Spontaneous crafting (unfortunately not by me)

Last night, while looking for a pen to take to trivia night, I found my crochet needle. I've been planning to learn crochet for a while. There are some folks out there doing very impressive things - Monster Crochet, for example. Anyway, it went into my purse with a ball of yarn. Once I got to trivia, my friend Christy was immediately drawn to this simple tool. She is an experienced crochet-er and spent the whole time looping away. The result was this:

I'm planning to take it back next week for her to work on some more. Today, at work, I've been working on my own technique. I've got the chain down (mostly) but everything else is a mystery.

In other crafts, I'm getting nowhere fast. I still need to cut the pieces for the shirt and do more beading on the choker, although I've really lost my vision with that and have been putting it off. I did work on an old costume that needed to be hemmed, and I'm glad I got that done. Anyway, hopefully I'll have plenty to show next week. Have a good weekend.

random

A good friend of mine gave me this care bear (they are my nostalgia toys) and in a moment of desperation it became a pincushion. Then my ocd side kicked in and this happened:

Works in Progress

So, over the past week I've slowly been working on the various projects I've discussed here. I used pins to form a design on the cuff/choker.

Then I started sewing the beads in place.

After the messy work of ripping seams, I did a rough fitting on my shirt remake. I plan to add a wide black ribbon under the bust to give it definition. I am also going to trim the collar and sleeves in the light peach fabric.

My final work was knitting and finishing a small wallet for my bag. My cards were getting lost in the abyss of the bag.

Tour of My Home

I thought I'd show off some of the finished projects I have displayed around my house.

I bought this wreath for St. Patrick's day at Michaels. I love clovers and green so I may keep it up for a long while. However I added my own touch - some green mardi gras beads I got from Cliff.


In my hallway, I've put up some family photos, a painting I made and my cross stitch.



In my bed room, I made a collage out of nature pictures from a calendar/datebook. I think it distracts nicely from the persistent wood paneling.


On the way out the front door, I've put a cross stitch that I redesigned from a kit.

fringe benefits

While taking apart my shirt to reshape it to my body, I took off the cuffs. They were too perfect to throw away so, I'm thinking about making a collar/necklace. The pink and black reminds me of punk, so I'm trying to go in that direction (although it's all pretty girly right now). To add to the mix, I have black seed beads and some strings of Mardi gras beads. It will make a nice side project and will probably end up a funky jewelry piece. Give me ideas if you have any. The specific design is still in formation.

crafting for reality

I am an American. I am overweight. It's not thrilling but it's true. Because of that my clothes often cease to fit. so, I got inspiration from Wardrobe Refashion and decided to make some new clothes that do fit. Here is my palette/recycling pile:

Burrito (my lovely boy cat) liked it.
I figure I can get two good shirts out of the pile, at least. Here's the two for the first mashup:

They're both kind of peach, so I'm planning to have the plaid be the top/chest and the silk to drape over my midriff (because that's where I'm hiding my belly). Basically it should end up like a maternity blouse, but I think I'm ok with that. So, I'm currently ripping seams to reuse them.

So, recently I've managed to get a few things done. I needed a bag to hold my knitting so I started this:

And ended up with this:


I also modified a welcome sign for my door. (picture later)

New Blog

I want to have a place to record my crafting exploits and display them. I've done cross stitch, knitting, sewing, painting - all of which I love. I've got finished works I want to show off and works in progress I need encouragement with. And ideas. I want to document all my crazy ideas so I can come back to them later. I hope that sounds like an interesting read - if not, I understand. I hope to have more to show you soon.

Thanks,
Lucky