Flamingo cross-stitch, Bless this Mess Death Star cross-stitch, and a Snuffleupagus embroidery

Hello! I'm so excited to have finally finished this project! At the end of 2009, I brought a cross-stitch kit to do on our honeymoon, but when I opened the packet a couple of months later most of the kit contents were missing. Oh no! That's what you get for not checking the contents before the returns period ends, I guess. >_< I was a bit disheartened, so I put it away ... for over four years. Yikes!

In May I was searching for a new project to work on and came across the 'kit' again. It only contained a colour guide but I had enough aida cloth and thread in my stash to make it and I figured I could do well enough without the actual pattern, so I gave it a go!

The most frustrating this about this pattern was that it is not symmetrical! I spent a lot of time trying to even it all up, but I think it was worth it as now looking at it doesn't cause me to twitch ~_^

  

I brought the frame from an op-shop for $2 (bargain!) and painted it with Kaisercolour in Sea Breeze. I love how tropical it looks! Kaisercolour have a lot of really lovely colours, I wanted to buy all of them! I'm going to have to plan more painting projects so I have a reason to buy them! ^_^

I feel like this project would be perfect for my bathroom, but I'm always worried about putting soft furnishings in there in case the humidity turns them icky, so it might end up on the staircase gallery instead.

 

I think the flamingo project is the biggest cross-stitch I have ever done and I am *such* a slow stitcher, so when it was finished I was like "no more cross-stitch for a while!!" and then I turned around and made another cross-stitch. Deary me!

 

This one is a little present for Scott and I'm pleased to report that he is very happy with it ^_^ I hope it's relatively obvious, but it's meant to be an incomplete Death Star.

I made a pattern too, so if you'd like to make your own you can! Just click on the image above to view and download ^_^

I used a solid grey for the outline, the line through the middle, and the outline of the laser and then metallic silver thread for the rest. Metallic thread is a massive pain to work with, but it *does* look pretty! ^_^

 

This hoop will be added to Scott's ever-growing Star Wars collection ^_^ One day (possibly when he's got his own room for everything) I'm going to have to do a photo tour for you all!

Lastly, I saw this Snuffleupagus drawing and thought that it would be perfect for an embroidery project. I chose a green and white raindrop fabric for the background, and did Snuffy in orange - a bit brighter than he is normally but I thought the green and the orange looked really good together.The photos I took didn't turn out that well, but in real life it is a little easier to see the difference between the background and the embroidery.

But not by much. Ahoy, eye-strain! >_<

 

I traced over a printout of the drawing for the lettering and the outline of Snuffleupagus and then used one strand of embroidery thread to do tiny little hairs all over him. Omg, right?

I think if I were to do this again, I would use a lighter background, but I'm pretty happy with how it looks nonetheless ^_^ Maybe I can just tell people that he's semi-invisible as a nod to his origin story? ~_^

I've got seven more projects to do before the Summer Nerd Games end on September 2nd, but I'm back at uni this week so I won't have as much time. I'm planning on three more embroideries, one crochet project, two plushies (which count as one project), and I'm undecided on two other challenges. Eeep! What do you reckon? Possible or not? ^_^

- Lisa x

Diminutive Dinosaur Display Doodad

Hello! Do you know what your house is missing? That's right, a dinosaur display stand that is perfectly sized to hold one mini cupcake. It's just so practical!

 

Mmmm, ok, so I'm lying about the practicallity thing, but it is cute! And easy to make! And involves both dinosaurs and cupcakes! (I've sold you on this now right?)

Awesome. So, here's how you can make your own!

1. Gather three plastic dinosaurs of approximately the same height. This is important, because you don't want your display stand to be lop-sided. You'll also need a jar lid. Mine is from a jar of korma curry paste (yum!).

2. Paint everything with nail polish. I used Rimmel "Be a star" (for the pink dinosaur), Rimmel "Grey Matter" (for the grey dinosaur), Revlon "Midnight Affair" (for the dinosaur that looks black but is actually dark blue), Revlon "Grapefruit Fizz" (to make that same dinosaur glittery), and Revlon "Black Lingerie" (ooo, risque!) for the jar lid.

3. Once everything is dry, arrange your dinosaurs like shown in the picture above. Place the jar lid on top of them and use a Sharpie to mark where it sits.

4. Remove the jar lid and put a bit of E6000 glue on each mark. Leave it a couple of minutes so it becomes tacky, and then carefully replace the jar lid.

