Post-Christmas present



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My mum is one of the unfortunate people who has her birthday rather close to Christmas. For her, it means people may have run out of gift-buying stamina (and money). For me, I always feel I want to get her something very lovely, as she is my mum, but I need to get organised and inspired quickly in order to get it to her on time.

Z1 said she would like to make her a brooch so I thought that, with a bit of supervision from me, we could make something that would be mum-worthy, personal and mailable. It would also be something that could occupy Z1 for a bit while I worked from home in the lazy, post-Christmas, huddle-in-from-the-cold-and-let-the-Zeds-watch-Arthur-Christmas-again-and-again days.

 



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I discovered the craft section in Walmart in preparation for the great conquering Christmas craftathon of 2012. Generally speaking, I head to Dollarama for our craft needs but I felt for a real, proper birthday present for my mum, we could splash out on quality Walmart goods. Also, Walmart is near a lovely park with an ice rink so we could do skating before or after the dratted and dreaded shopping centre (ok, ok, mall, I do think of it as a mall, my assimilation to North America is well underway). I was hoping for brooch backs of some description and Z1 was going to choose the decorations for the brooch. I was going to steer her clear of anything too gaudy in the hope that my mum might actually, really want to wear the creation.

 

Sadly, Walmart did not provide a brooch back for us and so I made do with a cut up cereal box and a safety pin secured with sticky tape. It did, however provide some nice colourful buttons. I did try to convince Z1 to choose the darker colours rather than pastels but she would not be swayed. I had intended on covering up the back with shiny paper or something but we couldn't get the glue to stick well so I just let it be.

 

Z1 took charge of the size of the brooch and was planning to just stick the central button on after a careful selection process. Not only did this leave a not-so-attractive area of naked cardboard on the brooch, it was also only going to take a mere moment to complete so I encouraged the use of more buttons. I think that the finished object is good enough to be worn with pride by my lovely mum. I am sure she will receive it gratefully, graciously and with grandmotherly affection so I will keep my eyes open to see if she wears it at all, indicating that she truly likes it, when we next see her in the summer.