Sleep lessons...

I need them.  Sleep lessons.  I am the type of person that will go to bed at a decent hour only to wake up every hour to play candy crush and listen to audio books until another hour of braindead takes over.  I can't, for the life of me, just stay asleep.  I wonder if it contributes to my creativity and overall awesomeness or if my sleep button is just an idiot.  I prefer the more romantic explanation
That being said, I have been a crochet fool.  While I love my bullets more than pie, it always seems to be the norm to see more hats going out the door in the winter months than bullets.  Go figure.  I guess one follows the money and hopes to be discovered sooner or later.  I assume this is why movie stars are discovered waiting tables.  I am simply waiting tables until I catch the eye of some shopper with an eye for recycle art and love for the smell of black powder. Until then, why not try to talk someone into a crochet top hat?

Grandma goes steampunk?  Whatever.  The whole idea is fun and gives me variety from the run-of-the-mill pageboys, beanies, and flappers.  Don't get me wrong, I love them too, but dadblammit, I love to see a little adult variety in the snow.  I say adult because every kid on the planet has a bear head hat someplace.  Old news.  Move over kids, its adult fun time.  

If you want to see more hats, They are in my shop at www.uniqueeuphoria.etsy.com.  

Admittedly, I took a break yesterday and experimented with some cording I got from a friend in a random package of fun.  Another friend had sent me a photo of a necklace that she enjoyed, made from a different (less pretty) cording.  I took it as a challenge to try to replicate.  The picture is lame, my camera is old and cheap...but much like that sad old lady that sits at the end of the bar at the local tavern, it just wouldn't be the same if it wasn't there...so, the camera stays and all the photos taken with it look dreamy and surreal.  Yeah.  Surreal.  Anyhoo....

It's fine, though I see glue and that tends to bug me.  I'm not a perfectionist by any means, I just struggle with shabby chic looking too shabby.  We won't explore the back side of the necklace.  

Crochet tophat winter outfit

I have a lot of people enjoying my crochet winter tophat and they think its really neat, but the question has been asked...or rather, the statement made, "I have no idea what to wear it with."  While steampunk and victorian dress can be very over the top, it is possible to incorporate the fun bits into your every day without too much trouble, while still occasionally turning a head with your blatant awesome without attacking everyone at the mall with your...um...blatant BLATANT awesome.  I tried to demonstrate by making a collection of simple pieces of clothing to make an everyday steam-victorianesque outfit, complete with a warm coat and my handmade crochet tophat (Hello Buffalo, NY right now---amiright?).  Just to be extra sassy, I included a pair of my earrings to top it off.  Sassy, and...I really love those earrings right now.

Victorian Amethyst Rifle Casing Bullet Earrings by UniqueEuphoria
etsy.com

Victorian-inspired top hat by UniqueEuphoria on Etsy
etsy.com

Dabbling, because my ADD told me to.

Thats about it.  Boredom hits me pretty quickly and I flit from one thing to another.  Etsy tells me, as a store owner, its much better to have 1 kind of thing instead of lots of things.  Sadly, if I focused on 1 kind of thing, I would be one kind of asleep.  I sometimes think that is the real difference between an artist and a crafter.  An artist is all flitty and do whatever.  Their work is from their hearts.  There are no patterns and no plans.  It just happens.  The crafter is structured, refined, expert even.  They have a plan of attack and rarely waver. Crafters are predictable.  I can't say that is entirely a bad thing.  I mean, if I want a handmade coffee cozy, my best bet is to find a crafter who has thousands of them.  In my store I might have one or two, but its only because I thought it might be fun to add hair to one, or feet.  Absolutely everything in my shop is an experiment.  I never have a plan.  It just comes and if I love it, I list it.  if I don't love it, it gets put away somewhere until another idea strikes that will make it better, or I destroy it.  Either way.

So it all started when I was digging around in the deep freeze for some hamburger.  In the corner I saw a bag that was questionable to say the least.  I opened it and found the hide from a pheasant a friend had harvested for me during last year's season.  The feathers are beautiful and it had been a while since I played with them. I felt it was high time to separate the feathers from the hide, wash, sort and strip them and if I still have the gumption, make something.

I had the gumption.

Feather fascinator and others...

