The Craft Frog

The Harrison Dollhouse, A

2012-02-18T07:47:00.000-06:00

The dollhouse building instructions are divided by letters. So I figured that as soon as I got each letter done, I'd take some pictures and make a post about it! So here is... The first post!

The directions were pretty straight-forward. But before I actually started removing foundation bits and gluing them on, I drew the hardwood pattern on the floor first. It took a little bit. I used a pencil to draw with, and one of those little disposable nail files to measure the width of the "planks." I started from the back of the floor and worked toward the front, then just added random lines for where each "plank" would end. This is a close-up of what it looks like when it's done:

Once I got the lines drawn, I figured it would be easier to paint/stain after I had the foundation bits glued on and had a raised surface to work with. So I popped all those out and glued them as it said in the directions, using tacky glue with masking tape to clamp. This isn't my first die-cut dollhouse, and with previous ones I've used hot glue. Those went together faster, without a doubt, and on the simpler houses hot glue worked just fine... but on one particular house there were a few places that I had to cram/cut pieces in to make it work, and there were more than a few gaps. Die-cut dollhouses are meant to fit together snugly, and if you have absolutely no give and then make a mistake on top of that... It's frustrating. So tacky glue is the way to go for me.

Here's the bottom.

I mentioned it in a different posts, but if I had been using a hot glue gun, I would have had a lot of issues with the foundation. I didn't put the pieces for the front and the back on "straight" and so when it came time to put in the middle pieces, I had to un-tape and shove them in and re-tape. But it all went together.

And then I started painting. I drew a line (with pencil) where the walls would go, so that I could paint the front porch and stain and there wouldn't be any overlap.

I also painted the foundation pieces, two coats. I used wood filler to fill in the cracks where the tabs go into the slots. I scored along the drawn hardwood floor lines with an x-acto knife to make them stand out more, and then I stained.

I did a pretty crappy job of staining, honestly. It's pretty easy to see. I forgot that you take your brush and do smooth strokes along the woodgrain. I got the "along the woodgrain" part, but there weren't smooth strokes, and so it's a little uneven. I'm hoping that when the walls and everything get up, and I have furniture in there, it won't be so noticeable. Second and third floors will be better!

I do still need to varnish the whole thing, but I think I want to get the walls up first because I have an idea that tacky glue may not stick as well to the varnished surface. I'm probably wrong, but still. Walls first. I'll varnish the foundation while I'm waiting for paint to dry. The shell is next and I have to paint all of the outside bits.

MOAR BABBLE!!!

2012-02-16T14:23:00.000-06:00

I just had the following conversation with my husband:

Me: I kind of want to crochet a frog skeleton.
Mr. Craftfrog: ... That's not creepy at all.

So I'm going to crochet a frog skeleton as my next crochet project. I'm going over details in my head right now because I don't want it to be huge, but I also don't know that I have enough white embroidery floss to make it tiny. I have some white baby weight, I may end up using that. It would be smaller, anyway.

Dollhouse: I'm getting a lot done, but it just doesn't look like it. Once I this whole section finished, I'll take some pictures. More staining, I have to score the hardwood floor pattern into the wood, and then fill and sand and paint some more. Yeah, that looks like a lot of work. BUT. I just got the rest of my stuff I needed to get this done. Now all I need are shingles, and shingles are SPENDY!!!

But now the childrens are done with snack, so it's off to do parenty things.

Star Trek!

2012-02-14T07:30:00.000-06:00

I'm totally revealing one of my sooper seekrit projects. :D I made Star Trek kitty!

He's a classic Trek kitty, and he was a lot of fun to make! :D The details were done with embroidery floss and just sewn on.

I've done a little work on the dollhouse. The foundation is all together on the base and I have the hardwood floor on the first floor done. I'm using tacky glue, with masking tape to clamp, so it's not the instant gratification of banging the whole thing out at once. BUT. Tacky glue has better lasting power (especially in humid climates like mine) AND you can easily shift the pieces after they're glued on to get the fit you want- which saved my ass with the foundation. I haven't painted or stained yet because I figured it would be easier to do it when I could get it up off the direct table. And it looks like it will be easier. My daughter keeps asking if I've made the stairs yet. No stairs yet. I'm waiting on additional supplies to get here (X-acto knife, wood filler, scrapbook paper for wallpapering) so I might bust out the stairs and do them soonish rather than later. You can do them any time in The Harrison and I fully plan on using my removable partitions (and gluing them in place) so the stairs will help me see where to put them to get the size of rooms I want.

This Past Week

2012-02-11T07:17:00.000-06:00

Pretty busy! I started my second secret project (I'll have pictures of both as soon as they've been received and opened. I'm pretty happy with how it's going. I was using the wrong size of hook and that provided a little frustration last night, but I should be able to finish it today and send it out on Monday.

We went to the zoo yesterday. It's been holding pretty steady at 65-70 degrees here for the past few weeks. Like, even the cherry trees are blooming. Except yesterday. At least it wasn't raining. We rented one of those stroller things, and my daughter spent most of our time at the zoo in her Daddy-powered princess carriage, bundled up with her princess blanket. And my son... Sigh. He spent most of the time pulling on my hand and saying "Run? Run? Run?" At the end, I was able to contain him in the stroller, thankfully. But they both slept well last night!!

AND! On Friday:

Dollhouse is here! I was worried that the delivery guy wouldn't want to drag the 30 lb box up the stairs to our front door, so I went down to meet him.

And it gives dimensions on the box. And in the description when I got it. But I didn't really realize how *big* 31.5" was until I got the base of the thing out on my crafty table.

It's big. I've assembled a few dollhouses before, but nothing this big. This is going to be a long-term project. Not just because of the size, but because I want this to be "finished." Like, I spent Friday evening and some time yesterday afternoon drawing a hardwood floor onto the first floor. The next step is painting and staining, painting the foundation pieces, and then finally gluing them on.

One tip I have- if you can pick up an upholstery sample ring from a furniture store (a ring with the swatches on it, not a book where they're glued to pages), do. Not only can it provide upholstering fabric for miniature furniture, but you can use the samples to carpets smaller dollhouse rooms.

Sunday, Sunday!

2012-02-05T11:58:00.000-06:00

It's Sunday! I'm hoping my son will take a nap today (Grrrrrrr!!!), and soon so that I can hop in the shower. Because I'm going out WITHOUT THE CHILDREN! I'm super excited. I'm going to see "One For The Money" with a friend, and while I'm pretty sure it's going to be completely horrible ('cause let's face it, the books are), I'm hoping it'll be that awesome-horrible.

I'm going through my food section of my shop right now, which means that there will very likely be new food patterns popping up frequently within the next couple of weeks. I for sure-for sure want to do some cherries and a cupcake, and I'm also tossing around the idea for some grapes and plums and CHOCOLATES. So we'll see.

Also... I'M GETTING A DOLLHOUSE!!! Well, a dollhouse kit. I'm excited. I'm super excited. 'Cause I'll put it together and then I'll have a long-term project to work towards and do, and fill it with the tiny things I love to make. So... YAY for that! Eventually I want to get myself Greenleaf's Garfield (that's been my dream for, like, ever) but it's a little spendy right now and I want to start with something a little smaller and a little more reasonable (and easier to move). Something to practice on, as it were. Hopefully I'll be able to order it on Monday and then I'll make a very excited post about how it's here, and then there will probably be posts about miniatures cropping up, in addition to the sewing and crochet.

And now... Shower time!

WiP Wednesday?

2012-02-01T08:23:00.000-06:00

It's Wednesday, and I really don't have much going on, so I figured I'd start a WiP post. Even though I don't have a lot going on. Yeah, I hadn't really thought this through. But now I'm committed!

I'm doing another swap and so I have that going on right now. Of course, since it's a secret swap I can't really talk about it. Um... I hope my swappee likes it! *cough*

Next up on my project list is another secret project for a friend of mine who lives very far away. So... 0/2 at this point. I also hope she likes it!

OH!!! I did do a trade with the fabulous Jewel Renee for FROGS!!! I'm seriously dying of cute over here. LOVE!!! I really like the disgruntled froggy in the front! And did I mention she's the sweetest person ever? EVER!

Um... I finished a couple of mature-themed items that I can't talk about because this isn't a mature-themed blog, so you'll just have to take my word for it that they're awesome. They'll be showing up in the other shop I plan on opening.

I've made a slight change to my chess set plans. I'm still going to do it, but I think I might do it with micro crochet just so that I don't have to worry about balance. The characters will be small enough and light enough that I can just glue them on and go.

I thought about quilting yesterday and I'm thinking about it again today. I have some new fabric from the last time I worked on the poor, neglected Farmer's Wife, and I'd really like to see how I can work it into some new squares.

Speaking of micro crochet, I do want to get a smaller hook so that I can try one strand of embroidery floss and see how I get along with that. The froggy that I made was directly taken from on of my mini patterns and in a 1/12" scale, it's bigger than I would like it to be. So we'll see.

Well, this was all over the place and I didn't really say much. So, um, happy February!!!

Micro Crochet

2012-01-27T20:33:00.000-06:00

Apparently it's a thing.

I really enjoy crocheting, but making miniatures is something I love. Doesn't matter what the medium is, I love making 1/12" scale miniatures. I've tried crocheting them before using just embroidery floss, but the scale was too wacky and I gave it up.

UNTIL!!! A couple of days ago, an online friend post a picture of tiny dollhouse-style doilies she'd made out of size 50 sewing thread and I was all, "AHA!" I don't have size 50 sewing thread, but I DO have oodles of embroidery floss sitting in my closet. So I pulled out a skein, pulled it apart into three sets of two threads, and used my smallest crochet hook to make this:

I have some issues with him- the limbs are on a bit crooked with each other and so are the eyes. But this was mostly a, "I'm going to see if I can do this," experiment. There will be more in the future for sure. Probably not for a little while since I'm in the middle of going through my shop. I'm also planning on making shawls and scarves and blankets and things. More stuff on my list of things I want to make. :D

Etsy and Cleaning

2012-01-23T08:44:00.000-06:00

So today's entry... Etsy and cleaning! :D

I'm in the middle of going through my shop and redoing all my listings. They're getting better pictures (which means it's a lengthy process because everything I have in there is made-to-order). I'm almost done with my "wearables" section. I added a few things, changed some prices, and re-took some pictures (that I have to re-re-take today when my son is napping). I have two more things I need to make and then I'll be all done. And then onto something else. Food maybe.

