Don’t Spill the Coffee!

So in a couple of conversations with Firstborn Son about my work, he has urged me to do some blog posts which describe the process of creating a doll. At first I resisted because I am still pretty new to this field, and I do a LOT of experimenting. And some of my experiments make me feel a little bit foolish afterward because in hindsight, well DUH, obviously THAT was never gonna work! And why would I want to put all my vulnerability out there in the world for everyone to see and laugh at? But Firstborn Son says no, really, I should try it. People will find it interesting, he says. No one is going to judge you. And Firstborn Son is a pretty savvy guy.

So okay. Even though I feel a little bit like I’m standing up here in my underwear, I’m going to share some of my recent experiments. Let me know what you think!

Here’s what happened: after I finished Contemplation I realized I wanted to do some more contemporary figures. I thought it would be fun to depict some of the sort of people you might see in a coffee shop. I sculpted a couple of heads (more on those later).

Once I got the heads done, I was ready to move on to the hands. But in order to do the hands, I need to know how they’re going to be posed and what, if anything, they’ll be holding. Well, obviously, they are going to need some coffee.

So I made a coffee cup. It was pretty easy. After a little experimentation, I had the right shapes. The cup is made from a sheet of Bristol board and the cardboard sleeve from a pizza box.

I glued the sides of the cup together (I didn’t take a picture, but you can probably figure out how that worked!), then put glue on the tabs for the bottom.

I inserted the bottom:

And pushed it around and fiddled with it until I had it where I wanted it, let the glue dry, and — voila! — a paper coffee cup!

As I said, that was pretty easy.

But then I had to figure out how to make a lid. And that was the hard part. Coffee cup lids are really complicated!

I puzzled over it for a while, and then headed out to A.C.Moore for some inspiration. (I wonder what they think of me when I go into a craft store and then just wander s-l-o-w-l-y up and down the aisles like a zombie!) Anyway, I was pretty pleased when I found these little jars of paint that had lids that were almost exactly the right size for my coffee cup. They were really cheap, too — something like 99 cents for five of them.

I cut the lid off one of the jars and trimmed off all the little protrusions that were sticking out of it, made a hole with a needle I had heated in a candle flame, put a coat of white paint on it, and it was perfect!

There was just one teeny, tiny little problem.

It didn’t look a thing like a real coffee cup lid. And that just wasn’t going to do.

So next I tried making one out of polymer clay. . .

It sucked.

Maybe if I made it a little bit simpler . . .

Nope. Still sucks.

So this time I went to Michaels for inspiration, and wandered s-l-o-w-l-y up and down the aisles. I came home with a whole bag full of stuff and did some more experimenting. And here’s what I ended up with:

Not perfect, but definitely the best one yet. Wanna know how I did it? Okay, I’ll tell you. In fact, I’ll write a whole tutorial for you!

Ahem. My first tutorial on art doll and miniature making. (Since this is now a tutorial, I’m obliged to use the imperative case.) Pay attention!

———  COFFEE CUP LID TUTORIAL ———–

 You need two round templates. One needs to be exactly the same diameter as the rim of your cup, and the other slightly smaller. It’s easiest if you can find templates that have an edge, as you will see. In my case, the little paint jar from my first experiment was perfect for the larger template. I ran a Sharpie around the edge:

And made a print of it on a piece of Bristol board:

If you can’t find something with an edge, you can use a button or a coin or whatever you can find, and just trace around the outside of it.

Cut that circle out just outside the lines. You want it to be slightly larger than the rim of your coffee cup.

Now you’re going to use the same template to cut a circle out of a piece of craft foam. Again, having that edge made it easier, because I could use it to impress the circle into the foam:

But again, you could trace around the outside. This time cut right on the line.

Now center the smaller template inside the foam circle and either impress it or trace around it. I used a pastry nozzle for my second template.

Make two of these:

And use a sharp craft knife to cut them as in the photo below. (I know, they’re a little rough. I could spend the next two hours trying to make perfect ones, or I could go ahead and write this tutorial. You get the idea):

Glue the one with the D-shaped cutout to the Bristol circle, and glue the ring on top of that. Then trim away most of the excess of the bottom circle, leaving just the tiniest little lip:

Now measure the height of the two foam pieces, and cut a strip of paper that size. Mine was just over 1/8″.

Glue the paper around the edge of the foam pieces to disguise the seam and make everything look nice and smooth:

You might want to put some weight in the bottom of your coffee cup to give it some stability. I squirted a little bit of hot glue in mine. Then I hot-glued the lid onto the cup.

And it was done! It’s not perfect — the lip on the bottom is simpler than the one on a real lid, and I haven’t figured out how to make the hole in the top. But the overall impression is pretty good, I think.

Whew! Look at that — I survived standing up in front of everyone in my underwear! Maybe I’ll do this again!

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A Tutorial!

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Tee shirt blanket, TJ

Hello Everyone! I’ve decided to try something new for this post. I just finished making a fleece blanket for Darling Daughter to take with her when she leaves (this weekend! eep!) for her freshman year of college. The tee shirts from her high school plays have special meaning to her, but she wasn’t really interested in wearing them any more. She asked me to help her turn them into a tee shirt quilt. The problem is, I’m not a quilter, and given my obsessive tendencies high standards I knew I was going to end up really, really REALLY frustrated if I tried to turn myself into one a week before I had to have the project done. So this turned out to be more of a tee shirt blanket. Since my online research didn’t turn up anything quite like this, I thought I would share my process with you. So here goes — my first tutorial!