Happily, I sold one right away.  This beautiful lady is also a 

etsy seller and makes wonderful meditation pillows.  Her husband also makes

gorgeous handmade pottery which is sold in the shop as well.

By all means, go and see what she has!

Barbieszenhouse

I flitted around with this and that, but looked over in the corner at a gallon sized pickle jar I had, full of seashells.  I decided to play, but was not thrilled with my lack of imagination.  I had made all this before.  It was then I discovered that I had Polymer clay.  

Since seashells are indeed cast offs from various sea monsters, 

I thought a mock taxidermy of sorts would be fun.  I ended up with  some pretty cool little monsters

growing out of those seashells.

Octopus and other questionable sea-krakenary

Alas, my thoughts turned back to my bullets.  They are, after all, my favorite medium.

Something different though.  After the invention of the corseted bullet, I really felt I needed to step it up.

I went out to the shop and broke out the cutting wheel and started hacking away at a bullet hoping something would come of it.  At first, I was really going for some kind of  sculptural thing.  I beat on it with hammers and trimmed off bits and pieces, when I kind of saw something in the rubble.  

It wasn't long before I had a plan-ish and hacked away until I got this shape:

I don't know.  A cicada?  I filed away at it for a while before bringing it inside to stare at it for a bit.  

I had a fella, who had shot a very beautiful deer this season, ask me to make something cool out of the bullet he used to harvest his deer.  While I was digging through some scraps of filigree trying to decide where to go with THAT project, I spied a piece that was still whole.  It was then my 30-06 cicada became a 30-06 cockroach.  

Of course, as the prototype it is far from perfect, but seems to be well on it's way to being a recycled UniqueEuphoria original.  

Hair clip I think.  I mean really, what woman doesn't invite bugs to crawl through her coiffure? 

Especially when they are made from spent bullets and scraps of filigree.  I'm just sayin'

Run you better run, run from my bullet...earrings...

I spent the day out in the shop punching out primers from bullet casings to make jewelry, namely earrings.  A lot of people were asking for earrings as opposed to pendants and I really had to real way to utilize a decent earring.  I had made some attempts, but wasn't really happy with the overall result.  It turns out, a .22 has a very thin and easily punched out primer-capsule situation, most likely due to not being a re-loadable type of bullet.  Anyway, a little metal punch and a whack with a hammer made for a very nice, centered hole.  I was able to make some pretty neat specimens last night.

These are .22 shorts and are an 1800's friendly round that I picked up at the cowboy range.  Most specifically, these were laying all over the floor of the church after Fire in the Hills.  The flowers are fire polished Czech glass with antiqued brass filigree.

I experimented with some other sizes since my hubby bought me some small drill bits as a treat the other night.  I often break these, so a set of drill bits is better than a dozen roses to me any day of the week.  

So anyway, 30 carbines.  The lighting in my room is really crappy, but you get the idea of them anyway.  A .30 carbine was introduced in the 40's, so unlike most of my bullet casings, it's not a Victorian-era round.  I have a lovely assortment of firearm enthusiast friends that keep me supplied in odd casings. 

Here again, larger Czech fire-polished glass flowers with aged copper filigree findings. 

And lastly, another pair of .22 shorts.  Mottled, creamy green and brown Czech flowers with antiqued brass and a rhinestone roundel. 

So, that was last night's project.  I also have been working on a few dollhouse miniatures for my sister who recently acquired a very large display dollhouse with a pretty limited supply of minis to go inside.  I had some Sculpy and Fimo, so decided to try my hand at miniature making.  She had a garden plot on her Pineterest, so I went about trying to make veggies.

I'm getting the hang of it.  they are really tiny, so its a little harder than I had anticipated it to be.

Things I have learned in the process is, keep your heat gun on hand.  When you do a section or layer, hit it with your heat gun and "bake" your piece (Be careful, you can burn them and yourself.  I had the bits I was working on stabbed onto a pin that I had mounted on the end of a chopstick).  That way, when you put on the next layer, you can fiddle with all the little details without messing up your prior layer. With these tiny guys, you really don't need to bake it if you just use your heat gun.  Also, have some pastel chalks on hand.  that way you can add color layers to your items before heating them up.  This is how I got my carrots "dirty"  the carrot top is a tiny piece of moss that I had harvested and dried from the roof of my garage.  One little hunk of moss with make millions of carrot tops.  I may do a picture tutorial on my UniqueEuphoria blog to better explain my method.  Really though, this is fun and really does not cost a lot to get into.  The most expensive part is the actual clay, and you use so little making such tiny things, you really get your money's worth out of it.  All the other goodies can be found at the hardware store or in your house.  The texture of the leaves on the cauliflower was a little seashell and the leaves of the corn was textured using an old toothbrush.  It helps to Google images of the thing you are making, so you have a reference to color and texture and you can refer to the screen as you work.

