Puzzle Party!

To celebrate my 54th birthday back in March, I threw myself a jigsaw puzzle party. It was awesome. I printed the photos right away, but I'd been waiting to scrap them until I could get my hands on puzzle patterned paper. As soon as it showed up, I made this page. 

Puzzle Party (affiliate link)

I've been doing modern scrapbooking for 25+ years and this is the first time EVER that I used up all of the letter Zs on a sticker sheet before running out of any other letter! Using one Z is really rare for me and running out of them - ever, let alone first! - is unheard of. Like most people, I tend to run out of the vowels and letters like S, T, and R. Anyway, that was a fun first for me. 

Perler Bead Lighthouse

My latest internet rabbit hole led me to lighthouses. I learned that there are 750+ standing lighthouses in the US, of which approximately 450 work. All are fully automated. There are lighthouses in 31 states; Michigan has the most by far. There is some debate about how to define what exactly a lighthouse is, but most experts agree that Michigan has around 129. Maine and New York each have around 65, followed by Massachusetts (52), California (45), Wisconsin (43), Washington (30), Florida (30), North Carolina (29), and Ohio (26). 

The vast majority of lighthouses are white for easy visibility. Some have colored patterns (usually black, red, or unpainted brick) called "daymarks" that provide a contrast with the sky and water for easy identification during daylight. Lighthouses come in a wide variety of shapes and styles. Rather than design a craft for one specific lighthouse, I decided to make a generic design that represents the hundreds of lighthouses in our country. Affiliate links below. 

Perler Bead Lighthouse

Materials:

• large square pegboard
• Perler fuse beads
• iron

Steps: 

Start by placing three black beads at the bottom center of the pegboard. Add five white beads on either side of the black beads. Repeat this same pattern for the next three rows up. Then add four rows of 13 white beads, then one row of 13 grey beads. 

Add two rows of 11 white beads centered over the grey row. Then make three rows with two white, two black, three white, two black, and two white. Add two more rows of 11 white beads, then 11 grey beads, then 11 black beads.

The next row up has 9 black beads. Then add three rows with one black, three yellow, one black, three yellow, and one black. The next row has 11 black beads. Add two rows of 7 black beads, then one row with 5 black beads, one row with 3 black beads, and a single black bead at the top. 

My pattern is easy to alter if you want to make a lighthouse that looks different. Just change out the colors to add daymarks, make it wider, make it taller (you'll need to use a second board), move the windows, etc. You can base your project on an existing lighthouse or design your own like I did!

State Name Art: Kansas, Delaware, Iowa, and Nevada

I finished a second batch of State Name Art. This time, I made Kansas, Nevada, Delaware, and Iowa. I love how they're completely different from each other and from the four I previously made. Affiliate links below. 

 

State Name Art

Materials:

• Bristol vellum
• Flair pens
• colored pencils
• white Posca pen (Nevada)
• microtip scissors
• colored cardstock
• glue stick

Steps: 

Print or trace the outline of a state onto paper. (Bristol vellum is my favorite when working with colored pencils.) I made the outlines using the graphics on PicMonkey, but there are plenty of places to find outlines. Students can draw their own outlines or use pre-prepared tracers. 

Use a pencil to very lightly sketch in the letters of the state. Make adjustments until you are happy with the letters. Some letters may be distorted or have missing parts; that's perfectly fine as long as the state name is legible. Outline the letters with a Flair pen, then color in all spaces that aren't part of the name.  

Lightly sketch a scene across the white space of the letters that represents the state. When you are happy with what you've sketched, fill it in with colored pencils. I did sunflowers for Kansas...

... the beach for Delaware...

... a cornfield for Iowa...

... and a night sky in Nevada. After coloring this scene with colored pencils, I used a Posca pen to add the stars. 

Cut out the state and glue it to colored construction paper. 

I had a lot of fun with this latest batch of states. Figuring out each one is very satisfying. As I said before, I have no intention of doing all 50, but I'll keep going for now! 

I Finished My Second Quilt

I was so excited to finish my first-ever quilt and I am just as excited about my second quilt! 

I didn't select the fabrics for my first quilt. I'd volunteered to take a pile of donated fabrics home to cut into squares and eventually had the courage to sew them together. I asked the experts in our group to teach me each skill as I went, since I was learning to sew as I was learning to quilt. I struggled and made a lot of mistakes but I'm really proud of that first quilt. 

For this second quilt, I had full control over everything. I started with six pre-cut blocks from our big stash, then picked other fabrics to go with them. I put the top together much faster (and with far less seam-ripping) than last time, despite having to piece more blocks together. While very few of my corners lined up last time, most of them do on this quilt. I was able to do all the steps without asking for advice. Binding was still the trickiest part for me, but even that went better this time. It's exciting to see how much my skills have improved from my first quilt to my second. I still have a lot of basics to master, but that will come with practice. I'm eager to get started on my third quilt! 

As a reminder, all of the quilts that the St. Mark's Quilters make go to Lutheran World Relief, which passes them on to people around the world following natural disaster or war. We accept donations of fabric, batting, and thread, as well as monetary donations to pay for shipping the quilts. Each quilt costs about $4 to get to people in need. The quilt I just finished is our 41st quilt of the year. We hope to finish a lot more, so shipping costs will add up. 

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I photographed the quilt on our dining room table, which is part of the bunny territory. This might be obvious from the bunny toys and open box of hay that are visible in the first picture. It's definitely obvious in this photo, with visible pens and litterboxes. 

Did you spot Tulip, checking out the chair? Bunnies are ridiculously curious, which meant that the second I moved the front chair away from the table, Tulip ran over to check it out. Even though it's the same chair she regularly naps on, somehow it's different and needs a full inspection. Silly bunny!

Common Loon Craft

The common loon is a beautiful and distinctive bird that lives primarily on lakes in the northern US and Canada. An expert diver, 80% of its diet is fish. The loon is the state bird of Minnesota (and the provincial bird of Ontario, Canada) and is also found in abundance in Wisconsin, Maine, Michigan, New Hampshire, and Alaska. Make a loon of your own by following this easy tutorial. Affiliate links below. 

Common Loon Craft

Materials: 

• cardstock (black, two shades of blue)
• scissors
• colored pencils
• white Posca pen
• craft glue

Steps: 

Cut out the basic shape of the loon from black cardstock. Draw your own on scratch paper first or print my shape below in the correct size to use as a template. 

Shade the loon's beak with a grey colored pencil. Use a black colored pencil to add a line to define the upper and bottom mandible. 

Color the eye orange, then add a black pupil in the center. Use an extra-fine Posca marker to add a white catchlight at the top of the eye. 

Draw a series of vertical lines along the throat and the back of the neck to make the distinctive bands. 

Use a Posca pen to make the rest of the markings on the loon: white hatch marks on its breast, curved white lines on its shoulders, and blocks of white on the wing that are bigger at the top and center than lower and on the sides. Finally, use the grey colored pencil to define the tail feathers. 

The underside of the loon is white like its chest, but I didn't bother coloring it since I knew it would be covered by the water. Also, I trimmed the loon to give it a more rounded bottom. Here's my finished loon. 

Cut three (or more) strips of cardstock to make the lake water. You want them to be a little wavy. Glue one piece to your background paper, then glue the loon on top of that. Glue the next strip so that it covers the underside of the loon, then glue the final strip over that. 

I'm glad to have made this project and learned more about this super cool bird!