Archive for sewing

It’s That Time Again

February 1, 2013 conventions, handmade, plush, sewing No comments

 

 

I’m gearing up to start my sewing for convention season! If all goes as planned, I’ll be selling at three conventions:

HeroesCon in Charlotte, NC June 7-9

Dragon*Con in Atlanta, August 30-September 2

NC Comicon in Durham, NC November 9-10

I’ll also be attending GI Joe Con in Indianapolis. On my birthday. Because I am a nice girlfriend who does that on her birthday for her boyfriend. (I’m kidding, I loves me some conventions and I’m getting treated to a mini shopping spree at Kokomo Toys.) I won’t have a booth at GI Joe Con, but I will be bringing some cuddly friends with me for the room-to-room trading, mostly GI Joe as well as some other beloved 80’s buddies.

So here is my tentative list of the what I’ll have available. If you can’t make it to a convention to see me in person, I will have limited numbers of each character available in my Etsy shop.

Princess Bubblegum

Fionna

Hellboy

Rorschach

Harley Quinn

Thanos

Deadpool

Hit Girl

10th Doctor

11th Doctor

Weeping Angel

Storm Shadow

Baroness

Destro

Snake Eyes

Roadblock

Zartan

Snape

Harry Potter

Voldemort

House Elves

Bilbo

Cthulu

Mr. T

Slenderman

Skeletor

Trap-Jaw

She-Ra

Mal

Jayne

Spock

Capt Kirk

Leia

Han Solo

Lando

Lion-O

Ninja Turtles

Splinter

Greedo

Finn

Marceline

He-Man

Bugs

Sea monsters

Elephants

Dragons

Zombies

Cobra Troopers

Excited! You can check out pictures of convention dolls I’ve made before on my Flickr page. I’m also working on refining my My Little Pony pattern, so look for those too!

Buzz Buzz Buzz

April 20, 2012 conventions, handmade, plush, sewing 2 comments

I have been an extremely busy bee! As Heroes Con and Dragon Con are drawing closer, I’ve been spending every spare moment attached to my sewing machine and turning out batches of cuddly friends. Here are two of the largest batches I’ve made:

Ninja Turtles! Shredder had better watch out with all these little guys after him. They are so fun to make, the little shells and bandannas come out so adorable. Plus, who can say no to teeny plus nunchucks? Nobody, that’s who!

I absolutely had to make a big batch of zombies for Dragon Con! It’s held in Atlanta, which is also where AMC’s “The Walking Dead” is filmed. This zombie hoard is decidedly cuter, and less pungent!
This is only half of the plush zombie hoard! I have twenty-two cuddly brain eaters with removable guts. Each one has a unique set of gross features with skull faces, bloody mouths, wormy friends, eyes dripping goo, and various injuries. These are probably my favorite thing to make, which might be cause for concern…
I’ll be putting a limited number of these, as well as a few of the other dolls I’ve made, on my Etsy shop this weekend.

Fireball!

March 21, 2012 dolls, sewing No comments

Custom orders are done and it is finally time to throw myself head first into sewing dolls for conventions! I love custom orders for all the different and interesting requests, but I’m excited to take a break to work on some new designs and old favorites. Plus making multiples of things makes me feel super productive.

One of my goals for this year was to offer a wider selection and more original plush characters. I always have fun sketching new ideas and playing with designs, and I’m looking forward to offering some different things this year. Since this will be my first year selling at Dragon*Con, one of my first thoughts was obviously cuddly baby dragons! Since I happened to take some in process pictures while making the dragons, this is going to be a kind of behind the scenes look at my doll making process.
Any new character starts with a sketch, like the one above. I get the basic idea down and figure out what pattern pieces I need to create.
Since dragons are well known for their treasure hoarding, these little guys needed some sparkle. That meant one thing: sequins! One online order and lots of excited squeaking later a box of various colors was on the way.
I work from the same basic pattern for all the 18″ dolls; this pattern is modified or added to as needed for each character. The baby dragons needed a diffent head and a modification to the body pattern to get the cute little tail and dragony rump. They also made some little wings and two different options for ears. Once the new pattern pieces were drawn, I stitched up and stuffed a protoype.
This is the little dragon prototype, and he is super cute! Pleased with the look, it was time to move onto my favorite part: selecting colors and combinations. Lizardy greens and yellows were an obvious pick, along with fiery pinks and reds and some black and deep grey to recall the dark caves where dragons make their homes.
When making multiples, I usually sew and assemble the basic body first and add details later. I didn’t plan out which color got matched to each set of wings or ears; I like to fiddle and experiment with color combinations. Once the basic bodies were done, I just started putting pieces with them until I was happy. Playing with the sequins was definitely super fun, so sparkly! Each dragon got two different colors of sequins in several clusters of three or four.

