Paper Flower Balls and some other things

Hello Everyone!

I see I have a few new followers! Thanks for reading my ramblings!

I've been a bit under the weather here of late. Got the blues big time! Happens this time of year EVERY year so it really doesn't come as much of a surprise to me. I'll snap out of it eventually. I always do.

I get to thinking of what I don't have instead of what I do have and it gets me down. If you all knew what I have lost over the years, you would better understand the reason for the blues this time of year.
I won't go into all that's been lost over the years cause there isn't any way of getting back what's gone. I wallow in my memories of what was, what is and what will never again be. 

Simple as that.

Life. 

You take it one day at a time and hope for a better tomorrow than you had yesterday.  

I continue on though cause to not continue on is not an option.

And I continue creating things from castoffs.

The ornament project is coming along slowly this passed week. You'll understand when you see what I've been up to!

Pretty, isn't it?

Would be a lot prettier if it were all one color but I ran out of the pink, which is actually purple, just looks pink next to the purple color I had to substitute. 

I forget what the correct name of these balls are. Kudsama or something like that....really should go look that up.... kusudama....almost had it right! 

I found the tutorial for these guys here:

http://findinspirations.com/2009/07/handmade/

I knew I didn't have enough of any one paper (except orchard paper) so I decided I'd make them out of magazine pages cause I have enough magazines to last three lifetimes!

I cut the magazines into 2 inch squares and started folding, gluing and assembling. 

I've devoured many hours of watching movies and television programs on hulu.com

Each ball requires 60 little paper cones. Takes almost a minute and a half to make one little cone. The  more I made of these, the faster I got at it, but still takes over a minute for each one.

I started out with mostly black and white cones and the more I made, the more colorful they got. 

Takes five cones to make a star and 12 stars to make a ball. 

Tacky glue holds the cones together and fast drying glue holds the balls together.

(My supplier quit carrying the fast holding glue so I will have to rely on the tacky glue to hold the rest of these together that I make. It will work, will just take a little longer in the gluing time is all.)

I'm thinking they will get spray painted either silver or gold instead of just leaving them as is.

Each ball is about 3 inches in diameter. A good size for a tree ornament! 

Putting the little devils together is no mean feat! It takes concentration and a good steady hand to line up all those petal points so you don't end up with a cock-eyed ball!

There are 8 of them in this shot, all hanging from their white cotton strings from the cup hooks under the upper kitchen cabinets. Yes, I did have to remove a cup to put them here for photographing.

I'll be adding a plastic pearl to each star on the flowers when I get them all completed.

My two pink containers are once again filled with flower parts in preparation of putting more together. It's moving along nicely though, right on schedule! 

I've sewn another pair of elf slippers too.

I still need 8 pair of elf slippers so expect to see some more of these!

This is the second pair of yellow elf slippers.

When I downloaded the pictures of the elf slippers and the paper flower balls, a whole boatload of pictures came up on the download that I'm sure I already downloaded from the camera smart card but there they were, staring me in the face!

Thought I'd show you all a couple of the tasty pears that came off my trees this year!

These pears were delicious!

Last year, the pears were hard as rocks, misshapen and not fit to eat!  They were not sweet at all. Was like chewing on tasteless cardboard! The only thing the pears were good for last year, was to throw for that fool dog, Fred to fetch! He ate quite a few of them but we can't take his word that they were any good to eat. Fred is, afterall, a dog! And what do dogs know about quality pears?
Nothing! That's what dogs know about pears!

I sat the nice yellow pears on the dark green counter and took about 50 different pictures of these two. This is the nicest of all those shots! 

I never claimed to be a good photographer!

I'd still like to make some pear brandy! We had a bumper crop of pears this year! I'm hoping for another good crop next year! And next year, the old body willing, I intend to harvest more of them myself. Never did get to make that pear tart I wanted to make. The old body just hasn't been cooperative this year when it comes to physical work. Pears don't wait for a better day! When they're ready, you better be ready as well. I wasn't, not this year. 

I have green yarn now so I can finish up the red flower ornaments. You'll see those in the next post.
I also have some fishes started. I'm uncertain at this point, if those will materialize into actual fishes for this ornament project or if they will happen later. All depends on the progress of the elf shoes and the flower balls. 

Next post I'll do a recap of all the ornaments made thus far so I can see what's ready and what still needs done! I do believe the little birds will be in the ornament packages this year. I just love those little paper mache birds! LOVE THEM! I'll need to another batch of those for sure to have enough of them for the project but they go rather quickly so that shouldn't be a problem.

I'm going to try to keep a good attitude while these blues hang around. 

You all be good to one another! You really don't know what is in the minds of those you love. Remember to give some hugs and lend an ear from time to time!

Without love the world falters. Don't let the world falter on those you love.

Peace

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