The Evolution of a Doll, Creating Yourself

 Every day, I feel like I am creating myself. Who I am as a mother, as an artist, as a friend and partner and sister and daughter. Who I am as a thinker and a doer.

It's an evolution not unlike creating... art, crafts, food, novels, business plans, outfits, papers... whatever.

Dolls.

Like this here doll I made my daughter for Christmas.

Here she is, nothing but a sketched out pattern and some upcycled t-shirt material.  I took my scissors to it and cut away everything that she was not.

Leaving her with a basic, disassembled, empty shape.

 In this scene, my doll has been sewn up and filled with stuffing. I've begun to MAKE her, to take the ideas of her and put her into reality, give her form and shape. She's a doll now. Anyone could look at her and say, that's a doll. (Here she's sitting next to another gift, unformed, which turned out to be a pink kitty.)

You see the thing is, nothing we create will ever get to BE anything until we actually start, until we put it through that sewing machine, and take it all the way, see what happens with all that machinery and sharp pointy things and fears of what might go wrong or how the machine might break down (mine did) or how we might forget how to use the mighty machinery (I didn't) or maybe my doll might not look like what I wanted her to look like (she didn't really look like what I imagined at all, she became her own thing.) You just have to do it. Put yourself out there and say, YES, I will do this thing.

Once you have the basic shape of your doll, that's when you can start putting your personality into her. That's when you can start giving her the colors, trying out different ways of making her look. Here, I'm giving a go to see how the different colored felt pieces might make her look, trying out some placements for her cheeks and eyes and lips and hair. This was not the first combination I tried. I held up different colors, cut out many little circles, tried different shapes and sizes. And this was not the first time I'd made this kind of doll face, either, she is just another variation on work that I've already done.

 Here I have committed to my choices. I've gone and pinned them down. Made them real and permanent. There's no more changing my mind on the color of eyes or lips. Again, did she turn out like I thought she would? Not quite. But in the sewing, in the doing, she became her own thing, not just an idea, but a doll. This doll.

 Then I tried some of the stuff I'd never tried before. Always in the past, I'd made hair with yarn or embroidery floss, but this time I knew I wanted to try felt. How would it work? I didn't know. It was an experiment, something new to try, a risk. And I gave it a shot.

 Here she is with face and hair, after all my giving it a go and planning and making my ideas come real and trying out different variations and committing to my choices and stitching it all down and making it real.

She's a doll.

 I like her.

Originally, she was inspired by two things... the scrap fabric I had, aka brown t-shirt, and the vintage doll dress. I made the original pattern so that she would fit into this dress. After that, I allowed myself to be inspired by the various dolls I have seen and loved and by what I had already done with doll making. I mean, this is why you have a daughter, right? To make girly stuff for them?

It doesn't matter that she didn't like the yellow dress on this doll and made me make her a pink dress out of scrap fabric, right?  Or that she'll probably change the scrap pink dress, even though she designed it, and put her in a different vintage doll dress.

What matters is I went all the way in and trusted my abilities and my judgment and gave it a go. What matters is I took it to the end of the journey and didn't give up. What matters is I made it. I thought of it, dreamed it, planned it, trouble shot it, detailed it, put it all together and then put it out into the world, I mean, gave it to a five year old.

Make a doll. Make a craft. Make a painting. Make a novel. Make a home. Make a business. Make a life. Create yourself. Those things are not you, and yet, the making of them makes you.

What are you making?

Abundance and 96-100 in the 100 days creative challenge,

 Branched
gold acrylic paint and pen on paper
96/100

Yesterday was my 100th day of my 100 creative works in 100 days challenge.

Woo hoo.

I actually did it. I didn't even cheat. I missed two months of painting and drawing because of my move, but I was able to get my grove back and restart my creativity. Maybe it's a good idea that I did commit to finishing this task, against the odds, because it meant my creativity didn't get lost in the many duties of moving. And life. Don't forget life.

