Mod Podge Shoes

Hi Everyone!

It's been a long time since I've posted in my Fuzzington blog.  That's because I've been busy being a new mom, and blogging about that.  I have taken a bit of a hiatus from pipe cleaner animals and sometimes I'm even too busy to craft!

To satisfy my crafting hunger a little, I've been surfing Pinterest a lot, especially while I'm nursing.  My little Audrey nurses about 8 times a day, and that's 8 times a day that I get to pin stuff on my boards.

However, yesterday, I found a rare window of time to do a DIY project that I've had on my list for a few weeks now.  Mod Podging an old pair of shoes! I first saw this idea on Pinterest at Lovemeagan.com.  I absolutely loved the houndstooth pattern! From her blog:

I also saw another version of how to do this with some old flats on Make it and Love It.  She did a reall cute job with hers as well:

So I decided to do a cross of the two and take an old pair of flats that I had and convert them to a houndstooth pattern too.  I wish I had taken before and after pictures, but I totally forgot.  What I started with were completely white shoes (so try to imagine).  I found the same houndstooth cloth at Joanns as the one in Meagan's tutorial.  Here is what I ended up with:

I love them! They're good as new! And I can't wait to wear them!! :)

My San Diego County Fair Entry - Old School Video Game Cross Stitch

Every year I try to enter something in the Competitive Exhibits at the San Diego County Fair.  In the past, I've entered the Photography competition and the general arts and crafts competition (with my little Fuzziingtons).  Generally my entries are very amateurish compared to the hardcore entrants (every year there are people that DOMINATE different categories) and I never expect to win, but it gives me an excuse to do something crafty, PLUS I get a free ticket to the fair out of it!

This year, I decided to try something new and enter the Needlepoint/Cross Stitch competition.  It gave me a new craft to try and learn.  I'm pretty new to cross-stitching, and in retrospect I had NO IDEA how long it would actually take me to complete my submission.  I have never worked so hard on something that ended up looking so simple.  I've estimated that I have spent at least 60 hours and made more than 10,000 stitches in this project. But in the end, I was pretty happy with how things turned out, all things considered.

I present to you, my Cross Stitch sampler entry for the San Diego County Fair 2011 Needlepoint and Sewing competitive exhibit!

This cross-stitch sampler is a tribute to the old school Atari video games that I played as a kid.  The three that are featured here are Pac-Man, Centipede, and Space Invaders.  I played these games endlessly on my Atari 5200 game system, and had so much fun with them.  Video games have since become such an elaborate and sophisticated experience-- sometimes I just yearn for the simplicity of an 8-bit video game with a joystick and one button! These games may seem old school, they never go out of style.

When I turned my entry in, the older ladies volunteering at the Fair gave my project an odd look.  That's right ladies, this isn't a traditional sampler with pretty flowers, animals, houses, and alphabets.  It's not traditional by any means.  If the judges' reactions to my piece is anything remotely close to the reactions of the ladies that took in my entry, then chances are I have zero chance of winning anything.  BUT, I know that some child of the 80's will stumble upon this during the fair, as they hang out in the Home and Hobby exhibit to enjoy the air conditioning in the exhibit hall. And when they see this they'll give it an approving nod in agreement, and that's all I'm really looking to get out of this. :)

Another Treasury! - "Not Weird.... Gifted"

My mother always told me that I'm "not weird, but gifted," and this fact has been confirmed by this Etsy treasury that maybeads created, which includes Henry the dinosaur.

Maybeads is a gifted glass artist, and she makes the sweetest handmade glass beads that you ever did see! Click here to check out her shop! I recently bought these adorable turtles from her:

So the next time you see my pipe cleaner animals, just remember that they're not weird, but gifted!! :)

Benson - The Morkie

Here is the first feature of NightLady's custom order: Benson the Morkie.

I have never heard of a "Morkie" until now. For those of you who are unfamiliar as well, a Morkie is a mix between a Yorkie and an Maltese, and look at the super cute result!!

Benson's nickname is "Hightower" because he's a little taller than his parents, so I made him taller as well! Look at those long legs! :)

Custom Order - A Bundle of Love!!

I just shipped one of my biggest orders ever from Nightlady on Etsy! Check out her shop here. She sells the loveliest flower pins and brooches, like this one:

So pretty, right?

Well, Nightlady really surprised me a month ago for an order for 12 Fuzzies!!! WOW! Five items were already in my shop, but the rest of them were custom orders!! Three dogs belonging to her, three dogs belonging to her parents, and one raccoon. The ones in the shop she was going to use as prizes for her students.

I certainly had my work cut out for me, but after a couple weeks of bending a twisting, I eventually finished! Here is the entire gang:

I'll be posting more detailed pictures in the upcoming days, so stay tuned!

Custom Pipe Cleaner Pup: Val

My best friend's (Luisa's) 31st birthday was yesterday, and as a present to her, I made her a custom Fuzzy of her adorable Pomeranian, Val. I believe Val is short for "Valentine" because she was a gift to my friend from her husband for Valentine's Day. Here is Val (the only recent picture I could find of her on Facebook--- I have no idea why she has a cone on):

And here are a few from when she was a pup:

HERE is Val, FUZZIFIED!!

Turned out Val was pretty hard to fuzzify. I don't know if it's because she's so darn cute, or if I had just put too much pressure on myself to make Fuzzy Val "perfect" for Luisa. Either way, I think Luisa liked it.

My New Squidoo Lenses

OK, so I have created TWO Squidoo lenses to see what this is all about! Check them out and let me know what you think!!

