Love, Robot Pop

Etsy Fort Worth January Craft Challenge

2012-01-31T23:56:00.003-06:00

This tutorial is my entry for the Etsy Fort Worth January Craft Challenge to upcycle disposable sushi trays. For my project I chose to dismantle and shrink my sushi tray into funky beads and charms to create two different necklaces and a bracelet. I often use vintage, repurposed and found items in my jewelry, so my tutorial is a little more loosely written and should be considered more of a source for inspiration to create your own sushi tray jewelry than an exact tutorial to follow step-by-step.

To start off you will need a clean, dry sushi tray made of number 6 plastic(this is the number inside the recycling triangle on the bottom of the container), cutting mat and an xacto knife. I used every bit of my tray to create my beads and charms, minus a few little shards that I cut off to straighten out sides and remove sharp/jagged edges. My tray had nice little rectangles in the bottom. I used the imprinted lines as a cutting guide. I then just cut randomly sized shapes from the other pieces of the tray. The pieces which turned out best for me were about 0.5 to 1" wide and 0.5 to 2" long.

Once you have all of your pieces cut out punch some holes where you want to attach charms and to create random patterns(oopsie, forgot to take pictures at this step). The pieces with extra holes actually curled up a lot better for me. For the next step you will need an oven, cookie sheet, parchment paper and your cut pieces. Make sure you have plenty of ventilation! The plastic gives off fumes, which you want to breathe in as little as possible. For this step I recommend doing a test batch or two first to figure out optimal temperature for your oven. For me I found 215 degrees for a few minutes worked best. Place your cookie sheet covered in sushi tray bits in your preheated and well lit oven. Squat or sit down and WATCH your pieces. DO NOT LEAVE THEM UNATTENDED! After a minute or so they will begin to dance and curl. DON'T PANIC! Keep watching until they stop rolling around like a fortune telling fish, then put your oven mitts on and carefully remove the cookie sheet from the oven. Set the sheet down on a towel or top of the stove to cool off a few minutes, and turn off the oven. There will be pieces that are beautiful and there will be unusable ugly pieces. Don't fret, just go with the flow and have fun with the funky unpredictable shapely beads and charms that you can use.

Now the fun part begins! To begin making some sushi tray jewelry you will need: round nose pliers, wire cutters, another pair of pliers(flat nose, nylon, round nose, etc will work fine), jump rings, some chain(old necklaces work great. You don't have to buy new supplies to make new jewelry.), 22-26 gauge wire or eye pins, head pins, clasps, some beads/pendants/charms(again you don't have to buy new. Look in your jewelry box, junk drawer or supply stash for fun stuff to use to make your piece fit your style.) and your new sushi tray beads and charms.

First up is this asymmetrical necklace made up of beaded chains:

To begin you will string a few small beads on small lengths of wire or eye pins, then use your round nose pliers to make a matching loop on both ends creating pieces of beaded wire similar to those pictured below. Next, attach your beaded wire pieces together to form two lengths of chain that are at least 7-9" long. You will also string some of your sushi tray beads that formed a tube shape on eye pins. Use jump rings to attach together some of your sushi tray beads and charm pieces. Not all my pieces formed perfect tube beads, so I just looped jump rings through the holes I punched. You will need a 16-20" long chain of your sushi tray beads.

One you have your chains completed you will string one end of a thin necklace chain through the eye of one side of your sushi tray chain. I used a broken necklace for my chain. One end had an existing oval closure with a circle opening on either side and an existing jump ring. I attached a jump ring through a punched hole of one of my sushi tray charms and the open hole of the necklace closure. At this point I also added one end of each of the other two beaded chains I created. I then opened the existing necklace chain jump ring and attached the other end of the necklace chain and closed the jump ring. This created a double length of necklace chain, which allows it to slip easily over my head with no clasp. If you would like a clasp you may attach one at the point where the necklace chain and sushi tray chain meet. You should now have two free dangling ends of beaded chain. The easiest way to figure out attaching points for these chains is to put the necklace on. Pick up the loose end of the chain you want on top and bring it across to the other side of the necklace to make an asymmetrical U. You are going to form the lower inner chain first. It should be a little higher than the sushi tray chain. Open the jump ring where you wish to attach the chain, loop it on and close the jump ring. This part is really open to personal preference. You may have to shorten or lengthen some of your chains, so that they fit comfortably on your proportions. You will repeat the same steps with your second beaded chain, so that it hangs slightly higher than the first beaded chain. For my necklace this was two jump rings up from my first beaded chain. This is where I stopped on my necklace to keep it removable without a clasp. If you wish to use a clasp you could keep adding sushi tray or beaded chains in the same or opposite direction.

