Projects - Ever After

Projects

February21st

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Craft Therapy

Posted in: Lori, Projects

I find solace in crafts, and I get giddy when I actually use some of the stockpiles of supplies I’ve amassed over the years. Here are a few of my latest creations:

First up is an embroidery pattern that I designed in Illustrator. It’s stitched with Cosmo thread on linen fabric. I then selected six little vintage buttons from the button jar. I wanted to make my own shadowbox frame but ended up just buying one from Hobby Lobby. This little creation is getting shipped off to Utah for my sister’s 40th birthday. I’m only a month-and-a-half late.

When I was a little girl, my mom made me an Easter dress each year. When I was eight, she made a particularly special dress with a tole painted yoke. I still have it. I also still remember the day this photo was taken. I was not happy with being forced to wear hot rollers and with the resulting ultra-poufy do.

For this little soldered pendant, I scanned a floral motif from the dress and made a little collage in Photoshop. When I was in Utah a few years ago, my mom sent the extra Easter dress fabric home with me, so I cut a little piece of it and used it on the backside of the pendant. This has gotten me in the mood to sew a dress for Vivian this year. Maybe even out of the vintage pink Easter dress fabric? Ariana is too old for such nonsense, she reminds me, but I am going to knit a vest for Tad.

And while I had the soldering iron out, I got some practicing in and made myself a fun, busy charm bracelet. I call this creation “A few of my favorite things . . . ” and found myself humming the Sound of Music song as I soldered away.

I’m sure BT wishes that I could find solace in family history work and that a few of my favorite things included cleaning, folding laundry and making dinner.
August10th

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Redemption

Posted in: Lori, Projects, Vivi

When Ariana was approaching the age of toothlessness, I made several little tooth fairy pillows that she gave as gifts to special friends. The pillows are quite time-consuming to make, each taking 5-6 hours from start to finish, and I ran out of umph before I got one completed for Ariana. Sadly, so many things in my life seem to be like that. I love doing projects or other acts of service for other people because it makes me feel good and, by and large, people appreciate the help. But I tend to run out of time to do things for my own family, and quite honestly, my family is sometimes much less appreciative of my efforts. But that’s no excuse for neglecting those that I love the most, and I’m really trying to better balance my priorities. And so when Vivi discovered that she was really, really close to losing her first tooth, I seized the opportunity to right past wrongs, and working at a feverish pace, I started making her a tooth fairy pillow. Well, to be completely honest, I first went into a funk for a few weeks because she’s passing into the next stage of life, and I just want her to keep her baby teeth for a few more years, and then I feverishly started in on the pillow.

I worked on the pillow while the kids and I watched Anna and the King last night, and out of the corner of my eye, I could see Vivi wiggling the tooth, so I stitched faster. I finally forbade her from any more wiggling because, if I had come this close, I was NOT going to have another one of my kids lose a tooth and not have their own custom-made tooth fairy pillow to put it in. No mother should have to go through that once, let alone twice. 😉

It’s tough embroidering the small letters, and I know that I could have done a better job on that part, but I resisted the impulse to tear it all out and start afresh. “Finished is better than perfect. Finished is better than perfect. Finished is better than perfect.” I had to chant this false mantra to myself over and over to cross the finish line, but cross I did, putting the stuffing in and stitching the opening closed this morning. I would have had it done last night, but the computer crashed (unmountable boot drive error, blue screen of death), and I had to turn my attention to that so that I could sleep.

Aaagh, sweet redemption. I only hope that Ariana can forgive me for not making her a pillow back in the day. I’ll have to figure something out to make amends.