TGIF!
Fridays are the Monday of the crafting weekend. :) And this Monday is goooood….
Well, I have been pretty busy lately with some projects that needed to be done asap. Hence, the lack of blogging. Well, that is the excuse I am going with, anyways! I had to make a little one skein extra to go with the afghan I finished in the Make-A-Long. I should show you a picture, or tell you what it is, but it is going to be a surprise! :D
I am also working on two scarves for my brother’s friends. A momma scarf and a baby scarf! I have never made a tiny scarf before, so I hope it turns out well. :) I had the pleasure of being able to use enemyairship’s Piranha Plant Scarf pattern while it was still posted. As these are gifts, I decided to make them again by memory (barely). This is something that I am not entirely sure on, the dos and don’ts of using people’s patterns…. I hope it is something that I don’t cross the line on. :(
Other than that, I have another project that squeaked into the line up as well. I am fortunate enough to be able to give a go on Purplej3nn’s new scarf pattern! I have seen the photo and I like! :D I can’t say I have seen many (if any) scarves out there that look like this one and I hope that I will be able to give her some valuable feedback. I have recently (very roughly) written up my own first pattern and I know that once I get it all written up properly, I would love to have people test it out before I make it public. But, that is another task that is slowly becoming lower and lower on the crafting totem pole… Next up is Purplej3nn’s scarf and the wedding cross stitch! I honestly don’t know how I will get that finished and framed and sent before the wedding. :S There will be a few all nighters, that is a promise!
I must admit, I made and pretty damn good latte this morning. I am getting better at using my espresso machine and making consistant lattes. Occasionally I have one that is too sweet or too strong, but I am getting better. :)
As I asked on Twitter, has anyone ever used the ergonomic crochet hooks from Lion Brand? I am very intrigued and really want to try them, but the price (after shipping to Canada) and the very spaced out selection of needles makes me wonder… Have you tried them? What are your thoughts?
Make-A-Long Wrap Up
Well, I have to post this quickly. I have alot of things I need to get done today. And of course, they include crafting. ;) Crochetting to be exact.
Here are a few photos from yesterday. A friend came over to join me in my ventures. She is working on a granny square quilt and she started laying it out to see how many squares she still needed to make. I absolutely love this afghan, I should have taken more pictures but unfortunately I did not. The colors are amazing and the randomness of the placing is gorgeous. Here it is:
After I finished my classic tote, I resumed working on my sister’s afghan. I am using the Lion Brand 5 1/2 Hour Throw pattern with Lion Brand Wool-Ease Thick and Quick in Oatmeal and… oh what was that one again… Oh ya, Barley. A strand of each. It turned out amazingly!
If you haven’t noticed, I finally figured out how to take the date stamp off of my photos! Yay! But I am still learning on how to take decent ones. Sorry about the blurriness. :S
Well, I am going to make a toque out of the remains from the afghan, so I should get down to business! I hope everyone enjoys their Sunday, no matter what you decide to do with your day. :)
Crafters, Start Your Engines!
Well, I haven’t been in the mood for blogging lately. As you may have noticed. Oddly, I haven’t been in the crafting mood either. I have started early morning gym visits and that means that I don’t get any lattes in the morning. Therefore, by the time I get home, I am ready to crash. Anyways, enough of the excuses. They end here.
Tomorrow is the big day. THIS big day! Yep, you read that right. A 24 HOUR MAKE-A-LONG! :O Holy crap, I just got the heebie jeebies. Now, in all honesty, I won’t be attempting the full 24 hours. I have such a love of sleep that I just would not be able to do it. It would be unpleasant to be around me. To say the least. ;) Well, that being said, I am going to be crafting a hell of alot. And updating all along the way. On here, Twitter, maybe even Facebook or Ravelry.
What will I be working on? Well, the bags to begin with. And then probably going to finish up my loose crochetting projects. And then after that… well, we’ll see if there is an after that.
I suppose I should rest up. Wish the weather wasn’t so ugly here. I would sure appreciate a nice morning walk to wake me up for the day.
Anything is possible after a crisp spring morning walk.
Sunday Afternoons…
Hello again, all. It has been awhile for me to find some time to post about all my crafting ventures. Unfortunately, that also means I haven’t had much time for crafting!
