shadowboxes

One of my newest creative projects has been shadowbox making.

I knew I wanted to make some as Christmas gifts, and I had already had this idea (and had pinned a whole bunch of inspiration onto a secret Pinterest board!) before we went on vacation.

I also knew that vacation would be a perfect time to collect some items; down by the coast there’s plenty of lovely pieces of nature, and of course the cherry on top is that much of it came from some of our favorite places.

I was right about how many treasures I’d find; I went on all of our hikes with little collection containers in my bag so that I could take home anything that caught my interest (I was lucky enough to find three cicada exoskeletons under a tree!).

As soon as I started to put together the Christmas gifts, I knew that I simply had too many wonderful little pieces to limit my own personal collection to just one box…so I decided to make two 12″x16″ boxes for myself 🤭

monarch chrysalises from my children, flower seeds from my garden, an old hornets’ nest, insect exoskeletons, rainbow stones — I love every single piece I included in this box!

One is dedicated to the coast (i.e. my second home), and the other is dedicated to woodland life (i.e. my real home).

I’m so happy with how they came out, and there are still a few small open spots in the woodland box, waiting for a couple more special pieces to be found.

I have miniature bottles of sand (the smallest is about an inch tall, it’s adorable) from our three favorite beaches

When I was done with my boxes, and my Christmas-gift boxes, I still wasn’t satisfied, so I ended up making a series of mini boxes to sell in Riley Mae’s Nothing to Crow About gift shop (which I wrote all about in my previous post!).

I’m happy to report that three of them have already sold, but you can check out the remaining two right here!