we pressed them for about 24 hours or so to flatten them out.

the opportunity to mod podge our autumn leaves passed us by last year somehow, but this year we were able to do so. after the leaves were pressed, i applied a coat of mod podge to each side of each leaf (in the evening – thus the dark photo – sorry.) this preserves the color and returns some suppleness to the leaves — like magic!

notice it doesn't say "modge podge" on the bottle, folks.

once they were dry, N and i got out our wooden beads and some wire to string the garland.

we wrapped each bead through twice, to hold it in place.

we had fun interspersing beads with the leaves, and it looked pretty when finished.

now we have it hanging over our balcony for thanksgiving time… (but secretly, i’m sooo ready for christmas decorations instead!)

a few evenings ago, we noticed a little bag of silver pendants in our art cabinet that we had yet to use — and i have my friend, rachelle of tinkerlab, to thank for passing them along to us! so, thank you, tinkerfriend, for these great blank “canvases” of the jewelry variety! they provided N and i with some enjoyment, as we decided how we wanted to design our pendants.

N wanted to make a “nature one” and a “beady one.” so we gathered some pebbles and shells from random buckets of beach treasures that are still in our backyard.

then N rooted through my seed bead collection and found some colors she liked.

she arranged the seed beads in the circular metal pendant, and put a white shell in the center of the square one with some pebbles and a few random neutral beads around it.

once she had them arranged how she wanted them, i squirted dimensional magic onto each, and let it dry for 3 hours. after it dried and encrusted all of these jewels to keep them in place, N wore her new beautiful mandala necklace!

and she decided we should give the “nature one” to rachelle and her little artist, N, as a thank you gift.

happy fall, y’all! (ooo, my quasi-southern roots are showing.) today is the first day of autumn, even though the sf bay area seems to just be getting the summer started. regardless, in my body and spirit, it feels like it’s time to bust out the chet baker and a scarf. to celebrate the season, i gifted my little one with a basket of autumn goodies today…

among the treasures was a strand of mala beads i strung just for her. i’ve always intended to make N one of her own (as she covets mine) and i was inspired by this one i saw on little. lovely. i just used 108 (in the buddhist tradition) blonde wooden beads i had on hand and some stretchy cord.

after they were strung, i looped embroidery thread around my fingers, snipped it at one end, then laid it over the cord. i tied another piece of thread around that to keep it in place. this made for a cute tassel.

i also included two wonderful autumn books in N’s fall basket — i just love both of these seasonal series. one is autumn, an alphabet acrostic by steven schnur and the other is by the light of the harvest moon by harriet ziefert. we have the other seasons from both authors, but somehow didn’t yet have these autumn treasures.

additionally, i found a sweet little melissa & doug wooden kazoo, some pomegranates (N’s favorite fruit – she takes after her momma!) and one a replica of one of my childhood memories… a weather telling owl kinda like this one! when i was a kid, i had a ceramic owl exactly like this on my windowsill. he has little clear salt-sized crystals on his head that change color to tell the weather (or so i thought when i was a kid???) when one of these owls came up randomly on my etsy homepage this summer, my heard did a little flip flop of recognition, and i knew i had to buy it!

another fun thing about today is that we got to use the autumn side of our handmade placemats – ah, refreshing change! i can’t wait to have some fun with fall art projects now…

first day of autumn breakfast

happy autumn to all! did your family do anything special to celebrate autumn’s arrival?

our hearts go out to all of our east coast friends who have been dealing with hurricane irene and her aftermath. in our pre-cali stomping grounds of richmond, va, much of the beloved city’s beloved residents have been without power for days and huge trees fell and took out homes, cars, playhouses, etc. the photo below is one that my dear friend in richmond took of a fallen tree in her yard.

photo by amy howarth

this is the scene in many of my friends’ yards right now, and the work of cutting up the trunks and branches has begun. while these trees make for fine firewood for the winter, surely some little parts of these hurricane spoils could be repurposed into lovely branch art, yes?

photo by amy howarth

coincidentally i’ve been drooling over some tree-themed pins in the past few months (cannot. curb. pinterest. addiction.) and it seems that, while hurricanes are often tragic and never desirable, mother nature has left behind some art materials in my friends’ yards. so i’ve decided to share some ideas for how to make art out of this bad situation, for those of you who may have a lot of wood lying around. and a saw. (gosh, i want a saw.)

if you click on the images below, they will take you to the source of the image.

building blocks - i SO want these!

wall art (many other branchy ideas at this link, too)

love these gift tags - or stamp any image onto them & glue a magnet to the back!

i'm seriously making these in the fall (i heart mini-eco!)

weaving between the branches

how stylie are these hooks?

great table!

lovely beads

so beautiful above the bed

earthy candle holders

when life gives you lemons, make lemonade.

when hurricanes give you fallen trees, make branch art!