Last weekend, I took a trip to Fabricland with my uber crafty aunt. I needed some help picking out “home decor cotton” for a bag I hope to make soon. I found enough for quite a few bags! It was 50% off everything for members so I got some discount fabric for $2 a meter! I love sales. I also found some fabric for a sewing machine cover tutorial that I have been looking at for awhile. I finally got around to it today!
Here is the tutorial and here is the finished product:
Cute fabric, right? Perfect for a sewing machine cover! I was surprised that I managed to cut the pieces straight to the lines in the pattern, except the sewing machines had to go sideways because the fabric wasn’t wide enough to accommodate it otherwise. Oh well.
Overall, it was a very fast put together. The only complaint I had was doing the corners. I haven’t done them before so it was pretty hard on the first side. Then, nothing lined up so I had to take it all apart and start over. The tutorial doesn’t explain how to do corners so if you decide to do this yourself, I highly recommend figuring out the corners ahead of time. I have the problem of not fully reading over a tutorial before I dive in. Whups! It isn’t as sturdy as I expected it to be. But I think that is my fault in expecting otherwise, since it is only one layer of cotton fabric. I suppose I could have used thicker “home decor” fabric and it would have been alot more rigid. And probably harder to do the corners too.
You may have noticed by now the… interesting… window coverings I have. Orange, Yellow, White and Purple geometric squares/diagonals. I have had them since I was in Grade 12. I went to a boarding school and we needed curtains to cover our cubicle-type bedroom entrances. These were mine! I find it hard to get rid of them, they have been with me ever since. They are tacky but I love them.
Well, I have looked through my photos and found that I have actually done more crafting than I thought! Such a good blogger I am, taking pictures of everything. Only to forget about it all.
Here is a picture of the fabric I got to make these bags:
I really wish that the date and time would go away.
Anyways, the left fabric (bright and almost on the tickytacky side of things, kind of like my curtains) is the sale fabric (surprised?) and the right fabric is the regular fabric. I love them both, perfect for spring and summer. You won’t lose the left fabric bag, that is for sure. I will be able to make 2 bags out of it, lots there!
I also made a rice heat therapy bag that has come in handy lately. I made one mistake with this one though, I put in too much essential oil. The whole house smells like cranberries when I heat it up!
Anyways, here is the tutorial and here is the finished product:
I used scrap fabric from my first bag and a grey fat quarter. Easy and fast, yet again.
As for yarn crafts, I have been dyeing a few more skeins to test the waters. I have found that I absolutely love dyeing yarn and I could really get into it. Real dyes and even painting all types of fibers. But, I keep telling myself that it is something I will have to wait to do. Once I get a house with a backyard and a bigger kitchen, I will dabble it a bit more. And then if I am very very lucky, I will someday live on an acreage and have my own llamas and sheep. We can all have a dream, right?
I have begun a crochetted rug for in front of the kitchen sink. I borrowed a few pattern pamphlets from my aunt and picked out one that both I and the BF decided on. The yarns being used are the brown from the sweater I got and unravelled, white that my Grandma gave me a long time ago, and sage green that a friend gave me because she didn’t like the color. She won’t like my rug I guess, but I’m ok with that. ;)
I have also tossed around the idea of picking up knitting again, as well. I have found that there are so much cuter patterns for knitting clothes, purses, anything, rather than crochetting. Knitting is much more time consuming, but it would be nice to have a decent skill set in both methods.
Now, on a final note. I have decided that I WILL NOT LET MYSELF BUY MORE FABRIC OR YARN UNTIL I FINISH UP ALL THE PROJECTS I HAVE ON THE GO. I must use up all (or close to) the yarn and fabric that I have before I can buy more. I live in an apartment with storage restrictions that keep me from buying and storing caches of yarn/fabric. Also, my pocket book has restrictions. ;)
Hope everyone had a crafty weekend! I will spend my evening on the couch with my crochet hook and rug in hand. Looking forward to it!
Dabbling in Dyeing
Well, a few more projects have begun over the past few days. I have a lot of starting projects and less finishing them… I need to have a month where all I do is FINISH projects. Or at least decide if I will ever intend to finish it. And if not, then get rid of it. But I think that same mentality probably goes for a lot of crafters out there.
Anyways, on to what I have started.
