Sunday, August 27, 2006

Operation Ollie

My MSN buddies should all know my nickname, lost duckie, by now. In our college years, all of us were accrued an affectionate animal name. I coveted the position of duckie, Sandy was christened ostrich (ostensibly due to her height).

Since this girl pal of mine is turning a year older soon, there is no doubt that I have to plan something special for her. Last year, I was in the United States. The year before, she probably had to stuff an unsuccessful cake attempt down her throat. So, Operation Ollie materialized this year.

Ollie started out from a mess of cotton wool, felt pieces, brown fuzzy strings, cotton balls and an aimless brain with no-whatsoever-clue-in-going-abouts.


Primarily, Ollie's face was created from a piece of beige felt cloth. I wanted white but somehow, there didn't seem to be any white-colored felt pieces on sale at Spotlight. No fish, prawns also can lar.


I had such a hard time creating Ollie's head. I almost died trying to turn her head inside out. Her beak got stuck somewhere in the process and I was so frustrated I almost tore the head apart. That explains the very traumatic, ruffled, unstuffed head as seen below.


Fortunately, with the help of cotton-wool surgery (sort of like what silicon will do to boobs I guess), Ollie got plumped up and looked a wee bit better.


Yes, yes, I know the beak looks weird. I MMS-ed my friend a picture of it for feedback and he replied that the beak looks fucked. Okay, whatever. How can the beak not be fucked after being stuck in its supposed oesophagus for a good half hour before I could finally unstuck it?

Anyway, I commenced on developing Ollie's fluffy body. Basically, I sewed on my Dad's hankercheif (Shh! He is not supposed to know about it.) over a fluffy brown cotton pom-pom. Then, the tedious task of sewing the fluffy black feathers began.


This is how Ollie looked with her ruffled feathered body.


It was nearing four at dawn when I finally cut the legs for Ollie. Don't mind the morbid picture below. I rate it NC16. View with parents supervision.


Next morning, I continued with the last stage of Operation Ollie - legs surgery. After stitching the sides of the orange felt cut-outs messily, I stuck a straw into it and poured rice.




After filling up with rice, and stitching those darn legs onto the fluffy black body, Ollie was finally completed.


The final touch - samples of cards were created with Photoshop. My stupid freaking printer induced much blood-puking. I need to buy a new printer soon. Sheesh.


Operation Ollie completed.


Over and out!
We had a early celebration of Sandy's birthday at the Botanical Gardens earlier this evening. More updates about that later. :)

5 Comments:

Blogger eha said...

wow. you know something? i think we should get in touch with our younger selves once in a while. you know the DIY thing like what catherine mentioned in her blog. i think i cannot sew but can explore for the sake of trying something new :) i have already forgotten how to sew.

1:35 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

liddat i want you to make me a sheep on my bday. wuhahahaa. anyway ollie is such a cute name! and the ostrich is so cute la. cute in a dumb way. eh. did you purposely make it look dumb? LOL later i say the wrong things sial. but anyhow,i love it!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY SANDY! (i bet u r reading)

2:28 AM  
Blogger musette said...

Let me just say that I totally ADORE your handmade ostrichie! Wahahaha. I think it looks so silly that just looking at it will no doubt bring a smile to my face. =)

谢谢你!!!

Catherine, thank you for your birthday wishes too! :-)

10:42 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

eha> You're not the only one... I think I can only put thread through the needle head now. Nothing more.

musette> And I was asking our Ms Jellybeano if you cried when ya received the gift... so touching rite? Oh yes, a belated Happy Birthday to ya too!

Ms Jellybeano> So when can I start taking sewing lessons from you? =P

11:41 PM  
Blogger jellybeano said...

eha> I don't know how to sew lah. My sewing sucks. If you see the stitches on Ollie, you will cry... cos it's just too bad.

cat> Okay lah, next time I will make you a sheep and i will make sure it looks the dumbest possible k.

musette> glad you like it!!!

toukarin> See above: my sewing sucks!!!!

10:23 AM  

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