Prinny Dood!

Prinny from Disgaea that Id made.

Link, he came to Town. Come to Town, To save the Princess Zelda.

Zelda Chicken and two different Links that Id made.

Dig Doug, Doug digged?

A couple Dig Doug sprites that Id made

Final Fantasy Saga

A whole bunch of different Final fantasy characters that Id made.

Our One Piece Pirate Crew

Id, Sticks, and Dragon have been watching a lot of One Piece.  We went to ACen last month with the kids and I made costumes for each of them.  Dragon was Nami, Sticks was Zoro, and Tic Tock was Luffy.  Id made these.  I'm sure he'll be making more of these. 

Skull from pirate flag and Zoro

Mega Man

Some Megan Man characters and mega man style designs that Id made.

Helmet, Marty Mcfly, and the Joker

Magnet Man

Pokemon Forever

Id made all these Pokemon characters.  I made a pokeball and sticks copied it and made the other one.

Spring has sprung

A few flowers we made with the flower patterns.  We have the daisy pegboard and the tulip one as well, but I don't think we've made anything with them yet.  Sticks brought home a cup with a sunflower seed he planted at school.  All the other kids had little green stems, but nothing has grown from Stick's seed yet.  I guess he has the same green thumb that we have.  His teacher game him a couple extra seeds to try again since tomorrow is the last day of school.  Let's hope we can get something to grow.

Protect Skylands From Evil Forces

I purchased Id the Skylanders game two Christmases back.  Sticks loves the game and can play through a few levels on his own.  We bought the Giants game when it came out and have been collecting all the figures from the most recent game.  Sticks went as Chop Chop (his favorite character) for Halloween last year.  We don't play much anymore due to time restraints and other interests, but our enjoyment of the game hasn't faded.  I made the Undead Element, which is huge.  Eventually we plan on making one of all the different Elements.

Chibi things that kill

Sticks and Dragon have watched a lot of Hello Kitty's Fury Tale Theater thanks to Netflix.  Even though the show is older, they still enjoy it.  Who couldn't love the cute Sanrio characters.  Sticks made a Kerokerokeroppi for a coworker of mine.  She payed him $5 even though I told her she didn't have to.  He used the money and some tooth fairy money and bought a spiderman action figure.

This Whole Thing Started With A Dream And A Mouse

Id and I have always enjoyed Disney movies.  Before the kids were born we would watch them together and would even see them in the theater.  Not too much has changed on that front.  We still buy all the animated ones that we can and see as many of them in the theater with Sticks that we can.  We will probably attempt to take Dragon with us when the new Monsters University comes out.  Hopefully she doesn't ruin our whole movie experience.  The Ralph one was the first Disney character I made.  He looks a little off because we didn't have the right colors for his face at the time.  their will definitely be more Disney characters in the future.

I'm super, thanks for asking

We took Sticks to see Iron Man 3 in the theaters.  He loves superheros like most boys.  Spiderman is his favorite.  He enjoyed the movie even though it was a little slow going for him to get to all the action.  Since the movie was fresh in his mind, we had to make an Iron Man.  More superhero characters will be coming in the future.

Ornithoid and Swine

I doubt their are many people out there who have not tried playing angry birds, this family included.  Sticks is better at this game than I am.  This is the largest project Sticks has done.  I foresee him making more angry bird characters in the future.

I throw nickles into the oven and it's music

We recently bought Sticks a Les Paul Pee Wee guitar and plan on taking him to get lessons.  This inspired us to start making music. 

Sticks made the speaker and the headphones

Keeper of the Forest

My Neighbor Totoro was recently released on blu-ray.  Of course we had to update our DVD copy and have a family movie night.  You're probably asking where Totoro is.  I recently made a plush Totoro, so I skipped making a perler one at this time.   I will be making a Totoro as a future project.  I may even do another Catbus that shows off his body. 

Catbus and a Soot Sprite

Chemical X

After making the Powerpuff girls (Bubbles, Blossom, and Buttercup).  Sticks reminded me that I needed to make Professor Utonium.  Maybe someday in the future, but I doubt it.  Sticks and Dragon watch the Powerpuff girls from time to time, but it's not one they usually ask for.  At the time I made these we didn't have many girly ones so I felt we needed to fix that.

Feed With Candy

Sticks, Dragon, Id, and I enjoy playing this game.  It is cute and a rather inexpensive one.  If you never heard of it you can check out the Cut The Rope site.  This was Id's first large project.  Unfortunately their were problems with the ironing process, but it still looks good.

