While I Waited

 I do believe the process of tea staining requires more patience than I can muster. So while the "soups" simmered I decided to venture on into another aspect of my little project. This time, however, it involved a bit of deconstruction.

 

 You see I wanted to inside scoop on how book pages stayed together.

Can you believe they are sewn?!!!

 

 Yup, one little section at a time is stitch to another little section until you have a book. Of course by the time I was done figuring this out I had no more book left....

 

 ....so I made my first attempts at a new teeny tiny one!

 

 Oh and one final word on tea staining...I'm done with it!

The green wool had a slight change after 3 days but not so much as to really make a difference.

 

And the red velvet....four days in and just as bright as ever!

 



Soup of the Day

Minted Wool Consomme

 

 

Hoping to have better luck with this than I seem to be having with the velvet. All results will be posted soon! 

A Stressful Situation

  I decided my red velvet tuffet needed some distressing. Not a lot, just enough to make it look as if it had a history to it. So with tuffet in one hand and gruff sandpaper in the other I plopped myself down in front of the telly to catch up on BBC's Sherlock. In the time it took Watson and Sherlock to reunite, solve the mystery, and save London I discovered sandpaper had little to no effect on velvet.

Go figure!

 

 No fear, I'd recently acquired a tiny dremel set that came with an assortment of attachments to file and sand with. The telly went off, the power switch went on, and.....

 

 ....the distressing got a bit out of control!

Worn is one thing, moth eaten something else entirely.

 

 Some of the tying threads even became casualties in the process. Not good.

 

But now, several days later, I have a new best friend in the distressing department.

Can you see his work in progress here? Maybe just a bit? I'm finding it difficult to take close ups of the work. Whether it's the velvet of the vibrant red I'm not sure. I just know it looks a whole lot better in person and I'm hoping you'll take my word for it!

 



 

Anyway, meet Mr. Razor Blade. He's quite the handy fellow.

 



Maybe you can see the results of his employment a tad better here.

Hope so!

 



Worn velvet achieved I'm on to my next case...aging the color.

Logically I guessing fading it in the sunlight would be the best bet but since the sun is currently hidden with falling snow I might as well explore some other routes in the meantime.

First up...a tea bath.

 



The kids saw it this morning and thought I was back to making my strange Polish fare.

"Yep," I said "It's Velvet Soup!"

 

Beads or Blossoms?

 Quiet time during our most recent snowstorm was used to sketch a bit with needle and thread. I knew I wanted a slight crazy quilt appeal for the red velvet and thought some seed beads would be a fun addition.

 

 Turned out they weren't.

My overall impression was blah and the process....NOT VERY FUN!

Those little things were more than frustrating to work with.

 

So good old embroidery work it will be!

 



Palette Play

 I fell in love with these pages from a magazine recently.

The color combinations were so exciting to me that I decided to use them as inspiration for the little project I've got going on. 

 

Today I set out to establish a palette of sorts based on it. Even though I don't anticipate using much embroidery floss along the way I still dug into my stash to play with the colors a bit. I find it handy to have a little assortment of skeins around to help me select just the right paint, fabric, ribbon, beads, or whatever else fun pops up in the process.

 

I will, however, be in need of some green floss coming up here very soon. It was a big debate for awhile here but I'm seriously leaning towards the brighter one in the middle.

Much more exciting don't you think?

Woodworking Weekend

 A wee bit of drilling....

 

...and a couple cuts.

 



A Tisket, A Tasket.....

 A basket full of...

 

 ...BELLS!!!

 

 Lots of bells.

 

Lots and lots of bells.

 

 Ok, 166 bells to be exact.

 



But...

considering they were on clearance for 5 cents a piece

there's no reason to sound the alarm!

 

 



I Heart Austin Kleon!

Let me start by saying my new project "Something Small, Every Day" is going very well. For all of January and now almost a week into February I have devoted at least 30 minutes a day to the pursuit of an endeavor I've wanted to try for a very, very long time now. Previously I had thought it "too hard," "too time consuming," and yes "too beyond my capabilities." The inspiration to even have a go at the first 30 minute stint on my endeavor came from none other than my favorite creative guru guy Austin Kleon. The post that convinced me can be found HERE....I highly suggest you read it.

 

I really wasn't going to say much about this new project...you know just in case it bombed out on me or something. I does however seem to be doable and actually quite fun. Supplies I thought would be difficult to source practically fell in my lap, tools I didn't know existed magically appeared, and the ideas wouldn't stop coming. While I'm still not prepared to reveal all the nitty gritty details, I have been inspired to share some tidbits. And the source of this new inspiration to share....why Austin Kleon of course! Today he had this NEW POST about the upcoming March 6th release of his book, "Show Your Work!" I was so excited!

 

 I've known about this book coming out for some time now, but today's offer to pre-order a book and have it signed by him was too good to be true. Not just his name mind you, but with your name to. Wow! Austin Kleon would write "to natalie jo" inside a book just for me. I was a millisecond away from submitting my order when I realized it would take up to a week longer to have my book delivered. Hmmm...the book in my hands on the 6th or my name in the book, what was I to do? I sat there staring at the cover of the book on my computer screen for several minutes waiting for my gut instinct to kick in.

 

Eventually it did...but not in the way I expected!

Suddenly I forgot all about the physical book and focused instead on the message of the book,

SHOW YOUR WORK!

 

And so that's what I'm going to do. For the next month I'll post snippets of my work in progress. A little here and a little there. And then, on March 6th, I'll have a reveal of sorts to coincide with Kleon's release. That's right, whether I bomb out or not I will show where I'm at in full.

