Pieces of Friendship - Part 2

I finished up my last 2 swap pieces and enjoyed every stitch! I'm excited to see what comes back.



My third piece is brown/gold/black. There are 2 open brass hearts in the middle tacked down with just a couple of tiny stitches and surrounded by black sequins with an added layer of transparent gold sequins on top of that and held in place by a tiny glass seed bead. A black 4mm Swarovski bicone sandwiched between two tiny seed beads. There is a vintage glass cab up in the upper left corner and another vintage glass cab in the lower right corner. A metal dragonfly bead in the lower left and vintage flower shaped sequins throughout the upper right held in place by more black Swarovski bicones.



Last is in my favorite colors. A beautiful filigree heart is the center piece, held in place by seed beads. A little metal bird charm has a place in the lower left and a metal ladybug bead on the lower right surrounded by vintage sequins. Some aqua glass flower beads and other random glass beads finish it off.



Here they are all together.

Now a quick photo tour of my weekend spent at the Becoming an Outdoorswoman program...



It sure felt good to be outside for an entire weekend and the bonus was meeting so many neat women.



One class I found most fascinating was 'Backyard Habitat', it focused on finding ways to landscape your yard using native plants to build habitat for wildlife. If that is something you find want to learn more about, I highly recommend the book that was a handout in our class - "Bringing Nature Home" by Douglas W. Tallamy. My goal now is to plant a butterfly garden in my backyard (among other things) specifically for Monarch's



Next was ATV safety. While I have ridden on an ATV numerous times, I have never learned much about safety, I found the lessons taught in this class quite valuable.



The setting was so pretty too - a large grassy area, right on the river.



Canoeing was next and even though I was tired, I had a great time. I don't know that I learned anything new, but I did have a blast just paddling around the little lake with my canoe mate.



My last class was Orienteering - always good to know how to use a compass and orient yourself on a map when you are in the outdoors. I'd like to spend more time using those skills - I don't understand it as well as I would like to at this point.



I didn't take a class in archery, but managed to snap a couple of photos.



Of course, there was a campfire on Saturday night - complete with ghost stories and marshmallow roasting.



Given the opportunity, I'd do it all over again in a second!

Next outing... a trip to the zoo with my grandson's second grade class on Friday, we have a wonderful childrens zoo here in Fort Wayne, a day spent there is always a good day.

Pieces of Friendship

One of the projects I'm working on right now is the Pieces of Friendship swap hosted by Pat Winter. I wanted to participate in the project to stretch myself a bit. I have never used a sewing machine (I didn't start with this project) and I don't quilt - so this posed a bit of a welcomed challenge for me.

Once I really dug into this I wondered what the heck I had gotten myself in to. Pat provided a pattern to use for the puzzle pieces - I knew I'd be beading my pieces, but hadn't given much thought to all the twists and turns that came with creating the pieces. I cut a template to be used in creating all the various pieces - it took a bit of effort to formulate in my mind how to accomplish putting the pieces together that would be stable and have a finished backside. Using my template I cut out 4 pieces of heavy duty Pellon to use as my stabilizer. Then found 4 different fabrics I liked and used the template to cut the fabric pieces into the puzzle shape.

I sewed the fabric to the Pellon using a whip stitch around the edges in the hopes it would limit the fraying. Once that was all done (YIKES that took a long time), I moved back into my comfort zone and began to add beads. Since this swap is about friendship I wanted to add a heart to each piece and go from there.



My first piece is pink - I started with the vintage tear drop shaped glass cabs, I don't know if you can see the subtle difference, but they are two slightly different colors. I ended up adding these and peyote stitching a bezel on each until I had a flower shape. I added a Swarovski crystal in the middle and finished off the flower with an outline of lined pink beads. Next added was the metal heart - you can't see it, but there are openings running top to bottom on the one side where I added the beads to hold the heart in place. There is a line of vintage sequins, a little cherub sew on and 3 dragonfly beads to complete it.



After the beading was complete, I measured and then cut out pieces of poster board - a bit smaller than the puzzle piece, I wanted to add a bit more stability to the finished piece. And a piece of Ultrasuede for the backing.



At that time I also added Fray check to the stitching on the back.



I added a little glue to the poster board and attached it to the back of the puzzle piece, once that was dry - I added a bit more glue to the front side of the poster board (just enough to hold it in place) and added the Ultrasuede. Then added another round of whip stitch to the outside edge.




Next piece - blues and some yellow. On this one I started with a big yellow glass heart bead, there are fire polished beads around the outside of the heart and 'rays' made of tiny bugle beads and itty bitty glass hearts. A metal happy face bead with sequins to frame it. A silver butterfly bead, a couple of metal dragonfly beads and a cute little metal bird bead to finish it.



Blue Ultrasuede completes it - now I'm on a roll! I should have the other 2 finished in the next week or so.

Note to Pat, even though I have pushed outside of my comfort zone on these pieces, I'm having a BLAST!

Each photo is 'clickable' for a larger view.

Next up - I'm out of town for a few days enjoying the outdoors and maybe even learning a little! I'm attending the BOW (Becoming an Outdoorswoman) program for the weekend. My classes include ATV Use and Safety; Backyard Wildlife, Canoeing and Orient Yourself Outdoors. And I'm hoping to camp out in my tent while I'm there. I'll be taking my camera and hope to capture at least some of it on film.

I've attended these programs in both Northern and Southern California. It is a WONDERFUL way to spend a weekend and learn a bit about the outdoors. The weekend is for women only and most programs offer classes in fishing, shooting, camping, survival, photography, outdoor cooking, archery and lots of other neat stuff. It's also a great way to meet new friends. If it's something that might interest you, I highly recommend that you learn more about it and maybe even check out the program in your state.

Even if you don't have someone to go with... go on your own! You'll have new friends by the time you leave.