Upcycled photo frame pin cushion project

Here's a cute little idea for old, tiny picture frames.  My mom had given me a box of stuff she was cleaning out of her craft room and inside were these little picture/mirrors things:

Cute right?  I suppose the lucky person would find these and the backs would easily pop right out so you can safely remove the glass without too much drama.  Me, I live for drama.  My backs were glued in.  So a little exacto knife carving, a little prying and a little swearing, I managed to...

Ahhhhh, break the mirror   Seven year's bad luck?  I think not.  I'm recycling.  And...I'm too awesome.  I repel bad luck. Stay strong and keep prying.  

Ta da!!!!  Now choose your fabric.  Not only am I recycling the old frame, but that fabric is left overs from another project somewhere out there.  

Sorry the picture quality is kind of meh.  It's like, 5:00 a.m. and I'm trying to do this in low light, all stealthy so as not to wake up the spawn.  

So anyway, you want to cut your fabric a little bigger than the back plate thingy.  This isn't an exact science.  Just follow the general shape of your backing thing and make it a little bigger.  

Start hot gluing it down following the edge of your fabric.  Pleat it with your fingers to keep it all even.  You want this to pouf out the front of the frame.

See?  Like this.  all glued.  

Now, your back plate thingy was not made to allow for fabric.  Usually these things consist of some kind of cardboard, so take your utility knife or scissors and carve it down a bit so its a little more frame friendly.

Your going to want to get some fiberfill.  You don't necessarily need to spend money on this either.  I like to visit the dump weekly and see what I can find.  An example would be leather chairs.  Always carry utility knives with you so you can harvest the free.  Within those leather chairs is an endless supply of perfectly usable and clean fiberfill.  WOO!

Pack that inside the fabric pocket while hot gluing the back thingy (I'm sure this is the official name for it).  Use a pencil or something to get the fiberfill under control while gluing in your back thingy.  

This is going to be under a little stress, with the fiberfill all packed in there, so run a bead of hot glue around the edge to neatly seal everything up.  

When your done, you have a cute pincushion.  I left the hanger thing (yet another official term) on the back so I could hang it up on the wall next to my sewing area.  

You can use any frame to do this.  I happened to like the antique look, so I kept it pretty original, but you can spray paint your frame or embellish it any way you want.   Have a friend who likes coffee?  Make one with coffee theme fabric and embellish with coffee buttons.  Sewer?  Wine drinker?  Pirate lover?  Trust me here, they have a fabric for that.  Go nuts. 

teapot surprises

Yep.  I'm a swapper.  I love to do those cool mail swaps where you have some kind of a challenge and then get a random partner to send to?  Well, if you've never done it, go to swapbot.com and sign up.  Its free and super fun.
The last swap I did was supposed to be for a cup of tea and a letter.  You get 2 partners to which you send 2 teas/packaged beverages and a letter.  as long as you follow those rules, your good. However, I LOVE getting fun mail and extra special things and I honestly believe that you get what you receive, so I try to make mine special.

What I did was, I drew a teapot freehand onto a piece of paper and then cut out each section that I want to applique   Like this:

Then, you pick your fabric and iron it on to stabilizer--the thicker the stabilizer, the better, especially when you have tiny swirls and corners to stitch around. 

Then, you trace each piece out onto the stabilizer side of the material and cut it all out.  For interest, use coordinating colors, but different fabrics for each piece.  

I then take a piece of felt and tightly zigzag all the way around the piece, making sure to leave an opening at the top so you can put things into your teapot. 

You end up with a little something like this.  You want to trim the felt edges of the teapot for a nice finished look.  I added a pocket in the front too, to put my letter in for my partner.

