How To Make Realistic Fake Long Jimmies Sprinkles For Fake Cupcakes And Such In 6 Steps

It took me a long time to know what to use to make these long sprinkles (sometimes called “jimmies”) to make them look realistic. The real candy ones have rounded edges, but the fake ones I’ve seen always have sharply cut edges, which totally look fake and suspend my disbelief. God blessed me with the idea to use the same thing I use for the cupcake icing: latex caulk. Here’s how:

STEP 0:

Gather Supplies

SUPPLIES: YOU WILL NEED:

Caulk Gun

Latex Caulk

Icing Tip with very Small Round Hole (I used a Wilton size 3 but the finer the better)

Duct Tape

Wax Paper

Paint (I use the cheapest acrylic craft paint I can find)

Scissors

STEP 1:

Cut the tip off the caulk, puncture the inner lining of the caulk with something long and sharp (most caulk guns nowadays seem to have a nifty tool on them that flips around for this very purpose…it looks like a metal stick on a rivet, but a metal hanger will also do), load the caulk into the caulk gun. Duct tape the icing tip to the caulk tip.

STEP 2:

Squeeze lines of latex caulk out on wax paper. If you don’t have wax paper, go buy some. You use it often in craft projects, it’s cheap, and it releases the caulk WONDERFULLY. I can’t say enough about how handy it is.

You don’t want thick lines because then your sprinkles will be disproportionate. You want the lines to be thin, not the full diameter of the icing tip. So to help make the caulk stretch thinner, I hold the tip a few inches above the paper and squeeze gently (instead of squeezing hard and fast) while pulling it along. It takes a very little practice.

STEP 3:

Let the caulk dry. It should not take very long at all, maybe 10 minutes. When the caulk is dry you can peel it up and paint it. Don’t paint it on the paper. This will leave lots paint sticking flat off the side of the sprinkle, which will also look flat on one side. Instead, put the paint on your fingers and pull the caulk through it. Then lay it across something thin like tweezers or a knife blade to dry. HINT: Of course, use whichever colors you like best, but I have to mix most of them with a little white to make them look better and not so saturated or bright…in other words, not so fake. OPTIONAL: Once the paint is dry, paint them again with something glossy to give them that candy-coat shine finish.

STEP 4:

The paint should dry very quickly too, probably in less than 10 minutes. Once the paint is dry, cut small pieces to make sprinkles. Do the measurements need to be precise or all the same? NO! The beauty of this is that long sprinkles have a variety of lengths, so your sprinkles will look realistic if they do too.

STEP 5:

Roll the sprinkles just a little between your fingers. This rounds the edges on the ends of the sprinkle to make it took realistic. HINT: Wash the paint off your fingers if you are rolling a different color sprinkle because the paint will rub off and stick to the sprinkle, making the color a little off.

Do this with multi colors for hours and hours (good thing to do to keep your hands busy while waiting somewhere or watching television) and soon you will have a big pile like this:

TA DA!

All pictures were taken by me for use by anyone. Credit is nice but not demanded. Share and share alike, right?

Public Domain April 2015

Another Blog Post I Hope To Do Soon

Coming Soon! (Hopefully!)

Treats For Robecca (Miniatures Typewriters And Robots)

I have no idea when Robecca Steam was actually “born”, but she is one of my favorite Monster High characters and I kind of think she may have been born in July. To me, she kind of might have that personality.

I found a few things I thought she would like, and so, for her “birthday”, I took a picture of her with her presents: 1 bronze typewriter pencil sharpener (vintage) made in Spain, and 4 little robots to decorate her desk (when she gets one). The robots were those polymer grow toys from the Dollar Tree store (where everything is a dollar!).

Dreaming of what she will write when she gets her own workspace…

Incredible Imaginative Futuristic Fashion Doll Art Dresses By Fred Butler For Selfridges (LOVE!)

These dresses designed and crafted by Fred Butler for Selfridge’s are probably the coolest fashion-doll fashions I have ever seen. I just had to share. All pictures taken from Fred Butler’s rad site, http://fredbutlerstyle.blogspot.com/2013/08/weds-aug-7th-barbie-opens-her-first.html. Be sure to check out their blog homepage. They have incredible cool taste and continually post fab stuff: http://fredbutlerstyle.blogspot.com/

The line-up.

Love the detail. These are little wearable pieces of art, for dolls. Reminds me of a fun 1970’s sci-fi movie.

