• Art - Blog - Crafts

    Tree collection additions

    Over the past few years I’ve started collecting Christmas trees. Mostly because I keep making a new kind each year but I’m not opposed to buying one at a thrift store or garage sale if it really speaks to me.

    This year I was inspired by Mini-me. She had to film a tutorial for her technology class. Her group of three girls each picked a different Christmas craft and bought enough material for the three of them to each create their own.  She was inspired by this tree.

    inspiration tree | Halle's Hobbies

    Her version used smaller pieces of cardstock. It got very tedious for her towards the end of both punching all the scallops and hot gluing them to the paper cone. It was her punching all those pieces that had Mr. G prompting me to try my Silhouette machine again.

    Speaking of paper cones…I made the cones from poster board after first seeing the price of a craft store foam version and then realizing that the foam would melt with hot glue. Glad I thought that one through before starting!!

    lace wrapped tree materials | Halle's Hobbies

    This tree came together really quickly.

    vintage lace trim for lace wrapped tree | Halle's Hobbies

    This vintage trim was in the bottom of my sewing box likely bought for some project my mom had intended to make in the 1970’s. At least it’s getting used now! lace wrapped Christmas tree| Halle's Hobbies

    Isn’t it sweet. I had the tiny glass ornaments in my stash as well. All it needed was a topper. I auditioned several ideas but finally decided a star was in order.handmade star for lace wrapped tree| Halle's Hobbies

    I drew a star on a piece of paper so I’d have a guide to do my bending. I used a twisted piece of 22 gauge wire. I had to “tie” the star at the crossover points “barbwire style” for stability.

    The second tree (well technically it was the first one) was yarn wrapped.

    yarn wrapped tree| Halle's Hobbies

    I used a leftover partial skein of acrylic yarn for this one. Again I had some tiny trims in my stash to give the tree a finished look.

    Nothing I love more than to use stash items! No cost…no trip to the store…AWESOME!

    Tree collection | Halle's Hobbies

    My humble little collection in our game area of the family room. You may be able to see both my Suess tree and cork tree. Additionally you also may be able to see the recycled Christmas card balls I made last year and the 12 days of Christmas swap book from several years ago adorning the table.

  • Art - Blog - Crafts

    A second look: Creative ADD

    Secondlook

    This month for Second on the 2nd, I’m sharing a post from February 2012 that still makes me laugh at how all over the place my creativity takes me. Sometimes even in the course of a day. Right now I’m just wishing that creativity would kick back into gear…I’m in a bit of a dry patch on the creativity front.

    Join me for a look back…

    eyes

    I’ve been all over the place lately when it comes to creativity.
    I think I may have Art ADD (attention deficit disorder).
    Ok…some might argue that I have ADD in other areas of my life as well but the Art ADD is self-diagnosed.
    I blame the other on Motherhood. Children steal you’re ability to keep a clear running thought in your head. 🙂 But I wouldn’t change a thing.
    Anyway…these are the things I’ve done in the past week.
    I papered our recycling cabinet to match the fridge.
    Knit another dishcloth on the loom

    Knit a cowl on the loom…

    Miniature terrain on a recycled CD…
    Another terrain piece…
    And last night I started another twirly crochet scarf because my elbow was hurting from the repetitive motion of the knitting.
    Crochet seems to work my wrist more and doesn’t bother me.

    In addition I’ve been washing and ironing my way through a large box of old linens. Deciding what is decent enough to save and use and what I can use in my artwork. Vintage linens and fabric are part of my idea for the Postcard Challenge book.

    So, yeah…definitely Art ADD.

    ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

    That was a crazy amount of creativity in a short amount of time. It would have been really great to bottle a bit of that enthusiasm for a later date such as now!

    On a side note…what do you think of my blog makeover? I was feeling the need for a change. I’m still tweaking things here and there.  Please let me know if anything is weird or not functional for you. Thanks!!

  • Blog

    T Tuesday: camp edition

    Welcome to another edition of T stands for TuesdayT stands for Tuesday_200

    Last week you may remember amidst celebrating our hostess Elizabeth’s birthday, I mentioned I had a busy week coming up. The reason was J and I were heading to Mother/Daughter camp for the third year in a row.

    After a chilly rainy start the weather turned absolutely beautiful!! Mid 50’s and sunshine!! We were busy from dawn to dark. It was exhausting but fun. Before we even left for home I heard “next year when we come…”

    We did lots of crafts….

    journal and pen

    journal and fiber wrapped pen with pompom

    leather stamping

    leather stamping…I plan to attach this to an upcoming journal

    chalkboard

    wooden chalkboard…I plan to do something more with this to make it a bit more pretty.

    There was also a locker size magnetic white board decorated with fancy duck tape but that must have went to school already.

    In addition there was horseback riding…horse barn after ride

    and the highropes course that included a zipline.

    I wanted to embed a video here but it’s not working out…so you’ll have to imagine J zinging along a wire over a ravine.  🙂

    We had a wonderful time!

    This morning I sat with my coffee signing paperwork for my boy’s second day of driver’s training classroom instruction.IMG_0354

    Time passes oh so quickly!!

    I’ve got more paperwork to take care of today as well as a small mountain of laundry.

    What are you doing today?