Etsy shop

I have been debating over whether or not to give Etsy a try. 

There are so many cute and desirable things on Etsy. What would the harm be in posting a few things and see if anyone wants them?  So I put together a few items and posted them in my typewriterorange shop here: http://www.etsy.com/shop/typewriterorange?ref=pr_shop

I was able to spend some time at work on Friday fine tuning all the descriptions and photos and finally opened the doors so to speak.  Then I lay awake in my bed and stared at my familiar ceiling…waiting…..

Even though I haven’t done a whole lot of work, I have been working hard getting these things ready to be posted. 

Then the doubt came. 

Who would possible want to PAY for something I made?  Was I asking too much for something I used my own two hands to make?  Was it ridiculous for me to think that anyone would like something enough to click that “Add to Cart” button?

So, I bit my nails and watched my shop sit….and sit….and sit…

The weekend came and went.  I went back to work Monday and didn’t think twice about the shop.

Then, came then.    A magical thing happened.    I had my FIRST sale!

Someone hit that lovely green button!  Someone bought a Totoro onesie I made. 

My first sale, hopefully one of many!  Woohoo! 

Project: Panda Bread

So, I stumbled upon this really cute idea for some “Panda Bread” over here at Perfect Pandas: http://perfectpandas.com/2008/01/08/panda-bread/

I have always had a soft spot for Panda bears and thought I would totally wow the nieces or kids in nursery with a fun treat. 

This is what the bread is supposed to look like….

Mine looked more like this….

I wish I had taken a photo of the bread out of the oven before I chunked the gooey mess.  Sadly, I actually tried this recipe twice, wasting much flour in the process.  Now, I did do all of this by hand, I do not have a stand mixer. 

The first time I did as the recipe called to add all the food coloring and cocoa powder after the dough was already mixed up….um can we say wet mess of dough?  I still shudder to think of that green slim on my hands.  Needless to say that recipe for the bread just sucked.  It was tough and hard, burned on the top…..absolute mess. 

The second time I found a recipe for Amish white bread online and divided it up into 3 batches and added the food coloring to one batch and cocoa to the other before mixing everything together.  Everything seemed to be going so well.  When I had to actually roll the dough up in the right order to form the panda face, it all just sort of mushed together.  I knew it wasn’t going to turn out right even before I put it in the oven, but I didn’t want to throw it away… I had worked so hard!

So, it came out and didn’t resemble a panda bear face at all.  It resembled more of a hot mess than anything.  I have a few problems I need to work out before I try this again. 

The different dough has to be soft enough that they can mesh together in the oven, even though they are separate colors and consistencies.  When this 2^nd loaf came out of the oven all the different layers just peeled away from each other.

But the dough also has to be firm enough so you can roll everything up tightly so you don’t lose the shape of the face….

The bread itself was delicious, but didn’t cook in the middle, and was almost burnt on the top….Let me clarify, it was lightly brown on the top, Jake says that isn’t almost brunt…To me it is. 

So I shamefully wowed no one with my cool panda treat. 

Project Panda Bread:  EPIC FAILURE 

Mourning the loss of my brown hair....

So a while back I had some purple hair.  Not the extreme all over purple, just a little bit at the tip of my hair.  It was fun, something fresh, I liked it.  But, the color faded too quickly and I was applying purple die to my hair almost every other week, and that wasn’t much fun.  Plus there was that period recently where I was trying to find a new job and purple hair doesn’t exactly improve the odds.  So, last month I grabbed a box of Garnier dark brown hair dye.  My hair is really dark brown, so I got the shade “Darkest Brown”.  It worked perfectly to get my hair back to an all over natural looking dark brown.  Plus it didn’t smell absolutely horrible!  It smelled only slightly horrible; there was enough avocado, grape seed, and olive oil to combat the chemical smell.  

So, this weekend I noticed that the tips of my hair were getting too light, (not purple) just a really light brown, almost blond in some areas.  So I grabbed the EXACT same color Garnier hair die “darkest brown”.

I went about my way, did everything as the box instructed.  I washed it out and let my hair air dry.  Then when I was time to get ready for church I went in the bathroom and got the hair dryer out and went to work.

