My First Blog Entry - WOW

I've always wondered what it's like to have a blog and finally gave in. I love to sew and paint primarily. I used to teach fitting of patterns but haven't done that in a while. I primarily quilt now, but also love to make pincushions, mostly because I can finish them quickly and get immediate gratification.

I also love to do tole painting and my favorite type of painting is of animals. I've been doing that for about 5 years now, although I've been doing something with art since I was very young. At one point in my life I wanted to go into art as a profession and even attended the Center for Creative Studies for a while. However, I found I was more at the bottom of the creative geniuses that attended that institute and abandoned that specific path. Now I use painting and creative sewing as a way to calm myself. Had it become a profession, it would have been more of a stressor.

I hope to use this blog as a means of sharing some of my creative energy with the world. Perhaps I can create tutorials of some of the things I create and share. My husband thinks I should be selling my stuff, but I get more pleasure, right now, in gifting it to my friends who appreciate the time and effort that has been put into it.

I'm currently working on centerpieces for the yearly Christmas Party for our Painting Group, HOMDA, (Heart of Michigan Decorative Artists). I'm making 7 of them and they each take several hours to put together, paint, then decorate. They are fabric snowmen that have a Christmas tree with two snowmen painted on either side, who are decorating the tree. Then the fabric snowman needs a hat made and arms, which I'm making out of floral wire and wrapping with brown floral tape to look like wood and bending to look like arms. In their arms I'm placing a string of fake little Christmas bulbs. The bottom of the snowman has garland around them with larger Christmas bulbs glued in. Finally, they have clay noses that need to be inserted. Now, the clay noses were bought at a painting convention I went to in early November. When I came home from the convention, I pulled the bag of noses out of my suitcase and put them in a safe spot so I would know just where they were when I was ready to use them on these snowmen. I sure wish I could remember where that safe place is. I've been looking everywhere I can think of for the last three days!

If I don't find them by Friday, I'll have to resort to chenille noses as a substitute. I'll post pictures of them on Saturday after the Christmas party. Can't post them now just in case one of the HOMDA members sees this blog. They're centerpieces for the tables, but they are also door prizes and a surprise.

I have a lot to do before Saturday to finish all the things that need to be done for the Christmas Party. We have 26 gals attending. Fortunately I didn't wait till the last minute to get everything done like I usually do, but I wish everything was completed already.

I have my granddaughter coming over everyday starting Wednesday and she's only 10 months old. When she's here I get nothing accomplished. She is the sweetest little thing and she's starting to walk and talk and she loves to follow Gramma around. So the next two days will be full of getting everything else I need to accomplish finished!