 

5. Leave the stand for 24 hours to ensure the glue is properly set.

Ta-da! It's all done! Huzzah! ^_^

 What do you think? I hope you like it! I've still got heaps of dinosaurs, so I think you'll be seeing a few more prehistoric crafts around here ^_^

I'll see you in a couple of days - with a WIP that I have *finally* finished! Yay! ^_^

- Lisa xx

Pterodactyl sweater clips

Here's a fact about me: I *love* toys. So when I found a tub of dinosaurs for $2, I simply couldn't resist bringing them home. Then I set to pondering what to make from them ... You may remember that a while ago I made some dinosaur brooches; I decided to tweak that project just slightly to make Pterodactyl sweater clips - yay! ^_^

It's been very rainy and windy here lately, which is not optimal weather for spray painting, so I painted my Pterodactyls with some emerald green nail polish. Painting them in this way does take longer, but they turned out very shiny and not sticky at all (which can sometimes be an issue with spray paint).

 

One thing to keep in mind if you are painting plastic with spray paint is that the original colour of the plastic can affect the final look. I didn't have any problems with this nail polish, but some others I tried were too light to get a good colour, especially if the dinosaur was originally dark brown or dark green. To counter this, you could spray paint them white first and then apply the coloured nail polish or spray paint and then give a coating of clear polish if there is any sticky residue.

To make these Pterodactyls into sweater clips, I just used E6000 to attach a badge back to each one and then threaded chain between them.

 

I used a rather long chain because I like my sweater clips to have an almost necklacey drape to them, but of course that is up to personal preference! ^_^

I have another dinosaur craft to show you next week, but then I still have heaps more dinosaurs to use up! Any suggestions for what I should create? ^_^

- Lisa x

Felt flower crown

Hello! Last night I finished another project for the Summer Nerd Games; this one is for the Craftster Anniversary challenge and so the prompt is "what Craftster means to me".

Straight away I thought of this quote from Frida Kahlo, which I think kinda sums up my reason for blogging in general, but also for joining internet communities like Craftster (and Pinterest, and Instagram ...); the idea that you can be alone and accepting of your strangeness yet also wanting to connect with other people who share the same type of strangeness as you.

So I wanted to make something inspired by Frida, and I decided last night that I would finally jump on the flower crown bandwagon, and make a floral headpiece.

Obviously my eyebrows are no where near as magnificant as Frida's, but I tried to imitate her look a little bit by doing my hair up in maiden braids and wearing some dangly earrings. I also wore red lipstick, but that's not anything really different for me! ^_^

 

You can see the braids a bit better here ... as well as the end of one of them! Ugh, I'm not cut out for this hair styling lark! ~_^

 

I spent about three hours making the headband, but most of that was taken up by making dozens of felt flowers! I didn't even use up all of them for this, I may have to make a matching brooch or something later on ^_^ 

A couple of Frida's portraits show her with monkeys, so I got my little friend to make a cameo. Isn't he cute? ^_^ I think it's funny that our pale skin is almost the same colour! 

 

This photo gives your a less obstructed view of the entire headband. I attached enough flowers that it is wearable either way around.

 

Do you have a favourite side? I like this side maybe a little bit more because it has more of the bright yellow flowers which I really love ^_^

 

Up close with the camera, you can see evidence of the hot glue I used to construct and attach the flowers - in real life it is not very obvious though.

I made three types of flowers, but none of them look exactly the same because I didn't use any templates. I like this effect though, I think it looks more natural for all the flowers to be slightly different. Well, as natural as very brightly coloured felt flowers can be, I guess ~_^

 

I used the instructions for the cherry blossom and the rosebud from this site and the rest of the flowers were made just by cutting out flowers with four or more petals, adding hot glue to the centre, and then pinching them closed. All of these flowers were very easy to make, just very time consuming.

I made at least three of each type of flower for each colour that I used, and I tried to ensure that I had a good variety of sizes. Having the tiny little flowers was especially useful (even though they were a pain to make) because they fill up the gaps between the larger flowers perfectly.

 

 The headband that I used for the base was an old, plain black one. In the photo below, you can see that I added a long rectangle of black felt to the headband so that the surface area available for glueing flowers to was much larger. I chose black so that it would blend in with my hair, but you could really use any colour that you wanted.

I am really happy with this project. It took a while to complete, but it's not complicated or technique intensive, and I used only stash items! Yay, go me! ~_^

What do you think of the headband? Do you think I should reward myself with a trip to the craftsstore for using up so much stash materials for this challenge? ~_^

- Lisa x

Crochet owl hat

Hello! This week I finally finished a WIP - omg, right? My second cousin Killarney is going to be one in August and my mum was trying to decide what to get her. Mum was kinda set on an owl hat with little ears, but neither of us were sure how to do that until I found this cute fox hat in Target.

(Taking selfies in department stores is a thing that normal people do, right?) I felt a little dumb for not working this out - the hat is a rectangle and the corners become the ears. Easy-peesy!