I glanced in the mirror; it took me a minute to realize that my hair was not dark brown.   Doth mine eyes deceive me?  No, they did not!  My hair was in fact not dark brown but BLACK.

That’s what I said. B L A C K, black!  Jake had a good giggle about the sound I made when I discovered this new color. I ran to the trash can to make sure that I hadn’t picked up the wrong box (just to give Garnier the benefit of the doubt- It could have been my fault).  NOPE!  There it was on the box “darkest brown” the EXACT same one I used last time.

So, after I verified that Garnier had indeed failed me, I began to rant!  Why did I have to get a miss-marked box?  I didn’t want BLACK hair, I wanted Dark Brown!  Don’t get me wrong, I have nothing against black hair!  It can be very beautiful!  I just wasn’t expecting my hair to be BLACK! 

The good thing is that it doesn’t look terrible or unnatural.  At least it wasn’t something like blond or red.  Once again, nothing wrong with those colors, but I would have looked ridiculous as a blond. So, it looks like I will be trying this out for at least a month or so. 

I kind of like it…

Project three

Project three: Pillow cases

The Tall One and I were out and about in Franklin on Saturday.  We had lunch at Peking Palace with my brother and sister where I stuffed myself with Empress Chicken and the best wonton soup there is.  Jake was a really good sport, after lunch I went clothes shopping.

I don’t actually like clothes shopping, but I like clothes, so I must do A to get B.  I don’t spend a lot of money on clothes, I shop at Plato’s Closet and Goodwill but I find some good stuff.  Anyway, after shopping and finding too many things we also stopped at JoAnne’s.  It was a quick stop but I always check the clearance bins for the little rolls of fabric they have already cut and priced.  I found this print for a few dollars and decided I liked it enough to make some pillow cases for the throw pillows for the couches.  I found another roll of the same fabric. 

Jake liked it too, so that was a plus.

When we got home Jake took a nap and I sewed these slip covers.  I like em!

Pillow cases, a success.

Project Two

So a few weeks ago I decided that I wanted to make a tote…

I wanted a bag that was big enough that I could throw my sketch book, an extra shirt for when I spill something on myself, a pair of flip flops for when my “cute” shoes are killing me, and other random things that just wouldn’t fit in any of my purses. Essentially something as big as a backpack but cute.  

I had a little bit of scrap material left over so I did a bit of Google-ing for some ideas and after work a few weeks ago I sat down and started at it. The tall one (my husband) sat on the couch reading while I sat at our kitchen table cutting and sewing away on the new sewing machine while we watched In Plain Sight on the Wii with Netflix.  (That’s an awesome Friday night if I do say so myself)

                Let me make a side note:

1.       The Wii is awesome, along with Netflix I have no real reason to go outside.

2.       In Plain Sight has really grown on me. Marshall Mann…oh I could just eat him up!  He is just sweetness personified.  

Ok, back to the tote.  So, I spent Friday night measuring and cutting the material and I sewed the straps.  I knew it was time for bed when I had to remove a seam because I wasn’t paying attention and sewed the wrong pieces together.  I got up the next morning and busted it out in no time. 

I am pretty happy with it as far as size and pocket space.  If I could make it again I would have loved to have had some different material, but since it was basically free and I made it in time it took to watch 4 episodes of In Plain Sight I’m not complaining.  (Let’s call it 3.5 hours…I was distracted my Marshall Mann....)

There is even a pocket on the inside.  Fancy, I know.

Overall, tote was a success, also now completely obsessed with In Plain Sight....

These are my confessions

I am sitting at work, cursing UPS because they have not delivered my shipment of new cases.  You see I work in the office for a Dental lab half of my job is entering new cases.  These said cases usually come in morning before 10:30 am, but they didn’t come yesterday until almost 3:00 when the other UPS guys comes and picks up my shipment to go out at 3:50.  Was a crazy day, and now it is almost 2:00 and still no shipment from UPS.  So, with all my other work done, what is there for me to do?  Blog!!!

Let’s see, I have a confession to make….oh wait.  UPS just walked in.  Hold that thought….

