See also: Amigurumipatterns.net  –> Cats
This cutie has shipped already and will hopefully arrive within the next days at the home of her new owners, 2-months old Gerda and her family 🙂 The cat is only 4 inches tall and the soft and tiny belly calls out for a belly rub 😉
This is the first pair of baby slippers that I was actually able to finish. There are numerous adorablepatterns out there, and I’ve tried a few, but always ended up in a situation where the stitches wouldn’t add up any longer and I decided to unravel the whole thing (also because there weren’t any upcoming baby showers that would have justified further devotion to this). This time it was different. Good friends of ours just became parents, and I happen to know that one of their favorite colors is green. It was just one more lucky coincidence that I came across a baby slipper pattern that suggests using green yarn (not that you couldn’t choose any other color…;-)), so I decided to give it a try. There were some difficult situations with the star stitch that was being used, but I was able to figure it out and the stitches just kept adding up according to the pattern, what a miracle! Then there was the problem with the straps and it took a couple of attempts until I finally got it right. The joy and pride that come with finishing a project like this are unbeatable, especially if the result looks just like the picture in the book 😉
…that’s not only a Take That song, but also my motto for today’s post 🙂 It’s been a while since I last posted anything and I certainly won’t try to bore you with lame excuses, so I’ll just skip that step to say Hi everyone!
There’s been an awful lot of crocheting, crafting, making going on and I’d like to share the outcomes with you:
There’s the monthly Whimsey Box that broadens my crafts horizon every 30 days with fun projects and easy instructions. You should definitely check them out, so far I made hand scrub and lotion, paper flowers and a picture frame. All projects come neatly packed, the kit itself is wrapped in tissue paper and an adorable matching satin bow, there’s some art work as well and an ‘achievement’ button for every project you finished (actually you receive the button with the kit and that’s basically cheating, but I won’t mention that here 😉
Then there are more crochet projects, of course (Amigurumi, crochet slippers, baskets, a Fox Jar Cozy and some more Amigurumi 😉
I purchased three crochet basket patterns/project kits and only managed to finish one so far, in two different color combinations. The stitches used are pretty simple, but my downfall always is the end of one round/beginning of the next round, where you have to join with a sl st and/or ch1 and then sc in the next st, wait, wasn’t it the second sc? See what I mean? I keep couting the stitches of every row, hoping that I’m not in the middle of creating a basket-shaped monster (well, barely basket-shaped in that case). Sometimes the stitches add up, sometimes they don’t. Not sure what this actually says about my crocheting skills, but I hope I’m not the only one who has trouble with this… However, the baskets turned out quite nicely (see pictures), and I’ll try an owl-shaped basket next (bought on Craftsy).
In the meantime I took up stamping again and bought an alphabet stamping kit. Possibilities are endless!!! I started carrying a notebook with me for collecting all the quotes and words I want to stamp on cotton bags and maybe even shirts, at some point. Have yet to find out if the fabric is still washable after stamping (promise on the stamping kit package). I’d love to make my own statement shirts at some point, but I’m really afraid of the colors fading and ruining other garments in the washer. I’ll keep you posted!
Then there’s also the chain mail owl making and the homemade cosmetics branch and the granola factory and the gardening… An entire DIY armada coming your way 😉
My good friend Milo gave me an owl-making kit from The Ring Lord for my birthday, a kit for making tiny chain mail owls. He promised to help me make them since he already has some experience in the chain mail sector. Last week he stopped by at my place for pizza and owl making and it was fun! Bending the rings wasn’t so much fun first, and figuring out where to put the small, large and medium-sized rings in order to create an owl-shaped something was quite exhausting, but in the end Milo turned out to be a great teacher and instructor so that we were able to make three cute and adorable owls!
Also, I got into cosmetics thanks to the very first Whimsey Box I received (which included ingredients for hand scrub and hand lotion) and also a gift set for making my own body scrub. At first it feels a bit weird to pull out your handheld mixer that usually comes into action for beating eggs for cookies and cake, and beat your fluffy moisturizing, exfoliating body scrub, but if you thoroughly clean all the equipment afterwards, there’s nothing wrong with that 🙂
Almost two weeks ago I took on my biggest project so far, the Rainbow Shell Throw from The Crochet Boutique. I expected this project to last weeks if not months, but I was able to finish it last weekend, surprise! It was a really easy pattern made with clusters of double crochet stitches and you could see some progress after a short while, plus it was fun to change colors every few rows. I’ll see how ‘usable’ it really is for an evening on the sofa and as a living room accessorie. I might consider making a second (and maybe even a third throw) as a wedding present and this time experiment with the colors. The yarn I used was LionBrand Jiffy Yarn, just like suggested in the pattern. It is fluffy indeed, but not too fuzzy, so you can crochet smoothly. The sleeve also said it is washable at 40 degrees although I might not want to put that statement to the test… 😉
Here are some pictures:
The crochet coffee I made a few weeks ago was meant to be a gift for a real coffee addict, and apparently it was an acceptable gift because the recipient featured the coffee in his German blog: 😀 Yet Another Blog: The Eternal Frappuccino 😀
Thanks for spreading the word!
My second try to crochet a coffee to go, this time with cardboard bottom and inner surface to give it a better shape. Unfortunately I forgot to also add some beads to the bottom so that it has a better stand, but I may as well remember that for the next one 😉 Since the coffee cup is meant to be a gift for a Starbucks addict, I tried to imitate the marker signature on the cup (it kind of worked out, more or less, although I’m not completely satisfied with the result). Here’s how it looks:
It’s been two weeks since I opened my studio aka living room to the public, and it is time to look back and draw a conclusion.
The weekend of May 11 & 12 has been a blast! It’s been a lot of fun, it exceeded all my expectations, I met so many great people and I’m incredibly sad that it is over and that Cambridge Open Studios only take place once a year.
Despite the rather unpleasant weather conditions on Saturday we had a steady crowd of people coming in, taking a look at my artwork and asking questions. I really enjoyed talking to everyone who wanted to know about my ideas and inspiration, my best practice for preparing resin or the locations of my photography. Of course people also appreciated the wine and cheese bar in the hallway, there were several visitors from France who praised our French bread and the selection of tasty dairy products 😉
Since Sunday also was Mother’s Day I had been afraid that there would be less traffic, even more so because the majority of friends and acquaintances had stopped by on Saturday already. Far from it! Most of the time the stairs that led to the living room creaked and announced new visitors and promised interesting conversations, enthusiastic comments and simply fun. Thanks to my husband we had live guitar music from time to time and eventually the sun came out to turn Saturday’s rain into multiple rainbows and blue skies. The last visitors left around 6 pm and that was the time I could finally take a deep breath in and reflect on the past two days.
I have to thank everyone who contributed to that weekend’s success, either as a visitor, a promoter or supporter in general. Thanks to all the friends and my family who endured weeks and months of monotonous talking about the preparations for Cambridge Open Studios and who still managed to inspire me with ideas and helpful thoughts. I also want to thank everyone who announced Cambridge Open Studios via word-of-mouth advertising to family, friends and colleagues! And talking of colleagues, special thanks to Milo Martinez of Black & Tan Company for providing the beautiful table as part of our collaboration 😉 Not to forget the staff of the Cambridge Arts Council who once again did a great job preparing and organizing this huge event!
All of you made these two days of Open Studios a huge success!
Thx,
your Foolish Owl!