This is just too cool and imaginative for words.

I love this flower outfit.

This outfit reminds me of one of my favorite movies of all time, “Zenon: Girl of the 21st Century”. Probably my favorite of the collection, it would be hard to love it more than I already do.

This is just awesome and exciting. So inspired. I love the colors and the configuration. And those shoes!

Agree? Leave a comment! Be sure to visit the creator’s blog and give them some love! http://fredbutlerstyle.blogspot.com/2013/08/weds-aug-7th-barbie-opens-her-first.html

DOLL TROUBLE By Helen V. Griffith, One Of The Best Live Doll Books Ever

Can I tell you a long story? It’s about a great book I loved as a child and only recently rediscovered. *deep breath* Here goes:

I found and read this book in a Albertson’s or Brookshire Brothers supermarket of all places around the year 1999. I read it while my mom shopped, she didn’t buy it for me and I never saw another copy.
It is about a girl who has a Barbie-equivalent (for obvious copyright reasons named something else) fashion doll that is alive and they do things together, possibly solve a mystery. The doll is very glamorous and a little conceited (but still nice). She had a glamorous name but I couldn’t remember it.
The girl got this doll because she swapped her own used fashion doll for the beautiful living doll at a resale shop (without the owner knowing it—the talking doll jokes that she was stolen). It turns out  the substituted doll had been bought for the friend by the friend’s grandmother and came in a deluxe pack with lots of clothes. The girl substituted her used doll instead. LATER she learned her doll was alive. At the very end of the book, they discover that the doll came alive because of a magic doll cloak woven with metallic threads. The doll’s earliest memory was waking up feeling horrible and itchy because of the metallic threads, and she was alone and frightened, so she always hated the cape. In the last chapter, the girl’s friend put the cape on their own fashion doll, and the book ends with the doll waking up and the girls excited to be able to have adventures together with their living dolls.

 

Fakie Stars! (Novi Stars Knock-Off Dolls) Review!

So a friend of mine bought these adorable Fakie (or “Faki” if you prefer) Stars dolls on Aliexpress, and I thought they were so cute I just had to review them for you. So here we go…

This was the picture of the page my friend ordered from. These EXACT dolls were what arrived. Stellar!

From: http://www.aliexpress.com/snapshot/6067992239.html

Here you can see what holds the dolls in the package: ONE (1) little plastic-coated twisty tie around the waist of the doll, and ONE (1) cardboard tab holding the feet. That’s it! And the dolls arrived looking JUST LIKE THE PHOTO BELOW. Taking them out of the box was so easy, and they weren’t messed up at all, despite crossing a ocean and being crammed in a mail box. I have no idea why all the “name brand” or “big name” dolls are tied down SO much. Did these companies watch “Toy Story” too many times?

From: http://www.aliexpress.com/snapshot/6067992239.html

Here are pictures of the box.

Screw copyright laws. Box front.

Screw copyright laws. Box back.

Screw copyright laws. Box side. By the way, the only thing these dolls smell like is plastic. Definitely NOT “scented”.

Screw copyright laws. Box side.

Screw copyright laws. Box tops.

So they are labelled “Novi Stars” even though they are obviously not the originals made by MGA Entertainment. But you know what? The U.S.A. copyright laws are so draconian and insane, they have earned my disdain. It’s unlikely my friend would have found these awesome dolls without them being called “Novi Stars”. Plus, MGAE ABANDONED Novi Stars, refusing to make more despite them being the most awesome dolls in decades. So you know what? I don’t care if they plagiarize away, those Chinese toy companies. Just please, stop oppressing your workers.

Anyway, they all came with the same red shoes that didn’t really match and so the shoes were removed pretty much immediately. Also, those cheap orange rubber bands that turn gooey and dry-rot into the dolls’ hair were replaced with clear elastic hair bands.

These dolls are just a delight! So cute, I personally think they are cuter than the real Novi Stars dolls. I like the soft rubbery (vinyl?) heads and painted eyes here better (certainly better than the unyielding hard heads and painted eyes of Gail Lexi and Cici Thru). It would be fun to repaint a few, if there were extras. All the eyes were painted the same style and colors, although other sets for sale had different eyes. The paint was fairly straight, although some was painted outside the lines. Not bad enough to be distracting though.Their bodies are clear and glitter is embedded in the plastic. Dolls just don’t get better than that! They are so pretty, like candy.