So, I have recently discovered the wonders to be found in a second hand store. Well, I always knew the wonders, but I just found some pretty cool ones. I found an absolutely adorable tea pot that I just love. No, it has nothing to do with crafting, but what good crafter doesn’t appreciate a good coffee/tea pot? What would keep up up those late hours, sewing until the cows came home? Anyways, I also found a couple of cheap purses that had cute handles. One was a pair of simple circle bamboo handles, but my favorite are these:
Beautiful wooden handles complete with apple holographic sticker! The bag is obviously homemade, so I will probably just use it as a base pattern and tweak it to my tastes. My boyfriend isn’t impressed with me having ANOTHER purse, but I think he likes the thought that all together, it will be <$5 to make. But then again, who doesn’t love that.
I also found two sweaters. One is homemade and I loved the color of the yarn, so I thought I would take it home and unravel it. Even after all this time, it still boggles my mind on how much yarn, time, and money can go into a sweater. I would easily say that $50+ on yarn plus who knows how many manhours. And there it is, sitting on the rack for $7. If it was a sweater I made, I would probably cry. But would be happy to know that it went to a person who could appreciate the effort. That being said, I unravelled it. I am not entirely sure as to what I want to do with it yet. But there is ALOT of yarn. Possibly a massive cowl? Another scarf/hood? I think I will twist it up in hanks and think on it. Anyways, here is the picture of the sweater:
Washing and trying to un-kink the yarn:
I used this tutorial, but the kinks didn’t get out and it still has the slightly old yarn smell. Not that I hate the smell, but you get the idea. Upon chatting about this over tea, a friend and I decided that it probably wouldn’t hurt to put a single hank in the washer (as shown) with a small amount of Dove and put it on the delicate cycle. It feels like acrylic so that would probably work. Then, spin like the tutorial says and hang to dry. Maybe I will try it, maybe I will just be lazy and whip it up into something that the kinks won’t be noticed.
The second sweater was machine-knit and wool (was going to dye) but I can’t figure out how to unravel it, so it will be going back to Salvation Army, I guess!
Now after all that fun, a friend and I decided this weekend would be wonderful time to hand dye our first yarn. We used this tutorial. Very easy and very hard to screw up, right? Well first things first, I had to pick up some Lion Brand Fisherman’s Wool. Unravel and hank it. Done. Here are the photos from the continuing process:
Dyeing the yarn in the crock pot (this is mine)
This is my friend’s.
Dyed and hanging to dry! Mine are on the left, friend’s on the right.
After dried, re-winding it into a hank (to get a better view of the variegation). I don’t have a winder, so I used the bottom of my chair. Not glamorous, but it sure works. I put the original hank around the bottom of a stool so that it would not tangle. Again, it works so why not do it?
Completed product! I was a bit unimpressed with mine at first, but once I re-wound them, I started to really like them. Much more appealing than just chunks of color.
All in all, a VERY fun experience. A few things I learned in the process:
- Use a small crockpot so as to have little standing water. The more standing water, the more your Kool Aid will disperse and not go where you want it to. See the red ball? Ya, it wasn’t supposed to be just red and orange. I had blue and purple in there, too. RED TAKES OVER!
- Use a full packet of Kool Aid per section. More vibrant color!
I managed to get 3 approximately equal hanks out of one ball of wool so I have to do my last hank yet. I bought more Kool Aid (see photo!) so I will l have lots for whenever I get a 40%+ off coupon at Michaels and just stop by for a ball here and there.
I have begun to crochet my hanks into a cowl and will show a picture or two when that is completed. Crochetting is on the docket for tonight. Crochetting and TV and tea. Perfect!
Well, I do have more crafting to share in regards to my Fabricland trip (50% off everything for members!) that I took today, but I haven’t eaten anything but a piece of toast and a muffin. All day. I am famished. Food > blogging at this moment. I’ll get back to you… later. :)
Gone But Not Forgotten
Well, I said in my last post that I would share some of my favorite past projects. And in no particular order, here we go!
A scarf for my dear friend so she can cozy up in her love for Mario:
The pattern was from here. She loves it and I love that it was such a hit.
