Pinterest Progress - Buttons

I've become a bit obsessed with Pinterest, and am in great danger of falling too far into the trap of pinning lots of great ideas that I will never ever try. So both here and on my teaching blog, Jelly Beans and other Tangents, I am endeavouring to try the ideas I pin, blog my success or failure, then remove the pins! Progress!

One thing I desperately want ideas for using is buttons. I have a large tin full of buttons. It came from a jumble sale when I was a child. Some buttons have been used, some added, but the overall rate of change of button quantity has been positive. Sorry, forgot which blog I was on.

First idea: The button Christmas tree ornament.

Very easy to do, if you have the right buttons. I made do with what I had and managed to make two small trees, one with darker greens and one with bluer and paler greens. It took a bit of playing to work out which sizes and shapes and colours worked out best. Also I didn't have a star, but I did have a broken button that has some vaguely star-like qualities. Still need another star-substitute for the second one.

My versions:

It even looks nice in front of my weeds!

Science-Fiction Wedding Outfit Part 1 - Design

Rhiannon is going to a science-fiction themed wedding where the dress code is either costume or formal-with-sci-fi-accessories. She's going with the latter, and I'm helping to accessorise her.

The concept is a small hat/fascinator in a fairly standard modern style, but with weird glowing alien flowers.

I'm really looking forward to this project as something very different that integrates some very different skills! Tomorrow, a trip to Jaycar is in order.

See Part 2 and Part 3

Rhiannon's Steampunk Hat

Rhiannon wanted a mini top hat for a steampunk hen's night, in black and white, that might be appropriate for general Victorian costume later (not necessarily historically accurate, but not so steampunky that it would look weird).

I only took one progress pic, to check with Rhi if she liked the shape:

And here it is (almost) finished (sorry for the couch photos!):

There are lots of faults that drive me crazy but overall I like the look of it. And it was all made from stash. Yay stash!

Rhi is going to embroider something along the stitching line of the gathered facing. Normally I would add some kind of trim there but didn't have anything suitable, so we are going to COMBINE OUR POWERS instead. Which I'm sure will magically improve the result.

Some of my thoughts regarding this hat:

• I thought the velvet would be a pain to work with (because I usually have found that it is) but one benefit was that it hid the stitches well. They just sunk into the pile and disappeared. Yay!
• The black and white combo looks nice but every bit of shed fluff from one shows up on the other!
• I dislike buttonholes. My machine had a fit about one of them and I messed up another one, and then the buttons we chose were bigger than expected and hid some of them anyway! Grrr. And they messed up my even edge.
• This is the second mini top hat I've done with a curved brim and the first with a point at the front. I like the look of both, and they are easy enough to achieve. For the curved brim I added extra width to the brim pattern piece so that it is more like a circle than an ellipse. For the point I didn't change the pattern at all, just shaped it that way after wiring.

An introduction from Rhiannon

I'm Rhiannon, the other half of Jupiter Hollow.  What can you expect in a blog post from me?

• CRAFTS - I love textile crafts, and will blog about crochet, embroidery, sewing, costuming and other techniques that catch my eye.  I'm currently doing the NSW Embroidery Guild's basic course and some of my assignments might end up here for show and tell.
• NEAT THINGS FROM THE PAST - I have a strong interest in vintage crafts and food, fed by my historian's training. On occasion I'll try out a recipe or pattern from an old journal or book and share the results here.  Old advertisements, funny anecdotes culled from the Australian Women's Weekly -  all are fair game. I've written on the history of Christmas, and I'd like to bring some of that to a wider audience through this blog. 
• GEEKY CRAFTS - I'm a roleplayer and so are most of my friends. Those influences often come through in the crafts I make as gifts
• ETHICAL FASHION - I too have an interest in ethical fashion, so you can expect some posts about that, whether refashioning existing clothes or searching for ethical choices to buy, wardrobe planning or talking about other blogs that are doing cool ethical fashion ideas.
• REVIEWS  - Any books that I think are relevant to the general interests of the blog - so craft books, sustainable fashion & design, maybe some history of crafts/fashion/food - will get reviewed. I'm planning to review all the relevant books I own and the ones I have access to in local libraries. But I imagine I'll be busy just reviewing new things I buy. 

To give you a sense of the eclectic madness coming from me, here are some photos of past projects which may yet be blogged about if I feel so inclined!

Chapter One: In Which Tanith Introduces Herself

Yay new blog!

You'll see two people posting here, myself and my sister Rhiannon. We've decided to start a craft blog together and soon(ish) start selling our crafts together.

I am currently a full time maths teacher and I'm teaching TAS (technology and applied studies) classes this year too. I have a teaching blog which is mostly pictures of the silly things I decorate my classroom with.

My craft interests include millinery, costumes, soft toys, toys in general, everything to do with Christmas and Halloween. I aim to learn a lot more about designing soft toys and about woodworking in the next year or so. I also love to draw and paint. And I love maths, but that's arguably not a craft.

I've recently developed a strong interest in ethical fashion, which I will also blog about, and I'm starting to explore other ethical lifestyle choices and gardening.

Here are some of my favourite things that I have made, to give you an idea of what might be yet to come: