Alice in Wonderland - part 9 the court

When I decided to make this project there were certain scenes that I wanted to do. But then I also had other space so I can't really say why the courtroom is one I decided on. Maybe it was the card people I made initially that helped me decide.
Back when I did the tree for the tea party scene I also finished up the wallpapering for the court section. I envisioned this stately court with a dais and paneling on the walls... but then I went to my stash; I didn't find what I was looking for. What did happen was just a nice brown paneled room - wood wallpaper and floor plus a shiny ceiling. I am pleased with this section despite the grandiose ideas I had to start with. That is normal for me to dream and then scale back once I realize I don't have the space, materials or whatever it takes to make the dream happen.

This week I have finally gotten back in there and made progress.
Top
First, I finished up the top.  I just went with a hedge of sorts. But before I glued it down, I decided to make the rabbit hole smaller.

The hole was just too big and it bothered me, so I added paper inside and painted it. Then I added more paper (after the above photo) to make it even smaller and more ragged. Once painted brown under and green on top, while the paper was still wet with glue, I poked the new hole. I added glue and filled the area with greenery.

This hole actually goes down into the ground some and I am pleased iwth it now.
Also note the light down below - to the right.

Mr. Rabbit looks quite dapper, but almost too small. Yet, I remind myself, that he would be smaller than her.

Back to the court

I already had the two guards made so next was to make the queen. 

I really wanted her to be over the top and I think I did with her. The king on the other hand was more robust instead. One touch I added for the king was the wig. It was in my notes so I added it.
I discussed how I made them previously. The king has a bead to enhance his girth. All the card people are enhanced with bits of ribbon, shiny paper, trim, beads, sequins and glitter. It was fun to pull out different parts of my stash to play with.
I also got creative to cover the heads on the K and J because they are two headed. Just looked funny to have that head upside down. The Q it was hidden in her skirt, but for the K I used a half of a sequin. For J I used a whole heart sequin and added the sash over it.

I was also trying to make him look guilty for stealing those tarts by folded him over a bit.

The table with the tart tray is a gold painted bird bath using a paint pen. It covered the best although getting into a few spots was tricky.  I used a heart shape sequin for a tray. The tarts are some things I made years back for a swap and I went crazy making extra for once.

I also added glitter to the rabbit's clothes to enhance him. 

This one shows the full court and how it is with the rest of the project on that side.
I still need to add edging and then lastly I will be finishing up the tea party.

Don't Look Back - scene in a cup

Some might assume that a tea cup project needs to be a tea time scene, but I am happy to prove that is a totally unnecessary assumption. This project was inspired by the cup and saucer.  I bought this recently at a yard sale along with a few other related items. I wanted them mostly as I thought they would work with my other items with this style. I didn’t necessarily purchase them for making a mini in. 
I set up a display in my living room on a shelf I have just for this purpose. I rotate the displays here as I feel like it which is usually at least with the seasons, but sometimes more often. As I was quite busy, I didn’t actually finish this display. I kept adding things and then didn’t get back to finishing it. But I walk by in every day as it is near the door to my bedroom.  
Several times as I walked by I pictured something on top of the cup. This wasn’t something I already had. Instead it was something that would need to be added. I have various prints from this same artist and one in particular came to mind. I went to that print and said, yes, I believe it could work.

Fill the cup

There are a number of ways to fill the cup.  In all likelihood, I might could have just glued a heavy paper/card to the rim of the cup and that might be ok. My concern is that over time the paper could sag. Also I was planning to stick things in and knowing that, I thought it best to have foam at the top. I use builders foam often, so this was my go to solution.
I cut a circle first and then smaller blocks that I would stack underneath. I did have to angle the side of the circle as I wanted it to be level with the rim. I also wanted the foam rim to match closely to the cup rim, so I used my craft knife to cut away a little at time until I was happy.  There was a gap in a couple of places but figured I could cover them with the landscaping product.

