Whimsical horses

So much here in Japan is... whimsical.  Even something normally plain and functional, such as the barriers around construction zones, feature illustrations like gophers with hard hats on.

Very shortly after arriving here, I learned that there are images of horses everywhere in the area.

It's no surprise then, that my search for horse-shaped objects has led me to find some cute ones.


First up, an adorable little wooden horse, all stubby-legged, stubby-nosed, and awesome:

A Japanese racehorse!  Again, all stubby and cute:

My most recent find.  They had all of the zodiac animals on these little wooden charms, but they were all portrayed as babies.  So this is a foal!:

I'll certainly be keeping me eye out for more horse HSOs, whimsical or otherwise, and I'll be sure to share my findings.  :)

Seattle Saddle Pad

Back at the airport in Seattle, I started drawing up a new pattern for a saddle pad.  It was about 6am and we were sitting at the gate, waiting to board the plane that would take us to Japan, after having been away all the previous day and through the night.  I daresay the paper pattern I sketched out for this pad was NOT the neatest one I've ever done - ha!

I started stitching on it in early June, after I finished the "Prettiest Ever" pad.  (that one I had started stitching during our overnight at the airport)  I was able to decipher my punch drunk pattern and off I went, stitching away.

This one has probably taken me the longest out of any that I've made.  I think it might be the most intricate, as far as the number of lines, dots, color changes, and so on - which should be a good thing, but I sort of found myself losing interest in it off and on.  Ah, the creative journey can be a bumpy one, eh?

Also, more recently, I had run out of one of the colors and I was sure I had more, but..  where??

(this was what helped spur my epic embroidery floss organization project into action)

Last night, I confirmed that I did have more of the color I'd run out of - thanks to my nifty, organized floss collection - and I FINALLY finished the stripey saddle pad.

Motivation Monday - Chaaaarge!

Here we go, charging off into another week.  I hope it's a good one for all of you!

 

 

Festival season

Summer is festival season in northern Japan.  There have been several in our area so far, with even more to come in the next couple of weeks.  Today was the last day of the local city festival and it was Jeff's first day off in over a week.  It was also our Anniversary and it was nice to be able to spend the day together.

I didn't get any crafting done today, because we were out and about, looking at things like this:

That is a massive float in a parade... moving down the street...  being pulled by people.

Adding to my list of blog posts I want to make about things we've seen here, would be a post about this parade.  It was amazing.  As usual, I took a ton of pictures, and video too, but it is late here and I'm off to bed for now.

Maybe I should pick a day of the week to do a regular Japan post.  Hmmm...

Mirror image

And now for something completely different...


Jeff has a small collection of motorcycle models and during the move, one of the mirrors came off of his favorite one.  Unfortunately he didn't realize it until we'd already thrown away all of the packing material and that box.  We searched and searched on the floor and under things, but couldn't find it.

He was bummed out and not sure what to do.  He mentioned that he might just take the other one off, so at least the bike is symmetrical.  I've had the idea all along to try and make a new mirror for him, but I wasn't 100% sure how I might do it.  I decided to give it a whirl today.

Here's the one that's left.

It's a fairly simple shape, but a bit complex too - if that makes any sense!

I examined it from every angle, then grabbed some wire as close to the right size as I've got, and got to work.

First, I bent the wire as close as I could to the basic shape of the other mirror - only reversed.

Looks sorta right.

To check the lines, I held it against the other one.  I don't think it's exactly perfect, but it's hard to tell without the solld part of the new mirror filled in.

I studied both of them from every angle, did some tweaking and then...

Yay!  I get to use this stuff again!  It will be my first time since the move.

I mixed up a small glob (technical term) and started filling in the wee wire framework.

Getting there...

I missed up another small glob, finished the main part of the mirror and then verrrry carefully formed the wider bits on the mirror stalk.

It's hard to tell at this stage, but I had to say that it already looks better than I thought I'd be able to do.

Now, to let the epoxy dry.  I left it sitting like this; a new technique for drying.  I've never done this before, but it seemed like a good idea.

After it's dry, I'll give it a coat of matte black and see how it looks.  I'm not 100% sure how to do the actual mirrored part, but I'm learning towards a tiny circle of aluminum foil.  ;)


Of course, I had a bit of epoxy left over.  What to do...?  Ah, I know, I'll put some on this guy.  He can be my epoxy dump - he's going to need a lot of it.  Oh, you don't know him yet...  but you will, eventually.  ;)

Buying with a purpose... mostly

A bit of backstory for today's post:

I'm a craft supply hoarder..  yeah, I said it.  I have a TON of craft supplies, to make a TON of things.

I've tried to be more purposeful in my acquisitions though, only buying something if I have a specific project in mind for it, rather than, "That's cool, I'm sure I could use it for something!"  So, with that in mind, I've seen a LOT of awesome things in the many craft stores here and I've managed to talk myself out of most of them.

One thing I've always been able to talk myself out of is fabric.  Sure, I have a pile of fabric with crafting in mind, but it's all stuff to be recycled - such as old sheets and clothes.  As I can recall, I've never actually bought fabric for craft purposes.  

Recently, I had talked myself out of buying a small roll of fabric that had foxes on it.  I love foxes and have a little collection of fox things.  I had the fox fabric in my hands and thought I had to have it.  Then I thought... But what would I DO with it?  I didn't know, so I put it back.

Now, here I am, embarking on a journey to start making Arabian costumes.

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Yesterday, during my "kidnapping", we stopped by a couple of craft stores.  I was curious if I might find any fabric that could work for the costumes.  The stores have hundreds of... squares, maybe they are called?  (I know next to nothing about any sort of actual fabric crafts - quilts and so on)  They were small bundles of fabric in many, many different colors, designs, textures...  I liked the idea of getting some of these little samples of fabric, since I don't need much.  Unable to talk myself out of buying some fabric for the first time...  here's what I ended up with.

A couple of plain pieces with a nice texture.  My idea for these is to try some hand embroidery on them:

I think this is the best type of pattern I found for the specific purpose I was looking for.  I might do some hand embroidery on it too, for more color, texture, and accents:

I thought this one was nice and I have some costume ideas for it too:

These are just gorgeous.  I've had the idea to do a "Jingle horse" costume for a while now and I think they might work for parts of that:

Oh, and the fox fabric I mentioned at the beginning of this post?  They had it, in various colors, in these little packs and...

I got the orange one.

Getting out of the house

Today I was "kidnapped" by a new friend here and we spent the day having fun in a nearby city.  We stopped into several stores, had lunch, and even went to the beach for a bit of beachcombing.  It was a fun day and it was good to get out of the house.

I have some neat crafty/costume-related finds to share in my next post.  For now, here's a random picture of my cat in a sink:

 
(She got out of the house today too.  This evening she went for her first walk outside of our yard on her leash and harness.)