Glittery antler flower crown

It's the middle of summer here in Australia, so I'm dreaming of cool spring evenings and lush woodland groves. Recently some friends and I were planning a crafternoon and trying to decide which project we would make. I'll show you what we decided on next week, but I couldn't resist recreating one of the other suggested projects - an adorable antlered flower crown by Georgina Doull, featured here on Mollie Makes.

Creating the antlers was definitely the trickiest part of this project; Georgina makes it look so easy, but I made and remade mine several times! I also wasn't sure if I was going to glitter them or not, so I didn't follow her instructions to press the glitter into the clay before baking. Getting the glitter onto the antlers after baking was quite difficult, so if I was to do this again, I would listen to Georgina ^____^

My headband was already covered with white ribbon, so I left it as is. I did use some baby blue ribbon that was originally from a bouquet of flowers to help attach the antlers, but it's barely visible from the front.

The flowers I used are all foam roses. I was originally planning to use some of the larger size roses, that you can see in the top corner in the photo above, but then decided they were too big and instead stuck to the medium and small sizes instead.

 

I cut off the wire stems with scissors and then attached all of the flowers with hot glue. There is a patch were a bit of glue leaked onto the front of the band, but when I'm wearing it the glue isn't visible.

 

The back of the band isn't as pretty as the front; I'm considering making some felt leaves to cover up the backs of the roses.

 

 

I feel like I should be waiting for some fairies to drop by for a tea party while I'm wearing this! ^____^ Despite the clay antlers, it's quite light and very comfortable to wear. I'm thinking it would also be lovely for a Christmas outfit or a casual party costume.

Considering that 2016 starts in two days (whhhaaaatttt??), this will be my last project for the year. Thanks so much for spending time with me; I hope you've had some fun and maybe even found a little crafty inspiration. As always, I love to hear from you; what you enjoyed, what you'd like to see more of, what you created this year, and what you plan to create next.

Enjoy the rest of December, and I'll see you in the new year!

- Lisa xx

Halloween 2015: Mermaid costume and spooky sweets review

Hello! So, Halloween is over for another year. I adore Halloween; I'm always so sad when it's finished! I've been told a few times this year that my hair looks like "mermaid hair", which is SUCH a lovely compliment that I decided to go as a mermaid for my costume ^____^

Rebecca and I were planning on hitting our regular rink for their Halloween skate session and then a party afterwards so I wanted something that would be comfortable enough to skate in.

 

I figured leggings and a skirt would be a practical combination and when I found this gorgeous shimmery scale fabric at Spotlight, I knew I was on the right track. I used this tutorial by Cal Patch to make my own pattern for the leggings and, aside from making them a little tighter around the knees next time, they worked out wonderfully!

I'm not yet at the stage where I feel comfortable enough wearing only leggings, so I also made a circle skirt with the same fabric. This video tutorial by Annika from The Pineneedle Collective was extremely helpful for this, but as my sewing machine was still broken at this stage, I had to get a little creative with sewing it together. I ended up doing the entire thing on my overlocker, and not hemming the skirt or adding elastic to the waistband. I'm a little worried that the waistband fabric will eventually stretch out; if that happens I'll have to reverse engineer in some elastic, but it was fine for a costume.

For the top, I printed out a picture of clamshells and used them to make a freezer paper stencil. I mixed up some light blue and light green fabric paint (I just diluted the colours I had with more white fabric paint) and used sponge brushes to add the blue on the top and green at the bottom. Then I used a brush dipped in both colours to mix them together in the middle of the shells and create a colour gradient look.

And then I put silver glitter all over them! One can never have too much glitter ^___^ Lastly, I made some hair accessories simply by attaching, with E6000, hair pin backings to some shells and starfish I had in my stash  (hoarding from childhood holidays *does* come in handy! ~___^)

The day after Halloween I hosted a crafternoon, and took the opportunity to test out some spooky recipes!

The strange pink lumps below were meant to be the Bloody Popcorn Brains by Not Quite Nigella, but mine are not quite as pin-worthy! My popcorn turned out really sticky, so making them into any real shape was seemingly impossible. I just ended up blobbing down lumps, adding some raspberry jam and calling them Blood Clots! They taste amazing though and are perfect for a special dessert treat or for curing diabetic hypoglycemia (I'd personally opt for the former!). 