And here it is!  all packed up and ready to go!  It was very easy and the pot only took about an hour extra to put together.  A little effort and my partners have a super special surprise.

I also offer little things like this in my Etsy shop all pre-made for the swapper.  Not everyone is crafty, but everyone loves special just-because surprises.  That little something extra will make someone.s day.

https://www.etsy.com/listing/104776939/vintage-1960s-fabric-coffee-gift-set

Because I'm on the subject of surprises, Look what I GOT TODAY!!!!

In touch with my nerdy side

I have been working on a couple of special orders lately.  One happens to be for a Brony who really, really needs a My Little Pony.  I'm not the most familiar with these guys anymore.  I remember them from when I was little, but since then they have kind of gotten lost in the pile of mind-numbing cartoons my daughters love.  It turns out, there is an entire adult male following, who call themselves "Bronies."  I am seriously amused and so, had to take on the task of crocheting a 12-inch tall Rainbow Dash.  As you probably know, I just can't follow a pattern, so usually when I take on amirigumi, it's kind of fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants and is subject to artistic interpretation.  I can't even tell you how excited I was when I finally got the 4th leg done. Whew.  Then I checked the picture and started swearing like a toothless pirate when I saw the be-hatch needed wings.  GAH!  We have a love-hate relationship right now.  Anyway, she is getting there and for the most part, turning out pretty accurate:

The wings are posing some problems.  This one needs another layer and maybe some tailoring to get it a little less...hand-y.  It is definitely the biggest crochet project I have ever taken on and has taken me the longest.  Take THAT attention deficit disorder!  

Then, another customer approached me to crochet him a Bomb-om for his desk.  It originally was supposed to be a coffee mug cozy, but at the last minute, he changed his order to a straight up amigurumi.  Either way, he is awesome. 

Yeah, you better run Mario. 

Well, It took some time, but I have an awesome product going into my etsy today.  I made crochet stitch markers just a little more ergonomic and easy to use by utilizing the traditional lobster claw, only at a scale much bigger than what is usually used.  It seems even when I use the small lobster claws, I not only have trouble getting them placed on my work, but getting them off as well.  The bigger size should remedy that situation and should be a little easier for stiff and arthritic hands as well.   I had to special order the lobster claws, but I'm thinking they will be well worth the added expense.  So, here they are.  I am showing you how much larger these are than the traditional clasp so you can see the difference.  They will come in a set of 5, but because these claws are so much more expensive than the regular ones, I have had to price them accordingly.  I am hoping the ease of use and convenience will be worth the extra.

New section in my etsy store

Real quick, its been a really, really long day.

I opened  a section of my etsy shop dedicated to handmade, affordable things for snail-mail swappers!  Fabric postcards, tea bag cozies, stitch markers, etc.  New things will be added every day and I am offering free shipping for everyone everywhere!

I'm pretty excited about this and as a swapper myself, I have always gotten good reviews on the items when I sent them to my partners and I think it would be nice for the not-so-crafty swappers to add in something really special sometimes.

Now, some of you are probably asking, what is a snail-mail swapper?  It's really fun and SO awesome.  Write letters and send treats to people all over the world.  It is very safe and strictly monitored, but is an excellent venue for paying it forward and random acts of kindness, which I LOVE doing!  I have written to lonely people, sad people, happy people, stressed out people.  I've been told that their day was going so badly and they came home to a big pile of bills and bad news except for a pretty little package filled with tiny little gifts just for them.  It makes their day and I want to spread the word and get everyone involved.

So, here is the link to the swapbot blog where you can read all about the process and the fun:  

http://blog.swap-bot.com/ 

From there, you can read about the process and get a link to the actual site where you can set up a free account.  Add me to your relationships and maybe I can set up a swap with you!  My profile on Swapbot is here:

http://www.swap-bot.com/user:uniqueutopia

Okay!  I am done!  So tired!  See you on the fun side and thank you for hanging out with me!

DESTASH GIVE AWAY AND PROMO!!!!

I have about 5 crochet and 5 knit stitch marker sets of 4 to give away.  Colors will vary.  Comment on my post and specify whether you would like knit or crochet, then email me at unique.euphoria@gmail.com with an address so I can send them to you.  First comenter, first serve.  While supplies last.

