The Spring Fairy.

I my attempt to make my second doll, which I had no idea what she was going to look like, I started making her eyes. And this shape was different from my first one, that had only a circle eye.
I shaped the white part of the eye with polymer clay, baked, painted the colored part with Sharpies, then used liquid acrylic to make it shiny and more realistic.

The next step was to shape the head, arms and legs with polymer clay (sorry I didn't take a picture of them).
After baked I gave her some color in the face using pastel pencils. And also attached her eyelashes.
Then I sewed the body with fabric, and attached the head and limbs.

Here I glued her hair to the head.

When it was time to give her a dress, I saw this beautiful fabric at Jo-Ann, and decided it would look good for a fairy.
So I made her dress, and her wings. And put some flowers to make her a Spring Fairy.
There she is...

No Kid Hungry Bake Sale.

Today my town is running a fund drive to help end childhood hunger, and the funds are going to greatamericanbakesale.org.
It is always a blessing to be able to help, and also a way to be grateful for what you have now. Especially because me and my husband went through some tough times throughout our lives.
So this is another chance to give back, and contribute a tiny bit to the Universe and say:"Hey there, thank you!.

Spider Man Party Final Preparations.

The day is coming, and I finished making a few items for the kids.
I made some masks made of red paper plates, using black puffy paint to draw the face.

I made a giant spider web so the kids can play "toss the spider". The spider was made from a styrofoam ball with legs made of piper cleaners.

I made some web snacks using pretzel sticks and melted chocolate.

This cool idea I saw somewhere in the web before, but I couldn't find it now to give the credits. Using Mini Baby Bell Cheese I first cut the eyes using my Exacto knife. Then cutting a piece of Saram Plastic Wrap, I drew the face using a black Sharpie. Then I wrapped the plastic in the cheese, and used a lollipop stick.

And finally the cake, I used two cake recipes to bake in two 13X9 cake pans. After baked and cooled, I stacked them to make a building shape.
The decorations I made out of fondant the day before. I made tiny garbage cans, garbage bags, doors, windows, latter, and other few details for the building.Let it dry for a few hours to paint with food coloring and paint brush.

For the walls of the building I pre colored the fondant, then opened with a rolling pin, cut to the dimensions of the cake, and made the details of the walls with a knife.

Attaching everything together after the I frosted the cake came out very cool.

After pictures it went back in the refrigerator, because the party is only tomorrow. Now I feel better the cake is ready and tomorrow will be a lot of fun. Hopefully I will be able to handle all the kids.

Go Little Mouse, Go!

Little Mouse will give lots of love to a little friend.
He will bring his friend fun, superpowers, and they will be together for years, and years, and years... a whole lot of happy years.

Birthday two on the making: Spiderman Table.

My youngest son asked for a Spiderman birthday, and with two weeks left, I feel a little behind.
We started with choosing between cupcakes or cake, and he liked a cake in the shape of a building. I got engaged on the idea, and thought would be great to make a little city, with other buildings made of paper (because there is so much sugar we can have).
I found a couple of boxes to make buildings.
I covered with scrapbook paper, making the windows and details.

Then for the table, I covered with some wrapping paper, leaving the white side up.

And using acrylic paint, I made the streets and areas where the buildings are going to stand.

For the background, I reused my oldest son's old science project board, which was also wrapped in wrapping paper.

Then I roughly made a sketch of the background.

Then we painted with acrylic paint.

I also decorated water bottles with my superhero scrap paper.

Using some white string I tied some spider webs.

Putting everything together looks nice. I still have a few more days to make other decorations and prepare the food. In the meantime I see if I can find more cool ideas.

Coffee Filter Flowers.

It is teacher appreciation week on my kid's school, and today is flower day.
I needed to send specific flowers for each teacher, and decided to send paper flowers for them.
My sister told I could use coffee filters to make flowers, so I gave it a try.

Mrs. Shumsky likes hydrangeas, so I used a styrofoam ball and glued small petals that I cut.

After dried I used a green piper cleaner for the stem.

Mrs. Sommi likes Lillies, so I cut larger petals on the coffee filters.

Then a technique I learned from my father, I used the back of the scissors, and held the petal with my thumb on the other side. Then I pulled upwards, to make a little curl on the petal (you have to hold the base of the petal with the other hand- mine was holding the camera).
PS: Sorry for the bad manicure.

Then I taped them together around a pipe cleaner.

The pistils (really not sure if this is the correct name) of the flower I made using yellow polymer clay attached to a few pieces of wire.

And then I placed them in cones made from a brighter paper, and a pretty ribbon.

They came out nice and delicate, hopefully they will survive the bus ride with the boys.

Cherry Blossoms, Taiko, Muffins and a Moment of Realization.

Altough my face shows where my descendents came from, not necessarily I enjoyed being this way. Growing up in Brazil, I was very different from the other kids, and people are sometimes not nice about the fact you don't look like everybody else.
So I refused to participate of any traditional family gatherings, and didn't want to be reminded of who I was. And no matter where I was, I always had a feeling that I didn't belong.
But I think age bring us to understand the past, accept, stop the blame, and embrace the events of your lives.
So when my husband started learning Japanese, I started remembering words, understanding the culture, and becoming eager to learn more. Together with my husband and kids, I started learning to play Taiko, which is a traditional Japanese drum, at Ryu Shu Kan Japanese Arts Center in Long Island.
We became so excited, and I think the Japanese inside me came up.
Our Sensei invited us to perform on the Cherry Blossom Festival, and I think that was the moment my entire transformation happened. Looking at the costumes, the art, the language gave me a sense that I was in the right place.
Of course this is a crafts blog, and not a confessionary, so I am here also to show the muffins I brought to my friends at the festival.
I first made the flowers with fondant, using my flower Vegetable Cutter. Painted with Pink Icing and yellow pearl dust in the middle.

I used them to decorate a few banana muffins, and the recipe is here.

The Festival was beautiful, the weather was perfect, and our performance was very exciting.


I guess we all learn about ourselves every day, but right now I am glad I can honor the memory of my parents, and be happy about myself.
Thank you, thank you, thank you...