Menagerie Workshop and Shop Update!

Hello everyone, and - for those who celebrate it in North America at this time of the year - an early happy Thanksgiving!

I had so much fun at last week's Menagerie workshop. I learned so much from the process of prepping and teaching the class, as well as from my four joyful, competent participants. All skilled seamstresses, they were focused, patient, asked fabulous questions and worked with great determination for four hours to make stuffed toys together. We started out in the "do this next" step-by-step way of traditional classroom sequences and then very quickly, each participants found their own pace and rhythm, so that what was left for me was to wander around the room and enjoy watching them instinctively assemble their plushie from its disparate parts (and occasionally poke my nose in their business to see if they needed any help).

Oh, how I've missed being in a classroom! I loved the intimate size of this class, which allowed us to chat randomly between sewing an arm, or a tail, or to demo a particular technique one-on-one. So, so, fun. There was a lot of prep to do beforehand, not only of the materials we'd be working on, but even more so to anticipate the best way to teach someone in a brand new setting, with equipment and technology I'd not been accustomed to using. I mean, for the past couple of decades, my mode of instruction with you guys has been tutorials and photodocumentation. And before that, when I was a high school teacher, there were still chalkboards and white boards and OHPs and transparencies (remember those? Sooooo funny). 

Of all the things I've learned as a teacher, the most vital is this: different learning speeds. These days, we talk about different learning styles: visual, auditory, kinesthetic, and I can't remember the others. But more fundamental is the challenge of presenting the same instructional material to a group of learners who, because each is an individual, will process that material at varying rates. And as instinct leads us to slow down for the student with the most furrowed brow, this concept was drilled into us in teaching college; some professor would always be asking, at some point or other, regardless of whether it was a Science or English or Phy Ed teacher's course, "And how will you ensure that the quick learners will not get bored?" 

I almost went the way of the powerpoint presentation, let me confess. I thought I'd run a slideshow of enormous annotated photos detailing each step to guide most of the class even as I backtracked to an earlier stage to review a particularly fiddly technique with others. 

Thank the stars I didn't. Instead: handouts. Which looked just like one of my blog tutorials, with color photos and do-this-do-that in accompanying text. Did it involve more prep work? Sure, but it was worth it. Some participants followed the instructions, others deviated as they felt creative, and anyone could be on whatever page fit their speed most comfortably. 

My one regret is not thinking to take photos. Grrr! I was so focused on being present during those four-plus hours, that I didn't imagine I might want to share that experience with you guys in this post after. I did take one quick shot - just one, and only because I thought the husband and kids might like to see what it all was like - and the participants have kindly let me share it here:

I wish I'd taken photos of the setup of the room, the various animal displays of both Season 1 and Season 2 Menagerie critters, and the sewing tables stocked with notions and materials at the start of the class. When I got home, I recreated the shot I would've taken:

If I ran this workshop again in the future, I'll be sure to do a better job photodocumenting it! I also need to record all the things I'd tweak and those that worked wonderfully, because the learning process for me was at least as exciting as being able to teach in person again. One of the things that really surprised me was how much I liked cutting out pieces of fabric for the participant kits. It felt like mass-producing (which you all know I adore) but without the actual making, and I had so much fun doing it that I made way more kits than I knew we'd need. It certainly gave the participants plenty of choices on the day of, but it was mostly because I wanted to keep going with the cutting and assembling. Well, now I have kits to put in my Etsy shop for you to buy if, unlike me, you actually disprefer cutting stuff out and just want to get right to the sewing!

There are three different Menagerie kits, and each contains almost all the materials and notions you'll need to make that animal, plus the templates so you can make more of that same animal after if you want. You'd only need to supply fiberfill stuffing and sewing thread. I'll include some instructions (you'll get a black-and-white printout with your order, and I'll email you the color PDF version). 

Here, I anticipate a question: Does the kit come with the sewing pattern?

To which I will say that the answer is a bit roundabout, so bear with me as I try to explain.

These kits are intended to be used with your Menagerie sewing pattern, so if you already own that, you'll find that the print instructions, particularly for the Rabbit and Ladybug, are very similar. If you don't, the print instructions accompanying each kit may be adequate if you already have some experience sewing stuffed animals. There might be some Menagerie terminology (like "rolled ear") that's new to you and which are explained in the Menagerie sewing pattern, but instinctive people will probably be able to work around it. 

