A Very Merry Twistmas with Handmade Moshlings

I repeated my homade holiday plan from last year, which is to only make my gifts for the daughter from what I had around in my craft stash. It wasn't too difficult to decided what to make. She and her cousin are heavily into Moshi Monsters these days. I thought I'd attempt some of their favorite Moshlings. I made the daughter an Oddie and a Squidge. Then, I made her cousin a Liberty.



Oddie was the easiest of the three. I used polar fleece remnants for most of it except the black of the eye and the feet, which are both felt. The sprinkles are cheap plastic beads.



I was pretty happy with the way it turned out, even if the eyes are a wee bit crooked. He turned out to be her favorite of the two.



Squidge was made like the Pygmy Puffs on my knitting loom with the same yarn as the Puffskein. He has shank button eyes and nose. I used my dremel to grind the nose closer to shape. The feet, ears and wings are remnant polar fleece. I didn't have any of the orangy gold-ish yellow that her feet are, so I cut portions out of a printed scrap piece. :)



Squidge was a tough one. I had the most concern getting her paired parts (eyes, ears, feet and wings) to all align properly. I was glad to see that I succeeded pretty well when finished. I did fail to add the eyelashes, but I wasn't sure they would show up anyway on the furry yarn.



The most complex one was the Liberty that I made her cousin. She is also made mostly of polar fleece, except for the black of the eyes and the dress. Oh, and her nose is a tiny brown shank button. The dress was made out of a striped shirt. You may recognize this fabric from the legs of our rag doll witch from a long while back. The crown and dress are both removable. I put it on an elastic band. I wasn't sure if she'd like it to come off, but she really likes to dress/redress her dolls, so I thought it would be fun for her.



Her body is an alteration of the pattern I used for the polar fleece monster dolls. But, I changed the shape of the body making it smaller. I attached the arms right out of the head, which was actually a little easier, but made the head flop back and forth a bit being so big and with the added weight of the crown. I kinda wish I had done this for the Pet Society Zombie Bunny. It is more closer to what it should look like.

I ran out of time to make the ice cream and wish list. I will be making them and sending them on when I get a chance to. However, all in all, the three moshlings were a success. They both loved them. If it hadn't been for the Moshling Collector's Guide she received from Santa, these would have been the daughter absolute #1 gift this year. Curse you, Santa! :)

Have a Happy and Crafty New Year! I'll be back next year with some more Steampunk projects, including a few more hats!

Daughter's Many Litters of Super Cute Felt Critters

Daughter turned her interests to some hand sewing just before Christmas when she found a book entitled "Super Cute" by Parragon. The owl was her first project. In no time, she was trying different techniques and making all kinds of felt characters for our enjoyment. A few lucky friends and relatives got one for Christmas. Her cousin got the bunny in the lower right. She made the little bear on the top left just for me. Ahh, I feel so special. My bear was the first one she attempted to turn inside out to hide the seam. She figured out how to put the ears inside correctly all by herself! I was very impressed.



Grandma got the dark green one in the bottom right of the pic above.



Aren't they the most adorable things you ever saw?! Okay, I may be a tad biased being her mom. But I still think you have to agree that she's quite a talented and creative 9 year old. :)



Some even have removable clothing. I'm loving the "Madeye Moody" eye patch!



She was thrilled to receive a new sewing kit Santa. I hope to see many more of her creations this coming year. I'm trying to get her to make me some Potter Pal Puppets. Haven't convinced her to give it a try. . . yet. ;)

Next up, I'll be posting what I made the daughter and her cousin for Christmas. I kept to last years homemade holiday plan of only using what I had around. Stay tuned to see the results!

New set of Pistachio Hair Falls

Finally posting a new pair of super long pistachio hair falls. From loop to the tip of the tassels they're at 30" long. The shells on these were an experiment in transitions with the Kool-aid and food coloring dye used in my previous falls.



