-Jewelry: I had my mom bring me back some beads from India, and I want to attempt something with those (I bought some supplies, but except for one failed attempt at a bracelet this summer–the beads were too heavy for what I wanted to do–I haven’t done anything with that yet.
I have nifty little round boxes to put said jewelry in as a great gift, if i can just get around to creating it.

-Sweater snake: I saw a cute idea at the Candler Park festival this year where they had made long funky snakes out of old sweaters. must try that. would be nifty for boy. So, trip to thrift store or maybe i have something in my closet?

-Xmas cards: OK, not that creative of a project, but a project none the less, so here’s the status…
First step –Pictures *complete!*: I dragged the little pink tinsel tree out of the basement to give me something seasonal for the background, dressed the boy all cute and did a photoshoot!
Step 2– Photoshop (in process): A few pics turned out pretty good, so a little bit of cropping, photoshopping different options — thinking black and white for this, but still working it.
Step 3 — determine how i’m going to do the cards — print them myself? Go through an online print place (used Vista Print last year)?

New this year:–

Sweet sushi (introduced at April Fools day) does a repeat performance. Directions are here

– Creep fingers. I saw something similar in a magazine (may have been BH&G halloween issue) and changed it a bit. I usually do Witches Fingers almond cookies, but decided that that would be too much cooking this year, so this was the alternative. The original pic was white chocolate, but I had several mishaps with my white chocolate this year, so I ended up making them out of regular melted chocolate chips. (A happy accident, as i think the taste of the chocolate with the salt of the pretzels was tastier than it would have been with white) Also, the original had slivered almonds as the finger nails, but I borrowed from my cookies and used whole blanched almonds (split in half so they weren’t as heavy) because i think they look creepier. Easy to do, just dip the pretzel stick in the chocolate, and stick on the almond. I used a cooling rack at a 45 degree angle to hold the pretzels while they dried. The holder idea was also stolen from the magazine. Just glasses, covered in sleeves off an old shirt.

Mozzarella Eyes – A new creation of my own this year. Easy and yummy.

– Monster balls. A test run due to the fact that I had left over Rice Krispie treat mixture and a bag of gummy body parts that I had impulse purchased at Big Lots. They were all eaten, so I guess they worked out! They are pretty self explanatory. The eyes are white chocolate with mini chocolate chips embedded. I glued them on with extra melted chocolate.

-Bone Marrow: Bread baked with smoked sausage and BBQ sauce inside, with the ends split to resemble a bone.

Other Creepiness, Back by Popular Demand

– Flayed Face. Erika created this by layering proschutto into a art store face mold, then filling with a spicy cream cheese and cheddar cheese ball mixture. Lessons learned from last year… shread the proschutto into small pieces or it’s too hard for people to ‘cut’ through. Served with wheat crackers.

– Brain. Old-y but good-y. I’m thinking about changing the dip next year, though, just because I’ve done this one for years. It’s a crab dip in a brain mold – I got the recipe/idea years ago from http://www.britta.com/HW/HWr.html. That’s also where I got the recipe for the witches fingers cookies that I usually do, and I recommend those as well.

– Peanut butter eyeballs. I don’t remember where I got this one, and a search of the internet reveals that alot of other people have it too. But this is a perenial crowd favorite.

And I loved the idea of the glove animals. Now, realize that I’m usually better at visualization than execution (i.e. I can think up all kinds of really neat things to do, but I get lazy when it comes to actually doing it) and my sewing skills are marginal at best. But I digress…

The Materials:
I’m enamored with the idea of doing some of these out of really nice wool or cotton socks/gloves. Knowing my limitations, I decided to go for cheap materials to make my first attempt. So I found these hot pink acryllic gloves in the dollar spot at Target. As I had embroidery thread from a previous unfinished project attempt, my cost outlay was pretty low :)

The Recipient:
I like having a target recipient for my project, and of course my initial thought was that the target of the first attempt would be The Boy. However… the hot pink… at 2, I don’t think his gender sensibilites would have caused a negative reaction, but alas, it just felt too girly. Luckily next door baby loooooves bunnies (and the boy sleeps with a faboo sock monkey that her mom made), so I decided to make it with baby H in mind.

The End Product:
I think it worked out pretty well for a first attempt. I think it would look better (but more of a choking hazard) if it had buttons or such for eyes. I’m claiming my pretty crappy attempt at making the features is an effort in playing up the handmade crafty aspects of the bunny.

The Follow-up:
The Boy, although in theory loved the idea of giving the pink bunny to Baby H, in practice was wanting to take it back home with him. So a quickie bunny #2 was created! (pic to be posted)

The Destructo-bot Tshirt I made. (freezer paper stencil). Click for full post

a bunch of the doodles are posted here..

This is “Highlights from Proto-Dabbled.  Before I started this blog, I had a Live Journal, and these are some of the projects I posted there:

I seem to need a deadline, and christmas was the one for this one. I had the idea of doing these rollup chalkboard placemats months in advance for kid xmas gifts, but of course it was the last minute before they were finished. Details and original post here.

From Proto-Dabbled:

Behold my crafty-ness
For those who have been paying attention, i was lamenting my lack of ability for my ideas to fully translate into reality. Anyway, since the presents have now been given, i saw reveal the gift. I had the idea of making ‘placemat/blackboards’. I took oilcloth on one side, and chalkboard cloth on the other, sewed on some little cute shapes and a pocket to hold chalk, to make a little portable drawing pad. This was the prototype placemat blackboard – this one was given to Sarah. I made one for Erin too (i think it’s actually a little better done. my big concern is that they aren’t as sturdy as i’d hoped, so i hope they stay together!

What’s this place about?

“I have an idea!”
I don’t claim to be the best artist/crafter/builder/whatever but I think that half the fun is trying new things and bringing ideas to life. That’s the moral of “dabbled” . Just do it. Try it. Change it around. And let the world see it when you’re done. “Wouldn’t it be cool if….”

What you’ll find here:

The working title of this “project” (Dabbled, I mean) was Dot’s Unfinished Projects. I seem to always get ideas on stuff I want to do (and my husband rolls his eyes when he sees I have an new idea) and I’ll add it to the list of things to do. Sometimes I buy supplies, sometimes I start, sometimes I actually finish (usually when I have a deadline of some sort), and sometimes the idea just keeps flittering around in the back of my mind. Usually i’m inspired by stuff others have done that i’ve seen on the net, othertimes it’s just out of my little head.

So what kind of projects? Well, anything, but mostly crafty stuff, or food, or art.

What else will you find here? Well, probably links to other cool stuff people have done, stuff that I like for inspiration.

Why this blog?

Up til now, I’ve been throwing all my projects, unfinished and otherwise, into my livejournal, littered in with all the random stuff I post (like the cute things my 2 year old does). This blog is an attempt for an appropriate home to my projects, and other stuff I find inspiring.

Browse and Enjoy!