New Ventures

Tif, Danielle, and I have started up a site called "Novel Props," wherein we will craft items from some of our favorite books.  A broad example of a novel prop would be the One Ring from Tolkien's books, though that one has been created and recreated, so I doubt any of us will bother tackling it. 

My first endeavor was a brooch from Robin Hobb's Farseer trilogy.  It turned out in general as I'd envisioned it in my head, which is a good thing. 

Hopefully this will keep me crafting on a regular basis, as well as giving me an excuse to build a big nest of books and never emerge.

If you have suggestions for novel props, by all means, I would love to hear them!  I'm able to do basic jewelry, cold cast "metal,"  some woodworking, and a bit of needlecraft, so not too many small props should be entirely out of reach.  If I don't have the skill for it, I'll beg Tif for help, and learn something in the process.

Christmas Crafts

This Christmas, we were low key and made gifts for most everyone. One of the things I gave was jars of home made bath bombs (or in this case, bath bonbons), which fizz luxuriously when you drop them into the tub. I used this recipe. However, for citric acid, which really should have been simple to find near canning supplies in any of the FIVE places we had to go to find it... I used Sour Salt from the kosher section. Same thing. Much easier to find. Rather than using an essential oil to scent it, I used rose water, which was a bit touchy to stir in without everything bubbling up, but seemed to work fine. I wanted the smell to be a bit subtle.

I also baked some rose petals on a baking tray until they dried out (surprisingly quickly) and crushed them to add to the mixture. Who doesn't like rose petals in their bath? They added nicely to the scent as well.

I pressed them into candy molds, using a pestle to put enough pressure on them to make them firm. I had to try some, of course, and I was pretty pleased with the result. I dropped in three bonbons, and they fizzed away in short order. It was a pleasant smell--not overwhelming or chemical--and there was just enough oil in them to leave my skin feeling nice and soft, but not enough to leave a mark on the tub. Whew. These would also make a good foot soak, I think.

One other thing, if anyone's planning on making these--humidity can do really wack things to them. They need to dry for a while before being packaged, but leaving them out for too long makes them puff up. After opening a jar of bonbons I'd closed tightly and having it hiss like a bottle of soda, I decided I needed a dessicant in there. I got a little box of it from the craft store--the kind used to dry flowers--and made a little sachet for each bottle. After that, voila! No more pressure and hissing, though I was too late on a few of the bottles, and the bonbons looked more like macaroons than sleek candies.

Tiny Door

I showed the little door I was working on earlier, and I've finally finished it! I ambitiously wanted to make it so the door could open a crack to see a little bit of the front hall, but that turned out to be too big a challenge for my meagre skills. Ah well. In any case, it is now framed in with MDF carved and painted to look like brick, which gave me a little space to attach the mail box, along with the house number. I would have liked to have added the number of the house where it'll be, but I had neither enough space nor enough numbers. So instead, I made the address 42--which, incidentally, is also the answer to the question of life, the universe, and everything. Though it can't be seen all that well, there is a tiny book and an unbrella hanging from the mail box. I figured since the door would be inside a house, a fairy might hang their wet umbrella out there.

Blessed be Electricity

Hurricane Ike made itself known in Cincinnati on Sunday in the form of some insane wind. There wasn't really any rain, but the wind tore piles of leaves off the trees, and brought branches and trees down everywhere, including on top of a neighbor's poor car, crushing it pretty thoroughly. Power went out, and shortly thereafter, the wind dropped-- as did the temperature to a comfy 70. So that's where we've been for the past couple days. All things considered, it was not a bad time at all, though everything in the fridge will need to be replaced. The temperature was lovely, and the time was quiet and relaxing. We got a bunch of reading done, and I worked on a couple craft projects. People were out chatting and clearing branches off lawns, and even the neighbor with the crushed car was in pretty good spirits.

The project du jour was a tiny door to the Little Country. A fairy door, if you will. The plan is to secretly have it installed in the home of a niece and nephew for Christmas. I've assembled everything, and now I just have to add shingles and frame it with basswood, making it possible for the door to open a crack to show a coat rack and a bit of hallway. I have a tiny umbrella and scarf, along with a miniscule key that fits the lock. Em and I are debating giving Mini M the tiny key for Christmas, (maybe on a bracelet?) and telling her it probably goes to a little door. She'd find the door herself. Since it's going to be a Christmas door, I've made a tiny wreath for it out of paper twisted around a little copper wire, snipped and painted. More photos to come as things get finished.

Follow up: The Bag of Bags

Remember that project from a LONG time ago that I was poking at?

Let's just pretend I finished this bag several months ago, shall we? Here is--as my sister, H.A., dubbed it--the bag of bags! I crocheted it out of a bunch of Kroger plastic grocery bags we'd accumulated, and from donations from friends as well. The lighter tan bags are from Michigan Krogers, and the darker ones are Ohio Krogers. The white stripe is a couple of Hillers bags. It turned out to be surprisingly sturdy and flexible, in part because the method I had of making the "yarn" for them uses a double layer of plastic.

