Mad Hatter Sign.. progress!

Also worked on getting the center piece that is going to attach the arms and head together! I still need to construct or purchase the base of the sign, but I'm going to finish that next week, or the week after. Now I have a lot of painting to do. The center piece was turned on a lathe and is the first thing I have not created myself! My grandpa is a master when it comes to using the lathe and while I worked on my Captain Hook project he was gracious enough to glue and then turn ten plywood discs into this masterpiece! It is always fun when I get to see my Grandpa work his magic. Wednesdays are fun for me because I get to spend time hanging out with him and I get to make and create whatever I can come up with! Even if I think of something outside of my scope of knowledge, I can turn to him and he can always figure something out! 

Captain Hook's Crocodile Snot Mustache Wax

Ahoy there!

I took the better part of the day and made some non wedding related decor for our future Peter Pan themed bathroom. Hopefully this piece makes the cut, or I can hide it somewhere else! :) I've become quite attached to the mustache I grew for my Pirate costume last Halloween and I have yet to cut it! I decided on mixing two of my current fascinations right now, Peter Pan and mustaches and creating something no one else has. Enter, Captain Hook's crocodile snot moustache wax! Captain Hook has the gnarliest moustache and I figured it should forever be adorned on my bathroom wall!

I cutout Captain Hook and the board behind him.. I wanted the piece behind him to look like deck planking as a background, so I am going to paint that and draw would grain on it as well. So far it is a little bare, so I started thinking about playing around with some more characters. The crocodile was one of my favorite characters in Peter Pan, so I decided to try and come up with something that had to do with the croc! I'm going to cutout a bust of the crocodile and add it somewhere.. Nothing is glued down yet, so I can still make changes. I'm not sure if I want to do a few more scrolls for Captain Hook's name, and another for the Crocodile snot.. just going to play around with it in Photoshop before I commit to anything!

I've gotten behind on all my Alice painting, so not sure when I am going to get this done, but it was relaxing to work on something different. It was also fun because I was getting to create something that is Peter Pan themed, but also has something to do with me too!

Tweedle Dum and the Mad Tea Party sign!

Whew. It has been insanely hot around here, lately! I don't fair to well in the heat. I did my best to knock out several projects, but I didn't finish as much as I would have liked, but this week has been packed full of adventure and extreme temperatures. 

I don't write about my personal life a whole lot, but my best friend is in town and we've been hanging out a bunch. Usually when he is in town we are playing video games like fiends and then spend late night hours bowling at our local bowling alley and top the night off with more gaming. Surprisingly we've yet to touch a video game! Skyrim and Left for Dead 1 & 2  have been calling my name for some time, but to my Fiance's delight it has just been bowling, working, BBQ'ing and swimming! I don't miss the video games much because they overtake my craft time!

I finished cutting out Tweedle Dum and I had enough time to start my next project.. The Mad Hatter Tea Party Sign.

I unfortunately was too impatient when trying to remove the finished product away from the unused plywood. I'm getting better with the jigsaw, so I went around the entire outer dimension in one stroke. Mr. Dum was not coming loose and was binding, so I tried to pop him down and the legs got caught and of course the weakest link snapped. It didn't break all the way off, so I braced it on the back using some scrap pieces of plywood and mended it back together.

I almost met my match with Tweedle Dum. I had to SQUEEZE into the spot between his legs and guide my vehicle home the best I could.. it was quite a sight! I don't think I am going to ever do that again. Tweedule dum is the tallest character I've done so far.. I'm scared to do Alice or a Card Guard for fear that I won't be able to get them home!

Broom stick dog!

Finished cutting out my broom stick dog! Still need to paint it and make the other Tweedle and I have a few other designs I'm working on now! To my pleasant delight I was also able to secure two 4X8 sheets of plywood on top of my trusty work horse.. my '57 VW bug! Made it about twenty miles without a hitch... Now I won't have to borrow, beg, or procure a truck! Invested in some nifty tie down ratchets and now I can pick up supplies at my leisure!

I made the body and head separate on the broom dog because I hope to add a motor to his head, so he is actually sweeping! If my head is bigger than my wallet or ambition.. I can just screw it on at a later time sans the motor! 

I lucked out and found some coloring pages that I was able to edit on the computer of the March Hare and Mad Hatter. The broom stick dog and a lot of the other characters I'm want to do, I haven't been as lucky, so I drew him on paper and using my new scanner I was able to get a decent image into the computer. I find myself going frame by frame and looking for the best stance position of most of the characters for inspiration! I find it easier to keep everything in scale if I scale the images on the computer and then print them out page by page and trace that onto the plywood. There are several ways of doing this, but my method has served me well so far. 

Whoo hoo! Here is evidence that I arrived safely at my destination with the wood and roof rack still attached to my car! 

Happy Anniversary!

Last Tuesday was my anniversary to my better half, and we both agreed to keep it low key because we're saving money for the wedding and honeymoon, so I decided to use some of my Halloween props to decorate the room up a bit. I wanted to something out of the normal and due to the plethora of Pirate related items I own, I decided to decorate with some nautical flair because we both love the Blue Bayou at Disneyland and it has been MUCH too long since we've been.

I setup a table for us to eat dinner in our bedroom.. 50 candles later, lights, banjo and exit music from the ride, and a few Pirate props and we were immediately transported to our favorite place at Disneyland and probably our best anniversary dinner thus far!

The oysters were curious too...

Finished up my first Tweedle twin.. going to finish the other half next week! Knocked this out in half a day including the painting! Definately one of the easier characters to paint in regards to there only being  about ten colors.. The shoes are supposed to be black from all the screen captures I've gathered, but I was afraid it would loose its contrast against the black lines of the characters, so I just colored them in with almost a black cherry. If you also notice, I painted too much yellow on the left side of the shoulder! The bib should extend past the arm! I will fix that when I paint the other one! Sometimes I get too excited when trying to finish a project. 

Here is my better half standing next to the cutout for reference! Trying to get everything close to the scale they were in the movie, but I think I went overboard with the Mad Hatter and March Hare, so now everything is going to be enormous if I decide to make some larger characters like the Card Guards, Alice or Red Queen.

I had to buy a new jigsaw because my grandpas old school jigsaw uses blades that are probably no longer produced! The new jigsaws use a t or u shank and that style will not work with his trusty jigsaw. I bought this jigsaw when I started making the larger cutouts and I have been pleasantly suprised with it. I've cut all the characters out with a SINGLE blade! The Ryobi was one of the least expensive tools Home Depot had and I'd recommend it to anyone wanting to create wood cutouts like these! I'm using one of the finest blades offered, so the edges are cutting real nice. I'll get a model number and blade model number if anyone is interested.