This is a painting of a branch. In gold. I had extra gold paint on my palette from painting another picture, so i wanted to use the last of it, and I've always loved those twisty branches, so... No special meaning behind it.

Monster Plans
watercolor, pencil, pen on paper
97/100

These are plans for a horde of monsters I am going to make my son for Christmas. A kraken looks an awful lot like an octopus, and godzilla looks an awful lot like a T-rex. Interesting. The plan here is to use felt and cotton knit and buttons and embroidery floss.

I need to do less planning and more sewing though.

 this bowl is full of abundance
pencil, water color, ink wash and acrylic on paper
98/100

This is another empty/full bowl. This one  I designed with gold leaves and pomegranates to symbolize abundance. The bowl is marked with hatches, which to me always represents time. The background is a dark, deep brown, like fertile earth.

An incomplete symbology

ink and watercolor on paper

99/100

Speaking of symbols, here I drew out my own study sheet. I was just thinking about some of the symbols I seem to use over and over again. Sometimes when I paint, it's a kind of language, I paint stories... or parts of stories, and the symbols are part of the meaning making. 

Too many years reading and writing poetry. :)

Miniature doll in progress
paper clay, silver wire
100/100

And for my 100th work of art, I am posting a paperclay doll that I started. She's not done in the slightest, but I don't feel bad about using a WIP for my last entry. It's a new challenge for me and I have been wanting to try it for ages. Plus, I think it looks kind of cool unfinished, just the white paper clay and the silver wire.

It was even better before I dropped it while the clay was still damp and it landed face down on the floor. She got a little smooshed. Oops. I tried to fix her the best I could. I think when she's dry all the way, the paint will go a long way to making her look better. What I've seen of the tiny dolls people make, they don't have to have all the details in the clay. You can just give suggestions of the features, then when you paint her face, she gets her personality.

I intend to give her hands and feet attached to the wire, then wrap the exposed wire with florist tape, then make tiny clothes out of fabric. I do not know who she will be. She might be a woman from the 30s or 40s... as I think about the hair style that I kind of molded a bit already. We shall see. Whatever she develops into, that's part of the fun.

And I guess that's why I picked this piece for my last entry, instead of another piece that I completed... because where I'm going in my creativity is still unwritten.

I think I've entered some territory that is new to me, and have developed some techniques and ideas that are rather interesting. That's one of the best things about doing this challenge, watching how you develop as you go. It's such an extended project, one of small babysteps, that you can actually see the journey you make and you can see how one thing leads to the next.

And so now I'm done and I can relax on the posting, but I do hope that I can continue with my art work and see where it takes me next.

I do recommend this as a challenge for anyone. It is a challenging journey, but if you keep your daily goals small enough, it is not impossible. You'll notice that whenever I got behind in my count, my art work would get smaller and simpler, and that's okay, it still moves you forward. If 100 days is too long a challenge, you can do a month of art works, or  43 days. Or whatever number suits your life. It's committing to the creating that makes it worthwhile.

Getting My Houses in Order, 61-66/100

Little Houses
paper clay, acrylic paint and ink
3/4"-1 1/4" tall

These took awhile to make. And my daughter instructed me in how to paint many of them. The gold paint was her idea, although I decided to use it also on the windows, to represent all the light and merry making going on inside of the little houses.

Yellow House

61/100

I have not decided what I will be doing with these little houses. My daughter says I should make teeny tiny people to go with them, but that would make them millimeters tall, since the largest house is only an inch and a quarter. 

Gold Roof house
62/100

 This one. One inch and a quarter.

And the gold roof. My daughter's idea. These are things that I am adding to my total of 100 works in 100 days, although they are not paintings. A lot of things go into being me, me as an artist. And a slight obsession with houses and miniatures are some of those things. And sometimes miniature houses.

I was thinking I should make some little set, a little diorama or something with them, putting them into tiny boxes. I don't know. It's an idea.

