Thursday, July 28, 2011

Busy, busy, busy

After 6 years, we finally have cable in our neighborhood! Yesterday, they hooked us up and, though there've been a hiccup or two, we're off DSL and on knology. During all this, I've been steadily plunking away on my various projects.

The first are a set of miniature top hats. One is a deep red silk corset design and the other is a black silk tuxedo design (complete with bowtie and watch fob). The brims are dyed leather I got in a scrap bag while the body shapes are courtesy of a plastic Coke bottle (12 oz small for the corset) and a plastic Dr Pepper (16.9 oz or the tux). The material is glued on with spray adhesive and then the brim is stitched on using pre-punched holes. The tuxedo's buttons are actually watch stems from recycled wrist watches I got in a grab bag at a flea market.

The dapper pair
Mini TopHat - Corset Mini TopHat - Tuxedo

Other than that, I've worked on my Eyes of Newt using the small gel beads from the floral department. I purchased purple but in retrospect think the green may have been a better choice. Since taking the pictures, the fancy design at the top of the bottle has been covered in twine and there will be labels soon on all the jars.

Eyes of Newt Small eyeballs

Monday, July 18, 2011

Halloween buildy fun! (part 2)

Finally got the first batch of loose eyeballs finished. Current count is 2 dozen and halfway fills the jar I have set aside for them. Now I just need the label and something suitably gooey to put in there with them. Possibly floral gel? hmm
Eyeballs

Tuesday, July 12, 2011

New and Exciting Projects!

After being generously given a variety of shell casings by a friend, I've been working out how to use them in an interesting way. As I'd seen several pens before, I decided to try my hand at it. Silly me chose not to hunt down a how-to and instead muddled through on my own. It's not the best looking thing around, but it's mine and I did manage not to kill anyone while making it.

I used the brass spent round (of course), a pen kit I found at The Unclaimed Baggage Center in Scottsboro, two Vintaj filigree charms, some copper sheeting and wire, and some black craft chain. If I do this again, I will definitely try one that requires a cap instead of using a twist mechanism!

It still needs some cleaning as there's some visible glue and epoxy, but here are the preliminary pics:

Photobucket
Photobucket

Friday, July 1, 2011

Halloween buildy fun!

Spent this morning picking up more bits and pieces for our Halloween set up. Got all the PVC bits to make a pair of cool bubbly tower thingies for the mad scientist/witchy lab place we're adding this year. I've got a book I'm going to alter into a spell book for the table as well as some jars we're going to fill with specimens and delightfully disgusting ingredients. There'll be scrolls and such as well added to the mix. I'm trying to decide between a crystal ball or a bubbly, foggy cauldron though I may say to hell with it and use both! I've just got to find a cost effective crystal ball that won't shatter during storage. And eyeballs. I really need to make a bunch of eyeballs.

I already have one specimen in a jar and he looks very nice. I'm using a "grow in water" octopus in a medium sized jar. His tentacles have curled inward and he looks quite unusual. If we decide to tint the water, he should look most disturbing. I have some small, plastic skull faces I'll use for the 'wax seal' on the scrolls and have been offered the use of a rather rickety bookcase to house them all in. If we can get a black light that will blend well, we'll use either some laundry detergent or highlighter ink to make glowy potions. Yes, liquid laundry detergent glows under black light as long as it contains phosphorous (which most do). If we have time, we also want to add a super creepy dangling crank spider though we'll probably paint him to look like a black widow. Watch the video...he's scary! I'm contemplating a "Don't Feed the Monster" sign for our monster box that was such a hit last year but I'm afraid it may ruin the scariness. It was the simplest prop we had...a wooden treasure chest containing a strobe light that made monster sounds and the ball from a wacky weasel ball. We propped the top open just slightly, laid a chain over it to look like it was holding something in, and turned everything on. It scared more folks than anything else we had. lol

We're moving our cemetery to the side of the house and hopefully will have better lighting this year. I'd like to add a grave grabber or a mausoleum front but we'll have to see if there's time. Either way, I'm actually excited about Halloween this year. I couldn't get into it last year so our set up was...well, less than stellar is putting it mildly. This year, I hope we really terrorize some kiddies! *cackles evilly*