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bleaching designs onto t-shirts

When you were kids, your moms and science teachers all told you not to play with chemicals and other fun stuff, right?

Today we’re going to play with chemicals and other fun stuff.

Our lovely Seattle friends Thomas and Dikla visited last weekend, and Thomas wanted to try out the t-shirt bleaching technique he’d been seeing around online. We did some internet research, bought thrift store t-shirts (we already had a plenty of bleach on hand from this bit of questionable advice, filmed at our place a few weeks ago) and got to work.

One of the brilliant things about making designs with bleach (apart from the playing with chemicals part) is that you’re not adding paint or ink, so the design can never wear off. Nor is it dyed, so the design also can’t wash out. In fact, as one of this year’s Desert Bus Craft-Alongers put it, “the graphic will never fade since it’s bleached into the fabric; the fabric can’t regain the colour.”

See? Brilliant.

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30 Comments
by on September 18, 2011  •  Permalink
Posted in MAN CRAFTS, T-shirt Modifications, Wearable
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Posted by Tally on September 18, 2011

http://tallystreasury.com/2011/09/bleaching-designs-onto-t-shirts/

beady-eyed fish

Sometimes crafting ideas descend from the highest planes of inspiration and creativity, floating down through the heavens to alight on one’s mind with delicacy and grace. Sometimes they come from other places entirely.

A coworker of mine shared this joke with us back in June, writing it on my boss’ white board. At first I could only think that it was an awfully strange version of an eye doctor’s chart.

Turns out, it’s a joke that must be spoken out loud, with a Newfoundland accent. It looks like this:

A buy, C D fish?
M R not fish!
O S M R fish. C D B D Is?
Whale oil beef hooked, M R fish!*

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14 Comments
by on September 9, 2011  •  Permalink
Posted in Plushies, Scraps, Sewing, Toys
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Posted by Tally on September 9, 2011

http://tallystreasury.com/2011/09/beady-eyed-fish/

creative uses for pinback buttons… and all about PAX!

First off, I apologize for not putting up a post last Friday. I was in Seattle, busily depriving myself of sleep and being surrounded by 90,000 or so amazing people. It was awesome. My lack of posting was less than awesome, but let’s remember my double post of the previous week and move along, forgiving and forgetting. Should be quite easy if you were at PAX and are thus as sleep deprived as me.

PAX, for anyone unfamiliar with the event, is a twice-annual celebration of all things gamer and geeky, an encapsulation of why online gaming communities, D&D groups and games night companions are amazing and will make your life a happier place, full of rainbows and unicorns and (My Little) ponies. It’s a massive video game convention hosted by Penny Arcade, an event to which the word “epic” can actually be applied with honesty and accuracy. It’s a place where people dress up as blue aliens because it makes them awesome. Everyday life should be so wonderful. Read the full post »

17 Comments
by on September 3, 2011  •  Permalink
Posted in Decorations, Events, Geeky Goodness, Jewelry & accessories, Wearable, Wrappings & containers
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Posted by Tally on September 3, 2011

http://tallystreasury.com/2011/09/creative-uses-for-pinback-buttons-and-all-about-pax/

hand-sewn dice bags

This past Friday I posted a tutorial for simple, fully lined dice bags. An easy, classy, tidy way to store and transport your polyhedral treasures, or your MtG tokens, or any other small objects. For those who don’t have a sewing machine, I promised a tutorial for how to make a hand-sewn bag, and here it is.

The main difference, apart from this bag being stitched by hand, is that this bag is not lined. You could follow the same tutorial as for the lined bags and simply do the sewing by hand – possible, but a pain, and most people just don’t do that kind of hand sewing anymore, just like most folks (even craftsy ones) don’t hem sheets by hand or sit around doing embroidery to pass the time and fill a hope chest.

The simplest and cleanest way to do a hand-stitched dice bag is to make it from felt, which doesn’t fray. A double layer of felt on something this small size would make it too bulky to work well, hence, this bag is unlined. Read the full post »

35 Comments
by on August 22, 2011  •  Permalink
Posted in Bonus updates, Felt, Geeky Goodness, Purses & bags, Sewing
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Posted by Tally on August 22, 2011

http://tallystreasury.com/2011/08/hand-sewn-dice-bags/

lined dice bags – for all your polyhedral needs

PAX is coming, PAX is coming! The Penny Arcade Expo, that massive convention of video game goodness and fellowship, begins next Friday, and it’s time to prepare.

There’s tons of advice out there about how to survive a convention, the most common salient points being things like: shower daily, wear comfortable shoes, carry hand sanitizer at all times and for the love of your everlasting karma, be kind to the poor harried event organizers and your fellow convention goers.

What I’m going to offer by way of fresh new convention advice is to always carry a dice bag. Because inevitably you will find yourself at that booth that sells dice by the cupful, drooling gently and murmuring, “Ooooh, preeeeeetty.” And you’ll remember that you don’t have a set of blue dice yet, and the d4 from your favourite set went missing last month, and they’re so well priced if you buy them by the scoopful… Read the full post »

34 Comments
by on August 19, 2011  •  Permalink
Posted in Felt, Geeky Goodness, Sewing, Wrappings & containers
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Posted by Tally on August 19, 2011

http://tallystreasury.com/2011/08/lined-dice-bags-for-all-your-polyhedral-needs/

braided paper bracelets and bookmarks

Braiding, according to some random and unverifiable website I saw once, is a task with “Ancient World Origins,” practiced around the world and probably dating back ages and ages and signifying different things in different cultures and maybe even linked to way old-school deities. I’d look this stuff up properly, but I had a super busy week at work and I’m already two glasses of wine into my weekend, and if I went anywhere near Wikipedia right now I’d no doubt vanish into a black hole of links to everything, only to emerge again on Monday morning knowing all there is to know about Prigogine’s Double-collared Sunbird and how you get from its Wikipedia page to the one on seaslugs.

So. Here’s what I do know about braiding.

It’s pretty.

It’s relaxing, unless you’re on the 5th attempt at french braiding your own hair at 7:30 am and it’s coming out all bumpy again.

There was a guy in my junior high youth group who got some girls to teach him how to braid so that he could help his mom out by braiding his little sister’s hair for her in the mornings before school. Every girl who ever met that boy had plans to marry him. Read the full post »

42 Comments
by on August 13, 2011  •  Permalink
Posted in Jewelry & accessories, Ornaments, Paper Goods, Uncategorized
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Posted by Tally on August 13, 2011

http://tallystreasury.com/2011/08/braided-paper-bracelets-and-bookmarks/

leafy felt plants with needle felted accents

The other day I looked over into the corner of my office where I pile the things that will need dealing with soon but not right now, and realized that my one poor little office plant was back there, looking decidedly unhappy. I wrote a while ago about how I’m not the best grower of green things, and offered a paper plant solution. Today I’ll offer another fake plant solution, but in felt.

Apart from providing another undying way to spruce up a beige office corner, the needle-felting-onto-felt procedure outlined in this post is also a generally useful technique. It can be used to decorate all kinds of felt objects. As you’ll see below, this method gives you the ability to add details to felt, “drawing” them on with a felting needle, and it also allows you to give flat pieces of felt some shape and three dimensionality.

Plus it’s another opportunity to stab things. Good stuff. Read the full post »

5 Comments
by on August 5, 2011  •  Permalink
Posted in Decorations, Felt, Flowers, needle felting
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Posted by Tally on August 5, 2011

http://tallystreasury.com/2011/08/leafy-felt-plants-with-needle-felted-accents/

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