And this is what I came up with ^_^ Killarney's head is 44cm in diameter, so I crocheted a rectangle 24cm wide and 28cm long. The width has two centimeters added for a seam allowance, and the height is what I thought looked good on my "baby head stand-in". (I've still got my fingers crossed that it fits!) Luckily, it turned out that one of the decorative glass domes that I have on my bookshelf is exactly the same size as a baby's head. 

Weird, but useful.

I used a baby yarn that is super soft (I detest ichy hats!) and also changes colour - oooo! ^_^ I like that it's pastel without being *too* pastel, you know? I used a 3mm hook, and just did trebles. I actually did make another version of this hat using single crochet, but it turned out way too stiff  - _ -

 

The eyes are just basic circles, made using another type of verigated baby yarn that I found in my stash (this one just changes between white, purple, and blue) and a pretty dove grey yarn. The beak is yet another type of baby yarn, again from my stash. My Nana Tess was really into making baby clothes, so I have heaps and heaps of baby yarn that I've inherited from her. I like to think she'd be happy it's finally getting used up! The beak is just a granny triangle, made with trebels (yet again!) ^_^

As is almost always the case when I finish a project for someone else, I'm still wondering if it needs anything more. I was thinking about adding tasels to the corners, or a scalloped edge on the base, or maybe some pupils and/or eyelashes ... but I also don't want to go overboard. Mum likes it how it is, but I do still have a month to ponder adding things to it ...

What do you think?

- Lisa x

Two art canvases and a recovered faux book

I'm slowly getting through challenges for the Summer Nerd Games on Craftster but last night I had a burst of creativity and completed three projects! Omg, right? I also used up all my double-sided tape ... it was totally worth it though.

I brought a faux book from the Reject Shop ages ago to recover and use with my Steampunk Librarian costume but then I found a much nicer looking one at Typo and I used that instead. But now the first book has finally received its makeover! ^_^

It's quite simple, but I'm happy with how my new copy of "Hogwarts: A History" has turned out ^_^ I just recovered the book with scrapbooking paper, added a metal drawer label for the title, and then added details with my quill and gold paint pen. 

My drawing skills are a bit lacking, so I drew a simplified version of the Hogwarts crest on the cover and just added some details with the gold pen. I think it looks nice nonetheless ^_^

 

I think my favourite part of this project was using my quill - it feels so different to regular pens and it's so fun to use ^_^

 

Then I found a couple of 6x6 inch square canvases in my stash, so I made two more art canvases to add to my little collection ^_^ First up: the polka-dot owl canvas!

I covered the canvas with this blue spotty scrapbooking paper and then set about cutting out circles from several other papers.

Then I drew tiny owls on each one. You can tell they're owls right? (I hope so!)

 

I used my tiny alphabet stamps to add the proverb (courtesy of Albus Dumbledore) and then stuck the circles down with tape and then gave everything a coating of mod podge.

Yay! All done! ^_^ I had proverbs on the brain by this time so I started on another canvas. This one is the "silver linings" canvas ^_^ I love how colourful and happy it is! The little wooden clouds had been in my stash for a while, so it was great to use them up ^_^

 

For the front of this canvas I used a piece of scrapbooking paper from my 6x6 inch paper pad, and then used a complementary piece to cover the sides.

 

I used my silver paint pen to colour in the edges of the clouds as well as draw an edging line on the fronts of them.

Can you believe I used washi tape on only one of these projects? I used five different kinds on this canvas to make up for it ~_^

 

And then finished it off with the tiny alphabet stamps again ^_^

 

And that's it! I've still got two canvases in my stash, so as soon as I get some more tape I'll do something with them too ^_^ The best thing about these projects is that they were all 100% stash! It's great to use up some old supplies ^_^

Do you have a favourite? What's your opinion on scrapbooking style crafts? (I know they're not everyone's cup of tea)

- Lisa x

Skeleton heart embroidery hoop

Since our team for the Summer Nerd Games decided on the geekdom "nerdy ladies", I have discovered that there are not that many crafts inspired by the feminine side of the nerdverse. Sad times. So, I've had to watch and read *study* a lot more TV shows and movies and books and comics to get inspiration. Such a hard task! ~_^ But, totally worth it. The textbook challenge for July is to make something anatomically inspired, and I had the perfect project waiting in the wings! ^_^

When I saw this shirt on Thea Queen (from Arrow), I knew that I had to do something inspired by it! Since I'm a student now (read: I have no money), I wanted to use materials from my stash and I wanted to do something fast and simple.

A hoopla was the winning answer! All I needed for this craft was some calico, black embroidery floss, and a 4 inch hoop - all things pulled from the black hole of craft supplies that is my spare room ~_^

 

 I used only one strand of floss and did the entire thing in backstitch. I think it turned out pretty well! And now I have another hoop to add to my wall ^_^

What do you think? Do you like it? Do you have a favourite female fictional character? Let me know! I've been missing our chats ~_^

- Lisa x