Ann Arbor Co-worker and crafter genius Marian Short always has the best ideas for everything, whether it’s Halloween costumes or cute baked goods. So I wasn’t surprised when she showed me two banks she’d made to donate to 826 Michigan, a center dedicated to helping lil’ kids with writing and overall creative skills and part of the 826 National endeavor. Marian did a great job photographing the two banks she made and detailing the process. Here’s Jinx, in her own words.

Both halves of the open-mouthed head.

The teeth I cut from an oversized bulk tofu container. Red fabric — remnants from my eleventh grade prom dress that my Mom made. Seriously. Again, Mom, thanks for the hoarding lessons. *Disclaimer: no, I don’t live in some scary, overstuffed hovel.

Paper mache and hot glue made this whole project possible. No fur and the one head’s already bitey!

Cut-up scrubby sponge makes for a nice, textured tongue. Those sponges helped for padding all over the creature.

Three layers of paper mache on this one, ultimately.

“Fetching” side view.

Yawning maw.

Garrrgh! Rarrrrr.

Fur affixing went surprisingly fast. Unfortunately, due to the fabric thickness, it pretty much ate up the forepaws. And what am I doing? Not much, still in my (fabulous) slippersocks.

Closeup. See, they have different colored eyes! Like David Bowie. If he had two heads. Um, hmm; yeah. I cut into the head forms before gluing the marbles on, so that they sat in a little bit.

Now he’s really shaping up! To define the barking head, I covered the parts around the eyes with an old, worn black velvet. Noses are those great leather-looking overcoat buttons.

The fur sheds everywhere, when not cut carefully. And if one gets burning, melted glue on oneself and THEN black fur bits stuck to it? Aggravating.

Jinx! When I was trying collars on him in one of those big Pet supply places, an employee came over to pet him. And then laughed; and then seemed disconcerted. I smiled, but she still thought I was an oddball. Whatever.

Oh, I did an engraved collar, too. But I was trying to convey that his OWNER was the true monster “My Owner is a Proud Member of Monsters Union, Local 826” or some such, but there was no way to do it in such limited room. Alas.