Hope is an anchor for the soul

Good afternoon friends

Today is the day before a pretty big change (for me anyway) as after four years I return to full time work in a new role. Exciting and scary at the same time.
 In many ways it has been both good and bad only working part time; it gave me time to focus on crafting, teaching and demonstrating for which I am extremely grateful. Having said that; I am looking forward to getting back to working full time to ease some of the practical pressures of life which will allow me to regain some of the joys and passions that creativity brings which kind of got lost along the way.
Which brings me nicely to the title of this post.....
Hope is a word that resonates with me, it has helped me look to the future in foggy times. Hope has brought me a long way and I definitely feel that it has "anchored" me.
You may recall this book box I made using one of my new Book Cover Kits a while ago?

I made the book cover up but instead of making a book from it I turned it into a box using some strips of chipboard. This weekend I finally got round to filling it, thanks to lovely goodies that I received from That Craft Place. They were just perfect to create this.

 The inside paper is Gelli Printed onto old music paper and glued in place. All the embellishments are from That Craft Place. They are a bricks and mortar craft business (Currently in Eastbourne but moving shortly to Polegate) They have a Facebook Group where you can join and see what they have HERE as well as a lovely natter and chatter page too, which is HERE) Lisa makes fab MDF and Greyboard embellishments.

 I stamped the edges of the inside cover with my Fantasy 2 Border stamp and glued the ships wheel in place. I left it natural and just added triple thick glaze to the outer and inner spokes. The centre has a small adhesive pearl coloured with Bronze Distress paint.

 I coloured the sea embellishments with Archival ink (Fern and Orange Blossom) and doodled some details with a back pen. They are glued in place with a glue gun.

 The focal point is this gorgeous key with the word Hope. It was painted with Traditions paint and glazed with Triple Thick Glaze. Below that is an anchor, this was cut off the anchor border Lisa does; painted grey and glazed too. I filled in the rest of the sentence with a black pen.

 Of course, you know how I love books right? So it was inevitable that I would have one here really. I made a simple 6 page book with a jute cover. Glued the starfish to the front and the bakers twine that I used to sew the book was left long to form a wrap binding. I glued the spiral shell to the back and coloured with some Media Interference paints and glued the other shell with a glue gun  to the base, leaving enough of a gap so that the book could be tucked between.

This should give you a better idea of what I mean. I'm really happy with the finished piece. It's something special and marks the beginning of a new chapter in my life.........