Friendship is Magic

I loved My Little Ponies when I was a little girl.  After having a daughter of my own I guess it was only a matter of time before she liked them as well.  At first I didn't approve of the new look because I felt overly nostalgic on the old design.  Now I prefer how the new ponies look and I actually enjoy watching the show with Dragon.  (Sometimes I feel like I like them more than she does.)  Their will definitely be more MLP projects in the future.

Freaky Just Got Fabulous

Dragon has gotten into Monster high.  They first started putting out merchandise when she was baby and I remember we bought her the Draculara plush.  I really liked the designs of the characters, but never purchased anymore when I found out that they were supposed to be from a web series that was coming out.  I wish I had.  A lot of the dolls are rare and very expensive.  It doesn't really matter though, she's too young to really care and it's a valuable lesson that sometimes you can't and wont get stuff that you want.  Luckily she wants the ones she sees in the stores and isn't aware of all the ones she can't have.

MH skull and Crest

The Cherry-Chasing Dot-Muncher

Sticks made these Pac-Man ghosts and of course Pac-Man himself.  I think I overheard that he was going to do Mrs. Pac-Man eventually.   I know he has played the game at least once, but probably not that many times so I don't know how come he wanted to make them.  Some of the things he makes are odd, so I'll take it.

Your Princess is in Another Castle baby

I grew up playing these games and they are super easy to make.  Id played them as well, but his video game knowledge and collection from back then is a little larger than mine.  Sticks enjoys Mario too (I don't know of anyone who doesn't).  I'm sure I'll be making even more.

Super Mario Bros 3

Super Mario Bros 2 (Sticks did 3 of these potions)

 

Random Mario related projects  (Sticks did the Purple mushroom)

Dr. Mario

Funfusion

 I purchased the Best Friends Activity bucket in order to get the dog and the small girl and boy pegboards.  The beads that come in this set and a lot of the other buckets are the funfusion beads.  As you can see, the bucket is clearly labeled.  We did pick up a couple bags of beads from Michaels that were also funfusion (before we knew they were different).  The Jo-Ann we normally go to do not sell the funfusion single bags and the Perler Bead website does not either. 

A word of caution.  The funfusion beads melt a little differently than the normal beads.  We have done a few projects and after ironing found out that some funfusion beads were mixed in with the regular colors and up close it does look a little odd.  I made a light pink pig out of the funfusion beads and Sticks copied the pattern with regular beads in a different shade of pink.  It's hard to tell the difference in this pic, but you'd notice it in person or if the beads were mixed together in one project.

funfusion beads used withe the light pink pig to the right

Perler Accessories

Bead Tweezer Plus

Regular tweezers would probably work just fine, but we purchased one of these when they were on sale for 30% off (The $1.99 price tag isn't much to begin with).  They are very helpful when a bead has a mind of it's own and goes where you can't pull it out without knocking over a bunch of other beads.  After we bought one we purchased the Pet Parade box set (in order to get the horse pegboard) and now have two of these (one for each adult). 





Bead Sweeper

Dragon is constantly dropping beads or Tic Tock is knocking them on the ground.  We purchased this to help pick up the beads.  The kids actually like using it and it picks them up fairly well.  Not a necessary purchase, but has come in handy.  I still spend a significant amount of time picking them off the floor.  Our Vacuum cleaner has sucked up quite a few too.







Their are a couple tools for the Motionators, but we haven't done any motionator stuff so i have no idea if they are worthwhile or not.

A word about Ironing

Every kind of set you buy comes with ironing paper.  I do like the paper that comes with the sets, but they have creases in them that sometimes show up on your finished project depending on how you iron them.

I have heard that wax paper is a disaster to use, but we haven't tried too use it.  Instead we have used parchment paper which is right by the wax paper at the store.  I don't use the parchment paper often, but Id does and doesn't seem to have a problem with it.  If you're used to using the papers that come with it and switch to parchment paper, just be aware that they are a little different and you may need to keep the iron on a little longer.

