Crochet + shoes

Cross a crochet fetish with a shoe fetish and you equal crocheted shoes in every color. Can it get any better? Pattern purchased from sylver.etsy

Pattern is relatively easy, you just need to make sure you won't be interrupted much since most of the pattern involves carefully counting your stitches. The pattern gives you the option of working with help or jute for the bottom sole. I am happy I choose to go with the latter option. My hands are torn up enough from the jute so I can't imagine what they would have looked like after the hemp.

I am thinking yellow or spring green next...

One sock down and one to go

How exciting! I crocheted myself a sock! Okay, admittedly worthless until I have a pair but sometimes you need to celebrate the small milestones too.

Yarn and pattern are from epicurus.etsy. Pattern is listed for advanced crocheters but I didn't think it was too hard. And I was in doubt as to how a crocheted sock would look but since the pattern uses lace weight yarn, it isn't bulky or uncomfortable.

acorn hat (aka why I sometimes love mistakes)

I don't know exactly what got into me, but I have really been crocheting up a storm since I got done with the show and general holiday goodness. It was like I caught some kinda hooker disease (get it? crochet hooks? hookers? ah, never mind). But ravelry makes it so easy to find all these cute, free patterns and I have a load of random stash that I have been trying to use up.

Case in point: my acorn hat. I was trying to follow the pattern from Lion Brand's website for the "Aaron's Trick Hat" using some LO thick 'n' quick I had from another project. I don't know why it turned out so pointy on top, I couldn't even begin to tell you really. It just reminded me so much of an acorn that I went with it, I mean some times mistakes are happy mistakes right? I mean think of penicillin, microwave ovens, and teflon - all happy mistakes! I just made up some felt applique accents and voila - my acorn hat.

(me hamming it up, pretending to be a little woodland creature)

swaptree + sunday afternoon = new skirt

I could do without the world financial crisis. Couldn't we all? But if it were to have a silver lining, it does make me more apt to be economical myself. When you are paying so much more for food, gas, and well, everything - it obviously cuts down on your budget in other areas.

So on this note of trying to be more squirrel-like with saving money - I must confess my crush on swaptree.com. It is a site where you can swap any un-loved media you have lying around (books, DVDs, CDs, and even video games!) for stuff you do want. So not only are you recycling your old junk but helping another do the same! I basically raid my shelves every month just to make sure I didn't skip some forgotten college lit book that I will never crack open again.

My most recent trade was for the book Sew What! Skirts which I was able to utilize today during the Ame Bean's nap to make this:

The fabric is from a Joann remnant bin that was 75% off. And I got the book to help me for about $1.75 (cost of shipping). Plus the notions are all from a local scrap art store that sells things for nickles and pennies. So I figure I spent $4 on this skirt. You can barely thrift clothes this cheap! &hearts

Yarn and No Coast

I am so enthralled with my wheel spinning class! Last week we practiced with some Bluefaced Leicester. It was just speaking to be dyed with grape kool-aid and to be crocheted into a scarf-let. The charming buttons were taken off an old anthropologie sweater that had become too big. I like spinning with the Leicester, it is softer than corridale and was easier to spin than merino (at least for now, I totally need to get better at spinning merino, it is sooooo soft).


Also, I found out over the weekend that I was accepted into No Coast Craft-o-Rama again this year!! I had such a great time last year that I am honored to be picked again to participate in this year's show. The only down side is that I am now going to be crazy busy for the next five weeks. But if this year is even as half as successful as it was last year for me, I will have more than enough to buy a wheel, whoohoooooo!!!

new barrette = love

Found this little guy in a larger pattern of a japanese fabric. He just screamed to be made in to a barrette.

Knittin'

Hooray! After a too long hiatus from, well just about everything but taking care of the Ame bean, I am back to crafting! And I finally finished my first knitting project. It is not the easiest thing in the world to go from crocheting to knitting - it's a whole new way to hold your hands. And thank goodness for the continental method (which is using your opposite hand to hold yarn versus the English method), otherwise I would have never gotten it.