Bags of bags seem to be popping up everywhere, and I love it! Not only is it environmentally friendly, but people are taking up needlecrafts, and that can only be a good thing!

Here it is, stuffed with tea towels.

The Bag of Bags

A while ago I developed a fascination within my crafting habits of creating something new out of itself. That sounds a little confusing, I realize, but let me give a couple examples that may clarify.

The "making things out of the same things" kick was first inspired by this vaguely creepy site wherein a lady takes the leftover fur from client's pet groomings, and spin it into yarn. How quirky would it be to make a dog a sweater out of its own fur? That's the sort of thing I'm talking about.

With the bundles of fur gleaned from the cats when warm weather finally hit, I hand-spun about 6 feet of yarn, which I fashioned into another, smaller cat for them to play with. They had a weird fascination with it, like a toddler looking at pictures of themselves--not quite sure what it is, but it's so familiar.... they adored playing with their little offspring so much that it got destroyed before I thought take a picture.

Then last month I stumbled over this instructable, which was the perfect realization of the "making things out of the same things" idea, only more sensible and less involving cat hair (which is always a plus). Instead, it involves using all those plastic grocery bags most of us have stowed away someplace and creating a sturdy, reusable grocery bag out of them.

I was lucky enough to have sisters in town at the time I decided to go about rolling and cutting up bags to make the "yarn" for the project, and Em helped by making neat plastic circles. No matter how I've tried since then, mine are ragged and wonky in comparison. :(

Ah well. In any case, here's the progress on the bag. It's not all that lovely, admittedly, but I think it'll be a handy thing, and though our community has a vigorous plastic bag recycling program, it's nice to repurpose them permanently instead.

I'm also entertained that everyone who's come to visit lately has bestowed upon me a bag or two. In the last picture, you can see the strata of various places. There are darker bags from Ohio Kroger, a line of white from a random Hillers bag I'd saved from Michigan, and then the lighter yellow of Michigan Krogers.

I also have some Target bags I'm looking forward to using on a separate bag. I think a red and white bag would be much easier on the eyes than this one.

I'll post more as the bag evolves. I'm (supposedly) crocheting it, but I'm an awful crocheter, and I don't work on it as often as I ought to.

Der Hollow Book

Well, I've painted the outside of the hollow book/box, and it looks a bit more "booky" than it did. I do need to find a thin belt of some kind to hold it closed, since the little magnet inside doesn't do the job all that well, particularly if I'll be carrying art supplies around in it and such. I'm picturing a book strap like the kids used to carry books home from school back in the "olden days." I'll probably have to make one if I can't find one to repurpose. Ah well. It's a little sloppy, but I think if I have another go at it, I'll know more what I'm doing, and will be able to make a better one. At $1.99 a pop for the plain box, it's not so bad. I'm also considering trying covering it with leather on the outside--if I can find a leather thin enough, and an epoxy strong enough. That's for another day, though.

Mystery Solved!

A few months ago, I was mystified by the fact that occasionally, the sweet delicious smell of waffle cones drifts through our neighborhood.

The enigma was ended by Tiffany, who informed me that it's actually elves. Elves making cookies. Keebler elves. In a Keebler factory nearby. Not exactly as magical as I'd hoped, but it's still kind of awesome that the neighborhood sometimes smells like cookies baking. It's also nice that it's actual cookies, not some random toxic run-off chemical that we're delightedly inhaling deeply as it does a number on our lungs.

Besides setting me straight about neighborhood odors, Tiffany is helping me cast a version of a trilobite brooch as seen in a comic I read. We sculpted it on Saturday, and when I can manage to get over this ridiculous head cold, she'll show me how to make the mold and cold cast it. Hurrah!

Observe: I may have had a slight obsession with running Sculpy through the pasta maker. It needed a lot of softening. Seriously.








Here's the partially-done scultpt of the brooch. It's not as massive as it seems. But it's still kind of massive, now that I think about it.

Makings

I have been making.

We got couple lovely couch cushions several months ago. Their covers were made of a soft woven brown fiber with a bit of a sheen to it--nice and nubbly. Unfortunately, they were sewn really shoddily, and since they were woven, they were just falling apart after only a few months. It was a shame to let the fabric go to waste, and since I lost my last pair of wrist warmers (Wrist dickies, as we refer to them. Remember turtleneck dickies from the eighties? It was just a neck and a bit of cloth, so you looked like you were wearing a turtleneck without bothering to actually put one on under your sweater. ) err... sorry about the detour. Since I lost my last pair, I thought I'd repurpose the fabric to make new ones.

