8/1 Hopeless

How to Train Your Dragon. Did I mention I love this movie? Most of this post is HtTYD related, so I felt it appropriate to use a Toothless icon.



Dang straight I am. lol...


Previous posts:
Planning on Catching Up
Visiting My Old Teacher
Playing with Glue
A Book I Read
Jamboree and Failed Meeting
Randomness
A Bird Bath Project
A Clean Room
Sled Run
Game Cube and N64
A Short Post



Okay, so a couple months back, one of my teeth broke. It's only half a tooth now. And I still have problems with my wisdom teeth - one's falling apart before it can come out, the other is pushing all my teeth out of line. Now, when I bite down, only one set of top and bottom teeth actually touch, the others are close (or not close at all) but they don't quite reach. It's incredibly annoying, and means I very much prefer only eating/chewing when I have to - i.e. meals. lol. Which, is a good thing, because it will help me lose weight I thinks.

That being said, I still have a sweet tooth. But "sweet" is the worst to eat, because those are the things that like to stick to already messed up teeth...

unless it's cotton candy!! No need to chew cotton candy, it melts in your mouth! Weeee! I've become addicted to this stuff. But now I'm out! I'm going CRAZY! Seriously, when dad sends me out to shop for groceries in a week or so, I'm picking up some more!


Speaking of my dad, he gave me a gift certificate for Toys R Us. Just ten bucks, but what on earth do I get there?! Granted, with some of the money I was given as a thank you for that bird bath I repainted, I went there to get a Murdock action figure... (GO A-TEAM!) but that's the first time I've gone to Toys R Us for a loooong time.

So... what did I get?
*cough* Certainly not another Murdock?! ROFL. *pathetic* When I bought the first one, I simultaneously wanted to hang it up on the wall and open it up to play. I chose to hang it up. Naturally, I sat for maybe half a minute with the ten dollar gift card before I thought of getting another Murdock so that I could have one to open up too! *manic laughter* Have I mentioned I looove that movie???! Actually... come to think of it... I should have checked out their HtTYD merchandise... mayhaps their stuff would have been better than what I found before...


GREAT segway there. Ha.

So yeah, when I first saw How to Train Your Dragon, one of my first thoughts was "I wants a Toothless plushie!!!!!" *drool twitch giggle* So I wandered to the store, and found this:

You. Can. NOT. Be. Serious. WTF is this thing?!?! For those who are unfamiliar with Toothless, here's a picture of him:

Okay, so... does that thing above look ANYTHING like Toothless?! Ugh I was so annoyed. But was quickly happified once I hit up deviantArt.

A lovely lady by the name of Katy A created a tutorial and pattern to make your own plushie!!

I was like YESSSSS!!! Never mind that I've never used a pattern before in my life. I went to Walmart and got some black fabric, and was ready to go! Since I'd never made anything from a pattern, I figured I'd use fabric I had lying around first as a practice round before using the black. But... this was back in May, when I was just entering in blackout mode. I only just got around to actually trying.

This is the only "in progress" pic I took:
Mainly because I was too busy cursing and crying over the pattern/instructions/sewing machine. lol. I think the pattern was made for those who'd used one before, therefore they'd know that, for instance, when a piece says "x2" is means "trace this once then flip it over and trace it again." - Unless it does say that somewhere and I was too busy swearing to find it, which was quite possible. I also chose my cow print fabric, because it was on sale for $1/yd a few years ago, so I bought the last 9 yards of it. And haven't used it for anything. lol. Problem with it? It's more like a canvas type of fabric, so it frays SUPER EASY.

That all being said, I did it. I spent hours and hours on it, mainly because it couldn't all be done via machine and I'm terrible hand sewing, but I did it.


Tada!! Since he's a cow print Night Fury, (Toothless' species is Night Fury) I didn't want to call him Toothless, because he isn't Toothless. Toothless isn't cow print. So, I named him Hopeless.


First it was because I felt the project was hopeless for over 90% of the time, but then he ended up keeping his name because his wings are so floppy he'll never be able to fly. It's hopeless. Hee.



His eyes are made of clay. Katy A made a tutorial on how to make clay eyes as well. These are slightly different than her version though. Hers calls for safety buttons, but I didn't have safety buttons, so I just used wire to make the button loop. I actually mixed glow-in-the-dark paint in with the light blue, hoping to make his eyes glow. But I didn't use enough. You can baaarely see the glow in the dark, not strong enough to take a picture, nor is it strong enough to notice. Oh well. Whenever I get around to actually making Toothless, I'll see about actually getting his eyes to glow.

Actually, I got the Glow in the Dark paint back in may for $2.27 at Hobby Lobby. Then I lost it during the room cleaning process! I was like, noooooo!! So I went back to Hobby Lobby, and the paint went up to $3.27! GRRR! So, you may be wondering, how could I possibly remember how much I paid for it the first time?!! Well, because just now, literally just now, I remembered where I put the first one! And the price tag was still on it. It's unopened, so I found the opened second one, took an exacto knife and switched the price tags. I still have the recent receipt, so I'm going to see if I can get away with returning the old one. I mean, they still have the same barcode, it's just that this first one is a bit worn on the edges - I wasn't keeping it in a flat area.


There's me and Hopeless. He's so totally camouflaged!! lol.


I now have a reason to put this sign up again. Originally, it was up behind my hugemongous cow.

(oooold picture alert. taken... two, three years ago?? when the ex won it for me.)But that cow is now down in the basement. So I took the sign down.


But no more! Hopeless has a cow print perch (i.e. the Aldi box) on my nightstand. Hee hee. And he looks straight at me when I glance back at him from the desk. lol.


And would you check that out? Part of his tail is fraying and coming out from the seam... soon he'll be missing that part of his tail. Just like Toothless. lol. I'll have to make him a neato replacement.


All in all, I hated the experience. From almost the very beginning, I had decided that Hopeless wasn't a practice round, he was the only round. And for the entire rest of the process, that decision remained. It wasn't until after that I realized it was my poor choice of fabric and my poor ability to follow directions that made this project so terrible. So I might actually give it another go. Someday.