2010 ESD Enchanted Challenge: Fairy Treasure - Left Side of Piece

WOW there is a lot to explain!!! I'll start from the top, in the left top corner I created a bead embroidery vine. The vine stem is made with a metallic thread stem stitched on and then I added seed bead leaves with short bugle beads in the centers of the leaves. Then I added some little treasured items hanging from the vine! There are a couple keys, a piece from a necklace, and a couple of earrings! The Cameo earring is very special to me. I bought it in Italy with my allowance money when I was a kid(I think I was about 10 at the time)! I loved earrings when I was younger but now I never wear any at all! LOL I'm more a necklace girl now! LOL So I put this special memory onto this piece since it will be hung as art in my home!!!

I added a bit more to this motif since the last you saw it! I added some necklace parts and beads! You can also see the button cluster I added over the top of the hand dyed lace I incorporated around the piece to act as moss along with another key!

I like how in this photo you can see the path your eye travels up the metal flower motif to the green silk ribbon and bead flower motif, then up the button cluster to the beaded vine!

Now we are to the middle left of the piece!

I LOVE this metal flower motif!!! I knew I needed something there but at the time I didn't know what would be just right, when I saw a necklace I had that one of the rhinestones had fallen out of one of the flowers and I hadn't yet fixed it! I grabbed up the necklace and brought it over for tryouts...sure enough I loved the idea of it there! BUT it didn't work as is so what I did was take apart all the components of the necklace and place them how I thought looked best! I also added other metal bits and leaves that I have in my stash to complete the motif! It took a lot of stitching using invisible thread to get ALL the little parts sewn down into place!!!
I found a beautiful set of keyholes with keys and this keyhole was one of my faves! I sewed it on with a little bit of silk velvet behind the hole.
You can see a gorgeous green gem that I tucked in on top of the silk velvet patch just below that is a cretan stitch seam treatment in another of the challenge packet's threads which is a gold silk thread! Over the top is part of a bellflower vine motif!

For the bellflower vine I used a vine trim that I sewed down using a running stitch in a gold metal thread along the stem. Then I added bellflower bead-caps with crystal beads in the centers.

Now we are to the lower left of the piece! You can see a good view of the bellflower vine wandering in this section!

I added rhinestones to the center of the little flower motif I blogged about here. I think they added a touch of that extra sparkle I love! I also added one of my favorite little bee beads!

I also added some extra green feather stitching to this bottom patch along with a set of pearl earrings! I got a whole set of pearls (necklace, bracelet, earrings) for Christmas one year but I don't wear earrings anymore so these found the perfect home on Fairy Treasure!

Follow Me on Facebook

Hi everyone, I noticed that lately I've been updating facebook more often than my blog and I enjoy that part of everyday updates, little tid bits of what I'm doing or thinking and I thought why not merge the two by creating a facebook fan page for my blog! The benefit of a fan page is that I can give updates and chat on the wall but not having to add everyone in the world as a friend to do so. So I created one! Now I can do little blog updates that won't clutter my blog with chatter, but give you a little more personal insight into what I'm working on everyday! So if you enjoy that type of update become my "fan"! I think it will help encourage me to do more too! I need motivation!!! LOL ***recently facebook changed it from "become a fan" to "like" so LIKE my page to get updates LOL ;)
My Facebook Fan Page

Christmas Gift: SRE Embellished Family Portrait-Finished

Yay!!! I finally got it finished just in time for our gift exchange! Here it is all framed!
Now let me show you the progress from where I left off last!

I added vines in! I created them by drawing them freehand with an air-erasable fabric pen and then stem stitched them in using 1 strand DMC floss! Next I used 4mm green silk ribbon and added ribbon stitch leaves. To get nice looking leaves I start at the tip and work backwards trying to keep them evenly spaced as I go.

Next I added more ribbon stitch leaves to the floral frames. Also I added some flower buds in yellow to fill in any extra gaps left open. I used yellow 4mm silk ribbon in a 3 wrap French knot for the buds.
After all that the very last thing I added was some green seed beads to the vines to give it the perfect finishing touch!

