Work in Progress: PYOP Ornaments

Yesterday Brie and I went to The Pottery Stop to work on pottery for the first time in months. I'd been thinking about doing some smaller pieces...something manageable where I can work on several at one time while I wait for parts of them to dry.

I'm using my usual wax resist technique on these ornaments but I thought I'd try something a little different and not just use a black background (which will turn into the outlines of the drawings on my piece). So on some of these I am experimenting with dark brown and gray backgrounds, for a softer outline.

So on the top right is an image that may look familiar...I've used Whaley on a few items before but I love him so I painted him again. The bird in the tree also may look familiar...

The two bottom images are Tuscan scenes I've been thinking about painting for a while. Just reminiscing about Italy a bit...

The fifth ornament, on the top left, is still blank...wasn't sure what I wanted to paint there yet. Brie (always helpful) suggested Sean Connery in a red diaper a la Zardoz (if you haven't seen that movie, it is totally bizarre, but worth checking out for his outfit alone!)

I was thinking more along the lines of an elephant with a pretty blanket on its back, or perhaps a pirate ship, or a little city scene. If I'm gonna do Zardoz I'll definitely have to do some practice sketches first and not just freehand it.

More pictures to come when these are done...and they will be for sale in my etsy shop!

Craft projects in the works: PYOP and felt fruit ornaments

Yay! Now that I have passed my exam and am done studying, I was able to spend some time on crafty things this weekend.

I had been wanting to try making felt fruit ornaments for a long time so yesterday I started with apples and pears. I think they are pretty darn cute!


I really enjoyed stitching these and they are much faster to make than my owl ornaments!

 

Today I went back to The Pottery Stop to finish my last PYOP coaster and work on my other wax resist pieces (the plates for my brother). My elephant coaster from last time was done!

 

 

The plates are going kind of slowly...I finished one side of each plate. I think I will finish them this week. Love the toucan! And I did something a little different on the back of my whale plate (instead of the usual bees). Here are the "before" pictures...neither piece has been fired in the kiln yet, the colors will be darker after that. What do you think?

I totally love the ducky and umbrella!  :) 

Custom owl orders

I recently had two fun custom orders of my embroidered felt owl ornaments!

The first was an etsy order for 10 pink and brown owls for a baby shower--what a cute idea! The owls are great for decorating, and can then be given as favors to attendees after the party.

I did a bunch of color variations. I actually cut out 19 owls to give the customer a chance to pick which combinations she liked best.

 

 

Here are the finished owls in the color combinations she selected.

So cute!

 

The second order was a set of blue owls for my friend Mary (they were a gift for her daughter who goes to UNC). It was Mary's idea to do them in her daughter's college colors...also very cute!

 

 

I love doing custom orders! Sometimes customers have great ideas for color combinations or uses I hadn't thought of yet :) Plus I love making these owls, they are a lot of fun to sew.

materials: DMC, eco felt, grosgrain ribbon, thread, polyester quilt batting

Owls in progress (or ghosts)?

Here's a bunch of the felt owl ornaments I've been working on, in various stages of completion. Some of them resemble colorful ghosts rather than owls at this point...

Outdoor owl photo shoot!

There are lots of pretty cherry blossoms near my place, so I figured I'd re-photo some of my owl ornaments outside.

 

Next: new red owls!

Ornament sketches

When I'm super bored and sitting on an airplane I love to make lists and brainstorm project ideas.

Here are some sketches I made a while back of potential ornaments to make.

So far from these I've only actually made the owl ornaments...

 

 

...but I'm sure I'll come back to these sketches later when I need a new project to start!  

Holiday happenings

This year, I spent Christmas Eve baking cookies and pizza with my brother...mmm pizza...

 

 

...and then a few days visiting with friends. I went to visit Gleb and we ambled through downtown Ambler and did a little shopping.

 

And even though the holidays were over, the owl ornaments were not! I made a large batch....most of these are now available in my etsy shop.

Winter projects and downtime

It's nice to have some downtime this week. I've taken a break from a lot of my other activities over the past month or so to try and relax from all the craziness. I had a bunch of crap go wrong: one of the birds got sick (repeatedly), I got sick (also repeatedly), I got in a minor car accident, etc.
 

Just for the sake of amusement, here is the email I wrote to the rental car/repair/insurance people about the first car they gave me. To their credit, they did replace it with a car of my choice that was a major improvement.

---

Hi Dave,

Thanks for sending this and thanks for your message as well. Your service has been great and I was very pleased with how fast and easy everything was the other day!

Quick question (maybe you know or the Enterprise folks do)...is there an "air freshener" hidden somewhere in the rental car? It is very strong and smells horrendous, like a toilet, and I'm having to drive with the windows open even in the cold to keep from gagging. I looked around in the car but couldn't find the source--I would REALLY like to remove whatever has created this nasty smell if I'm driving this car for the next week.

Thanks!

 

---

 

I also finished several new batches of coasters, some elephant ornaments (including a custom order for a mom with baby elephant--how cute is that?!), and a crapton of pins. These are mostly available in my etsy shop right now.

Green leaves coaster set

Autumn heather rainbow coaster set

  

Brown and tan woodland flowers pin

 

Elephant mom and baby custom Christmas ornament 

 

Green woodland flowers felt pin 

 

Pair of gray elephant Christmas ornaments

 

Purple poppies felt pin

 

 Zen black and gray leaves coaster set

New ornaments, necklaces, and other items in my shop!

Check out these new listings in my etsy shop!


Elephant felt Christmas ornament



Three purple hearts and flowers felt pins



Set of 4 felt owl Christmas ornaments



Pretty posies medallion felt necklace in shades of gray



Pretty posies woodland medallion felt necklace



Purple heart felt pin



Red poppies medallion felt pin



Woodland flowers medallion felt pin in light green



Woodland flowers medallion felt pin

In other news, I seem to be sick again...but I also got a really cool custom order for 15 felt flower pins last week, so that kept me somewhat busy.

I tried to make each one a little different. Didn't they turn out nice? :)

Happy Thanksgiving!

 

Hope everyone is enjoying the holiday today! I spent a nice leisurely morning doing photos of some of my new creations. Hoot!

 

 

My Thanksgiving plans include going out to FANCYDINNER, which is something my friend Brie and I have been doing for 5 years now...we pick a different restaurant each year and get dressed up and go out for a really nice meal. Most places have traditional Thanksgiving fare on the menu (which Brie likes but I don't much care for) in addition to their regular menus, and something hilarious and awkward always happens.  Two different years, the the lights went out in the restaurant! So I'm looking forward to some great food, good times, and no dishes to wash! :)

 

materials for hoot owl ornaments: Eco-felt, DMC, thread, ribbon, quilt batting