So I made the obligatory first scarf, with all the normal newbie mistakes. It's actually a cowl but same difference I guess. Now I just need to wait forever until I can actually wear it.


really goofy-faced action shot:

Bebe shoes

These were my testers for this super cute baby shoe pattern I found here. The pattern's biggest size was 3-6 months so I had to increase it a lot since, well, Ame has some big tootsies, even for a 13 month old. I wasn't even planning on being able to use them but since they turned out decently well, now Ame has her first pair!

Painting shoes = awesome

So it was ridiculously cold here in MN over the weekend. I don't think it got above zero and with the wind-chill factor, felt like -15 or worse. So suffice to say that I didn't once go outside the entire time. What to do when you are couped up? Paint your shoes of course :)

They started out as these fine but plain diesel shoes that I haven't worn in a long time:


And magically (okay, more like a whole Saturday later) turned into these!:


Tada!

I used just some thinned out acrylics in lots of layers and then applied a special "leather-only" varnish that is suppose to protect the paint from cracking, chipping, or wearing off. I also did an under layer of white to help with evening out the final color:


Here is the finished one next to the unfinished one. I think they look completely different now:


And more pictures of the finished shoes:





I still have to get some laces for them. I am hoping I can find some fun ones with stars or hearts or I am just going to go with plain grey ones. I also plan to cover up the diesel part on the tongue with some yellow felt. Nothing against diesel as a brand, but I think the khaki color looks just awful with the yellow and grey. Now I am on the hunt for any other leather shoes in our house....

Ame hoodie

So I cooked up this little number from a zip hoodie that was on sale at Target for only $5 and some felt that I had hanging out
It is a bit big on her but lucky for me she is growing like a weed and she should fit in it tomorrow (okay a slight exaggeration but it feels like she grows that fast!). And then here is the awesome action shot
The ears look wonky since she is not one to sit still for a picture and the hood was moving all around. But I really ike how it came out. I mean how can you go wrong with a pink panda on a baby?

Crocheted Baby Jumper

So Miss Ame has learned how to pull herself up and cruise around on the furniture. It is a remarkable thing to see, this person that only nine months ago couldn't even hold up her own head is basically walking around. However, this requires her to be constantly supervised leaving me very little time to do, well, anything. But I have learned a great secret. I am able to easily watch her and crochet at the same time. So I am expecting that I will be posting a lot of crochet projects in the future. I am also finally going to teach myself how to knit since I am dying to make this one sweater. But anyway, I was messing around and came up with this little number for Ame Bean. I am really digging grey and yellow together right now. I didn't follow a pattern, just winged it. But I wish I would have tried to write down what I was doing since I really like how it came out and would like to do another. Oh well, such is life.

Wardrobe Refashion

Well I did it. I didn't buy anything new for two whole months. Well I guess I did buy a sweater from Anthropologie but it was on sale and I only spent .90 of my own money (the rest was a gift card from my birthday). Otherwise I made myself a new pair of pants, refashioned a two sweaters, a sweatshirt, and three t-shirts. I also purchased a couple of things from the goodwill outlet for a total of $4 and a track jacket from another second-hand store for $8. Also, no shoes were purchased (I still don't know how I managed that one) and also no accessories.

And now I am hooked. I mean why would I need something new when I can either make it myself or just take sometime to rummage through some second-hand stuff? So I am going to keep on going with this and see how far I can go before buying anything. The only thing I need to refrain from is being tempted to buy things at the store I work at with my wicked awesome discount.

dance-dance-everyone look at your pants

Holy crap, I made myself pants. And I lurve them. So much so I am going to make myself a pair of jeans using the same pattern. Which was "Built by Wendy" #4110. I was a bit scared that the largest pattern size wouldn't fit since I am a RTW 14 but it worked out perfectly. They are even a bit baggy so I can adjust that when I make the jeans. And then more capris. And then more pants. And then I will have a different pair of bottoms for each day of the year, muhahahahah!

Life happens

That was my motto this weekend as I watched the hours whittle away. I had all these plans for crafts but life just kept happening and there was nothing I could do about it. Oh well. I did have fun though. We finally got over to the Minneapolis Sculpture Garden on Saturday. It is a short walk there from our house but we always forget to go. I hadn't been there since college and it is always fun just to see the people milling about. That is the hubby above getting frisky with some of the artwork in the pic above.

