My Recent DIY Stuff

What's up blog readers? Being on holidays means that I have a whole lot time for myself and freeeeedom! But also with this freedom, boredom tends to strike; however when it does I like to try something new. Something D.I.Y. :)

Recently I have done three DIY projects. Yeah, no. Wouldn't really call them projects... I just like how fancy it sounds. How about I show them in order starting from most difficult to least difficult, okay

1. DIY Bear Keychain

This was something I received in my KK present last year - 'Animal kit of wool felt'

How cute is it?! I'm not a very artsy/crafty person and even though I really admire DIY stuff (especially when I see people do it), I'm just not that motivated to go ahead and make something myself! This is an exception though, because it was gifted to me and I couldn't say no to this cute bear staring back at me ^^

And so the DIY mission began.

Never had I dealt with wool felt before and throughout this mission, I felt rather clumsy (sort-of pun intended). Poking the felt with a needle was a bit of a tedious task and I managed to poke myself a few times (ouch) but drew no blood (thank goodness).

I only took a picture after I was done, nothing at the start or in between as I was busy focusing on the instructions and frustratedly trying to piece the wool and everything together. Took me at least an hour to do and to me this wasn't that easy!

I looked up a tutorial because the sheet instructions weren't enough for me. This bear turned out looking so gorgeous *envies*

Credit: PaperPastels

Now to show you the outcome of mine and how it compares to the proper outcome:

Please don't laugh.

Actually, feel free to laugh. Because I am laughing as I am typing this xD

Firstly, the face/head is no where near as round like a ball - instead it's flat like a pancake! It kind of has a smile like the Joker's and the ears look like two hair buns. Would this count as a pass if I were in say, craft class?? I think this is a fail bahaha.

I did attach the chain part but it wasn't on securely and yeah... I took it off in the end.

I don't think that I was supposed to end up with spare wool felt but I did. And with that I decided to mold together a heart.

Aww, it's because I love you guys *cheesy grin*

Onto the second ~project~

2. DIY Dip-Dye (triple D's, lol whut)

To be honest, I'm not actually really into the dip-dye craze... hypocrite haha but seriously the only reason I decided to do this was purely for experimental purposes. Since it's summer here right now in Australia, people generally prefer to dye their hair lighter and so I thought, now would be the perfect time. I contemplated going blonde but was too afraid of how that would look on me. Mid last year I purchased a box of pre-lightener a.k.a bleach and after reading reviews and seeing pictures, I realised that my hair would turn orange if I only used this box of DIY bleach. And so, I was too afraid of going temporarily orange. I knew that I needed more products to get the perfect blonde but meh, went with bleach first.

This was what I used

If only these colour charts were accurate *le sigh*

Yes, I would have rather gone to a salon to go lighter but I just... I just need to save up first and have better cash flow. And I don't mind dyeing my own hair... been doing it for years and I wanted to see whether I could successfully go blonde on my own.

I was willing to potentially sacrifice my ends for the sake of experimenting.

Under bright, natural lighting

(Don't mind me -  was in my PJ's)

That above, is the result of bleaching my ends twice. The first time turned out more browny-orange and now it's more orange-blonde. Basically I just want to get rid of the orange undertones but yeah... I'll probably need to dye over it.

I have been using a toner shampoo however I haven't seen much of a difference since using it. It probably works best with pure blonde hair (something that I'd like).

Thankfully my ends aren't as bad as I thought they'd be after two rounds of bleaching

 I reckon it looks better curled.

It's really not that amazing but yeah, DIY hair dyes ain't so bad :) Much cheaper than salon dyeing at least!

The next thing I'll do is buy some ash blonde dye to hopefully further counteract the orange/yellow so that my ends look much prettier hehe, wish me luck! And if that turns out well... then maybe I'll go all blonde? Please let me know if I should or not!!

Now to the easiest out of the 3~

3. DIY Studded Headband

By far the simplest DIY

Basically all I used was a bracelet like this and an old headband, and glued together

However using a studded bracelet like so is not ideal because:

• It's studded inside and out - makes it harder to glue
• May require cutting, hence cannot be reversed (in case you want it as a bracelet again!)
• It's genuine leather! Again, would rather use a cheaper alternative/material

I ended up using a cheap $3 one that I remember buying from Sportsgirl, and I noticed how low-quality it was compared to the one above. The cheap one didn't have double-studding (studs only stuck on the strap) and wasn't made from the same material. And it was the perrrrfect length the wrap around the headband - no cutting required!

 Ta-da!

Totally perfect for channeling SNSD's I Got a Boy style - Go Jessica, rockin' out her studded headband~

Of course hers is way more awesome

That concludes my DIY post - hope you either found it interesting or inspiring... actually it's probably more the former than the latter haha. Or neither D:

Thanks for reading! I'd love to ask you a questjen since I haven't in a really really long time~

What would you like to make yourself?

I wish I could make clothes! Or even jewellery :) Maybe one day haha, watch this space ^_<

♥ Jen xx