You can buy the Menagerie Sewing Pattern here.

In order of challenge level, I'd say the Rabbit is the quickest sew in that it is a classic Menagerie animal with very simple surface details. The instructions are also pretty basic, with a couple of photos or diagrams.

The Ladybug also comes together quickly but because it deviates a little more from the classic four-appendage Menagerie animal, the accompanying instructions contain more detailed step-by-steps and photos.

The Grey Cat is a new variation on the original sleepy-eyed Season 1 cat, 

so the instructions are correspondingly much more detailed. I'd go as far as to say you wouldn't even need the Menagerie sewing pattern with this Cat kit - the instructions are more than adequate. 

And speaking of patterns, I'm thrilled to announce that you can now buy my Menagerie pattern book. In print! 

Limited numbers of physical copies are now in the shop. The pattern book is the same full-color thing as the popular PDF digital pattern, except in hardcopy, 

and spiral bound for your reading (and reference) pleasure. 

For those who want to sew something a little smaller, 

I'm relisting my Spring Bird kits, 

with the option to bundle them with the sewing pattern if you don't already own it. You can select the option in a drop-down menu and I will email you the PDF pattern file after your purchase is completed. 

Finally, and I'm super excited about this - for the first time ever, there are also some actual Menagerie critters in the shop! I've been hoarding all my prototypes since day 1, only some of whom have found space in my sewing room to live

but as I'm working through the documentation of Season 2, I've needed to make duplicates for the photos. The plan was to release all the duplicates when Menagerie 2 is finished, but I. Am. Running. Out. Of. Space. Plus, I want nothing more than for these animals to find better homes and other children (and adults) who will love them now. So this is the first wave; just seven, each uniquely handmade and one of its kind.

Axolotl

Beaver

Rabbit

Dilute Calico Cat

Grey Tabby Cat

Sperm Whale

Narwhal

Lots more photos with each listing in the shop.   I hope you stop by and find fun and creative gifts for yourself and someone you love!

Emily Has Been Binding Books

This past summer, Emily, back home from her first year at college, found herself a new creative outlet: binding books. These are all gifts for friends. She had an idea of their respective favorite books and set about procuring used paperback versions, taking off their covers and making new ones with fabric and hard paperboard. She designed the new covers on her computer and printed them on vinyl using her Silhouette machine. Then followed heat-pressing, gluing and setting between clamped wooden boards, and painting. 

This was her first book.

The page edges are painted grey at the top of the book, blending into red at the bottom,

after which were added six black crows.

Since this is a duology,

©2024 Emily Teigland

here is the other book.

©2024 Emily Teigland 

Its page edges are painted in reverse, with five crows. If you've read the series, you might know why.

©2024 Emily Teigland

Emily made this set next for a friend who, in addition to enjoying Austen, also loves plants.

She found these endpapers online.

Here are the back covers, with quotes from each book.

This is the next set,

©2024 Emily Teigland

also a duology. Emily used metallic /pearlescent vinyl for these.

I love the intricacy of the vinylwork!

©2024 Emily Teigland

Once again, painted page edges,

quotes on the back, 

©2024 Emily Teigland

And gorgeous endpapers.

©2024 Emily Teigland

Thank you all for reaching out to comment and email me after my last post. I was thrilled and surprised to hear from so many of you, and very encouraged that you're still reading my blog! I have no plans to stop blogging, and I promise that I will post whenever I can. So much happens in our home and family from day to day, and yet very little of it can be reasonably turned into a post in the same way that adventures of toddlers or elementary schoolkids with cardboard swords and bunnies and egg-laying chickens could. For so many years, ikatbag has been a record of not just my projects but also the creative things we've done as a family. So many of our projects, for instance, were inspired by watching my girls in their various play scenarios. Each had a story, was a story - stories even I've forgotten - of princesses and fairies, detectives and world-savers, blossoming entrepreneurs and fearless outside-the-box-ers, of our literal and metaphorical journeys to explore the great outdoors, museums and organized playspaces, as well as the limitless creativity of a child's mind. These adventures were how we stewarded our time, of which we seemed to have a lot then, although it seems just a blink now. "Mum, I'm bored, what shall we do today?" was the soundtrack that seemed to play on loop, and out of that boredom came manic creative lunacy. I love how those early posts so easily allow me to revisit those long-ago days. 