Another is an afghan I made for my brother and his wife for Christmas. I used Lion Brand Wool-Ease Thick and Quick yarn and Lion Brand’s 5-Hour Afghan pattern. It was really only 5 hours! Well, give or take. The only thing I would change is the width, I would make it wider. It was a bit long and skinny for my taste but it would be a good length if you just spread it out lengthwise down your body. But I have quilts for that. Another few notes on the yarn, it softened up amazingly! As well, though it is pretty hole-y, it is very warm. Or so I am told. Take a look at the cat, she seem to agree with me! :)
I am glad that those who I made this for enjoy it as much as they do. It really is a wonderful feeling to have those you love, love what you have made for them. I highly recommend it. :)
Another project is one that I wrote up the pattern for myself. I have always had a thing for really big monk hoods. Ones you can get lost in. Here is a quick photo I snapped of myself wearing it, sorry for the ugly cubicle background!
It is a scarf with a large hood. I contemplated putting mitten pockets on the end of the scarf, but ran out of yarn. I didn’t use special yarn - just one of those 1lb bags from WalMart. I didn’t want to use really good yarn because I had no idea how many times I would be taking it apart and putting it back together to get it just right!
I think it is pretty darn cute!
Now, a quilting pattern. Ongoing. I used a bunch of my Mom’s old scraps she had lying around. Its just a basic patchwork quilt, I will be putting strips of muslin between the blocks as well as using it for the backing and probably binding. I have this weird obsession with muslin. I absolutely LOVE it!
Here are a few completely blocks to get an idea of the colors:
And now for the last project, we go to cross stitching. I made this for my boyfriend’s family for Christmas and his Mom absolutely loves it! Sorry for the crap picture, I forgot to get one when it was finished and by the time I remembered, it was on their wall and I couldn’t avoid a glare.
Well, that is all that I have documented! I of course have many a scarf made. Who doesn’t? And a couple slouchy toques. Those are always fun. :) I have a few cross stitch projects on the go, but I won’t get into those here.
The First is Always the Worst
The first post in a blog is usually the hardest to write. I would know, I have written about 10 of them, only to give up on nearly all of the blogs soon after. So I’m going to jump on in and pretend like you all know what is going on. If there is a “you all”. Anyways.
My sewing machine is still floating around in “being ordered” land. It was supposed to be here a few days ago but I am still left waiting. And NOT enjoying it, might I add. It will be a Janome 4030 QDC. Its a base-model computerized machine but that is all that I need. I don’t need fancy schmancy stitches or sewing without the pedal. I used to have an old, solid as a rock, Singer Touch n Sew. Only God knows how old it was. But a couple weeks ago, I sewed its last stitch. As much as I loved the old gal, it will be nice to be able to not have to baby my machine into working. That will be a nice change. Also, I will have to think of a name. I like to name inanimate objects. Except my Jeep, she is nameless. Wonderful and nameless. :)
I have a few projects ready to go for when she finally arrives. A few bookmarks and iPod/camera cozies. I will post the links to the tutorials I used when I finish them up and post their pictures. I just used some remnant fabric from Fabricland. Its nothing fancy, but it was nice and cheap. I also got a new cutting board, ruler, and rotary cutter while I was there. All OLFA products were 50% off, so that is always an excellent time to get it. And solid fat quarters were 4 for $10. Another excellent price. I have problems buying things at full price these days. There are so many places that you can get good deals, or just wait a little while and maybe it will go on sale.
As for crochetting, I am writing my very first pattern! I have yet to finish the project, but I will be posting the pattern as soon as its done. Just a hint, its a hood/scarf combo. I know I have seen them before, but I haven’t found one with a hood that is this large. I love huge hoods. Hide yourself away and cuddle up in a scarf. Perfect. I didn’t know how it was going to turn out, so I just used a 1lb bag of yarn from WalMart (again, super cheap). It is 100% “unknown fibre”. But really, these bags are just machine ends so are decent yarn, but have a few flaws so they sell them in 1lb bags for $6(ish). How am I supposed to pass that up??
Knitting: I don’t do much of it anymore, now that I have been crochetting. I like to see progress. Instant gratification. And knitting is so time consuming that I don’t find it as appealing anymore.
Cross Stitching - I have a modified rug hooking-to-cross stitch pattern on the go. But since it is all solid, it is taking awhile. I have put it aside so that I can get started on my cross stitch/suede bookmarks. Another photo or two or twenty will be posted when those are in the process!
Well, I think that will suffice for now. Still no call for the sewing machine today. :(