Gray House
63/100

Sorry about the photography. I am not quite set up for a photo studio. That's one of the things I want to set up in my work space, and I'm not sure quite how I'm going to do that.

 Blue House
64/100

This one reminds me a tiny bit of the house where I'm living now. I think that's why I painted it the blue-gray.

Little White House with Red Roof
65/100

This little house sometimes finds its way into my paintings. I have no reason why. You'll have to figure it out yourself.

White House with Gray Roof
66/100

With these houses, I am still behind in my challenge. There are 14 days left. I have 34 pieces left to do. That's about three a day.

This is indeed a challenge. A tighter one than I gave myself to begin with.

Oh well. I guess the whole commitment is about the COMMITMENT. Am I committed?  Yes I am committed.

It turns out I was not as committed to nanwrimo this year. I gave that one up as soon as I sat down in my new studio and thought about all of the very many things that I really wanted/needed to do, various other commitments that I needed to take care of to get my house in order.

One of the things I am committed to is to get an agent for my novel. I don't talk about my fiction writing in my blog very often. For some reason, it doesn't invite as much show and tell as the artwork does. So much of it is still in process and not ready to be shown.

The art is though? I can't explain.

Well, today I also did some work on querying and synopsis. I can't say even that is complete, but it's the process that is important. And it is, indeed, getting my house in order.

Moving House

Moving House

I've kind of fallen down on my 100 paintings in 100 days. A few days in, I discovered that I'd have to move in two months, and as the days got nearer, the stress and time constraints kept me from painting and even more, from posting.

Now, the 100 days is not actually over yet, so who knows, maybe I will manage to put it all together. I mean, I did do these little houses and charms, and perhaps if I count some of the other things I did, not just paintings, I might not be as far behind as I thought... but my 100 days is not moving smoothly.

Speaking of moving, my move is upon me. Today is the day when we hit the road, so perhaps in a few days when the travel is over and the dust has settled and we are ensconced in our Florida home with the warmer weather, I will come back and show you the plethora of travel themed sketches, paintings, feltie and paperclay projects I have done while riding in the car and trying to keep my kids entertained. I packed a bag with all the things I might need to do so. Wish me luck.

I'm going to take this as a lesson not to take things so seriously, to lighten up and enjoy the ride, even if the ride is bumpy. Perhaps I could have kept up with my painting if I had just remembered to breathe, and to do the work I needed to in the time I had, and then to take a break and do my painting when I needed to.

Oh yeah, I'm also doing nanowrimo.org, even though the first week will be rough in the writing department. I can catch up, I know.  I have always hit my word count, every time I've done it, even if I haven't written a successful novel.

Ah ha. I will take the lessons of my 100 in 100 kerfuffle. Do what I need to do. Take some time to breathe and focus on what I WANT to do. The kids can't talk the ENTIRE trip, right? There will be some time to get some brain space to write, right?  Right?

Oh well, I'll just go with the flow. Let the road rise to meet my feet, er, pen. Ok, enough mixed metaphors. I have to pack the last of the bags in the car and take off.

See ya on the flip side.

DIY Harry Potter Stuffed Owlets from Upcycled T-Shirts

Pigwidgeon's Pals 

DIY mini stuffed owls made from upcycled t shirts, felt and buttons.

Meet Pigwidgeon's pals.  We have here a Parliament of Owls. Parliament is the group word for owls, not flock. Hm.  And this is 20 owls, therefore, a parliament.  They might be considered owlets. I guess it's all in your perspective. For G's last birthday party (outer space theme) I made felt alien beanbags as favors. So when we decided on a Harry Potter theme for this year, I thought little owls would be a good favor. I was inspired by the stuffed animal pillows I made for my kids this past Christmas. The owlets are a variation on the larger owls.

