Fourteen Years Later I Finally Had Time To Finish The Wood Christmas Ornament Pieces

I often get asked how I manage to make so many things. My answer is always - think kits and assembly line. Whenever I've made something over the years I've always made a  bunch at once in an assembly line fashion creating kits to be done at some later point in time.

For instance when I was in my woodworking phase I would spend days on end outlining the pattern pieces on the wood pieces hubby and I had bought. Then hubby and I would spend days on end cutting the wood. If the projects called for fabric or other embellishments I would spend days on end cutting the fabric and putting all the embellishments together. Then I would put everything together in a kit and store it until I was ready to make it.

When I did make it I would make many at one time painting everything that needed painting first, then sewing everything that needed sewing, gluing everything that needed gluing, etc. Multiple projects were worked on at the same time which, in the end, resulting in my being able to make a lot of things in less time. If I made each item one at a time I would waste a lot of time in the set up and cleaning up of tools and work areas each time. If you do it all at once you only set up and clean that particular area once.

Needless to say since I never do anything in moderation I have a lot of kits waiting to be assembled. So, since I was working on the wood projects for my Tinytopia class I decided to see what other wood kits I had waiting to be finished and found two that could be made at the same time as the projects for my class.

One of the wood kits I had waiting to be made was from a Plum Purdy by Renee Mullins pattern I had bought in 2001. The pattern called for making 6 wood Christmas ornaments painted on one side. I had cut two pieces of wood for each ornament so I would be making 12 ornaments.

I was hoping to show you a picture of the pattern but it is so old it is no longer in circulation - at least I couldn't find a picture of it online.

Since I was now in a mixed media phase I decided to finish the ornaments this way on both sides.  I would be painting, collaging, embellishing, sculpting, stenciling, gluing and sewing the ornaments in various mixed media ways.

Here's my results:

 

Fronts of the two Santa ornaments.

Backs of the two Santa ornaments.

Fronts of the two mitten ornaments.

Backs of the two mitten ornaments.

Fronts of the two snowman ornaments.

Backs of the two snowman ornaments.

Fronts of the two stocking ornaments.

Backs of the two stocking ornaments.

Fronts of the two gingerbread ornaments.

Backs of the two gingerbread ornaments.

Fronts of the two angel ornaments.

Backs of the two angel ornaments.

Fourteen years later and this kit was finally finished.  Albeit not like the pattern had called for, but finished the way I wanted to for now.  In looking at the ornaments I was pleased with the way they had all turned out.  I hope you would agree.