Chelley's Crafting Room Chaos

So for those that don't know (which is probably most of you) I'm part of a LARP organization called Amtgard. This is a medieval swords & sorcery game, similar to a live action Dungeons & Dragons. It's pretty fun. We get to hit fellow nerds with foam-padded sticks at full impact (without trying to break bones. Seriously, swinging that hard is being a dick and we don't like it when people play like that) every weekend. Or, in my case, shoot people with foam-tipped arrows from an actual bow. I love talking about this game, so feel free to ask any questions. I'm happy to answer them and if you're interested, help you find a park close to you so you can join the awesomeness that is Amtgard.

Aside from the battle-play there is a crafting side to things. Most of us make our own weapons, armor, and outfits (yes, this is costumed) though there are online shops for buying such things. Shipping to Alaska is often prohibitive, so the make-your-own-gear thing is even more prevalent up here. This thread is dedicated to sharing my craftiness for the game. Some of my work shown will be my first forays into that particular domain and some will be things I'm actually pretty good at.

Enjoy!

My "crafting room" doubles as my dining room. It is almost never used as dining room as a result. We usually eat in the living room cause it's more comfy and it's easier to acquiesce to the Tiny Human's demands that we share our food if we're in the living room than trying to keep him seated in the dining room.

Controlled chaos...

(DeviantArt link cause I can't attaching things to work properly)

Back to back crafting competition coming up in January that requires at least 7 different item categories to be in the running to win means LOTS of work between now and then...

finished so far: baby sized sword

almost finished (and WIP pictures): my dad's old battle axe. He had joined the game as well and played for as long as his health and work schedule allowed him. His axe blade had come loose from the core, so I decided to fix it. Upon taking the cloth cover off, I discovered what a newbie foam craftsman my dad had been and opted to rebuild the blade entirely. I used the old blade as a pattern in order to maintain some of the lopsided-ness of the original. The idea being to make it field-legal again, not necessarily to make it perfect.

old blade
old blade edge
new blade
old and new together for comparison
almost done! Just needs the black foam there to be glued on and the cover restored.

So it seems attachments are not going to work for me... sooo links to my DeviantArt it is instead!

Latest completed item: baby booties! These were made from a kit purchased at Tandy Leather. Pretty quick and easy to make. Haven't decided yet if I want to fringe the cuff or leave it solid. Also haven't decided which color tie to use for display purposes.



baby booties

Thread necromancy activate!!

This is one of my current projects. This axe was left behind in my garage by friends who had been living with me for a few months who no longer play Amtgard. On first finding it, there's several weapon safety specs it doesn't meet. The haft needs more padding and the strike edge on the axe head was coming off.

These links are all the before pics. Minimum specs are that it needs to be 2.5 inches wide. and there needs to be 1 inch of foam on the strike edge of the core.

whole axe
axe head close up
flat side of haft
strike edge of haft
inside cross section of haft
inside cross section 2
extra foam added to meet specs

I'll update this thread with new pics once I've finished this project. To get the haft to spec I just took it off entirely and have rebuilt it from scratch. Weapon smithing, particularly with a flat edge like this will have is not really my forte. I usually stick to cloth creations and food, so we'll see how this turns out.

Also, if a link doesn't work, let me know so I can fix it asap!

Was it you who was quilting a Harry Potter quilt?

Not I. I have no clue about quilting. It's on my list though

So I got a lovely combination embroidery/sewing machine last spring. This is one of my most recent finished things. It is a reversible paladin/antipaladin belt favor. In Amtgard, a belt favor is just a neat thing to wear on your belt to symbolize something. This can be a person's personal heraldry or even the heraldry of a fighting company or household they belong to. In this case, it is to represent a pair of classes that can only be played by people who have been elevated to knighthood. (That in itself is a complicated process. I'm happy to talk about it, but is not the point of this post.)

Anyway, the phoenix is a reserved symbol in Amtgard. So not just anyone can wear one. The white is for the Paladin class and black for the AntiPaladin class.

More stuff to come!

That's really cool, Chelley! I love the detail on it!

This is from February 2020. This is the last "big" project I've completed. The gold trim is hand-sewn on. The sleeves are salvages from a skirt purchased at a local second hand store several years ago. I found the separated pieces in a scraps drawer and realized they were the perfect length for the sleeves on this dress. Yay upcycling!

It currently fits a little more snugly than I intended. Part of that is cause I'm tubby, the other part is that I accidentally made it smaller than intended cause I tried a different kind of seam on it for the first time. Love the seam (french seam) but I lost a about an inch overall with that seam. Corsets are amazing tools for rectifying such things. Hopefully, by the time LARP can meet in person again, I won't need to cinch the corset quite so tight. (there was no sitting comfortably in that cause sitting made it dig into my sides rather hard.)

I love your stuff! Keep it coming!