Crafts – Page 2 – make monster

Testing Kraft-Tex with Waterproof Ink & Stamping, DIY Sew-In Labels (Kraft-Tex Testing V2)

So I left off last time with just treating the Kraft-Tex (washing, mooshing, and then letting dry), with the intention on testing out how well it takes paint. I’ve decided to make a few ‘leather like’ labels to put into handbags or other things. I figured it would take the ink really well, but I didn’t know how ‘washable’ the ink would be after it were stamped.

As a side note, I got my stamps from this guy:

HootOwlPress – Custom Stamps

And I was really super chuffed with how they came out! Don’t let my stamping skills fool you, they’re super awesome on paper and you can get special stamps for fabric (which in hindsight would have been a much better idea).

So here is what I gathered to test out my wee experiment of stamping on Kraft-Tex:

stamping, branding, ink, product branding, kraft-tex — Step 1: Gather supplies.

I used something called ‘laundry ink’ which is a completely washable permanent ink. Be forewarned, it WILL STAIN EVERYTHING YOU OWN. It stained the stamps and my hands, but I will be happy to note this did not decrease the effectiveness of either.

I stamped the Kraft-Tex, making sure I loaded up the stamp with plenty of ink. I held it onto the material for a few seconds before slowly (I REITERATE: SLOWLY) peeling off the stamp, making sure nothing moved in the process.

stamping, crafting, kraft-tex, DIY, product labels — Step 2: Admire your stamping skills. Success! Kind of. I wasn’t that careful with these because they were just an experiment. I didn’t really think at this point that they would hold up. I am a pessimist.

I let them dry overnight before attempting Stage 3.

kraft-tex, washing, stamping, DIY, product labels — Step 3: Set up the washing station. Please admire my use of eco friendly laundry detergent in this endeavour.

To really drive the point home, I used scalding hot water and plenty of soap. I let the Kraft-Tex soak for 5 minutes before really scrubbing them, in essence, trying to rub off the ink.

Sweet!!! No loss of the inked image after soaking and scrubbing. I promise I’m not working for these guys and trying to promote their product because I’m getting kick backs. These experiments are mostly to settle my own curiosity and to understand the limits of this weird material before making things out of it.

I let them dry overnight, and the results were pretty awesome. They turned more ‘supple’ like leather, but there was no loss of the stamped image, nor did they break down. I’m pretty happy to use these as product labels that won’t degrade if they need to get wet. Nor does the laundry ink smear or fade after washing.

Craft Room Organizing and Stash Show and Tell

I haven’t really been much lately for doing things around the house… My excuse is that I’ve been in and out of the house since March, half living up on Ballina and other jobs. I got it in my head to at the very least unpack all my craft stuff and take stock of all the things I haven’t touched in a while!

Olive Tree Markets, fabric stash, remnants, Japanese cotton, craft room — Some Japanese cotton fabric remnants I got from the Olive Tree Markets

Fabric stash, fat quarters, Amy Butler, IKEA, craft room, unorganised — Old fabric stash, mostly from the US which I brought over in my suitcase.

fabric stash, craft room, unorganised, so much pretty fabric — Other fabric stash, mostly from Australia ($$$$) and the bottom one’s are from IKEA

Japanese cotton fabric, Nippori Fabric Town, stash, craft room — Stash of Japanese Fabric from Nipori Fabric Town (Tokyo)

craft room, fabric, stash, unorganized — Craft room 1.0 before the move, showing my swathes and swathes of fabric yet to be touched

The finished product (if you can even tell)! This is all a very moot point, because the room will have to be cleared out eventually to make room for a housemate when Pat leaves for his pilot training (sob sob sob). But I’ll take it while it lasts! Not like I will do anything, but hey…

What is Kraft-Tex Paper ‘Leather’ and how to treat it

Kraft-tex, fabric — Kraft-tex drying after being washed

I won’t lie, this stuff tripped me out when I first saw it. I was walking through Byron and little shop had these massive leather tote bags in all sorts of metallic colours. The shop owner saw me touching them (because I’m like a 4 year old and have to feel everything shiny), and asked if I knew what is was made of.

“Feels like painted leather” I said.

“Nope, it’s paper!” She replied, smiling as the shock moved across my face.

What. The. Hell.

I spent that entire night frantically googling this mystical material.

The makers of bags are called Uashmama (who have a whole range of cool things), and call it ‘washable paper’. It feels exactly like leather, but it’s a manufactured paper product that’s a vegan alternative to cow hide. I’ve even seen their stuff pop up in Newcastle now, at one of my favourite Hunter Street shops, Studio Melt. I don’t know exactly their source, but commercially it’s available as Kraft Tex (or KraftTex, Kraft-Tex depending on where you look).

