T Stands for Valentine's Day

A couple of weeks ago, I started thinking about what to get Himself for Valentine's Day. I think it's so easy to come up with ideas for women, but men? Not so much. Himself doesn't wear ties, jewelry. Doesn't drink hot beverages. Has enough geek tee shirts to clothe a small nation. Though chocolate would be appreciated, it's more or less a fall back gift. What to do?

Himself enjoys gardening and last year started a garden using straw bales. He also bought an Aero Garden and has started some tomato plants. Ok, a gift that has to do with gardening. He's got lots of gardening tools and if he needs to know something about a plant, or growing, or fertilizing there's alway the Interwebs for the information. Surfing the Web looking for ideas for gardeners, I hit upon plant stakes made from flea market spoons. Perfect! Instead of flea market spoons, I found open stock flatware at Walmart. I decided instead of teaspoons, I'd opt for soup spoons as they had the greater surface area. They came in packs of 4 so I bought 3 packs for 12 spoons.

I used Arches Text Wove from the scrap box. It's a nice, soft paper and would mold to the bowl of the spoon. Or so I thought. When I went to position the first drawing, I saw how the bowl of the spoon was angled so the drawing would point to the ground and wouldn't be seen. Oops. But it worked fine on the back of the spoon. A Sharpie pen was used to outline the drawings. I debated painting them with acrylics, but opted to use colored pencil instead as the drawings are so small. less than 2 inches by 2 inches. Tore the paper to fit the spoon better, because of the curvature of the spoon the paper wouldn't really lie flat so some of the labels have small pleats. Glued it with Modge Podge and sealed it with 4 or 5 coats of an acrylic sealer.

For the first two spoons, I did Tomato, Tomahto as I sure he would plant tomatoes. We have chipmunks in the yard and they love the garden. I named one of them Timex. So Timex holding a sign: Free Lunch.  I wasn't sure what else Himself would plant. Casually asked and was rewarded with peppers and cucumbers.

I was able to complete two spoons, but the best laid plans aft gang agley. The days I planned on working on the stakes, Himself had snow days, or he came home from work early. So the day before Valentine's Day and another snow day, I had to try to get at least 2 more spoons done. So while he was out shoveling snow and raking the snow off the roof, I began working on the cucumber and pepper drawing. Later, when he would watch TV in the bedroom and nap, I'd be able to glue and seal the spoons.

He had transplanted the tomato plants to pots and put them on the dining room table as the chandelier has bright white lights to help with seasonal affected disorder, and the dining room window gets a lot of afternoon sun. I tested the spoons to see how they would look in the pots. Pretty good, if I do say so myself.

You would think with all the cups and mugs around here one of them would have a heart for Valentine's Day. Nope, so there is my trusty, blue Fiesta, mug emptied as I worked for T Day.

Finally got the spoons done and since I wanted to use them for the T Stands for post and because he sometimes reads my blog, I asked if I could give him his Valentine's Day present early.  So ta-dah! Plant Stake Spoons.

Drop by hosts, Bleubeard and Elizabeth's blog to find out what the rest of the T Stands For gang are up to. If you want to play, include in your Tuesday post a beverage or container for a beverage. Don't forget to link your blog to Bleubeard and Elizabeth's page.

Happy Valentine's Day <3