Anyhoo, I finished two clothing recons for my Wardrobe Refashion pledge. The first is an old maternity sweater that was way too stretched out in the belly region. I chopped that off, sewed some buttons on and also shortened the sleeves.

I kinda was mad about that after the fact since I could have left the sleeves as is and just rolled them up in the summer but oh well. I really like it though, it turns out to the be the best little cover up when the wind picks up at night.

Then I made up this little number trying to make a yoke. I REALLY struggled with this one mentally. For some reason I thought it would be a super simple "cut out this and sew in that" project. But I had cut too much of the patterned shirt (which is better than not cutting enough) and just could not figure how to get it all to line up in the end. I have learned a little since starting to sew and I just made sure to baste stitch the whole thing first. I had to redo it a couple times but it is a helluva lot easier to rip out baste stitches. But then I decided I didn't like the sleeves of the black tee shirt so I made some different ones. I hadn't really made a sleeve before either, so this whole shirt is a whole lot of experimentation.



Now today I just bought two patterns from the "Built by Wendy" line. One is for pants and one is for shirts. I am REALLY bad at patterns but I have to keep trying I guess. I really had wanted to work on these all weekend but life happens and I just couldn't get to it.

New Mission - Wardrobe Refasion

So I was reading Yellow Owl's blog and stumbled upon this Adorn article. Which led me to this - Wardrobe Refashion - the best idea under the sun. You pledge to not buy any new clothes for your term (2,4, or 6 months). I emailed the administrator to join starting June 1st for two months. Even I am too late, I am going to do it anyway. I just had a huge clothing event in my closet where I went through everything and chucked a bunch of stuff. Anything that was worth saving, even just to cut up for fabric, got put aside of course. But that left me with a very sad empty little closet. I would do it even longer but I am jet setting to Hawaii in August and I cannot even imagine attempting to sew a bathing suit.

Small project to help a friend

I do not really know if anyone follows soccer (or football as it is know in the rest of the world) but earlier today was the Champion's League final between Milan and Liverpool. Basically, if you do not follow soccer, it is the European soccer Super Bowl. My team, Arsenal, did not make it to the final but my friend Emily is a huge Liverpool supporter. She was *kinda* freaking out about it. So I made her this coffee/beer cozy for when she was at a local pub watching the game. I whipped it up in under an hour since I was pressed for time this morning. Unfortunately it did not bring her or her team luck and Liverpool lost 2-1. I tried.

almost a month

since my last post, shame shame!  I have been busy creating away.  I starting doing some more ATCs and crocheting too.  It seems I barely get time to do anything but then when I see what I have done in a month, I am impressed.  That and I am always jumping from one craft to another - sometimes mid crafting.  Whenever I get frustrated, I just switch subjects (or try to).  I think this results in my not getting as much done.

Anyhoo.  So my hat is the thing I am most proud of and use everyday.  I did this soon after my amigurumis.  Hubby thinks it's funny his 27 yr old wife has a cat hat :)




Basically I crocheted a rectangle - folded it over and sewed up the sides.  Then I db crocheted twice around the rim and added the flaps.  I got the inspiration from somewhere but I can't remember where - otherwise I would credit.

Shoes

So I finished these shoes today - worked on them over the weekend.  They are bittersweet in that they were the last pair clearanced at Target so no more painting ballet shoes until I can find some more cheap fiber ones.  They were originally a leopard printed velvet material that I painted using a pink/gold metallic fabric paint and sharpies for the decoration.  So excited to wear them!

First Post

So it is 10 in the morning and I haven't been to bed yet. But that could be that I slept all day yesterday. I will look back on this I am sure and laugh, but I am over due for this baby to come out and I just can't sleep at night no matter what I do. So I craft. And since I have baby on the brain, what else could I do but put some additional touches to some plain onesies that we have laying about. So here they are, the first one I did was the owl using some felt and buttons. Then I painted the octopus and the two pandas. The pink panda was first but I like how the green panda came out better.





Sorry the pics are dark, I tried with the flash but they were just not coming out. Well if I don't go into labor today/tonight, we shall see what else I come up with!