snowman ornament tutorial...

Supplies:
*Wooden knobs (also labeled doll heads) of two different sizes. These are 1.5" and 1.25".
*Buttons the same diameter as the smaller knob base.
* 20 gauge wire and something to cut it. I use datacomm cabling from my stash and wire nippers.
* white paint and a paint brush or sponge
* black paint pen
* orange polymer clay
* drill with 1/16" and 5/64" bits
* hot glue gun
* yarn or ribbons for the scarf

- Paint snowman body parts white (or yellow if you're a 35 year old child...). Allow paint to dry.
- Use orange polymer clay to make carrot noses. Insert straight pins into the base (top? big part?) of the carrot before baking.
- Drill a 1/16" hole in the center front of the smaller knob.
- Remove the straight pin and drill a 1/16" hole in the top of the carrot.
- Drill a 5/64" hole in the top of the smaller knob.
- Thread the head, neck and bottom onto the 20 gauge wire until it reaches the bottom of the larger knob. Mark the wire 1/4" above the top of the smaller knob with your fingernail and remove the wire. Bend the wire at the mark and trim away excess wire.
- Insert wire hanger through the top of the head and put a dab of hot glue to secure. Thread wire through button holes; put another dab of hot glue in the bottom knob and insert the wire ends into the bottom. Allow glue to set.
- Using a black paint pen draw snowman's face.
- Bend a small length of wire (will vary according to depth of hole drilled) in half and insert ends into carrot nose and then insert the carrot nose into the 1/16" nose hole.
- Tie yarn bits around your snowman's neck and ta-dah, you have a roly, poly super cute snowman ornament!



For some of the ones I've made this year I finger crocheted the scarves to bulk them up a bit. I used nine stitches to get all the way around the neck and then left the ends long for the rest of the scarf.



These are fun for the kids to do too. Be careful with the hot gluing and straight pins of course! My guys did all the painting and stacking for measuring the wire, I did the drilling, cutting and gluing and they did the faces. Logan (5) also made carrot noses with me and I stuck the pins in for him. Caleb (3) just played with the clay. Still fun and everyone has a nice project to show off!

snowmen and spam...

Last weekend the boys and I sat down to paint a box full of wooden knobs and made a plate full of polymer clay carrot noses with the intent of making snowman ornaments for the tree and for family gifts. To date Caleb and I have actually assembled some ornaments and Logan and I have a date to build his ornaments tomorrow. I'm working on a tutorial for these guys...hopefully I'll have it up tomorrow sometime. They're super easy and super cute, especially when they're all wonkified by wee artists hands.

Here is a group of ornaments I made last night:



And here is Caleb with his two completed snowmen (as eyeballs):



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Oh, and the spam mention? Haloscan is apparently under attack at the moment as I am being buried with spam comments. I have no idea if they're malicious links or what, but to be on the safe side I switched on the comment moderating so that I can ban the IPs and delete the spam before anyone else has to mess with it.

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12/18 New filters seem to be installed and the spamming has ceased! Back to regular commenting for all of us :).

stella and the much too sunny afternoon...

"stella's day didn't exactly go as planned..."

Stella woke up bright and early this morning expecting a sunny, but COLD forecast. Everything seemed to be going according to plan until just about lunch time when the sun really started beating down and suddenly things weren't so chilly anymore!

Stella knew her days were numbered from the start. She really wished she could've had a few more days to enjoy the view, but accepted her fate and melted quietly to the ground.

We gathered what was left of her and stuffed her in a clear glass ornament for posterity's sake.

Stella's guts are vintage mica flakes. Her eyes, mouth and buttons are little black glass beads (currently buried under her hat and scarf). Her arms are bits of grapevine twigs. Her scarf is made of ribbon and her hat is a tiny i-cord made on a knitting nobby.

trees...

We finished putting our tree up this evening. Lynn's job was to unwrap and distribute the ornaments to the boys who in turn hung them on the tree or handed them to me to hang on the tree. Uncle Nic helped too.



I have to admit it turned out really nice: Logan and Caleb were very satisfied with their job; Lynn actually looked at our ornaments and was surprised by how many really nice ones we have in our (my) collection; and I think Nic had a good time too. I fully anticipated it being completely lopsided and wonky, but in the end the tree was reasonably balanced, needing only a few minor adjustments.