I then went on to create a triple layer necklace and bracelet. The layered necklace could easily be adapted to only one or two layers.

The base of the necklace is the chain the fan pendant is on. The chain is 18" long with a spring clasp, but can be made any length you are comfortable with and use any clasp you like. I used a vintage red plastic fan pendant because I felt it went well with the design on the sushi tray, but feel free to use any charm or pendant with multiple holes for attaching charms. The sushi tray charms dangling from the fan were created by running a head pin through a sushi tray bead, then making a loop with round nose pliers, and attaching the charm to the fan with a jump ring. As you can see, some of the charms on this necklace have a more conical or angled shape at one end. This look was achieved by cutting one end of my original sushi tray bits at an angle, so when they shrunk they formed the shapes you see now.

For the chain layer I placed above and behind the fan piece I first cut an 8" piece of chain. I then created 14 single sushi tray charms, 5 2" lengths of chain and 4 sushi tray eye pins. Next connect one single charm to each of the sushi tray eye pins, and one single charm to the end of each 2" piece of chain. Then, starting at the center of the 8" chain attach a jump ring with one single charm and the end of a 2" piece of chain. Moving one inch out from the center attach another jump ring, single charm and 2" chain, then move out another inch and repeat. Repeat the same process with the other two single charms and 2" chains on the opposite side of the center charm. Then attach one of the four double drop sushi charms in the center of two of the single drop charms and chains, then repeat, so that when finished it looks like the image below.

You will then use small jump rings to attach the ends of your 8" chain to your first 18"(or selected size) chain. To do this measure 4"(or add one inch to this for every 2" larger than 18" that you went) down from one side of your clasp and attach one end of your 8" chain. Then, repeat on the opposite side of your clasp. This will give you an inner chain of about 16".

For the third, lower section, of my necklace I attached 5 hexagonal filigrees in a V pattern. They are held together by looping a small jump ring through the sides where they touch. I had two holes on each side, so I used two jump rings to give more stability and hold the V shape better. Next you will need 3 long sushi tray charms with one hole, 2 short sushi tray charms with one hole, 2 long sushi tray charms with a hole at each end and 4 eye pin charms. To make my eye pin charms I strung one red bead, one clear bead, a center punch sushi tray curl, one clear bead and one red bead, then closed the wire in a loop with my round nose pliers. Once you have all your charms attach the two short single hole charms to the long charms with a hole at both ends. You will then use jump rings to hang one long charm at the outside of your V, then moving inward hang an eye pin charm on the next open side, then a double sushi charm, then eye pin charm, then single long sushi charm(this one hangs from center point on a hole a bit higher than others), then eye pin charm, then double sushi charm, then eye pin charm, then end on final open side with your last single long sushi charm. You will then attach a jump ring to the outside point on either side of your V pendant. Add a 6" piece of chain to the jump rings on either side of the pendant. Next measure 2" down on your main necklace chain from the point where you attached the previous section of chain. At this point add a small jump ring and one end of your chain on the V section. Repeat on opposite side of necklace. You have now finished the triple layer sushi necklace.

The final piece I created from my sushi tray was this bracelet. It does not use pieces I shrunk in the oven. To make it you will need: 4 pieces of chain, jump rings, pliers, a 1/16" hole punch, 8 or so small rectangles of sushi tray and a clasp or some sort of closure. First punch a hole in the corner of each of your sushi tray pieces.

Next, use jump rings and pliers to connect the sushi tray pieces together with the jump rings.

Once all your sushi tray pieces are connected lay it across your arm a few inches up from the base of your wrist. This will be the resting point of the bracelet. Using your thumb and middle finger to press the two end points of the sushi chain to your arm and lift your arm to check the distance between the two points. This will help you determine what lengths of chain you need. For mine I needed 4 pieces that were each barely longer than an inch. However, to determine your length measure your closure and subtract that length from the total distance you still need to cover. Then half the distance you still need to cover to get your chain length. For my closure I used 2 double strand to single strand pieces and a large carved bead on an eye pin. You can replace the double to single strand pieces with a single jump ring and use a clasp instead of the bead. I made my bracelet without an opening closure, so it fits me more like a bangle.