And... AND!!!! I'm adding shipping prices to Canada. Just Canada for now. Once I get organized, I'll add shipping prices to other countries, but I'm kinda :/ because shipping a small flat rate box to Australia went from $11.00ish to $17.00ish. Ugh. We'll see how that goes. Just the one section has shipping prices to Canada for now, but I'll be going through everything and the whole shop will be done at some point!

As soon as I'm done, I'll probably have a sale of some sort. All "Yay I'm done!" and stuff.

Now I must spend most of the day cleaning. It's super dark and stormy out- I just told my daughter we get rain and thunder and tornadoes in Alabama instead of snow- and I'd really rather just curl up with the kids and some hot chocolate and read a good book, but until I crochet myself a self-cleaning apartment (hahaha) then I have stuff to do!

Fairy Wings

2012-01-20T11:26:00.001-06:00

I did them! They're done! Sewing-wise, there's probably a better and/or more efficient way of doing them than what I did, but I'm so not a seamstress. :D

I started out with an idea of how I wanted them to look in my head and sort of worked from there. There was a lot of winging it. (See what I did there?) They weren't very difficult to do. Getting the wire into the right shape and then making a pattern that made me happy were the trickiest bits, I think.

Materials

fabric- I used a half a yard of each color. There's enough left over from both colors that I could have made straps out of them, but I certainly wouldn't want to get any less.
wire coat hanger
wire cutters
pliers
hot glue gun
paper for making the pattern on- I used construction paper
stiff cardboard
patience

First thing you want to do is make the armatures from the coat hanger. After I got the first one done, I briefly thought about just having the one armature and making the wing longer (which you could certainly do) but I liked the look of it with two better. Safety first with the wire cutters! No kids, no pets, wear goggles, all that good stuff.
I measured my daughter's back, from shoulderblade to shoulderblade. I don't have an exact number but it's around 4". I bent the hanger up on either side of her shoulderblades and then started shaping the top armature. I guesstimated the length I wanted and ended up cutting a little bit off of one end, and then used a tape measure to measure it and made the other side about that length. They're around 10".

I did the same for the bottom one, only I based it off of the armature I already had done and eyeballed the length. Just play with the wires until you get the general shape you want.

Then trace them onto your pattern paper. Draw the wing shape around the traced line, leaving enough room on top of the armature for a seam allowance.

The line about half an inch down from the top on each of them is the traced armature line. I made one side look the way I wanted to, cut it out, and traced around it for the other side so they would match.

Trace the wing shapes onto your fabric, you'll want two of each shape, and cut them out.

Put the wrong sides of matching shapes together and then pin the ever-loving crap out of them.

Set your sewing machine to zig-zag and sew around the top edge of where the armature will go.

Feed your armature through the pinned fabric so that it's at the top and sew a sleeve for it. I didn't sew a sleeve for the entire length of the wire because by that point the shape of the wire no longer matched the top edge of my wing. I sewed at critical points so that it would stay in place and wouldn't move around.

Then finish your zig-zag seam to sew the fabric together.

And repeat for the other wing shape.

Rev up your trusty glue gun. Decide which piece you want on top and how you want to match the colors (if you used different colors) and then glue the middle section of the wing shapes together.

Please note this is the back. Your wings will probably be pretty floppy at this point, so we need to reinforce the back. Break out your stiff cardboard and some sharp scissors. Cut a small rectangle to support each side.

Glue in place, repeat for other side. I covered mine first to match the wings, but you don't have to. Then cut more rectangles, skinnier and longer, to brace the middle section. Glue one end to the middle section of the wing and the other to the cardboard support already glued on.

You may want to repeat it for the front of the wings, but I tested mine out and decided that they were fine just like this. I may change my mind later. ;) After I did that, I wrapped the whole middle section of the wings with more matching fabric, just to make it look neater.

Edit from a couple of days later: I will be reinforcing the front. I want something less noticeable than a chunk of cardboard, so I'll see what I can come up with.

Then, back to the sewing machine for straps. You might want to sew your straps at the same time you do all your other sewing. I probably would have if my son wasn't in bed in the room with my sewing machine by the time I got all the sewing on the wings done.

Cut two lengths of fabric however long you want (I did selvage to selvage on a matching star-printed fabric because my daughter wanted stars)- make them each double the width+1/4" of the finished width you want. Mine were about three inches wide.

Take one, fold it in half lengthwise, right side in, and sew a 1/4" seam all the way along the length. You may wish to pin first, I didn't. Leave one end open. Turn it right-side-out. Normally I would iron it properly and top-stitch just around the edges to finish it, but I had an impatient little girl who's been waiting a couple of months for her wings, so I just wanted to get it done. So I just turned them inside out and called them good.

Take the straps back to your wings and glue onto the middle section of the wing. This picture is the front of the wings. I looped the straps around the back, glued them in place, and then crossed them over the front and glued there as well.

And then to finish, I made a few little flowers and glued them on the middle section of the wing to hide the straps and everything.

Here's the happy fairy princess in her jammies!

Bradley

2012-01-18T08:33:00.003-06:00

You know how you just get inspiration for things that you HAVE to make? Yesterday, I was sitting at my computer and I said, "I need to make a pancreas."

So I went a-Googling. I knew that there was a pancreas, and the function of the pancreas, but I wasn't actually sure what a pancreas looked like. Apparently it looks, well, like a pancreas. And it cuddles up with the duodenum. So I made a pancreas AND a duodenum.

This is Bradley. Bradley the Pancreas. It's really hard to tell in the picture, but he's winking. Next time I make him, I'll make the face with a darker yarn- probably blue. I'll update the picture when I make another one so it's easier to see.

AND... If you've ever wanted to make a pancreas, here's the pattern! :D Sewing the duodenum is a little tricky, you'll need to sew the stoppers inside either end, about a row down from the top. If you don't mind gluing, it would be a lot easier to glue the duodenum to the side of the pancreas. The actual pancreas part will need to be firmly stuffed too, or it won't shape right.

Materials

worsted weight pale yellow, baby pink
G-sized crochet hook (or whatever makes tight enough stitches to keep in stuffing for you)
stuffing

Pancreas (stuff as you go)
1) ch 2, 6 sc in 2nd ch from hook, join with sl st (6)
2) ch 1, 2 sc in each sc around, join with sl st (12)
3) ch 1, *sc, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (18)
4) ch 1, *sc2, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (24)
5) ch 1, *sc3, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (30)
6) ch 1, *sc4, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (36)
7) ch 1, *sc5, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (42)
8-9) ch 1, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (42)
10) ch 1, *sc5, dec over 2 sc* around, join with sl st (36)
11) ch 1, *sc4, dec over 2 sc* 5 times, sc in each of remaining 6 sc, join with sl st (31)
12) ch 1, *sc3, dec over 2 sc* 5 times, sc in each of remaining 6 sc, join with sl st (26)
13) ch 1, *sc 2, dec over 2 sc* 5 times, sc in each of remaining 6 sc, join with sl st (21)
14-22) ch 1, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (21)
23) ch 1, *sc, dec over 2 sc* 5 times, sc in each of remaining 6 sc, join with sl st (16)
24-31) ch 1, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (16)
32) ch 1, dec over 2 sc 5 times, sc in each of remaining 6 sc, join with sl st (11)
33-34) ch 1, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (11)
35) ch 1, dec over 2 sc 5 times, sc in last sc, join with sl st
break yarn, finish off, sew closed

Duodenum
1) ch 12, join with sl st to form ring. ch 1, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (12)
2-36) ch 1, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (12)
break yarn, finish off

Duodenum Stoppers (make 2) and Eye (make 1 for each eye)
1) ch 2, 6 sc in 2nd ch from hook, join with sl st (6)
break yarn, finish off

Assembly
Sew one duodenum stopper inside bottom of duodenum. Fold end down to form a short right angle and sew in place. Stuff duodenum lightly. Sew other duodenum stopper inside other end of duodenum. Arrange around side of pancreas and sew in place. Arrange and sew eye onto pancreas, then embroider winking eye and mouth.

Princess Crown

2012-01-14T12:29:00.000-06:00

A while ago, I promised my daughter that I would make her a princess crown. So... I made her a princess crown.

I started out with an idea involving crocheted pieces and bits of wire and then I realized I was probably over-thinking it. So I went browsing on Etsy, which I often do when I need crafty inspiration. I found a few headband-style crochet crowns and it clicked into place. I went onto Ravelry and found this adorable pattern and that's what I did this morning.

I changed the pattern slightly. I did three rows of straight sc, and then instead of the row 5 that was written, I did:
(sc, hdc, dc, dc, hdc, sc) across the top stitches of the dc, then sl st in the sc. It gave made the points a little more pointy and added a bit of texture.

And then two little circles:
ch 2, sc6 in 2nd ch from hook, join with sl st (6)

And one oval:
ch 3, 2 sc in 2nd ch from hook, 5 sc in next ch, 3 sc in bottom loop of next ch, join with sl st (10)

and sewed those on.

She loves it. She's happily wearing her "purple golden princess crown." Now all that's left for her fairy princess outfit are the wings.

Stormy Thursday

2012-01-12T13:22:00.000-06:00

It is Thursday, right? It has to be. And I'm ALL CAUGHT UP!!!! Of course, I promptly started a bunch of new projects... *cough* But it's a sickness that can't be stopped. AND... I started on my daughter's wings. And by started on, I mean I think I've figured out an outline for the top and bottom portion of each wing and how I want them to look when they're finished... But I'm still working out how to assemble them into finished wings and how to sew the wings onto the armatures. ... I just had a stroke of inspiration while I was writing this. I may end up doing some cutting and sewing today, we'll see. I do still have a lot of cleaning to do. I will be doing a tutorial for the wings here, too. Most of the suggestions I saw were, "Make an armature out of a wire coat hanger and just stretch panty hose across it." That's a really neat idea, but I'm not so sure about the practicality of it. My son is a little tornado of accidental destruction. Pantyhose snags really easily.

