Nest - Art Elements Challenge March 2018

Ugh, y'all, where the heck has March gone!?!?  I hope you can overlook the lack of text in this post, as I very much procrastinated my writing, and don't have a finished piece for the first time in a long time.  I've been slacking a bit with my creative renaissance, but some of it is that other things have been going like day job overtime that uses up extra energy.

This month has been the launch of a new era over at the Art Elements blog.  We are now starting to do theme challenges every month.  I am SUPER excited about this because now I can participate in our challenge with any of my myriad of hobbies.  Perhaps one challenge will inspire me to make a doll wardrobe.  Perhaps one will get me out of the box on my bug collecting.  Mixed media?  SURE!  Photography?  Why not!

2014 at the Knoxville Zoo with my friend's daughter.  This kid-sized nest is in the parakeet aviary!

I have always been a nest builder - I much preferred as a kid to build a nest out of pillows, cushions and comforters rather than a fort.  I love to be surrounded and supported on all sides by warm soft comfort, like a baby bird.  Add to that, my love for birds, especially baby birds.  Precocial or altricial, it doesn't matter.  We have had parakeets, chickens, quail, and for several years I was an active volunteer at a wildlife rehabilitation center and raised orphan songbirds every spring while in community college.

Several years ago I had a "great" idea for a necklace.  I asked Sue to make me some of her gorgeous robin egg beads, beaded them a nest, and had the whole thing connected to some leather straps, intending to twine branches, leaves and flowers up the straps...but it was just ...ugly.  Too much brown on brown on brown, with three little eggs floating in the middle.  So I cut it apart and started pulling new things to go with it. 

Here is the original nest with the little eggs.  I had some feathers already stitched that matched the color scheme, and pulled out this little sparrow netsuke as well.

Sparrow looks cute on the nest, but not quite what I had in mind.

In digging through my stash, I started to go another direction, but the original nest just wasn't doing it for me.

I cut the eggs out so I could use them in a new attempt...and then the little sparrow moved in.  I will probably just keep the nest and sparrow like this now, he seems so at home!

I captured the apple green face in blue, and then started building a tree in square stitch. 

After the tree was built up, I tucked a nest foundation behind the edge of the trunk and added the eggs.

I built it up with some strange hybrid of peyote and netting, then added intertwined strands and short fringes.  I will probably work back through this with some fine yarn or other fiber for some more authentic texture.

The back of the face is fully captured in more green and capri blue. 

I'm on the fence now.  Trying to decide if this buttefly wing is the way to go, or if I would rather head down the leaves or flowers road...

Additionally, I have been seriously considering sewing myself an adult human sized nest!  Surely I can just scale up this tutorial, right?

 I hope you had fun looking at the metamorphosis of this project!  I hope to keep going forward and finish this piece for wearing soon.  I just hate leaving something unfinished...and these little eggs deserve to not be crammed in a box anymore!  Please hop along and check out how everyone else has been inspired by nests this month.  The very best thing about our new challenges is that ANY of you can participate along with us!  Even if you don't have a blog but would like to play along, all you need to do is message me or any of the rest of the Art Elements crew!  We would be happy to include your pictures in a post!


Guest Participants-
Alysen
Anita
Divya
Kathy
Kym
Mona
Rosantia
Sarajo
Tammy


 AE team members-
Caroline
Cathy
Claire
Jenny
Laney
Leslie
Lindsay
Marsha
Niky