 

The Spooky Worm Halloween Jello by A Spicy Perspective was voted "grossest-looking" by my guests; some wouldn't even try it due to its appearance! I'll grant that it's creepy looking, and the tapioca pearls lend an interesting texture to the jelly, but Scott, Rebecca, and I all quite liked the taste. I used lime and grape jelly and they turned out these lovely pastel colours, which went really well with the "witchetty-grub" lollies I found in the supermarket (I couldn't find plain old jelly worms like the recipe called for anywhere!). I used little ramekins as my moulds, but the jelly didn't come out cleanly. No matter, I think it looks even more gross this way ~___^
 

I'd never made chocolate bark before, and I found The Pioneer Woman's Halloween Bark tutorial very helpful even though I didn't follow her recipe completely. I melted white cooking chocolate, poured it into a tray lined with baking paper, and then pressed in salted pretzels, Star Wars character cookies, mini M&Ms, and pop-rocks. After sitting in the fridge for a while, it was ready to be broken up and served! This was the most popular dessert at the crafternoon; the salty-sweet combination was considered most superior by my friends ^____^ I personally think that the addition of the pop-rocks makes it a very appropriate Halloween treat as there is something rather creepy about your sweets making random cracking noises ...

Scott's favourite was the coffin cake; which is just a plain chocolate cake with peppermint icing. Can't beat the classics, I guess! I got the coffin-shaped pan from Spotlight and it does have a cross indentation on it, but that didn't show through very well on the finished cake, so I added my own with writing icing.

And that's it! Gosh! Did you have a fantastic Halloween? I hope you did, and that you dressed up! I love hearing about and seeing other people's costumes ^____^

- Lisa xx

Many hairbows

Hello! I know it's only just gotten into September, but for some reason I am so excited for Halloween this year! I was tidying my craft room (again! This has to happen fairly regularly, in order to try and curb my hoarding tendencies ...) when I came across a pack of "flat fats" (basically 50cm squares of fabric that Spotlight sells) in Halloween prints. I'd been thinking for a while that I might try to make a patchwork cushion but since I'd been thinking (and not doing) that for a couple of years I decided that the cushion idea was going out the window and instead I was going to make hair bows. And since I can't stop at one, I made ten.

Unfortunately I don't own enough Halloween fabric to make ten different spooky hair bows (something I obviously need to rectify fairly quickly!) but I did manage to make four.

These three are from the aforementioned Spotlight pack. I think my favourite is the stripey one, because those little purple gravestones are just so cute! Also in the pack was some awesome purple bat fabric, but as I used some of that for the background of Rebecca's witchcraft hoop I didn't have enough for a full sized bow. I may have to make some mini ones soon!

 

 

I also finally used this silky skull fabric that someone once gave me. The piece was kinda too small to do much with, so I put it in my stash and promptly forgot about it. I'm so glad I found it again because it was the perfect size for a bow!

 

Since one can never have too many hair bows (please, no one tell me otherwise ...), I then used up some more fabric remnants making these six pretties. I can't decide on my favourite here; I think the black and white stripe is going to be really versatile, but I love the dark grey floral pattern as well.

 

If you'd like to make some of your own, you can check out my tutorial for them on Cut Out + Keep! 
 

In other news, my workplace just finished a 100 day fitness challenge - huzzah! Of course this meant it was time for a party (nope, we learnt nothing) and so I baked a raspberry oat cake to help us celebrate. I used writing icing to draw a shoe on the top which was a bit tricky. You can see where I had some trouble with finishing off lines! Nonetheless, it looks like a shoe (big plus!) and the cake tasted really good - yay! ^___^

 

Currently I'm working on some crochet, but I think it's going to be a while before it's finished as it's pretty huge. The first row involved 364 stitches - yikes! I'm experimenting with broom stick crochet for this as well, which is a first for me. I'm quite liking how it looks so far, so I'm hopeful it will turn out well.