I soaked the shells half immersed in the dye. The red color separated and bled up the shell giving a three-toned transition from purple to red to natural. I strung them so that the shells also transition from heavily purple to natural with green shells at the top to resemble leaves. It created a lovely flower-like effect. I also strung small clusters of green and purple above to look like buds and a small green and natural bud at the tassels on the bottom.



I sealed these shells with satin acrylic spray paint, so they have a little shine to the shells. I used some scrap yarns to fill in the tassels. Though not pictured, I also created some green feather dangles that can be clipped into the tassels.



Because they were part of an experiment, I absolutely have nothing in my wardrobe that goes with these falls. So, I'll either need to start a new outfit around them (woohoo!) or I'm pondering offering these on Etsy.com if anyone is interested in owning them. After the Holidays I hoped to get started making a few pair in a sorta snaky scaly pattern.

Not sure if I'll be posting any more projects before Christmas. Though, we do have a hat in the works that I'd like to show the WIP on. Until next time, have a Crafty Holiday!

Sew many have slipped by...

...without mention. Even a couple Harry Potter themed projects. I feel really bad about that, because some really do need to be shown off. So, I thought I'd share some my mom had made this past year that didn't get the praise they deserve.

Back in August she decided to try my cushion critter (pillow pet clone) pattern available on the post here to make the kids some smaller cushion critter bunnies.



My daughter received this red/tan/black polar fleece one printed with Scotty dogs. Grandma also made her matching pants and red shirt. I failed to get pics of the set, as well as the set she sent to my niece. It was pink with flower print.



I think they turned out adorable at only 6x8" in size. It's a great pillow for car rides.





Back in early October, the daughter had talked Grandma into attempting to recreate a "Skelanimal" bat from an image that she had on a pair of gloves.



He's so cute! And, also made from the remnant polar fleece. I was so impressed that she made the pattern all by herself. She usually has low confidence on that type of thing. But, she did a fantastic job! Way to go mom!



And lastly, I haven't posted these items we sent my sis and her daughter back in a Harry Potter personal swap we arranged like two years ago! Yikes, has it really been that long!? I spaced and forgot to get pics, so waited for them to finally send over a few.



They each got a Cornish Pixie with a large cage to keep them both in (not pictured). They are like the ones we made here. But, each was an experiment in using a different fabric. As you can see, the polar fleece stretches making the pixie much larger and thicker than the ones made with less stretchy fabric like the velour.



And a "Ginny Weasley" rag doll with cloak ready for her trip to Hogwart's. I helped make the cloak and dress, but mom made the doll. She is based off the pattern we used on these that I posted about a LONG while back.

Next up I'll be posting about some more pistachio falls I finally got around to finishing. And, after the new year, I'll share some homemade Christmas gifts and more custom hats.

More Monster Dolls and a Zombie Bunny

I'm really behind posting some of the crafts we've been making this year. For instance, long before Halloween, my mom had made some more monster dolls for my daughter. So Batsy has friends!



Meet the werewolf named "Wolfina" and a frankenstein-ish doll named "Victoria". They were made using Batsy's pattern that I created last Christmas.



Their polar fleece hair is removable via Velcro. So, all of them can exchange hair colors and styles along with their clothes. I wanted to put faces on both sides, so you could flip it over for a different expression. But, the daughter was too excited to start playing with them for me to sew them on.



We really need to get busy on some more clothes. The daughter has been helping. She made Wolfina a shirt out of a bright fuzzy red sock. She's also made a hat out of an old pocket (not pictured). Kids are so clever with upcycling. :)



To reward the daughter for making Principle's Honor Roll again, I also not so recently made her a Zombie Bunny.



It's inspired by a costume she dressed her pet in on Pet Society on Facebook. She has named this one "Stitchy Buttons".



We've got a couple other sewing projects around here that mom has put together. I'll try to dig them up. This is one trouble with making things for the daughter. She runs off with them, and I never get to take any pics. ;)

Until next time, HAPPY CRAFTING!!

Having a Ball with Eyeballs

Juggling Eyeballs!!
Yep. Eyeballs you can juggle made from balloons! How fun! We had to try it. Though, I can't take credit for this project idea.



