A choir of sleeping angels

The sleeping angels have gone through a variety of changes since I first thought of them in 2010. The first ones wore dressing gowns, then they grew more angular and their hair grew longer. I'm very happy with my latest design for them which is softer and more flowing.

Sunday School Ideas

From September 2010 to June 2011 I was a Sunday School teacher at my local church. I was helped a lot by the website Sermons4Kids and built ten main lessons from it, which I have listed below.

1. What to wear. This lesson revolved around a dress up doll and the words compassion, kindness, humility, forgiveness, patience, gentleness 'and above all love'. These words have since formed the basis of my virtuous flower brooch.

2. Don't bury your talent. In this lesson we did a lot of origami.

3. All you need is love. In this lesson we discussed the things in life we love and drew hearts.

4. Don't be afraid. In this lesson we concentrated on things we were afraid of and drew lots of candles to cheer ourselves up.

5. The tater family. This lesson was about the fruits of the spirit: joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. We spent our time drawing a big tree, cutting out paper fruit with spirit words on them and sticking them onto our tree.

6. Look on the inside. In this lesson we discussed what makes someone look great on the outside and also what qualities make someone great on the inside.

7. Things that go together. In this lesson we discussed things that go together in the material world like fish and chips and also things that go together spiritually like faith and good deeds.

8. A topsy-turvy world. This lesson was more ambitious as we tried to write upside down poems, 

9. Riddle me this. In the lesson we answered various riddles and tried to make up our own.

10. The greatest gift of all. In this lesson we made origami gift boxes and made special note cards featuring the spiritual gifts of grace and love to put in them.

I was pleased with my ten months of Sunday School teaching, although quite overwhelmed with other stuff in my life at the time, so I was also pleased when I gave it up. Below is a collection of some of the resources I built up in my time as a Sunday School Teacher and the virtue card matching game I created is at the top of this post.

Last Bus Home on Wattpad

I decided to publish Last Bus Home on Wattpad before I visit NYC. The six parts of the story cover six weeks in the protaganist's life, so I shall publish one a week, between now and the end of October. Below is a summary of the story.

Last Bus Home

Wednesday nights were dark and lonely, waiting for the last bus home from college and then Miranda entered my life. She was a free spirit, mysterious and unearthly. With her came change, I could see more clearly, experiences became deeper, more meaningful, I could see the truth and the way to move forward. After Miranda I never felt alone again.

Load of Hay Market

I wanted to do my twelfth craft stall before my long anticipated trip to New York in late October and so took part in the Load of Hay Market in South Ruislip on the first Sunday in September. I was hoping to have some time to arrange my craft stall with a little more flair than usual. We were a bit late, but I think the stall still looked slightly more artistic, I even changed it around a bit, about half way through.

After a slow start business picked up. An enthusiastic lady bought a number of items from me, a lavender owl and a lavender cat, a poppy brooch and several cards. A little girl was very interested in my lightest, brightest doll and a little boy bought a knitted purse.

  

The highlight for me was talking to the other crafters, especially the eclectic ladies next door to me (craftsbytopazmoon) and a Polish lady who crocheted exquisitely (mwojciechowska).