Whew. My wall “art” crafting marathon has concluded. That was a long couple of days, man. And yet, only one of the eight frames has actually been hung. The lone wall resident is this piece:

Isn’t it gorgeous?! I have to admit – I didn’t actually make this one. The beautiful embroidery hoop was a gift from our friend (and my bridesmaid) Jess. She got it from Etsy seller the merriweather council.

“Love is all you need” is in reference to the song I walked down the aisle to, and 07-02-11 is our wedding date. And the colors are our wedding colors! Isn’t it such an amazing gift?! The hoop could have been hung on its own, but I felt like it needed more attention drawn to it, so I mounted it on slightly-shimmery lavender scrapbook paper with hot glue. The shadow box frame is from Ikea, of course.

Here’s a closer-up view of the embroidery:

And a better shot of where it’s hangin’:

Please pardon the trash in my trash can. I know that’s where trash goes, but it’s still kind of unsightly. Luckily, there’s a lovely kitty next to it, prettying up the joint.

The other six pieces (the seventh, of course, is this one) are chilling on the floor for now, because hanging them is going to be a bitch, and I’m not mentally prepared for that yet.

It was so hard to photograph all six at once! I had to stand on a chair and switch lenses, and the picture still came out crappy! You can’t really tell from the photo above, but this is going to take up a lot of space – the whole thing is almost four feet wide, and three feet tall.

These are going to hang on the big wall over my media cabinet. I made the pieces by putting scrapbook paper in – you guessed it – Ikea Ribba frames. Here’s what one looks like a little closer up:

I really love them individually, but I have to admit, I’m a little underwhelmed by them as a group. I knew they were simple, but I thought they’d make more of a statement. I tried a bunch of different configurations, and this one was the most visually interesting … yet still, not particularly thrilling. Hopefully, I’ll feel differently when they’re on the wall. I wish I could blog about these with the enthusiasm I had when I first started the project!

I took enough photos to post a tutorial on these, but honestly, they’re so simple to make, and I’m not as excited about them as I thought I would be when they were finished, so I’m not sure if that post will be written. That is, unless anyone wants a tutorial! I’m happy to post one if anybody is particularly interested.

Can you guys tell I’m tired? I’m also battling a nasty, nasty cold. They were giving away flu shots like candy at work today (they were FREE!), but I’m not big on that kind of thing. My mom doesn’t really believe in Western medicine, and while I don’t take it that far, I kind of think flu shots are a bit of baloney. Or is it “bologna”? I know the latter is how you spell the lunch meat (which, incidentally, was also a persona non grata in my mother’s household – she said it was full of chemicals), but I’ve never seen that spelling used when referring to nonsense … Oh, never mind. I think I’ve had too much cold medication.

Has anyone else ever spent time on a project only to be underwhelmed by the final product? Did it grow on you? Please tell me it did!