#craftingfail

Here is my latest creation that I was so proud of. I think it turned out beautifully. My son had taken an extremely long nap one day and I had time to roll up all the rosettes and pin them on (I had previously wrapped the wreath and it took me three nights to do it because I double-wrapped it) and get it hung up. Isn't it lovely? Yeah, I'm pretty humble. :-/

I hung it on our front door temporarily with a shower suction-cup hook thingie. I don't have a real wreath hanger and just wanted to see what it looked like for the time-being. I kept it up and called my mom and dad to come over to look at it and play with LMW.

We were playing outside and Dad said, "Something just fell in the house and broke." I thought, "Oh, the wreath fell but it couldn't have broken. It's styrofoam protected by yarn." I looked inside and sure enough, it was in the floor broken in three places.

Talk about heart-broken. I haven't had the gumption to tape it up/glue it back together and re-wrap it. I don't know if my heart can take it.

My First Yarn Wreath

Yarn wreaths are all the rage these days so I just had to try my hand at one. Because I live in a small town, I have had the hardest time finding wreath forms. I was able to go to Hobby Lobby one day after a doctor's appointment in North Little Rock so I convinced the husband to let me stop and see what I could find. I picked up a styrofoam form as well as a very large vine wreath that was 50% off. I picked out some felt, since our Walmart only carries variety packs and I needed some specific colors. They also had patterned felt and I got some in houndstooth (I've ALWAYS loved houndstooth) and black and white damask.

I already had the grey yarn that I got for $2.33 at Walmart. So, I went to work wrapping--it took me a LONG time because I'm a perfectionist and it took awhile to get into the groove. I don't think it will take me as long the next time. If you're interested in a tutorial, just hang out on Pinterest for 5 minutes and you'll see one. If you don't have Pinterest (what are you waiting for? Go!), this is probably the best tutorial I've seen, although it uses a straw wreath wrapped in plastic as the form.

Here are some felt rosettes and ruffles I made whilst watching TV last weekend...

I made these sitting on the couch a week ago before I even had the wreath form.

I also made a peony with a variety of felt using yoonie-at-home's tutorial

Finished product. Took me probably 4 hours total which includes wrapping, creating the flowers, and getting it put together (I didn't do it all at once). I still need some sort of ribbon to hang it, but it's for a friend, whom I hope doesn't read this blog! and I'll get added before I give it to her. And like I said earlier, once I've done this a few times, it probably won't take quite as long but that will depend on the size of the wreath.

grey yarn wreath with black, grey, red, and white accents

And the cost was CHEAP:

12" Styrofoam beveled wreath form: $3.59 with 40% off coupon (originally $5.99)
Red Heart Super Saver Yarn in Light Grey: $2.33 for a full skein and I only used about half
Various sheets of felt: 25-50 cents a sheet (I used two full sheets and small pieces of four others)
Pearlized pins: around $2 for a box (you can use as many or as few as you like) or you can just hot glue the flowers to the yarn
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Less than $10 for everything!

Weekend WIP

This is a flag that has faded with two years of fall display. I'm in the process of repainting it, so it will be nice and fallish.

You can see how faded the unpainted parts are on the bottom section in this photo. I hope to have it finished by Monday.

Next is the tee shirt quilt I've been trying to get finished. I have all the "quilting" part done around the edges. As you can probably see, I also have some seam ripping to do, taking out some misdirected lines. I was getting used to my new machine.

I'm going to begin taking those pesky lines out, and try to get the edges ready for binding.

There are other projects calling my name, but I will turn a deaf ear until these two are done.

It's the weekend, and I'm just gonna sit here and relax!

A Little Fall Decor

I've been constantly thinking about how I can do some fall decorating. I finally found a few little fall things stuck in the back of my craft closet and decided to fill a dough bowl my mother-in-law gave me years ago. While I was in Walmart the other day, I grabbed a few real pumpkins to add.

I actually planned to post a picture of it yesterday, but the dark bowl, sitting on my dark coffee table just didn't show up well. In the meantime, Tanya posted her dough bowl and I got antsy to get mine fixed up right.  I remembered I had a piece of gold fabric in my antique "wardrobe" where I keep my stash, and I grabbed that little gem and made a rectangle to place under the bowl. It's nothing fancy, but it helps with the display. And brightens things up a bit.

I've had these mums on the dining table for a while now, so I didn't have to do a thing there.

I really wanted to exchange the two, placing the mums on the coffee table and the bowl on the dining table, but it was just too small to accommodate that large dough bowl, durn it. Oh well, at least I have a little something something for fall. But in all reality, my entire living room is made up of fall colors, so it's all good.