We just celebrated my daughter's birthday this past week. We didn't do anything fancy this year. Just some homemade cupcakes and crafts. There seemed to be a running theme of eyeballs. This would be partially due to the eyeball candy and cupcake wrappers we found in the clearance bins after Halloween. But, the daughter likes eyeballs and other creepy things. Which is probably rather odd. And, there is some irony in this, too. The irony being that all her dolls nowadays have button-eyed. Hmmm...how strange. :)

Anyway, we had lots of balloons left over after b-day decorating, so I remembered this tutorial for making Juggling Eyeballs I'd seen on Michele Made Me. The balls are made simply with balloons and uncooked rice. And the cool part was that they were giant EYEBALLS! Really easy kid friendly project. So, we scouted out what we had; found three plastic bottles and some long grain rice (since we didn't have short); and made a couple. A few minutes later, we had juggling balls!



I must say, substituting with long grain rice didn't work very well. The rice holds it's flattened shape when dropped. And, being new jugglers, we dropped them a LOT. So, we made a second attempt with some expired peeled yellow "mung" beans in the back of our cabinet. They worked much better than the rice.



After making our eyeballs, we also used the balloon necks that we cut off to cover some additional juggling balls. They remind me of billiard or pool balls.



Now we just have to learn how to juggle. It's going to be lots of practice to be able to juggle three of them! I just can't seem to get more than two going at once. :)

Hope you had a great Thanksgiving and/or scored some bargains this Black Friday! I'll be posting some more sewing projects shortly. Later!

Guessing Game: Time to Reveal Steampunk'd Items and Winners

If you missed my last post, we were having a little guessing game to figure out what everyday items I made some costume bullets out of. Big THANK YOU to everyone who participated. So many answers were so very close. It was difficult choosing the deserving winner. But, we have!

Now to find out what they really are!.....



If you said pen parts, you were correct, but only partially. Some of the many bullets I made were indeed made from different pen parts that I salvaged from assorted dead pens. However, I knew it wouldn't be difficult for some of you to recognize these. This is why I said to "be specific" on the two bullets in the challenge. The trick was that the bullet cylinders of the chosen two weren't actually made with the pen itself.



It was the caps that made up the cylinder portion. To be precise, it was Bic Round Stick Pen Caps. Both of the bullets in the challenge, as well as all the bullets pictured in the top row of the 2nd image of this post, were made with these caps. The second bullet did use the joint that holds the internal writing portion into the barrel from the same pen. As for the tips, I used 6mm Plastic Spaghetti Beads that were given to me. A third of a bead was cut down for the very tip of the second bullet.

Bic pens are truly fabulously well designed and crafty pens. Inexpensive and sufficient to write with, too. I wondered if any of you had noticed my frequent use of them in my projects. I have used them to make my adjustable knitting loom, a polymer clay covered pen, and some Harry Potter inspired writing quills. We use the internal ink parts left over to refill our other pens. So, no part of the pens have gone to waste here. :)

Here's how it was accomplished...



First, we cut the open ends off shorter. Two reasons for this. To remove the skinny clip part and to remove the "Bic" logo around the lower band. The plastic is soft enough to cut through with an exacto knife, or even a sharp pair of scissors. You can use a small flame, like a lighter, to smooth any burrs on the edge after cutting. Also, remove the center from the tip of the cap. You don't need to do a clean job. The little nubs will help the bead to stay in place better.



For the simplest version, we just crammed the spaghetti beads into the top. I used a tiny amount of glue around the rim to secure the bead.



For the longer bullet, I used the tip joint part thingy. It is also stamped with the logo, which can be removed with a little sanding. Just wrap a 150-200 grit paper around the tip and rotate it to wear it down. You'll also need to stretch the hole on top of the cap to get the parts to fit. I forced the opposite end into the hole to stretch it out. Turn it back around, and it should just pops right in.

