craftgrrl | Barrette / hair clip suggestions?

I have always been a fan of funky hair clips with things attached to them. Flowers, plastic toys, beads, you name it. However, my attempts through the years to create such items have always fallen well short-- fine for my personal wear, but nothing that would ever fly if I wanted to sell them.

I chalk it up to having never found the right barrettes for the job, or the right construction method. I have mainly tried those springy clips you can get at any drug store-- I had a hell of a time trying to find a picture to show, but they are shaped like this. I really like that type because it works well whether you have a lot or a little hair, but anytime I've tried to sew something to them, it always seems like the item being sewn to the clip slips around. And forget gluing, doesn't seem like there's enough surface area to glue on them.

So, my questions:

1) Do you have a particular type of hair clip that you use when attaching things to them? Are there secret magic perfect craft hair clips that I missed the boat on?

2) How do you personally attach things them? Sew? Glue? Any particular advice?

My main goal: I'd like to attach fabric or yarn-oriented objects to hair clips and not have the result look or work like crap from either the top or bottom.

Thanks for any tips, sorry for the strange subject matter. Hope maybe it'll help someone else, too. :)