It's becoming sunnier and warmer here, so perhaps a largish crochet project wasn't the greatest idea though! I'll have to start thinking of warmer weather crafts ... perhaps this will be the year I finally make myself a Wonder Woman bikini? Only time will tell ~___^

- Lisa xx

 

How to make stickers into brooches

Hello! I don't know if anyone else is like this, but I have a hard time using stickers. It's just like, once you use them, that's it! I know, it's weird - and I keep buying them hoping to find the perfect place to stick them to. This has resulted in me having quite a lot of stickers but I've finally discovered the perfect use: make them into brooches! Yes!

 

I started off with these two cute rollerskating stickers that I got from a Roller Derby bout (p.s. if you're in Perth you should come to the next WARD bout! I'll be on the sidelines cheering and dreaming of the day when I'd be good enough to join in! ^___^). I didn't want to stick them to my helmet because I thought they'd probably get ruined next time I hit the decks (this happens a lot) and I figured they'd be perfect for repping derby in my everyday life ^___^ I got a lot of questions at work on how I made them, so I decided to get out my sticker collection and make some more!

 

To make your own you'll need some thin balsa wood, a scalpel, jewellery hardware, E6000 glue, PVA glue or mod podge, and some fun stickers.

 

I just stuck my stickers directly to the balsa wood, but I noticed one of them moving around while I was wearing it yesterday so in future I would brush on a very thin layer of glue before adding the stickers.

Cutting them out with the scalpel is the most time consuming part! I used the time to catch up on some Welcome to Night Vale episodes ^___^

 

Lastly, use the E6000 to glue on the jewellery hardware and leave everything to dry.

 

I made three hair clips; the popcorn one has gotten a lot of lovely compliments at work ^___^

 

The larger stickers are the best ones for brooches, as you can't see the badge backing peeking out behind them. The Hello Kitty milk choco brooch was the easiest to cut out - square stickers are definitely the way to go if you want to make one of these brooches fast!

I made three sets of earrings from these tiny animal faces. The lions were tricky due to their manes, but I really love them! ^___^

 

Lastly, I made two larger earrings from some Maneki-neko stickers Pip brought back for me from Japan, and made a ring from a fan sticker from the same set.

I've still got a lot of stickers in my collection so I think I'll be making more of these in the future, and now I have an excuse to buy even more stickers ~____^

- Lisa xx

Easy skeleton hand hair clips

Hello! I just have a tiny little craft to show you today since I am in the final weeks of my degree now (!!!!) and have been making more essays than projects. I have just handed in the final assignment for my Cultural and Media studies class, and have two weeks to write two more research essays. And then I am done! I am really excited, but also very nervous as this means I will soon have to find myself a job. Eeek!

I brought these plastic skeleton hands from ebay, which are apparently meant as Halloween decorations. Like, I guess you just scatter them around? I am not sure. I brought them because I wanted the kind of jewellery that I see in the goth shops, but am too cheap to shell out for ~___^

 

I got ten hands, so I now have plenty to work with! These clips were very easy to make; I just glued the clips onto the underside of the palms, making sure that the length of the clip was hidden behind a finger. I used E6000, so they're staying fairly well, but I think a different style of hair clip would work better for this. I just used what I had in my stash, but I will be keeping an eye out for better alternatives.

 

My next task is to make myself a necklace, however, I think I also need to look into varnishing or sealing them somehow as the black on the hands rubs off very easily. I have some spray varnish, so I'm going to give that a go.

Looking at these pictures makes me feel a little sad as I think soon I will have to say goodbye to my pink hair! ; ___ ; At the end of this month my job search begins, and also my brother is getting married, so I was planning on dying my hair a very dark red to look a bit more "normal". But, that's apparently not normal enough and I have been told brown or black is what is required! I really am not looking forward to letting all the bleaching time I've been putting into my 'do go to waste.