STEP 1: FIGURE OUT HOW BIG THE BLANKET IS GOING TO BE. I started out thinking I would cut each tee shirt image to the same size and space them evenly. So let’s see (mutter mutter) . . .

hPhoto credit: Clay Shonkwiler. https://www.flickr.com/photos/shonk/418180402//418180402/

. . . six shirts . . . front and back of each . . . the image on this one is 8″ x 12″, so multiply that by 12 . . . okay . . . but wait, this one is 9″ x 14″, so it’s going to have to be bigger. . . I guess we have to figure out which image is the biggest and cut them all that size . . . (wow — Grease had a HUGE cast and crew!) . . . okay, so 18″ x 14″, multiply that by 12, plus 2″ in between the blocks . . . hmmm . . . plus the borders . . .Aaaaaand it looks like this blanket is going to be big enough to cover a small SUV.

Ummmmm . . . maybe another approach is warranted.

What I ended up doing was cutting out each image according to its own size. Each one was different. Then I played around with arrangements until I had something pleasing.

I measured the whole assemblage, adding another 12″ or so for the borders, to get a general idea of how much fleece I would need. I ended up using 2 yards.

STEP 2: STABILIZE THE IMAGES WITH FUSIBLE INTERFACING. This will stabilize the tee shirt knit so it doesn’t get all pulled out of shape while you work on it. You don’t need anything fancy here — just the cheap Pellon stuff. Now, I don’t use fusibles very often, but when I do, I have found that regardless of whether I cut the fusible and the fabric separately or at the same time, they never seem to come out quite the same. Something always shifts and the two pieces almost-but-not-exactly line up. So here is how I’ve learned to do it instead:

Cut the interfacing a little bit larger than the image (that’s my printed ironing board cover showing through the interfacing at the top of the photo — next time I’ll cover it with something solid so the picture isn’t so confusing!)

Now “baste” the interfacing to the fabric by pressing a hot iron in the center of the fabric and  working your way out toward the edges. Pick up (don’t slide) the iron each time you move it. Don’t go the whole way to the edges. Just get pretty close. Oh, and be sure to use a pressing cloth — the iron can melt the tee shirt image if you put it directly on it. Now cut off the excess interfacing right along the edges of the fabric:

See? Now they line up perfectly! Finish fusing the interfacing:

Check for bubbles on the back side where it didn’t fuse properly:

No worries — just iron it again from the back (using your pressing cloth of course — that stuff will make an unholy mess on your iron if you don’t!)

STEP 3: FINISH THE EDGES OF THE IMAGES. You’re going to turn the edges under by about 1/4″ and stitch them in place. But first, cut a little wedge off each corner. (This will make a miter on the back when you turn the edges under) :

Don’t cut off too much — it should look about like this:

Don’t bother trying to press the edges under. Just turn them with your fingers as you go:

When you come to a corner, lower the needle into the fabric, raise the presser foot:

And turn the piece so you can do the next side:

Manipulating the fabric at the corners can be pretty fiddly. I use a chopstick to help get everything lined up and hold it in place while I put in the first few stitches:

STEP 4: PLACE THE IMAGES ON THE FLEECE. Lay everything out flat (You’ll probably have to do it on the floor unless your blanket is really small or your sewing table is really big).

Get everything exactly where you want it, then turn each image partway back and temporarily hold it in place with spray adhesive:

Don’t use too much — just a light mist in the middle of the piece should be fine. All you are doing is keeping the image from moving until you can stitch it. Now hand baste each piece:

Yeah, I know — you probably hate hand-basting, but believe me, pins are NOT going to stay in place when you get this thing on the sewing machine and start manipulating it. (Ask me how I know!) Go ahead and use your fastest, ugliest, longest running stitches. It won’t take as long as you think it will.

You know the next step, right?

Yep. Put it on the machine and stitch it. I usually lengthen my stitches a little bit when I work with fleece.

STEP 5: FINISH THE EDGES. There are a number of ways to finish the edges of a fleece blanket. I’m always overdoing things, so instead of just turning the edges under or cutting a simple fringe, I naturally chose to do a so-called “braided” edge (which is really more of a chain-stitched edge). Here’s how I did it:

Cut off the selvages. Mark a piece of masking tape at 3/4″ intervals and stick it on the fleece 2″ from the edge. The masking tape doesn’t have the run the whole length of the blanket. I used a piece that was somewhere in the neighborhood of 8″ long. Cut fringes up to the marks on the tape. (I didn’t photograph this part, but I have faith that you can figure it out!) When you get to your last mark, just move the tape over and keep going. When you’ve moved it so many times that all the sticky is gone from the back of the tape, make another one.

When you have fringed all around the blanket, cut a little slit near the end of each piece:

So it looks like this:

Bend a paper clip into a little loop. Stick the loop through the slit in a piece of fringe (it doesn’t matter where on the blanket you start):

Now grab the end of the next piece of fringe with the loop:

And pull it back through the slit in the first piece of fringe:

Now stick the loop through the slit in the piece you have just pulled through, and grab the end of the next piece. Then do the same thing to the next piece. Keep doing this — you are chain-stitching the pieces of fringe together:

Go the whole way around the blanket. When you get to the corners you can cut off a few of the fringes to keep it from getting bulky. When you get back to where you started, cut the last fringe open and stick it through the first one:

Then hand-stitch it closed again.

Voila!

Now Darling Daughter can take all her theatre friends to college with her!

(But TJ would really prefer that she not go away at all!)