Oh, Wolverine, what did they do to you?

I've been kind of busy lately, helping with my sister's upcoming wedding (I love you Kimberly!)  So fewer tiny stuff and more regular-sized stuff.  But I did manage to pick up a new arrival.

The saddest Wolverine ever.  I got him for ten cents.

Yes, he is missing two of his claws on one hand.  Yes, he's in a permanent sitting position. Yes, a lot of the paint is worn off of his body (even, scandalously, his rear end).

I want to show you what he looks like now, because hopefully I'll be able to give his legs some joints and spruce him up to better-than-new!  Happy arting!

Rapunzel Rapunzel, how many bottles of shampoo do you use in one go?

I got this Rapunzel at a garage sale, basically for free because her hair was so messed up!  Look at this!!  I've always wanted a Rapunzel in my dollhouse, so much so that I tried to make one myself!  I'm not crazy about my sculpting, so I'm not going to relink to that, but it's on the blog!  Somewhere!

 

I used a little bit of fabric softener and a lot of water and brushed it all out with a wide-toothed comb.  The tutorials all say to use a wire wig brush, but... I'm a rebel.  No, I'm not a rebel.  I just didn't want to buy it. She did lose some hair, but that's okay!  That's the magic doll detangler.

 

I might get someone who's a prettier braider to rebraid, but basically it's pretty awesome, huh?

Happy arting!

No Bones About It

Today I made a skeleton!  Rather, I took a dollar store skeleton garland that looks like this:

And fixed it up a bit.  I gave it actual joints beyond the shoulder joints and the hip joints.  This next part is a little technical... I noticed that the shoulder joints were connected to the upper ribcage, which is entirely incorrect, so I connected it instead to the clavicle (the collarbone, which, on these little plastic guys extends right to where the shoulder joint would be).

How did I do this miraculous thing, you might ask?  All you need is a piece of cardboard, a pushpin, and wire, and scissors.

Using the cardboard as a buffer, I pushed the pin through the skeleton to make new holes, one a little above the knee joint, one a little below.  I did that for the knees, shoulders, wrists, elbows, and cut the joints apart with a scissor.  At this point, I filed the edges down a little with a nail file.  Finally, I strung the joints together with wire, and painted the whole thing.  In the pictures, the eyes look darker than they are; I mixed a middle gray so it wouldn't overwhelm the rest of it.

Here he is, chilling with Poe.  Poor Poe.

Hello Dobby

Finally finished!  Here's a picture of Dobby next to Hagrid, for scale.  The very tall to the very small.

And here's a slightly better picture.  The picture isn't awesome, because I'm still using my phone camera.   The reason he's bandaged: he has a habit of hurting himself when he misbehaves, in the books.  The real reason he's bandaged: his arm fell off, and I had to crack his legs to get him to stand up.  His ear fell off and I replaced it with paper, and you can't tell the difference! 

I did a quick touch-up and replaced the picture, sorry!

Happy arting!

to thine own elf be true!

I'm having my first experience with Sculpey! It's fun!  My hands hurt because I've been sculpting all day, though.  Here's one of the fruits of my labor.  Dobby!  I want to bake everything at once so he isn't in the oven yet, and now that I look at the picture, I can see where I need to smooth more, and add more.

 There's his cute little profile!  I made him with wire and candy wrappers as his skeleton, and the only thing that can move on him is his arms (if he bakes correctly).

Happy arting!

The house now has something that I've been calling a Gentleman Velociraptor, though my mother suggested the title Philosiraptor, which I very much like.  Here he is, before he became a gentleman, trying to eat my brother.

Bad velociraptor.  Bad.

Here he is, all dolled up.  I made his monocle with a chain and a circle clasp, plus clear nail polish for the glass.  In retrospect, using a small circle of clear tape and then clear nail polish would have maybe looked better!

Here he is from the front!  I made his vest with real leather, bought from the thrift store.  I learned that using white glue on leather actually works remarkably.  His buttons are little silver thingies that my sister took off of a shirt and gave me ages ago.

I love this little guy!  Happy arting!

