Welcome to my blog

If you enjoy finding a lot of different outlets for your creativity, then we may just be kindred spirits.
This blog is an outlet for my interest in miniatures, crochet, plastic canvas, and many other various arts and crafts.

I also love walking, taking digital photos, and most recently, have rediscovered an old love...bike riding! I purchased an amazing new bike, a comfy Townie by Electra this summer, and have been having a grand time exploring the area as though for the first time. It's like being a kid again!

If you enjoy any of these things too, pour a cup of coffee and tea, sit down, and join me.


Take care!
Kat
Showing posts with label T5 challenge. Show all posts
Showing posts with label T5 challenge. Show all posts

Thursday, March 15, 2012

T5 challenge still working on

I'm still working on this, but I'm running out of time...I only have until St. Patrick's Day, on the 17th.
I probably won't even enter this, as I'm such a newbie and unsure what I'm doing yet, lol.
Here's what I have so far...I still want to touch up the paint and add a few more items, fix a few things...
T5 challenge in progress, unfinished



I may not be able to enter the challenge even if I wanted to, because I used spackle.  I've never used it before, and wanted to try it out.  It was cool...like frosting a cake.  I should have used more, but I didn't know if it would stick to cardboard or not.

OK, so here's what I used so far:
1. stir sticks-dock, rowboat.
2. toothpicks-dock
3. beads-sculls, bone, little silver thing that looks like a beer holder to me, lol.
4. feathers-part of two feathers, cut up, used for plant, stem of feather, cut used for base of sword, part of telescope (this is REALLY tiny).
5. Qtips- boat oars (1 qtip cut in half), part of telescope (feather stem and qtip stem, inserted in eatchother to make it)
6. Paper clip - parts of 1, cut up and twisted for oar locks
7. card stock - bottom of boat
8. small box - under rock on the right
9. paper -one sheet crumpled and painted to cover small box for rock on the right, half a sheet for photo image

I tried to make a treasure chest out of card stock, but failed miserably.  I can't get the printie to print to scale.
T5 in progress



I still had to use caps, so I found this cap for my ventolin inhaler (upper right), which sort of looked like a crate.  It's blue, so it doesn't go.  I tried using marker to color it, but it didn't work.  I don't know if paint will stick, as it's plastic.  I still have to use foam cards and felt, so I may cover it with strips of either of those. I put a piece of felt in it to remind myself, lol.

Oh, I was allowed to use an extra item not on the list, so I used part of a bobby pin for the sword.  The "handle" of the sword is another small piece of feather stem.  I painted the handle brass.

If only I had some experience, this could be really cute.  Everything I'm making is very amateur, which makes sense since I am an amateur, but it's frustrating when my brains sees something my hands can't make, lol.

I found the perfect sticker, in the shape of an anchor.  Once I add that, I'll have 10 items from the list.  If I can cover the ventolin cap with foam or felt, I'll have used 12 items from the list.  I plan to use the tea from a teabag for soil, but first I'm going to make a cup of tea, drink it, lol, and save some to dye a tiny piece of paper for my treasure map.  I plan to cut up pieces of an eraser to use as gold bars.  Oh, and the ribbon; I'm going to make a tiny flag from part of  the ribbon, and use the rest as a tether for the boat. So that will be 15 items on the list. Which means I still have to use 5 more!  There's no way, lol.  I can't even remember what else is on the list; I'll have to check.  I wish the list was made in word instead of pdf so I could just copy and paste it.

I was going to use bottle caps for the dock, which has turned into a sort of bridge/ladder, but it didn't look right.  Then I was going to use the push pins/thumb tack bases for the base of the dock, but I couldn't pull the pins out of the plastic.  I was afraid to cut them out, because it's been my experience that cutting things like that makes the tip go flying and those are sharp...I don't want my dogs to step on them.

I suppose I could use the foam board stuff and cut it in the shape of waves, but that would be tacky.  And not thumb-tacky, which I could use.