I enjoy upcycling and recycling, so I went into it planning to use old t-shirts for the body of the owlets. Also, from experience, I've learned that I like felt for the applique, since you don't need to hem it. I use a nice, thick wool blend felt for these, rather than the polyester kind of craft felt you can find in craft stores. The cheaper felt pills very easily, but the more expensive felt can stand some wear and washing. I got mine here.

These aren't a complicated project, just time consuming when you're gathering a whole parliament. 

The first step, after collecting your t-shirts, is to cut out the shapes.  I wanted my owlets to be vaguely owl colored, so I picked neutral colors, grays, tans and white, for the snowy owls, of course. My daughter is crazy for pink, so I added in a gray and pink heart pattern for her. A whole bunch of different patterned owlets might be great, and I was tossing around the idea of mixing patterns... but with so many owlets on my plate, I decided to go simple.

I cut out different sized and proportioned ovals. I went into it with the intention of making each one different, so I wasn't looking for a pattern to make uniform owlets. If I wanted to, I would have drawn my first owl pattern on a piece of brown paper (remembering to leave an inch or so for sewing) and then just used the pattern as I was cutting out all of the owls.  For some of my owls, I wanted ears, so I added a scoop to the fabric at the top.

Make sure when you are cutting out your owl body shapes, you take TWO pieces of t-shirt and place them insides together, cut out your body from both shapes at once. That will mean that your irregular shaped pieces will make one irregular shaped owl, rather than having to match odd pieces into one owl.   Keep your owl body back and front together to simplify things later. Pin them if you are afraid the pieces will get lost.

 Here are some of the cut outs. They each have a back and front together. You can see the different oval/owl shapes here. Some are smaller, some wider, some taller, some larger. This is part of how we give them personality.

The next step is to cut out the felt faces. The faces are the rest of the personality.  I toyed with making separate eye balls, but in the interest of simplicity, I made these kind of number eight shapes, of the two eyeballs connected together.

To make sure the eyeball shapes worked on the owlet bodies, I kept trying them against the cut outs. That's how I chose the figure eight shapes vs two separate eye balls... they actually looked cuter.

I cut out little triangle shapes out of a contrasting color felt for the beaks.

As I began cutting out the felt faces, I began to experiment with the size and shape. I found my figure eights got larger as I went on, and I threw in some puffy heart shapes. Owls are not all the same and different breeds have different faces, so I liked the heart shapes to add some variation.

This is my little kit of owl supplies. You can see the pile of owl bodies in different colors and shapes. This pile is on top of the felt squares in colors I thought would work for my owls... mostly in whites, tans, and beigy yellow... although there is one bright yellow eyed guy. Not sure why I didn't make more in that color. He's cute.

Also in my project kit is a collection of needles, pins and various owlish colored threads and a bunch of buttons (inside the altoids tin). The buttons were used as eyes. Most of them are shades of black, tan or brown, with a little bit of pink thrown in for the girly girls.

Cute factor is important here. I actually tried on variations of all the faces on my owl bodies before I started sewing. I would test out the eyeballs on the tshirt, pick out the perfect buttons. Stand back a little, move the button in or out, the face up or down, squint at the soon to be owl face, and then, when I felt the, "awwwwww" reaction, I said, "yes, that's the one."

The first thing I would do, once I'd found the perfect face combination, in the perfect placement, was to stitch the buttons down, since that would keep most of the pieces in place enough for me to sew the whole thing.

As I went on I found that a little bit of fabric glue also made it more secure and sped up my parliament assembly line process of creating them and avoided the need for pins, but I'd still have to sew those buttons on.

You have to stitch the faces on before sewing the two sides of the bodies together or you make everything more difficult. In my case, sometimes I wanted the thread to show, so I picked contrasting thread for when I stitched the faces on. Some I wanted the stitching to be less obvious, so I chose the same tone of thread. I did not really try to hide the stitches. I like the hand made look, so I let it show, and I wasn't worried about the hand stitching being perfect. Again, that's part of the personality.

