Shallay

Baby Mazeo

shallayb — Wed, 30 May 2007 18:52:07 +0000

Child’s Bookcase

shallayb — Sun, 18 Feb 2007 00:13:25 +0000

I was getting quite frustrated by the piles of Library books that we would bring home and stack in a corner. Anytime Niva wanted a book she would have to dig through looking for

what she wanted. We have regular book cases but they are inaccessible to her. So I saw a book case that displayed books for children in a Montessori catalog for $80. Ha I thought I could make one of those. And so I did.

Here is a look at how I built it I took a 4′ length of 1″x11″ pine plank and measured up to where I wanted the shelfs and dowels to be and then made a diagonal mark about 1 1/2″ away from each point. Then cut it along the diagonal and trimmed the bottom so I had two sides. The shelf part is 1′x2.5″ strips that I cut into three 23″ long pieces. The dowels were cut into 24″long pieces and the idea was that I would drill in 1/2″ on each side for the dowels and then when I screwed the shelves part in it would hold the dowels in, however I must have mis measured because the dowels were all about 1/4″ too long and I had to trim them. I dabbed some glue on each end and drilled pilot holes for all the screws. I did this for one side and made a paper template to transfer to the other side.
It was quite difficult to get all the pieces lined up and secured and keep the dowels in while I was screwing it together. Once I had done that I screwed in some back boards to keep the books from falling out the back (I already had some masonite so I didn’t purchase it with the rest of the material that is why it is short).

So here is the finished product complete with books. Niva, 2yrs, was able to start using it right away without any instruction on how to get and put away the books and she keeps her books neat now and is able to quickly find what she is looking for.

Cost to make, around $20 as I already had some materials.

Jeanette Breen Website

shallayb — Thu, 12 Oct 2006 00:33:05 +0000

Whew! I finished it! It took a bit longer than expected and I had some bugs that were giving me trouble but I worked them out, learned a bit and I even put in a slideshow on the front page. I created the header from two seperate images, joined them together and did some painting* on top. Fun stuff. So check it out: jeanettebreen.com.

Komono Shirt

shallayb — Mon, 25 Sep 2006 22:21:30 +0000

Made some Komono Shirts for Niva, still working on the pattern, haven’t got it quite right but this one is really close. She is a great model. Tie slips through hole inside then ties in back to the tie from the front piece. 3/4 sleeves great to keep her just a bit warmer without getting in her way. Works great for mobility.

New Look - New Function

shallayb — Fri, 15 Sep 2006 09:21:53 +0000

I have now changed my site to be more interactive! I will be posting my artwork blog style, which is more fun I think. So if you want to see something - click on a category, do a search, or scroll the archives. Have fun!

My services are listed in the service page, and to contact me go to the contact page blah blah, but if you need to get home, click on the header. Anyway pardon some technical appearances, I am re-writing my blog template and it is all in html, css script stuff which I am slowly learning.

Trash Chandelier

shallayb — Fri, 21 Jul 2006 06:10:49 +0000

Made this chandelier for our ugly lamp over our dinning room table. I think it looks much better than just the lamp hanging there. Also it was free to make since it was made from excess lamanate that I was going to throw away.

And here is a full Shot

Christmas 2005

shallayb — Fri, 18 Nov 2005 06:08:32 +0000

Painted a Picture for Bibi, Richard’s mom because she loves roosters and her whole kitchen has everything rooster.

Other boxes that were painted and then sealed with flaxseed oil.

Kallie’s Wedding Dress

shallayb — Sun, 02 Oct 2005 01:03:58 +0000

I wanted to try my hand at making a dress from a sketch and so I offered to make my cousin’s wedding dress. It started off with us sketching back and forth about different ideas and we settled on this one. Then I found a pattern that matched the body as close as possible and then just kind of made up the rest. I think it turned out great, with only a minor glitch with a sleeve that I never was able to fix. The dress was actually three layers, two cotton and a crinkled rayon. I ended up taking in large seams from the waist to the thigh to make the dress kind of flare out a bit at the bottom. We were going for something light, no fluffy skirts!, but elegant. For the back we went for the look of the buttons, without all the hassle, so there is a zipper behind them and some hooks to keep the buttons over the zipper. To put the buttons on speedily I glued them into place and then stitched them on so they were all evenly spaced. Amazingly I did not get so mad as to almost burn the dress, which shocked me because I thought for sure I would be sick of it at the end. The part that gave me the biggest worry was when I cut the dress for the big swooping layer of fabric because if it didn’t work then i would have just cut the dress in half literally for nothing. Oh and the edge of the swooping layer was burned with a wood burner to seal it and keep it from fraying rather then weigh it down with a hem. So I had a good time and the bride was happy too!

Baby Niva

shallayb — Sun, 24 Apr 2005 18:49:45 +0000

Ferdinand The Bottle-Headed Cat

shallayb — Thu, 16 Sep 2004 06:36:15 +0000

The following illustrations are for Ferdinand The Bottle-Headed Cat written by Marv Cummings and published by Bookman Publishing. They are pencil drawings based on the author’s descriptions. The drawings are owned by the author and used with his permission.