What Other Colour Would One Wear In The Giger Bar?

Our holiday to Switzerland was born of one idea - to visit the HR Giger Museum and Bar.
It was amazing, and luckily La Gruyere was a lovely medieval town to stay in also.

So we made more than one visit to the bar, but I asked for photos to be taken for bloggy purposes whilst wearing my all time favourite skirt. It looks like nothing special, because it isn't. A plain black circle skirt - magnificent! I love everything about it! I intend to make another a little bit longer as this is a bit short for those times when  you need to be a bit more respectable ;)

So these pictures of me aren't the best I know. I was tempted to crop my head off and say it was eaten by an alien creature but it would probably have made it worse.... However, they are taken in the frickin Giger bar which makes up for it entirely!

The skirt is made from plain black cotton fished out of the oddments bin of a local shop, it was nice to work with although a little bit crisp, which made the skirt very poofy until it had been through the wash. I just used maths to make it, and it has a little zip and button closure at the back. It is not one for wearing in the wind, I had a Marilyn Monroe moment when we were in Geneva heading back to the airport. Thankfully I was wearing VERY large pants!
The t-shirt is a me made one, pattern made from an old tee, it is a bit too big across the back, hence the bra straps showing. But it does the job. Would you believe me if I said I had caught the sun whilst there?!

 

Here is a picture of some of the seating, I cropped myself out of the other half of the pic, but it is a nice shot of the interior of the bar, which will probably be the coolest bar I ever visit. The museum is right opposite the bar, but sadly no photos were allowed in there.

Hard to imagine a Cath Kidston print in here isn't it!

That Mod Podge Shoe Thing

I jumped on the bandwagon and tried that mod-podge shoe nerdifying thing. I did this quite a while ago and never got around to blogging about it. It came about in the usual way of it being really late at night and me being on my own and deciding it would be the perfect time to try out that time consuming craft project I pinned months beforehand.

So I got out a stash of Neo magazines and set about snipping a pile of cute pics small enough to fit on the shoes, as well as a pile of multi coloured bits to be fillers.
As you can see they turned out all bright and funky, and despite them not being the kind of thing I would normally go for, I thought they looked pretty awesome and were definitely going to be worn.

Front view - I love the Junko Mizuno mermaid picture <3 br="">

Side view one

Back view

 Side view two - showing some less than perfect sizing on the back shoe.

If you know me, you will know that sometimes when I get the urge (you know that urge) to make something, I often don't think about it practically and end up with some pretty silly things happening. The biggest mistake was using magazine pictures instead of comic book pages. The magazine pictures are thicker and do not "become one" with the shoe fabric. This was not helped by a big shoe issue - these were shiny shoes and the pvc cheap nasty surface was not the best for gluing things onto, even mod podge is weak against them. So when I finished applying the pictures (some which were just unsuitable which I should have replaced, as in the above picture) and slapped on a couple of coats of mod podge (gloss) and let them dry, I was about to encounter my next set of problems.

First there was an incident where the shoes were placed too close together (they were dry, it was about a week after) and they fused together, this resulted in some of the mod podge coming away when I pulled them apart. Then when I started walking about in them to wear them in a bit (I had only worn the shoes a couple of times before so they were still a bit tight and ouchy) the subsequent creasing made one of the pictures come away. This showed me that I could effectively just peel the whole lot off as they weren't really bonded to the shoe as I explained before.

Now I just have the shoes sat in my craft room being a decorative feature that nobody except myself ever sees. And I am torn as to what to do with them. Do I rip it all off and try again with comic book paper? Or keep them as an odd ornament?

Suggestions welcome!

Shorts to Skirt Upcycle

Good afternoon folks!

First of all I would like to say how sad I was to see the news about the terrible destruction in Oklahoma City, such a heartbreaking thing to happen :(

Today I am sharing a little project from last year, you know how on the ball I am with these things. A while back I got some weird shorts from a charity shop (I have since discovered they are gauchos) that I liked but could not find anything to wear with them that looked okay. So I thought sod it, I'm going to have to make them into a skirt. And I did!

I forgot to take a before picture but just imagine some really odd wide legged knee length shorts and you're good to go. I unpicked the inside hems and just re sewed them to meet like a skirt. You have to chop the little crutch bit out but otherwise there isn't much to do other than getting the join smooth.
I top stitched for strength along the front and back seams. There is also one of those vents (? is that the right term?) at the back to allow leg movement - always a useful thing to have! I added the lace at the bottom to jazz it up a bit, I think it works quite well!

I even covered (badly) my raw edges as it was fraying like a S.O.B!

I haven't worn it many times, maybe three or four, but I do still like it. I wore it to my first OU tutorial thinking people would be all smart casual, I might have made too much of an effort....and the top I paired it with is actually a bit see through...oops! So errmm yeah, librarian chic... I rocked it baby ha ha ha! ;)

Totoro Tote Bag!

One night when I was feeling super blue and was unable to sleep, I decided to be pro-active and crochet up this cheeky little fellow! I didn't use a pattern (and unfortunately I was not in the right frame of mind to have even thought to write down what I did) but it was a straight forward double crochet (US single crochet) extended oval base and then rounds of treble crochet (US double crochet) until I reached the desired height. I used treble crochet for two long straps. I appliqued the eyes, nose and belly (with yarn used to make the little arrow bits) using felt. The bag is also lined using scrap t-shirt fabric. I keep meaning to make him some whiskers so the poor people who have no knowledge of this magnificent beast stop thinking he's an owl.

