Busy Little Bees Part 1

Happily, my class schedule is getting busier every month, and I have not had a lot of time to post.  Summertime was a very busy creative time in our "Get Your Craft On" classes, Dirt Therapy classes and Poly Clay Jewelry classes.   I would like to share with you a few of the projects we completed over the last few months.  Unfortunately, I sometimes forget to take pictures, so many of our projects go unrecorded- including some great tumbled stone decoupaged coasters, reed diffusers with customized fragrances and decorated vases and patriotic door hangers.

Going all the way back to July 4th- Here is a fun watercolor/ mixed media flag inspired project. I taught this project to seniors in Assisted Living and modified it for my Memory Care students as well.  Everyone was very happy with the results!  We painted the design in watercolor, applied glitter to the stars and dimensional paint to the frame.  We raised the stars with small pieces of foam core for a three dimensional look.

Patriotic Art Created by one of my students at Winters Park in Garland

One of the most popular projects of the summer were our painted tote bags with felt button embellishments.  I found some great tote bags at the Dollartree and used DecoArt fabric paints.  We embellished with Felt flowers and buttons from Michaels.

Pretty Tropical Bag for a Pretty Lady!

Another Happy Customer at Horizon Bay In Arlington, TX

In addition to our regular Arts and Craft classes- we sometimes work on Garden decorations.  Here is a great example of our completed pots for the patio at Silverado in Plano Texas.  These pots were made by my Memory Care students.  The designs were made by using our fingertips as the body of our butterflies.  The black painted details really make the designs stand out.  We placed the pots on their front porch area where they sit and enjoy time outside when it is nice.

Fingerprint Butterfles and Felt Flower Plant Pokes

Painted Pots with Summer Hardy Annuals

In addition to planting out our pots, we started vegetables from seed and planted them in our raised beds.  Here are a few of our sucesses.  Cucumbers, peas and radishes did pretty well until the really hot summer weather kicked in.

Cucumbers and Peas on the Bamboo Trellis

Cucmber on the Vine

We also have been having fun in our Poly Clay Jewelry Making classes.  I have found the secret to success- always keep all my students working on the same project.  In the past, I had the ladies make lots of different styles of beads and they would end up working on different projects- and many times, nothing ever got completed.  Now I choose one project and we all do the same design (then put our own spin on the project).

We recently tackled making Polymer Clay Calla Lily pendants and they came out beautifully!

Close up on our Calla Lily Pendant

Dee Dee and June at Signature Place in Dallas