Water Lily Luminary

This project nearly drove me to madness.

Was it because the directions were bad? No.

Was it because I tried to go too quickly and I didn't pay attention to what I was doing or because I went completely insane and kept starting over.

Of course not.

 Was it because Crafty the Penguin was missing from my desk?

Absolutely. There can be no other explanation for it.

Honestly, I worked on this project for 5-6 hours. It was insane.

The biggest problem likely was that I tried to go to quickly with the most important part of the project - the construction of the planter base that allows it to stand. I made a mistake that kept my pieces from fitting together properly. It simply could not be fixed.

So, I had to cut out new pieces. I was out of the gray paper that I had intended to use so I grabbed some yellow paper. After I had the whole thing put together, I decided that I despised the color of yellow that I had used.

I started taking it apart again. That's how I roll.

At any rate, I finally got it together.

The project is called Water Lily Illuminated Compote. It's available from the Dreaming Tree website.

There's a very detailed video that explains exactly how to put the project together. It's not difficult, but you have to take your time.

It's incredibly sturdy. My cat, who has a tendency to pounce my paper projects, could attack this baby several times and it would not come crumbling apart. It's solid.

It is a time consuming project, but it shouldn't take anybody in their right mind 5 hours to complete it. It probably should take about 2 hours.

I tried some new inking skills on this project.

 I used a cotton ball to rub a bit of fired brick  Distress Ink on the inner pedals of the lily. 

I love the extra oomph that the ink gives the flower.

This is the first time that I've made a luminary. I put two electric tea lights into the box to make it glow.

While it took me a long, long time to finish the project, I'm happy with how it turned out. It's quite large and I learned something new from completing it.

My goal is to build a magnificent 3 dimensional paper castle by the end of the summer. I think this project helped me to develop some of the patience that I'll need to build that masterpiece.