I recently made a car. Crocheted, I mean. It was definitely a learning experience. I have plans to make some more, but none that'll be quite so big. I had a lot of fun doing, though, and the little guy who it was for (that phrasing looks really awkward, grammatically speaking) loves it, so that's the important part.

It is cold and stormy here again, so it looks like we'll get winter for another weekend. It's a good thing that I've put hats and mittens for the kids in my immediate to-do list! :D I still haven't done them for this year. But since we've been running the AC pretty regularly... Sigh.

And I'm doing Pay-It-Forward again this year! Super excited about that! No idea what I'm going to make, but it's not going to be the same as last year. Hmmm...

Hope everyone has a great weekend!

It's Monday Again

2012-01-09T13:04:00.000-06:00

Apparently it's Monday again. I don't really have a whole lot to write about right now. I have two more projects to finish before I'm ALL CAUGHT UP and then I think I'll take a mini-crochet-break. Or make things that I want to make. I do have a pair of wings I want to sew together for the girl (which I promised her) and I have a fairly good idea how those will work in my head. Of course, translating things from the tangle in my brain to out in the actual world can be hit or miss.

Right now I'm enjoying a nice cup of coffee, listening to what I'm pretty sure is my son talking to himself in bed, and my daughter is watching "Frankensteins." And by Frankensteins, she means Little Einsteins. I... Meh. It's better than that damn monkey with his kleptomania that magically always works out for the best.

I honestly have no idea what else to write about at this point. I have an idea for some new things, but they're the types of things I get soapboxy about, and I have no desire to get soapboxy here. So we'll say that it's social commentary in a tongue-in-cheek and/or humorous way.

OH! I'm going to be making chess sets. Crochet chess sets. I have one sort-of "traditional" one planned and then one WAY not traditional.

I have abandoned this for a while in the pursuit of QWOP which makes me laugh until I pee or can't breathe. Or both. So I'm going to wrap this up now, and urge EVERYONE to QWOP.

I Hate Spam

2012-01-06T10:37:00.002-06:00

This is a ranty post that has nothing to do with crafty things, about something that may be hard to read about, or some people may not agree with me on. But I feel it needs to be said. So if that type of thing is not your bag, then this probably isn't the post for you.

This morning, I got this comment on my most recent blog post: "Hi, my name is Heather! Please email me when you can, I have a question about your blog! HeatherVonSJ[at]gmail[dot]com"

My first instinct was, "Spam." This isn't addressed to me, and my name is posted up on my blog. I also have an email address posted on my blog, as well as links to my Facebook page and Etsy shop, where people can also contact me directly.

I cautiously emailed Heather and just a couple of minutes later, received a generic, "Thank you for your email," form letter. At least this one was addressed to me! It turns out that Heather doesn't actually want any information about my blog, but rather wants me to try and direct some of my traffic to her website by providing free advertising for her.

After I emailed, I Googled her email address, and it seems that Heather does this type of thing a lot. I don't know her blog selection method, but she leaves the exact same comment on dozens of blogs at a time, and I'm willing to bet that most bloggers have an option to contact them directly. There's a blog post here about it, where Heather herself comes in and leaves a comment about everyone's blogs being about families and motherhood and all that other stuff. Heather, you missed the mark. Not every woman's blog is about motherhood and families.

This is basically telemarketing, internet style. I used to work for a phone company, and they would do this same thing. They would call, leave a voicemail about being an "account representative" and call them back, and they would try and sell you their shit. It's called inbound telemarketing in the phone world.

Heather has a blog about being a mesothelioma survivor- a blog that gets updated infrequently. I am fortunate to have family members who are cancer survivors, and I definitely feel for those afflicted with cancer. The American Cancer Society and the Mesothelioma Applied Research Foundation are non-profit cancer organizations. Heather's blog's parent site is NOT a non-profit.

I'm willing to bet that every American knows someone who's been affected by cancer. Everyone is someone's parent, someone's sibling, someone's friend. So please, raise awareness for cancer or post links for non-profit organizations.

Heather, if you read this (which I'm doubting because you didn't actually read my blog at all before posting your spam at me), I hope you remain healthy I wish you all the best. If you chose a different approach than internet-telemarketing, you might find that it works out better.

Happy New Year!

2012-01-02T11:31:00.000-06:00

It is, apparently, the new year. 2012. The Mayans predicted the start of an age of enlightenment, and I honestly can't think of anything else the world needs more than that, right now.

I'm about to go and pour myself a cup of coffee and furiously crochet while my son sleeps and my daughter watches that infernal monkey on TV, but I'm taking a moment to update because I haven't in a while!!

I have some plans for 2012! I'm going to get a healthier lifestyle, which will very probably have the added bonus of losing me some weight. (And no, Captcha spammers, I don't need to "review" your crappy products in exchange for a few measly coupons. No thank you.)

I have so many ideas for things to make and do. My idea of sewing toys in addition to crocheting them has been slightly derailed, because the ideas I had were specifically for children's toys, and the CPSC has taken a big crap all over small businesses that make things for children. It started from a good place, and in reality is *helping* the people it set out to protect us from, and is screwing over the small businesses of America. I have a lengthy soap-box-y rant about this, but I'm not going to go into it right now except to say, "SCREW YOU CPSC!"

I'm planning on that gingerbread house, probably in a couple of months. Dragons, ponies, robots... Wings and a crown for my daughter that I will be posting the tutorial/pattern on here for. And more free patterns. And more patterns for my minis. So many ideas, I think one of my goals should be to start an idea journal.

I hope everyone had a safe and happy New Year and I look forward to being creative with you in 2012!!

Getting Caught Up

2011-12-26T07:03:00.000-06:00

SO busy. Still. I'm getting there, though. I've been crocheting up a storm this weekend and as soon as I finish my coffee I'm going to do some more.

I did manage to pull out my sewing machine, though. And by pull out, I mean remove the cover for it, which made my son freak out. He started screaming and crying and that was BEFORE I tried to sew his Elmo blankie with it. It was the saddest thing ever. And it got worse when I pulled out the Elmo flannel to make up a quick blankie with it. I, of course, was the most horrible mother in the world for wanting to torture Elmo.

This proves that it's been way too long since I've done any sewing. Not only does he not remember it (I used to sew all the time with them in the room) but he's scared of it. I didn't put the cover back on, so I think that if I can use it a little at a time I might be able to actually start sewing again. I did finish the Elmo blankie, though. I just took about a half a yard of fabric, folded it in half, sewed a 1/4" seam most of the way around the edges, flipped it inside out, and top-stitched it closed, a little less than a 1/4" seam.

There it is, in all its Elmo-y glory.

Happy Holidays!

2011-12-23T07:51:00.000-06:00

Our holiday was yesterday, as well as my son's birthday. We did them together, but this will be the last year for that because I think that by three, my son will know the difference. I don't want his birthday to get forgotten under the Solstice.

They had a great time yesterday, playing with new toys. More new toys are coming tomorrow, and then as soon as I get a little less busy I also got some fabric to make some more stuff for them.

I promised my daughter a crown and wings. And a stiffer fairy wand. *snerk* I didn't reinforce the shaft of hers... *cough*

And my son loves that little red monster so damn much that sometimes he'll carry around a shirt with Elmo on it when he's wearing his other Elmo shirt. So I got some super soft Elmo flannel and I'm just going to whip up a really quick little lovey-blankie for him to carry around with him. Also a mini-Elmo...

I have so many ideas and plans and not enough time. I'm actually thinking about putting my shop on vacation for a month or so, so I can get some of these ideas out into the real world... But for now I think that's a bad idea and I'll just leave it the way it is.

I did score some super awesome surprise mystery fabric, too. My daughter is really into dragons right now and I got about a half a yard of this:

And she's super excited. I don't know what I'm going to do with it, but she's a fan.

So happy winter holiday to you, in whatever form it comes to you!

Giveaway Winner (and other assorted goodies)

2011-12-22T08:07:00.000-06:00

Ukhsud said... 1: Those minis are so CUTE! I was looking at the Uterus thinking "That'd be hilarious to make for xmas for my mum, wonder if the pattern is available." And then I looked and saw it was. SWEET! Hopefully I'll find time to make it by next week :)

Say what? It's never number 1! Except today. So expect an email in your email places.

Also, we did our Secrety Santa thing, and I can now show pictures of the awesomeness that I made (as well as something else I made).

Tiny ninja!

Tiny Gandalf

Even tinier Yoda!

More Giveaway!

2011-12-19T06:34:00.001-06:00

Last week was hats, and this week is amigurumi!! This one is open to both US and Canadian residents. Although, please be warned that if I'm shipping to Canada, it might take a bit for me to get to the post office.

What do you get? Well... You get your choice of either a uterus:

OR two minis of your choice. What are minis? Minis are 4" tall crochet dolls that are cute enough to sit on your mantel, and sturdy enough for kids to play with. If you need inspiration, you can go here and pick two of anything there, or you can say things like, "I want a cow and a pirate." And I will totally make you a cow and a pirate.

So. Leave me a comment about which one you want- generally, if you want minis you don't have to say which ones you want right now- and this will close Wednesday, December 21 at midnight CST. I'll use the random number generator to pick a winner on Thursday and then I'll create and ship within two weeks (possibly a little longer if I'm shipping to Canadia). And. If you are a no-reply blogger and I can't get an email address from your profile, you will also need to leave that because I fail at internet-mind-reading and I need a way to contact you.

And... if you can't leave a comment because it won't let you, you can email me at thecraftfrog at hotmail dot com and I'll comment for you.

SMS Giveaway Winner!

2011-12-16T19:19:00.000-06:00

We have... A WINNER!!!

"Beth said... Froggy hat is adorable!!!!!!

My favorite hot drink? I'm pretty boring... hot chocolate!!! :) "

YAY for Beth! I've sent you an email.

Thank you everyone for entering! I had a TON of fun with this, and picked up a few new drink ideas. Raspberry hot chocolate? UM, YES! And a new mallow recipe? Rane, you rock my socks!!! I do not like store-bought marshmallows, and neither does my daughter... But these I'll have to try.

Fabulous Friday

2011-12-16T07:23:00.002-06:00

I WAS ON REGRETSY!! Well, something I made was. I am the happiest girl in the world! Caution: While this page isn't, Regretsy can be NSFW, inappropriate for children, and offensive to some people. But here it is!

In other news... (cough) The giveaway closes today. It closes at 5:00 PST, which means it's 7:00 CST, which means I will be drawing a name tonight. So. Last chance. You have about... 12 hours. And... GO!

I got to do something else this morning that I rarely ever get to do. I got to finish my coffee while it was hot. My first cup, anyway. Everyone else in the house is still sleeping. (Of course, my son was up during the night for a while, so that's why he's still sleeping.)

Potty-training: my daughter is pretty much done! We went to pull-ups at night for her for a while, until the pack ran out. She's been (mostly) dry at night for a little while, and then one night she looked at me and said, "You can put big-girl diapers in garbage." I'm still not sure that she'll use the potty whenever we go outside the house, but I'm not really worried about it.

Next giveaway starts MONDAY! This is your big chance to win something else! It will run until Wednesday evening, and then I'll pick the winner Wednesday night.

My son turns two next week, on Thursday. TWO! I can't believe that my baby was born two years ago. He's really started to pick up a vocabulary now, and one of his recent words is "Peabs" (please). Adorable.

Um. Picture?

This is cow-cat "hiding" behind a piece of fabric (after my kids scattered the fabric all over the floor). He's had some cat-nip here and he's trying to play with my daughter and he thinks he's being really sneaky.

As a side note, my daughter closed her little fingers in the door and needed a Mickey Mouse band-aid to make it all better. I couldn't find them. But since I remembered seeing them in a recent picture, I pulled this up and was able to find them.

Good Morning Thursday

2011-12-15T06:32:00.000-06:00

It's Thursday! If you haven't entered the giveaway yet, it's over here.

I have had a ton of fun reading everyone's answers and entering giveaways myself. Hot chocolate seems to be a pretty recurring theme here! :D

In answering other people's questions, some people were asking about what we intended to do in the New Year. I'm a firm believer that making resolutions is setting myself up to fail, but if I make goals and plan for these goals, then they're much more likely to get done. So one of my big goals for the new year is getting back to my poor, neglected sewing machine. I need to finish my Farmer's Wife quilt AND I want to get into making toys out of sewingness. I haven't quite decided *what* yet, so we're just going with a generic "toys."

I also want to make some wings for my daughter. That seems pretty ambitious, but a sew-y friend suggested that I make armature for the top *only* and then cut the bottom in a pretty pattern and just let it dangle. I saw a couple of examples doing just that, so I'm going to go for it. If I can swing it, I'll attach the wings with velcro so they can be machine-washed. I have two young, messy children. Machine-washable is important in my house!!

And because posts are better with pictures, I ordered a bunch of yarn from Fabric.com the other day and it came in a child-sized box.

Also I cut my son's hair. So now he's more fuzzy than shaggy.

Sew Mama Sew Giveaway

2011-12-12T06:00:00.073-06:00

More great giveaways here!

I had a lot of fun with the giveaway this past spring and after my first giveaway of my very own, I decided to take part in this one! I'm super excited!

You don't need to follow me to enter (although if you want to hang around that would be SUPER-AWESOME! No pressure), or tweet, or Facebook, or anything else like that. Just leave me a comment telling me what your favorite hot drink is. For example, mine is chai tea. Or London Fog- that stuff is tasty. Or mint hot chocolate. Or... Yeah, I'm not really being helpful anymore. Favorite hot drink (or six if you're like me). AND you have to tell me what you want to win. Also you need to be a resident of the US 'cause I'm poor.

What are you winning? Well. You have options.

Choice A: A froggy hat, you choose the color, for your favorite tiny human. And you're also getting a little 4" tall froggy doll that I can't show you a picture of right now because I haven't made it yet. But it will be the same color as your tiny human's froggy hat. By tiny human, I mean someone who is either between the ages of 1-3, or 3-5. If this is what you want, please specify in your comment which age group your tiny person fits in. And here's a picture.

Ugly couch not included.

Choice B: A whale hat for your favorite large human (or you!). Fits most teens and adults (I have a tiny head and my husband is 6'4 with a proportionate head and it fits both of us). I will either make you a turquoise narwhal, or a cream beluga. Same hat, only one will have a horn and one won't. AND. I will also make you a little 4" whale to match. The narwhal will have a pointy toothpick sticking out one end, so if you're not into pointy toothpicks and you want the narwhal hat, PLEASE tell me that you want a tiny beluga with your narwhal hat. And here's a picture.

If you are a no-reply blogger and I can't get an email address from your profile, you'll need to leave me one in your comment, or I won't be able to get ahold of you if you win and then both of us will be sad because I'll have to pick someone else.

This is running from today (Monday, December 12) to Friday, December 16 at 5:00 PM PST. Sometime either Friday night or Saturday morning (probably Saturday morning after I settle the kids and am at least halfway through a cup of coffee) I will pick a winner via random.org. I will then email that winner and they will have until Monday to get back to me before I'm forced to pick another winner (which would also make me sad). I will then crochet your items for you and pop them in the mail no later than December 24. So think of this as an after-Christmas gift.

A few people are having issues with not being able to publish comments, so I'm going to post comments on their behalf. If you're running into the same issue, you can email me at thecraftfrog@hotmail.com and let me know and I'll make a comment for you as well.

Sickness and Hellephants

2011-12-11T08:20:00.000-06:00

Allow me to whine, just a little. It started off with my son, who spiked a high fever, then my daughter who spiked a high-for-her fever (her average healthy body temp is around 96 degrees) and then they had to go and make me sick. And it's not like you can tell your young children, "Go away, we can't have cuddles or kisses even though all you want to do is cuddle all day long because you feel like crap."

Anyway... I finished something else I can show you all.

He lost his ear, so she's holding onto it for him because she loves him. :D

First giveaway starts tomorrow morning and will run until Friday! And the link-up doesn't start until 6:00 AM PST, which is 8:00 local time... So the post will be up for a couple of hours before I can link up, but the good news is that when the link-up opens, I should be ready to go.

Stuff I CAN Talk About

2011-12-08T09:30:00.000-06:00

YAY giveaway starts Monday! (yay!)

So I've been mentioning a bunch of stuff that I can't talk about, so I was sitting here and I was all, "I KNOW SOMETHING I CAN TALK ABOUT!!!"

Fingerless gloves. I made some. And I'm debating making some for myself now because I like how they turned out. Plus I can still crochet with them on. Total win.

Pattern here.

These worked up pretty quickly. The only issue I noticed with them was because of the basic shape, you couldn't make the wrist-arm part too long. Although they are worked top-down, so it wouldn't be too hard to fit some increases in there.

Pattern here.

These are very pretty. I ended up making the first row of the hand part of my first one about 6 times because I was making counting errors. Go me. But not a bad pattern to follow.

I used to make fancy-stitch blankets and baby layettes (that's actually what I "learned" on) so while I was a little scared of doing something a little more involved than basic amigurumi again, it wasn't a big deal. They weren't very difficult.

AND I won stuff!

The bracelet, not the cat. Creepy cat is creepy. This was made by the very talented Lassarina. She does very beautiful work and I was pleasantly surprised by how light the bracelet is.

Excited and Impatient!

2011-12-07T22:21:00.000-06:00

I have things I feel excited and impatient about. For example, I made something today that's my absolute favorite thing I've ever made and I can't even really talk about it because it's going to someone else for Secret Santa. And I don't want them to see stuff about it on here. And if I had a little more free time, I would keep it and make another one.

I'm also excited and impatient about the Sew Mama Sew giveaway!! Monday!! I'm about 90% sure on what I'm going to be giving away. I keep reconsidering. I think I'm going to go with both options and it'll be a "If you win you get to pick." I'll have a blog post scheduled for the wee hours of Monday morning and then whenever my kids let me I'll come and link up and post it to Facebook and all that.

And then the following week, I know what I'll be doing the second giveaway for. Oh, I know. So stay tuned.

Paypal Makes Me Sad

2011-12-05T21:41:00.002-06:00

I've mentioned Regretsy a couple of times here before. For those who aren't in the know, Regretsy points out "interesting" craft practices on Etsy. It's not for everyone, there's a lot of snark and adult language that happens there and sometimes the people commenting make ignorant and tasteless comments, but overall it's meant as good-natured parody.

What I haven't mentioned is that Regretsy also raises money for different charitable causes. It's December, month of Christmas. We're in a recession and a lot of children are facing present-less Christmas. As a community, the followers of Regretsy decided to do a Secret Santa for less-fortunate families, so children that might not normally get gifts would have something to open up on Christmas.

Paypal has decided that this isn't allowed. This is the Regretsy blog post about it, but to sum up it's ok to donate to help people's sick cats, but not poor people. And yes, that's pretty much a quote from a less-than-helpful Paypal employee. Ms. Winchell, the author of the Regretsy site, tried to reach a compromise with Paypal and was told that they know what she's doing and won't play games.

Apparently helping less-than-fortunate children is the root of all evil. Now we know.

**Update**
This update was posted on regretsy.com tonight, with information on what's actually happening with this whole mess. Paypal apologized and unfroze Ms. Winchell's account and her business account, but no one (other than Paypal) is pretending that if they hadn't been faced with a PR nightmare of epic proportions, they still would have made this right.

Busy!

2011-12-05T07:19:00.000-06:00

I'm busy. Super busy. Insanely busy. Busy busy busy. Next year I'm going to start my holiday-making-stuff in March. For reals.

I'm doing Secret Santa online this year. I'm super excited. Not only do I like getting crap in the mail, but I like *sending* stuff in the mail. I can't get too specific about what I'm doing on the offchance that the recipient of my stuff reads this and is all, "Hey, that's what I said *I* liked," but I'm really excited. First of all, I get to make new minis. I haven't really had a whole lot of chances to do that recently, and I have utterly fallen in love with making them. (Luckily my kids have also fallen in love with playing with them.) And what I'm making is spawning a whole new set of "I want to make that as a pattern because that would be AWESOME!" So I've figured out what I'm going to do- I'm going to make collections of a bunch of just-the-minis and then put the patterns together on the cheap. I'm going to do a farm set, a zoo set, a medieval set, an ocean set (squeeeeee whales!), AND MORE and I still have plans for a couple of playsets floating around in there. Not enough hours in the day, right?