The quality varied from doll to doll, although the bodies were all the same. The best quality doll is the yellow one. The rubbery (vinyl?) head is firm, so the ply is thick. The hair is perfectly matching goldenrod yellow, fair quality, rooted well, soft, not greasy, and has big curls. Her face has very little glitter, unlike the others.

The clothes are well-made and fit well and actually very pretty and interesting! Some of the materials are good quality, others are not. The blue fabric is super-cheap (although it has nice blue glitter on it), the black fabric is really nice material. She has a halter top that is one solid loop of fabric, so one must take the head off to get the dress off. This is easy to do and not a problem. I much prefer this to having the hassle of tying a tiny bow all the time, and with those ends getting in the way.

The dark blue doll is especially lovely. Her face has a little silver and gold glitter, pleasant but not distracting. Her hair is a nice blueberry purple with alot of awesome dark blue tinsel. She came with pigtails, but my friend put her hair in a bun (very elegant, yes?). Her dress is good quality and very well made. Her head has thinner rubber/vinyl, but still fairly sturdy.

The turquoise green doll is so cool. Her hairline is rather far back on her head, but maybe that adds to her uniqueness. Her head is made of very thin cheap rubber/vinyl. Her hair is rather thinly rooted. It is matching seafoam green with a stripe of blue right down the middle part. It looks good, other than being too thinly rooted. She has ALOT of gold and silver glitter in her face. Her dress is my personal favorite out of the 4. She has a halter top that is one solid loop of fabric, so one must take the head off to get the dress off. This is easy to do and not a problem. I much prefer this to having the hassle of tying a tiny bow all the time, and with those ends getting in the way. The purple fabric is semi-cheap and covered with clear iridescent glitter. The waist has a band of green and purple flowers, good quality trim. The skirt has 2 layers of black net covered in 3 sizes and shades of green glitter, with the glitter sewn towards the inside so it won’t rub off as easily. It’s wonderful and fits well.

The pink doll has a thinnish ply rubber/vinyl head. Her hair is thinly rooted as well, matching pink with a strip of blue rooted down the middle part. It looks really good like that, like cotton candy. Her dress is interesting-ish, but does not fit snugly and is the cheapest-made of the 4. The spangled green is not good quality. I like the black net with foil accents, but the foil and the spangles rub and fall off  with even very minimal handling. The dress is very loose. Her hair is pulled back in a ponytail. It was loose, but it is too thinly rooted to look good down.

The arms and legs are good quality flexible vinyl. The arms are ball jointed and swivel around and out to the side easily and smoothly.

The legs move forward and backwards, but not out to the side. This is absolutely fine to me. They have white plastic joints inside and can bend slightly, like Barbie’s click-click legs.

The head attaches to the neck on a peg. It is easy to pop on and off. It stays on snugly and can move side-to-side but not really up and down.

All-in-all, Fakie Stars are pretty fabulous. I definitely want a set, despite them being shameless rip-offs of Midnight Magic dolls.

WHAAAATTT? Wicked meta, man 😉

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Even MOAR Favorite Monster High Custom Dolls

Just like the title says, I found these from the far corners of the interwebs, and I just love them. It’s pretty impressive how artistic and skilled people are.

LOVE this parrot girl (actually she is a quetzal, albeit a male quetzal O_o). From: http://atelierazyntil.tumblr.com/

VERY cool Abe Sapien Monster High custom doll by FinleyUsagi on DeviantArt here: http://www.deviantart.com/art/Abe-Sapien-Monster-High-381473006 I think he looks kind of like the Creature From The Black Lagoon.

Incredible Jinafire repaint. She looks almost real. From: https://www.flickr.com/photos/97609951@N03/9462745689/in/photolist-fqc3BK-eey7d8-eey79F-eeDQsW-eeDQqN-gdruMU-gRpQaF-gdrwSf

Beautiful JInafire re-paint from: https://www.flickr.com/photos/kinomi42/9677674317/in/photostream/

FANG-tastic custom Art Class Howleen by Jayswen93 on Tumblr http://jayswen93.tumblr.com/post/66773183298/why-didnt-my-baby-ghoul-get-an-art-class-doll-oh I love the creativity and I love the Art Class dolls. If this was sold in stores, I would definitely buy it.

I LOVE his Hauntleywood Black-Carpet-event-crashing Toralei’s hair too! From: http://jayswen93.tumblr.com/post/79070883578/projectwest-songsfromthecatacombs

Hope you enjoyed! C’est tout pour maintenant!