My girls are older now, and other things have fallen into place in their schedules: school, band, sports, friends, travel. Their interests have expanded way beyond what I've tried to nurture as director of creative operations. And they're sharing their own photos on social media, and choosing their own ways to tell their stories. So this space seems a little quieter now that it's mostly just me making stuff. Oddly, it's not anywhere as sad as I thought it might be. Every now and then someone will bring a group of friends over to make posters, or friendship bracelets or - in a throwback to those halcyon summers of middle school - slime. And creativity has begun taking different forms than art-and-craft, too. Whenever Jenna bakes, for instance, it's artistic expression as much as it is therapy or nourishment. And there's music, too - all three girls love being in their various instrumental and vocal ensembles, and that's hard to capture in a photo, or in words. 

And so I thought I'd post Emily's most recent project here today. Not only because it's fun to see, but also because it's fitting - this blog after all, is an archive of what fearless and unbridled creating looks like in our home, and all the accompanying stories of product and process. Sometimes I'm still part of it, and sometimes not. I still get a huge rush to say, "Look what gorgeous thing got made here today!" I'm so happy that you guys are still stopping by to visit, and get to see it.

Speaking of visits and process, I am happy to report that I have FINALLY fixed the https thingy on my blog. The whole thing was surprisingly fraught, actually. I can't remember when all this surfaced but suddenly, some years ago, as a result of some Google update, websites had to switch from http to https to up their security. Now, increased security is always good, especially against hacking and other unauthorized access, plus there were instructions all over the internet promising how easy it was to do it for your particular blog platform. And to an extent, that last bit was true: I got my family blog (a dinosaur of a thing on Blogger) fixed in, like 30 seconds. Then I tried to do the same for ikatbag.

Total failure; nothing worked. Instead: all manner of restrictions, roadblocks and error messages like  You Do Not Have Authority! I eventually realized that it was my custom domain that was complicating things. Numerous forums and hours spent contacting custom-domain-third-party-sellers later, I was no further along. Then I succumbed to my grief funk - or maybe it was the wretched pandemic, I don't remember; it was all one big unhappy party - and UnSafe Blog! got punted to the bottom of my priority list. I rationalized it thus: I wasn't selling stuff directly off my blog and thus not collecting credit card numbers or anything like that, so it would temporarily be semi-OK to leave it as is while I tried to get my life back on track. Still, the thought gnawed at me that people might be leery of visiting ikatbag because of the doomsday messages greeting them each time they loaded the homepage: Unclean! Suspicious Site! Flee To Safety! And so, every now and then, I'd muster the energy to try a different forum, or re-contact some technological help desk that a search engine had newly unearthed. 

Finally, a couple of weeks ago, I got a hot lead. Someone sent me a long, long list of complicated instructions that the husband and I pored over (and he's a software engineer, so that's saying something) in the course of several days. We followed those instructions to a T, and as it seemed to be proceeding in a meaningful direction for once, we tried to have faith,  taking breaks whenever our brains hurt, which was often. There came one horrifying moment toward the end when ikatbag inexplicably and chillingly disappeared off the internet, heralded by yet another fun error message claiming I, the owner, had closed the connection. What connection? What did it mean, closed? I swear my soul left my body and floated in the ether, screaming that its imbecilic owner had somehow deleted its own blog forever, while all the other disembodied soul-victims of virtual scams jeered and hissed I Told You Sos.

Miraculously, my blog reappeared some time later, and the https thing was somehow magically in place, and everything was gloriously secure and I stopped pulling my hair out and stared at the screen and was like, What Just Happened. It was scary stuff. Let me tell you, friends, technology is a giant people-eating monster. 

BUT! I am relieved and glad to say that ikatbag is once again benign and welcoming to all and sundry. Thank you to everyone who endured the sinister warnings and continued to come read my tutorials and ramblings regardless. It may have taken literally years to sort it out, but it's now all good. So spread the word! Invite new friends and the previously-leery! How wonderful to move forward at last!

