Saturday, May 10, 2008

look what I made today!

That's a sliver of black walnut in the middle of the lid. I took a pine needle basketry class today at the Birmingham Botanical Gardens. I'm giving this to my mamacita on the morrow. I thought I would try to find a wide glass dish to set down in it and get a posey of flowers to really show it off. It needs a coat of lacquer but I don't think that will happen before I give it to her. Yep, 31 years old and I still make stuff for my mom for Mother's Day...keeps me feelin' young!
It is now 10pm and I have been working on this since about 9:30 this morning, minus driving time and lunch and dinner of course. I really like the craft. There was someone from my book group in the class when I got there so I got to sit with someone I knew AND we decided we liked this well enough to go in together on the supplies to do it regularly. She has a long leaf pine in her yard and we'll buy some of the synthetic sinew and large sowing needles for the rest. The sawed nut shells we'll have to work on. It is fun and made me feel like a real folk artist although I did poke myself with the needle about 50 million times and ended up with the pointy end of a pine needle stuck in the tender flesh under my fingernail TWICE! It is not for the faint of heart or the easily bored. I would liken it to counted cross stitch or embroidery, only requiring more muscle :)
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