I did have to add in the triangles (at bottom of pic) to force the foam to stay in place. I wanted this as pressure versus glue as I was gluing to ceramic.


Landscaping basics
I drew a rough outline of the path and then painted brown and green.  I adjusted this until I was pleased with the shape.

Next I applied glue to the path and sprinkled on fine brown ballast from my stash. I patted this in place and let dry a while before shaking the excess over a paper plate.  The excess was then returned to the bag. I allowed the brown to dry before I moved to the green.
Next was the green.  I used two different products. One was a very fine medium green foam. The other a mix of lighter green and yellow. I mixed these two together until I was pleased with the result. Then I added glue to one section of green at a time, repeating the sprinkle, pat and shake process. 

All these products are stored in plastic zip bags. I prefer the zip bags over a non-zip bag as tape just didn’t work for me. I use a bead scoop for getting a little or lot of product from the bag, instead of just shaking out of the bag. It also helps to keep some of the product out of the zip area. 
Road sign
The pole is a bamboo skewer painted white and cut longer than I needed. The extra length was to stick in the foam. I did use a needle tool to poke a hole in the foam rather than force the pole. The sign itself is heavy card. I used my craft knife on the end of the skewer to open a slot for the sign to slide into. Sign glued in place and skewer glued back together best I could. The paint helped hide any gaps. I hand-lettered the sign with an extra fine point pen.

Mushrooms
I knew I had a bunch of thicker paper holes in my stash. I pulled out this bag and decided they would work for the largest ones. I did use a my swirl punch for the smaller ones also using some thicker paper. I used a double ball stylus and paint brush end plus a foam pad to shape the mushroom caps. 

The stems are round wood toothpicks painted white. I was able to get 4 stems per toothpick as I wanted the narrow pointed part for most of them. The caps and stems were glued together and then I painted the caps red. They were then glued to the scene. To help with placement, I did punch a hole in the landscaped foam but mostly in the landscaped grassy part, as a deeper hole wasn’t needed. After the mushrooms were all in place I went back with dots of white on the red.

Morning glories
The vine is made from strips cut from the edge of copy paper and then painted. These super narrow strips tend to curl on their own but I did some strategic gluing to get it in place. To get length, I just glued them one to the other. The curls made same way but added as I was working the flowers and leaves.

The flowers are more hole punches from thin paper. I cut a slit in them so that I could make a cone shape. To shape them, I rolled them against my finger with my needle tool. Then glued them and then painted. 

The leaves were some punches that I purchased with a group. 

This group went together to buy a bunch of different colors and shapes from dealer that offers both punches and punched petals. One individual did the ordering and then separated them into smaller amounts to send to or each group member. I glued the punches to the vines and later went back and painted all the leaves to match the vines. 

Egg-shape flowers
Again I used the swirl punch for different sizes. Then I shaped each flower with the double ball stylus. Rounding them from the back and then dimple in the front. Then I painted them. The leaves for these were also some punches from the group but were heart shape and cut them in half to use them. To give them dimension so not glued directly to the grass, I added a bit of foam to the back to elevate like a short stem.

Daffodils
To make these I started with a strip of paper. I used my craft knife to cut petals of similar shape and size. Just slightly curved cuts.
The center is a roll of paper that I frayed the edge of the tube.

 The green leaves were from my stash. I purchased them online or at a show. I could have easily hand cut these as they are similar to the other petals. I repainted them to match.

Star-flower/lily (orange and white flowers)
Since I made the egg flowers I decided to stick with making these as well as similar to the illustration as possible. 
They were made similar to the daffodils with different petal shapes.

