Bed pleats and bead bottles

I have been inspired again by a tutorial on Casey's Minis and wanted to show you what else I am working on. I'm not promising that I'll be able to do this exactly right because let's face it every mini that Casey makes is amazing, but I'm certainly going to try. Her tutorial on beds and how to make pleats starts April 07, 08 and goes forward for a few posts after that. By the way, if you don't already follow Casey's blog then I really recommend that you do. I've started back at post #1 and I am reading my way forward, making notes and bookmarking for future reference along the way.

Funny how this project started was with a box of Bumble Bee Tuna Salad and Crackers snack at work. Not wanting to throw the box away I stuck it in my purse and carried it home. For some reason I just knew it was the right size for something. And then it hit me - beds. Specifically kid sized beds for Sophie and Olive. Then during my next trip to Michael's I picked up a couple of rolls of scrap fabric. At first I was going to get two different patterns, but then I thought that if Sophie and Olive are anything like my sister and I were when we were little, then they would just end up fighting over who got what bed - so matching beds it is. Then I found these great little wooden fence pieces (Micheal's again) and got two larger ones for the headboards and two smaller pieces for the footboards (is that what they're called?). At home I already had this bead board that you can see underneath the fabric. You use it when making necklaces and bracelets, etc. because it has lines to measure with and also it's made out of thick cardboard sort of stuff so when you're midway through making something you just stick a pin in and it keeps everything secure. I also have a box of pins, hairspray, another huge bag of fabric scraps and ribbon that my Aunt gave me, and some fabric tape for supplies. If hairspray doesn't make any sense then read Casey's blog for further details. As I get experiment with this I'll post more pics as well.

While I had the bead board out I thought I would pull out my box of beads as well. I've seen some really cute mini perfume bottles for sale on ebay that were made out of beads so I thought since I've already got the supplies that I would give it a try. I haven't got the right kind of glue just yet so I used pins to try out some different looks. My friends who were over at the apartment agreed that some of these turned out looking like fancy liquor bottles rather than perfume bottles, but that's an okay bonus since I will be needing bottles to fill the saloon eventually. I really like the 3rd one from the left as a perfume bottle though. I think I will give it to Kitty once she has her own little vanity area above the saloon.