Leaves and bugs and Robin Hood

Ok so I'm still fairly sick but at least yesterday I recovered the use of my brain! I've been working on some new felt accessories for my etsy shop.

All of the blog reading the other day came somewhat in handy, I got some new ideas for crafty items to make, and different ways to list them.

I started by making this ladybug gift set, which I adore!

I've also been thinking about making a felt cuff bracelet for a long time, I keep seeing them in craft books and online. I wanted mine to be all forest-y so I did leaves (and an acorn, on one). Why foresty? Because of this:

Yeah, that's Jason Connery (yep, son of Sean!) as Robin Hood in the 80's TV series. I've always liked Robin Hood things and I must admit I was mildly obsessed with the show, even as a kid. Check out his fantastic armband wrist-cuff things!

As I recall, Kevin Sorbo had some pretty sweet armbands in Hercules as well.

Although his armbands usually had lots of metal hardware and stuff on them. (For what? Did he attach things to them, and pull like a boat trailer or something?)

In any case, here are my felt leaf cuffs.

It was a lot easier to photograph on a towel than on my own wrist! However, it made me think that these might make nice napkin rings too :)

 All three cuffs (the acorn one is not quite finished):

The ribbon is kind of thick, I think for my next batch I would use something smaller.  

A look at the backs. You can see a little stitching, but not tons.

What do you think?



Being sick is GROSS

Somehow over the course of the weekend I managed to catch some sort of plague (ok it's either a bad cold or the flu) and have been at home sick, bored, and completely miserable.

I haven't even been motivated to work on crafty things because I've just been so gross. Here's a lovely chart of my activities thus far.

Actually, the complaining might be under-represented on this chart.



Felt cockatiel softie!

So a friend who's getting married contacted me a while ago to make some cockatiel felt sculptures to use on top of a birdcage at the wedding. What a cute idea!

The couple sent me a picture of their birds, who are "whiteface" cockatiels, an interesting mutation that doesn't have the bright orange cheeks and yellow face that are most common. I wanted to make my felt birds to match theirs as much as possible.

Surprisingly, I did not have a "craft fail" at my first try.  Perhaps this is because I have been around my birds so much--I know pretty well how they are shaped! While I've made some cockatiels out of felt before, they weren't totally 3-D so I thought this might be a challenge.

I totally love how he came out! He's got a puffy belly and the wings are a little bit movable, so you can hold them out a little bit to make a "cape" like Edy does when he's happy. The beak is a little bit adjustable too--couldn't decide if I wanted to sew it down closer to the face or not.

I really wanted to make the crest lifelike so I used two layers of felt to create the "feathers." His tail is still a little bendy despite three layers of felt tail-feathers.

Here's a view of him from the top/back.

And sitting on my couch, from a distance it looks like a real bird! Haha.

Here are some of the supplies I used to create my cockatiel soft sculpture...fiberfill, embroidery floss, and gray, black, and white felt. You can also see some of my templates, which should make the second softie go much faster--wing templates, crest templates, underside of the tail. The light gray felt tube on the right will be used for the head, and the dark gray tube for the body.

I did not add feet to this softie...once I hear back from the bride & groom we'll see if the feet are necessary. I thought it would be pretty complicated to add them, and might require purchasing some floral wire, which I tend to stab myself with a lot by accident.

More soon on cockatiel #2!

Some birdies to welcome the spring!

Between a bunch of parties and other fun things this weekend, I found time to work on a few new pins for my etsy shop. The first pin came out exactly as I had imagined it...two cute little birds in love!

The second pin was kind of an experiment, to see if I could even make a cockatiel that small on a felt pin. It actually did not come out the way I was expecting, although it is still kinda cute.

 

More pins coming soon!

St. Patty's Day blog giveaway winner!

Hope everyone enjoyed their St. Patty's Day yesterday!

Yay! The winner of my giveaway for an embroidered flower barrette is:

thecharmingfreak

Congratulations!

Thank you all so much for entering...and have a great weekend!

Ahoy! Pirate treasure maps!

The last few days I've been working on more of my little map paintings (I sell some of these at ArtSpring currently). This time I had some Ikea frames purchased in advance, so I made sure the maps were sized to fit.

Which one do you prefer? I am partial to the second one.

These are so cute for a kid's room. I often draw these maps for children I babysit/hang out with, and they really enjoy using them to create a story or game.

I love drawing the little castles, ships, forests, huts, mountains, etc...and of course I made sure to add in a whaley for good measure!

If you are interested in purchasing one of these treasure maps, please convo me, as I'm not sure if I will be posting them to my etsy shop or not.

Shiver me timbers!

St. Patty's Day blog giveaway!

Just in time for St. Patty's Day, I am doing another blog giveaway! This time, it's for one of my felt flower barrettes. You get to choose which one you like best--I have various sizes, colors, and styles :) The barrettes range from about 1.5" to a little over 2 inches.

It's easy to enter--just leave a comment on this post below including your email address and which barrette (from the picture above) you'd like if you win.

You can leave your email address in this format if you like: pickychickybird AT gmail DOT com, just to avoid spam.

The lucky winner will be chosen at random on St. Patrick's Day--Thursday, March 17th. I will announce the winner here on my blog, so stay posted!