EDIT!  Due to the overwhelming response, I am now officially out of stitch markers; however, there is still a few left in my shop and if you chose to buy, I will still include a free gift as below.

Not a knitter or crochet artist?  Go to my Etsy shop at http://www.etsy.com/shop/uniqueeuphoria.  If you see something you like and buy it between now and August 8, 2010, I will include a surprise gift worth $5.00 or more with your order.

Here comes the sun

Wow. What a storm we had last night! My electricity was off from 9-ish until 4 this morning. I let my brother in law come inside before a house fell on him. It was the least I could do. :)

Not much going on in Craftville lately. It seems my job did not read the part of the contract that said they actually were supposed to pay me for services rendered--go figure-and after a year, I quit. It has been a long week of resume typing and cover letter including. I did make a pretty something today though while the baby was being quiet. Nothing fancy, just using up some things I had lying around that was left over from a couple of other projects. I think it's legal for a recycle artist to recycle...right?

Featured!!!

I was featured on Trashion's blogger today! Come read my interview!

http://etsytrashion.blogspot.com/2010/07/feature-me-friday-unique-euphoria.html

It's hot in here and it is just me

HOT outside. Oh I know you southern belles are saying, "You think Wisconsin is hot, pft!" Yeah yeah, this Viking is waiting for her ice flow.

I have a few new bits in the shop. Most exciting is my score I got on some solar lights that the local home improvement store was getting rid of because of cracks-the solar part is functioning fine. That being said, A new element has been born to the unique euphoria. SOLAR! Go an check them out in my shop. There is more to come as soon as I get off this demon machine of addiction (my computer) and get down to the shop to talk some trash. I'm also thinking about some souvenir ideas for my shop. I am a fat quarter addict and I have a ton of scraps here. Keep your eyes open for freebies within the next week or so. Think bubbles and postcards...intrigued? Good. Muahaha...

I will be including pictures as soon as I get my camera back from the cabin. It seems I left it on the counter when I left. I hope no mice poop on it while I'm gone...ew.

Pimp my table

I signed up for this swap in which the participants had to sew 2 placemats and 2 napkins to "pimp" your partner's table. I'm not really sure why I signed up since I have never made a placemat or napkin in my life, but I did. There were a few links at the end of the swap description with how-tos on how to make placemats, but they were all quilted. Unfortunately, unless the quilt is actually a quilt, the look is not my thing and the whole process of quilting makes my eyes cross.

I was on my own.

So, I took 2 matching fat quarters and guestimated how big a placemat should be and backed them both with some fabric stabilizer, then I took some pinkish flower fabric (my partner's only hint as to what she likes on her profile is that her favorite color is pink) and proceeded to applique some hearts here and there. I had some white fabric that is like dress shirt material and used that as a backing, sewed right sides together, fliped everything right side out and topstitched. I then had some flour sack material I thought would make good napkins and cut out a couple of decent sized sqaures, hemmed the edges and used the scraps from the placemat material to applique hearts onto those. It wasn't that hard! I think they came out kind of cute and are much busier than any placemats in a store...hope she likes them :)

Remembering the euphoria

While I would love to say I was one of those care-free moody artists that had all the time in the world to lay around and get inspired, I sometimes need to remind myself that this is the real world and that wanna be rock star persona was left behind with the Ramen noodles and green hair of old-I never told anyone that the green hair was an accident. Something about cheap black hair color on bleach blond hair...I don't know. I ran with it.



Anyway, today I steal a few seconds while my home schooled son finishes up some reading and my 18 month old tries to unveil the meaning of life with words of 2 syllables or less. The laundry needs to be done, my floor needs sweeping, the dishes are stacked. Glamorous.



To say I would rather be creating in my studio would be a lie at this point. It's damned cold out there and instead of tackling the much needed housework, I prefer to blog and crochet some arm warmers for a certain someone for Christmas. I wonder if I can talk someone into gifting me a Snuggy?



Okay. Agenda updates. After all, this is my shop blog, Not my personal-whining-winter-blues blog.



Bottles are slumped and waiting final touch ups before going up on the site. Today I took the time to make some sexy address labels for my outgoing packages. Possible etching tonight. I'm not sure if it's wise to go with the Christmas theme or not, since sales have been so slow. I would rather not store them if I can help it. Hm...Perhaps I should consider a huge sale? Thoughts?