I think I will try using Manic Panic black and hope that it will fade, in the same way that the blue, purple, red, and pink dyes that I've used from them have faded, so hopefully I can go back to brighter colours afterwards without having to rebleach. If anyone has any experience in this dilemma, I'd love your advice! Otherwise, perhaps I will just get myself a wig ~___^

- Lisa xx

Princess Bubblegum crochet crown

Hello! I don't know about you, but I spend a lot of my time thinking about costumes. They're just such fun! I love going to Oz ComicCon and Supanova and seeing all the creative ideas that people have come up with, but Halloween has a special place in my heart. I mean, it's a spooky day where you can dress up and dance with a zombie; is there anything better? ~___^

This year, since my hair is currently pink, I've decided to go as Princess Bubblegum from Adventure Time. Yay! I'm  going to do a closet cosplay and also go as a hipster version of PB; this is mostly because I don't really like wearing my contact lens and my glasses are so black and thick-rimmed that, well, they kinda suit the part!

 

So I've got a pink top, handkerchief scarf, skirt, and tights but to be truly PB-esque I needed a crown. I found lots of different ones, made out of all kinds of different materials, but I was most inspired by a crochet version I found and so decided to give that a go.

I also wrote down what I did to make this one so you can give it a go if you like! My crown is quite a bit bigger than others I've seen which I'm still kinda on the fence about. I like it because it stands out but ... I don't know, maybe it's too big? Either way, I guess you could just alter the pattern slightly so it suits you more. I will also mention that this hasn't been tested and so there are probably mistakes; if you find any, let me know and I'll add in corrections! ^___^

 

Princess Bubblegum Crochet Crown

Using a 4mm hook and yellow yarn (I used 100% wool in an 8ply), chain 120.

Row 1: Chain one (this is your turning stitch) and then do a single stitch in each chain stitch (120 stitches)

Row 2, 3, 4: Repeat row 1

Row 5: Chain one (turning stitch). Do a single stitch in the next 53 stitches. Chain 3, treble in the same stitch you just did a single stitch in (you will have a single and a treble in the same stitch). Treble in the next 13 stitches. Chain 3, do a single stitch in the same stitch you just did a treble in. Single stitch along the rest of the row. This will give you a segment in the middle of the crown which is slightly raised. Tie off your yarn.

Row 6: Tie your yarn onto the raised treble segment, four stitches in. Make one chain stitch and then do a single stitch in eight stitches; this will give you another slightly smaller raised section.

Row 7 - 22: Chain 1, single stitch in each stitch (8 stitches) 

Row 22 - 26: Chain 1, treble in each stitch (8 stitches). You could do these rows in single stitch as well if you wanted to, but they will be covered by the round part of the crown and I find trebles faster and easier to do. Tie off your yarn.

Crochet a flat circle using single stitch; I did 12 rows and my circle has a diameter of about 7.5 cm.

Cut out a circle slightly smaller than your crochet one from light blue felt. I painted my felt circle with glitter mod podge to make it sparkle!

Sew the felt circle to the crochet circle, and the crochet circle to the end of the uppy bit of the crown (yup, that's a technical term).

Sew the two rectangle ends of the crown together so that it forms a ring. 

Tie on your end at the back of the crown, where your sewn join is. Single stitch around the edges of your entire crown. This will smooth out the blocky edges of the uppy bit and just generally make everything look nicer ^___^

 

My crown was looking a bit droopy, so I sewed a thin craft stick to the back of the uppy bit. I was worried that this would make it really uncomfortable, but I was wearing my crown around the house last night (as you do) and it was fine. I may sew a little cushion over the end of it anyway, just to make sure I don't finish Halloween with a mark on my head ~___^ Other options to fix this would be to make it shorter, or maybe use fabric starch.

 

I, as usual, have grand plans for this costume which probably won't get done. I was planning on making a visit to the craft store today to pick up some orange wool to make this amazing Science the Rat but last night I broke my toe. Well, it may only be fractured but I enjoy being overly dramatic. Still, it's meant that a lot of my plans for the week have to be delayed since walking is rather painful.

On the bright side, I will be sitting down a lot over the next couple of days which will be the perfect reason to get ahead in my assignments. Yay? ~___^

Are you crafting anything for Halloween this year? I have two more Halloween crafts on my list, but it looks like they'll have to wait until next week. I've had this zombie project in my head for *ages* so even though Halloween will offically be over, I'm still going to make them! I can't wait to show you ^___^

- Lisa xx

P.S. Does the gem part of the crown remind anyone else of the Stargate?