Baby Bratz custom

I found a bag of Baby Bratz dolls at the local op shop (thrift store). I've got a ton of unfinished projects, but hey, what's one more? I admit, I dislike the strong makeup that most fashion dolls have. I know lots of people love that fierce, edgy look, but I prefer softer colours.



I repainted one of the dolls and gave her the biggest anime eyes I could get away with. And made her pink. So pink, because I love pastel pink (neon pink can go jump off a cliff) and because I only had pink ruffle ribbon. Her dress is basically a cheat dress made of ruffle ribbon and lace. Turned out better than I thought it would. I think I'll have to try it on some SF figures and if it works out, do a small tutorial. Her hair is made of brushed yarn because I don't really want to spend money ordering proper doll hair. I used colour pencils to do her hair, but it was pain and a half and didn't come out as nicely as I wanted. Next time I'm just going to use paint. I'm thinking of doing up the rest of the dolls in this style, with different colours.




Went on holiday, bought things:



The Sylvanian restaurant set was also from Toys R Us, but I bought it on sale about a month and a half ago. Just hadn't gotten around to opening it, ha. Now that I have, I've discovered that the building is full of interesting molded details to paint.

I finally got Wydowna! I've been wanting her for two years now, but the prices for her in Australia are ridiculous. $50 normal retail? Ugh. I've tried trading for her with a Haunted Rochelle on the Monster High Arena forum, but the trades fell through THREE times after people realised how much shipping from America to Australia would cost. >_>

Anyway, I finally found Wydowna for the much more reasonable price of $35. Toys R Us had a pretty good discount on Monster High. I even got Iris too, because I love the monstery-ness of a one eyed fashion doll. My husband said she looked like a green Leela.

I love the more monstery dolls of MH. I hope the reboot doesn't wreck that. I know I said that I like softer pastel colours on dolls, but sometimes a fierce look just suits them. Depends on the character and the mold. I like the wide eyed look the reboot preview showed for Lala and Frankie, but on Cleo? Nope. Big piles of Nope. Cleo looks best with her narrow eyes and dark make up.


I also need to blog about the wonderful package Wildberry sent me. Her handmade sock is lovely, and the chocolates--yum! I love the ski set and everything. All nicely wrapped too. XD

Nuka Cola Cap Collector Box

I got this at my work Christmas Party. I gave it to my husband, because I thought it would be funny. He looked at it awkwardly and told me that I should put some Nuka Cola caps in it. I had thought about it before giving him the box but felt a little reluctant because the last time I made Nuka Cola caps it was for my brother-in-law's funeral.




Anyway, in the end I decided that I would go ahead and redo the entire box and give it to my husband as a Christmas gift. I planned on doing up the bottle caps with far more detail that the funeral caps had, and in a variety of types. Make real life Nuka Cola caps have something positive  associated with it rather than just that horrible memory.

I wanted to do it up with a Fallout theme, but in a way that also made some kind of sense. I mean, why would anyone have a box for collecting bottle caps? Thus the Bottle Cap Lottery and the Cap Collection Crate was born.

The front of the box. I think I should have put Cap Collector's Crate on it instead, but it was too late by then. I had thought about Cola Cap Crate, but for some reason the closeness of the 'c', 'p' and 'r' letters made me think of 'crap'.




The back of the box with the contest rules. Hope it's readable. Husband said that he reckons that the time limit for turning in the box of caps should be about two weeks. I wonder if you'd turn into a ghoul if you tried to drink 500 Nuka Colas in two weeks? And mmm, food paste.




Here are the caps. I know there's a Sunset Sarsparilla one in there. Me head canon is that whoever had it las just chucked one in there thinking that no one would notice. But those cap counter people at Nuka Cola are very thorough. They will find out. Also couldn't resist a Nuka Cola Yellow. There is no Nuka Cola Yellow. Just some dude who 'makes water'.

2015 Sylvanian Baby Ornament Swap 2

Received my package from CastorFiber. She's amazing. The ornament she made is simply gorgeous, and the little cat face is adorable. Plus she put in all these extras too, including little crafty things and accessories as well as an SF telephone set! And so many yummy chocolates and sweets! This makes me embarrassed about what I put into my Sock Swap package. It's no where near as elaborate as this... :x

2015 Baby Sylvanian Swap

Joined the Sylvanian baby ornament swap. Now that my partner has received it, I can post about it. :D I'm really glad she likes it because many times I looked at what I was doing with that gingerbread house and my eyes felt like they were going to fall out from sheer exasperation. It didn't turn out the way I had intended (I had envisioned something a little more simple and clean looking). I still need to practise my piping, it's rather messy looking. At least I discovered a better way of cleaning my piping nozzle. Wet wipes FTW. Don't know why I never considered something so simple. I never liked using that piping nozzle because of the clean up, but now it's much simpler and I can read manga in front of my computer while I'm doing it.