Then, I tried various paint. The caps already have a texture that will help paint stick without need of sanding. Shooting them with a light coat of spray paint will help acrylic paints stick better. However, the best results, I think, probably came from good old gold/silver "Rub n' Buff". The fancy filigree on some of the bullets is actually just short scraps of lace that were painted.



One last minute clever thing I discovered using all the assorted pen parts, is that you can make the bullets into tiny containers! (The image above is of four of these containers.) How cool, right?! They could hold small pills/capsules, tic tacs, or even secret messages! ;)


Now for winners...

With so many similar answers, we decided we'd pick two winning guesses as well as one random winner. We scored them one point for each part guessed right and one point for being the first to guess a particular part.

Kudos to Creepy Creations, our highest scorer! She not only guessed it was pen caps and beads, but also the brand of pen! Great eyes! Our second place winner is The Cardboard Crafter for being first to mention the bead and for callin' out the pen tip! Congrats to our random winner , Jana_Ellena, chosen by random.org, who also just happened to be the first to guess pen! And, for being a good sport letting us borrow her challenge idea for this, I'm sending Mich in LA a bullet necklace, too. So great of her to come by and guess! Thank you so much!

That should wrap this up. I'll be notifying the winners via email shortly. Please send you snail mail addys ASAP, so I can get these to you. Thanks, again, to everyone for coming over to play!

Next up, I'll be posting about a quick fun project we tried this week. It was a ball!...or three! ;)

Guessing Game: What Everyday Object Are These Made Out Of??: Steampunk'd Vampire, Werewolf and Zombie Bullets

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Want one of these bullets for your very own? :) Well, good news! I'm giving away not one...not two...but THREE of them! You could receive one just for guessing! Read on!



Awhile back, my man was making a Steampunk'd ammo belt hatband for his red leather hat, but it was looking pretty empty and sad without any bullets in it. We looked around for shells to use, but frankly, they were hard to find. And, what we found was kinda expensive, not to mention right down heavy for his hat. So, after running short on time for faire, I got to looking through my craft stash and came upon some everyday items that, when put together, made amazingly perfect bullets!

Just take a look at some necklaces I put together after I finish the simple ones for his hat:









I was pretty proud of my own cleverness on this. So I thought I'd share a quick and simple tutorial with all you empty ammo belt wearers out there. Now, at this point, you may be asking yourself, "So, where's this tutorial? I don't see a tutorial here." But, to make it fun, I have something else in mind first. Muhuwahaha!

Mich L. in L.A. has a regular "Guess the Mystery Thing" on her blog. She has such clever posts and pretty items. I thought it'd be fun to host a similar challenge and invite her to be on the other end of the challenge for a change. (I hope to stump her, as well.) ;) And, you're all invited to play, too! But, don't worry. This one is really easy. It shouldn't be tough for someone to guess it right off.

*******UPDATE 11/22/11*******
Voting has ended for this challenge.
View the reveal and winners here.
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We're going to limit guesses to the two painted bullets at the top of this post. The first one is made in two parts like those in his hat. One part is the everyday item and the other is a common craft supply. Or, try to guess specifically what the second bullet is made out of. It is made in three parts.

You could win one of the bullet pendant pictured below (with the chain attached):



Now take a guess. For more of a challenge, don't be tempted to peek at the comment section til after you guess! You just need to take a stab at what objects the two bullets in the first image on this post are made of. You've probably already figured it out. But, please be specific, because the best (most accurate) answer wins (judged by my mom, my daughter, and me). Don't fret if you have no clue what it is. I'll also pick a random winner for one, as well.

THE RULES: Just comment with your guess. That's it! Oh, but be sure your email addy is in your profile or comment where I can find it to contact you. If I can't find it, I will chose a new winner.

And, while we're on this topic of the Mystery Thing Challenges, it's taken me an embarrassing long time to share an awesome item I won from Mich L. in L.A. Check out this really cool rubber grape ring. Yep, that's what I said. Rubber grape ring. I got it by participating in Mich's challenge here.



That's all for this post! Thanks for stopping by and GOOD LUCK to those who play along!