Fob Winners and Updates

Here are the three people who were chosen by the random number generator to each receive one of my wool felt scissors fobs:

True Random Number GeneratorMin:Max:Result:20

True Random Number GeneratorMin:Max:Result:6

True Random Number GeneratorMin:Max:Result:8

(After generating each number, I copied and pasted the results here; there were 56 comments, and I entered the number 56 as the "Max", but when I copied it here it reverted to the default setting of 100.  Weird!  Anyway, it generated the random numbers just fine.)

Comment #20 is from "Carla".  She will receive the bird fob.

Comment #6 is from "bethwalker07".  She chose the watermelon fob.

Comment #8 is from:  "linny".  I will send her a ladybug fob.

Congratulations!  I will be contacting each of you shortly.



And now, a few updates on past posts:

1.  My Blog is a Book:  I told you that I used Blog 2 Print to have all my blog entries from 2011 turned into a soft-cover book, which I was going to give to my mother.  You may have been wondering how she reacted to it, and the answer is, she LOVED it!!  She was very impressed with it and she read it from cover to cover, and commented on many of the things I had written.  It may be the best gift I've ever given her!  So now I can highly recommend this, especially if you have a relative who (like my mom) doesn't have a computer to read your blog.

2.  Octo-Bear:  After showing you this "interesting" creature I made for a partner in the March Birthday swap on Craftster, some readers wanted to know how I attached the legs.  Since I had received a special order for an Octo-Bear as a result of the post, I announced that I would be making another one and posting in-progress pictures.  Well, that order was cancelled (the young woman's car broke down so she didn't have the money for an Octo-Bear), so the leg-attaching tutorial will have to wait until some future date.

3. Amazing Amaryllis:  In January I showed you my pot of amaryllis bulbs as they grew into huge and gorgeous flowers.  Well, they continue to be amazing, because they are blooming again!  In July!  After having just bloomed in January!!!  The pot is on my front porch now, and in addition to the four-blossom stalk in the picture below, there is a second stalk starting to emerge.  These are some serious over-achievers, and I feel like I've been given an unexpected gift with this second round of blooms.

Octo-Bear Update

Thanks to all who left comments about yesterday's "Octo-Bear" post.  Since a couple of you are interested in knowing how it was constructed, I have good news:  I'm going to make another one, and take lots of pictures, and show you how I did it!  All secrets will be revealed sometime within the next couple of weeks.

A Different Kind of Stuffie

Every month on Craftster there is a Birthday Craft Swap; March was my birthday month, so I joined the swap!  Everyone who joined posted a list of things they would like to receive, and the other people in the swap could choose to craft anything on anyone's list.  The only requirement was that you "claim" at least one item to craft during the month.

I made two claims, and I've already shown you the pink and gray Kindle Cover.  The other thing I made was a little outside my comfort zone as far as style goes, but it was right up my alley in that it was a stuffed toy.  I present to you:  Octo-bear!

 Usually I go all uber-cute when I'm making stuffies, but this one wasn't for me, so I had to make it to my partner's liking.  She had a creature very much like this on her Pinterest, with a teddy-bear for the top part; I used my Mystery Critter pattern for that.  I gave it a zipper for a mouth to make it look scarier, but that wasn't quite enough, so as a final, touch I gave it the scowling eyebrows--THEN it had the proper demeanor!

I had some black and white checkerboard fleece that worked great for the legs; they are stuffed with fiberfil and have heavy wire all the way to the end so they can be posed any way.  Sewing the legs to the body turned out to be very simple (I had worried about it and thought it through a LOT!)  For the finishing touch, I tied a ribbon around it's neck with a key and a coin bearing the words "secret" and "unique". 

My partner said it was the best stuffie ever, so I guess I got it right!  I learned from this swap that I can be flexible with my style when I need to be--that's nice to know.