Valentines Are Everywhere!

Many years ago I made Valentines from two small red heart doilies. Using embroidery floss I sewed them together with a chain stitch all the way around, but leaving the top open. I sent these to several friends and put tiny things inside like stickers, notes, poems, tissue paper snowflakes, even beads and other tiny objects captured inside small paper hearts.


Here is one of the 'snowflakes' with heart cut-outs.

An old candy box I found in an antique mall for $1 !

A heart shaped sewing kit:

The "Regrettable List"

Carolyn and I found a wonderful needlework shop in Lyon, France! The owner has designed most, if not all, of the needlework patterns and kits in the shop. There was a very cute embroidered wall piece, sort of a reminder board of things to do.

Later I mentioned something I thought should go on my "life list." Then Carolyn and I got to talking about how trendy "life lists" are. We decided that we would each make a craft project with the theme being "regrettable list." That is, it would include some of those things that, when you get to the end of your life and you haven't done them, you're gonna regret it!

So, here is my craft project. (I don't think Carolyn has started her's yet, but she has an idea for designing something in felt.)

I covered a glass jar (peanut butter!) with blue tissue paper. I found a picture of an old clock in a magazine and copied it on my copier. The lettering on the jar was all done on my computer, in Microsoft Word. I have an old version of Word, probably the newer ones do even more. There is a button you can click on called "Word Art," and you can fool around with your text in lots of ways. The font is "Emma Script" which I found on the internet. It used to be featured in Mary Englebreit's magazine. You have to pay for it, it's not one of the free fonts.

The neck of the jar was embellished with beads and little birds I bought a long time ago (I never throw any potential craft material away).


Each plastic straw has a flag at the top. The flags say things like: "piano, records, letters, hammock" and lots of other things I don't think I have time to do, or haven't got around to doing yet. So, every day (hopefully!) I will pick a straw out of the jar, and whatever the flag says I will go do that for 15 minutes! Afterall, 15 minutes of piano playing is better than none at all.

I thought about using narrow dowels instead of straws, but the straws were faster. Painted dowels would be cute, with the flags glued on.

The flags were also made on the computer, in Word. I simply cut the top of the straw and inserted the flag.

Fascinator, Part 4 - The Dolls

"Lulu's Garden" Fascinator with Flowers, Arbor, and Garden Visitors

Lulu always had such wonderful flower gardens. I remember, in early Spring, just laying on the ground in front of the flower beds, taking in the heavily scented hyacinths. We also had three large lilac bushes around our house. And mock orange! Perfume filled the air!

But I digress. The theme for the hat, "Lulu's Garden," necessitated little people enjoying the garden. So I made little dolls to sit and walk through the garden, sort of representing my sister and me.

The dolls were made with 32 ga. florist's wire, but next time I would use Artistic Wire. I had fits trying to get the bead 'hands' and 'feet' onto the florist wire because the thread kept bunching up, even after applying Tacky Glue to the ends. This wouldn't be the case with Artistic Wire, and it also comes in lots of wonderful bright colors, and several gauges. I have used florist wire in making other tiny dolls and it works very well, especially when you are wrapping with thread to build up the anatomy (examples below). 

(Directions for these tiny dolls in a future post.) But for the above dolls, to place on the hat, I kept the design very simple. Here is a diagram for assembling the doll:


And for the skirt, which is just a piece of painted buckram (the skirt on the second doll is a piece of pleated ribbon):



Detail of the hat and doll with pleated skirt. Oops, I think I already included this photo in my last post. Here it is again!

The hat does not just sit and stay put on top of the head. Fasten a length of narrow, round elastic at either side of the hat. This elastic is placed on the back of the head, under the hair. You then have to fiddle with the hair next to the hat, so the elastic doesn't show.


I didn't have the guts to wear the hat at my sister's guild fashion show, but I'm pretty sure I will wear it at the Artistic Figures in Cloth opening banquet since the theme is "Hats!" I know those dollmakers will be wearing some pretty far out chapeaux and I'll be in excellent company!