Dandelions
I thought these were too much and so I took artistic license to not include them. I find them too much of fantasy. Sure that doesn't exactly make sense with the other flowers I made already, but I am just drawing a line and not making these. It's the whole the yellow flowers are too small relative to the leaves thing that bothered me.
Tree
One thing about doing a project based on a picture or drawing is how much of the picture will be done. Sometimes the picture has a depth that would simply be difficult to achieve in the space available. With the trees this was indeed the case.
The trunks are made with dried plant material. I choose the shape best to match the trees I had room to do. The greenery is just the cluster landscape foam sold for trains. I love this stuff. The shape was general. But the choice to flatten the top is because I want this project to fit in a plastic box.
Owl
Before I started this project I told myself that I would find a bead/charm to do the owl. I wasn't particularly interested in making one in clay although it was a possibility if the bead/charm thing didn't work out. Indeed I was able to find a suitable charm and even ones the right size and without any loop to be cut off.

This product is sold for going inside of a clear locket. It is flat on the back, but I was ok with that, rather than creating in clay.
To add feet, I cut a piece from the hole punches.

I cut the tail at the same time and this also gave the charm a place to sit and something more to glue to the top of the pole.

Doll
It took me several weeks to get back to this project because the next phase was the doll. I knew that I wanted to make this using cloth covered wire. I knew I could do it so the time delay wasn't me procrastinating like often happens, but simply real life activities keeping me busy.
To start the doll I used a wire pin template (pins in a block of wood a the wrap points) I made for some previous dolls.
This is the result of the template

Next I shaped the body by squeezing the legs and arms together, then painted the feet as shoes. I also added some tissue paper to the feet to build up the shoes.
The socks were also tissue paper and I painted. The lines are done using a 20/0 liner.The technique is to make sure the brush is wet and roll the brush through the paint to get a fine tip. I also like to use extender which is an acrylic product that extends the drying time but also thins like water but with different properties than water.
To give the body depth, I knew I wanted to add stuffing or something. My something was batting used in a jewelry box. I wrapped the stuffing in the middle and then wrapped with white silk ribbon. I applied glue to the ribbon to keep in place. I didn't use a lot of glue, just enough to hold it in several places. I could have tried to match the color of the ribbon to the finished color, but I figured painting the ribbon would hide some of the glue marks and make it look better. (I was right.)

After completely wrapping the torso, legs and shoulders, I painted the body blue.
I then added tissue paper pants. These were painted as well.
Next was a tissue paper jacket/sweater that was also painted. Here's with the black base coat only.

 I think the tissue paper did well cover the ribbon. I wasn't worried to much about the top.

The white tissue paper was to keep me from getting the yellow edging paint on the blue.
Next was to paint details on the jacket. I used my liner and a 3/0 round to paint with. The dots were made either with a double ball stylus or a needle tool. I repainted anything that was too big when creating the dots. Black dots in the egg flower shapes here were added after the red dots.

To finish up the doll, I decided to use a plastic bead for a head and gave her a face. The hair doesn't show in the illustration so I went with curly blonde. The hair is bunka unraveled, glued on and then trimmed.

Doll hat
For her hat, I used a bead  on a toothpick for shape. I applied thin white glue to a piece of tissue paper and applied to the bead. Boy, waiting for that glue to dry was an inconvenience. Meanwhile I also cut a brim from paper. This was a round piece with a smaller round piece cut out of it. 

I glued the brim on to the tissue paper. Then I decided I needed another layer of the tissue paper on top of both. Once dry, I careful removed from the bead. It did get squished up, but I was able to reshape it. To finish it out with color, I just painted it all over one color then adding several similar colors in lines and swirls to try to mimic the straw pattern.

