Nick N-Nick Nick N-Nick Nick Nick.... Nickelodeon!

I know, I know, I've been missing for a whole week, well it's because we had a Nickelodeon All Access cruise last week on my ship. That means there were costume characters everywhere and slime.... lots and lots of slime!! Here are a few photos I managed to nab while running around after Sponge Bob:

Character Meet & Greets:

Oh! It's Dora!


Fanboy and Chum Chum


Cosmo and Wanda


Geo and Millie


I got my picture with Squidward!

The Sponge Bob Show with Tom Kenny


Patchy The Pirate getting ready for the show


The voices of Patrick and Sponge Bob, Bill & Tom and Andy Pally who writes the music



The cast of the Sponge Bob Show


Tom Kenny, the voice of Sponge Bob - what a lovely man!

Well, those are my Nickelodeon adventures for now, more soon!

Busy Busy Busy!!

I know, I know, I missed Share the Handmade Love on Wednesday! It's been madness around here. Ever since I got back to my ship it's been non-stop! I've been learning the ropes of working with the Nickelodeon costume characters and doing their slimy laundry (don't ask!) and after only 48 hours on the ship I had my hand up SpongeBob's butt!! I had to fix a snap, ok?!

The Nickelodeon stuff is a lot of fun actually. We have Meet & Greets and breakfasts and live shows. One (with the slime) is a full gameshow in our theatre which the kids love. There's a lot of laundry, but not more than I can handle and it's interesting to look after a different type of costume. That's a new special skill on my resume!!

In other news this week I got my first custom order! I'm very excited to be making a belt for the daughter of my new friend Deezie. They liked the belts in my Etsy store but they were all too big for her daughter, so I'm making her a custom one based on my Rock Belt (see it here). In honour of the occasion, here's one of my other belts!

I wanted to create another belt like my Rock Belt and originally wanted to make something a bit more feminine and floral. I used an old pair of jeans that one of my dancers had left for me and was thinking I would embroider on the denim outside with flowers, vines and butterflies. I tried sketching out some ideas but nothing looked right to me. I then discovered as I cut the waistband off the jeans, that the inside of this pair was lined with a white fabric printed with a floral pattern! I decided to follow this pattern and let the design develop organically, excuse the pun!! I started by hand embroidering over the flower shapes in the print with colours I consider to be floral – more pretty and subdued than vibrant, but bright nonetheless. I considered sewing butterflies and other gardeny items on to the belt but it didn’t feel right. I went for the simple approach and just used the original flowers as the focus. I added green vines to anchor the flowers to something, instead of leaving them floating on the belt. I added green beads to represent leaves and green buttons to continue the natural theme.

This a very feminine piece and will look good with outfits in pastel or pale colours – maybe for a wedding or a garden party?!

This belt is currently available in my Etsy Store here

Mermaid's Revenge Choker and Sponge Bob....

Today's entry is going to be a bit twee!! First off, lets do the good news!

I was rummaging through pieces of coral and shells I had collected in Aruba when I found this. A piece of coral with odd colours that inspired me to do something odd with it. I created the choker band out of pink metallic fabric machine embroidered with a scalloped design. I then played around with pink coated wire and made swirling links to attach the coral to the band. The choker closes with a pearl and loop made from knotted thread.

I think this choker is fit for any rambunctious mermaid making her way in the world!

It is available for sale in my store here.

And now on to the not so good news... depending on how you look at it. I was informed by my office today that I am going to receive additional training in April to work with Nickelodeon Character Costumes... Now in some ways this is a good thing. It is a new skill for me to learn and I will be able to put Nickelodeon on my Resume. However, I fear I will be cleaning kid's puke off Sponge Bob... which is not so good! I didn't sign up for slime and kid's snot, that's for sure. Right now it i probably best to focus on the positive ;-) So yay for new skills! Bring on Dora and Sponge Bob.... where they are going to fit in the dressing room I will never know!!