Two weeks ago, during those days of stress, I found it so helpful to keep my hands busy. When I need to occupy my hands, I tend to put aside the machinery and go back to simple techniques: painting and hand-sewing. What came out of my creative energy were embellished napkin/placemats, a hand-painted pillow, embellished coasters, amongst some other things.
These are all easy projects one can do with a needle and thread on the sofa, which is where I worked on mine. For the placemat/napkins I used some linen napkins I had picked up on clearance ages ago. I just cut out a stencil of a heart on card stock and painted onto the fabric using fabric paint. The pillow was painted the same way onto natural linen and backed with a vintage pillow case.
For the coasters, I cut out 5x5" squares of fabric. The top is a wool suiting, the back is patterned flannel. I painted the hearts onto the top and let it dry. Then, with right sides facing I stitched around the edge, leaving a 2" hole in which to turn right side out. Then I just stitched close around the edge and made a decorative stitch around each heart.
Turns out these heart shapes all over my house really do remind me to be happy and embrace love. And all that handwork helped me work through a stressful week.
