Every Christmas Leslie creates an original découpage plate design. These plates feature an original painting carefully cut by hand, applied to a glass plate and finished with hand marbled paper and sealers. Use for decoration or for serving. Hand washing is recommended. Order plates by emailing us at leslie@leslielinsley.com
I love designing wedding invitation plates. Most of them are 10-inches square, but lately I’ve been expanding to platters. Most are 16×20 inches because the invitations are getting larger and there are so many activities with printed programs included. Also, more and more, couples are creating little booklets of events, names of everyone in the wedding party as well as cute maps, “save the date” cards, and lots of other printed material. And then there’s the shower invitation that I usually put on the back.
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Leslie signing copies of “Nantucket Cottages & Gardens”
at Marine Home Center during Stroll Weekend. (some still available)
This week has been a busy one for everyone. It seemed like we had lots of time to get decorated and ready for Christmas and suddenly we don’t. Or at least that’s the way it seems. The Festival of Wreaths was a big success. Always a good kick off to the season. Then we had Stroll Weekend and now a round of holiday events. Every year I attend the party at The Homestead – always joyful. Music by the ShepCats – makes the party quite lively. What I like most about this yearly party is that it reminds us of how our community reaches out to all generations and doesn’t forget the elderly.
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Since I’ve been doing a lot of writing this summer I haven’t had much time for decoupage, except to make the wedding invitation plates that people order from me. I miss crafting. Summertime is a great time to have fun creating projects. However, for the past two years I’ve been designing decoupage boxes. Many years ago, when I began my career, my grandfather made small boxes from scraps of wood for me to decoupage. These boxes were beautifully designed and proportioned, but not of any particular special wood. Therefore, on their own they were not lovely. They were made to be painted and used for covering with my cutout designs. I still have about four or five dozen left in the raw and little, by little I am working on them. At first I thought I’d have a show at The Nantucket Looms where I have sold my boxes for over forty years. But, as I finish each one in my leisure time, after months of working on it, I can’t think of selling them.
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Using a holiday as an excuse to make gifts is great. You already have a theme or color scheme. Since it’s Valentine’s Day this month think red and white and hearts. Think romantic! There are lots of projects that take very little material and cost . Best of all they are quick!. I’ve written many tips books. Depending on the times, some have addressed money issues and focused on projects that cost next to nothing. At other times “easy” was the focus like “Leslie Linsely’s Quick and Easy Decorating Tips”. At another time I wrote, “Leslie Linsley’s High Style Low Cost Decorating Ideas”. Everyone wanted, and maybe still do, a great look for little money. But right now everyone is time conscious. Saving time, instant gratification, but great results! Today in the New York Times I read that the high-powered business lunch in a fine restaurant is dead. No one wants to take the time. And after a two-hour lunch they have to devote twenty minutes to catching up on twitter and emails and such. Seems a lunch at the drugstore counter (ideally with your computer along) is the way to have it all: lunch and business on the go. Sure doesn’t beat a lovely, slow lunch at the Centre Street Bistro.
Crafting and quick gratification seem to be an oxymoron. However in the spirit of the current sentiment I’ll try to respond accordingly. The following projects were designed to be easy, quick, money-saving and satisfyingly good enough to give as a gift. Make something for yourself. These are good winter projects. These craft projects are good for any time of year. But, since it’s Valentine’s month why not make something red and white from the heart?
Today I had lunch with my friend Gretchen. It’s a monthly ritual to can play catch-up and to celebrate our birthdays – two weeks apart. We always go to Miacommet Golf Club. In summer we sit out on the patio and watch the putters. In winter we’re often the only ones in the dining room. At some point we began to talk about creativity. Gretchen does many things. In spring her gardens take most of her leisure time. In the winter she crochets. “When I don’t have a project,” she said “I’m a little off kilter.” Most people who do a craft feel this way. Creativity in your life makes it fuller. When I’m in my studio doing decoupage I literally lose myself for hours at a time. I imagine many people who work on a computer feel the same way. The creative process does involve concentration whether on technique or during the design process, but when you get good at it, you enter a calm zone with time for thinking. Crafting relieves stress..
When I decoupage I design by instinct because I’ve been doing it for so long. Sometimes I have conversations in my head with my deceased mother who taught me the craft, or my grandfather who made the original boxes I am still working on. It’s an interesting little “time out” from everyday stuff.
Over the holidays I met a knitter. I asked if she also crocheted. I always think of crochet as a craft from another generation, perhaps our grandmothers’ or their mothers. I also think of crochet as something belonging to women in the Midwest. The woman I spoke to she herself was from Racine, Wisconsin. “Two things matter out there,” she said. “Crafting and sports. No one misses a high school football game.” And most women are familiar with crochet. Crochet and knitting instructions are reduced to the very basic form of communication, much like mathematics. For this reason I’ve never really liked designing projects or writing about that craft although I have often. I’m too wordy.
