DIY Candy Crush Color Bomb Squeak Toy

Yeah, we're addicted too.

We can't help but notice the Candy Crush craze.  It's everywhere.  Everyone is doing it.  And In April, Buzzfeed reported Candy Crush as the highest grossing app in the app store and the biggest app on facebook.  Scary!

While we were waiting for more lives on Candy Crush to accumulate, I decided to make Sebastian his own Color Bomb Squeak Toy.

As always, here's a tutorial:

Colorbomb to the rescue!

XOXOXOXO,

Erika and Sebastian

More Neck Tie Recycling

So here is a dog neck tie tutorial using a recycled human neck tie (you may have seen it in EveryDog Spring Issue 2012!).  I like this one even better than my original upcycled neck tie, but it's a little more complex.

Before photo:

If your dog is small (like Sebastian), you'll want to use the end of the tie.  If your dog is big, you can use the front like the humans do.  Determine the length you want the tie and add a few inches (this is because you'll be wrapping it around their collar).

Fold the "new" top of the tie back (make sure the width is bigger than the collar) and sew it or glue it in place.

Cut a small piece from the remaining tie material (this one is about 2" long) and fold it so that it's about half inch wide.  Stitch or glue both ends of the strip together to keep it from unfolding.  Center the strip on your tie like this:

Bring both sides of the strip in, creating shape to the neck tie like this:

Stitch it in place.

And voila!

But wait, there's more!  No need to throw away the remaining neck tie material.  Check out these matchy girly pieces Sebastian and I made for the ladies in his life.

Bow

Flower

xoxoxoxoxoxo,

Erika and Sebastian

Doggy Gaga!

Can you guess which one is the REAL Lady Gaga?  Ha!  

Sebastian had a lot of fun wearing this costume to the Bay Area Pet Expo February 26th. 

He entered the costume contest, but all of the dogs lost to a leprechaun pony.  This is the first and last time I enter a contest based on the audience clapping.  I think half the audience was from some equestrian group.  Not fair!!!

The winner

Anyways, we are done being sore losers. 

My favorite part of this costume is definitely the little meat hat.

Want to have your own little meaty Doggy Gaga? 

Here are the instructions:

What you'll need: Dark red felt, white paint, bright red paint, paint brush, some good glue and white elastic string.

Draw as many meat-like shapes as you need.  Obviously you'll need more the bigger your dog is.  Cut them out and make sure you have enough to cover your dog's back.

Make a special meat shape just for the hat and test-fit it.  I made mine in a way that it sits on the side of Sebastian's head and curves around the one ear.  You'll need to cut 4 strips of "bacon" for the leg wraps like this:

Decorate each meat piece with white and bright red paint.  I'm pretty sure anything you have around the house as far as paint will work.  I liked the red puff paint effect since it's 3-dimensional and looks like blood vessels.

Tada!

So, for the base of the meat, I made a little "jacket" out of some white fleece (I chose white because Sebastian is white).  For those of you who sew, any shape will work as long as it velcro's around the neck and the waist - you know, just like a real dog jacket!

For those of you who don't sew, I suggest using an old dog jacket as the base.  

Here is what mine looked like before the meat...nothing special.

Cover the "base" by randomly placing the meat pieces and gluing them.  After that, you're basically done!!  For the meat hat, attach elastic string to both sides and make the strings long enough to tie around your dog's chin.  For the meat leg wraps, wrap them around your dog's legs and wrap elastic string on top to hold them in place.  The meat leg wraps stayed on quite well with this method!

Here is the whole outfit with the meat hat at the top and the four leg wraps surrounding the body.

Tip: the ends of the elastic are going to want to unravel so just seal the ends by applying a little bit of glue.

I hope that was easy to follow.  If you make this (or any of my other projects for that matter), be sure to let me know.  I'd love to see pictures!

XOXOXOXO,

Erika and Sebastian