Thank you for visiting my blog and reading through my very long, wordy and picture heavy tutorial for some ideas on sushi tray jewelry. I hope you are leaving feeling inspired to create a piece of your own! I would love to hear your ideas and see your recycled sushi tray projects as well.

Please take a minute to visit my online shop and don't forget to vote for your favorite upcycled sushi tray project on the Etsy Fort Worth blog.

P.S. This is the first tutorial I've ever written, so please comment or email me with any questions you have.

Fall Arts Goggle

2011-10-07T18:52:00.001-05:00

This Saturday, October 8th, I'll be at Arts Goggle from 4 to 10pm with several other artists from Etsy Fort Worth. We'll be set up on Park Place between Enderly and 8th Avenue. There will be free food and drinks, as well as, tons of awesome handmade items. If you're trying to find me, just look for the small girl with bright pink hair and sparkly cat eye glasses.

I'm going to have a lot of new jewelry out for fall and winter, plus some adorable Halloween packaging and special surprises for customers. All $5 items, including earrings, rings and brooches, will be buy three get one free. Also sign up for my brand new email list at the show for a chance to win a $20 gift certificate to use online or at Cowtown Indie Bazaar October 15th.

Robot Pop now accepts payments in the form of cash, credit, trades or robots! Yes, robots. Bring me a robot of any kind for my collection and receive a discount or free jewelry. Trades and robots are subject to certain restrictions and must be mutually agreed upon by both parties involved before being accepted for payment.

One Sweet Giveaway

2010-07-05T13:14:00.000-05:00

I have one sweet cupcake themed blog giveaway to tell you about! My dear friend Margaret, of Hearts & Home, is doing a giveaway on her blog, and not only can you win one of her adorable aprons, but also a Robot Pop Cutie Cupcake Necklace and pack of Upcycled Paper Stickers with cupcakes.

The giveaway starts today and ends Monday, July 12th at 10pm CST. To enter simply visit the Hearts & Home blog. Complete prize descriptions and ways to enter are on the Hearts & Home blog.

Best of luck, and thank you for stopping by!

Stephanie

Panther City Bar Bazaar

2010-06-11T11:51:00.000-05:00

I'm very excited and happy to announce that Robot Pop will be a vendor at Panther City Bar Bazaar on June 13th. The event is being held at Lola's Saloon in Fort Worth from 12pm to 8pm. There will be handmade items by local artists, bands, and food.

I will have many new designs and old favorites with me, plus I have a special promo posted on my Facebook page for all my friends who come out and see me in person! I will also have extra surprises for anyone who spends $20 or more.

Vendors include many talented Etsy Fort Worth friends, such as Blueskysunburn, Handmade Hooligans, House of Smash, Sincerely Serenity, Soap Addict, Vera Harris, and Neke Designs, plus many other local DFW artists.

Bands include Sally Majestic, Chatterton, James Hinkle, Scott Copeland And Carey Wolf (song swap), John Stevens, Taylor Craig Mills, Scott Vernon, and more.

Burritos will be provided by Fort Worth Burrito Project, a great local charity that helps feed homeless around the city. Please check them out.

More info is available on my Facebook page events tab. I hope to see some of you there!

Blog Giveaway

2010-05-17T12:28:00.000-05:00

My friend Blueskysunburn Creations is having an awesome blog giveaway this week. She's not giving away just one painting, but three, and they're comic book themed! Head over to her blog Trial and Error and comment to enter. Entries must be received by May 22.

Also check out her Etsy shop Blueskysunburn Creations for prints and original mixed media paintings.

Let's Get Baked

2010-04-20T12:46:00.000-05:00

In honor of today, I thought I would put together a little favorites post. I hope you find the humor in it. I had a lot of fun putting this together.

Vegan brownies from Laura Etoile. She's Etsy Fort Worth's resident baker, and makes some yummy looking vegan treats.

I love this forest green hemp/cotton purse from Tippy Thai. It looks so roomy and soft. This shop is full of beautiful hemp purses and is now one of my new favorite shops.

Gaia Conceptions is filled with gorgeous handmade clothing including this summery dress. Everything looks so comfy and pretty at the same time, and is made from organic and eco-friendly fabric. They even hand dye the fabric.

This vintage canister is the best place to stash your snacks. Vintage Avocado is full of wonderful treasures from the past.

Do you dream of having seriously cute shoes? Then you need to check out Em and Sprout. They have many styles of Mary Jane shoes like this monsterific Frankenstein pair. They also have incredibly awesome clothing and felt accessories.

