Doll dress

My sister very compassionately suggested a $5 limit on gifts for nieces and nephews this Christmas. It's really hard to find something that doesn't suck for $5.

Aha! My niece is two, and she has a doll she loves! Sweeeet! This stashbuster cost me nothing.


I didn't have a pattern -- or the doll. (It's in New York and I'm in Minneapolis.) My mom in South Dakota, though, has the same kind of doll at her house, so she sent me the measurements and I made a cardboard dressform. I sent the dress down for my mom to try on her doll, and it fit! Now if only my nephews played with dolls ...

Ewok village

PVC pipe for tree trunks, Sculpey for the hut door frames, craft foam for leaves, a sheet of platic Corroplast for the platform, and lots and lots of primer and paint.


I got some hunter-y sweatshirt-type fabric to use as a mat to simulate a forest floor.

There's also an elevator, but it doesn't work very well yet.

Happy Halloween. So tasteless

I was invited to a party where I KNEW everyone would have an incredible costume. Boy howdy. One guy arrived as one of the Dick in a Box guys. Unbelievable. "Well, if you can't be incredible," I told myself, "just be mean."

I present Mount Lushmore.

Lindsay Lohan, (my son standing in for me), Gary Busey, and Amy Winehouse.

Bedroom rug

I made for my bedroom. Because I downsized from a queen bed to a double bed, there's a surprising amount of more floor space. Plus, I put my sewing machine in my bedroom, so I have a chair in there now, and I'd like it not to be on just bare wood. So I decided I finally should get a rug. I saw this in ReadyMade Magazine: They took a bunch of carpet samples and just duct-taped them together on the back. HA! I must have spent 20 minutes going through rug samples at Ax-Man (Best. Surplus. Store. Ever.) to try to find complimentary colors and patterns. Then I cut some of them diagonally so I would at least have some sort of pattern.

It's not the coolest thing, but it's not bad for 16 x $0.95. :-)

Shark teeth display

My awesome cousin Kate is a wildlife biologist for the state of Georgia. I asked her for some shark teeth, and a week later, a big bag of teeth (complete with handmade identification card) arrived. I got this display box 40% off at Michael's (is everything always 40% off at Michael's? I suppose it is if you have the coupon), combined some interesting Wikipedia facts with the information Kate also provided, and made this.

I still have not figured out how to adjust the manual exposure setting on my camera, so that's why there's the GIANT GLARE as BRIGHT AS THE SUN. Sheesh.

I hosted a baby shower for a dentist last weekend, which means I had 19 dental professionals in my house. The loved it!

X-wing fighter pilot shirt

It was a lot of fleece, some fabric paint, a black shoe string, and a couple feet of gray strap.

Bowling ball bag project

While looking at Wii games at Target the other day, I saw a Wii travel bag designed to look like a bowling ball bag. "Cool!" I thought, because I'll be taking the Wii to SD for Christmas with the family. But I ought not buy a $30 bag -- no matter how cool -- that I'm going to use maybe twice a year. I ought to wrap the whole thing in a towel and put it in a tote bag -- that's more my budget right now.

But it got me to thinking: Bowling ball bags are cool. So the next time I was at Savers to drop off a bag, I buzzed through the bag section. And there it was, for $4.99!



It still had the ball ring stand inside. The rest of the inside sort of sucked -- it was just the B side of the vinyl. (Ignore the newspaper -- that was for the pattern of what I'm getting to.) I washed the bag with hot, soapy water, then zipped up a bowl of vinegar in it overnight to get rid of the vaguely room-deodorizer-ish Savers smell. It worked really well.

Then I remembered this fabric called "Atomic Ale." I first got some of this a long time ago to make a wallet. When the bolt went on closeout, I had to buy another yard. No idea what I would do with it, but I knew something would present itself.

I wasn't sure I'd have the patience to sew the lining into the vinyl, so I made a pattern out of newspaper, then hemmed a piece of the fabric to fit each section. I adhered the fabric to the vinyl with adhesive craft spray. So far it's sticking really well!

A friend asked me, "What will you do with the bag?" I said, "What WON'T I do with it?" I think I will start by making pouches and sleeves out of Reflectix or bubblewrap for all the Wii components, and then covering the pouches and sleeves with the fabric I have remaining. I think it's going to be so awesome.