Hi everyone! I want to apologize for my hiatus. I have been struggling lately to take the time to write anything. I plan to pick up writing weekly articles for everyone, so stay tuned to what's to come! I'm planning to continue the Wonderful Plants series but I am open to options. I want to know what you guys are interested in. Be sure to send me a message at any time with any and all ideas!
For now, I wanted to share some of the projects I have been working on that will hopefully inspire you to live a creative life. Let's jump in!
Woven Wreaths
The first project I want to share with you is something I learned at a fiber convention last summer - Fiber U (https://fiber-u.com/). This convention was such an awesome learning experience and really peaked my curiosity in a lot of other ways to use fibers. I attended two natural dye classes which included a history of how dyes were used way before commercial dyes were available. One of the dyes comes from a female bug, how cool?! However, my favorite class I attended was the woven wreaths class. This project includes wool roving and a metal wreath frame. I started with just one wreath that I made in class and have made close to 5 more! To achieve this look wool roving, that is about 18 inches in length, is taken and wound around the rungs of the metal wreath frame. There are multiple ways to wind the roving depending on the look you are going for. Once you have your base you can add any embellishments you would like. For the wreath pictured above, I created a small sheep out of wool fabric and added floral arrangements purchased through Hobby Lobby.
My grandma had asked me around Christmas time if I could make a wreath for a gift exchange she was a part of. I created this one using the same wool technique and added a winter theme to it with some items I found at the thrift store. The combinations are limitless when it comes to decorating them!
Zipply Art
While at Fiber U there was a vendor selling patterns to recreate her work. I was instantly drawn to one of them for a gift for my friend Bailey. If you are interested you can find her patterns on http://zipplyart.com/. This artwork would be considered mixed media as it uses a bunch of different mediums to create, the most notable one is zippers! This pattern is called time for Halloween. The entire pattern is outlined in zippers while the inside portion is done via needle felting. To prepare, the zipper is undone from the other side and the edges are burned to keep them from fraying. Once that is completed the zipper is then stitched onto your base fabric in whatever pattern you choose and you can let your imagination flow from there. This piece also required a lot of embellishments. For the fence, I took popsicle sticks and cut them to style, they were then painted, and connected via floral wire. The remaining embellishments were beads and earrings. Once my piece was finished to my liking I took a piece of foam craft board and stretched it across and stitched behind. I found the frame at a thrift store and knew it would be perfect for this project.
A Calm Countryside
This project was completely done with needle felting onto wool. Needle felting is done by using a special needle that instead of being completely smooth, it has notches in it that grabs the fiber to push them into the base fabric. There are many different types of needles used for these project, some are large for a large area while some are smaller for more detailed work. On this project, it's hard to see all the details due to the glare from the glass but there are multiple different blended colors in this piece to create the different depths and lights, even in the pond in the background there are sparkly fibers to add interest to the water. Once the base landscape was done, I went in and hand embroidered flowers alongside the house, dandelions in the grass and birds in the sky. The clothes on the clothesline are pieces of wool cut to shape and embroidered on the line. I did my first needle felting project as a 3D sheep and quickly learned that making 3D shapes was not a strong suit of mine. I attempted the landscape and learned quickly that this is where I could excel in needle felting. The frame is a shadow box purchased at Hobby Lobby.
Sir Cluckington the Third
My grandma has been rug hooking for a very long time and has been trying to get me interested in it for years. For whatever reason I just couldn't get into it, until recently. I attended a beginner rug hooking class through the Big Muddy Rug Hookers Guild in January of this year. My friend Laura asked if she could come over that weekend and I said absolutely but I had a class planned and she was more than welcome to join. So, we went to Booneville and attended this class. It was such a fun time for the both of us and we made the cutest little mug rugs (see below).
After that I was hooked, no pun intended. This brought me to tackle a rug hooking kit my grandma had gifted me a while back which has been named Sir Cluckington the Third. Although I am not finished yet it's coming along rather nicely. Rug hooking has been around for many years and is done by taking strips of wool fabric at various widths and pulling them loop by loop through a base fabric such as monk's cloth or burlap. Once a piece is completed the project will need to be bound along the edges. There are many ways to accomplish this, again let your imagination flow!.
Barn Quilt Hoodies
One day while I was doom scrolling on Pinterest I found the cutest idea that I wanted to recreate, placing quilt patterns on a piece of clothing. My grandma and aunt both have barn quilts on their properties so I decided to recreate them in fabric form and attach them to jackets. My aunt's quilt square was extremely hard to replicate in fabric so hers isn't exactly the same but I did stick with the color scheme. The photographs don't do the colors justice but that's part of it, I guess!
Baby Clothes Quilt
This one I'm not going to share pictures yet as it is a high school graduation present. However, this quilt is going to be absolutely adorable as it is taking baby clothes and making a quilt out of them, similar to a t-shirt quilt. Please stay tuned for the outcome of this project!
Clever as a fox
This was just a quick project that I did for fall to have a wreath that I actually enjoyed on my front door. I took two different sizes of floral round wreaths and wrapped yarn around them. The inner darker yarn was hand-spun by my grandpa. My grandma gave it to me one day and said "I'm sure you can find something to do with this." she was right! The burnt orange yarn is a chunky style yarn that I got at the craft store. Once the base of it was complete I embellished it with a little fox and flowers also purchased at the craft store. This project is super simple to create, you should give it a try!
I hope you enjoyed this project update! Please, reach out at any time with any questions or suggestions that you may have. Until next time...
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