Out On A Whim: Stamped & Embossed Fabric Postcard

Today's Lesson From The Craft Room:  Send Your Art Out Into The Universe

Let me be the first to admit that it is difficult for me to let go of things - especially things that I create for the first time and am pleased with the outcome.  That happened to me with this fabric postcard that I am sharing with you today as part of Out On A Whim Wednesday.  I saw a reader's challenge in Cloth Paper Scissors magazine (if you haven't ever seen the magazine and you like mixed media, you may want to check it out!).  The challenge was to create a fabric postcard and mail it to the magazine.  I had never mailed something made of fabric (have you?) and just wondering how to attach a stamp to such a marvel really got me intrigued :)  So I let the magazine sit for days...no, make that weeks...and finally sat down to create.  I had wanted to incorporate one of the birds that comes to the backyard so one day I sat and watched as the crows arrived.  I then pulled out my camera inside the house and took a bunch of photos through the kitchen window.  The crow that I have included on the postcard was sitting on top of one of the shepherd's hooks that holds a bird feeder.  I printed the photo on my computer and then outlined the shape of the bird.  I cut it out and then placed it on a piece of chipboard and cut out a chipboard template that I can now use over and over.  I used the template to cut a piece of velvet and then I embossed the velvet using the Bella Toile background stamp.  The postcard itself began as a piece of muslin that I stamped and stenciled and heat embossed with a combination of current and retired stamps, sequin waste, gold embossing powder - I just kept going :)  I pulled out some Crumb Cake seam binding and did some stamping with my Calendar Alphabet & Numbers stamp set and Staz-On ink.  All the pieces were sewn to the muslin either by hand or with the machine.  I then added some little gold sequin stars.  The whole piece was then layered - a piece of thick iron-on adhesive interfacing in between the front and the back of the postcard.  I then ironed it all together and sewed the edges with metallic thread.  And then I smiled.  I feel like there is a special part of me in this postcard - particularly since the bird is a part of life in the backyard.  I didn't want to send it out - I wanted to keep it.  And that's what makes this even more special - just as the birds fly away from the back yard and I can't "keep" them, so too, I let go of this postcard and placed it in the mail to be sent off to the magazine.  No, I didn't keep the physical piece, but what I absolutely kept was the experience of creating this piece of myself.  I know it is difficult to let go.  At the same time, if we are not willing to let it go...did we ever really, truly have it in the first place?  If we really "have it," nothing can ever really take it away from us - it will be there forever.