Finally, here are some of the completed baby dragons! All the little eye decorations were cut freehand and each shape is unique. These little guys will be joining me at conventions and a few will be available at my Etsy shop. Time to move on to the next batch!

Nifty Thrifty: The Return of the Thrift

July 30, 2011 fabric, nifty thrifty, sewing, thrifting No comments
It’s Nifty Thrifty time again! This week is all about thrifted textiles. Sheets, curtains, pillowcases, and fabric are plentiful and cheap at thrift stores. Check out some of the neat sheets and curtains I’ve gotten:


I love the polka dots on this coupled with the bright flowers. This is definitely getting made into a skirt or dress.

I’m not even sure what this is, there’s some weird ruffly bit around the edges. I love the color and pattern though.

I think these are curtains, there are ruffles on one edge but they’re made out of what feels like lightweight canvas. I love the pattern though, it’s all gnomes and woodland creatures. I think this will make great totes and pillows.
Ha ha, remember those things that were around before mp3 players? Yeah, me neither.
If you sew, thrifted sheets are a great source of super cheap fabric. A flat sheet offers close to five yards for less than $5. Using pre-made items also give you the advantage of having finished edges, which means less time finishing seams or making hems. My ingenuity is a direct result of my laziness and hatred of hemming. I seriously hate hemming.
I’ve made several small quilts using squares cut from thrifted sheets. The white and yellow floral above is from a thrifted sheet.
The creamy orange stripe, yellow tulips, and larger scale floral on the quilt above are all thrifted. The larger scale floral was a pillowcase and one of my favorite finds; I love the grey background with the springy oranges and greens. I’ve used it to make a fabric belt too.

If you’re so inclined, you can make your own fabric belt. even if you’re not inclined, do it anyway. It’s super duper easy. You can check out the tutorial I posted here.
My skirts is made of curtains, it’s like Sound of Music up in here. I seriously love these curtains and their amazing ugly 70-ness. I have a serious soft spot for horrible seventies things. I may have scared my friend by freaking out about avocado green flocked wallpaper in a random furniture store in Gastonia, NC. (If you’ve never been to Gastonia, first of all, congratulations. Also going there is like time travel but not in a good way. But there’s an gigantamous fabric store and kitschy mini golf, so it’s pretty much worth it.)
You can also use thrifted sheets and curtains as what they were intended to be, if you want to be all boring and stuff. The curtains in my craft room are thrifted and I love the bright colors and florals. Fellow Crown Town Handmade member Amanda offers cute sets with coordinating pillowcases and sheets. You can check out the sets at Verabelle’s Attic. I love the look of coordinating but not matching linens, it’s a much more interesting and personalized look.
That’s it for this week. I’ll probably post again next Saturday or something.

Something Different

July 26, 2011 Choopie, crafing, patterns, plush, sewing, V.I.N.CENT One comment

Just kidding, it’s more plush! I’m having nightmares about stuffing again. I’m still working on commissions from Heroes Con. Isn’t that crazy? The answer is yes.
Anyway, I’ve gotten a lot of the simpler characters out of the way and I’m starting to work on dolls that require some pattern drafting. Does anyone else have a skill that some days you feel like the DaVinci of whatever and some days it seems like somebody snuck in at night and stole the part of your brain that knows how to do that thing? That could totally happen, I’m an insanely heavy sleeper. That’s me and pattern drafting. Sometimes I draw something and sew it together and stuff it and it’s like “Hi, I look exactly how you wanted! You should go have some ice cream for being so cool!” Sometimes I sew something and stuff it and immediately unstuff it and hide it under the table and pretend that it never happened.

