Monday, August 25, 2014
4 Months Until Christmas???
So you have all gotten your four month warning. If you are planning to craft for gifts, craft for dolls, or just craft in general, you have 4 months left. Let the countdown begin....NOW! :-) Talk to you next time awesome people. Bye for now. :-)
Monday, August 11, 2014
Sunday, August 10, 2014
Cyber Goth For Dolls???
So for a while now I have been trying to create an original character named Leia, and she would be into cyber goth fashion. But the doll I always had picked out for her was a Resinsoul Bei in tan, which makes her the height of roughly a regular fashion doll, but she’s thicker. I thought of making her a cyber goth fairy kind of, but I am wondering how much detail I can get in that size, should I try to get a bigger body, would a bigger body change her character, or am I being a wimp by not at least trying to make her clothing first.
I’ve know I’ve wanted one or two cyber goth characters in my collection for a while now, and I’ve been looking up cyber goth pictures and tutorials on how to make clothing and accessories for humans and planning on how to make them doll size. I am not sure where I want to start with my girl, and I am also going to come into a problem when it comes to shoes. But I’ve had her for a while now and haven’t done anything with her, much like my two other Bobobie/Resinsoul girls. I have decided it’s time to take them out and enjoy them. I mean I always get the white skin resin for dolls and by the time I play with them they have buttered. So from now on I am refusing to do that. I am going to pull them out and tinker and see how they work. I still have a goal of making my own dolls one day, it might help me some to know how dolls work in general. So Bei will be my first attempt.
I think I want to make her, I believe they are called waterfalls for her hair, fuzzy leggings for sure, and maybe even a tail? But I am not sure on her actual clothing yet. I know I will go for a skirt, short and slightly poofy, but I’m not sure on the top yet. I just love the bright colors of cyber goth fashions and I think they will look awesome against her tan resin. I just really want to try to get some detail in her clothing that will stand out some.
Also, the shoe issue, I don’t want to spend a lot on shoes, but I kind of want her to have several pairs she can switch between. I wonder if there are any dolls with feet her size. I’ll have to look through my collection of shoes and see if I came across any dolls that had bigger feet. I guess I need to head back to Den of Angels and other doll forums to see if others have found inexpensive ways to put shoes on the feet of their dolls. I just don’t want to spend more on her shoes than mine, especially since I’ve got several dolls that need shoes here that aren’t easy to come by. I might also have to look into making my own shoes as well. That will be interesting. I wonder if I can make the soles with 3D printing and then work around that? Hummmmm???
And to top things off I am also curious about including a little Japanese Punk Fashion into her wardrobe. It can also tend to be bright and funky, but maybe I will stick with just one fashion style per doll. I kind of like the idea of giving each one a unique style. Well not each one, just my special ones…I’ve got a lot of dolls and there isn’t enough time in the world to sew unique wardrobes for all of them. But some of them will definitely be getting the clothing treatment.
I guess I am just in thinking mode lately. I need to go through my fabrics and see what I’ve got and come up with some clothing ideas. I guess what is scarring my off is that fact that I have to come up with patterns for some of the items I want to make. I am not sure how to go about that, but I am willing to try and error to find what works for me. I hope to have something to share here soon, even if it’s just color swatches I am thinking of using. Stay tuned for that. And I will close on that note. Until next time lovelies, take care. Bye for now.
Saturday, August 9, 2014
I Got To Be A Google Doodle…Well Kinda
Can we just pause and reflect on the fact that I got a Google Doodle just for me today? When I got onto Google today, I was wondering who’s birthday it was today when I saw the cakes. I hovered over the image and got a surprise.
I was so shocked and then I of course I had to tell someone I had a Google Doodle. My sister was the only one around, but she was impressed, so I felt validated in my search for someone. LOL! So yeah, next time your birthday rolls around, take a look at Google, you may have your own Birthday Google Doodle waiting for you. Bye for now lovelies.
Happy Birthday To Me!!!
And on that note, I am off to have a slice of this lemon cake with lemon frosting, my mom made me. I think it’s adorable and I laughed when I came into the kitchen and saw it. She’d been planning it for a while. She’s planning my sister’s, which she has told me about in the strictest of confidence, and I can’t wait to show you it…in April. Well hey, maybe we’ll make one for Christmas, you never know. I mean I do have to make up for last Christmas, which was truly one of the saddest Christmases I have ever had, next to the first one without my brother. So this year has to be different, and very happy. I’ll talk to you lovelies tomorrow. Until then, take care. Bye for now.
Friday, August 8, 2014
Human Cloning From The Clone Factory
I guess I will stick to the idea of designing and printing original characters in different colored filaments. If I like the way my designs look, I’ll hopefully be able to sell my creations or at least the design for it. But first, I’ve got to decide on an OC. However, I do wonder if one day I will be able to have a 3D creation of myself. I could still go through That’s My Face and find a body and try to kitbash a body to work for it, but like I said, at the price and how fragile that face paint is, I just want something that is perfect right out of the box. The search continues!!!