Here is what it looks like with the matting around it!

I attached it to the backing of the frame which was a normal store bought frame you add photos to. I didn't do anything special just took large zig-zag stitches across the back to pull the fabric tight into place on the backing.

Usually I like to cover the back with a wrapping paper to make it look prettier but since the hanging wire was on the backing instead of the frame part I just left it as it...which doesn't look too bad to me this time.
After all that I printed up a label with my name, signature, and date with a special word "Cherished". I also enhanced it a bit by adding a touch of glitter to the word Cherished, the bird, and the heart on the letter!

Christmas Gift: SRE Embellished Family Portrait-Progress

I started on this Christmas Gift and took photos of my progression of silk ribbon embroidery around the photos!
First I started with some Sweetheart Roses done in 7mm light pink silk ribbon.
Then I started adding yellow 4mm Sweetheart Roses in clusters of three.

Next I started adding random Sweetheart Roses in a 4mm dark pink silk ribbon.

After that I started adding in a medium pink 4mm silk ribbon Sweetheart Roses also in random places. I wanted the feel of a picked bouquet.

Here is a photo of all the Sweetheart Roses all around in all the colors!

I changed my plan from adding little blue silk ribbon flowers to adding little blue beaded flowers instead! I created tiny forget-me-nots in size 15 seed beads in a lovely blue with gold centers.
That was a lot of work to get done but I'm still not finished!!! I still need vines coming out of the center and leaves etc.

Kid's Christmas Gift Pillows

My dear friend Wendy has 3 kids who ADORE handmade gifts! Seriously they love the handmade ones more than any toy, it's amazing! So I enjoy making gifts for them! Here are their pillows I created for them for Christmas, each one unique to them!
Joseph is the oldest so I used a Camouflage Flannel print and then Appliqued a bright green 'J' (which looks lighter in the photo it's more vivid in person) and I found a cool lizard print fabric that I cut out a couple of lizards from and one I appliqued on with the 'J' and the other I sewed into a stuffed toy!

Rebekah is the middle kid and loves all things girly and sweet! I used a sweet rose bud print flannel fabric for her pillow. Also I used a bit more of a fancy font for her 'R' and cut out a scene from a print in a oval shape and appliqued that on as well. The eye cover I bought and just set it on the corner, funny thing about Rebekah is she actually wears an eye cover when she sleeps!!! LOL I also thought it was neat that it had the word 'relax' on it that also starts with 'R' LOL!

Jeremy is the baby so I used a cute monkey print with a camouflage background flannel fabric for his pillow and I appliqued a bright banana yellow 'J'! Then I cut 2 of the monkeys out and sewed them into a little stuffed toy that I then attached to a "vine" of fuzzy yarn and sewed into the top seam of the pillow. That way the monkey won't get lost and he swings around playfully!

2010 ESD Enchanted Challenge: Fairy Treasure - Right Side of Piece

The lower right got a little more added than the last time I posted about it. It now had a couple of keys tucked in and the scallop seam treatment has a bit more added to it.

Along the right edge I put a piece of dyed lace to act as moss and a double sequin butterfly.

Here is a closer look at the fern with the 2 keys tucked in around it!

The scallops got a fine lazy daisy and stright stitches in between them and some beaded leaves on the rounded parts. I also added some little yellow Fargo Flowers (not the same as the Sweet Heart Rose but similar) from JBM's Floral Stitches book on page 94.

Here is a closer look at the crystal heart "necklace" I added using one of the challenge fibers that is couched down with a gold thread in tiny running stitches. A couple more double sequin butterflies are fluttering about it as well!Here's a look at the fluttering of double sequin butterflies! What I did was use 2 of the same shaped sequin and overlapped them. Underneath is a gold one and over it is a clear one which calmed the tone of the gold and even added a greenish tinge making the butterflies just perfect!
You can also see another key tucked in this area. I also added some green feather stitches as background greenery.