And now for something completely different! I spent the past couple of evenings watching romantic comedies. I love romantic comedies, the cheesier the better. I mean, they're all pretty much the same general story. Guy meets girl, they fall in love, they separate for some reason or another, and then there's a happy ending. It's the exact same formula as trashy romance novels. And the draw with both is, I get to shut my brain off for a while, look at (or read about) pretty people, and maybe get a giggle or two AND THERE'S A HAPPY ENDING! The added draw with movies is that I can crochet while I watch them. I have a hard time NOT multi-tasking. This is why I love audiobooks. And speaking of audiobooks, if you can track down the Dirk Gently books read by Douglas Adams (the author) I TOTALLY recommend them. Totally.

Anyway. Romantic comedies. I watched "Friends With Benefits" and "Crazy, Stupid, Love." I enjoyed both of them, but I have to say that I liked "Friends With Benefits" more. BUT. "Crazy, Stupid, Love" has a Canadian actor in it, which always makes me unreasonably happy.

And because every post should have a picture, here's my son being a doctor.

Princess Fairy Wand

2011-12-02T11:05:00.000-06:00

Last night, my daughter decided she was going to dress up as a princess fairy. She had on a star dress and her pretty princess footprints and she was bee-youful. We *just* got some straws from the store (more for my margarita needs than for children) and I was all, "I KNOW! I'll make her a wand!" So I took a straw, some Scotch tape, and some construction paper and two minutes later I had a wand. She loved her wand. She fell asleep clutching it in her little hand. I was a rock star.

However. We also have my son, the almost-two tornado of accidental destruction. Knowing him, he would get his hands on that wand and end up breaking it and then Rachel would be heartbroken. So instead of needing to make a new wand every day, I decided to make one a little sturdier.

I made mine a heart. But it's something that you could take pretty much any applique pattern, make two, and sew it to the wand to make any kind of wand you wanted.

Materials

worsted weight baby pink and lavender
G-sized crochet hook (or whatever will give you tight enough stitches to hold in stuffing)
wooden skewer or thin dowel- you can choose to omit this, but even with firm stuffing your wand will be a little floppy
stuffing if needed

Wand
1) ch 2, 6 sc in 2nd ch from hook, join with sl st (6)
2-?) ch 1, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (6)
break yarn, finish off
Mine was 40 rows and ended up being about 10 inches long. Just keep adding rows until you have the length you want.

Heart (make 2)
1) ch 2, sc in 2nd ch from hook (1)
2) ch 1, turn, 2 sc in sc (2)
3) ch 1, turn, 2 sc in each sc (4)
4) ch 1, turn, 2 sc in 1st sc, sc2, 2 sc in last sc (6)
5) ch 1, turn, 2 sc in 1st sc, sc4, 2 sc in last sc (8)
6) ch 1, turn, 2 sc in 1st sc, sc6, 2 sc in last sc (10)
7) ch 1, turn, 2 sc in 1st sc, sc8, 2 sc in last sc (12)
8-11) ch 1, turn, sc in each sc (12)
12) ch 1, turn, *sc, dc, tc, dc, sc*, sl st twice, repeat *-* (12)
break yarn, finish off

Assembly
Insert dowel and/or firmly stuff wand. Sew closed. Sew hearts together around top, then sew to wand, one on each side.

Foundationless Crochet

2011-11-28T12:40:00.000-06:00

I was revisiting my cheeseburger pattern and I was kind of hitting a wall thinking about the fries. The one in the picture are glued down and into place, keeping them flat. Wet blocking is pretty impractical here with a climbing toddler and two towel-loving cats, not to mention the eternal damp that comes with living in the south... And I can't glue these ones down. I was all, "What do I do?"

I was contemplating making the fries with two pieces sewn together, but it would be super bulky on such a small project and probably still a little bit twisty. No thanks.

On a crochet forum I'm part of, a month or so ago, I remember someone linking to a how-to foundationless double crochet. There was some discussion about how foundationless crochet (and I'm tired of typing that out, so from now on it's FC) doesn't leave your flat work all twisty and stuff. So I looked it up. And it's SUPER easy! I haven't yet tried FDC, but I think I'm going to for my very next scarf.

The one thing I had to figure out was how to even out my tension. I crochet really tightly, and my first FC experiment had the row twisting around in a circle because the tops of my stitches were too tight. So be aware of that. I'm sure that it would be the opposite problem if they were too loose, but it's really easy to find the balance, and if you mess up it's a really easy problem to fix. And I think it looks a lot neater. I only wish I had done it earlier!

I got my info from here- this one has a video- and here- I found the pictures less confusing with this one.

Next Giveaways Announced

2011-11-27T08:10:00.001-06:00

OH HOLY CRAP THIS IS AWESOME!
(blah blah sale info here)

I mentioned at the end of my last giveaway that I would be doing the Sew Mama Sew giveaway this year and I'm TOTALLY DOING IT!! But not right now.

I haven't decided what to do for the giveaway. Most likely it will involve something crocheted (right?) and possibly some fabric. Maybe some fabric. We'll see about the fabric. YAY FREE STUFF!!

But not right now. So when is it? Well... It's running from December 12-16. All you have to do is show up, leave a comment on the post that I post at that time, and I will randomly pick an answer. Please keep in mind that this will not ship in time for Christmas, since the mailing deadline for Christmas is Dec. 14.

Because this is a link party, there will be people from everywhere coming to enter my giveaway. But because I love you guys the mostest, there will be another giveaway AFTER the SMS giveaway with more fabulous prizes. Well, more fabulous prize. At least one. And that will run from December 19-21. And that definitely won't ship before Christmas.

I guess I need to get busy!

Thanksgiving and a Sale!

2011-11-26T08:37:00.001-06:00

So it was Thanksgiving this past week. We didn't "do" Thanksgiving- even with a small turkey my husband and I would have had enough leftovers for a month. We went grocery shopping instead, which was awesome! The store was pretty empty and there were no lines. For once. So I'm thankful for that. :D

Apparently in America, there exists a thing called Black Friday. Black Friday is the same as Boxing Day is in Canada, everyone has sales and there are riots and injuries and pepper spraying... Oh, and good deals. Can't forget about the good deals. I didn't leave my house yesterday. Well, I did the once, to check the mail. I had a pretty awesome mail day yesterday! I got some prints from Jewel Renee and they are AWESOME! She sells penguins and baby seals and baby manatees and they are the cutest things on the face of the planet. And she's a total sweetheart.

And then USPS had to crap all over my day. Again. Ah, my ongoing struggle with USPS. They've lost a second package of mine and they left some candles I ordered sitting in the sun. I know the rest of the country has been struggling with the weather, but not here. We hit 80 degrees for the first half of the week and now my candles are a little squishy. On the plus side, now I smell yummy whenever I handle them! :D

I've been busy a lot. And I'm making something I've never made before, fingerless gloves! I'm following some patterns from Ravelry.com, and I'll post the results once I finish them. When I first learned how to crochet, I went through a pretty big baby-clothes-making kick, so I did a lot of different stitches and shaping for flat things. I haven't done anything like that really in a long time, but it seems to be just like riding a bicycle. Plus the yarn I'm using is pretty (and soft)!

Which brings us to the sale portion of the entry! For Small Business Saturday (apparently it's a thing) through Cyber Monday (also a thing) I'll be having my minis at buy 1 get 1 half off. Or more, depending on the minis selected. And if you're interested in a mini you don't see, send me a message and I'll be all, "Yeah, I can TOTALLY do that!" And what's even better, this is good with any of my existing coupon codes!

Lions!

2011-11-22T10:44:00.000-06:00

I stayed up way, WAY too late last night making these. Well, the adult lions anyway, or the "daddy and mommy lions."

My daughter is 3. It was time for her to give up her binkie. For a little while now, we've been talking about how the Binkie Fairy would leave her toys if she stopped using her binkie. She said that she wanted the Binkie Fairy to bring her a daddy lion and a mommy lion (her favorite movie right now is Lion King) and I figured that she couldn't have a daddy and a mommy without having someone to be a daddy and mommy to, so I made the baby lion this morning.

She likes them. The mane took forever and a half to do. I need more coffee!!!

Things I Made

2011-11-21T09:13:00.001-06:00

They're in the mailbox, so now I will show you all things!!

Narwhal, narwhal. I'm really pleased with how it turned out. I might make myself a bright pink one.

My baby toy! The crinkle part was not that difficult. I had to do a lot of trimming to make it fit, but it fits and it's sewn in and it crinkles! My idea for a rattle did not work out so well, so I got a more conventional rattle-thingy and stuffed it inside.

I am almost done with my Claus pattern. Almost. Then I have a couple more things I need to make, and then dragons! RAWRR! My daughter has requested a blue one, and of course my son will want a red one. I have an idea to make them minis, which shouldn't take long... But I also want to make them into an on-all-fours type of thing, to scale with the minis so the knight can go and rescue the princess from the dragon. We'll see how that goes.

Also a reminder, I'm offering 12% off everything in my shop (and custom orders) until the end of November! Use the coupon code HOLIDAY12 at checkout!

Toats

2011-11-20T09:07:00.000-06:00

That's not a typo, I promise.

This is Toats. I made a post a while ago about being able to tie a feather to a nail and sell it as "art" on Etsy. Not only sell, but you'll be featured on the front page as being Awesometastic von Amazingsauce.

There is a similar issue with tagging. Tagging works a lot like it does here, or on Twitter. When people type your tags into the searchbar, your stuff pops up. So people take the most common tags (steampunk and vintage, just to name a couple) and slap them on anything and everything they can possibly think of. Octopus? STEAMPUNK? Something completely unrelated? Throw a monocle or a gear (or a damn owl pocket watch) on it, and it's INSTANT STEAMPUNK!

Here's my rather tongue-in-cheek contribution to the steampunk market. That's Toats the Steampunk Octopus. Now all I need to do is find some barn wood to photograph him on...

Just a Quick Little Candy Pattern

2011-11-18T07:11:00.000-06:00

We've had a hectic week here. Mostly it's been my son being needy after getting second degree burns on his fingertips. He's ok, they're considered minor burns because it's only his fingertips and they're pretty small, but he refuses to keep them dressed which causes him more pain. He's like a tiny Houdini. Of course, this is the kid who can take off his diaper with overalls or a onesie on.

My daughter (and now for something completely different!) has taken to Halloween in a big way. She loves that there are "coe-sies" (ghosties) and witches and jack-o-lanterns and treats she gets to put in her bright pink pumpkin bucket. So I made her pretend treats! She can put those in her pumpkin bucket all day long and then help the "coe-sie" not be scared of Halloween. (Thank you, Super Why. This is one of her favorite pretending games.)

I wanted to get a metric crapton of them finished (or at least 9). They work up pretty quickly, but I sustained a crochet-related injury last night (I'm fine now) so I might get some more done today. But I have two for now.

Remember folks, I crochet really tightly. So if you're looking at these going, "They're too big! THEY'RE GOING TO TAKE OVER THE WORLD!!!" you can ch 6 instead of 8 in round 1 and make fewer rows. Basically you want a tube.

Materials

worsted weight pink, white
G-sized crochet hook (or whatever will give you tight enough stitches to hold in stuffing)
stuffing

Candy
1) ch 8, sl st to form ring, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (8)
2-12) ch 1, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (8)
break yarn, finish off

Assembly
Pinch one end shut flat and sew closed. Weave yarn in and out of the stitches between row 3 and 4 and pull to cinch closed. I also wrapped the yarn around the weaved in stitches once and pulled really tight to make it cinch smaller. Stuff firmly, up to between rows 3 and 4 of other end. Pinch other end flat and sew closed, then cinch that end closed between rows 3 and 4 from that end. Weave in all loose ends.

Getting Medieval Up In Here

2011-11-14T12:17:00.000-06:00

The last couple of minis I finished were a knight and a queen. Like, medieval queen, not fabulous queen. And because everyone needs pictures:

I've been doing a lot of Dragon Cave lately, so that might have something to do with it. And I've been thinking, I want to make a dragon! I'm kind of working out the details in my head right now. I may need to make it un-machine-washable so that I can support the neck with some floral wire or something, but we'll see how it goes. But before I get there, I've got camo army guy about 2/3 done (he needs arms, eyes, a helmet and a belt), I want to make a little barbarian in a loincloth with a club, and I have two orders that I need to get finished. So for right now I'm working on dragon structure in my head.

AND!!! I want to make dragon hatchlings. In eggs. Tiny ones, with eggs that you can take apart and reveal the inner cuteness. I have lofty plans. I'm thinking I may not get my gingerbread house done this year. I've kinda lost the ambition for it. Part of me is all, "YOU NEED TO FINISH IT!" even though, if I finished it now I might be able to have the pattern up by the end of the month, which isn't a whole lot of time. I will firmly commit to getting the rest of my Claus pattern done, which will include a tiny tree and presents, but I'm thinking the gingerbread house may end up being Christmas in July. Plus I need to make a playset for my son for Yule, and if it takes about the same time that Fairy Garden did, we're looking at a month. I have about a week before it's going to be a month from Yule. So if anyone was looking forward to the gingerbread house, I sincerely apologize. It will get done, just not before this (winter holiday).

Southern Cookin'

2011-11-11T21:27:00.000-06:00

Nothing to do with crafts. Like, at all. So if you're just here for the crafts, you won't miss anything if you just tune in next time!

I've been in the south for about three-and-a-half years now. In my time living here, I've come across a lot of southern cooking. Some of it is incredibly good!

For instance, red velvet cake. OMG WIN. First you have chocolate cake. Then you have cream cheese icing- fun fact, when I was pregnant with both kids I could just sit and eat my way through cream cheese icing with a spoon. But it has to taste more cream cheesy and less processed oily. Yeah.

Pulled pork. Like, good pulled pork. You just look at it and it starts to disintegrate in your mouth. For reals? How did we not have pulled pork in Canada? (At least my little section of Canada.) But then, down here barbeque is a Thing. I guess it helps that it's still 80 degrees out here when it comes time for the slaughter.

Sweet potato fries. Where I grew up, sweet potatoes were a Thanksgiving-and-Christmas thing, and we called them yams (although they really were sweet potatoes. I don't know.). They were rare and special and often just eaten baked. But here they're common enough that they get made FRIES out of. Awesome fries.

Of course, I do miss some things. LIKE POUTINE!!! I would kill for some poutine. Real poutine, with beef gravy and squeaky cheese. Hell, I can't even get fake-y poutine here unless I make it myself with "brown" gravy and mozzarella cheese. What is brown gravy anyway?

Fish and chips. With halibut. And tartar sauce. And a lemon wedge. I can go to Captain D's, order "fish and chips" with is basically poorly cooked greasy salt. Um. No thanks!!!

Yogurt. I don't mean actual yogurt, although the yogurt selection is pretty slim... I mean everything that gets covered with yogurt. And miles of frozen yogurts.

Salmon. Pacific salmon, of course, not that Atlantic stuff. Although we're even a little too far away from Atlantic salmon grounds to make it not SOOPER expensive. Salmon is my favoritest food ever. Even more than cream cheese icing. I could eat salmon as my only protein for the rest of my life and I would be all, "SCORE!!! I GET SALMON!!!!" If I had access to salmon, I would seriously consider a pescatarian diet. BUT NOT FARMED SALMON!!! I get all soapboxy about salmon farms. :/

And because blog posts are made into awesome by pictures:

source

I Do Not Like Them, Sam I Am!

2011-11-11T13:49:00.000-06:00

I'm branching out! I've done keychains and now I'm making baby toys. Like, rattle-and-crinkle baby toys. I'm kind of excited at how this is turning out. I wasn't sure I was thrilled, and then I got it stuffed, and now I'm happy with it. Of course, finishing it up after I put the rattle unit in it was kind of wearying. "Rattle rattle rattle" with every stitch. Now I just have to figure out how to make a circle-shaped crinkle thing. I think I have an idea, but I'm not sure how well it'll translate out of my head. I'm better at working out how to crochet things than I am with sewing. Pics as soon as I'm done and it's been received!

I was able to find cotton yarn locally for which I was really thanking my lucky stars. I was looking at $10.00 online for the same amount of cotton yarn that I got here for $3.00. So. That's happy.

What I'm Doing Wednesday

2011-11-08T21:56:00.000-06:00

I finished a few this past week. I made Penelope. I also FINALLY got started on my Christmas minis collection and my gingerbread house. Gingerbread house is on hold until tomorrow night when I get more of the appropriate brown and I'm maybe about 1/3 of my way through the Christmas bunch. I'm going to do them up for a pattern like I did with my big group of Halloween minis. So far I have

Santa and Mrs. Claus. I found a lot of sigh-inducing scantily-clad ladies in lingerie when I was looking for pictures of the Mrs.

We're on the count down to (insert winter holiday here)! In the spirit of (appropriate winter holiday), I am going to be offering a coupon code HOLDAY12 for 12% off everything in my Etsy shop (excluding shipping). This is good until the end of November and includes custom orders placed by the end of the month!

Penelope

2011-11-06T06:33:00.001-06:00

You can find anything on Etsy, right? Like... Anything. And there's a helpful site named Regretsy (unaffiliated) that points out some of the more interesting things found on Etsy. And yesterday morning, I saw a uterus lamp. This uterus lamp.

That lamp is fabulous. I love it. Let's all ignore that it's incorrectly labeled as a vagina lamp instead of a uterus lamp...
The more I looked at it, the more the little craft gremlin in my head said things like, "That uterus is awesome. I bet you could make a uterus. You could crochet a uterus. You HAVE to crochet a uterus." So I had to crochet a uterus. I was working on the fourth side of the gingerbread house, but I was compelled to crochet a uterus, and I wouldn't be able to work on anything else until I got my uterus done.

And I have to say, it was kind of fun saying things like, "I think my uterus might be too big." "You can play with my uterus after I'm done."

As I was making her, I realized that she needed a name. Penelope seemed to fit. And so, without further ado, here's Penelope.

I'm thinking of making her a Santa hat, so she can be ready for the holidays. Also for potential holiday cards. I'm also thinking about making another one in purple and orange, 'cause who doesn't want a purple and orange uterus?

And now... The pattern. This is not the first uterus pattern that's going up on Ravelry, but I think it's the only one with ovaries. At this time.

Materials

worsted weight rose, baby pink
g-sized crochet hook (or whatever size will make stitches tight enough to hold in stuffing)
stuffing

Ovaries (make 2)
1) ch 2, 6 sc in 2nd ch from hook, join with sl st (6)
2) ch 1, *sc, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (9)
3) ch 1, *sc2, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (12)
4) ch 1, *sc3, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (15)
5) ch 1, *sc3, dec over 2 sc* around, join with sl st (12)
6) ch 1, *sc2, dec over 2 sc* around, join with sl st (9)
7) ch 1, *sc, dec over 2 sc* around, join with sl st (6)
stuff
break yarn, finish off

Uterus
1) ch 2, 6 sc in 2nd ch from hook, join with sl st (6)
2) ch 1, 2 sc in each sc around, join with sl st (12)
3) ch 1, *sc, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (18)
4) ch 1, *sc2, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (24)
5) ch 1, *sc3, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (30)
6) ch 1, *sc4, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (36)
7) ch 1, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (36)
8) ch 1, *sc5, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (42)
9) ch 1, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (42)
10) ch 1, *sc12, dec over 2 sc* around, join with sl st (39)
11) ch 1, *sc11, dec over 2 sc* around, join with sl st (36)
12) ch 1, *sc10, dec over 2 sc* around, join with sl st (33)
13) ch 1, *sc9, dec over 2 sc* around, join with sl st (30)
14) ch 1, *sc8, dec over 2 sc* around, join with sl st (27)
15) ch 1, *sc7, dec over 2 sc* around, join with sl st (24)
16) ch 1, *sc6, dec over 2 sc* around, join with sl st (21)
17) ch 1, *sc5, dec over 2 sc* around, join with sl st (18)
18-21) ch 1, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (18)
22) ch 1, *sc, dec over 2 sc* around, join with sl st (12)
stuff
23) ch 1, dec over 2 sc around, join with sl st (6)
break yarn, finish off

Ovarian Ligament (make 2)
1) ch 2, 4 sc in 2nd ch from hook, join with sl st (4)
2-5) ch 1, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (4)
break yarn, finish off

Fallopian Tubes (make 2)
1) ch 6, sl st to form ring. ch 1, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (6)
2-21) ch 1, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (6)
22) ch 1, *sc, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (9)
23) ch 5, sl st in same st, *sl st in next st, ch 5, sl st in same st* around, join with sl st
break yarn, finish off

Eyes (make 2)
1) ch 2, 6 sc in 2nd ch from hook, join with sl st (6)

Assembly
Sew one end of ovarian ligament to one end of ovary. Repeat for other side. Sew to side of uterus. Sew row 1 of fallopian tube to side of uterus just above ovarian ligament. Bend around as shown and sew one or two of the "fingers" to the top of the end of the ovary as shown. Sew on eyes and embroider mouth.