I've been finding it harder and harder to want to do anything crafty lately. I just feel so blah about everything in general.

I've been practising sewing on a Baby Bratz doll. My sewing is still shocking, but at least I can say I made some clothing with *gasp* the help of a needle. I didn't sew anything for the baby swap. The Sylvanian bear's clothes are held together using my best friend, craft glue. I really should do more sewing. It's probably easier and less messy to stitch something together than to glue down every seam (the dreaded glue strings, ugh). I learned a few new things about bashing cloth together to form clothing together after doing the Bratz dress and the SF dress. I just have to apply that knowledge to actual sewing, hah...

The original ornament was something I got from Kmart. It was a snowy scene with a white house and two pine trees.

Hopefully I'll feel more alive once the holidays kick in mid next week.

I bought my first few Amiibos. Animal Crossing ones. I can't resist Animal Crossing. Nintendo's got my wallet in a death grip. Send help.

Newsagent

New repainting project! Been busy with work and stuff and haven't updated or done much in the way of crafts lately. This is my last 'cottage shop' style building. I'm turning it into a newsagent's.



Also scored these shelves off of eBay a couple of years ago. They're from the rare SF bookshop set, but didn't have any of the accessories. I'm thinking about repainting them (cue cringing from several SF fans). Depends on how the building comes out--I want them fit the general style of the building.



I sprayed the black on yesterday, and I'll try to fix up the little mistakes tomorrow.

Summer Swap 2015 Custom

Now that bloem has received my swap goodies I can post the custom baby carry case I sent her. XD



Clothes glued together, as I still can't sew and believe me, I tried. I tried to make a simple skirt and failed, ugh, so I just glued a bit of lace together. I made the bucket made of paper and wire (used some of Rainy Blues' paper cup templates, cut down to size) , shovel made of paper and a cocktail toothpick end, and sand made of polymer clay.

Sylvanian Summer Swap

I signed up for a summer swap (it's winter here down under, lol) on the Sylvanian Forums. The packages have started coming in and I received mine from the lovely Kyraja in Germany. I absolutely love the dress and the DIY bed kit! Especially the cute owl fabric. I'll take pics once I've put it together.

 Items from Kyraja:
 


I love that she got me the little Emily Trunk. The standing baby elephants have been been discontinued so I don't see them in the shops anymore. The sandwich set has interesting play features--you can actually stuff salad into the gaps in the bread, and the bread holds it in quite firmly too. A simple and effective play design. I never noticed before. I thought you had to hold all the separate sandwich bits together using your fingers.


 Here's Emily nicking a sandwich from the counter as mum orders a bagel.
 

Monster High Custom

I have a few Monster High dolls. I love how much thought and detail goes into these dolls, and their unusual choices for creatures to turn into dolls. I really like the more outlandish ones. A six armed spider doll? An actual skeleton doll? An articulated centaur? A golden dragon? Not to mention lovely intricate designs on some of the doll torsos? Sold! Ah, where were you when I was a child? Not that I would have bought them as a kid anyway, I was very much a pink and girly toys girl. I still am to some extent--I love cute things, but I've since learned that I have an extremely morbid side. I love ghoulish and outlandish things, and I have a rather inappropriate sense of humour.

 Anyway, back to the dolls. I like them but I've never been a fan of their face ups. I like a more subtle looking face on my dolls in general. I've been accumulating several of these dolls with the intent of repainting them and finally (after about two years, haaaa...) broke down and bought a can of MSC (so expensive here...) Best dolly decision I ever made.

 Here's my first MH custom. This is the fourth doll I've ever customised and my first MH one. The other dolls have been Bratz. I used a Vampire Create-A-Monster doll head as the base because it's the mold I liked the least. I used a mix of coloured pencils, pastels and paint for this custom. I did all my previous customisations using acrylics and pastels, so coloured pencils is another first.



 I made a brushed yarn wig for her because all the Liv wigs I have makes her look like a strung out druggie or something. Don't even get me started on the default CAM wigs. Yuk. The tutorial I'm using is this one:

It took a long, long time. @_@ I don't have a flat iron so I used a clothes iron to smooth out the wefts.

