Thing-a-day.com

Wanted to finally post what I made today and yesterday.  I made this little broach  yesterday - you can make and wear  her with almost anything. I like to  wear this broach with my vintage black dress for a dinner party or a night out on the town with friends. This little dove can be also be used to decorate - gift packages instead of a bow, place one on your fancy hat with a feather, hang with string from the ceiling in front of a window or make a few and add to your favorite house plant. I have instructions on how to make it on http://www.instructables.com/id/Woven-Paper-Dove-Broach/

…is the name for “hummingbird” in Brasilian Portugese, literally meaning “flower kisser.” We saw this beauty today here in Monterey. He had a gorgeous fuschia patch of irridescence on his breast, but that unfortunately did not come out in this photo. Nevertheless, I was lucky even to get this pic, as I barely got my camera out for this one shot before he flew away.

A few days ago I saw this tutorial on Crafty Chi’s blog about making rubber stamps from old corks.  I meant to do it then, but other crafts called to me and after seeing Kimberly Pye’s Korkinesse yesterday I was reminded that I hadn’t yet to try making the cork stamps.  So today I made one of a little bird.  

The image reverses when stamped, something I forgot. Luckily, I chose something that didn’t matter. Carving into the cork was easier than I anticipated, but it did make a mess and I had to be careful around the more narrow areas.  The cork surface isn’t the best for stamp.  It’s uneven, and the holes need to be filled in.  I’d have to get a matching ink pen to fill in the gaps, and as you can see I used a ballpoint pen on the one on the right and it shows.  This was definitely fun and inexpensive, using materials I already have so I think I’ll be playing around with these little guys. 

Title: Watch T-birdie
Description: Native American style thunderbird drawing
Inspiration: This day in history, the Ford Thunderbird prototype debuted (1954)

it’s week three of thingaday and i have a new theme, “flora and fauna” (although i’m thinking things will more than likely fall heavily onto the “fauna” side of things.)

these cupcakes actually *are* dual purpose.  not only are they for thingaday but i also made a bunch of them (most not pictured) to thank people who had voted for me in a local blog competition i’m entered in.  wanna vote too?  click here,  go to the second grey box and click “glitter pissing”.  many thanks for your effort if you do!

These socks were a gift from my sister. Inspired by this post by dyslexia, I decided to use the cute valentines socks my sister gave me as arm warmers as well. I like them better as cuffs. I simply cut and hemmed the end.

i’m having a hard time committing to this challenge…
baby steps, and breathe. 

here are some things that flew over my head today.

I woke up this morning and looked out of my hotel window on the 20th floor and thought this was headed directly towards me.

we went out for a walk and these things kept flying over head

out on a boat and ended up under the flight path of these

and finally, this dude was just chilling over the boat for the entire trip.

I took my boring planner and made it pretty with modge podge.  yay!

Today I was inspired to try carving again.  And why not try with one of my favorite animals.  Here is my carved bird.  I love the orange ink and pairing them on my one card.  Tweet tweet and happy day to all!

I know I have already done one today, but this is what I worked on after dinner and I just couldn’t wait to post it.  Plus I have to do a new project for tomorrow.  

I saw a cute idea for a yarn ball “flower” display on Bella Dia a couple weeks back and thought it would be the perfect little project to use up some of the yarn that I’ve got piled up (I’ve started about 15 knitting projects and finished about 2.) It was a good opportunity to use up some of the more challenging yarn that I have. It doesn’t have the smooth look of the original, but they’ve got their own fun vibe. I hope to make a bunch of them over time for all my little vases.

And now that I’m caught up, today’s entry:

This is a magazine photo outlined with marker and painted in with gesso. I also did another one, which is on my blog.

Tomorrow is my dad’s birthday. My parents’ only request are handmade birthday cards. I thought I’d do something different this time. Who doesn’t like a pop-up? I found a great tutorial on Instructables.com that includes this template print out.

I am new at this, and so I think I saved yesterday’s post instead of posting it so a day late, here is day 1’s post!

Day 1, 11:10 PM: Can you tell that I am a horrible procrastinator?

Sharpie pen on canvas… yeah i dono what i was thinking

hopefully the next ones will be better!

I made a bird with a broken wing so that I would love it more. There are too many perfectly healthy plushies out there - I have no sympathy for them. Last weekend I saw a Broken Heart Robot, which I guess inspired the broken wing. It’s strange to see emotions other than happy, on toys, and it made me look at toys in a new way. Why shouldn’t we empathize with them?

Anyways, this is my first attempt at making a softie from fabric. I knit way more than anything, so I thought I should try something different. I did sneak a little knitting in there with the scarf. I think it’s cute. I wrapped it they way I like to wear my scarves.

The materials are all from what I have laying around. I tend to keep things for future projects, and end up with too many things. I hope to make good use of my collections this month. I have a drawer of socks with holes in the heels and toes. I can’t wear them because they bother me too much, but I did cut one up for the stuffing for my bird. I plan to use the rest of the socks as stuffing for other projects too (don’t worry, they’re all clean). The belly of the bird is made from leftover fabric of one of my favorite dresses. I got it from a thrift store and had to trim off 5 inches because it was too long for me. The legs are made from 6 paper clips.

I’ve made my ‘thing’, but the camera isn’t working. Getting a new webcam for my birthday tomorrow, so as soon as I have that, I’ll get the pic up here.

It’s just a simple paper crane to start off with. D:

i’ve been sick for the past three days, including today. so, between sleeping and taking care of baby, who’s also sick, i only ended up making this…

pretty lame for the first day, but hopefully i’ll make something better and more interesting as the month goes by.