Until next time,

Star Wars - Millennium Falcon

I am so excited to show you our Millennium Falcon! 

It's a playhouse of sorts for the Star Wars peg people from this earlier post.

If I ever had a craft bucket list, this would've been on it.

Before we go any further, I want to tell you about Lindsey. If you've been around craft blogs for a while, you might've been familiar with Lindsey's blog Filth Wizardry. She is an absolute genius -  her ideas and projects were always way, way, outside the box, mind-blowingly original and so utterly, inspiringly fearless. One of my favoritest of those projects was this Millennium Falcon she and her husband Paul built in 2010 from thrifted items. I remember seeing it and wishing my kids had been into Star Wars (or anything Sci Fi, really) so I had a reason to attempt to make something even close. But it was not to be - as I'd mentioned in the last post, we stayed in a princess phase for a very, very long time, which then morphed seamlessly into a Harry Potter phase, then slime and Minecraft. And by the time Star Wars finally became a thing much later, it felt like the ship had sailed, both literally and figuratively.

Then, more than a decade later, my nephew was born, and the stars aligned so that this year, he became besotted with Star Wars. And I saw this for the second chance it was to make this crazy, wonderful dream project. I pulled up Lindsey's blog and read all her notes, in addition to Paul's, and then very quickly realized that the found objects which were easily accessible 14 years ago were totally not so today. Still, I loved their concept and design for the Falcon, and decided it was worth doing the research needed to locate present-day alternatives to recreate it, if it were even possible.

Seven weeks later, here is my version of their Millennium Falcon - it looks a little different but I kept as many of their original features as I could. 

I'll give you a quick tour. It's essentially a plastic microwave lid sitting on a circular wooden serving tray, with holes cut into the plastic lid for a cockpit

and a fold-up ramp.

Inside the ship, there is a removable partition

 that loosely divides the base into four rooms

The cockpit is an air freshener container whose top can be removed so the regular sized peg people can get inside. Here's Han Solo in it. Unfortunately Chewy, being taller, doesn't fit. 

Although there wasn't an occasion in the movies for all the characters to be together on board, here they are now, all gathered for a photoshoot.

Here are some shots of Kate (now 15!) playing with it. 

Watching her, I felt like something had come full-circle - I think it was the (very) delayed gratification of finally having built this for my kids to play with, even if it was for just a few minutes. There was a tiny bit of Please Can We Keep It imploring but everyone knew that it had always been meant for another little child to own, and we were ultimately excited to think of him opening the gift and enjoying it.

So, let's deconstruct now. I didn't want all my research to go to waste, so I thought I'd do a tutorial so I could share it with you. Here's a funny thing: for the longest time, I didn't even want to commit to painting the peg dolls until I was fairly confident I would be able to build the Falcon, and I couldn't be sure of that until I'd found all the parts I needed. This took a couple of weeks - surfing the internet, going to random brick and mortar stores in search of very precisely-sized items. As an example, the most uncertain of these was the cockpit. 14 years ago, Lindsey and Paul had used a dollar store air freshener, but when I went to our dollar store (and countless supermarkets, Target, Walmart, etc.), all I found were glass plug-ins or rotund plastic things that were the absolute wrong shape. I finally found this at a local hardware store, which led to choosing the correct-size PVC pipe to fit it, and at that point, I knew I could finally begin working on the peg doll portion of this project. So conflated and silly, right?

This random jumble of parts was the first draft of sorts - I ended up tweaking the design quite a bit, and replacing what you see in the photo below with more suitable alternatives in later photos.

As with the peg dolls, I thought I would include links to the various components of the spaceship to save you the research time, should you want to do this yourselves someday. Even this second picture I took below doesn't show all the pieces I eventually used. The black 45-degree elbow joint, for instance, was not the right angle after all, and I ended up replacing it in the final design with a white 60-degree one. Still, it's a good layout of roughly what you'll need.

A: This 13" serving board was from Target here and served as the base of the spaceship.

B: This 11.6" microwave cover was from Amazon here, and was the top of the spaceship. 