Hobo sack
Of all the things I thought was going to be a severe challenge, this wasn't it. But it was. At least until I applied glue and paint.
I tried first with cotton cloth. No way. I didn't want to try tissue, because I wanted to tie it.
Next I made a square of silk that I applied a line of glue to avoid fraying. This silk was some from my stash in off white. I've had this silk for many years and purchased the smallest amount I could at the store we got it at. I got several colors but for this type of doll any light color is a good choice. A good source is thrift stores. Silk isn't easy to care for so I think it gets donated a fair amount. The key is of course finding a light color. But I digress.
The silk square gave me the best chance of achieving this. But it was applying thin white glue and then later paint that made it able to be pinched and sort of tied into shape. 
Inside the square is a plastic bead that I had to glue to the middle to fiddle with the silk square.
The paint was a just a base coat. I let this all dry before I applied the little details.The stick is just some grapevine that I cut the right size.
Suitcase
The suitcase is two pieces of strip wood cut to size. I sanded all the edges before gluing them together. Then applied paint. To give it depth, I applied a dirty water wash (thinned black paint) and wiped off as I went. The handle is wire I painted after inserting it into the wood. The label/travel ticker is paper that I glued on and painted.

Finished
Overall this was a really fun project. I will say it was more challenging in some areas than I expected, but nothing I couldn't conquer with trial and error. It also feels really good to have completed this. This year hasn't been a year for minis so far. That's ok, because those other things were important and minis can wait.

Card People - Alice in Wonderland project part 5

In part 4 I shared the first card people I made.  I googled images of cards and found a set of fronts that I liked.  Then did same for the backs.

I used MS Word to insert the images.  Then I re-sized them so that the cards were about an inch long.  In hindsight, I might have gone a bit smaller, but rather than waste the ink, I used what I printed.  I did print them on two pages as I did not care to deal with the alignment of two sided printing.  This also made it very easy to deal with the wire arms and legs and allowing them to be sandwiched in between.

Once willing to have stick like 'people', it is easy to just have wires for their arms and legs. It is an easy step to the feet being circles and hands non-existent or even circles as well. The head is another decision altogether.  I have done clay heads before and considered that, but paper heads would fit in with the paper bodies.  

One clever thing I think Lewis Carroll did is the use of the suites.  Spades are the gardeners, Clubs for the guards, Diamonds for the courtiers and then the Hearts are royalty.

My problem came back to heads.  The face cards have a face; the number cards do not. My ultimate decision was to use the face on face cards and add heads to the number cards.  I used the faces from the spades and clubs for the number card heads.  This worked out because I wasn't using all 52 cards, as in these are just extra.  Plus there are two faces per card. I found it interesting that the faces were different not just by J, Q, K but also by suite.

Here is how they are made:
1. 3 inch wire (26 guage black colored copper wire) for each side.  Plus 1/2 inch wire for head.
2. Made a circle for a foot and then bend for an ankle. Bend at the shoulder.
3. I applied glue to the back, laid on the arm/leg wires and a head wire. Then laid on the front and press together.

I should have took this pic without the glue, every time I look at it, I think that the glue is going to dry out.

4. I removed the head wire.  Wasn't trying to glue it in place just yet, but did want the space for it.
5. Used one of the faces cut from a face card,glue to wire and add a covering.  For some this was ribbon, some was bead with the face glued on.
6. Glued the head in place - trimming wire as needed.
Optional - to make the diamond cards have more depth, I added a roll of paper inside before I did step 2 and 3.  The wires for the legs then had to go through the roll.  Also I skipped the head wire since I wasn't adding one.  Some of the trims for the diamond cards was added before the two cards were glued together.

The Gardeners (spades) got paint brushes and buckets
-These were made by cutting a strip of paper, rolling it up and gluing it together.  Then I glued the roll to paper.  After it had a chance to dry, I cut around the roll.  I painted the outside grey and added red inside.  Then I added a handle.  The handle is also paper.  I cut a very very thin strip from the edge. 

The Soldiers (clubs) got clubs
These were made from black paper I punched - 6 circles glued to a wire that I added circles to both ends.
Arms then were bent to hold the clubs in place.

I also added a belt to one of the soldiers I am sharing today.  I made a couple others with more trim added.  Will show them later on.

The Courtiers (diamonds) got fancied up with various trims. Notice they do not have heads added.  

The card people were so much fun to make, especially when I got to play around with adding trims and such.  

