Tiny Bird Nests... Spring is in the air!

Spring must be right around the corner.  My desk is covered in tiny little bird nests.

Pearly eggs of all colors, and wiry nests in silver, copper and rust are "spring"ing up everywhere,

all getting ready to go in tiny little shadowboxes:

Soon I'll add copper to these and solder them into necklace pendants.  I'm preparing for a couple of Spring boutiques, and thought these would be a nice offering for the new season just around the corner.

Flour Sack Babies

I've been wanting to do this post for a while, as kind of an experiment to see how many visitors I get.  You see, when I look at the stats for this blog, the post that gets by far the most hits is from way back two years ago, in February of 2010.  You can check it out here.  I wrote about a teen jewelry-making class we were hosting, and mentioned that some of the 8th-graders attending were doing their annual "Flour Sack Baby" project--and, as a requirement of that project, each brought along their little "baby" that they had to lug around and be responsible for all weekend. The girls proudly carried their wee ones: flour sacks wrapped in either blue or pink paper, which were further decked out in blankets, baby clothes and hats:

Well, it must be the season again for this assignment, because lately, their have been SO MANY Google searches for 'Flour Sack Babies' that end up here.  I'm talking hundreds and hundreds!

UPDATE: As of the end of July, this post has now had well over a thousand visits.  That just cracks me up...

Not exactly what I was expecting would entice visitors to my humble artsy-craftsy blog.  Oh well, welcome....nice of you to stop by!

As a bonus, I'm going to show the flour baby that my daughter made a few years ago, when it was time for HER to do this assignment:

 

How weird does this look?!?  She made a life-size copy of a photo of a baby's head, mounted it on foam-core so it would stand up, and attached it to the flour sack.  She shot this photo of the two of them in black& white, which seems to make that baby look more "real"--kinda creepy, huh?!  She carried him in a front-facing baby pack, which also looked creepy and hilarious to boot.

So, hope this helps those of you who are trying to find flour baby reference photos on Google.  Come back and visit again sometime!

February already?!?

A month sure passes quickly.   It's the beginning of February, and time once again to participate in the collage challenge hosted by Mary at Green Paper--using at least a part of the three elements she's provided, in a collage of my invention.  Here's my concoction:

 

She Had a Notion

These are the images she provided:

I added a couple of other elements, borrowed from The Graphics Fairy, to suggest a sewing/notions/dry goods theme, hinted at in the ledger-sheet image Mary provided.
And there you have it!