All the wood extensions were cut from scraps in my garage, so they can be substituted with other kinds/ thicknesses of wood pieces. 

C: These two front mandible-looking things were cut from 1 x 4 lumber, and are roughly 3/4" thick.

D: The ramp was cut from a long strip of 1/4" x 1-1/2" plywood. I don't remember the exact length of the ramp, but it was about 3", maybe 4".

E: This strip of wood is a placeholder for this photo. I eventually cut two pieces from that same 1/4" x 1-1/2" plywood that the ramp was from. They became the "runners" under the spaceship, which I will say more about later. They served two functions: one, as an anchor for attaching the front mandibles, and two, for the completed spaceship to slide along a table surface later.

The next three items assemble into the cockpit. 

F: This eventually was replaced by this 60-degree 1-1/2" elbow joint.

G: This was a section of 1-1/2" PVC pipe (1-1/2" is the interior diameter; the outer is more like 1-3/4"), cut at an oblique angle to facilitate hardware installation. We had scrap pipe in our garage but you could easily buy a short (2 ft) length from hardware stores like this.

Save the rest of the PVC pipe because you will need scraps of it for two other applications later (not shown). 

H: This is the Glade air freshener.

J: The next two items assemble into the room dividers. I loved this idea from Lindsey's original design, and so replicated it here. The clear cylindrical bit is from a CD spindle holder, just as hers was. I cut off the base and saved just the cylindrical walls. You can buy empty spindle cases on Amazon, for instance, but mine was a donation from a neighbor.

K: The three "fins" became the walls of the room divider thing. I measured and shaped these fins according to the height and shape of the microwave lid. These were cut from scrap plywood which, if I remember right, was 3/8" thick. I dislike putting screws into the edges of plywood, because they tend to split the wood layers, so if you have regular lumber of appropriate thickness, use that instead.

L: These are little wooden discs I had in my wooden blanks stash. Some of these were 1-1/4" and some were 1-1/8". They are surface embellishments for the top of the spaceship. I also used a 2" disc (not shown because it was a later idea) for the cannon mount at the top of the ship.

M: This is a 1" hinge - I only used one of the two in the package.

Now for the how-to: first, the room divider/inner chamber thing. The three "fins" were attached to the cylindrical inner chamber with screws, 

then the entire thing was painted and varnished. 

Next, I built the main floor of the spaceship. To begin, the ramp was attached via the hinge. I pre-painted the ramp and part of the rim of the circular board around the attachment site, just so that as I layered more parts on later, I wouldn't have to shove tiny paintbrushes into nooks and crannies. Attaching the ramp first allowed me to draft the two mandibles on either side so their curvatures matched the appropriate sections on the circular board.

There are three mandibles in this next picture because one of them was a practice piece for getting used to the jigsaw. I am no woodworking expert, but I learned quickly that pre-taping the lines with masking tape really helped with getting clean, crisp cuts, especially with plywood. 

Then the mandibles were wood-glued to the two strips of plywood, 

which we will hereafter call "runners". The runners were trimmed at the top end to match the pointy tips of the mandibles - you'll see this in the next photo.

The runners were subsequently wood-glued to the curved edge and underside of the circular board. Then screws were driven in along the length of the runners. I used a countersink drill bit to drive the screw heads in flush with the surface of the wood so they wouldn't protrude and scratch whatever surface they were resting on. The resulting arrangement was very sturdy. You can also see that this sequence of assembly ensured that there was enough space on either side of the ramp for it to fold up and down easily. 

This is the top view. Because that circular rim of the base was beveled, the mandibles did not lie flush against the edge of the board, so I filled the gaps with wood filler, which looks gross and messy in the photo, but got painted over eventually.

The cockpit was next. The air freshener was disassembled and cleaned out.

The smallest part at the top had no function in this project, so was discarded. The bottom had most of its stem sawed off (this bit was discarded, too). The remaining thing I'm holding would become the front "glass" face of the cockpit.

On the main body of the air freshener, the top opening was cut off to remove the pokey-out bits. 

The PVC elbow joint would need to fit into this opening, and those bits would've prevented that.