I reused the zippers, and made use of the silk edging already on the inside of the cushion cover. I added some reinforcing ribbon, and a loop and button to close it at the top. I also had to add a long loop of thin ribbon on the inside at the elbow end, so I can hold that with my teeth as I zip them up. Otherwise I'd have to have the Boy zip them up, and that would just be lame. This one needs a little more stitching added to the ribbon, but it's basically done. Both of them took me about an evening.


Not a difficult project, and my sewing machine was lovely and behaved perfectly. I seem to have the tension issue well in hand.... Quite accidentally, of course, but I'm not touching it, since it seems to be a-ok. This is a machine the Boy got me a couple Christmases ago. I remember using my mother's machine, which required hours of squinting and threading needles and trying to readjust bobbins... All of which, doubtless, was my fault. But this new machine is fancy. The little design on the black ribbon is made by the machine sewing little patterns. Fancy. It is too fancy to be Amish. (link to a sweet children's book--check out the illustrations about halfway down the page.)

In other, more edible news, we made a butternut squash soup that turned out quite yummy.


I'd never made one, but we'd liked a few we'd tried various places, and it seemed easy enough. I wasn't quite into any of the recipes I found, so combined the parts I liked into a slow cooker recipe that turned out really nice. It's very simple, and very comfort-foody.

• 1 raw butternut squash
• a pat of butter
• nutmeg (I grated about a third of a "nut" of nutmeg--I think that would be about a half teaspoon of the ground stuff? I kind of wished I'd used more though.)
• hot madras curry powder - a decent amount. it's not that spicy, and the finished product is not at all spicy.
• cumin - a nice shake, but not too much, because it can overpower the taste of the squash
• chicken stock - I used enough to just come to the level of the cubed squash in the slowcooker.
• sour cream - a heaping tablespoon
• one dollop of cream or milk

Cut the squash in half, and then slice it so that you can cut off the rind. Once that's done, cube it, and throw it in the slow cooker with the stock, butter, nutmeg, curry powder, and cumin. Let it cook away on medium high for 2 hours, or you could put it on low for 8 hours while you're at work.

At this point, the squash may not be totally mushy, but will be soft enough to blend. Scoop the chunks out into a different bowl, then blend them several at a time, pouring them back into the slowcooker as you go. Add stock while you blend to keep things moist. Some people might like theirs silky smooth, but I found it was really pleasant with a little texture to it, so I didn't blend forever.

Once everything's blended, turn the heat to medium or a bit lower, and wisk in the sour cream and a blop of cream or milk. If you boil at this point, it'll curdle, so keep the heat down a bit.

You can serve right away, or let it simmer another while. We served it with a couple sage leaves, and a bit of sour cream. I have a feeling this soup is one of those ones that will be even better the second time around. The recipe makes quite a bit, so you can pack it up into the freezer or fridge to use another day like we did.

The Cusp of Autumn

For those of you wondering, my dad came through heart surgery well, and is making a good recovery--which makes me very very relieved. Life can be pretty sucky at times, but mercies like that can make all the other stuff seem pretty irrelevant and small.

I realize I'm a worrier a lot of the time, but I hope I'm not a pessimist. It's only because I forget to remember the things that are good. Er...unless that's the definition of a pessimist. I think of them as someone who's aware of what's good, but manages to imagine everything is going to be awful anyway. I'm working on encouraging my tiny, withered seedling of optimism to grow up into an oak tree or a skunk cabbage or whatever.

Yes, I know. It's been for-freaking-ever since I've blogged. As an apology, I would like to offer these tasty morsels:

• What do you get when you combine Johnny Cash's vocals, Led Zeppelin's drums, Beastie Boys bass, Ted Nugent's guitar, and the Beatles lead guitar? No, not an apple streusel, silly--It's quite possibly the BEST MASHUP EVER.
  

• When it comes to storytelling flash games, many times they're a digital cacophony of crappy animation and awkward gameplay. However, Samarost is different. It's essentially a beautiful interactive children's book with lovely music, interesting art, and engaging puzzles. I've linked to the walkthrough, because I did get stuck a couple times. Point and click adventures force you to think a little differently, and it takes a bit to catch on. There is a second installation of the game as well.
  

• Also, who doesn't like a simple game that basically just involves Japanese Victorian ladies slapping each other?

• This is a concept I can get behind. "The more unhappy you are, the more ice cream you need."

• For those of you with small dogs, this is valuable info. And it's darn cute.
  

• Here's a highly entertaining look at what the world of 1910 envisioned the year 2000 to be like. The page was originally in French, and I've linked to the Google translation, so the text may be a bit awkward. The ideas are an awful lot like we used to dream up for the future as children. Machines that put on your makeup! Pills for dinner! Ah, the glorious future...

• And if you'll excuse me now, I have to go take my daily chocolate supplement.