And on that last chaotic note, I am off lovelies. I will talk to you all tomorrow. I'm getting older and better like fine wine tomorrow. My mom says she is making me a special cake. I'll be sure to share that fun with you all. Until then. Take care. Bye for now.
Thursday, August 7, 2014
Skin Biopsy, No Bueno
And on that last painful not, I am off lovelies. My foot is starting to feel less numb, and well, I’m so not enjoying the feeling. Also, the cat, who has a foot fetish, especially with my foot, especially with the foot that got the biopsy, is on the hunt for foot, and I want to crawl under my covers and hide from her. I will talk to you all tomorrow. Until then. Take care. Bye for now.
ETA: Guess who just got a call from her doctor letting her know her thyroid is just fine? This girl!!! Woot!!! It’s going to be a very happy birthday for me!
Wednesday, August 6, 2014
Needle Felting Experiment 1
So, I thought it was time I got to my first experiences with needle felting. I admit, I am kind of bummed with how things turned out, but I know that eventually my work will get to a level I like. While I do like what I’ve created, I didn’t like that they didn’t turn out how the picture on the kits said they should. I have always had a problem following patterns to create something the way someone else says it should look. So I think from now on my felting adventures will be more from my creative eye and less from somebody else’s. I may still get a kit every now and again, but I want to try seeing what I can come up with on my own. Once again, I blame Maqaroon for giving me the needle felting bug. I really love her channel and videos. She inspires me in my future goals in where I’d like to take my hobbies.
So after getting bit with the needle felting bug I jumped onto Amazon and found some kits for relatively cheap to play with. The first kit I picked out was Dimensions Needlecraft Feltworks Complete Beginner Kit. This kit has everything to get you started needle crafting. Well, almost everything. I say this because, when I opened the kit to make it, I tried using the needle that they include in the kit and found it almost impossible to use. I stabbed at the wool lightly, hard, and somewhere in between but it wouldn’t felt together. I then took a needle from a needle felting supply kit I bought from a Chinese seller on Amazon, and it worked instantly. So if you do buy a kit, you may want to have some other trustworthy needles to actually put it together with or risk sitting there a long time stabbing at the wool hoping it will felt, see the needles below I got from the kit. They are very small and don’t have a lot of “barbs” on the end.
Once I got the right needle, the felting part went relatively smooth. I read the directions, put on my needle felting thimbles, and started. After a few minutes of stabbing, I got into the flow of things. However, being new at needle felting, I wasn’t sure how much pressure to put on the needle and how to angle it, even after reading the instructions, still found myself having to stab at weird angles to get the look I was going for. So I wasn’t too shocked when about a forth of the way through I felt a snap, heard a metallic click, and noticed my needle was no longer pointy. I looked at my project and noticed the blunt end of the needle poking out from the wool. I carefully pulled it out, replaced the needle, and took it much gentler with the stabbing. So from what I understand, when you needle felt, go directly up and down so you go strictly in and out. This means no stabbing from funky angles, at least not when you are a beginner. And don’t be to aggressive with your needles or they will snap. You can see my blunted needle and the underside of my work below. That pointy bit on the right part of the picture is the other half of my needle.
Once I thought I was done, I simply pulled the project up from the mat. Do this carefully and slow. I don’t know why the whole process of pulling the wool out from the foam mat gave me shivers. To me it was the equivalent of finding a plant growing from the rug, it was just unnatural to me. LOL! So I tried to pull up as quickly and as slowly as I could go. LOL! I took a quick video of me pulling up to show you what I mean.
As you can see, I like to watch, or rather listen, to things while I craft. That day I was catching up some on the Shaytards. I am still behind on videos with them. I need to have another crafty day and soon. Also, you could see that after I pulled the project up there were a lot of gaps I didn’t see while working on it. All I did was put it back on the mat and work on it some more. What you didn’t get to see was when I started working on the center of the flower I started putting the black in the wrong place, placed it where the white dots are instead of the surrounding area, and had to pull them out, pull the fibers free as best as I could, and then put them where they were suppose to go. Needle felting can be very forgiving on your mistakes.
So, what do you do with your appliqué after you are done? Well you can either cut close around it and attach it things like clothing or bags, you can frame it, or you can get another felt item like a little purse or bag and needle felt it onto that. The possibilities are endless, just use your crafty imagination. What am I going to do with mine? I think I may frame it to remind me of my first attempt at needle felting.