I was going to use cotton balls as white caps on waves...maybe I still can? I wonder if cotton balls can be needle felted?  If so, maybe I can needle felt a little pirate.

I only have one toothpaste cap, and it's on my toothpaste, so I'm using the ventolin cap as the toiletry cap. I keep my ventolin in the washroom medicine cabinet, so hopefully that will work.

I was thinking of using the toothpaste cap as the end of a cannon.  Maybe I can use the foam board stuff as a cannon?

Stick pins...I guess I could use them to secure the box/paper rock more securely?

I'm getting a headache, lol.  I wish I would have joined this group sooner, so I could have had more time.

Oh well, it's fun, and it's giving me some experience at thinking a different way.




Wednesday, March 14, 2012

T5 challenge continued

Well, I'm making a big mess with this challenge, lol.
So far I've used the stir sticks, toothpicks, paper, box smaller than 3 inches, qtips, bottle caps, feathers, beads.
Here's a picture (nothing but the box and photo are glued in yet, and not all items are in the picture.
T5 challenge in progress

It's not that nice looking.  Apparently my imagination is miles away from my ability, lol.  I know how I want this to look, but can't seem to do it.

I'm far from done, and there are only a few more days left in the challenge.

It doesn't help that I don't know how to use printies.  I found the cutest little treasure chest printie, but I can't shrink it down enough.

This photo shows the boat, made from stir sticks, the dock made from 4 toothpicks and stirstick left overs from the boat.  The dock is held up by two bottle caps on one side, and the small box covered with crumpled and painted paper (to look boulder like, lol) on the other side.  I have oars made from one double ended qtip, but it's still wet.  I want to make an anchor from a paper clip, and a sword from a paper clip and paper, if possible.  I have some feather trees, but thery're still wet.  I'm going to use the tea from the inside of a teabag as dirt, with part of a buried treasure (more beads) sticking out.  I wanted to make a little shovel.  I still have to use foam, more paper (not cardboard or poster board...I can't think of the name...some sort of paper board, lol).  I'm going to use part of the ribbon as a flag, and part of the ribbon as a rope to tie the rowboat to the dock.
I'm supposed to use thumbtacks...and I forget what else.

Saturday, March 10, 2012

T5 challenge

Well, I joined a Canadian online miniature group, and they're having a trash to treasure challenge.  The ladies are all very talented, so my attempt at this challenge is going to fall far short, but I want to try, anyway.
When I first read the list of items we have to use, an idea popped into my head right away.
I read "napkin, tea bag," and thought "Treasure map!"  I thought I could dye the napkin with the tea and crumple the napkin up to look like an old treasure map.  I thought it would be cool to make it a 3D treasure map, with a sunken boat (the mast made of toothpicks sticking up out of the water), an anchor (paper clip),rickety falling apart dock (stir sticks and toothpicks), rowboat (stirsticks), skull (beads from Halloween), palm tree fronds (feathers painted green).  I'm allowed to use felt, a piece of green material, a piece of card stock, foam board, and other things.  We're allowed to use glue and whatever else we need to put it together...I wonder if that includes spackle, so I can make some caves?
Anyway, I have no experience with minis (other than my plastic canvas dollhouses), so even though I have lots of ideas, I don't know if I can put them into practice.
I tried playing around today, and this is what I have so far.  It's very rough...I was just trying to see if it could be done.  There's no stain or paint or anything, and the clamps are still holding the pieces together:
Rickety dock out of 4 toothpicks, 2 caps, part of one stir stick.  Rowboat from stir sticks, left overs from dock. 




































After the glue dries, I'm going to paint the caps grey to resemble cement, and stain the dock and boat.  I have to make a bottom for the boat, out of card stock.  I have weird looking toothpicks that I found at the dollar store that will make perfect oars when cut in half.  The toothpick sticking out of the boat isn't part of the boat; I just put it there to give the clamp something to hold onto.