First, take a look at what I found for $2 at Micheal’s yesterday:
Why do I need a miniature Superman lunchbox? I don’t know, probably for the same reason I need the other random items that litter my shelves (like the Hello Kitty Pez dispenser, the piggy bank of Mickey and Minnie Mouse dressed up as Luke and Leia, the random vintage jewelry, Japanese hair pins and more miniature glass bottles than I care to count). They also had mini Batman lunchboxes, but what I really wanted was Wonder Woman (didn’t have her though).
I’ve been in a crafty mood lately, and the half-finished projects scattered around my room attest to that. Last Wednesday was the last day of the Wednesday night kid’s classes at church that I volunteer for (haven’t I mentioned that I volunteer to work with the church kids? I guess not. I’m their official crafts/games/story teller person and handle about 10 -15 kids, ages 4 to 6). With the classes not starting back up until the fall (summer break and all), I’ll have more time to work on my own projects now that I’ll be getting a break from designing kiddy crafts during the week.
I’ve had a hankering to make a doll lately. I’ve made dolls before, mostly Reborn baby dolls though I’ve also made dolls by sewing, sculpting, crocheting and ‘putting together from random parts lying around’. But I want to make a really sturdy, high-quality doll that can be posed and detailed, and easy to make clothing for. Something about 13-15 inches high, with an adult female body, preferable jointed at the hips, shoulders, elbows and knees. Ultimately, I’m inspired by the Japanese ball-jointed dolls, but I don’t want to actually get one myself (yeah, you can customize them to high heaven but they’re just…too mainstream). I could sculpt the entire thing out of clay, but that’s too fragile. I’m thinking of making it out of silicon. I have lots of mold making experience and at our family businesses we actually make our own molds so I have easy access to the supplies I would need. But I’ve never tried making a silicon doll before. I’ve helped my mom make porcelain doll molds, but that’s a bit different. I may just take the easy way out and do a heavy customization an a pre-existing fashion doll (Gene? Tyler? Barbie?) instead. But I’ll have to look more into it.
I also really need to work on my Princess Zelda costume. I have parts and pieces for it lying all over my room, but the work has been stalled because I don’t want to start making it until I have a serger sewing machine – no point in doing all that work only to have the costume fall apart and fray a year later. Unfortunately, sergers cost $200 upwards, and I don’t have that money to spend at the moment. I also need to get a new dress form – the one I have is too big for me now (yay for losing weight!).
(Btw, that’s my old dress form to the left there, with one of my better costumes I sewed about two years ago, I love that dress…doesn’t fit anymore though, been thinking about taking it in).
So until I get a serger and new dress form, the Zelda costume is held off indefinitely. I have clothing patterns for the dress already, as well as a box full of gems and other pieces to make the armor, as well as a half-finished crown. Really need to finish that crown – the leaves and headband part are all done, just the middle part of the crown is driving me insane. I have been searching for months to find a perfect gem to go in the center and I have yet to find anything that’s just right. I’m also not quite sure how to go about sculpting the middle piece, so kind of putting it off.
However, I did recently convince my two younger brothers to agree to wearing Han Solo and Luke Skywalker costumes should I manage to get them sewn before Halloween. Brother #1 is 6’1 and has dark, slightly curly hair and Brother #2 is 5’11 and had shaggy blond hair. I’ve wanted to dress them up as Han and Luke for years. Of course I’d make myself the classic white Leia dress. This year my family is thinking about going to Mickey’s Halloween Party which is held in the Magic Kingdom in Disney World every year, so I’d have to get them done before that. So that’s a total of four costumes I want to sew before Halloween…got to start saving up money for that serger and dress form!