It's November!

2011-11-03T08:05:00.001-05:00

Or so I hear! November is not starting out very well for me. The ear infection I had seems to have come from a sinus infection. Blah. But. The fever broke the night before last and again during yesterday afternoon, so hopefully this means that the fever is on its way out (again)!

We've had a death in the family. The hardest part about that is that we're not in a position to be able to help with any of the thousands of overwhelming details that are left to the family members of the deceased. But. I firmly believe that the family member is at peace, and that's the most important thing.

I did manage to finish up all of the slippers in my quest to keep busy. I think the next time I make slippers (which will eventually happen, the kids are only going to get bigger!!) I'll use a different pattern. The length is fine, and these do fit socks underneath... But they're just a little too wide. I don't know if it's just that my kids and I all have narrow feet. They work up quickly and they're pretty, so I would absolutely recommend the pattern to non-narrow-feet-having people- just keep a tape measure handy! :D

And I made this.

Next I promised my daughter I would make her a little princess doll (I have most of it worked out in my head, but I have no idea how I'm going to manage the crown), and then I think I'll get on the gingerbread house that I've been talking about forEVER. :D And then the Christmas minis.

Pretty Princess Footprints

2011-11-01T09:08:00.000-05:00

Well, that's what my daughter calls them. :D I don't know if it's just a mental block and I'm my own worst enemy, but I can shape toys... I have issues shaping things for people to wear. We woke up yesterday morning and it was 60 degrees in here and I thought, "I guess it's time for me to make some slippers!"

So I found these. I went through to make the gauge swatch and the pattern suggests an F hook. I ended up using an H hook, which may give you some idea about how tightly I crochet. This also explains why people end up with super huge hats when they follow my hat pattern. (I changed the gauge to rnds for that and made it stand out more, so hopefully that'll fix that up.)

And then I liked it, so I put a flower on it. I changed the pattern for the strap, too. I made mine 2 sc per row instead of 4 hdc, and I joined it to the inside of the slipper to start instead of making it one separate piece and then sewing both sides on.

The flower is just another one of those simple, 5-petal flowers.
ch 4, join with sl st to form ring, *sc, ch 2, dc, ch 2* five times inside ring. join with sl st

I'm not a fan of how the pattern was written. I don't know if this is common for garmenty-type patterns- I certainly don't remember it from my baby clothes making phase-, but the whole "continue for so many inches" thing made me :/ . I'm assuming (and I'm probably wrong) that if you have a gauge, you'll know approximately how many rows will make up an inch. Like, if you get, say 17 rows to 4 inches, then you're probably looking at 4 rows to an inch.

But. My daughter loves them. They're wide enough on her little feeties that she can fit some socks on underneath them for when it gets actually cold instead of just chilly. I'm totally planning on making some for my son with little frog eyes, and some bigger pretty princess footprints for me.

Army Bear

2011-10-30T08:20:00.000-05:00

My daughter keeps telling me he looks like a gopher, so maybe he's an army gopher. A million and one thanks to the people who helped me find pictures of the Army dress uniform, especially Eileen- without whom the beret would not look right.

I wanted to make softies for all of the branches of the military- one in camouflage and then all of the different dress uniforms. I was going to make a marine first, but then I was talking it over with Mr. Craft Frog and both of us mentioned that we had no idea what the army dress uniform looked like now. 'Cause it's changed. I guess my google-fu was broken, 'cause the only thing I could find were pictures of the combat uniform and the non-army branches of the US military. So I asked some online friends and they were super helpful and now Army Bear (or Army Gopher) is done! I have plans for the other ones, but I need to get more Christmas stuff done (including the Santa and stuff that I've been talking about FOREVER) and the gingerbread house. I'm also going to be making a mini for each of them and the army one will be in Class B's, 'cause it's hard to get a jacket to look right on a mini.

Army Bear can be found here.

Easy Scarf

2011-10-26T13:48:00.000-05:00

I've been talking about scarves for a little while and I figured I would get a couple done. This pattern is easy and easily adjustable, and there's a little bit of texture. I think it would also look pretty with alternating colors! I'm not putting a gauge on this because there's no "right" size for it. Mine turned out to be just over a yard long and about 3.5" wide, with 130 stitches in each row, and 9 rows- the perfect size for my children!

Materials

worsted weight blue
I-hook

Scarf

1) ch 131, sc in 2nd ch from hook to end (130)

2) ch 3 (counts as 1st dc throughout), dc along row (130)

3) ch 1, in back loops only sc in each dc (130)

4) ch 3, in both loops dc in each sc (130)

repeat rows 3-4 until desired width. Finish off with a row of sc in both loops

If you want it longer or shorter, just increase or decrease the number of ch in row 1.

Feeling Better!

2011-10-26T08:06:00.000-05:00

The fever is gone. I still have the pain in my ear, but the fever is gone, so I can deal. Fevers really knock me on my ass. So yesterday, after spending a good chunk of the day furiously (re)finishing something USPS lost, I made a thing.

You can find her here.

Next up, I suppose, is going to be the gingerbread house. Or maybe a mini dragon. Or scarfs!

Feeling Like ...

2011-10-24T13:55:00.000-05:00

I'm waiting for my son to fall asleep (so that I can clean out the litterbox and take out the garbage, of course) so I figured I would ~~waste~~ spend the time making an update here instead of playing more Glitch. 'Cause my son will eventually fall asleep and I don't want to be looking at the clock in a couple of hours when he wakes up going, "Crap, I didn't take out the garbage."

I am lost in a field of blah. I'm fighting an ear infection on top of it being that super special time of month and I just have no energy and I feel like crap. So instead of whining at length about how super crappy I feel and my frustrations with different things that are great and enormous, I am instead going to write about 5 things that I happy about. I used to do this daily as a journaling exercise when I was going through a rough patch and, you know, it helps.

1) I am a permanent resident. This happiness is still lingering from a week and a half ago-ish. I got my brand new shiny card in the mail over the weekend. In a few [insert short time frame here] I'm going to get a SSN, and THEN I'm going to start looking at getting a driver's license. YAY for being a permanent resident!

2) My cat is awesome. She's the most tolerant cat on the planet- she lets my son "pet" her nose without complaint. She sleeps with me pretty much every night, and when it starts getting cold at night, she sleeps on me.

3) It is no longer 5000 degrees outside. It's not even in the 90s anymore during the day, which means that we're entering the few weeks a year where it's pleasant to go outside and play. Which we will probably be doing soon.

4) I am very soon going to go and make another cup off coffee. Coffee always makes me happy.

5) I am also going to play me some Love Shack. Because the B52s are awesome.

Mug of Hot Something

2011-10-22T14:40:00.001-05:00

Coffee mug done!! I made one with hot chocolate too. And even though I don't like marshmallows (neither does my daughter, actually) I put marshmallows in the hot chocolate!

Depending on how everything is lining up, you may only need to make the first 5 rnds of the beverage. I did 6 rnds for the hot chocolate in the green mug and 5 rnds for the coffee in the blue mug.

Materials

worsted weight emerald green, dark green, dark brown, dark blue, medium blue, medium brown, white
G-sized crochet hook
stuffing

Mug
1) ch 2, 6 sc in 2nd ch from hook, join with sl st (6)
2) ch 1, 2 sc in each sc around, join with sl st (12)
3) ch 1, *sc, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (18)
4) ch 1, *sc2, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (24)
5) ch 1, *sc3, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (30)
6) ch 1, *sc4, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (36)
7) in back loops only ch 1, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (36)
8-17) in both loops ch 1, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (36)
18-19) switch to second color, ch 1, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (36)
20) switch back to first color, ch 1, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (36)
break yarn, finish off

Base and Coffee/Hot Chocolate (make 2, one out of same color as mug and one out of beverage color)
1) ch 2, 6 sc in 2nd ch from hook, join with sl st (6)
2) ch 1, 2 sc in each sc around, join with sl st (12)
3) ch 1, *sc, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (18)
4) ch 1, *sc2, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (24)
5) ch 1, *sc3, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (30)
6) ch 1, *sc4, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (36)
break yarn, finish off

Marshmallows
1) ch 2, 6 sc in 2nd ch from hook, join with sl st (6)
break yarn, finish off

Handle
1) ch 3, sc in 2nd and 3rd ch from hook (2)
2-20) ch 1, turn, sc in both sc (2)
break yarn, finish off

Assembly
Sew base to bottom of mug. Stuff and sew beverage inside mug, between rows 18 and 19. Sew handle on side of mug as shown on green mug.

FLOG MY CRAP!

2011-10-21T07:22:00.001-05:00

So I guess my blog has been around long enough that people are starting to send me form emails about how they want to "work with" me or whatever. Basically, they want me to try and get YOU to buy their crap. Um, no. If someone wanted me to make something with their new fabric/wool line and wanted me to review it honestly, I wouldn't have a problem with that. But this whole, "DO YOUR READERS BREATHE? We want to throw a few bucks at you so you can you can sell them our completely irrelevant nonsense!" is a bunch of crap.

The first one I got basically said, "Hey, I was reading your blog and I want 'your opinion' on this weight-loss thing?" I declined to reply, but my first thought was a raised-eyebrow. "Are you calling me fat?" I really had to fight myself not to send that back. I mean... I am fat. I've had two kids and the weight after the second one is coming off slowly, mostly because I keep making excuses about not being able to exercise.

But... This is a CRAFT blog. Do I write like a fat person? Is there a fat writing style that I'm not aware of? Is my little crocheting froggy avatar/banner fat? Do I crochet like a fat person? Am I doing the fat person FMQ pattern? Like... REALLY? I may have made an entry waaaaaaaaaaaaaay back in the beginning of this blog about needing to lose some pounds, but that would have been over a year ago. Know your audience, people! Check for relevancy!