New stuff just listed

Everything is free shipping for the month of December. I added a few new bits for the holiday season as well. 3 new bottles will be comming

in tonight as well as another new bird feeder. Stop in later tonight to take a look.

Bottles

I had mentioned in a previous post that I had a special order for clear bottles for picture transfer. I wasn't at all happy with the bottles I had originally done, so I went shopping (at the recycle center) and brought home a few more clear bottles (plus a few pretty colored ones-who can resist?!), took extra care in cleaning them and took extra care in smoothing the kiln shelves. I ramped the heat slowly to slumping temperture, watched diligently as they slumped and crash cooled as soon as they were slumped to my specifications. I let them slowly cool the rest of the night and they are absolutely perfect. I'm so excited for my customer! I had to share my success story, since bottle slumping is such a trial and error craft, at least for me. There really is no solid directions for doing this and so many variables, I found that I am on my own. I'm pretty excited.

So, here they are, my perfect bottles. Hopefully a long line of similer ones to come :)

I was slumping some bottles tonight and thought I would work on something in the shop since it seems like when I leave that kiln and work in the house, I tend to forget and overcook my bottles. Since I had some wire twisted, I went ahead and made this little number. It is a ornament holder to hold those really special ornaments you don't want the cats/kids/dogs to knock down and break or if you just don't have the room for a tree but want to show off the ornaments you have.

The ornaments I have pictured are pretty special to me. They are antiques that belonged to my sister. A Christmas when she had left home and had no food, tree or decorations. She opened up the door to her aprtment one day to find groceries and these ornaments. That was more than 20 years ago. My sister passed away and I still have her ornaments. I came up with this idea to keep them safe from 4 kids 2 dogs and a cat and still be able to enjoy them. I'll be posting this model in my shop as soon as I have it cleaned and painted.

Holiday sale

Shop my store this weekend and recive free shipping on every item. Also, prices have been cut on all fall inspired items to make way for the winter holidays!

Edible Napkin Rings

I love, LOVE getting a brand new set of dishtowels, tea towels or napkins. Its the little things-and my little thing is clean, bright, starchy brand new towels or napkins. I have several family members that feel the same way, and a cozy kitchen basket with new towels and maybe a couple of cookie cutters and little sweet measuring spoons would be adorable. Here is how you can make it special:

First of all, find a nice big seasonal cookie tin leftover from a previous year, or a neat basket--anything that is shallow but roomy and would make a cute base for your project. I have several baskets I got from the thrift store. Sometimes they even give them away because they get a lot of these. Take advantage and be creative! Next, if you can sew, you can buy a yard of white cotton and sew some napkins/tea towels or you can buy them premade. The difference is a few dollars and if your trying to save money-do it yourself is always the better deal.

Now, you can give these plain, or you can decorate. Take an apple or a pear and cut it in half lengthwise. Dab dry with a cotton cloth or paper towel. Make sure to make it as dry as possible so it does not interfere with your paint-yeah! Paint! Acrylic paint is very affordable (a dollar a tube or less) and is permanent. Choose a color and paint the surface of the cut pear/apple. Choose a darker version of the base color and paint the lower edge of the pear/apple to give the illusion of shadow, and stamp straight down and firmly into the corner of the towel. Lift straight up so as not to smudge and you should have a really nice fruit print. You can go in after it is dry with black and pain small black seeds-then, when the paint is completely dry (give them a good 24 hours to be safe) lay an old dishcloth over your painting and iron to help set the paint. If you are doing napkins, you can also do this to plain white place mats to match.

Okay, so you have your napkins/towels and they are adorable. You have your cute basket or tin and its a matter of putting them together-here's where we can make this really special:

Make a simple yeast roll recipe and half it. One half stays plain while ground fennel seeds or poppy seeds are added and mixed with the other half. Roll all dough into long, narrow strips, like snakes. Take one plain and one flavored "snake" and twist together into strands, then make rings.

When they are baked, use your bread "rings" for napkin rings on your fancy new napkins, or you can wrap your bread rings in one of the tea towels and tuck the others around the package. CUTE!

Add a festive bow and a silk poinsettia blossom and you have a really sweet and yummy gift.