Week 50

This week, I went for more a refurbishment than a total creation. I took one of Bob's old xbox controllers, and I modified it for a steampunk appeal.



Steampunk inspired xbox360 controller



I painted it with permanamel paint. The base color is gold mixed with brown for a bronzey color and the buttons are gold mixed with amber for a more brassy color. I also used an embossed two-tone leather/pleather, and some 20gauge copper wire coils.They're actually the same links I use in jewelry but on a much tinier/more delicate scale. I used the hook part of each link as a clamp to slide it onto the leather and crimp it on. It is isn't perfect, but overall I'm pretty proud of it.

I think it's pretty cool how well the new modded controller fits in with some of Bob's other stuff:



Controller next to Bob's favorite watch and sunglasses



For reference, these are what Bob's other controllers look like. They come white, and some people (like Bob) buy "skins"/decals to add a little more personality to them.



regular xbox controllers with decals

Pretty big difference, huh?

Week 49

I'm not positive, but i kind of think the stone is a sapphire. At first glance it looks black, but if you hold it up to the light its a deep deep blue like my promise ring.

I'm really not happy with my settings so i need to come up with a better method- right now, i tend to melt several of the pins when i'm putting the piece together and i make them too long. I'll probably redo these at some point. Must.Make.Cleaner.Prongs.

Week 48

This week was a dream catcher. I started 2 other projects, but they aren't working as well as I had hoped. I used to make metal dreamcatchers all the time, but haven't in years...

It's about 3" round. I'm thinking about turning it into a windchime, a hairpiece, or a belt. What do you think it should be?

One of the projects that isn't going so well is to dreamcatcher a glass, but it keeps bunching up- i might google crocheting bottles etc to figure it out. Maybe I'll macrame (sp?) one, that I know how to do :)

Weeks 46 & 47

You may have noticed that I didn't make anything/post last week...because I was on VACATION!!! (woot woot!!!)- you can read a little ditty about my vacation with a few pretty pictures in the archives on the right side of the screen.

I decided to do a little extra this week to make up for last week and keep The Xarata Project on schedule.

First, a photo of Honey's final collar- which I finished the day before we left for vacation (so... January 22nd)


She didn't want to sit still for me to take a picture, so pretty much all of them ended up blurry...



Also, some new hair flowers, because there's nothing like a tropical island to get you in the mood for flowers :)



Fall leaves, lily hairpins, a sunflower, peruvian lillies




Calla lily and an orchid
I'm not really sure how I feel about this orchid, it's a little too fake looking for me and we know i prefer for most of my hair flowers to look like the real deal- I get asked all the time if the flowers in my hair are real and I'd hate for them to be so blatantly fake.




I've had these (expensive) silk calla lillies for at least 6 months, they're really difficult to get onto a clip and it's still not perfect, but I think they'd make for really cute wedding hair (of course most weddings just use real flowers, but this way it doesn't wilt. lol)




I think leaves or fun, and there is probably a very narrow target group that would love this hair clip. I bobby-pinned these leaves into my hair and clothes for my wood nymph halloween costume last year and it would have been a million times easier if they had been on clips like this one. I'm just kooky enough to wear this not for halloween though :)




Peruvian lillies, deep from my stash of silk flowers i used to bobby-pin into my hair
Again, a little too fake-looking for my tastes anymore.




I've been wanting to make this sunflower since September, but I ran out of hairclips for making hairflowers and then i did the glass project and then I felt like nobody wanted to see more hairflowers- but darn it, I wanted to do more hairflowers. lol




These are my first set of permanently attached hairpins and I'm pretty happy with them. This particular set of lillies I like to stick into a french-braided crown hairstyle.




Too bad i don't really have any tropical silk flowers. I don't think I've ever seen silk hibiscus or plumeria flowers. I may have seen birds of paradise but i think they'd be kind of awkward... I have orchids...


I also made a sort of belt/mock cincher out of some of that fabric i originally chose for the coat and then didn't have enough of. I think it adds a cute pop of color to the Little Black Dress.

I love the paisley henna pattern and the black on wine color combo. Really, a belt like this probably needs interfacing, but I don't have any so c'est la vie.

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Also, I wanted to share a belated xmas present that I received right before I went on vacation- a photo stage!!! I don't have any pictures of it because I accidentally left it at my mom's house and have not gone to retrieve it yet. Basically, a photo stage works the same way that those umbrella things in photo studios work but on a smaller scale- they diffuse the light and shadows to keep everything looking professional. Basically, it does this:



Candle holder that I made in college for a wire armiture assignment- my professor photographed it on a slightly larger photo stage than the one I received for jewelry, but the effect should be the same. Cool, huh? In college, a lot of art prof.s made temporary ones out of poster board and foam core board- they'd be set up for a single day of photo-taking and then stowed away- mine is more permanent- less assembly required.



VACATION!!!

You may have noticed that I didn't do a project last week- now, one could argue that i was being lazy or uninspired or something along those lines...BUT I prefer simply to say that I was on vacation from my regular life and leave it at that. I actually did extra projects this week to keep the Xarata Project in a proper timeline for its anniversary in March, but this post is about VACATION!!!

Bob and I spent a week in Punta Cana in the Dominican Republic- Sunshine, sand, blue water and blue sky as far as the eye could see- with a cocktail in one hand and a book in the other. It was lovely.

One of the things I've come to really love about Punta Cana is that the all-inclusives keep photographers on staff and you can get some really lovely photos. The permanent photo on the blog is from our first trip to Punta Cana. Look at that sunkissed skin and warm crystal water- jealous? :)

*This trip was Bob's X-Mas gift to me. It was wonderful.