Id has started to tape his projects before ironing.  This is helpful with larger projects to prevent beads from getting messed up before they have an opportunity to be ironed.  The projects aren't ironed on the pegboards, so you don't have to worry about them becoming warped over time.  Sometimes when you take it off the pegboard a couple beads are left on the pegboard because they are a little smaller than the other beads and didn't stick to the tape.  No biggie, just slide the bead in its intended spot and you'll never notice the difference.  (FYI- you don't iron over the tape, you still use the paper.  The tape is just to keep all the beads in place.)
At first Id used painters tape, but had a couple mishaps with it.  Now he uses a wide masking tape and has it down pretty well. The projects come out a lot flatter than when he ironed the large ones on the pegboards (this could be because we have gotten better at ironing).

The more you iron projects, the better you should become at it.  Luckily it seems to be a short learning curve.  Each iron is different too, so if you do get a new iron, you will probably have to modify your ironing technique a little.  No single technique is better, it's just what works the best for you.

Choosing a project

The ideas are endless on what can be made.  Dragon does her own thing with no patterns.  Sticks uses some of the pattern books to make his projects and he also uses the IPad.  Id has an IPhone and I have an ITouch so I'm sure at times we look silly sitting at the table with our devices and the beads.

You can find a lot of free patterns on the Perler Bead Website.  We generally don't use those patterns because they aren't our style, but I'm sure Sticks would use them if we didn't have the books readily available.  Also, any cross-stitch pattern can easily be adapted to beads.

Assorted projects that Sticks and Dragon made

Another way to create a project is find an 8-bit picture and make it into beads.  They even have 8-bit picture converters that will turn any regular picture into an 8-pit image.  We have never used a converter, but maybe we will in the future, who knows.  Beading this way is a little more time consuming than having a pattern, but easier than looking at a regular photo and deciding on how to make it look good in bead form.  This way is even more time consuming.  I made the monster High logo by just looking at a regular photo of it and I'm not sure if I'm completely in love with the end result.

We purchased the Bead It! app for the ipad.  You're supposed to choose any photo, add it to the program, and it will generate a pattern and let you know exactly what colors are needed for making it.  I haven't used it to actually make any patterns because the colors sometimes look odd to me, but I may eventually use it and tweak the pattern to suit my needs better.  Their are other apps out there and we may try a different one down the road.

Image used

pattern in program

list of how many of each color needed

Lastly, what we generally do, is copy other people's creations.  You can easily make your our own adjustments to make it your own.  The internet has tons and tons of images of completed projects out there.  If the image is clear and at the right angle you can count the beads and make one of your own.  Unfortunately I'm not able to credit the actual creators since I don't know who they are or where they first originated from. 

Burns

I have been fortunate enough not to have been burned yet.  We do not let Dragon or Sticks iron the projects either and they have listened pretty well about staying away when the iron is hot.  Tic Tock probably wouldn't listen to our warnings, so we generally iron the smaller projects on the stove since he can't reach it or the plug.  Thankfully he has been okay when we iron on the table and has yet to get injured either. 

Unfortunately Id has gotten a couple small superficial burns, but nothing serious.  I've heard some people say they still have burn scars from perler projects back in the day, I do not.  I probably got burnt back then, but I do not recall any event of that happening.  Anyways, we were browsing at a Garden store and what do I find?  An Aloe plant.  I remember my mom and grandma having these in the house and using them for burns and sunburns.  From time to time I have thought about purchasing one, but it always slips my mind and I never made a special trip to find one.  Ours is a small guy, so I'm hoping that I have a green thumb enough not to kill him.

Pegboards

I did purchase the Super pegboard and I must advise anyone to skip it.  I assumed you would be able to connect them to other super boards or the large square boards, but you can't. That part wasn't a deal breaker for me.  I thought it would be great for larger projects, but boy was I wrong.  We purchased it when we had very few pegboards and I used it to do a couple small projects.  The board warped after only a couple uses and does not sit flat.  I found out the hard way while attempting to iron a project and the middle of the board popped up and sent the beads in the air like a game of perfection.  It immediately went in a drawer and has yet to see the light of day.


So in our early days of doing beads, we had very few boards.  Now we have a wide range of them, practically all the different ones available.  Id and I prefer the large clear square ones, Dragon prefers the small heart, and Sticks uses the large square the most, but he does use the other ones if a pattern from a book calls for it.  I thought they would be all about the different shaped ones, but not so much.  Since they are still fairly young I'm not going to weigh in heavily and recommend avoiding them.  Each artistic style is different and some are super cute and hard to pass up.  

I store the Large Square pegboards separately from the other designs since we use them the most.  I use a plastic shoe box Sterilite tote for all the different shapes (from target) and a square plastic container (from Dollar Tree) for the large square ones.

