Looking For Something to Smash

 Yesterday I made a trip over to Goodwill looking for something to smash. No, I wasn't enraged and looking for some cheap thrift-store therapy. I was looking for items to use on our upcoming "Mosaic Address Plaque" night. Every month, a group of women from church get together to do something, and I volunteered to host a night to make these.

My original inspiration came from a picture in a Mary Engelbreit "Home Companion" magazine that I saved from years ago. I've always thought this was just beautiful:

The scan is a little fuzzy, but you get the idea.

Today I found another one from the same artist.  (You'll have to scroll down a few pages to see it.)      It's striking, but not as pretty as the first.

Here are some other address plaques I found:

Source: DV Mosaics

Source for above five: Pear Tree Mosaic Shop on Etsy

Source: Artcycled Mosaics

Source: Ree-Creation Mosaics on Flickr

There were also several more on this site.

Of course, since my favorite is the first one, I went looking for little ceramic roses and little bird statues that I could use to recreate this look.  I was successful on the rose part, and came home with this for $1.50:

The trick of course is removing those delicate little roses without smashing them...

I'll let you know how that goes later.