Tutorial--Stuffie Zombunny

Don't ask me why, but my 10-year-old has a passion for "ugly cuteness".  She's been bugging me to make a stuffie from her sketch.  Thus, this tutorial was born.

1.  Determine how big your stuffie would be.  If it's going to be bigger than a 8x11 paper, tape two pieces of paper together.  Mine were landscape (tape the long sides together) since the Zombunny will be quite chubby.

2.  Sketch your stuffie away.  (Mine is a design by my 10 year-old.)  Note that I drew the tail on the Zombunny's tummy to conserve paper.  (tee-hee).

3.  Cut out your stuffie.  (my girl wanted the ears to be separate pieces so it's now a baldie and looks just like a zombie!)

4. Pin the cut out pattern to the wrong side of fabric (leaving enough room for seam allowance).  

5. Use water soluble fabric ink pen (min is Mark.B.Gone) to mark seam allowance all around the pattern.  I eye balled mine to be 3/8"~5/8" wide.  

6. Cut along the marked seam allowance.  

7.  If your stuffie is not symmetrical, be sure to flip your pattern when tracing and marking your back piece.  

8.  Cut out the eye and tongue from the pattern.  Use the cut outs as templates to cut one eye on white felt and one tongue on red felt. (no need to add seam allowance.)

9.  Cut out the tail from the pattern.  Use this as template to cut 2 pieces on the main fabric adding 3/8" seam allowance.  

10.  Sew on the eye (I embroidered the pupil with black embroidery thread .) and tongue using blanket stitch.  Stitch on the X and lip line.  (I use the pattern as my guide for placement).

 11.  Cut four ear pieces adding 3/8" seam allowance.  With right sides together, sew two pieces together to form one ear.  Repeat with the other ear.
Forgot to take a picture of the tail...  With right sides together, sew two pieces together to form one circular tail.

 12.  Turn the tail and ear pieces right side out and stuff them with poly stuffing.  Sew the opening of the tail closed, but don't bother with the ears.  

  13.  Use the (already beaten up) pattern to draw sewing line with a water soluble ink marker. (adult censorship required:  my little one said this looks quite scary...)

 14.  With right side facing, sandwich the stuffed ear pieces in between (placement shown with red dotted line on the picture), pin and sew all the way around, leaving a 4" opening (on a straight line, not on curves) for turning.  Clip all the curves.  Turn right side out.

 15.  If your Zombunny looks asymmetrical, don't worry about it.  It's a Zombunny!  The more asymmertrical, the more zombie-like it will be.   Sew the tail on the back side.

 16.  You may take a tea break.  Now find a helper...

17.  Have your helper stuff the Zombunny with poly stuffing.  (use a chopstick to get to the arms and legs).  Sew the opening close.  
Finally, find a child who will give this Zombunny lots of love and hugs.

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October Aha!--Pattern Tracing Options

I have been looking for pattern tracing materials everywhere.  Joann carries sturdy plastic tracing sheets for $2-3+ a piece.  Quite pricy, I thought.  

I went across the street to Daiso and found these Translucent Poly File Folders (12.4” x 17.2”, 3pc.) for, yap, you guessed it, $1.50.  I figured that each folder has two sides that I could use.  For 3 folders, that’s 6 sheets.  For the price that I pay for these, it’s a steal.

 I like to reuse my bag and pouch patters, so these plastic folders are just the right size.  After tracing and cutting, I punched holes on each piece of the patterns and use brats o secure pieces from the same project together. 

 The down side of these plastic folders is that the permanent ink does not stay as well as tracing papers.  So I am risking losing markings or notes on those sheets.

 Then I found this: Plastic Drop Cloth from hardware store (10' x 20' for about $3.50). 

Be careful not to be greedy cut too long of a sheet since it's 10' wide.  Otherwise, you'll end up with a mess on your cutting table before you could even start any tracing. 

Lay the drop cloth flat on your pattern, using weights to prevent movement while tracing (as you would with tissue paper pattern tracing).  Permanent markers and rulers are great tools for pattern tracing on plastic. 

 Transfer markings and pattern number, size and details on the drop cloth.  It's surprisingly easy marking on it and the ink stays well.

Storage is a breeze.  You could fold it up as small as you desire.  (this sheet has 7 pieces of pattern on it, and it could still be folded up even more than this).  The beauty of this is when you open the sheet up, no wrinkles!

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October Aha!--Pattern Weights option

I refuse to buy overpriced pattern weights at the store.

 I found these fall leaves glass gem table decorations years ago and decided to give them a try as my pattern weights.  

No complaints.  My wallet is happy, too. 

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Fall Kids Craft--Funny Pumpkins

Draw a pumpkin with marker on an orange construction paper.

You’ll also need pages from cosmetic catalogs (they have mostly close up shots on faces), scissors (kid sized, blunt tips) and a glue stick.

Cut and mismatch the eyes, nose, mouth, ears and accessories.  Glue them on the drawn pumpkin.

Here's the best part:  have a good laugh with your child.

Let your child express herself, funny or not.

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Kids Water Color Tattos

What to do when your little one wants to feel pretty?