I'm not really happy with the wig. It's too poofy, and I gave it a bad haircut to boot. I have no idea how to cut hair. The spiky anime hair is my attempt to disguise the bad haircut, haha.


I also stole some wings of a McD's Flora to use in the custom. I had to break her to get the wings. Those toys are glued down tight!

I finally made something new.

I finally made something new. And took some pictures. I've been feeling very flat and unmotivated for the past few months.

I found a wonderful tutorial by ToniEllison for milk and cereal. It was fun if very time consuming to make. I need to do something about my bowls, they're not very good. And next time I think I'll make a little 'splash' to put at the base of the poured milk.

I think they look funny baking in the oven. I got a new toaster oven from the OP shop, but I didn't notice that it doesn't actually have a temperature control dial. Only options for heating from the top, bottom or both at once. Welp, at least it's smaller than my previous hulking beast at least?



I made three of them, with the red skim milk in the plain bowl being my favourite. It's also the one I made last so it has the least mistakes. I made an extra bowl of cereal with a spoon because I had so many left over cereal flakes.



I made the milk stream too high for Sylvanians. Mama Neptune had to stand on a chair to pour this. The stream works well with 1/6 dolls, though.


Shelly: Mama, where does milk come from?
Narrisa: Ducks, dear. Mr Waddlington delivers the milk.
Shelly: No, I mean WHERE does it come from? The carton has a picture of a cow on it, does this mean that Mrs Buttercup makes it herself--
Narrisa: Never you mind. Eat your cereal.

Yeah, where does Sylvanian milk come from anyway?

Pins and Needles Sewing Supplies Shop Update, plus other things

Long overdue update time! I actually completed this shop about a month ago, but didn't manage to take photos I was satisfied with until now.

Introducing the Pins and Needles sewing supplies store, your one stop shop for all your sewing needs. This shop contains craft books and magazines, thread, a nice selection of fabrics, paints, buttons, sewing machines etc.




Meet Adrianne Hopkins, the proprietress of Pins and Needles.



I had originally considered either a Dandelion rabbit or Silk cat mother as the owner, but I thought that Adrianne and her colour scheme fit in there really well. I love the Hopkins Champagne rabbits. They are a soft pink colour and their flocking is so, so soft! I added a lace trim to her dress. Her original stock photos had a lace trim, but the final release came without (unfortunate, because she looks much fancier with some extra lace). I just glued it on because I suck at sewing.


Interior shot




Little Re-Ment Care Bear. I used to have him in Mulberry's Toy Store, but he just fits so well in here, I couldn't resist.




Goodies for sale. I did my best to make up for the missing bits in my sewing set and added extra items like the books and more beads. No way did the original set come with enough beads!




Bay window turned into shelves. I don't think I really have enough fabric for a sewing shop, but it'll have to do. It's already pretty cramped in there.




A green, vintage Singer, the pride of Pins and Needles. Not for sale, it's Adrianne's personal machine that she inherited from her mother.



I love this piece. I kind of wish I had the black version too, but green's pretty good.


Sewing and knitting magazines.




Buy the bolt! I almost named Pins and Needles 'By the Bolt'. XD



And that's all for the shop. I might add some dress forms to the outside later, but hadn't really thought about it when I was taking the pictures. I also need to make better back drops and add more plants. The same two pieces of shrubbery is getting old.

---

I've done a review on this old Sylvanian school set on the forums here.

Also, I went to The Reject Shop last weekend and picked up this little guy.



Lalaloopsy candy pony! This one is called Mocha. I really, really wanted to like Waffles, because the concept of a unicorn with a smooshed ice cream cone on its head acting as its horn cracked me up. But Waffles has a really ugly bib molded on him. Just could not get over that silly bib. Mocha is really cute though.

Pins and Needles sewing supply store - WIP

I've been working on this on and off for a while. I got the Sylvanian Sewing Shop from Wendy a few years back, and even though it's one of my favourite sets, I've not really done much with it. I had originally wanted to fit it into the TOMY boutique, but there was barely enough space for all the original accessories much less the sewing shop.

I decided to customise one of the small cottage shop buildings for this. I used the pink building from the Madeline's Boutique release (Ms Madeline already has a nicely outfitted shop in my village). The pink building is one of my least favourites. There's something really un-Sylvanian about it. Most SF buildings tend to come in natural shades of brown and cream, and even when there's a pink building (the Urban Life Cafe Terrace springs to mind), it's not obnoxiously bright like this one is.



