Clay robots
During what Lisastarchild Pinkston - and yes, that is her real name - describes as an all-night crafting binge, she began tinkering with a single block of silver polymer clay, shaping the stiff dough into a palm-sized robot. "I started sculpting him as if he was sleeping, because I was falling asleep myself," she says. When the little bot was complete, she listed it on Etsy. It sold within a day. Since that night in 2009, Pinkston launched Sleepy Robots 13 online and has designed more than 8,000 tired little bots ($12-$25), each handmade from clay she sculpts piece-by-piece then bakes in a toaster oven and decorates with acrylic paint. Whether it's indulging in a pink-frosted cupcake, cracking open a book or dressed in a superhero costume, each robot is unique. "I can never make the same one twice because I do everything by hand," she explains. sleepyrobot13.com