Ok, cases entered and now complete with ALL my work for the day…so as I said before, what is there for me to do?  Blog…

Where was I?  Oh, right, confession making.  My mother-in-law gave me a Singer sewing machine when the tall one and I first got married almost 3 years ago.  It was great!  She had gotten herself a snazzy new machine and I inherited the old machine.  I loved this sewing machine.  It was great, yes; I said was….a few months ago, in mid project, my sewing machine decided that it liked reverse.  It decided that it liked reverse SO much that it just stayed that way; all the time.  I don’t know what happened.  The program light went out, I couldn’t change the stitch length or setting.   My sewing machine was dead.  So, the Totoro Back pack that I was showing off in my previous post was all sew in reverse.  It is hard to sew a project when you have to constantly rip out a seam and start over because you forgot to go the ‘other’ direction.

I had my sister-in-law’s father (mouthful) check it out.  He can fix just about anything, but no dice on this.  So, after checking with local sewing machine repair shops (I am not going to spend money sending it to Singer to have it repaired, too much to just ship) and talking with my father-in-law, it was decided that the sewing machine would have to stay dead.  My sewing machine is over 30 years old and they don’t make the parts for it anymore.  So, Target got $140 out of us yesterday for a new Singer sewing machine.  It is my new precious.  It sews forwards and backwards!!!!!!  Fancy, and it comes with a 25 year warranty.

project one

Well, this is the first entry for Typewriter Orange.  I love the way certain words sounds, and I also love the color orange.  It is just a bright and happy color.  “Don’t you just think orange is the friendliest color?”  Anyway, so the name of this blog is Typewriter Orange.  I have attempted to blog in the past which just turned out to be an epic fail.  I am trying again, but this time I am going to blog about art projects and crafty things and see how that goes. 

First Project to blog about: 

The Totoro Backpack

For those of you not familiar with Hayao Miyazaki’s My Neighbor Totoro, let me say that if you want to enjoy a great film that the entire family will absolutely LOVE, watch it.  But NOT the one with what’s her face Fanning doing the voice, the first one that was dubbed into English.  For those of you who already know and love Totoro, you can understand the obsession that my nephew has with Totoro, or Totro as he is called by my almost 2 year old niece. 

My nephew Brandon loves Totoro, and he always wants to read/look at my Totoro picture book before bed when he visits.  So, when I found out his family would be visiting close to his birthday this year, the idea popped into my head for a Totoro something.  Now I have done a few Totoro related projects in the past. 

The Totoro Hat:

The Soot Sprite Christmas Ornaments:

The Totoro Computer bag (Just a premade bag I screen the Totoro Log on):

And most recently the Totoro Shoes:

Now my first idea was to do a pair of Totoro shoes for Brandon, but plain kids size canvas shoes aren’t as easy to find as I thought they would be AND he can get a longer use out of a back pack than he can shoes, so I shifted my focus.  I have never even attempted to make a back pack before, so I just sketched a little idea in my little handy dandy notebook and set to cutting up fabric and sewing things together. 

The material choice was mostly for color and texture.  Totoro is a soft and cuddly creature, so a Totoro backpack, to me anyway, should be soft too.  I used the same material as the Totoro hat and used a more durable canvas material for the lining.  Note to self for future projects, this soft material gets caught in sewing machine like mad and will make further adjustments for future endeavors.  With that said, the eyes and belly pocket are made of white felt and the black parts of the eyes are just black buttons.  The nose is just black thread.  He comes with a zipper top, hanging strap, and adjustable padded shoulder straps.  Over-all I think he came out quiet cute. 

Sadly I was VERY sick the day his party came, I actually spent the day of his birthday party in the ER…gastro enteritis you are NOT my friend and I hope we NEVER meet again.  So, I missed the big reveal, but my husband was very sweet and took the present over and recorded the birthday boy opening his present.  Which I am happy to say he loves!  The other nieces and nephews immediately began making requests for their own Totoro bags, so I will be hard at work getting the kinks out of the design flaws.  If things work out well, I will try and post them on Etsy to see if anyone else might like to get one! 

Project one: check!