We got our first significant snowfall of the year today. I believe by this time last year, we had already used up four snow days on the school calendar. But it's Saturday today so we still haven't used one! It was really nice to be home doing indoor things - no errands and running around, just fun and family time.The "red-pink-white" charms I made need to be mailed on Monday, so I got busy finishing them up and getting them ready. I had to make 25 charms, so I used 15 of the heart charms I made for the "all hearts" swap and then made 10 of the variety shown below.
I was happy to find these inexpensive pink shell rings on sale at Michael's last week. I wasn't sure how I would use them, but I had so much fun coming up with different ways of combining them with beads and wire. Below is how I packaged the charms. On the other side of the card is my contact information, and on this side I stamped the little bunny and tied the charm on with bakery string (Don't you love bakery string? It's so festive looking. Remember the days when there was always a ball of striped bakery string in the messy drawer of the kitchen, just in case you needed to tie something up or wanted to play "cats cradle?"). The color scheme just seemed to fit!
Below is another charm I made up earlier this week. On one of my last trips to JoAnn's Fabrics, I bought out their entire stock of these cute glass bottles. I used some for my "snowstorm in a bottle" charms on my winter-themed bracelet, but I turned these into Valentine charms. I photocopied and drastically reduced a portion of a song by Andrew Lloyd Weber called "Love Changes Everything" and added that bar of music to the bottle along with some pink beads and red confetti hearts. Isn't it cute?
I also played with another method of making charms. I sandwiched a little collage between two pieces of memory glass one inch square. Rather than buying the premade metal holders for these or using solder to keep them together, I used polymer clay (I really don't feel like investing the time and money in learning to solder at this point in my life - maybe when I retire). I inserted a curved piece of wire to hold a jump ring before I baked it, and colored it with a silver metallic pen after I baked it. It's a little heavy and large for a charm on a bracelet, but it might make a cute necklace. I have a bunch more old stamps ready to turn into charms like this.
I made a few other charms out of polymer clay. I've seen people make miniature food out of clay and thought some sweets might be appropriate on a Valentine's Day charm bracelet. Here is a little mini cupcake...
... and here are some strawberry cream filled chocolate candies. Don't they look good enough to eat? Mmm!
Speaking of chocolate, next month I'll be making a variety of truffles with the adult Creative Playgroup. I needed to test out this easy recipe, and I decided a snowy day would be the perfect time to try it! These truffles are made with 3 cups of semi-sweet chocolate chips. Melt them in a glass bowl in the microwave and then stir in one can of sweetened condensed milk and a teaspoon of your choice of extract. You can then spread the mixture into a pan, cool, and cut into squares for fudge, or cool slightly, then roll in various toppings, as I did. I used almond extract and rolled them in coconut, chopped almonds, cocoa powder, powdered sugar, and white sprinkles. I think I like the coconut best. The recipe makes about 6 dozen. Wow! That should satisfy my need for chocolate for a long while! Hopefully, the girls will eat a bunch too - need to get back to healthy eating again!
Next post I'll show you photos of my first Valentine's Day charm bracelet. All I'll say is "I'm in love!"
I also played with another method of making charms. I sandwiched a little collage between two pieces of memory glass one inch square. Rather than buying the premade metal holders for these or using solder to keep them together, I used polymer clay (I really don't feel like investing the time and money in learning to solder at this point in my life - maybe when I retire). I inserted a curved piece of wire to hold a jump ring before I baked it, and colored it with a silver metallic pen after I baked it. It's a little heavy and large for a charm on a bracelet, but it might make a cute necklace. I have a bunch more old stamps ready to turn into charms like this.
I made a few other charms out of polymer clay. I've seen people make miniature food out of clay and thought some sweets might be appropriate on a Valentine's Day charm bracelet. Here is a little mini cupcake...
... and here are some strawberry cream filled chocolate candies. Don't they look good enough to eat? Mmm!
Speaking of chocolate, next month I'll be making a variety of truffles with the adult Creative Playgroup. I needed to test out this easy recipe, and I decided a snowy day would be the perfect time to try it! These truffles are made with 3 cups of semi-sweet chocolate chips. Melt them in a glass bowl in the microwave and then stir in one can of sweetened condensed milk and a teaspoon of your choice of extract. You can then spread the mixture into a pan, cool, and cut into squares for fudge, or cool slightly, then roll in various toppings, as I did. I used almond extract and rolled them in coconut, chopped almonds, cocoa powder, powdered sugar, and white sprinkles. I think I like the coconut best. The recipe makes about 6 dozen. Wow! That should satisfy my need for chocolate for a long while! Hopefully, the girls will eat a bunch too - need to get back to healthy eating again!
Next post I'll show you photos of my first Valentine's Day charm bracelet. All I'll say is "I'm in love!"
1 comment:
You are just amazing! Your mind keeps churning out one cute thing after another. I don't think I could pick a favorite, but being a big lover of chocolate, I might choose the candy with the bite taken out. I hope you sell a lot at the gift shop.
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