So what do I think about needle felting? I like it. I want to try it some more, try different felting fibers, try different needles, try different mats, and just see what I prefer to create with. As with any new craft I start, I went the cheap route in case I didn’t like the craft. I got a cheap supplies set that ended up working way better than the stuff that came with the kits; take a look at the first picture above, I got 5 kits to make, and I got some thimbles/ finger guards to get me started; take a look at the second picture above. Can I just say I LOVE the thimbles I bought. They are silicone and have saved my fingers many times already. I got some leather ones in the cheap supply set I bought, but they are a tight fit for me and I’d rather be comfortable, and part of me believes they won’t protect me as well as the silicone ones will. However I will give them a try again, after I get better at needle felting, and will report back to you on how well they are. Also, the mat that I got in the cheap set, although it worked better than the mats I got in some of the sets I got, it is still super cheap and after a few uses it becomes useless. So I want to invest in a better mat that will last me longer than the “packaging foam” mat I got in the kit. Seriously, if you are in a bind for a mat, the one I have is just like the foam you’d find in boxes that hold electronics. So if you have some laying around, BAM!, there you go, instant mat.
And that’s about it for my first try at needle felting. I enjoyed the motion of felting and no sooner I finished this I decided to jump into my next project right away, a felted bunny. Now that was a whole new adventure. Felting flat and felting round, though very similar, takes forming a new tactic on doing. You’ll see that blog post really soon. :-) And on that note, I will talk to you lovelies later. Until next time. Take care. Bye for now. :-)
Tuesday, August 5, 2014
This Is What A Thyroid Biopsy Is Like
So, I lived through my first biopsy. Let me tell you, while it wasn’t that bad, it is definitely something I am not rushing out to have done again any time soon. So, what happened? Ok, so when I showed up for my appointment, I got my vitals read and then placed in this room I had been in before when I got an ultrasound of my throat done about a week before. The table starts off like a chair with a high back, so I sat there waiting. Once the doctor and her assistants came in, she sat down with me and explained everything that would be happening and asked me if I had any questions. With no questions to be had, they laid the chair back into a table and the table tilts you a little so you are slightly upside down so they can get access to your throat. From there they proceeded to set things up, the set-up honestly took longer than the procedure. Once they were all set up, they opened a package and took out a large cotton swab looking thing that had soap on it and they wiped it across my neck. Then they opened another package with another cotton swab looking thing that had a chemical on it that made the skin on my throat sting some. After that, they turned out the lights and used the ultra sound to find the nodule. Once they found it they used a cold spray to numb the area, then using the ultra sound she asked me to swallow and then had me hold still. She poked a needle, that is smaller than a needle used to take blood, into my throat into the nodule and poked it in and out of my throat 4-5 times to get a sample. She had to do that 4 times. On the 3 go the needle bent some due to the calcium in my nodule, I didn’t feel anything when the needle bent, and only knew about it from her telling me afterwards. Also, there is a lot of pressure during the poking. I’m not sure if it was from the needed or the ultra sound wand, but it can feel like someone pressing hard on your throat. As with the needle, the pressure is tolerable too. After everything was done, they wiped my throat, gave me a regular bandage, and an ice pack to hold on my neck for 20 minutes to help me from getting a hiccie bruise. I thankfully didn’t get one. After that I went home.
She said if I experienced pain to just take a Tylenol because other medicines may cause me to bleed, she told me I didn’t really bleed during the procedure. Now speaking of bleeding, to prepare the night before you need to make sure if you take pain killers that aren’t Tylenol that you don’t take them the day before so you don’t have issues with bleeding. Also if you have blood thinners make sure your doctor knows because that could cause bleeding also. So it’s been a few hours and it just looks like I got stung by a few tiny bees. It itches a bit and has a dull pain when I touch it, so I will skip the pain meds and just deal with the itching. It wasn’t that bad, but she told me that sometimes not enough sample is pulled out, and in that case I’d have to do it again when I see her again in 3 months. *sigh* Oh well, at least it’s over with for now. For now I will relax before I have to start stressing out tomorrow over what I am sure is to be my second biospy of the week. Yay me! LOL! Now, if you are brave, here is a video below of what a biospy basically is. It seems that this patient got a numbing shot instead of the numbing spray I got. Either way, you will be numb for the most part. You will feel the initial needle prick, but it’s tolerable, and this is coming from someone who hates needles and has a low tolerance for pain.
So yeah, that’s how a thyroid nodule biospy was for me. Not as bad as I pictured, not completely pain free, but it was tolerable. The only thing I felt was when she would stick the needle in for the initial stick and the pressure. I didn’t feel the in and out poking. So I basically felt about 4-5 needle pricks. Not fun, but you can deal with it, and before you know it, the lights are on, the table is back in the sitting position, and you are on your way out the door with a bandage and an ice pack, ice up at home if they don’t give you an ice pack so you can avoid bruising. So if you have to get one done anytime soon, you will be just fine and you’ll be so glad when you get the negative results. 95% of those tested come out negative, so try not to stress too much over it. And on that note, I will talk to you lovelies later. Until then. Take care. Bye for now.
Monday, August 4, 2014
This Song Is Suppose To Make Me Happy!!!
Sunday, August 3, 2014
Damn It Girl Get It Together!
Saturday, August 2, 2014
One Week, Bad Day?
So maybe it's best not to blog when you are all weepy, but I worry if I don't do it then I will disappear