Exquisite Amber

I made a large, rare amber specimen from this amber-colored teardrop that I found at the kickoff.

Using a 1:12 scale, this sample would be approximately 30" long.  Exquisite indeed!  I tried researching world's largest amber sample, and found this history of the Amber Room instead.   The Amber Room was built in 18th century Europe, and once contained several tons of amber.  I won't reveal the rest, but it's well worth the read.

For Bob and Zilla: The Great A'Tuin

During the kickoff I found a great turtle doorknob that I wanted to somehow incorporate. I chose it out of loyalty to our pet tortoise Zilla.

And for Bob, I turned it into a Discworld tribute.  Terry Pratchett's Discworld is Bob's favorite book series, and features a flat world delicately supported by four elephants standing on the back of a giant turtle. The turtle is called the Great A'Tuin, shown here (credit: Discworld site):

The hardest part was actually cleaning the turtle.  Megan removed most of the grime by soaking it in Sprite.  (Thank you, Megan!)

I found some small elephant beads from Etsy, and used one of the larger glass pebbles from the kickoff for the disc.

I glued everything together with epoxy.  Results are below!

Ready Made Objets

Some of the items from kickoff were interesting enough to use in their original or close to original form. My favorite was the corkscrew mouse/pig, but the olive bead was a close second.  I found the olive loose in the same box as the wooden necklaces.  I glued it to a small wood pedestal and Lego square to make a floor lamp.

I mounted the other pieces on the toy blocks and store shelves.

It's starting to take shape!  I especially like how the ceramic monkey looks with the Monkey Brand Black Tooth Powder poster.