At this point, when the face was stitched on securely, I took both pieces of matching owl bodies and turned them inside out, outside faces touching and pinned them together, so that I could sew them.

I sewed them together on my sewing machine, leaving a seam allowance of about an inch (it was not important if it was perfect, because I was going for wonky and personality filled) more or less and sewed all around, leaving the bottom two or three inches open.

When the owlets were finished being sewn together, I turned them inside out, making sure that the ones with ear points were fully pointy (you can use a paintbrush or pencil to gently poke them out from the inside) and I stuffed them with poly fill. Fill them as full as you want.

Then, pin the opening with the seam allowance folded inside the bird. I used a hidden ladder stitch for this for the first time and was really pleased with how it turned out.

Voila.

Owlets done.

Oh. One more thing. When I was done, I found that some of the oval owls didn't quite look owlish enough. They looked kind of blobby. So I pinched ears into their heads and then simply stitched them with a couple of stitches. That's one of the fun things about making stuffed animals. You can actually sculpt them with a few stitches here and there.

Here's the whole parliament.

 Here are the pink heart ones. You can see the different faces here. There's a heart shaped one. The two on the left had ears pinched and stitched into their heads. The one on the right was left round headed.

The four white owlets. Notice the different sized eye/beak combo. How some eyes are closer together. The different effect that light buttons have vs darker buttons.. or the light and dark thread inside the eyes. Only the bottom owlet was left without pinched ears... because he looks like a little puff ball to me.

Tan owlets. Notice here that even the ovals are different shapes. Some pear shaped, some squarish, some are oriented upwards and some sideways.  And the eyes, faces and beaks all make for different guys. Two of these (left) were patterned with ears, and two of them (right) had ears pinched in. One of them looks like a potato.

 Here are the light gray owls. I really like the one with the little yellow face, and left him without ears. Another puffball.  He also has the smallest face of any of them.  And the darkest beak. But I also like the one with the big white face and yellow eyeballs and pinched ears. Oh, and the one with the darker yellowish face and brown button eyes. This might be my favorite collection.

The dark gray owls. Look at the difference between the two hear shaped faces here. In one, the face fills the whole body and there are bigger button eyes. In the other the face takes up half the body, which is pear shaped and the eyes are much smaller. Completely different personalities.

I hope when the kids pick out their owlet buddies, they leave me some of my favorites.

I thought I'd show you a sneak peak of my craft cupboard, though, since you saw one of my project boxes filled with the sewing supplies. I get these boxes from my job. They get them filled with herbs. I always saw the boxes and thought they were nice and sturdy and with a good size, and when I brought one home, thinking to put writing projects in them and sticking them in my book shelf for storage, I realized they were a perfect fit for my craft cupboard. I can keep my ongoing projects separated. I can easily grab a box and take it to my chair or bed or the porch or wherever I want to work.

The craft cupboard itself is a thrifted camp kitchen. There's even a little drawer in it for pencils (utensils, whatever) and the front opens up to make a work station. Perfect on top of a dresser for me.

I will show you a neater picture of it some day when I am not busy making a Harry Potter party.

Anyway, I must go. Happy crafting.

Can Eye Skip Today?

Eye.

Wax.

Day 8 AEDM

No, that is not a dried apricot.

That is an eye carved out of melted candle wax. I did it while avoiding my nanowrimo wordcount for today.

But I carved an eye.

And I hit 30 thousand words in my new novel. Bad words. Nonsense words. Words that will be removed when I finally figure out what words I SHOULD be writing in this book.

I am still cranky. I am still sick.

Can I skip today? (bad pun, I know. Plus, I did not skip today.)

Hi Ho, Silver-- I Mean, Glittery Ruby!

Glitter Ruby Horse (on desk, with plant and chocolate covered raisins.)

Plastic Cowboy Scene Horse, Gesso, Acrylic Paint, Acrylic Gel Medium, Glitter

11/02/10, AEDM #2

I had the urge, yesterday, to get some glitter out into the world.

