happy two thousand nine!

First and foremost I'd like to wish everyone a happy 2009! This past month has been crazy busy --- as I'm sure it has been for everyone else with the holidays. We had a wonderful holiday with our families and friends. We've had lots of snow too, which makes Christmas complete.

Over the holidays I hosted "arts & crafts day" at my house with a few friends. Amanda worked on her fabulous clay creations, Christine worked on a few watercolor paintings and worked with craft felt, and I did a watercolor illustration and prepared us a hearty lunch of grilled cheese & roasted tomato soup. We worked diligently while chit-chatting and admiring each other's work. It was fun to get together and have some company while we made art. We're hoping to make "arts & crafts day" a regular occasion, maybe even once a month. I can't wait till the next one!

During "arts and crafts day," I borrowed a craft book called "Sweet Needle Felts" by Jenn Docherty and I was so inspired by the authors creations that I knew I had to try a few things myself, order the book too! The book is about felting. Basically, felting is made with wool roving, needles and embellishments. I'll explain more about the process later.

My first felting project was a felted ball choker-style necklace. Puffy, black balls with shimmery gray seed beads. The balls of felt turned out perfect, but having never made any sort of jewelry before I did not compensate for the length of the necklace, so the necklace had to fit a very small neck. My Mom tried the necklace on and it fit her perfectly, but it really wasn't her style. My Aunt came over this weekend and it she loved it so I gave it to her. I didn't get a chance to snap a photo of my first creation but, she wants earrings to match so, I'll be sure to take a photos of those when I'm finished. Off to the bead store I go...

My second creation is a small bear. I'm still in the process of creating the bear, so I'll be posting him soon. I had a difficult time finding the wool roving in my area, so I placed an order online. My shipment is coming from California, so I hope it arrives soon! I'm close to finishing the bear, but I need the wool in a few other colors that I ordered to make him complete. By the way, his name is Franklin.