I am definitely missing a box of ornaments and decorations somewhere around here...will have to go looking for that tomorrow. Instead of looking for it tonight I decorated another little "tree." Some of Logan's weekend homework was to bring a 3-D shape wrapped as a gift to class on Monday. I have a stack of these press board cones that I often forget I have. They're just plain brown things and I thought, "how boring." So, of course, I had to decorate it before I wrapped it and sent it off to Kindergarten.



I decoupaged some green mulberry paper to the cone, wired some tiny grapevine around the outside, made a little nest out of excelsior and tucked the little cardinal inside the nest and topped it off with a tin snowflake I painted white and then covered in German glass glitter. Took about twenty minutes (plus dry time for the glue) to put together and everything was from the stash. Hooray for quick and "free" projects!

christmas atcs...

I finally finished my atcs Thursday evening. I was beginning to worry...no specific ideas were coming to me. I knew I would use my little carved elf stamp (this dude is getting some serious mileage!) and this summer I bought a package of the pink and red flocked paper that I've been itching to use since the day I bought it and from there...nothing. No composition, no nothing was coming to mind! Then I thought I would make little window sills for the elf to peek through to pay homage to the old "Santa's watching you" trick until I decided that was entirely too involved given my current list of MUST-DO-NOWs.

As you can see I went with plain and simple in the end with a pretty decent result, if I do say so myself. The little elf is slightly elevated from the card itself and the little snowflake is a Marvy Uchida Silhouette punch. I printed my info onto cardstock and punched gift tags with them. I put the ribbon through the tags figuring the recipients could use them as ornaments if they like.

Now I need to finish my ornaments! The stitching is proving problematic with the cotton batting I used inbetween. I have an idea to remedy the problem and of course have had several other completely different ideas for ornaments in the process too!

elfin greetings...

4x6 flat * blank on flipside * a6 red polka dotted envelope


5x7 greeting card * blank inside * a7 green polka dotted envelope

Here they are...finally. I had them printed in two different sizes: A7 greeting card size and 4x6 flats. Purchase buttons are up on the paper page.The greeting cards with envelope will be available individually for $3.75 ppd or in sets of ten cards and ten envelopes for $19.75 ppd. The 4x6 flats with envelope will be available individually for $2.75 ppd or in sets of ten flats and ten envelopes for $14.75 ppd. The individual cards will come to you in a cellophane sleeve and the sets will have their own clear box with ribbon!

I am totally smitten with this little guy. Logan is too. I think I've stamped about a hundred pieces of paper for Logan since I carved the stamp and he colors each of them with different colored hair and outfits. I framed up the original collage in a temporary frame and need to find a nice black wood frame to really finish it off. But before I do that I need to take pictures of all the great stuff I've been receiving in swaps and such over the last couple months. I have been a bad, bad, bad girl about keeping up with all that. Hopefully I'll be able to accomplish that in tomorrow sometime.

and the breaks are where on this thing...

Um, so yeah...Thanksgiving is four days away which means Christmas is thirty-four days away. Yikes!

Caleb is visiting all the grandparents down in San Angelo right now. He's been away since Friday. I thought I would accomplish many, many things in his absence. Ha. Not so much. At least not things I want to get done, like some new jewelry pieces, my Christmas ATCs and ornaments, and a certain purple north texas owl/penguin mix that I owe as a birthday gift.

I did get Christmas cards designed and off to the printers. Some should be ready to go this afternoon. Others by Wednesday. I also got some stocking stuffer things finished and my ornaments started too.







Today we're going to see a fetal/maternal specialist for a super-duper sonogram. My doctor wants to make sure all is well with the baby since I am having to take high blood pressure meds throughout this pregnancy. Hopefully we'll find out who's in the oven while we're there.

I will be spending tomorrow morning with Logan's class reading stories and teaching a Thanksgiving themed activity. What activity? I have no idea! I'll find out tomorrow. Then in the afternoon the Kindergarten classes are having a Thanksgiving Feast and putting on a pageant too. Rest assured, many pictures will be taken and possibly a movie or two.