A Couple Small Projects: Hair Clips & a Pillow

In between working on crochet projects, I've finished a few other small things here and there.

This week I organized my girls' hair stuff drawer (yes, a whole drawer - three girls, lots of hair) and I pulled out bows that had been worn till tarnished and dirty and flower clips with flowers falling off and the like.

The flower clips I repaired by adding some extra blossoms (forgive the busy newspaper print underneath the clips):

The dirty bows I pulled off and threw away, and then I hot-glued new flowers onto the still-useful clips (you can see the clip at the far left awaiting its blossoms):
I repaired a couple of headbands (gluing feathers and flowers back on) and then made a little something for me, perfect for sticking into one side of an updo (it's glued to a clear acrylic hair comb, which you can see under the flower if you look closely):

I love how quickly you can make something pretty with hot glue. Before I married my husband, I thought hot glue was fussy and more trouble than it was worth. But . . . I was wrong. He converted me! (Though, I don't think I've ever seen him use it to make hair things . . )

Also, since I had the sewing machine out for a larger project (that's still in process), I whipped up a quick throw pillow using a couple of large, pretty cloth napkins I'd bought on clearance, oh, a year ago? Here it is:

Forgive the bad light (it's been cloudy here), but isn't that embroidery lovely? Since the napkins already had that lovely, thick hemming job on them, I just cut the tags off and then traced the already existent-stitching with my sewing machine to sew the two together, right sides out, left a small hole, stuffed them with fiberfill, and stitched up the opening. Result: pillow!

It was so easy, I want to keep my eyes out for more pretty napkins at Marshall's!

It's nice to have some little things finished in the midst of bigger projects. Gives me the juice to keep going.

Speaking of bigger projects, because I so needed another one, I just started a cardigan in broomstick lace:

Yeah. I'm hopeless. :) Truth is, handiwork, I find, much like exercise and writing, fights the winter blues. Something about the tangible, actual, beauty of it makes me feel that life can't be as bad as I'm sometimes tempted to think. It's as if producing order in the work between the tips of my fingers restores the order in my emotions and my mind. It's a very great gift, work. Praise God for it. Amen.

Peace of Christ to you,

Jessica Snell