Luckily, I had some glitter left over from Halloween projects. And unluckily for my kids' little toy horse, it was in my line of sight when the urge overtook me.

This could be a dangerous situation, as it is rather easy to turn something regular into something FABULOUS. Although it did demand patience, because there are four layers here, gesso, paint, gel medium (which might not be the best thing to make glitter stick) and glitter. And I needed to let most of these layers dry before moving on to the next. Which I did not. And it was hard to get the whole thing glittered without rubbing off some of the glitter that was already placed.

Anyway, I enjoy the broad definition of art in the AEDM rules, as this might be more properly defined as craft, but for me, I think it's a blurry distinction.

I showed my daughter, and she's already declared that she needs a pink glitter unicorn.

Glittery Ruby Horse on desk with plant and Creativity Jar

I also wanted to show you my jar of art projects.

I wrote ideas for projects on an index card, cut them up into little strips, then curled them on the end of a paintbrush and dropped them into the mason jar.

This is to help me out on those nights when I collapse on the couch after a long day, with nary a creative idea in my head.

I can reach over and pull a curly strip, and let chance decide how I will be creative that night. I haven't needed to do that yet, but I'm sure I will at some point. Every time I have a new idea, I write it down, make another strip and drop it in. And I also have no problem with rejecting an idea I pull, if I don't really want to do it. I don't want this to feel like work. I want it to be fun.

Last night, I was really tired and didn't want to create. I just wanted to be a shlub.... but I know that in order to develop the creative habit of nightly painting to the point where it is automatic instead of a chore I have to make myself do... I have to honor my commitment, my long term goal of creativity, rather than my short term desire to be lazy.

It's a delicate balance, trying to walk between that commitment and keeping it fun. But that's why we keep the rules light and flexible, so that there is room for both the commitment and the fun.

How are you doing in your creative commitments this month? Are you managing to remember that this is fun? Are you staying true to your long term desire to be creative, even though the fear pops up and tries to make you do something else, anything else?

Maybe the Glittery Ruby horse might serve as a reminder that we have to get back on that horse, if we want to get all the way to the end of our creative journeys. And yet, this is still a FABULOUS journey, full of joys and light and unexpected turns.

Hmm. Yes. I do think so.

I believe that Glittery Ruby Horse will find a place on my desk, as a muse to my creativity and a reminder to remember the joy.

(Now if only I can get her away from my daughter. Perhaps a promise of a glittery pink unicorn will do.)

Works In Progress

"begin again" or Prayer for Rain

54/100 in 100 days

Yesterday I meant to spend all my time finishing pieces that I had begun. Instead, I kind of sat around in a funk.

The day before yesterday, I finished this piece... a drawing I had started inspired by another artist's print.

I was completely unsatisfied with the piece. I'm afraid that sometimes I get so inspired by what's going on around me that I drift off track and try out someone else's voice instead of my own.

Of course what attracted me to the piece were the elements that I already had in my creative vocabulary, the swirls, the doodles, the floral thing, the rain drops.

Now I am almost satisfied, but that didn't happen until I got away from the other artist's vision and paid attention to what I had done myself. I had to be able to see my work in order to see what I needed to do to complete my picture... my voice, my vision.

Lotus Tears

56/100 in 100

recycled menu and ink

Interestingly, the same day at work, it was slow and I started doodling on a scrap piece of menu. This is what came out. I read on someone's blog (I lost the link, so if it was you, please tell me) how they had an assignment to incorporate a realistic eye into their doodles. I thought that was a great idea, and since it had been years since I have incorporated realistic eyes into my doodles (seriously it was kind of an obsession when I was younger) I thought I'd try it out.

Now this piece I really liked.

But do you see how the two pieces are connected, both inspired by something from someone else, but allowed to marinate in my own brain, they become my own.