I added a large vine that I created by a feather stitch wandering about and then I added ribbon stitch leaves to each arm and then added gold bead caps with gold pearls for flowers.

I added a piece of feather trim with another key tucked in on top of it. Also below the feathers is a fancy button on top of some rushed fiber from the challenge package.

I added a gorgeous bee buzzing about and above the bee is a seam of cretan stitch in shiny gold thread.

I added a little floral motif over the top of some more of the dyed lace acting as moss. The motif is made using stem stitch for the stems, lazy daisies as the leaves with seed beads added to the centers, and for the flowers is 5 petals of ribbon stitch with a slight loop left on the tips and a gold seed bead in the center.

I tucked in a bit more feather stitching at the top. In the center is a Keyhole that I added gold glitter to the center since I didn't like what was in the center previously. I think the glitter adds the the magical feel!
To the left of the keyhole is a piece of hand dyed lace and a string of pearls. The original set of pearls was too large so I removed the clasp and added my own gold pearls and sewed it all down!
WOW that was a lot to look at and explain!!! And yet I still have so much more to share!!!
More to come...

Christmas Gift: SRE Embellished Family Portrait

This year for a Secret Santa gift exchange I got a sweet lady who has 4 adorable kids! So I got the idea to use a couple of their family photos and create something special with it. The finished project will be framed. For the background I used a sweet polka dot print and ironed on some photos printed on fabric sheets made for this. I also cut the photos into ovals. My plan is to do a lot of Silk Ribbon Embroidery around the photos and make it really special.

At the top I wanted the word "Family" so I used a word processing program to print out "Family" in the French Script Font. I then used a light box and traced it onto the fabric with pencil.
I stitched in the word using 1 strand green DMC floss in Stem Stitch and then started adding bead embroidery to the spaces of each letter. I used tiny size 15 seed beads.

My Annual Christmas Ornament Creations

This was all created Oct.1 but I haven't had the chance to blog it until now!!!
On the far right is the collaboration ornament of Elizabeth and me and the other 2 to the left are the ones I created while she was having fun creating!

Here's my first one which I choose to keep for myself. Every year I make Christmas Ornaments: One for our tree, one for Wendy, and one for the annual Ladies Ornament Exchange at our church.

This is the second one I made and Wendy loved it so it will be hers!

This last one was created after I saw Allie Aller's Crumb Piecing Tutorial! I just took all the scraps from my and Elizabeth's creations, crumb pieced them and then cut it down into a square. I think it still needs a few extra sparkly embellishments before it's totally finished but it is really cute as is too!

Elizabeth's Christmas Ornaments!

This was all created Oct.1 but I haven't had the chance to blog it until now!!!
This is Elizabeth!

She LOVES to create stuff!

She wanted to learn to sew so we started with a small CQ heart to turn into an ornament, but she almost despaired when she saw how her heart was turning out. When I looked at it I didn't see it as "messed up" I saw the start of the style of fiber art I see online all the time so I suggested that she sew bits of lace on random fashion like Lilla LeVine does! She loved that idea and here is the result! I told her this was the perfect example of what my Art Teacher would always say "Art is making order out of chaos!".

Isn't it amazing!!! I loved it so much that she let me have it for my own Christmas tree! How special it's truly a treasure to me! I suggested adding some embellishments to make it extra pretty and she didn't feel like doing that but said I could go ahead and do that part! LOL She's not into fine detail work yet, but I remember being that way myself! LOL
Here is the finished Ornament after I added a few finishing embellishments. I think our collaboration turned out to be a wonderful memory that I will cherish every year as I place it on my tree!

Here's three other ornaments she made and this time she sewed on some embellishments! Aren't they so creative and cute!?! Every year our church does a Ladies Ornament Exchange and she says she's going to use these as her Ornaments as a set.

She also whipped together a couple of blocks to stick in her school binder.

Next post I'll show you the ornaments I made while she was making hers!!!