I built a centaur out of foil, paper, and pipecleaners, and a cheap dollar store horse.  He was hollow, so I snipped his head off easily, and the white hair peeled off of the head (I'll use that later).  The napkin paper I used was too thin and it made him look lumpy, so I covered him up with regular paper, glued all to heck.  I filled him with pennies so that he'd stand up, but I found out that dollar store horses don't stand up anyway.

Here's Andy Warhorse! 

He needs clothes and tweaking, but... anyhow.  Anyone up for Cambell's Soup?

Guyzzzz.  Today I painted some tiny people.  They can be the elves that live in the house, causing mischief.

I found them, plain white, at an art supply store, in the railroad section!  A darling friend of mine bought it for me, and I had an amazing time hanging out with my buddies all day Saturday.  I even made a new friend (hi!)

This pic might be a little clearer, but I'm taking it with my cell phone so no promises.

From left to right, it's Shirtless Guy, Old Guy, Hipster Guy, Two Face, and the Fifth Doctor (or as I call them, the One With The Celery).

I did the painting with a push pin!  Guys, painting these little people is more fun than a ticklish monkey in a room full of feathers.

Today is the day I display my no longer messed up Superman!  As a refresher, this is what he looked like before:

Notice the lack of nose and the blue hue to his face.   He could double for Voldemort.

This is him now, after his makeover!

He's painted with nailpolish, and his cape is the same silk I used for my Doctor bowtie.  I made his nose with paper, molded to the shape.

I didn't have yellow nailpolish, so I did the next best thing and mixed crushed yellow eyeshadow with clear nailpolish.  It works like a dream!  Happy arting!

Garage Sale Saturday was a semi-success!  I got a few watches for dismantling, and I got a terrible Superman.  When I say "terrible Superman," the words don't really do justice to how truly terrible this Superman is.  Pictures don't, either, since the camera keeps getting blurry shots.  It must be his Kryptonian physique.

There's Oscar Wilde sleeping on the floor in front of him.  Anyway, Superman has hands that are scraped up with gouges and he's missing the tip of his nose.  He's going to be a real fixer upper.

Also: there's been some interest in the couch I made, so I made up a kind of tutorial.  This isn't size-accurate, just a visual representation, so that you can do your own thing and experiment with what works for you.

Fold on the blue lines, attach the red lines together perpendicularly.  Stuff where you feel it needs stuffing, cover every piece with fabric.  The backing goes onto the back of the main part to cover up where you attached the fabric (I used hot glue).  I made four rounded rectangles as the arm fronts and arm backs, and I sandwiched the blue folding tabs between them before I glued the red to red.  It's really a lot easier than it sounds!  Happy arting!

Modification complete!   Okay, here's the story: I was going to use shrinky dinks for the wings, but we didn't have any.  I tried friendly plastic... but it's really old, and probably should be renamed unfriendly plastic, at least while it's in my incapable hands.  I tried plastic wrap, shrunken.  I finally settled on paper, and sparkly watercolor, and pen, and shiny gloss.  Here's the result:

Cute as a button, am I right?
I used a fabric sunflower for the dress.  I just took it apart, and wrapped it around her, sewing it directly on.

Happy arting!  And I love-love-love to get comments, I read every single one!

Guys, today is part of that Super Secret Surprise that no one everyone was awaiting with bated breath! 

Here's my first attempt at a person.  Rapunzel, with her hair out of the window, all like, "Whatevs."  I saw part of Tangled, and decided to do my interpretation (given that I can't find a proper Rapunzel in the right scale).

Here she is standing (leaning).  Her legs and head are made of clay.  Her hands are foil with paper because I made them out of clay and decided I didn't like them, and foil is forgiving while teeny clay fingers might (read: will, if you're me) snap.

The hair is hair 'extensions' that I got from the dollar store from a Halloween costume display.  This is my first experience trying to wig anything, and I messed up hardcore.  I couldn't find anything that would properly connect barbie doll hair with clay.  Not hot glue, not Elmer's, not super.  Maybe I'm just not in the cool kids' club.  So I just used a combination of the three and the top of the head looked all different shades of jacked up.  That's why I added the crown, out of copper tape.

I also added little hair cuffs out of copper tape, and tiny jewels from a dollar store manicure kit.

The arms look kinda lumpy, but let's just say that's because of the dress I sewed onto her and leave it right there at that.  I'll fiddle with it, yet.  Happy arting!