The Hearts aren't done yet.  Figured I could share that later.  

1:48 Scale Star Banger's - How I made it

This project came about because of a challenge on Smaller and SmallerAdventures, a yahoo group. It was to use a round box - like a salt box or oatmeal box to create a red, white and blue themed project. The challenge was to do the project and complete it by July 31st. Although, that deadline was extended to Aug. 31st.

In addition to the challenge, we had the opportunity to participate in a swap for it as well. We could do either or both. I decided that with finishing school in June that I would have the time to do both.

To make my project I used an oatmeal box. I have made a project like this in a saltbox already so this was no big deal. Actually it should be easier because I would not be doing the plaster cloth as I did in my Scaredy Cats.

I have these great intentions to plan out everything and go step by step in an organized way, but often my creative muse gets ahead of me and I skip a step. This project was no different.

I knew I wanted to light it and I decided I would light it up using a LED kit from Evan's Designs. I had purchased them months ago to have on hand.

Well as I worked the idea around, I decided I would have the push button on the bottom. I had obtained a dome from a thrift store recently that didn't have a base. I knew I could make a base from foam core. Thought it would be easier to have the button on the bottom so didn't have to lift the dome to turn on the lights. But I discovered after doing this that since I was using foam core, it wasn't sturdy enough to handle this scenario so I had to redo the base.

The first base was foam core bottom, then a builder foam middle. But then I got this idea to add more lights on the top as I figured I have the height in this tall but skinny dome, why not use it. So the new base was all foam core.

The first layer of the base is big enough for the dome to sit on but just enough, no bigger. Then next is a layer that the dome fits around. Next was a base for the box. My box being for oatmeal was open already one end and I decided to invert the box. This allowed me to insert a base into the box at the floor. I initially cut my opening for having a builder foam floor, but turns out that three layers of foam core board equals the layer of builder foam.

Using three layers, I have one layer glued in place as the floor at the same level the builder;s foam would be. This left room to hide/house the battery and its holder. I cut another foam core circle for insetting below the floor and cut out a space for the battery housing. This piece was glued in place to the two layer base. Sections were cut out also for the push button and wires going to and from the button.

I added to the battery layer pieces to contain the wiring but also keep the building from moving around.

The opening for the project was cut of the side and I also pulled out my windows and doors. I have purchased some at shows to have on hand for those projects not designed yet. Comes in handy for things like this.

I decided where I wanted the door and windows. I decided to leave the middle above the door for the label I would create. I then measured to allow reasonable space for these openings both to each other top to bottom and also side to side. Then I cut the openings. I also test fit each component.

I also cut a foam core circle for the second floor. The LED's were added to this circle. These point down to the first floor. They were easy to hide in the foam core, but I added a paper layer to hide the wires. Holes were cut to allow the light to shine down.

To do the second floor lights they are glued to the ceiling paper (a heavier paper).

For both the first and second floor, I created and printed floor papers. The one for the first floor was my design done in Word using drawing objects and different colors and the second floor was using a print found on the Internet.

On the top of the box was the inset - not totally flat or squared top. I had decided that I would use it as a rooftop patio. I was also leaning towards something that reminded me of the used up firecracker so decided to go with a black ground cover here.  I added black railroad blast to the rooftop.

I also had determined that my project needed to have a lighting sculpture on the rooftop that resembled a shooting firework. After some fiddling and considering my available options, I decided to use some tinsel as the hollow portion and sequins as enhancers to the LED's. The LED wires are actually what hold them up. Sturdy wires.

This shows the tinsel.  It comes like this but can be stretched.  I got this package of multiple colors at a mini yard sale, but I believe it was sold as tinsel for 1" christmas decoration.  I have used in 1/4" tree decoration.

The wires for the inside lights come out to the same side. I added a groove in the box for the wires and then used tissue paper to hold in place. The wires were short in one section and so had to add a leader wire to get them to connect all underneath.



