Spastic Babble: Craft Par-tay!

First of all, let me say that my laptop erases my stuff a bazillion times faster than it manages to upload it.

Today was a crafty day.

Last night I saw the cutest little turtle of beads online so I decided I wanted to make a turtle too! (eventually I want to make a happy one, but that's besides today's point.) Thus, I grabbed my jewelry wire, some beads and got to work. The animals I saw online were made like the pony bead and ribbon animals that were super popular in the 90's (and are still seen on elementary kids today). Basically, both sides of wire run through each row, easy right? You would think. But my stupid turtle would have be the kid on the short bus. He was all scrunched up and 'tarded looking. And so I decided I needed to do some research, figure out what was wrong.

My retarded person... Notice that it does not sit flat.

So today I went to the library. It just so happened that my reserve of Inkdeath was available (sequel to Inkspell which was sequel to Inkheart), thus to the library I went! And I found books and books on beading! And one of those awesome books was pages and pages of photos and diagrams of little wire and bead animals/ people/ chairs/ tables/ bugs/ etc. Super cool.

And it mentioned a certain wire gauge. 28. So on the way home, it was to Michael's I went (again. I feel like I'm there twice a week lately). And I found the right gauge wire ON SALE for only 1.99!! Hooray! I also picked up some oven bake clay since I've been dying to try that out (thanks Festival of Little Hills for that inspiration) and it was on sale TOO! 4 for $5 and normally they were $2.50 each. It worked out great since I forgot my coupon. Go figure.

So we made it home and that wire was perfect! I think my bead wire is just made to not kink, where this stuff is made to stay in place. Anyway, these patterns aren't my idea. But the colors choices are!

Penguin!

Giraffe!

Turtle!

And, the most complicated but still my favorite,

The Fairy

She's totally cooler in person.

Then I broke out the clay. And I'm not so great with it as I am with kiln fired clay. Also, it would be nice to have those tools again and if I decded to do this a lot more I'd totally want better tools. And yet, I'm happy to use my hands and fingers, fingernails, a plastic fork, and a sharp corn holder (great for poking)

My Lizard was first!

And then I made a turtle! He has a hard time not leaning forward. His head's heavy.

(Full of brains, very smart little turtle)

Today I used white and blue. Things to note, blue stains your hands and thus your white.

I also bought black and red today. I think I'm going to try for some pirate themed stuff soon. Skulls look fun, as do skeletons! Yay! More photos to come I think!

Something else to note while we're on the craft moment:

Last week when my oldest sister in law was home from college she and I and Mom in Law decided to make SOAP! Now, this inspiration also came from the Festival of Little Hills. It's basically a giant craft fair with food and the occasional musician/ magician set up in the middle of the street. The things that I saw that I really wanted to try for myself were clay animals (some people made them into jewelry and magnets.. oh yeah! MAGNETS! woot! Now I know what I'm going to do with all these silly animals.), jewelry (the seed bead stuff), and most of all was soap!

The soap stalls were all selling expensive but pretty stuff. Sis-in-law's favorites (mine too) were the ones with rubber duckies sticking out of them. They had all kinds of ducks. Different occupations, different outfits (think cowboy hat and whip), etc. But they cost SO freaking much, and were so simple looking.

Sis in law had never been to Hobby Lobby, a lovely craft store here in the great state of Misery that doesn't cost as much as Michael's and has more craft, less fine art. It's a super fun place to spend hours in. Hours Jess? Yep. I've spent hours there. Looking. =)

We found a kit with a full pound of soap, two mold trays, scent, and color dye! The scent seemed to be a surprise, so we grabbed a bottle of coconut scent too and then wandered around looking for rubber ducks. Which we FOUND! The soap was easy, you melt it in the microwave for like 30 seconds, pour in some smelly stuff and some color, pour it and let it cool. And then WHAM! You have soap you made yourself.

Sis in law and I learned a few things:

1. It's hard to add too much scent when you only add a drop at a time. Next time, do it in long squirts.

2. When you want multi - separate- colors in one bar, it has to cool between colors. This is a problem until the green and the blue mix to become this awesome turquoise.

3. Rubber ducks have air in them and thus float. Sis in law got to sit there for five minutes pushing the duck down into the mold until it set enough to hold the duck down. Future ducks were filled with the liquid soap before being put into the mold.

4. Patience is a key.

5. I'm impatient.

6. It's SO COOL to shower everyday and use the soap YOU made!

So we ended up with pink and green cucumber melon scented hearts. And bars with DUCKS in them ranging in colors. Here are a few pics of the ducks. The quality of these photos is appalling (even though I'm the one that snapped them), so I'm not going to 'focus' on that part. HA! A pun!

Horizontal Ducky... Vertical Ducky....