 

More Favorite Monster High Custom OOAK Dolls–Re-Paints Of The Characters

NOVI STARS BEHIND THE SCENES On Their Awesome Dollhouse Commercial Set

Hey everyone! I was researching Novi Stars recently, and I was lucky enough to stumble across this gem. It is the process of how some miniaturist artists in Los Angeles, including the incredibly gracious, talented, and just plain nice Victoria Cloyes (who also happens to have her own Stop Motion animation show called “Me, The Puppet”), made the set for the Novi Stars doll commercial. I am re-blogging it with permission from An Artist’s Pride blog.

Novi Stars Commercial! Behind the Scenes

September 11, 2012

Hello everyone!

I just discovered that the commercial spots I worked on a few months ago are up online!  I was fabricating little sets for this new line of doll called Novi Stars, and you can find it all over now at Target, Toys R Us, everywhere!  Here are a few of the videos!

I thought I’d show you some of the things I fabricated for these elaborate miniature sets.  If you watch the adds, you see the dolls “land on Earth” in the middle of this crazy electric city scape.  We (I was one of 4 people working on the city) started with these basic foam core forms, and then covered them with styrene squares to create a cool texture.  These are the two I did below.

I was working with some tremendously talented people.  Adam Lawrence was our fearless leader and art director, and Jed Voltz and Will Potter were fellow fabricators.  After all the buildings were done, and after we added a few pre fab buildings from a prop house, the boys got to work covering it with this crazy amazing (expensive) electric tape.  Will created all these purple drips to fall down the buildings; it all looked super cool.  Here are all the buildings on set, with a few of the little pets in the street.

I’m especially proud of a few sets I worked on.  These were the set pieces for the stage set.  Going on only a concept sketch, I guessed at the dimensions and geometry, and created these shapes out of styrene and foam core.  Then, they were painted and lit.  Here they are in the shop:

           

… and here they are all lit up on set.  We added some speakers, and Adam built this giant light box of a stage to add drama.  It looked so fantastic!  I always love when sets get lit, most satisfying part of the process!

Here was a desk I built, again only going off of a sketch in a concept drawing.  (aka, no measurements or dimensions of any sort, only a doll to use as reference.)  I first did a mock up in paper using scotch tape, and then when it looked right, rebuilt it with styrene, using milky plexi as the table top.  This was a very complex undertaking, as all the geometric sides Really didn’t want to conform to a flat top and bottom, haha.  Here’s the paper mock up:

… And here it is on set!  I think it looked really fun all painted and in the boutique.  More on set art department, Michelle Green and Lindsey Sulski, helped out with the rest of this set, creating the little chair and desk, among other things.

Finally, my favorite piece was this crazy triangular dresser.  The geometry on this thing was Quite the challenge, as it is leaning forward, And is tapered, And has drawers.  Half way through making it in white styrene, the powers that be decided they wanted the whole thing to light up in blue plexi.

It was an enormous hurdle, as it is Much more difficult to accurately cut and nest thick blue plexi, than it is to cut and nest thin white styrene.  I had to do 3 mock ups, ultimately.  One in paper, one in foam core, one in styrene and then the final version in blue plexi.  Mind you, this was being built on set, on folding tables, with the AD and Director and everyone else watching and pointing at their clocks, haha.

Very high pressure, but hell, who am I kidding: that Of Course, made it super exciting because then it was a game with a deadline.  My heart was racing, and I was making sure to focus on every single stroke of the xcto blade, lest I should lose my focus and a finger all in the same moment.

This set also included a blue plexi light up wall, and a revolving tie rack “rotating closet”.  Michelle and I were geeking out the whole time at the adorable little outfits, which were excellently constructed and extremely fashion forward.  Seriously, they were cute.  Here’s a before and after shot!  Ps, Michelle made that chandelier, and I loved it so much, I asked if I could bring it home.  It’s hanging in our shop.

Woo!  This is a long post, but it was a super fun and exciting project, on which I met just a ton of great people.  Thanks for checking it out, and be on the look out for tomorrow’s Me, The Puppet entry!

How fantastically awesome was that?! Seriously?! I want to do this for a living. Don’t forget to check out more of Victoria Cloyes’s work at http://anartistspride.blogspot.com/ and at her website http://victoriacloyes.carbonmade.com/ She freelances too, so if you need anything cool done, you know where to go!