Friday, December 14, 2018

Tis the Season

I apologize for my writing being so scattered.  It's that time of year where I begin Christmas gift projects in October, with the belief that I have "plenty of time" to "do them all"... and am too busy creating to post about what I'm creating.  Also, most of what I've been spending my time on cannot be shared until after Christmas, so as not to spoil any surprises.  Therefore, I have a brief update with the few things I *can* share, then I should be capable of a full update around the New Year.

Without further ado...

Photography:

I finished my 2019 calendar!  My list of mail-out calendars has gone out, my list of in-town-drop-off recipients will be taken care of this weekend.
Most of my energies in photography over the course of October were geared towards completing my calendar.  Upon placing my calendar order, I turned my attention to my photography site and quickly determined that it is just too overwhelming.  I began posting photos in 2007, and the volume of images online is immense and dizzying to me now.  I've decided I need to scale back, and perhaps reorganize and redesign, neither of which I have the time to do at the moment.  So I have hidden most of my older albums for now, posted the link to my 2019 calendar, and will revisit the site reorg in the New Year.

In the meantime, here are a couple of images from my October outings.

In early October I visited Bloedel Reserve and crated this accidental double exposure.  My intention had been to capture this large pumpkin display, however I forgot to wind the film after the exposure and my next image was of a marsh further down the trail.  I did go back to Bloedel to reshoot the pumpkins, however I found this accident far more intriguing.

On my return to Bloedel, along with shooting panoramic pinhole, I experimented with my lensball (remember the crystal ball for my Halloween costume?)  I learned that the ball needs to be perched on something off the ground, unless I want to lay in the dirt.  Which I'm not opposed to doing under normal circumstances, I was unable to this day because I had an appointment after this outing.


Crafting:
I am in a flurry of Christmas Gift creating!  For the moment I'm only able to share two items, which have already reached their end destinations.

Mickey's Sorcerer's Apprentice hat.  This was inspired by G having made something similar using green pipe cleaners to make a tree.  It reminded me of Micky's hat, which made me think of our friend who is a Disney FANATIC, so I had to make this for him!  I used glittery blue pipe cleaners on a paper mache tree shape, stars from a bag of confetti, I cut the moon out of shiny paper, and the ears are black pom-poms.  

Bunco Pie Ornament - I found this pattern on Etsy and thought it was adorable, so I picked this as my annual Bunco ornament exchange ornament. This is my second attempt, for my first I used a lighter tan felt and it ended up looking like an unbaked pie!  This is made from felt, a little stuffing, a few beads, ribbon, and a mason jar lid.  I made the box out of card stock, stamped it, and used cellophane to make the little window. 

These two ornaments I made for myself using items I picked up at a vintage market

I found the two owls and the plastic light-topping stars at the vintage market.  I already had the wood base and glass bell in my supplies, along with the bottle brush trees, so I decided to put them together as an owl percussion jam session in the woods on little ice-star stages.

This owl is actually a large macrame bead.  The booth had a large bucket of them for a buck a piece, I decided he would make a nice ornament so I brought him home.  The branch, ribbon, berries, and presents came from my stash of supplies.


I am probably far more excited about my holiday sweatshirt than I should be.  Chewey with lights!!