In My Shop: Cute as a Button Barrettes and Hairpins

I just made a whole buttload of my Cute as a Button hairpins and barrette sets.  That's right--a buttload (okay, 11 sets if you need to get exacting about what precisely amounts to a buttload).  They are all made with vintage buttons (which I suppose is why I made so many--I could sort through and play with my collection of vintage buttons endlessly--and incidently, I also used to do this with my mom's tin of buttons when I was a wee lass--and have since caught Beeper doing it with my tins of buttons--clearly, a genetic thing...).  If you want some for yourself--find them in my Etsy shop, here.

Belated Post Ahead: The Great Pumpkin Patch

File this spot away for next year--that is, if it happens to be October and you happen to be in central Illinois, right smack in the middle of an Amish community, lots of soybean fields, and small town America.  It is called The Great Pumpkin Patch and is located in a Arthur, Illinois, down just about a million intersecting dirt roads, just past 100 or so farms, and take care not to hit the Amish teenagers driving that buggy there.  It also happens to be just down the road a spell from where my in-laws live.  There's lots to do--it's sort of like the Disneyland of Squash--check it out...

...learn your ABCs via squash...

...visit an old time school house...

...become a pumpkinhead--variety of your choosing...

...admire the rainbow o' squash...

...eat a freshly made caramel apple or 12...

...get lost in  corn maze...

...admire the variety of presentations of squash...

Unfortunately, the actual Great Pumpkin Patch was closed the day we visited due to MUD, but it's not like there are any shortage of pumpkins to choose from...

Yeah, we took home a trunk full.  I wish I had taken a photo of all the brilliant jack o' lanterns Mr. Beeper and I designed and carved--the one with two faces was my favorite...but, you'll just have to imagine what that looked like.

You can see more photos--but only if you really want to--because there was lots more to see and do--find it here.  

Read This: Bone Soup

The monster love is showing no visible signs of waning anytime soon around here.  Zombies, vampires, witches, skeletons, oogley-boogly sorts of monsters are all equally adored and appreciated for their individual merits.  Blood-suckers, brains-cravers, bony or warty noses--we are equal-opportunity monster fans.    So you can see how this book--Bone Soup by Cambria Evans--would fit right into our little library.

I admit though, part of what attracted me to this book is that it is a spooky little twist on the classic Stone Soup story I grew up reading--except so much more fun when a town full of monsters are tricked into adding their most prized ingredients to the soup--you know, like spider eggs, toe nail clippings, stewed eyeballs and similar delicacies.

Of course, really, what is best about this book are the wonderful creepy-cute illustrations--just enough spook but still enough sweet to appeal to the under-10-set without creating nightmare-fodder.  I mean, I would happily give any one of the monsters in this book a hug--or even spend the night in their wonderfully realized homes with secret-cupboards, cobwebby cellars and cracked mirrors.  Or maybe even design a plushie inspired by one of the monsters--you know, something itty bitty that might be able to live in a matchbox or something?  Hmmm...

But really--check out Finnigin the skeleton with his gigantic eating mouth and his very tasty bone soup recipe.  Guaranteed to please and nourish.  Get a copy here--or from your local library.

In My Shop: Matchbox Monsters

Got a hankering for a little weeny monster tucked up all nice and cozy in his own matchbox?  Why yes, you say?    Well, I just so happen to have about a dozen of them in my shop, awaiting someone just like you to take one (or 2 or 3 or however many) home.  They come fully outfitted in a nappie (the sort you never, ever have to change--I think they are self-composting)  and with their own little fringed blankie so they can be tucked sweetly to sleep when not at play.  Find them here.

Make This: Halloween Shadow Puppets

Inspired by Kate's shadow puppet tutorial over at Minieco, I designed a dozen shadow puppets of my own to give to the kiddies along with some mini flashlights at our upcoming Halloween party.  I essentially used Kate's tutorial to make these, except I painted my wooden dowels up in black stripes (using the same method I used to make my stripey pick-up sticks) because I love all things stripey, and made my shadow puppet designs just a little bigger with a few different designs.  You can download my shadow puppet templates here, if you care to make some for yourself:

DOWNLOAD SHADOW PUPPET TEMPLATES

You can also find Kate's tutorial with her own downloadable templates here.

A Halloween Crafting Compulsion: Part 2

 

Pretty creepy, huh?  I love this Halloween crafting project.  I mean, who does not want their own faux cured head on their dining room buffet?  Another brilliant Martha project.  If you happen to have a styrofoam head laying around, it's ridiculously simple to make using mostly stuff you can find in your kitchen--you just dip some crumbled papertowels in old leftover coffee, let those dry, and then paste them to the head with this flour/coffee/corn syrup mixture.  Put the head on a an old silver plate tray you pick up at your local thrift store (which is also where my styrofoam head came from), arrange some similarly stained gauze around the base of the head, et voila!  Your own dismembered and unwrapped mummy head.  Sure to delight small children and horrify your adult guests--or maybe vice versa.

You can see more photos of my dead head here and find the project with Martha's full instructions here.  

In My Shop: Two-Faced Friend Doll Kits

I've just put a few Two-Faced Friend Doll Kits in my shop.  These contain the pre-cut materials and complete illustrated instructions to make your own Two-Faced Friend Doll--including lovely vintage feedsack fabrics for the dresses, vintage buttons and notions, all wool felt for the hair and shoes, and recycled materials for the body, as well as the kit packaging.  It's a handy little kit for someone who would enjoy making a doll, but is too busy (or lazy) to select their own materials--you get the credit for hand-making something while cutting out some of the work.  I love it most because nearly the entire kit is is made from recycled or repurposed materials.  Want to see some more?  You can find the kits here.