General Conference Projects

This general conference I have been working on my Christmas Tree skirt. I am doing 5 scenes from the Christmas story that will be sewn together to form the skirt. I finally cut out the last two backgrounds today. So now I'm gonna put up the scenes, and tell you what I've done and what is still to be done.

First is the Angel appearing to Mary

The fabric I chose to do the walls on this one is pretty funky, but I hope it will work and give off the impression of a stone-ish type house. The room is probably bigger than is really realistic, but oh well.

I obviously still need to add the angel to this one. I need fabric for the angel robes, so those will not be done as soon as the rest of everything will be. I am considering redrawing my angels as well, because both of them (one in another scene) look a little odd. So we will see how that works out.

Second is Joseph and Mary Traveling to Bethlehem

I have somehow misplaced my donkey, so I am most likely going to have to cut out another one, but I have Mary all ready, and Joseph has all his pieces cut out, except his beard (it's the same story in the next frame as well). I had put Bethlehem on this already, but it was crooked, so I pulled it off (without damage to either piece yay!) and straightened it. It looks much better now. So this one really doesn't have much work to be done, besides Joseph's beard, even though it doesn't look very done. Oh yeah, and I guess the donkey, since I lost it.

Third is the Nativity Scene

Owing to the belief that the stable was more likely a cave-like place than a barn-type place, this scene takes place in a cave. The only players in it are Mary, baby Jesus, and Joseph. I have baby Jesus and Mary all done, just Joseph, once again. There is also a really big star to put right above the manger, outside of the cave, but I can't put it on until I figure out the size I will be cutting these all down to. I am somewhat dreading that part, as my patterns were a little lopsided, and I haven't figured out quite how I am going to get symetrical pieces with such a big circle. I will figure it out one day, and then I will do it. It's just like with Sonic's mask. I worried forever about it, eventually came up with a great idea, and it was a fairly painless process.

Fourth is the Angel appearing the the Shepherds

This is one of my favorite scenes so far, mainly because it is the most finished. All of those pieces are ironed down. The sheep are so cute. I had more of them, but it looked a little overly crowded, so I just didn't use them all. The angel will be up in the sky off to the right (where the shepherds are looking to. This is the piece that will probably determine how big the other pieces can be, as there is a lot of extra room on all the pieces but this one, though I think if I want to make it bigger, I can work something out. I messed up on the cave one, and ended up really short, but fixed that up, and I could rig up something to work here too.


Fifth is the Wise Men Coming to Jesus

Throughout the scenes, I have tried lean on the side of historically accurate, rather than what is traditional. That is why I have the wise men coming when Jesus is around two years old, and while he is in Egypt, because that is commonly believed to be the most likely time that the wise men found Jesus. As you can see, this scene is pretty much done. I just have to iron down everyone except Mary (she is already ironed down). I really like this scene as well.

I've also decided today that I am going to put corresponding scriptures to the scenes that they go with. The one about the shepherds, though, either sounds really odd "There were in that same country shepherds watching over their flocks by night", or dastardly long, and there would have to be two more verses to go with it. I am trying to figure out how I want to do the lettering. I know I do not want to applique it - I don't have the patience to trace the zillions of letters that would be by machine. My mom has an embroidery machine, so I could use that to do the lettering, and that may be what I end up going with, but I have seen one other way of lettering done, that if I can figure out how to do, would probably be my first choice. It looks pretty much like writing but is done with string. I don't really know how it is done. Actually, this isn't going to be a purely sewn piece, so I may paint the lettering as well. That is what I have decided to do with the facial features on the people.

The other thing I am considering is what color to put as the borders in between, and then what color to do the lettering on. I keep on having differing thoughts, but I probably won't decided finally until most of the pieces are done, and I take them to the fabric store and look at them all with various pieces of fabric. Actually, what I just thought of now that would be nice, would be to put them all together with a wood-type border. I've seen some really great wood-like fabrics. The only problem would be the grain on the curve. Ah well.

Oh yeah, I also have a few other promised pictures from before -

Janardan's Christmas present for me :

Actually, I think that's the only one. Oh yeah, there is one of my completed History of Creativity Project, but that is a poor quality picture, so I want to take another one, so I can get a really good one of it up on here.

I'm going to try and finish up the Josephs tonight, so that I can work on my new project idea tomorrow during conference. Making this tree skirt gave me the idea that I could make my own Christ-centered pieces to put up in my home, so I wouldn't just have the standard Mormon fair, but could have some of my own. There are two that I have ideas that I know I want to do. I want to do one of Christ calming the waters, and one just of Christ out in nature, I guess kind of a Gethsemane scene, but when it is light outside. I don't know what kind of sewing I want to do for the calming the waters one, but I know I want to do the just Christ picture as a paper piece, so I am going to try and start drawing a pattern tomorrow. I think the hardest part is going to be the face. It will probably take me a while to figure out how to make it look just right, but it will be a fun adventure, and hopefully will yield a very beautiful piece to hang in my home.