This last one is a little obvious, but I couldn't resist.

These are felt catnip toys. Perfect gift for your cat loving stoner friend, if you have one. If this isn't quite your style, but you still want kitschy and weird cat toys, then you need to check out Oh Boy! Cat Toy. They use 100% organic catnip and eco friendly fabric, so you know it's safe for your furry friends.

♥ Stephanie

Hot Studs!

2010-04-17T13:31:00.001-05:00

No, I'm not featuring handsome dudes today, but I did want to let you know that my Mellow Maisy Mushroom earrings are featured on this blog post by Vintage Fix. Also check out her Etsy shop. She has some really great finds. Like these...

♥ Stephanie

Fungi Forest

2010-03-26T23:05:00.000-05:00

I'm starting to work on some ideas featuring mushrooms for my own shop, like the Woodland Mushroom necklace above, so I thought I would share some other fungi items I found on Etsy.

I have to buy this mushrooms of the world tee shirt from Critter Jitters! The colors and design are just perfect, and the price is pretty reasonable at just $20. They also have a warm colored version available.

These postcards are so adorable, I would probably hang them in my daughter's room. Also another nice example of variety in the mushroom world. You can find these and other adorable and geeky items in Scientific Culture's Etsy shop.

If you embroider, A Little Sweetness has just the right pattern for you. I love the little hedgehog at the bottom! She has lots of cute mushroom themed embroidery patterns in her shop.

I love Corrabelle's hand carved stamps. Melvin the Mushroom is just one of many forest themed stamps available in her shop.

I hope you enjoyed this little trip to the woods to visit some fungal friends!

♥ Stephanie

P.S. Please let me know if you have any theme ideas for favorites posts. I'm always on the lookout for inspiration.

Cowtown Indie Bazaar

2010-03-22T13:55:00.001-05:00

Etsy Fort Worth will be having their first ever Cowtown Indie Bazaar on September 4, 2010. They are now accepting vendor applications and sponsors. The event will be held at Will Rogers Memorial Center in Fort Worth, TX. Please visit the site for more info, applications, and sponsorship levels.

I will be participating in this event, so check back here for updates, featured vendors, sneak previews of my booth, and more.

♥ Stephanie

EFW Grayscale Love

2010-03-21T02:08:00.002-05:00

For this installment of Robot Pop favorites I thought I would stray from my adoration of bright bold colors a little bit and feature some of the talent of Etsy Fort Worth in grayscale. There were so many wonderful and diverse items to pick from it was hard to choose just a few. Above is an image of my Ash Rose Cocktail Ring, which is currently available in my Etsy shop. Below are my favorites featuring shades of white, gray, black, silver, and everything in between.

First up we have the inspiration for this whole thing, the Mood Swing necklace from Casey's Clutter. Let everyone know how you really feel by changing out the black and white text to one of four included buttons that feature emotions. Total genius!

It's okay to be the black sheep with this adorable Little Lamb soap from Annie's Powder Room. I have a few bars of her soap, and trust me it smells amazing!

Sweethead makes gorgeous headbands with feathers, rhinestones, sequins, and ribbon, like this sophisticated gray beauty. I love how the gray feathers give it a pretty understated vintage look.

Searching for an apron to remind you of a bygone era? Hearts and Home has these full length bib aprons for the young and young at heart, as well as, a selection of girls dresses, aprons, and civil war era costume pieces.

Emma Alison Designs makes jewelry that's perfect for a date night, or any time you want to feel extra special. These Blossoming Branch earrings are one of my favorite items in her shop. I'm in love with the simple elegance of the organically shaped metal. These would look great with the headband featured above.

If you would like to see more work from the creative minds of Etsy Fort Worth please head over to Etsy and search Team Fort Worth. Or just click that link because I already did all the hard work for you. Thanks for visiting!

♥ Stephanie

Work in Progress: Crochet Cuff

2010-03-15T15:20:00.001-05:00

Ok, so I'm starting to get back into crochet again. I don't have a ton of time to work on big projects right now, so I needed to come up with something that would be quick, but also show off the pretty yarn I have in abundance. My solution=crochet jewelry. I haven't gotten very far, but here's a cuff I've worked up so far.

It is made from hand dyed, hand spun wool yarn in pink, green/aqua, brown with red or green angelina, and cream. The pink and green/aqua feels soft and smooth, the brown is a little bit rougher, and the cream is really thick and thin and nubby. This one was sort of a happy accident. It went from me wanting it to be a hat to a scarf to a pendant necklace to a statement necklace to a cuff. I think it worked out for the best.

