summer flair

Maura and I took a walk around town today, and it is humid! It's the kind of weather that makes me wish I was on the beach or at least at the swimming pool!

It's a great time of year for ocean critter brooches, and I have a great selection in my Etsy shop. All of my brooches are hand cut from scrap wood and hand painted with care. This whale brooch is one of my favorites!

Stuffed Whale and Starfish

As I've probably mentioned before, I'm definitely not an expert seamstress. However, I can't resist a cuddly minky fabric. I wish everything was made of that extra soft, bumpy stuff! I got some use out of a little piece of minky while making a couple of stuffed animals for my one-year-old nephew, Trey, this Christmas.

With the help of some free internet patterns (which, by the way, were in a language that I CANNOT read), I created a simple whale and a little starfish (that's where the minky came in handy). My stitching is definitely amateurish, but I still love how they turned out. My new goal is to practice creating things like this so that someday you won't be able to tell where I hand-stitched at all!

Winston the Whale

I am officially getting extremely excited for my RAW expressions show this Thursday! I'm working on my display ideas today - so hopefully some pre-game setup pictures will be posted here later.

In other news, I'm also excessively excited to go to Arkansas with my sister Katie, cousin Jennifer, and friend Erin! I'm looking forward to a week of live music, family and fun.

Now, without further ado, my character of the day (also, a kindred spirit, as we share many of the same hobbies): Winston the Whale.

Winston is a scholarly fellow. You can often find him wearing thick rimmed glasses and reading the daily paper or solving calculus problems for fun in his spare time. His favorite drink is piping hot earl grey tea, which he sips in copious amounts from his favorite magenta recliner located in the library of his undersea home.