Hello…it’s me!

Yes, really! It is! Lol.

I know, it’s been a very long time, and although I would like to say I am going to blog every day from now on, I just know that that would be the kiss of death. I think I said it last time I had a break, and look what happened next. Let’s just say I’ll try and write at least once or twice a week.

It’s not as if I don’t have plenty of crafty things to talk about. I have been drawing and painting, knitting and crocheting, making ATCs … although I haven’t made many cards. Much of my craft equipment and supplies is impossible to get at, so I am operating on a skeleton selection of goodies, although I have been adding to the yarn stash steadily. I won’t run out of yarn for a while yet (probably never, given that the minute I finish a ball, I take it as justification to buy another, or two!)

My latest creation is a bag. I haven’t made any bags since last summer, I think. I was knitting my five inch section of a travelling scarf, (more of this later 😉 ) and liked the combination of Peaches and Creme, (daisy ombre) and Stylecraft Eskimo (lemon) so much that I thought I’d make something else in it. Thus the bag was born. Sturdy, and with an inside divider, it’s in fresh sunny colours. Or another description would be, fried egg colours! I’m afraid that’s how I refer to it myself. Anyway, it’s basically knitted in garter stitch, but I did the joining together in double crochet, and I made the strap by crochet. The bag is fastened with a antique silver coloured bead.

Five minutes later!

Not five minutes after I wrote the previous post, the postman delivered my NaNoWriMo Mascot swap, and what a delight. He is  a ‘Lucky Cat’, made by Alissa, and he is beautiful. How clever to be able to create something out of clay! (I presume it is polymer clay). He is particularly loved because I have a black and white cat (Jiffers) so very appropriate. Alissa also sent other goodies, fabric and stationary. She had obviously been reading my profile on Swap-bot 🙂 Thank you Alissa. I love Lucky and everything else you sent. You have been very generous. Good luck with Nano. I hope Lucky’s sphere of influence reaches you too lol. Here are some shots of Lucky in his new home and the parcel.

 

 

Meet my new friend…

Having been away for three weeks, it’s going to be hard to catch up with all the projects I’ve been  doing. Despite not having access to the internet, it didn’t stop me being creative. Whilst on holiday in Argyll, I began a couple of projects, mostly in the evening, and on days when the weather was very wet. We decided the holiday was about relaxing, not running around like headless chickens, doing the touristy bit, so some days we didn’t go out until late morning or lunch time, which gave me time to be creative. One of the projects was this little chap…Bun Bun…who was conceived as a toy gift for my friend’s first baby, little Xander. I went to see him yesterday and he is, as you would expect, adorable. Bun Bun was made using my own pattern, except that it’s difficult to call it a pattern, because I made it up as I went along, and didn’t write it down. Already folk are suggesting I write the instructions down, so maybe the next one will be annotated in some way. I am not good at recording what I do, as I change my mind so many times, that my note pad looks like a page of graffitti (sorry graffitti artists), so I am considering trying to write it all down via a word document so that it can be erased and amended at will…I hope.

Anyway, here is the result of my endeavours. Meet Bun Bun…

Bun Bun was crocheted with Jarol Raffles, which turned out to be good for a toy rabbit, but I have to say it was difficult to embroider onto. His tank top was knitted in Paton’s Sorbet , (which is an Aran weight cotton), with trimmings in scraps of blue which I think was Stylecraft Kon-Tiki – a cotton mix. The carrot was done in crochet , but both balls, orange and green were odd ones without labels, so all I can say is that it was mercerised 2ply, I think. Hope you like 🙂

Fun with ATCs

I have been having fun making more ATC’s for swaps and as ‘extras’ for my swap partners. I also made some bookmarks, remembering to keep them as flat as possible so that I could laminate them.

 

 

 

 

 

                      

And lastly some cat ATCs. I didn’t plan on making these…they just happened!!

 

                  

Feeling guilty…

Today I have finally got around to writing something in here. The truth is, I just don’t have the time to blog any more, or the energy, but I am going to make an effort as it would be a shame to let all my previous work go to waste.

So, what Have I been doing? Well lots of things. Swaps for Swap-bot, a bit of quilting and card-making, and recently, just the last couple of weeks I have become engrossed in learning to crochet again. I leaned to crochet when I was a child. My grandmother taught me. She was a brilliant crocheter and made complicated doilies and table cloths etc. When I can crochet that well, I will feel good, but for now, just relearning everything I have forgotton is complicated enough for me. I do enjoy it though and love to design my own things. So here are the first results of my efforts, bags and purses. I am trying to learn a stitch or something every day and incorporate it in a pattern…well the last few projects at any rate, so that I learn as I go along. I am quite pleased with these. Hopefully as I progress they will get better.

 

             

 

Felt creations.

Well look what I made! Thanks to Paula for teaching me how to do blanket stitch around corners. I now feel much better about it. I think I have it sorted! So, I made a chicken, inspired by Paula’s template, but not quite the same, and some flowers, again, slightly different from Paula’s. I’m quite pleased, as it’s a new departure /skill for me.

 

 

 Catch you all tomorrow!