What a cutie!

Zombie Pin Up

Thought I would show everyone an idea in progress.
I was at work and listening to the radio, a song by the band The Feeling came on and as I was working away I heard the line "People in love their hearts get eaten" which is probably just misheard but it got my brain going!

I suddenly had this idea about a sexy zombie killing off her lover by going for heart instead of brains! I know this probably is not very funny to most people but my sense of humour is a bit odd and I thought it was fricking hilarious! So I thought of things I could do with this and decided that I wanted to do an embroidery as I wanted to do one and have no qualms about skipping the usual flowers and twee (I do like flowers and twee-ness, I just also like zombies :) ) for something a bit more ambitious.
So I drew a picture to get started with, I just need to wait to borrow (steal hahaha!) an embroidery hoop off my step Mum as I am on a not buying stuff for lent thing as consumerism seemed like a better thing to give up than chocolate. I am trying to use up things I already have as I have loads of craft and sewing stuff that should be used up a bit before I buy more anyway. I like to be thrifty and resourceful any way so it hasn't been too difficult, although there are a few things I would like to buy, I think that after lent I will cut down on purchases and use them as a reward for something I am doing, or rather not doing :)

Any how, I got the urge to pull out the pencil crayons and colour in my picture so I though I would post it up as an idea in progress, as soon as I get that hoop I'm gonna be on it!!

 

Don't steal my picture potential asses - I own all rights to my drawing!

I think I am going to turn my embroidery into a sewing machine cover or maybe a cushion, will have to wait and see!

After I had sat and coloured this in, I suddenly had the idea (whilst walking downstairs, ideas really do just come out of nowhere!) that I could draw zombie mermaids too! I got so excited about this totally awesome and hilarious idea that seeing as how my colouring in stuff was upstairs still (Upstairs is the ground floor where the living area is, downstairs is underground where bedrooms and craft rooms hide, it is cold and windowless in my craft room - boo!) I could jump straight in and make imagination reality!

Again, I own all rights to my picture sneaky thieving bumholes!

So umm yeah, I had a lot of fun :)

Watch out for an update once I have the hoop!  

Jim Woodring Cushion

I made this ages ago, I can't even remember exactly when!
I must state now that I do not own the characters shown, all rights belong to Jim Woodring. 

It's a bit battered now due to going through the wash a few times! It is a Pupshaw and Pushpaw cushion.
Basically I traced an image off the computer screen (I have no printer ink!) and used that to make templates for the faces, I have used black fleece and scraps of the cream fleece the cushion cover is made from to construct an applique style face for each of them. (I cheated and used fabric glue instead of sewing them on.)

I then copied the rest of the picture on to the cushion using a black tulip paint that just had enough left in it - phew! I left it to dry overnight and voila, one Jim Woodring cushion that you won't find in the shops!

New Mario crochet!

Finally I can blog about these bad boys! As they were gifts I couldn't risk putting them on here in case they were seen and the surprise ruined!

First up is my version of a big Bob-omb, saw him on a google image search and fell in love with the moustachio!!

 

Big Bob-omb is about 9 inches tall at a guess without including his fuse. I actually used a mixture of patterns and genius to make him, the main part of the body was from this King Boo tutorial from the delightful Wolfdreamer OTH, and the rest was made using the normal Bob-omb tutorial which I have previously made here, as a rough guide and guesstimating it to fit the dimensions required!

I was supposed to make him a crown (found on the King Boo tutorial) but it kind of didn't happen!

I also made a Boo from the King Boo pattern but decided to stick to the non-regal variety.

I used felt and some scrap white fleece for the mouth, the eyes were done using a tulip pen as I'm not too good with the embroidery on stuffed toys. 

Finally I made a Luma (the star....yes I know it looks like a spiky tear drop but just go with me!) which is pretty cute. Wish it was a beanie (or in my case a popcornie as I'm not buying expensive poly pellets when the corns do the same thing) but the little legs wouldn't have coped with the weight.

The Luma also came from Wolfdreamer, it can be found here.

I think if I did it again the arms and legs could do with a few extra rows to make them bigger as mine did not come out the same as the pictured one on the tutorial!


There are a few other "easy" Mario tutorials I'm going to do before trying the hard stuff!
We were getting a little silly and ambitious last night dreaming up an entirely crocheted Mario world and doing crazy things like a rideable sized Yoshi! It would be cool but my wrists would probably give up entirely and err.... crochet hooks are kinda small.....and I don't have a million hours to commit to it at the moment! Perhaps one day!

One for the boys....

Mario crochet toys!!

A mushroom to make you grow bigger and a bombomb :D

Here's the mushroom next to Colin to give you an idea of scale, they didn't take very long, about an hour and a bit each so when I get some more yarn I'm going to make more mushrooms (green, yellow with red spots and a purple one, all my fellow geeks will know what they do!) and create my own Mario universe! Will eventually make the main characters but they're a bit more advanced than the level I'm at now.

The bombomb even has his own little key detail as well!

I got the patterns for the bombomb here, and the mushroom here.

I did alter the mushroom pattern by adding a few extra rows for the stalk/face part.