Bucket List

Happy Hump Day Everyone!  It is hard to celebrate it this week, it means Spring Break is half way over. I love hanging out with my kiddos.  I am going to start this off by showing you a sneak peek of barbwired beauty's room redo.  We are super excited about how everything is starting to look. You have got to come back and see the full reveal! 

Yesterday, in the midst of painting and projects.  My barbwired boy comes to me with a list.  Both of my kids are obsessive list makers.  barbwired beauty's lists for church camp involves color coding and pages and pages.  barbwired boy makes lists for toys he would like to receive.  However, this list was different it was unlike any he had brought to me before.  It was entitled, 'Brayden's Future List'.  I do not 

recall creating a future list at 9 years of age.  Hey I am....well older than 9 and I still haven't made a future list.  If you can't read it here it is.....

• Work for Hasbro ( the toy company, he has already submitted to them by email his interest in toy testing for them)
• Have all the G1s (this is the first generation of Transformer toys that were released by Hasbro in the 1980s)
• Have all the T3 toys (also Transformers, associated with the new movie coming out this summer)
• Adopt a boy (he has said, he does not want to get married but needs a son to hand down all these toys to)
• Be a collector ( check)
• Have a good life (check)
• Live with Mom and Dad forever (Mom wishes he'd keep this one, sigh)
• Have a good life (it does bear repeating)
• Live with my boy (with Mom and Dad of course)
• Go to college (thank goodness, he will need to support Mom, Dad and son!)
• Still have my toys (no doubt)
• Play with my son (what a good daddy)
• Keep my Fluffy ( his dog from Build a Bear)
• Finally, go to Heaven (AMEN!)

Now, isn't it amazing what we learn from our kids?  I think it is high time I made a list.  Have you made any lists?

Now let's make this cute lil' nest.  What I have here is a bird, nest and plaque that I have added on to an existing mini urn I got at a consignment shop for 50 cents.  It was gold, so I painted it black.  I need to tell you I am sorry, but most of the tutorial pictures were blurry and did not make the cut. 

I started out with several shades of brown, yellow, orange and tan.  I mixed them together to get my desired shading for the birds nest.

I promise that is polymer clay and not something I followed the dog around for.  Once the clay was conditioned, I put it in a clay gun to make strands of clay.

I also used a garlic press with darker brown shades of clay and made more strands.

I then formed it all into a bird's nest.  I then moved on to the eggs and bird.  I used five balls of the blue clay.  

(Insert imagination here, sorry no pics) 

I made four into egg shapes.  Three for the actual eggs and one for the birds body.  To the body, I added a small ball for the head.  I flipped up the tail and used a needle tool to make 'feathers'.  I took tiny pieces of clay and made a flattened tear drop shape for the wings and again used the needle to to imitate feathers. Finally for our little bird, I shaped an ultra small piece of brown clay for the beak.  I again used the needle tool to split the top from the bottom beak and applied it to the head. 

Finally, I flattened some blue and used a oval biscuit cutter to make our plaque.  Make sure and make holes if you need them to hang the plaque now.  I placed all of these in the oven according the manufacturers recommendations. 

Here are the pieces after the oven.

I decided they were too literal a color combination for me and decided to white wash all the pieces.  I watered down white acrylic paint, covered all the pieces, then wiped it off with a paper towel. 

I thought it made the detail stand out more on the pieces.  I then took the needle tool, dipped it in brown paint and speckled the eggs.

Now it was time for assembly.  I took some moss and added it in to the urn, set the nest on top and glued on the bird to the nest. 

For the plaque, I used my Micron pen Sakura Pigma Micron Pen Set #05, 0.45-Millimeter, 6-Pack, and wrote "Bless Our Nest" on the plaque.  I already had some wire that had little leaves on it.  I placed this through the holes and then secured it on to the handles of the urn. 

The nest is now complete!  What do you think?

Everyone in my nest thinks it's grand.

From my nest to your's ... Many blessings!!