Get rich quick!

Need a little extra cash this weekend? I've got just the project for you--it will literally make money materialize in front of your face! You don't even have to go looking through grass or anything! Okay, it's not OUR money, you know, REAL money, necessarily, but rupee money, so if you're planning a trip to Hyrule it will come in handy at least. For those looking to stay home (Hyrule always seems to be in some sort of peril anyway), it will make a great cat toy. Look!
They're just made out of two pieces of felt and then embroidered shut with (mostly) matching embroidery floss. As you can see, they still get the basic idea across even if you are a terrible embroiderer and can't draw a straight line to save your life. I stuffed some catnip in them too, and the cats have been going crazy over them. Wanna see? Hm, what's that? You don't want to see pics of my kitties? Too bad, here they are anyway.

Reach, Dorian, reach! It's worth 20 rupees!
Bah bah! Yuki just found a blue rupee!
Dorian's rolling in dough.

Was this whole post just a giant excuse to show pictures of my kitties? Perhaps. But it really is funny to see them running around with rupees in their mouth, and there aren't enough geeky pet toys out there. Or any, really.

Anyway, it's just a fun weekend craft that takes less than 20 minutes, so make some up and watch your kitties go crazy! Stay tuned for more craziness--I promise, no more kitty pictures.

Fair Shield Maiden...

Alright, as promised, shield maiden of the year, Eowyn!
Yeah I know, poor Eowyn doesn't have a really cool costume like the guys (although I guess we could have made her when she was in disguise at the battle of Pelennor Fields) but I thought this costume was the most iconic for her character. Out of all of the dudes we made, though, she does have the most costume changes, so it might be cool to make some different outfits for her...

Anyway, this dress is pretty simple. The white felt is on the bottom, with painted gold, and then her little burgundy vest over that. I don't know if you can see it in the picture, but her sleeves have little braided ties on them.

I'm not 100% happy with her hair color, but our Hobby Lobby for some reason didn't have anything that I liked better.

Star Wars news: I am working on the new Star Wars set of people, and let me tell you, I am not really feeling them. The boy made AWESOME AWESOME blasters and lightsabers, but the clothes are so plain that I'm not sure they pop in the same way. The classic Leia outfit is just a piece of white felt with a belt on it! Maybe I'm just being too critical--I'll post some pictures next week, and if anyone is out there, maybe I can get some opinions on this.

New Lord of the Rings characters

Well, my plan for this blog was to post all of the Fellowship members, along with pictures and my incredibly witty, insightful thoughts about creating them. Well, since the Fellowship has burst upon the interwebs (with more incredible success than I thought possible, like this or this or this) I thought I would post some information about some LotR characters that I didn't show everyone. You know, maybe to make this blog actually relevant?

Okay, here goes--


Faramir! Isn't he so cute? Unlike the members of the Fellowship, he doesn't have any accessories. Of course, the tree of Gondor on his outfit is so incredible, that I don't think he needs anything. He is kind of complicated, though--he has three different layers of felt (the brown, the tan, and the dark brown) and little gold rings connecting the tan colors together. And of course his cloak.



The bottommost layers of felt have some decorative "baseball" stitching on them (not sure if that's a technical term, but it's the kind of stitching they have on baseballs so it's a good bet). And of course the belt--we have TONS of leather, since the boy used to work at a furniture store and got to keep lots of their little fabric samples they threw away.

I don't have a picture of him next to his brother Boromir, but they do look like they are related! Faramir's hair is one shade lighter but still in the same color category.

Faramir was the first non-Fellowship member I made, and of course (so he wouldn't be lonely) I had to make his lady-love, Eowyn--but you have to wait till the next post to see her! Okay, you could cheat and go to my flickr page, but then you wouldn't get to see all of the neat things I have to say about her!


Pretty Little Elf

Alright everybody, time for the pretty little elf, doing his little nancy dance. (Can you tell I was obsessed with Cassandra Claire's LotR private diaries?)

To be honest, Legolas was not my favorite in the beginning. He turned out fatter than the rest (and my sister was yelling at me to make him skinnier than the rest, being an elf and all) and his head is kind of a funny shape. It was super hard to find the right colors for him, both in yarn and in felt. Even now I'm still not sure we shouldn't have made him in silver yarn and a beige felt tunic with the green felt vesty thing over that. Being so fat though, that would have made him huge.

Anyway, once we got his hair together and his awesome bow and arrow and quiver, I changed my mind. The boy did such a wonderful job with the quiver (can you see that peacock? How crazy is that?!) and the bow (except when the cats ate it and stole the silver thread on it) that I think I changed my mind about little Leggy.

Definitely the prettiest!

Gimli

Okay, I will be honest. I never really cared that much for Gimli in the LotR movies, because I thought he was just used as some campy comic relief and he scares me a little because he reminds me of some of my customers at work. ANYWAY, I love the little Gimli the boyfriend and I made.

Isn't he so cute? I love his little braids. We decided that his beard would have to be made out of felt, like the other characters that have beards, and it couldn't be braided like in the movie, but I think the effect here turned out really well. Also, how cute is his little helmet? The boyfriend sculpted little Dwarven runes into it before he painted it. Crazy, right?
And you can't see them very well, but Gimli has two little braided strands running across his chest. I braided those suckers, they are 5 stranded braids (which are VERY HARD to do, for me at least) and you can barely see them. Oh well.

Hope you guys like him!

Maniac Monday--R2D2!

Okay, so, I am a little obsessed with R2D2. Scratch that--I am totally obsessed with Artoo. I have no idea why, but I have Artoo collectibles from pez dispensers to cookie jars to cardboard cutouts. I even have the little remote controlled Artoo that responds to your voice. Anyway, I thought I would share some cool R2D2 crafts I have seen on my trek through the intertubes.

1. The R2D2 casemod. Let me tell you, if I knew squat about computers and/or metal welding, I would so make one of these. I want one so bad. For now, I'll have to stick with my tower that has AT-AT's painted on it. (That's still kind of cool, right?)


2. Steampunk R2D2. I am fascinated by steampunk right now--I think it's a really interesting sci-fi trend. This steampunk R2D2 is just too cool. The guy that made this has details about it on his blog, it's very interesting. He made a lot of it from parts that you wouldn't expect, kind of like the original R2.


3. Okay, this one is kind of cheating. My boyfriend painted this Christmas ornament for me. Out of everything I've posted, it's the least technically challenging, but there is not a chance in hell it would look anything like an R2 unit if I tried to paint it, so I am still in awe.

For now, I'll have to stick to crochet and knitting, but I can still stand in awe of those with different craft techniques and say...I WANT!!!