I crocheted simple circles from the different colored sections of the yarn(yes, this was all one ball), then attached them by crocheting around the edges with the cream yarn. I also used the cream yarn to close up the cuff and the holes between the circles. I'm still deciding on whether or not I want to add a few vintage buttons. Opinions? Also still undecided on whether or not I want to sell it. I love the funky shape! I have another similar ball of yarn in the same colorway, so theoretically I could make another similar cuff.

I can't wait to make more crochet jewelry, especially now that I rediscovered a lot of my wonderful yarn stash hiding in the closet. Look for more fiber based jewelry in the shop soon!

♥ Stephanie

Funky Finds Spring Fling

2010-03-10T01:12:00.000-06:00

The Funky Finds Spring Fling will be here this Saturday, March 13th, and I can hardly contain my excitement! I won't be there as a vendor, but I will be doing all I can to support my lovely Team Fort Worth friends. It is from 9am-3pm(or later) at Will Rogers. Please visit us and frolic with me in a sea of craftiness! Below are reasons you NEED to be there:

1. Join in on the Team Fort Worth scavenger hunt and get an awesome handmade tote for shopping, but you have to be one of the first 50 to turn in your card.

2. Be one of the first 50 visitors to purchase 5 raffle tickets from Funky Finds and get a neat swag bag filled with goodies from Team Fort Worth. Including stuff from Robot Pop made special just for the swag bags. Here's a sneaky peek, shhh:

3. You get to hang out with a bunch of cool crafty people from Team Fort Worth, as well as, lots of other local artists and crafters.

4. There will be music and food.

5. The event is pet friendly. There will even be animal adoptions at the event.

6. It's totally FREE to come!

More info and directions are on the official website for Funky Finds! Hope to see you there!

♥ Stephanie

Yellow Roses

2010-03-06T18:52:00.004-06:00

I live in Texas, so yes, it does seem obvious when I say I love yellow roses considering the song and all. However, I think they have a special sweetness and honest beauty to them. Red roses are just too traditional for me. I'm really not much of a rose person in general, but I have a special place in my heart for yellow roses. I didn't quite inherit my father's green thumb either, so having any live roses around is out of the question. My solution for providing myself the needed happy eye candy of yellow roses has come in the form of faux handmade lovelies like the ones below.

These roses look so realistic, but they're actually pretty soaps. I imagine these being placed on a pretty aqua colored dish in a shabby chic guest bath. Satin and Birch has soap unlike anything I've ever seen.

There's this sweet ponytail holder in my shop right now. It's made from vintage fabric I inherited from my crafty great-grandmother.

Sweet and innocent, perfectly describes the dresses by my friend Makayla's Creations. They remind me of the handmade frilly princess dresses I wore as a kid.

Knock Knocking has a shop filled with super cute yarn wreaths like this one. I'm loving that the roses are made of felt, which is one of my favorite mediums.

I love the look of chiffon flowers and fascinator headbands. Thanks to Vie Moderne there's a perfect combination of the two available on Etsy.

I hope you enjoy this sunny little taste of Spring!

♥ Stephanie

Work In Progress: Resin

2010-03-03T13:37:00.004-06:00

I haven't made resin in a long time, but last week I decided it was about time I jumped in and experimented again. This is my first attempt at coloring resin and using this mold. I think the colors turned out beautiful, bright aqua, pale seafoam, and mauve. All of them have a top color of pale shimmery aqua. Some have a second layer of bright turquoise, white, or cotton candy pink. A few have a third layer of white. Here's an in the mold picture.

This picture was taken before I poured the white. I had some trouble getting them out of the mold, even with two coats of mold release. I think the mold release was actually holding them in, so next time I'm skipping it. Also the colors extended the drying time because I used a little much. Note to self: find a better way to get just a tiny bit of color in. Here's some more pictures of the unmolded cabochons.

I still need to sand the back edges and drill holes in some. I'm not sure what all these will become, but I'll update you when I figure it out.

♥ Stephanie

Welcome

2010-03-02T01:40:00.001-06:00

Hello, friends! Welcome to the new Robot Pop blog. I hope you will enjoy your visit(s) here. The plan is to share with you an inside look at my work, the work of my friends, and bits from my daily life. There will predominately be info on all things Robot Pop, including newly listed items, works in progress, sales, discount codes, contests, and more. Thank you for stopping by and taking a look around!

♥ Stephanie