The interior for both levels was painted white. Once that was completed I applied the full outer label.  I had created a label using the drawing object function in Word. I use that a lot to layer and repeat things to create stuff. Once I made the row of stars and the different background rows, I grouped them and then copied them to fill up the page. 

I started applying the label by applying glue to the edge next to the opening in the back. I added glue at the window and door openings and also along the top and bottom but not all over. I wanted the label to float over the wires and didn't want any wrinkling either.

To fill in around the second floor, I used a piece of thick card to edge it so didn't have the foam core showing. I had to piece together the label for each of the opening edges. Don't look too close. I could have printed another page but just used up the scraps.

Next I painted the windows. The door was already black and had decided it looked good so that's why I painted the windows black as well. I cut out thin card window frames for the inside and painted them black as well. At this point I realized the issue with making the openings a tight fit for the components. I had painted the openings and that made for too tight an opening. I trimmed and sanded them to allow for the components. Once everything fit, I glued the windows and doors and their inside trim in place.

For the base, I added a rock/stone paper I had on hand around the sides. The section where the dome would rest, I faux painted. When the dome is one, can't tell the difference between my painting and the rock paper.  When I was adding grass to the base, some fell on the edge for the dome and that would have looked good as well, but didn't won't to cover my faux painting or deal with dust if the dome edge wasn't covering the grass.

The steps to the first floor were made from foam core pieces.  I added the rock paper to cover the edges and top.

My orginal plan was to have a scaffolding in the front for Sparky to work on the sign, but after a detail discussion with my husband who does construction work, I decided to go with a ladder instead.

The ladder on the front was made from a plastic balcony my dad gave me.  I used my dremel tool and a cut off wheel disc to remove the platform and then painted the railing white to become the ladder.  There is also a ladder to the side to reach the roof top that is a grandtline product, I think.  Didn't have enough of it on hand to use for both places.

The text label was done in Publisher but I could have done it in Word.  I made it so the addition of the word Store wouldn't cover any other text.  Also since this is a re-purposed firework, the addition of the S on top of the label seemed fitting.  The S was cut very careful from wood and then painted.  The ' is painted on to the label.

To make my Boomers I used scupley.  I rolled them and cut to length.  I used the end of a paint brush to round the ends.  I also inserted the wire to make holes for the legs and arms, but didn't bake them with the wire.  The wire I used ended up not being the same size as the black wire so I had to drill out the holes to allow them to be inserted.  All the leg wires were pre-bent, but then after I glued them in some had to be re-bent.  That caused some breakage, but glued back ok.  The arms were bent after inserted into the body.  The thicker wire was 20 gauge and the thinner wire was 26 gauge.  The thinner being easier to work with.

Sparkle and Popper were made using the thinner wire.

Heads were made of scuply.  I added the bead eyes and nose before firing.  Some have mouths and some don't.  Hair made of either embroidery floss or unraveled bunka.  Their hard hats were goggle eyes.  I painted their bodies.

The swaps - although I participated in the red/white/blue firecracker theme swap, my swaps have not arrived.  I made a round BBQ grill as my swap.  I should make one for myself since I don't have one at this point.
The swaps I used other than the geraniums from Pam Junk were from previous swap events.

I had decided early on that this was going to be a firework store.  But I didn't relish the idea of making tiny fireworks.  I am very pleased that Banger explained they wouldn't be selling fireworks but works for them.  So that worked out very well for me to make fuses and wrappers - embroidery thread and scrapbook paper rolled up.

The shelves in the store were made from some plastic shelves that my dad gave me.  I used my dremel tool to cut them down.  They both were two sided and double width.  Also the counter was cut down as well. 

 

The only thing I ordered specifically for this project was the extra led lights.  All of this I had on hand for a some day project.  I highly recommend that if you want to create to purchase things when you see them.  Does not mean to purchase a lot, just a bit here and there and collect them. 

To see the completed project with more photos- check my earlier blog post here