The dangers of sewing while tired....

So I missed writing a blog post yesterday because I got home yesterday from work due to how tired I was... I pretty much just faceplanted and fell asleep...

However my observation from yesterday and today (so far) is that if you try to sew when too tired or otherwise not really paying attention properly one tends to (especially in my case) stab onself with the needle more often than usual as well as deeper... So far no jabs but that's also because I'm taking more breaks so I don't jab myself and bleed on my white fake fur or white fake felt.... :)

Work

What I have learnt today: I already knew that relationships are hard work but sometimes I just want to Dinozzo slap my partner up that bloody back off the head... :p

What is cool?

What I learnt today: Everyone has a different idea of cool.

Patience is not MY virtue

What I have learnt today: I've never been great at the whole Yoda thing or being patient with people who are just too stupid to shut up long enough to listen so they know whats happening or those that don't use their brain but when I'm annoyed or starting to get fidgety because I'm sick of people to do something they said they would at a certain time and they aren't and I have someone get in my face and tell me that "patience is a virtue" it just serves to annoy me even more...

So next time my response will be, depending on how severely I'm annoyed, along the lines of "that's not but it's not MY damn virtue"!!!

History Geek

What I have learnt today: Not everyone is into history as much as me.

Trying to help my partner's niece with her Society and English assignment on the middle ages and I commented off hand that it seemed like a cool assignment and she said how it was boring and that she didn't like homework. In high school I loved English and history assignments and homework. Perhaps I'm just a freak.....

The Pursuit of Art

What I have learnt today: In the pursuit of one's art, whatever art form that might be, there is most certainly some form of creativity needed and (at least in my case) some degree of insanity present at least half the time....

This is most certainly true for me because I'm insane all the time and because it tends to help fuel the creativity because I have really weird thoughts running through my head all the time...

Pinterest obsession

What I have learnt today: I pin WAY TOO MUCH!!! :)

I absolutely ADORE pinterest for the fact that it is so easy to create a pin board for anything but because it is so easy to add pins to whatever board I have near on (or over) 200 boards and upwards of 29,000 pins.... So cleaning up my boards tends to take a few days...

The Muses

What I learnt today: The Muses tend to give one inspiration at possibly the worst times ever... Like when I'm at work or just don't happen to have pen or paper on me...

They struck this morning with a great story idea while I was at work so I scrawled down some messy notes to help my recall later and jog the creativity again.

Princess Mononoke (San) Cos-play PART 2

The Cloak

I have been agonising this last week about cutting into my fake fur and so I have been procrastinating and making excuses for not having just cut into it already.... But I have my pattern pieces for the pelt and hood already cut out so it's time to start... 

I'm really apprehensive because I don't want to screw iy up and waste my fabric as it was so hard for mom and I to find to start with. 

The Mask and Ears

So I followed the instructions of mixing, flour de-lumping and cooking but my glue still didn't look quite right so I Googled this fine art and was reassured... 

http://www.wikihow.com/Make-Glue

The Earrings

I haven't done anything on these yet as I haven't yet made my mask.

The Makeup

This is my make up test number 1. The first picture is with the face paint crayons. 

These actually felt really great on my skin and felt almost like drawing on your skin with eye liner or  lipstick... 

Picture number 2 is with the jar of face paint and the face paint brushes.

Either way I'm realising not only am I sucky at free hand makeup and symmetrical free hand make up but also lining up where on the face it's supposed to be. 

The Fang Necklace

The 5 oddly shaped sausages at the top left of the picture on the baking paper are my, as naturally as I could, formed fangs for the necklace. Now to just impatiently wait for them to dry while I start writing my blog entry and start making my mask and ears. 

Ashitaka's Crystal Dagger Pendant

I'm still waiting on my arrow to arrive off the medieval shop on eBay... I bought it on the March 4th and they say the post time is about 7 days so it should in fact be arriving in the the post today or tomorrow!!!! :) I'm so excited to see it and start working on making the arrowhead into my crystal dagger pendant!

Which reminds me that I still need to make or buy some red cord....

The Apron Top

My op shop top from the back... (Before)

My op shop top from the front... (Before)

The Top and skirt combo

I'm quite happy with my op shop skirt so I will definitely be wearing it as part of the costume... Just trying to decide whether to wear one of my black spaghetti strap singlets or a black tank top.... 