This was roughly how these two parts would've fit together, even though I didn't end up using this black 45-degree elbow. You'll see a white 60-degree substitute in later photos.

This is a bird's eye view of the cockpit assembly. Remember the leftover PVC pipe I suggested earlier that you save? You'll need a short piece (1" is sufficient) for an inner collar to connect the air freshener to the elbow. Also visible are my pencil lines showing the position of the inner chamber/room divider on the circular board. This is to ensure I left enough room for it when attaching the cockpit system.

Finalizing the position for the hardware required roughly assembling the entire cockpit configuration and moving it around. I settled eventually on just two bolts, one through the short PVC pipe, and the other through the elbow.

Here's the side view to show you an accommodation I had to make for this particular combination of parts. The rim of the wooden board raised the entire cockpit configuration by about 1/4" off the main board surface, so I used a couple of 1/8" thick wooden discs (again, they were on hand and therefore convenient) to keep everything level. 

 

Once the positions of the bolt holes were finalized, the holes were drilled, and then the painting could happen. The entire wooden section of the spaceship was painted separately from the PVC parts. There is a flat circular disc in the photo below which I'll mention later.

Before the cockpit was added to the board (bolt holes visible in the photo), felt was glued to the runners. It was just easier to add the felt at this stage while the board could still lie flat upside down.

Then the bolts and nuts were put in to attach these two components to the wooden base.

Side shot: the two blue arrows show where the bolts went.

In the picture below, you can see the unpainted collar used to connect the air freshener to the elbow joint. It was hot-glued in place.

This is the completed cockpit. 

and the base of the spaceship at this point. 

Here is the room divider in place. It's a pretty snug fit alongside the cockpit system but there was actually a fair bit of wiggle room even when the lid was on.

On the underside of the wooden board: the felt-topped runners.

The base of the spaceship - completed.

The lid (microwave cover) portion of the spaceship was a more straightforward process to work on. First, holes were cut into the front and side to accommodate the ramp and the cockpit. Full disclosure: the plastic of the microwave cover, particularly the rim, was thick and challenging to cut through with just the exacto knife I was using. It probably would've been very easy with a dremel, but I didn't have one. At the time I wasn't aware of this, but I've since read (on the internet) that people use a hairdryer to soften plastic before cutting into it. Now, given that this is a microwave lid, I don't know if the plastic is especially heat-resistant, so this tip may not work. If anyone tries this, let us know in the comments how it went!

The next step was to sand the smooth surface of the plastic, to give the primer, glue and paint something to grab onto. See that little grey circular doodad? It was the vent of the microwave lid, and you can twist to rotate it. I had plans to attach a satellite dish to it because the Millennium Falcon had one, but eventually decided it might just be one more thing to break off during play, and so left it out.

Speaking of embellishments, there were any number I could've add to the lid to make it more closely resemble the Millennium Falcon, but I chose just a few so that the finished look was symbolic rather than a literal replica. The first was the laser cannon on the top of the ship. It was made with toothpicks glued to a small bit of plastic, and the whole thing glued to a pre-painted 2" wooden disc. This disc, like all the other surface embellishments, was hot-glued to the microwave lid. However,I assumed that because it was centrally-placed, this disc might end up being a convenient knob of sorts to lift the cover on and off during play. With that new function in mind, I added a bolt and nut to make it extra secure.

Six smaller wooden discs were painted and glued on for the Falcon's iconic heat exhaust vents. 

The side airlock was a wooden disc inside a 1/4"- thick ring of leftover 1-1/2" PVC pipe. The actual ship has two airlocks, one on each side,

but I only used one because there was a hole on the other side for the cockpit.

The backlight exhaust thingy was just a section of the rim painted metallic blue.

These are the three parts of the spaceship, with some of the peg people for size reference.

And a couple more gratuitous brag shots.

I had so much fun building this. There are some projects that you want to get done quickly before they turn into those cursed WIPS languishing forever under your sewing table, and so many of those still live in my house. But this was different - I knew from the beginning that this would be long-haul, but the momentum never flagged, and even the problem-solving-research phase felt like a treasure hunt. I can't remember the last time I got to be so obsessively immersed in a craft project - I was both relieved and sorry when it was finally finished!