Instagram Roundup

Here's a little peek at what I've been working on lately. Sewing, knitting, hand carved stamps and even melty beads!

The photos are from Instagram (yes, I joined that bandwagon. Who knew low-res images could be so fun?) and put together with another app called Frametastic. While my Instagram account is private I am sharing the crafty pics on twitter, flickr, and now here.

Hopefully I'll have some bigger finished stuff to share soon!

Quick Fall Fix

The weather's been gorgeous in my corner of the world this past week. The leaves are all changing but the temperature's been rather warm. Bright blue skies and vibrant fall leaves are so pretty together, don't you think?

So I made a trip to the Arboretum the other day and felt like doing some autumn crafting afterwards. I decided on a quick fall fix and knitted up this leaf dishcloth from a free Ravelry pattern.

 

I love how fast dishcloths knit up and how you can put them to practical use right away. Eventually I'd like a rainbow of dishcloths, and this will be my orange.

While I have some bigger projects in the works, this seemed like a good fit for Stitched in Color's Celebrate Color event. Bright orange leaf? Very colorful and  autumnal-y. Check out the event, it's fun seeing what everyone is inspired to create by the loveliness of fall colors.

Hope the weather is great wherever you are and that you're enjoying the fall!

End of Year Goals

Sometimes, things move pretty slow around here. For instance, I've been meaning to post about finishing my entrelac scarf for a while now. And it had been finished (the knitting part anyway) for some time before I managed to block it. It's like I'm in my own little time warp bubble or something.

Anyhow, I'm really pleased with how this came out! I started it in the fall of '09 thinking I would whip it right up for that season. Well, I was new to knitting and perhaps overly optimistic in how fast I could finish things. I put it on hold through the warmer months and returned to it this fall.

I love the colorful Noro yarn and the entrelac pattern. It actually wasn't that difficult, but was challenging enough to keep me interested. After blocking the scarf feels softer and looks less bunchy. I'd say it's around six feet long -- that's from three skeins! It goes with my big down coat and has been helping to keep me warm and relatively happy in the cold and snow.

That's one more off my 2010 project list, although I need to do the final tally soon and it's not looking good!

I do have one more goal that maybe YOU can help me with. I've been hoping to reach 50 sales in my Etsy shop by the end of the year. That's only 8 more to go! If you've been thinking about getting something, now's the time as I'm offering a coupon for helping me meet my goal. Just enter 15for50 as a coupon code to get 15% off anything in the shop! There's plenty of tea wallets and Gocco cards and prints there, as well as some random fun stuff like little felt items and ACEOs. Please check it out!

I'll be back soon with more projects and a new annual project list for 2011.

Doctor Who Crafting

For a while now, I've been wanting to put together a little crafty care package for the dear friend who introduced me to Doctor Who. Her favorite "character" is the TARDIS. I had the idea to piece together a TARDIS quilt, and this was the result:

In the space that usually says Police Box, I used fabric selvages. (My friend's name is Heather.)

I wasn't quite sure how I wanted to quilt it, but I took a cue from the background (crazily pieced Goodnight Monkey fabric) and did a bunch of stars in three different thread colors.

Here's a look at the stars from the back: (Plaid, since my friend also has a love for Scottish things. Like men in kilts.)

But wait, that's not all! I also made a little felt Adipose baby, complete with snaggletooth and all. "The fat just walks away!"

Actually, it flies away in a box to its destination. Along with another Tardishcloth (the third I've made, and btw I like it better in this Peaches & Creme yarn vs. the Sugar 'n Cream I used for the first two). Also included a couple buttons I found in an Etsy shop.

 Hope she loves it!

Wristwarmers or Sandworms?

So I just finished these wrist warmers (I'm wearing them now!)


They're made with a super soft Mirasol Sulka yarn. The colorway is Cinnamon and the simple pattern is called Toast. (Tell me that's not a perfect match!)


But since I started these while I was reading Dune, I can't help but think that they are spice melange colored.


Maybe they're even sandworms!


More details (including pattern link) on Ravelry.

Projects, Finished and Un-

You know what I'm really good at? Starting projects. You know what I'm really bad at? Finishing them. I keep picking up more stuff to do when I have many things undone. This is not always a bad thing, as I tend to do small projects in between bigger ones, maybe to prove to myself that I can finish the big ones. Here's a few of my current projects, finished and not:

Just learned some amigurumi thanks to the super cute book Amigurumi World.

(Nowhere near as fancy as this guy does, but really fast and fun to do.)

Dishcloths are another fast project. Here's a geeky one I call the Tardishcloth (Time and Relative Dimensions in Suds).

Got the pattern on Ravelry.

Here's two more projects I'm determined to finish. My entrelac scarf with Noro yarn, started in the fall, hopefully done to wear sometime this winter! (I'm on my last skein, anyway.)

And a super-secret mystery project inspired by the hexes I was making. (No, it's not for the flower garden quilt that I am still working on. It's something else.)

Any guesses what it will turn out to be?

As if I needed a new hobby...

I started knitting! Although I learned how to crochet years ago, I was always scared to give knitting a try. I'm not sure why it intimidated me so much. But my mom used to knit and had the idea to start again and teach me, too! So from watching her, reading various books, and looking at online videos, I'm now a knitter.


After getting the basics down, I found that I got bored really quickly doing simple rows of knitting and purling. Thus I started an Entrelac pattern scarf using gorgeous Noro yarn. The pattern is interesting enough to keep me engaged, and watching the self-striping colors change is also helping my short attention span.


Here's another "Hey, let's try something new" project. This is me learning socks on dpns while tackling colorwork. Very interesting. And I love the owls.


And here's one I actually finished! A slouchy beret. Meret, on Ravelry. Because after having an account there sitting dormant, I've gone Ravelry-crazy, queuing patterns, hearting favorites, loving the whole new craft world that's opened up to me while learning knitting. Want to keep up with what I'm doing? Find me here:
In addition to the scarf and socks you see here, I've also got another scarf for a friend and some armwarmers in progress. I'm also planning a shrug and a sweater vest. Add this on to the myriad of other sewing, photo, and other crafty projects I never quite seem to get done. Instead of doing NaNoWriMo and adding one more thing to my never-ending list, I'm joining with a friend who decided to do FiSoYoFo (as in Finish Something You Fool!) (and my friend coined that, btw, not me) (although maybe it should be FiSoYoFoMo?) in an attempt to actually complete a few projects this month. Or maybe just one. I dunno. We'll see what happens.