Heather Powers of
Art Bead Scene (as well as
Humblebeads and
Earrings Everyday) is hosting the second annual Art Bead Scene Ornament Blog Hop! Thanks Heather! Today is reveal day! Now, in a perfect world (I do NOT live in perfect), the perfect NEWLY created ornament that is in my head would be posted. As usual, life gets in the way (and a special family ornament crafting session to make ornaments for our oldest daughter’s first tree away from home). Thankfully, I've created enough Christmas ornaments over the last few years that I had one to post. So, for you folks who don't want the back-story, I'll post the picture right off. If you want to know how I got started with ornaments, and where I want to go with them, grab a cuppa', and keep reading. I have the gift (that's not what my family calls it) of gab. ;) Scroll to the bottom of the post for the list of participating bloggers and check out their artful creations!
This is a lion face I made for my daughter Gabrielle when she was in high school a couple of years ago. She went to an all-girls Catholic high school and was proudly a Lion. Then she went to college and was a Wheaton Lyon. This is a handpainted, stained glass ornament soldered with a lead free solder that contains sterling silver. It's made using the copper foil method of stained glass made famous by Tiffany. The first lion face I made for her looked like a bear she said. :( (It really does.)
I began, early in our marriage, picking up one beautiful handcrafted ornament for our tree each year. When our kids were little I would periodically buy them ornaments; not every year because we didn't always have the money. They then started creating Christmas ornaments in pre-school and elementary school and we added those to our tree. Soon, the tree became full of beautiful, special ornaments (our oldest daughter just took her box with her to her first apartment and has a lovely very first Christmas tree).
I've always had a craft or three going on but had never made ornaments for our tree or our kids until I saw a beautiful tree on the cover of Victoria Magazine years ago. It was a tree (and interior spread) decorated with ornaments by
Wells Jenkins of
Wells Ware. I. Fell. In. LOVE. I, however, could not afford them, as beautiful as they were. So, I had to figure out how they were made. I took a stained glass class that following year and learned how to cut and solder (though my soldering still needs work in my opinion), and figured out how to make them. The next fall I snuck into my parent's and in-law's homes, stole old family photos (copied and replaced them), and worked with our grandmothers to gather special photos. I made both sets of parents 13 or 14 ornaments each that year. It was, I think, the best gift (other than our children) we've ever given them. There were tears. It made my year. I was even able to get a photo of one set of my father-in-law's grandparents that he didn't know existed (the photo that is). Score!
Anyhoo, I continued working with glass through that winter and one day in March, my youngest daughter Gabrielle asked me if I would make her friend Annie a pin as part of her birthday present. Gabrielle was 6 1/2 at the time. I asked what kind of pin, she said a stained glass pin. I asked her if she just wanted me to glue a pin back to a piece of glass. She said no. She picked out a small curved triangular piece of pink/white wispy and asked me to paint a bird and a birdhouse on it (I did a little bit of decorative painting back then). I told her I thought the paint (acrylics) would scratch off. She thought about it a minute and said, "Well, if you use the boys' model paint it will stick. It sticks to everything you don't want it to." True that. Well, I made it, it was adorable, and we pinned it to her birthday card. That was the beginning of me painting on glass. The first ornament came a few short years after that when I was coaching one of her sports teams and made them for the girls at the end of the season.
As we were raising the kids, working, coaching - you know, life. I didn't have time for a lot of creating. So, still, there weren't a lot of ornaments created by me as they were growing. After we lost our beautiful TJ, we realigned. I have spent more time creating, but not enough. Work and life seem to get in the way still, but I'm trying to realign again. I have created some really unique ornaments over the last few years and there are many more (and other components) in my head and sketchbook. I want to bring them to fruition, to create the life I want to live - working from my studio, in jeans and a t-shirt, music playing and the studio door wide open (well, when it's not winter). It needs to become my priority, now that the kids are grown. I can make it happen, I just have to begin the journey and take one step at a time. "Go confidently in the direction of your dreams! Live the life you have imagined." -Thoreau
I know, it’s a book. Thanks for indulging me! Now, hop on over to check out the beautiful ornaments created by these lovely artists!