Underneath I'm thinking either my sports bra (providing it doesn't stick out through the sides of my costume) or a racer back sports bra are going to be the most comfortable bras for this and yet still give me enough support... Anyone know of cos-play specific bras?? :)

The Boots

I'm also really happy with my op shopped uggs... They are so warm and cosy and the colours aren't too far off... I do need to create a wrap for them to go around the ankle and then I'll wrap and tie twine over the top as there is decorative lace up parts at the back of the ankle that are very commercial and so very not San... 

The Dagger

This is my start on the dagger... I am using air drying clay for this one and just underneath you can see the dagger hilt (the sausage) and the rough diamond is the cross piece on the hilt. I thought that clay and roughly shaped pieces would fit the cos-play a little better than perfect formed and smooth because of the fact that San was raised by Moro and the other wolves. 

Because it is made of air drying clay though I am worried about it falling apart as I don't have any wire in it so I will be making a dagger from cardboard and paper mache as well. You know... Just in case... 

The Headbands and Arm Bands
 Haven't started on these yet...

High School Never Ends

What I have learnt today: In the awesome words of Bowling for Soup in their song of the same name- High School NEVER Ends... It's just the same petty people doing the same petty crap and thinking they're all that while they pick on others.... Oh how I don't miss that!!!

Procrastination and Pinterest

What I have learnt today: I spend WAY too much time on Pinterest. (http://www.pinterest.com/ocrafty1da/)

Which leads me to the procrastination part of this post... I was supposed to be posting pictures of my projects on my blog here from my "My Creations" pin board on Pinterest... Some how that has evolved into my cleaning up my boards and reorganising them a little...

Princess Mononoke (San) Cos-play PART 1

On the 28th of March 2014 I will be going to my first cos-play event ever so I'm really excited and I wanted to show my eager geekery by producing a cos-play and therefor taking me first (baby) steps into this the culture.

Since studying Japanese in year 7/8 of my first high school I have loved absolutely everything about Japan from the culture to the food, geisha, harajuku girls, the Lolita goth subculture, drifting, Tokyo and my favorite part the Japanese anime scene and Studio Ghibli. I especially like Mononoke Heim or Princess Mononoke with the tale of conservation and humans realising the detrimental effect they are having on the world around them and knowing they have to change if they want something to live for and somewhere to live.

So naturally I decided I wanted to do a cos-play of San for my first foray into the world of cos-play and therefor I'm planning (and have already started) to make my San costume for Comic-con.

The Character

(Picture from this link and found via a Google search- http://www.nomarket.org/princess-mononoke-desire-marry-prince/)

(Picture from this link and found via a Google search- http://animatedfilmreviews.filminspector.com/2013/01/princessmononoke.html)

(Picture from this link and found via a Google search-http://geektyrant.com/news/2013/10/17/princess-mononoke-best-of-cosplay-collection)
This is the back of someone's fantastic San!!! I want mine to look at least half as damn good!!!


(Picture from this link and found via a Google search- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Princess_Mononoke)


(Picture from this link and found via a Google search- http://sakimichan.deviantart.com/art/Princess-Mononoke-Prints-for-sale-275280478)
Just a really gorgeous image of her that I adore!!!

The Cloak

I'm quite OCD with costuming and reproducing things in that something which may not bug someone else will easily bug the crap out of me- especially when it's something I've made and ESPECIALLY when I know it's not quite right.

So that having been said so far my biggest struggle the last three weeks has been scouring the net and ringing textile stores to try and find white, long piled fake fur without ribs! (So many places had white fake fur with ribs, or fake fur with a long pile and no ribbing but it wasn't just straight white)
My WONDERFUL mom ended up finding and buying my fur for my costume so I could stop freaking out and obsessing over it. Of which my partner was very grateful and which reminds me- I still owe mom $60 ish for my fake fur.

Now I have my fur and I have drawn up my pattern pieces for my wolf pelt cloak ready to pin and cut.

The Mask and Ears

http://www.instructables.com/id/Princess-Mononoke-Costume/?ALLSTEPS

This is my personal favorite tutorial and in particular for how she made her mask and ears. I plan on following her tutorial for making my mask.

The Earrings

http://www.instructables.com/id/Princess-Mononoke-Costume/?ALLSTEPS

In STEP 4: Mask Part 2 - Details (step 2 of this part) this chick says when she cut out the eye and mouth holes of her dry mask she kept them to create San's earrings and the attachment on San's headband.

The Make-up

I have bought some new face painting brushes, a little pot of red face paint and a pack of face painting crayons to test out which method is best for San's war paint. I may end up taking the face paint crayons with me to Comic-com for easy touch ups during the day.