But with some more research, I discovered that this isn’t some new technological miracle, it’s been around for ages. If you own a pair of jeans with a leather name tag on the back, it’s probably not leather, but this Kraft Tex.

Of course I bought some. It comes in bolts like fabric, but feels like card stock. The website said to wash it once to give it a bit of texture. So this weekend, I decided to see what happened when I washed a bit. I didn’t send them through the machine, but soaked them in boiling water for ten minutes. After they became soft, I crumpled them and molded them a bit to get that rough texture. After drying, as if by some miracle, it turned into a really supple leathery material!

The next level is seeing how well this takes fabric paint. I bought some silver over the weekend, and in my head I have some really cool accent pieces for tote bags I want to do.

Japanese Seed Bead Wrap Necklaces and Packaging

Full disclosure: I’m not a jewelry person. I haven’t worn earrings since a New Years party… Nearly a year ago (side note, damn this year has gone fast). Necklaces for me are tiny neck prisons that always threaten to snag on an unseen nail somewhere and strangle me to death.

I felt this up until I started my recent purging and Ebaying of the majority of my crap in an effort to de-clutter. While cleaning out those IKEA drawers to get them ready for painting, I found an old necklace I made YEARS back.

seed beads, necklace, glass beads, wood beads, multi strand — First necklace I ever made!

It was my first attempt at making jewelry that didn’t involve embroidery floss and knitting. I thought it was pretty cool and I remember wearing it a few times! It was delicate enough to where it didn’t annoy me, was green, and asymmetrical (I’m not a fan of symmetry). Not blowing smoke up my butt, but I thought it was pretty cool 🙂

I became inspired to make the same style necklace, but also be able to have variable lengths depending on what mood you happened to be in. Long flapper style, doubled up, or 3 layers of a choker style. They can also be wrapped around your wrist/ ankle as a layering bracelet!

So, while messed up from my recent orthodontic adventures (re: not going outside because I look like a TMNT villain) I made one and became addicted. I ordered a fat stack of very nice seed beads and other bits from Fire Mountain Gems ($15 flat rate shipping to Oz, whoop whoop!) and went into production…

More photos of them later, when I can model (aka I’m not a hot mess from spending the day in the sun doing chores and crap) and show them off. But for now, here’s the packaging that I came up with!

product packaging, wrap necklace, DIY packaging, jewelry packaging — Wrap necklace packaging, version 1 (embroidery floss spool inspired)

Keeping with the “wrap” theme I modeled them off of embroidery floss bobbins. When I get the stamps I’ll put the logo and art on them.

The shadows are pretty awful since its so late in the day, but, oh em gee that orange…

Saturday Project: Before and After Dumpster Find Mannequin

mannequin, dumpster dive, repurpose, DIY, recycling, spray paint — Dumpster dive mannequin find before and after spray paint

I will go on and admit my secret shame: I dumpster dive. Not as much as I did back in the States, but if I see something interesting in the trash I have no shame picking it up. Australians also seem very good at putting their “nice trash” outside the dumpster… Council Clean Up Day, anyone!?

When I lived in downtown Newcastle the back entrance to my place was an alleyway where all the shops would dump their trash and it would sit for weeks before they got it emptied. Awesome for when my partner wanted to make seating for the veranda out of palettes, not so cool when it piled up and you couldn’t open the gate.

But I digress. One day I found this little gem shoved awkwardly in the side of the dumpster, probably by the guys who ran a t-shirt printing business at the end of the alley.

I carried it back up to the apartment much to the shock and horror of my partner.

Something needed to be done with it. I had all of these lofty ideas to paint it, put all sorts of designs on it, decupouge, cover in fabric or duct tape… None of this ever happened. I hauled it from one house to the other, thinking it would eventually go in the bin again.

I got some kick up the ass when I was home for a weekend and figured the very least I could do was spray paint it. One trip to Bunnings and $7 lighter, I had a can of blue spray paint.

I went to town on this thing. The partner tried to give me a few pointers (which I promptly ignored, even though he is amazing at anything DIY), and in about an hour it was done.

One thing I will recommend: clean off any marker before starting! I gave the mannequin a good wash but couldn’t get off the permanent market. I should have dissolved it with something to get it off, because as I was spraying the marker would dissolve from the paint. I wound up just giving it a first coat and letting it dry for a few hours but I could have saved myself some time and some of the nightmarish imagery.