I used water color pencils (dipped in water) to draw on JJ’s feet.  She loved it so much that she walked on her tippy toes for the rest of the day.

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Tutorial (kinda)--Easy Backdrop for Photo Shooting

I have been reading about backdrops for photo shootings.  But some required tons of work, and others taping sheets to walls.  None would work for me.  I am not buddies with the word “work”.  Besides, I have a dog and a cat who LOVE to get involved.  If  I have to tape sheets to the wall, all I would have is a PET STUDIO.  

My need for photo shooting is mostly for my crafts that do not take up much space.  My lazy crafter’s bulb went on when I look at my backyard.

Natural light, check.  Old swing chair, check.

The  biggest posters boards I could find, check.  

Prop the poster boards on the swing chair.  
No crease!  

Set my subject on the poster board and shoot!

 

I used flash, but was happy with the result.

Try different time of the day to get best natural light.

Tried a different color.  

Still prefer a warmer tone.

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Dress for Joplin

This is the dress I made for the Joplin project.

I had the choice of sewing a dress for 5 year olds, 7 year olds and 10 year olds.   From my experience packing shoe boxes for the Operation Christmas Child, most people would choose younger children.  Being mindful of this fact, I chose to sew for a 10 year old girl.

I went to the craft night with the floral fabric and without a T-shirt.  Unfortunately, when I got there, they were all out of girls’ T.  The event coordinator had a few boys’ T for me to choose from. And, fortunately, there was this mustard color T that matched my floral fabric perfectly!  Praise the Lord!  It all worked out.  

One little thing that I did not consider was the amount of gathering for a size 10 3-tier skirt.  I was gathering like crazy!  At the end, I took the dress home to assemble it.  Before the night ended, I thought something was still missing from the dress.  So I stenciled a strawberry (to match the floral print of the skirt) on the T with a bit of sparkles.  

Really pray to make a young girl smile on her 1^st day of school.

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Good Bye and Hello

My trusted iron that had been laboring for the past 14 years had finally breathed its last.  

It actually decided to retire 3 weeks ago.  But I was not ready to part from it.  I borrowed my husband's tools and revived this guy for a short while.  When it no longer heat up and snapped, I knew it was time to come out of my denial.  This is a tribute to a post-worthy iron.  Good-bye!

The timing of my old iron's retirement was not desirable, for I was in the middle of my lunch bag project. (it was a "arrrrr" moment).  The urge of finishing the project was so strong, I decided to head to Target around 10:30pm in search of a replacement.  My mother-in-law was very gracious to accompany me as my "body guard".  Thanks, mom. =)  Praise the Lord, there was a sale on irons.  
Welcome to my craft room, Steam Master.  Thanks in advance for the work you will do in the years to come.

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Tutorial--Thread & Ribbon Rack (Real Cheap and Easy!)

You have seen one of these thread rack in the craft store, right?  It organizes and displays all your thread spools. Pretty useful I’d say.  Though it’s affordable (around 10 dollars a piece), I was reluctant to spend money on something I could make.  I’ searched online to see if it’s cheaper and easier to build one myself.  Here are some posts I found:

http://www.instructables.com/id/How-to-Make-a-Simple-and-Stylish-Thread-Rack/

http://blogfullofjelly.blogspot.com/2010/02/diy-thread-rack.html

http://www.minitoko.com/wpblog/2011/02/thread-rack-diy/

These posts are inspiring.  But being sluggish, I do not feel like running to the hardware store anytime soon.  Not to mention that I don’t really drill, saw or sand (I sure am a mutant in the family…sorry, dad.)  It's my belief that only the creative ones could afford to be lazy.  This is what I came up with:

Thread/Ribbon Rack:

Cost:   Absolutely nothing!

Time:  5-10 minutes at most

Materials:

•       2 pieces of cork boards that my son no longer uses.   (can’t believe my luck!)  They are rather thin, about 1/4" to 1/2".  If yours is thicker, one piece should do.
•         a handful of 8x2 screws (sand color, found in my husband’s tool box.  Thanks, honey.  BTW, I am not giving them back…)  *Be sure to check if the screw head is small enough for your spool to sit on before using them.
•         a ruler

A closer look at the screws.

First, I stacked the 2 cork boards to give it depth for the screws to grab on.  Then the ruler was used to determine how far apart I want the screws.  Once that’s certain, the ruler just laid on the cork board to guide and level the screws in the same row.  

 Screwed the screws right into the cork boards by hand (slightly at an angle).   No tools required.  Make sure the screws grabs both layers of cork, yet do not puncture through the bottom layer (if the pointed ends of the screws are showing, you've gone too far).  
Could have used the double sided foam tape that came with the cork board to hang it, but I decided to nail this one to the wall.  Not going to take any chances to mount this twice.  

Like I said, cheap and easy.

I have 12 small spools of assorted color thread hanging around in the craft room crying for a home.  Since the board has extra room, I decided to use pins (that's right, just pins) for these light-weight guys.  Works like a dream.  I used a floral pin for the one odd spool on top.  The long pin works just fine.

Couldn't have been any easier.

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