V.I.N.CENT from Disney’s The Black Hole started as a hide under the table kind of project. The little round body base and feet weren’t too bad, just some sizing issues. Those little arm things were terrible! I might have made my boyfriend come help and then been kind of mean about it because I was grumpy about the terribleness. Luckily I got it in the end and he turned out really cute and his recipient was super happy and danced around a little. That’s what matters.

Choopie from the The Perhapanauts was a totally different story. I think I did his head twice to get the size I wanted. Other than that, the tweaked patterns for his arms and legs worked perfectly. Aw, and he has a little wings and bright green nipples. Adorbs. For some reason I love putting little nipples on dolls.
I’m almost done with the dolls for Stitch Wars Strikes Back at Bear and Bird Boutique. I’ll get some pictures and gush about them. Excited!

Watch Out, He-Man

January 4, 2011 nerdy stuff, plush, sewing No comments
My first crafting day of 2011 was a fruitful one.
I am now the proud mother of six little Skeletors. They kept my up all night with their plotting against He-Man and tried to sneak out after bedtime to attack Castle Grayskull. And they have faces only a mother could love.
If you’d like to adopt one of your own, head over to the shop. Despite their evil inclinations, they’re quite cuddly.

Aren’t You Tweet (2 and 3)

January 21, 2009 blogged, Craft 365, handmade, sewing, totes One comment

So I’m going to try this Craft 365 thing. I’m counting Sunday’s post as 1, sort of cheating but oh well. I’m pretty good about crafting everyday. Sewing is my therapy and after a day of retail I need some therapy. What I’m hoping this will improve is my dedication to blogging. I am terrible about blogging. I hate to take pictures, I don’t like editing pictures, and I never really know what to say on this thing. But I feel like it’s important for me to put my projects out there and maybe even inspire other people like I’ve been inspired by other blogs.

On that note, here’s what I’ve been up to for the last two days. I have a picture of the plotting on my Flickr.

I started out by finding pictures of birds that I liked online and traced the shape onto paper with marker. Most of them had to be simplified so I wouldn’t have a million little pieces. Then I traced the shapes onto some paper backed fusible webbing. I made it with a little overlap, but trimmed where I could so I wouldn’t have too many layers.

Then I cut out the pieces, ironed them on, and stitched around the edge just for added durability.

I still have a bunch more to do, I think I made 11 or 12 designs all together. (There are more finished ones on my Flickr.) The outsides have been cut out and the birdies ironed on and the contrast fabrics are selected, so just a lot of sewing to do.

In other news, I was blogged on Craftzine (my second time). So exciting!

Fabric Pouches

January 11, 2009 crafts, pictures, pouches, sewing 3 comments

I think I made a post about these way back in October of last year and I neglected to ever post pictures! I intended to sell them at Craft Attack, but they didn’t move very well. (Although I did get rid of one in trade.) Each one measures about 5″ by 7″ (9″ by 7″ when opened). They are lined with a contrasting fabric. Matching the fabrics and finding buttons to go was totally my favorite part.


I am absolutely in love with the birdy fabric on the fourth pouch. The pattern runs along the bias, which I adsolutely adore, and the birdies are so wee and lovely. It got lined with a red and white polka dot.


The first pouch was part of a fat quarter trade, an adorable floral. The fourth pouch is a vintage pillowcase from Goodwill and the fifth is from a set of napkins that were on sale at Walmart. I’m considering making a little curtain for the kitchen window from the fabric on the last pouch.


The black and white one is lined with a teeny dancing skeleton print, I think it’s one of my favorites of the batch.

The fourth one is made from a towel from the dollar store. I think it was there because the little jars on it say “sill” rather than “dill”, but I loved the colors and the absolutely horrified expression on the little fishes.