The Fang Necklace

(Picture from this link and found via a Google search-http://www.citymama.typepad.com/citymama/page/84/)

Because of all the photos that I have seen seem to have San seemingly picking up and dropping fangs off her necklace (I've seen one where it is just three fangs and round black beads, one with a single fang on either side of the crystal dagger and one picture with fangs going right around her neck) I am basing my version of her fang and round bead necklace off this picture.

I will be making my fangs from air hardening clay and I have already found some large round wooden beads for stringing in between.

Ashitaka's Crystal Dagger Pendant

For my dagger pendant I bought an reproduction arrow head off a medieval products company off eBay who's store link is below. I'm still waiting for it to be sent out to me but I did only buy it a couple of days ago. I will post a picture of it when it has arrived. However for now below is their product picture of it.

http://www.ebay.com.au/usr/medieval_shoppe?_trksid=p3984.m1497.l2754


(Picture from this link and found via a Google search- http://yellercrakka.deviantart.com/art/Princess-Mononoke-Hime-Crystal-Dagger-Necklace-358100662)

Because Ashitaka's dagger pendant looks more blue and pearlescent I will be having to paint my arrow head over the top but I thought the arrowhead I bought may be a better base for building colour on than my previous disastrous attempts of the past in recreating colors for paper machie projects.

I will also have to craft the wrap that sits on top of the arrowhead. I have bought some ADC clay (Air drying clay) that I will also be using for making the fangs for the necklace so I might use a little of the clay and some super glue for the red wrap that the cord sits on.

The Apron Top

A white, long sleeved top that I bought in an op shop for $3 will be the base for my apron. I'll post a before picture with it on and on a hanger in PART 2 before I start cutting into the shirt.

I plan on chopping off the sleeves and cutting a section out of the sides and re hemming so when it's unfolded it will look like a long rectangle. From the sleeves I will cut 4 long strips which I plan to hem into ribbons and sew back on the sides so that when I slip my rectangle on to wear it as the apron I will have my side ties like the picture below of San's top.


(Picture from this link and found via a Google search- http://www.moviecricket.com/top-10-best-anime-movies-of-all-time-34075/)

The Dress/Top and skirt combo

For this bit I am actually cheating a bit... In the pictures San is seen wearing a basic tunic style dress in (depending on your brightness settings on your tv) a navy or darker blue or sometimes black.

Considering I couldn't find a simple dress like that in a dark colour on my op shop hunt and I didn't have one in my wardrobe I started hunting for skirt instead. I will wearing one of my (MANY) plain black tank tops and a black, knee length skirt I found for $4 in (guess where?!) an op shop.

The Boots

For my boots, because I don't have a lot of money, I went op shopping and got a cheap pair of ugg boots in fairly good condition for $5 which have a fur rim around the top of the boot. I'm planning on wrapping a dark colored twine around the outside of them when I put them on for the cos-play. However I am also still trying to source images that show how she had her boots.

And I'm also planning on wearing socks in my boots... :) My obsessiveness will have to shut up on those imperfections.

The Dagger/Spear

(Picture from this link and found via a Google search- http://gallery.minitokyo.net/view/398334)

In this picture there is a tan strap visible of the bag that San's wears over her shoulder sometimes. I'm tossing up whether to make a hip bag with a tan shoulder strap that I can put my dagger in or whether to make a dagger and hip belt with a sheath for it. However as she didn't get sown with a sheath or belt I'm leaning more towards her bag as I can also store my mundane stuff in it such as phone, wallet, keys, money, etc.

The Headband and Arm bands

For my head and arm bands I have bought a couple of meters of black velvet ribbon, some snap fasteners and some ugly cabochon pendants that were on clearance and had a similar look to the jewels on the headband and armbands. I just need to pain the center stones black on two of them for the arm bands and a third with pearlescent white on top of the stone for the center of the headband.

The link below is from another chick who did a really cool San cos-play and I thought her idea for using spare bra straps for the armbands was really cool.
http://www.instructables.com/id/Princess-Mononoke-Costume/

So it's probably well established now that I'm an obsessive geek-freak and I simply ADORE op shopping! :)

The blog of another really great San cos-player is below. She spent the time making her ears out of clay and then carving them to look like wood and the results are great!
http://www.meagan-marie.com/mononoke/

Daily learning and crafty journey

I'm trying a new thing where I am going to blog one thing that I learn/have leave learnt everyday.... I figure the short and sweet posts will help me to remember to do it daily....

I am also going to be using this blog for my craft stuff like my tutorials for how I've made stuff, cos-plays I do and DIY gifts I make for people....

What I have learnt today: Finding wholesalers of foam roses is quite difficult!!!