Deals are to be found.

Our local craft stores have a limited selection of supplies.  We are fortunate to have a Jo-Ann store nearby that has a decent Perler bead selection. However, they do not have all the different colors, pegboards, or sets available.  They occasionally have sales for 30% off Perler bead products, and of course you can always easily find the 40% off coupons(sometimes even 50 or 60% off ones can be found).

In order to grow our color palate, we went to the Perler bead Website.  They have all the different colors and sets available.  The bags of beads are always $1.99 each when you buy 6 or more different ones (as opposed to $2.99 each).  They also have always had free shipping on larger orders and I frequently see deals where everything is 30% off.  Now we rarely go to the local craft store to pick up beads. 

Now what to do with all these beads?

Our Next purchase was the Perler bead tray with the idea book. Sticks (our 5 year old son) loves looking through the book and copying the designs.   The tray is nice for getting a small amount of several different colors that are organized, but we soon discovered that the amount of beads just weren’t enough.  

 After we decided to start buying the individual bags of the different colors we needed to figure out a way to store them.  While at the craft store we came across these containers on sale for 50% off.  They were a good idea, but they didn’t work for us.  We bead as a family and having to share got a bit annoying when everyone was grabbing for the same color.  They weren’t the easiest to get out and if we would have continued with this route, we would have ended up with a lot of these containers due to the large variety of colors available. 

Id was looking at a YouTube video of a guy making a large project and he had each color in its own labeled container.  I was skeptical at first, but we made it work.  Their are so many options out there for containers.  We found plastic ones at the craft store for $1 each and bought the last 4 they had.  They worked perfectly, but I didn’t want to spend that much or more on just containers and my OCD didn’t want a hodge-podge mess of different containers either.  Id came up with the solution...

We had a specimen cup sitting on a shelf from when he had his big V that he was supposed to take a back to the doctor, but never did.  We tried it out.  Unfortunately, a whole bag of beads do not fit in the containers, but I can deal with it for the price and the matchyness (yes, I know that’s not a real word, but it is one of mine).  Ebay has a lot of cheap auctions, some as low as 25 cents a container and their are a lot of other vendors out there with good deals if you search for them.  

I had a couple shallow plastic baskets that I had gotten from the dollar store that didn’t work for their original purpose.  The specimen cups fit perfectly in them and they stacked well on each other.  I have since gone back to the dollar tree in hopes of scoring a couple more similar ones with no such luck.  We plan on expanding our colors with Hama beads in the future so we’ll have to figure things out yet again when our collection expands.

 

Our First Boxed Set

Shortly after we got the glow in the dark bucket I headed to Jo-Ann again with another 40% off coupon and got the Wild 'n Wooly 3-D set.  All the beads that come in the boxed sets are mixed together.  I poured them in a shallow disposable container that I had left over from when we gave out Christmas cookies.  We found out quick that picking out each color needed for a project was tedious and time consuming.

 As far as sets go, it is just okay.  It only comes with one large clear pegboard and a bunch of beads with the patterns to make a bunch of neat animals.  However, if I could go back in time, I’d skip this set.  Other sets have more to offer in my opinion.  The only ones we made were the tiger and the Elephant.  Tic Tock (our one year old son) has since ripped up the patterns.   I don’t think we would be doing those projects even if he hadn't ruined some of them. I'm sure we could easily find the patterns again online.  The Perler Bead website has a lot of patterns that you can print off for free.  I know I saw the "Jungle Tree" pattern from this set on there.

The "3-D" Tiger and Elephant from this set

Since we obtained more colors Id and Sticks were able to make more slimes

Our Perler Family History

Id (my dear husband) went to ACen last year and came back with a Dragon Quest slime magnet.  When he showed it to me I think my immediate response was, “you spent $8 on that?!  Those things are so easy to make.”   

I began searching Pinterest and came across some awesome designs.  I made a board and starting pinning ones that looked neat.  I remember making them when I was a little squirt, but nothing as awesome or with as much detail as I found.  As with everything, the whole “scene” had evolved.   

Almost a year later I was at the craft store with Dragon (our 3-year-old daughter) and happened to walk down the Perler bead isle.   I had a 40% off coupon with me and no large projects in mind so I let Dragon choose a set.  She picked out the glow in the dark bucket and that is how House Marquart became involved with Perler beads.   

Our First glow in the dark creations. Sticks did the slime and Dragon did the hodge-podge heart and star.