Here's one for Fuzzington. I think I'm going to need to update it with more pertinent information:
http://www.squidoo.com/fuzzington

This one is a running list of why I love Swap-bot:
http://www.squidoo.com/10-reasons-to-love-swap-bot

We'll see if we get any royalties, just cents even!! :)

New Mini-Monsters and Sci-Fi Items in the Shop!!

Halloween is not that far away, and there are now some cute new items to get you in the mood!! I don't make nearly as many monsters (cute ones, of course) and sci-fi creatures as I should, so here is the start!! Hope you all like them!

Mini-Mummy:

Vampire Bunny:

Love Robot:




And, back by popular demand, Tarantula Ring:

More to come in the upcoming weeks! It'll be SPOOK-tacular! HAHAH!

Squidoo Lens

So I was looking around in the Etsy Forums this morning, I and I stumbled across a post that talked about "Squidoo Lens." I had never heard of this before, so I clicked on the link and found a new promotion tool before that I am just DYING to try!! Here is the link to the tutorial http://www.squidoo.com/how-to-use-the-etsy-module#module106749681

The intro of the tutorial says this:

A lot of people with shops on Etsy complain about lack of traffic to their stores. There is the mis-conception that by opening a store one is guaranteed sales. That is not how things happen. Most of the people with an Etsy shop are looking for quick, easy, and cheap answers to this problem.

While many people know about Face Book and Twitter and how they work, few on Etsy seemed to have heard about Squidoo. And Squidoo is the perfect answer. On Squidoo one can make a web page that can be as simple or complex as one wishes. And it is free.

Squidoo itself is a complex entity with many different parts to explore. But, starting at the beginning...

What is Squidoo? Squidoo is a web site, set up for sharing information. On it one can build a web page, called a lens, using a variety of different modules. And with these web pages one can gather views and direct traffic.

Has anyone tried this? I'll be putting mine together today. Anyone with some tips on this, please let me know!!!

Cool New Widget for Your Etsy Shop!

I just added the Craftcult Etsy Widget to my blog (see top right). You can choose from a bunch of different styles and animations. It's pretty slick. Try it for yourself, and see how cool it is! You can also get one of your own at http://www.craftcult.com/shop_widget.php?userid=

Enjoy!!

IT'S FUSILLI RICK!

Okay-- so this isn't made out of pipe cleaners... BUT--

My financial advisors, Rick Nerad and Steve Deppe, are AWESOME! I love these guys because they're personable, fun, and really care about my financial well-being. My hubby and I have been with these guys for almost 5 years, and we always have the best time when we meet with them. Shameless plug: If anyone reading this is looking for some top-notch "wealth management," feel free to contact them: http://nd-wm.com/

ANYWAY, it turns out Rick is a huge Seinfeld fan, and during one of our meetings last year, he did the best impersonation of Jerry Seinfeld and showed us the "Fusilli Jerry" episode. For those of you who need to be clued in like I did, here's a link to the video clip: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vdiROsB-yJI

Here's a picture of Fusilli Jerry that I found on the Internet:

Since then, I've been meaning to make a "Fusilli Rick." I purchased a bag of fusilli late last year to make Fusilli Rick as a Christmas present, but ran out of time, and that bag of fusilli has been sitting in my crafts drawer for over 6 months. I finally was struck with inspiration this weekend... With a bag of pasta and LOTS of glue, I present to you:

FUSILLI RICK!!!

I was really happy with how it turned out. I tried to stay true to the spirit of the original one. I even used the blue base!! This little statue shows Rick waving HI (because he is a really friendly guy) and reaching for our file.

I spelled out "Fusilli Rick" with alphabet pasta.

The little file holder also doubles as a business card holder!!

Here are some pics from the "Making of Fusilli Rick:"

My hubby will be delivering this little guy to Rick today. Unfortunately, I won't be there to see his expression when he receives it...

Next on my list, "Spaghetti Steve!"

Custom Pipe Cleaner Pups: Chippy and Dale the Maltese Twins, and Daisy the Yorkie!

In my last blog entry, I showed a picture of three dogs that my buddy Jarrod sent to me to Fuzzify for his Mom's birthday. Chippy, a 10 lb Maltese; Dale, a 6 lb Maltese; and Daisy, a 4 lb Yorkie, the smallest of them all!!

These adorable little pups are so petite as it was, I could hardly see how I could make them any smaller with pipe cleaners! Hahahah!!

Somehow I managed to make some time in my insane workweek and make these little guys! Here they are!

CHIPPY - 2 inches


DALE - 1.75 inches


DAISY - 1.5 inches


THE GANG!

I tried to make them proportional in size based on their weights. Now all I need to do is put bows on these little ones and wrap them up for Jarrod's mom. I hope she likes them!!! Happy Birthday, Jarrod's Mom!! :)

New Custom Order!!!

What will I be doing this weekend besides WORK (which I have a ton of)? Well during my breaks (in case you're reading this JJL), I'll be working on this week's custom order: 3 little fluffy dogs from my buddy Jarrod. Here are the pics that he sent me... they are SOOOOOOO ADORABLE!!!

The two Malteses remind me of our little Maggie.

The fuzzified versions of them will be a birthday gift for his mom. I will post pics of them as soon as they're done!!

New Fuzzy Friends in the Store! Fifi and Harley!

Introducing some new fuzzy friends!

Fifi, the Pink Terrier! She's pink and bubbly, and looks like cotton candy!

Harley, the Skinny Doxie.
All he's got is this bone! Take him home and feed him a ham sandwich!

Come check them out in the shop!