DIY

I'm not a very crafty person.  I don't really possess those skills.  My dad can imagine something in his head and draw it or go out to his workshop and create it without a second thought.  I think that ability skips a generation, because I suck at such stuff.  It doesn't keep me from trying, though.

At work, I had my cubical adorned with lots of my favorite geeky things.  I had toys and posters and pins and buttons.  But over time, I noticed things started going missing.  Coincidentally, the office "pharmaceutical enthusiast" (that's the politically correct way of saying "crack whore") kept commenting that her son would love some of those things just before they'd vanish.  So I took everything home.  I found new homes in my office for most everything, but all my buttons and pins ended up living in a bag.  Until tonight.  A few weeks ago, I had an idea.  I had a picture frame just sitting in my closet.  The reason being that I cracked the glass on it while trying to frame something for another diy project.  I was pissed, but what could I do.  I was convinced I would find a purpose for it someday, so I didn't toss it.  It's been sitting and collecting dust for three years now.  The idea I came up with was to make a button displayer.

On Sunday, I ventured out to Jo-Ann Fabrics, a store I don't think I've ever been in alone before.  Ken is well versed in Jo-Ann's.  He's crafty, he likes to sew, all that jazz.  He didn't feel like going out on Sunday, so I did myself.  I knew I needed about a yard of fabric and enough foam to sit under the fabric.  It took me a while to find what I was looking for, but I did it.

Tonight, I put this all together.

Here's the glassless frame, complete with matte.

I bought a khaki colored fabric.  I was going back and forth between this and a gray fabric, but the gray one wasn't quite the shade I had in mind.

First thing I did was pull the matte out to use it as a guide.  The foam needed to be roughly the size of the matte to fit properly.  Ollie chose to supervise this part of the project.

I got my scissors out and lined up the matte.

And then Lucy decided I wasn't good enough to do this on my own.

In fact, she was ready to help.  But first she needed to make sure her paws were clean.

Ollie was keeping an eye on her, making sure she cleaned up properly.

Then he came in for a close inspection.  Deciding she didn't do a good enough job, he chased her away.

I cut the foam down to size.

Next up, I draped the fabric out to see how much bigger it was than the foam.

I laid the fabric out flat.

Ollie jumped in to help with the next part.  I flipped the back of the frame and the foam over and pulled the fabric over, wrapping it all up.

Then I shooed Ollie away.  His "help" was getting old fast.  As I pulled each side of the fabric around, I taped it down to the back of the frame.

This is what it looked like after it was pulled and taped down.

Next step was to place everything back into the frame and secure it.

And this is what I got.  Since I'm not a very crafty person, I see the mistakes I made.  I could have/should have pulled the fabric a little bit tighter.  I also should have ironed it, taking out the crease from when it was folded, but (a) I don't know how to iron and (b) I don't really care enough.  I'm going to cover this with buttons.  Who cares about a crease?  I certainly don't.

The next step was my favorite.  I took the bag of pins I had and started attaching them.  I was actually surprised when I had as much extra space left as I did.  I thought what I had would cover the frame completely.  There's a lot of room left to add more.  New York Comic Con is coming up quickly, too! 

I have one step remaining and that's to actually hang it on the wall.  I need to find the right spot in my comic book room to do it.  It will mean moving a few things around, but that's for another night.  I'm a little too tired to do that now.