Work in Progress

Yesterday, in my funk, I spent some time altering an old pink tshirt of S's that he would never wear because it is, uhm, pink, into a skirt for me. I used loose inspirations and directions from around the web, but mostly came up with it on my own... which is probably why there are some major flaws in the skirt and I am not showing it to you today. That's what I get for being lazy and trying to do as little sewing as possible.

Well I will revise it and get back to you, as I will with the 10" square canvas painted and have eyeing for editing, and my developing gallery wall, and my novel, and this little art doll I am working on.

I've already painted out the golden brown on her forehead and I think changed my mind on the babushka. It just never warmed up to it. It never felt right. I have a new idea, but it will take some time because I have to create some wings from paperclay. Yes wings. What, you thought something else? Have you met me?

But I joke. Yesterday was a day of works in progress.

The biggest work in progress is me. Especially in all my laziness and thwarted actions.

I am still learning how to do all of this, this art stuff, this internet stuff, this job stuff, this parenting stuff, this partnering stuff, this writing stuff. This living stuff.

We all are.

I think we all are.

Here's to you, you work in progress.

I believe in you.

Mandala for Exploration and Bounty

Mandala for Exploration

acrylic paint and scrap textile samples (cotton and linen)

43/100 in 100 days creative challenge and Day 3 in August Everyday

This last weekend, I took my kids to a town festival. On our way to the bouncy house and clown performance, we walked past all the merchants who had set up tables outside of their stores. One of the stores was a furniture store, and they had PILES of fabric samples for giveaway. I was being conservative and walked away with three packages.

This mandala is one of my first attempts to see what I could do with the bounty of fabric samples.Bounty of fabric samples.

Look at those colors and textures and patterns!

I am almost more excited at the varied types than I am at the cost (free!) Almost, not quite. I enjoy the challenge of turning what I have into something special. I get to look at the materials and figure out what I can do with it.

Sometimes the materials call out for their own project.

I particularly like the natural and organic linens and cottons that I used in the mandala. They fit with a project I have had in my mind for a long time... but they changed the project too. The mandala was a test to see how the paint would work on the cotton/linen for the working project, but I thought the test was successful. Maybe sometimes this week I will show you the larger working project. Right now it is sitting on my bookshelf, waiting for its next stage. It has said it is not done yet, although I'd already done the photo shoot. Oh, okay, if you insist. Here's a detail of the working project.

Does she look familiar? I posted her a while back. And she is one step closer towards completion.

I have so many things in a state of partial completion right now. I'm not just working on one piece at a time. I work on one thing and set it aside, finish a smaller project, go back to something from weeks ago. Do a craft project for the kids.

Perhaps I shouldn't have shown the art doll in progress. Or perhaps I shouldn't have counted this mandala as a part of my challenge on its own, since I'll probably take it into another level and create something with this small scrap of mandala... but hey, part of this challenge for me is to take a look at all of the ways I am being creative in my life and accept them as part of a

creative life.

Do you give yourself credit for all that you do? Or do you always say, "not yet" "I haven't done enough" "I am not good enough" "I have to do more, try harder, be better?"

I do. I say all those things to myself all the time.

But they aren't true.

The truth is you are good enough just the way you are, in your imperfection, in your attempts to grow and change and create and love. We are good enough even when we fail, when we don't reach our goals, when we don't do all those things that we think we "should."

We're all enough.

Do you believe it?

Upcycled Butterfly Decoration Tutorial

Tissue Butterfly

repurposed gift tissue, bread twist ties, acrylic paint, scrap felt, wire, cotton tie

40/100 in 100 days creative challenge

Here's the whole of the butterfly I made, inspired by the poof. It took me a whole week to make a new one, photograph the process, edit the photos, and find time to post. But here it is!! Woo Hoo! Tissue Paper Butterfly tutorial. Except I decided to shake things up with the second butterfly, and it's made out of..... plastic bags! That's right, reduce, reuse, recycle. Upcycle, baby. Repurpose it. That's how we roll in these parts.
Plastic Bag Butterfly

repurposed plastic bag, twisty bread ties, scrap felt, acrylic paint, wire, yarn

40/100 in 100 days creative challenge

It's already tried to escape the house once.

