To-Do Craft Project

I remember making a God's Eye in art class at elementary school with yarn and dowel rods, and this Etsy blog had me agog. I so want to make one again! I must remember to revisit this one: http://www.etsy.com/blog/en/2011/how-tuesday-weaving-a-complex-ojo-de-dios/?utm_source=bronto&utm_medium=email&utm_term=Weave+a+Ojos+de+Dios%21&utm_content=etsy_finds_020812&utm_campaign=etsy_finds_020812  I ended up buying this and like it a lot even though the husband kind of detested it.  I love yarn art and handmade!

Papercrafting and Decorating for a Neighbor's 40th Birthday Party

Papercrafting my home for the holidays

I bought an evergreen wreath recently at Trader Joe's and I had candy-striped miniature ornaments to adorn it on my outside door. Well I also recently decorated my library with wreaths I saw on the Paper Source website--wreaths that cost $20 a kit. I figured out how to make them myself with white cardstock and red construction paper and discarded books and decorated similarly for my home. The wreath at the bottom was from a clearance kit I bought from Paper Source two years ago.

Glassmaking

I recently signed up for a glassblowing class at the Bay Area Glass Institute in San Jose. I loved the first class of gathering glass on a punti and taking it to a glory hole and the bench to use the jack and tweezers to create these flowers. However, last Tuesday's class of actually using a pipe to blow glass...well I thought this just blows. Hated it. I only made one glass ornament and was not interested in making any more. I'm hoping to eventually enjoy the rest of the class if I can master making an acceptable-enough bubble on which to layer on more skills to create other projects like a vase.

Christmas presents!

I haven't canned since my twenties when I had a boyfriend with apricot and Meyer lemon trees and the zeal to buy a canning kit to make preserves and Preserved Lemons for a Moroccan chicken recipe. For Christmas holiday 2011, I decided to jar Zydeco Beans (dill pickled beans with the zing of jalapeño, habanero, and a serrano chile) and pickled red onions coupled with a recipe for Braised Beef Short Ribs with Pickled Red Onions enclosed for my holiday gift-giving. Mighty fun! A neighbor said she loved the spicy Mexican carrots I pickled, and so I want to make more of that. I turned to the book, Tart and Sweet by Kelly Geary and Jessie Knadler for inspiration (http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/230735120)

Thanksgiving Banner

The day before Thanksgiving, I decided to create a banner that I saw on Etsy but with my own variation because I was in a mood to be crafty and get rid of a surplus of paper. I thought I was going to give this to my sister-in-law who loves fall colors or for my mother-in-law who was hosting my husband's family's Thanksgiving feast. However, my husband said he wouldn't give it to either of his relatives, and so I thought well fuck it, I'll hang it in my own home until the end of November. I like it, but I made it way too large for my dining space. Next I'm going to create a similar banner for my neighbor Tracy who will be celebrating her 40th birthday next month and has decided the colors for her party will be lime green and red.

Pillows

Four years ago deep into grad school and desperately in need of some creative release from academic tedium, I took 2-day sewing classes at the now defunct Yarn, Paper, Scissors in Burlingame. One of the classes was an Amy Butler kimono robe and then a tunic, but the first class was a quilted square pillow. Very basic. Room Service, "a line of vintage-inspired pillows decorated with mod '60s prints, Hollywood Regency-style graphics, and boho kaleidoscope patterns" has two pillows I love. However, each pillow costs $39 which is a bit too steep for my pocketbook or wants me to endeavor to sew my own. Piping and a zipper would be the hurdles though. Oh yeah and there's the challenge of finding comparable fabric. And so I think my next projects will be pillows!