Dr. Who TARDIS mini Journal and necklace

I can't wait for the new Dr. Who to start up this month, it's one of my favorite television series! I'm going to miss Matt Smith, but I'm excited to see what Peter Capaldi will bring to the role.  I wanted to do a Dr. Who craft for the blog, but I wasn't quite sure what I was going to do, until I went cavorting on my one of favorite craft inspiration sites, YouTube.  I stumbled across some book making tutorials and because I'm a little nuts, I thought it'd be a lot of fun to do a miniature of River Song's TARDIS journal.

I wasn't satisfied with the tutorials I found.  The crafters did a fine job with their materials and came up with some great journals, but they didn't look like the stills from the show.  They'd glued
something, usually card stock or cardboard on the top of their existing journals, which gave very sharp edges to the journal, however the prop makers seemed to have embossed the leather instead. I wanted something that looked closer to the prop, so I went looking for a material that I'd be able to work with that wouldn't cost me a ton of money.  I had some craft foam left over from a previous project and so I decided I'd give it a shot.  I think it looks a little more like leather than some of the examples I saw.  Of course, after painting, mine's not an exact copy of the journal from the show, either, but distressed items rarely look the same.

I wanted to make a necklace after seeing some of Jill Weisman's beading tutorials on YouTube, so this was a perfect opportunity to combine them both into one very stunning necklace.

Oh, and NEWS!  I have an Etsy shop now where you can find all of my crafty goodness for sale.  Most of the items listed there will be one-of-a-kind items all inspired from the blog.  You can find the pieces at the shop tab up at the top, too.  It'll take you to Etsy to purchase.  Go check it out!  I'll be here when you return, I promise.  :)

Steampunk Mini Top Hat Tutorial

I love the steampunk aesthetic of layered leather, lace, and metal. I am also developing an unhealthy obsession with mini hats and fascinators, even though I rarely wear them because I don't often have an excuse to get that dolled up.  I think they're all amazing works of art.  Crafty bonus: they're pretty easy!. I learned how to make them from Bev Hale over at Otherwhen Oddities at Octopodicon in 2013. Bev's class used an 8 oz plastic cup and felt to make the hats, but here I'm using craft foam because it's what I happen to have at hand. If you don't happen to have all of these materials, get creative with what you have around. All of the dimensions for this project are directly proportional to the craft foam size I had, which was 5.5"x8". You can scale up or down as you need to.

　
You'll notice that I did not glue a single gear on it. Gears are totally steampunk, but steampunk is not always gears.
　


Difficulty: Beginner. This project will take 1-4 hours depending on drying times and how much stuff you put on the hat.