But for today....you'll only get a peek at some red velvet, which by the way is oh so soft to work with!

 

 

 

 



Missing Pieces

 The biggest thing missing in this new year has been my ability to focus. I literally could not remember anything, could not decide on anything, nor could I accomplish anything. I had big plans to start this year with a bang but when I woke up on January 1st I had forgotten where I put them.
Empty as this bowl was my mind.

Yikes!!!
I can't believe I just wrote that....ugh.
The kids were having a Star Wars marathon downstairs and it appears
Yoda took advantage of my mental vacancy and moved in.
The force is definitely not with me.

Luckily, my camera is full of images and since a picture is worth a thousand words I'll let them help me put some of the pieces together.
 

We did indeed head up to my parents house for Christmas.

Earlier this year my mom joined the doll club I belong to so she received one of the garlands I made for party favors at our holiday lunch earlier in December. I don't know about you but I think it looks much better hanging up on her mantle than it did on my picture. Remind me to ask for a fireplace from Santa next year because goodness knows I'll probably forget before it comes time to write a North Pole letter again.

 



By the afternoon of the 25th all secrets had been revealed. Here's the trivet/potholder I gave the little sneak peek of. It really was so much fun to make up. Project credit goes to Ayumi Takahashi and her amazing book Patchwork Please but the inspiration to actually put the book to use goes to  this post from "Hen House." Truly amazing work!

 

I gave it to my mom.....

 



.....along with one of the little bird ornaments I was making up and an old copy

of The Birds' Christmas Carol by Kate Douglas Wiggin.

 



She in turn gave me this book!

 



It was written by one R. H. Horne and details the yearlong adventures of a jointed wooden doll named Maria Poppet. Something of a British version of Hitty I'd guess you might say which is more than enough to guarantee an afternoon of delightful reading.

 



In my head I made it my book of the month for December but since my head was not communicating with my actions it failed to make it's reveal until now. I was at a loss coming up with a doll but I did manage to "borrow" this one from dear daughter's American Girl stash. Obviously it's not British. Neither is it handmade. It is wooden, however, and.....

 



.....has the sweetest little red shoes painted on her feet!

 



We were home again in time to host my dad's New Year's Eve birthday meal.

 



It was indeed a Polish feast. Dear Hubby made the Paprika Chicken from the old recipe book I found. This shot of it in the early stages of preparation seems to be the only photo I took....best not to get in hubby's way when he's cooking!

 



I made up all my dad's favorite sides including cucumber salad and noodles with cottage cheese.

 



The centerpiece of it all turned out to be the Bigos, an old fashioned hunting stew with pork, sausage, sauerkraut, and mushrooms as the main ingredients. Honestly I think this was the straw that broke the camel's back as far as the kids were concerned. After it was all said and done they told me the food was "just plain scary!" My dad on the other hand loved it.

 



A few of our gifted items turned out to be a bit "scary" for them as well and required a day of returns at none other than my favorite place...the mall. I did find this little pin during our outing which got me thinking about getting back to work on some crafty projects. Tiny stitches taken in stolen moments are a great source of joy for me and I wanted to get a needle back in my hands.

 



And so....not too many days after our mall adventure I skipped out for and afternoon of fabric shopping on my own. I came home with this bag of goodies and a plan.

 



It started out as good a plan as any. I'd have my theme for the year be that of the "Empty Bowl." I vaguely remembered reading somewhere about Zen monks carrying empty begging bowls in the practice of releasing control over worldly concerns and simply accepting what was given to them each day. I could practice a similar idea only have my empty bowl host the crafting supplies that came my way. I could take one picture of the supplies gathered in the bowl at the beginning of each month and then another picture of the bowl filled with the finished pieces I'd made up from the contents at the end of the month.

 

It could be fun.

It could be interesting.   

Or.....

 

it could be that I was totally abusing the concept of the empty bowl.

My focus very quickly went from accepting what came my way to planning fabric shopping sprees with projects already in mind. Kind of controlling and materialistic don't you think?

I also became a bit obsessed with bowls.

 

In addition to my now not so "empty bowl" I started an English paper piecing bowl and...

 



....a granny square crochet bowl!

I was beginning to feel like Goldilocks, only no matter how much I kept tasting from the bowls none of them were "just right." I imagine I'd have gone on making an entire collection of crafty bowls but I just so happened to stumble upon a post by Austin Kleon titled "Something Small, Every Day."

 



I have a tendency to want to fill BIG chunks of time (weeks, months, even years) with lots of LITTLE projects. Such endeavors tend to become overwhelming and list ridden. In Kleon's post, however, he recommends you forget about tracking time beyond the day you are in and by doing so BIG projects can be accomplished in LITTLE bits of time.

 

This I thought might be good for me. I have something BIG I've wanted to try for a while now but  never did because I couldn't justify spending extended periods of time devoted to it. If it were only 30 minutes a day on the other hand, that I could justify. The supplies in this case were minimal and on hand.....the 2014 calendar that came along with my latest issue of Mollie Makes, a bag of wooden mish mash dug out from the bottom of my stash closet, and an old notebook. I'm sure more items will be needed down the road but since I don't need them today I'm doing my best not to think about what they might be.

 



So far I've collected some thoughts and quite a few "x's" on the calendar, one for each day "something small" is attended to. Once I've got something to show for my work I'll do just that,

 but in the meantime....

 



.....I intend to keep my bowl empty as a reminder to let things come to be in their own time and not try to predetermine their outcome or timeline.