Here are the supplies.

• Your wing material, in this case, plastic gift bag. Also tissue paper could work, or news paper. I was thinking tulle might work, or even regular fabric for a different effect. Why does it always have to be tissue? It doesn't.
• scissors
• twisty ties to make legs, antennae and to keep the paper cinched (this could be floral wire, or yarn, or anything that ties/twists.
• acrylic paint to make the butterfly designs. This could be tempera or watercolor or vegetable dyes, or food coloring.
• scrap felt for the butterfly body. You could use regular fabric or construction paper or yarn, too, I'd think.
• paint brush
• paint palette. Or anything to hold your paint while you're using it.
• glue, thread, or yarn to attach the body to the butterfly

Cut the plastic bag/tissue into two rectangles, one larger for the main wings and one smaller for the lower wings.Trim the rectangles so there are no sharp edges. You can be creative here and make them different shapes. When I did this butterfly, I suddenly realized I should have left part of the bag handles on, to make a tail on the lower wings. Then I could have made this chartreuse plastic bag into a Luna Moth! Oh well. Next time I encounter a chartreuse gift bag.

Over lap the two pieces of plastic just a bit.Begin accordion folding your two pieces, starting at one side of the laid-out plastic.
Keep folding all the way down. When you get to the second piece, hold the two together so they are folded at the same time.

When the butterfly is folded, cinch it in the center with a bread tie. Make sure it is symmetrical on either side, since that is how you form the wings.

Add two more bread ties and twist them around until they look like legs. You might have to mess with them to get them in the right position.Before you unfold the accordion pleats, start painting the edges. Paint all the cut edges and also paint the pleated edges. Brush the paint on lightly, using a dry brush.

I thought this might be nice if you could get the paint to bleed into the paper, perhaps using food coloring or watercolor on a soft paper, like coffee filters. My materials didn't bleed, but I think it would make a good effect.

When you unfold it, the paint on the pleats will give the appearance of veins and colored lines. You may have to touch up the paint when it is unfolded, particularly on the edges that were hiding within the pleats.Pull apart the pleats and spread out the wings. Fluff them up. I accidentally made this butterfly two layers, so it might be fluffier than a one layer butterfly. The original plastic bag would have made two different butterflies of this size (using the front and back for two sets of top and bottom wings) , or one double size huge butterfly (using the front and back each for one top set of wings and one bottom set of wings)

Tip here: make sure you do unfold and fluff before the paint dries. If you let the paint dry, the pleats will stick together. Particularly if you are using more delicate tissue, this will make the wings tear when you pull them apart.
The body: This could be done many ways. It might be cute to actually make a tiny stuffed animal insect body. You could stitch it right onto the leg wires. Or you could make it out of construction paper. Here, I cut an insect shape out of felt.
I also poked two little holes into the head. I tied the insect body on with a long wire and poked the end of the wires through the holes to make antennae. I tried finishing this butterfly two ways. One way, I cut another smaller piece of felt out and glued it on top of the wires/felt construction. That looked really good, but I used the wrong glue or rushed, and it did not stick. It could easily be stitched down.
Here's the butterfly with glued felt. In the end, when the top felt fell off of this one, I actually wrapped the felt with yarn and tied it off underneath to make a hanging string. But I like the way this one looks, so this is the one I am presenting. Anyone wanting to try this could easily get better glue than I had.

So there is my Butterfly Tutorial.

If anyone decides to make this out of other materials, I'd love to see the results. I imagine you could make little ones out of tulle and fabric and decorate with sequins and beads. Or do a newspaper project with the kids. Or coffee filters. This can be any level of craft, from permanent clothing decoration (I wouldn't use bread ties for that) to a fun project wit the kids.