I had considered using light pink and white, but I settled for a bright yellow and white instead. I'm glad I did, I like the yellow! I also got rid of the bay window and put in a balsa wood shelf. I really liked how the bay window looked, but there really isn't enough space for a lot in these little shops. I decided to put in the shelf after seeing moonrabbit_ly's photos of her sewing setup. There's not going to be enough stuff in my shop! No ribbon, not enough buttons, and especially no fabric. What kind of sewing supplies store has no selection of fabric?



Anyway, I started work on the accessories. Here are some buttons. I used micro beads I found at a cheap shop a couple of years back for most of them. I regret I didn't try to do a pattern with the tiny gold micro beads to make it look like one of those cards with fake gems on it.



I saw this on the Crafty Ladybug's site years ago. I cut the tip off those useless UK baby bottles and sanded the tops down and filled them with beads. I'm pleased by how natural the tops ended up looking--like they were always meant to look this way. :)



I also made some magazines, and a couple of books. The book covers were made using fabric. I love how the quilting book turned out. I was missing the paint brushes from the sewing shop, so I made some out of the ends of a couple of cocktail toothpicks. The fancy ends make for awesome brushes. To make the bristles, I chewed on the ends to make it split.





I'm also missing the original bottles of fabric paint from the sewing shop, so I made my own with some beads and cork paper. I guess I could have made the lids with polymer clay, but at the time I CBF.



There was some extra space on the shelves so I found an extra SF tray, painted it and filled it with goodies. The little packets are supposed to be packets of pins and needles. For the ribbon I used craft ribbon and those annoying little ribbons that come sewn on the shoulders of women's tops. I think they're for hanging the tops or something? I generally find them annoying so I cut them off.



After making those accessories, I looked at the little spools of thread and they just don't look 'real' enough when placed next to all the other stuff. I decided to be extra picky and wind real thread around them.



I've only got to make the sign, awning and the roof tiles and the shop will be complete. And maybe I'll be able to take better pictures of it after that. The pictures for this entry have been pretty dismal.

Space Hammy

For a Design a Villager Animal Crossing contest on the Australian ANC Facebook page. Draw an original character and come up with a profile, basically.

'Say hello to Sam, the jock space hamster. He very badly wants to go to space, and he's currently training to fulfill his dream of becoming an astronaut. He wears a space suit and helmet everyday to remind him to work towards his dream. Sometimes you'll see him bouncing on his trampoline to simulate the weightlessness of space. He also knows a lot of facts and trivia about rockets and outer space, and he will occasionally share his knowledge with other people. He was named after a Spaceman Sam his parents found in a meteorite crater.

His greeting is, "Up, up and away!" and his catchphrase is "great galaxies". If you get his picture, it'll say, "Never give up and reach for the stars!" behind it.'

I originally drew a gardening bunny, but a hamster riding a coin operated rocket was too hard to resist.

SPAAAAAAAACE

New blog layout

New blog layout! I'm aiming for something simpler. The previous layout was a headache, and I couldn't figure out how to increase the body width.

This is the second thing I've ever finished painting on the computer. I used Easy Paint Tool Sai. That program is SO AWESOME. I love the lineart layer function and the stabilizer. Especially the stabilizer, I have shaky drawing hands like you can't believe. I've learned so much painting this. I think it's a good improvement on my previous CG work.

The Candyman Comes

I've been away from this blog for a while. At first I went overseas for a month--back to my home country visit all my friends and family. I really miss jungles. And I've noticed that my body no longer can tolerate tropical heat as well as it used to. :( I used to be able to wear ankle length skirts and long sleeves in that weather and feel nothing. Now I need shorts and short sleeves.

I've also been focusing on my studies for the past couple of months. Some of it's over now. Anyway, two new pictures!




I really love the old Megahouse miniatures. It's really too bad that they stopped making them. The old Megahouse panda candy cart scales perfectly with the larger adult Sylvanians. Most of the current adults aren't as big as the old bear molds so they don't work as well. I originally had father Timbertop as the owner, but after I got this Marmalade bear, I decided that his clothes looked more like a candyman's should.

I love the little Megahouse candy. I'm missing about two or three of the sets, but I couldn't cram much more on the cart anyway. I should take more close up pictures of the contents of the cart.


Mr Marmalade: That'll be $56.

Jack: What? For a candy bar? That's crazy!

Mr Marmalade: It's vintage. That's the last one I have from 1958.

Jack: I don't think I want this any more.