The Bloggess made an excellent entry about this very thing here. Which proves again that Wil Wheaton is a god among men.

Fairy Garden

2011-10-20T16:15:00.000-05:00

Finally done!! Although to look at it seems a little anticlimactic for a month's work. But... We're done. And it's safely tucked away so that my poor daughter stops asking for it. I gave her the first fairy I made because it didn't photograph with the playset well, but at one point I had it sitting on the table with the fairy in the swing and it became The Best Thing Ever.

So the swing works. The windlass on the well works. BUT... It doesn't have to work if it seems too fussy to put together. So what does it look like?

Here's my gnome:

Pattern found here!

Cake Stand

2011-10-17T13:15:00.004-05:00

Hopefully I will get my Fairy Garden up later this week, but after struggling with the base I wanted to get something else done. Plus, I can use this for better pictures!!

I made a cake stand! There are a billionty and one patterns for cakes and cookies and desserty things floating around, and I've only ever seen one pattern for a cake stand. So I made another one. (Of course, I'll go to put this on Ravelry later and there will be a billionty and two patterns for cake stands.)

You could use either cardboard or plastic canvas to reinforce the platter (at which point you wouldn't need to make two of the platter) or the base, but I wanted to make mine completely child-friendly and machine-washable. 'Cause if I know my kids, I'll introduce it as a cake stand and the next time they have cupcakes, I'll need to get icing off of it. :D

Mine turned out to be 7.5" in diameter and about 3" tall, yours may be a different size depending on weight, hook size, and how tight your stitches are.

Materials

light gray worsted weight
polyfiber stuffing
G-size crochet hook

Platter (make 2)
1) ch 4, sl st to 1st ch to form ring, ch 3 (counts as first dc now and throughout), 11 dc in ring, join with sl st (12)
2) ch 3, dc in same sc, 2 dc in each dc around, join with sl st (24)
3) ch 3, *2 dc in next dc, dc in next dc* around, 2 dc in last dc, join with sl st (36)
4) ch 3, dc in next dc, *2 dc in next dc, dc2* around, 2 dc in last dc, join with sl st (48)
5) ch 3, dc2, *2 dc in next dc, dc3* around, 2 dc in last dc, join with sl st (60)
6) ch 3, dc3 in next dc, *2 dc in next dc, dc4* around, 2 dc in last dc, join with sl st (72)
7) ch 3, dc4 in next dc, *2 dc in next dc, dc5* around, 2 dc in last dc, join with sl st (84)
8) ch 3, dc5 in next dc, *2 dc in next dc, dc6* around, 2 dc in last dc, join with sl st (96)
break yarn, finish off

Stem
1) ch 36, sl st to 1st ch to form ring, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (36)
2-10) ch 1, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (36)
break yarn, finish off

Base
1) ch 6, join with sl st, sc in each ch, join with sl st (6)
2) ch 1, 2 sc in each sc around, join with sl st (12)
3) ch 1, *sc, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (18)
4) ch 1, *sc2, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (24)
5) ch 1, *sc3, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (30)
6) ch 1, *sc4, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (36)
7) ch 1, *sc5, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (42)
8) ch 1, *sc6, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (48)
break yarn, finish off

Assembly
Line up and whipstitch around edges of platters, with right sides out. I also sewed platter pieces together between rows 4 and 5 for added stability. Center stem on base and sew to base. Stuff firmly enough to hold shape, but lightly enough not to bulge out of base and platter. Center and sew platter unit to top of stem.

My Awesome Day

2011-10-14T16:09:00.000-05:00

So you all know I'm Canadian, right? I'm from BC, Canada, and I'm currently living in Alabama, and I've been trying to become a permanent resident. So yesterday we drove the three hours to Atlanta (with the kids. In the car. In a rainstorm) and arrived. We got checked into a crappy motel, the Motel 6 in Union City- I do NOT recommend it. The bathroom wasn't "filthy" but it wasn't "clean." The beds were uncomfortable, the pillows were uncomfortable, and it REEKED of some sort of floral Febreeze-esque spray that aggravated allergies and stuff. But it was cheap. And that was what we were going for at the time. Next time, though... We'll probably invest a few extra dollars.

We went out for dinner with a friend-in-a-box and we had a good time! And then, of course, tried bedtime. The kids have never overnighted anywhere that wasn't directly in our apartment. (Aside from birth, of course.) So they were wired as hell. Between them sleeping poorly, the allergies, different family members snoring, the beds, the temperature, and someone calling the hotel room repeatedly at 11:30 at night until we unplugged the phone, neither Mr. Craft Frog nor I really slept.

This morning, my poor little girl fell off the bed and cracked the side of her head on the nightstand. :( She has a REALLY nasty bruise there, poor thing.

But then we got to go to see the nice folks at the immigration office in Atlanta! And it made me laugh; someone told a guy to get ahead of us in the hallway ('cause tired kids walk slowly, for reals), but we still got called in before he did. Karma sides with tired children.

It basically seemed like the immigration officer was making sure that we are legitimately married and not trying to cheat the system. And verify all the details that we'd provided. I've totally been approved as a permanent resident! So YAY! We got out of there fairly quickly, and then went to a Waffle House for breakfast, and then home.

And the IHOP we stopped at on the way into Atlanta was crap. I think it was in Newnan? It was just on the other side of the Georgia border. The service was horrible. HORRIBLE. The food wasn't worth the price and the poor service. Blah. But the Waffle House we stopped at on the way back was awesome. There's just something really comforting and awesome about simple greasy diner food, you know?

AND!!! I can crochet in the car!!! I suffer from severe motion sickness. Ferris Wheels get me. Reading for a minute in the car gets me. Same with using a computer, looking down to dial a phone number, texting, any other time-spending activity I've tried. But not crochet! So I got some good quality crochet in.

One more random observation: My phone doesn't change the display time when I cross time-zones, even after powering off and back on again.

So it was a pretty good day. It's a load of stress off my shoulders, for reals. I'm so tired, though. I kind of feel like I'm moving through molasses. My body is tired... But my mind isn't. So I'm awake. Slow and clumsy and kind of scattered, but awake!!!

Gingerbread Man!

2011-10-12T13:26:00.000-05:00

Run run as fast as you can... You can't catch me, I'm the gingerbread man!

There will be a gingerbread woman coming. And a gingerbread house. My next projects (besides finishing the Fairy Garden) are going to be a cake stand and a mug of coffee/hot chocolate- which I will be posting the patterns for here!

Speaking of the Fairy Garden, I have the bottom part of the base finished. Now I just need to do the top of the base. I think I'm about 2/3 of the way through the project. I still need to finish the table, see if a tea set is feasible, make the pond with fish, and then put random mushrooms and flowers around. And, of course, the assembly.

Oh, Etsy...

2011-10-10T10:37:00.001-05:00

Are you looking for some extra cash? Sell rocks on Etsy.

You can paint little dots on the rocks. You can glue little strips of paper with questionable poetry to the rocks. You can glue/tie a bit of string around the rocks. And as long as you photograph them on a white background or barn wood, people will buy them. Lots of people. And then they'll gush about how minimalistic and beautiful they are.

I wish I was kidding.

I've decided that I'm going to crochet rocks and then glue them to other rocks. I will be a millionaire.

Note: I'm not talking about actual art on rocks. I'm talking about the kind of thing that my three-year-old could put together in a half an hour.

What I'm Doing

2011-10-05T17:09:00.001-05:00

This week in The Craft Frog... Earlier I mentioned Twitter, trying to be as absolutely pretentious as possible. ;) I'm on Twitter @Thecraftfrog. Or you can search by my name Joy Koestner, or the email address I list here. Mostly just random observations; I do most of my crochet right by computer and I do a LOT of random thinking while I crochet. So random babbles.

I finished two softies, you can see them here and here. I have more planned, including a ballerina, a police officer, and all branches of the military. And a baker and... Lots. :D

I'm toiling away on the Fairy Garden. I'm going to have to take a break from it soon to finish up a couple of orders, but I'd say we're getting close to half done. I think I need to make the base before I make the rest of it, and that's going to take some figuring.

And Christmas minis. And a whole bunch of minis. And scarves, and slippers, and my daughter has requested a Raiders football and they're going to need new hats and mittens in the month or two... Lots to do. And food. Lots of food. I WANT AN ETSY FOOD EMPIRE!!! AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! Or... Just... I want to make more food. I prefer crocheting food to cooking it. Plus, crochet food is totally vegan and fat-free! ;)

I Tweet Now

2011-10-05T11:45:00.001-05:00

I made a Twitter thing. So I can tweet. On Twitter. I have a lot of random thoughts while I'm doing crafty things, and now my super exciting and magnificent* life will now be shared in short, 140 character statements. I am... Wait for it... @Thecraftfrog. I know you're all shocked and surprised. (My name is Joy Koestner. You can find my by my name. Or my email address.)

*My life may not be super exciting, or magnificent.

I Made a Thing

2011-10-03T08:38:00.000-05:00

I made a thing and I realize that not all people might think she's appropriate for viewing (or for their children to view), so I'm putting the warning up here and the picture down at the bottom. :D

She's a pole dancing bunny. Pole dancing seems to be starting out a lot the same way that belly dance did. Way back when (and currently in some circles), belly dancing had this stigma that it was only for sex only, ever, and belly dancers were the same thing as strippers.

Pole dancing seems to be the same. There's a reason for the scant clothing (more than there is in belly dancing, actually), although I don't get the heels. I, personally, don't do pole, but I know people who do, and apparently it's a work-out and a half.

You can find here here!

The Belly Dancer

2011-09-30T22:05:00.002-05:00

A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away... or really about 6 or 7 years ago back in Canada... I was a belly dancer. I wasn't phenomenal, I would put myself at "good beginner." I loved it. LOVED it. Sadly I haven't been able to get back into it, though it's in my "I want to do this in the near future" list. We'll see.

After my coat stand mishap that took three days of my time, I needed a "quick" finish to refresh myself. I've been tossing around the idea of doing bigger softies for about a month now, mulling through a pirate with a pegleg and a witch and then I was all, "OH! I KNOW!" So I made a belly dancing kitty.

I was thinking about doing zills and realized there was no way to attach them to this model with it still looking good. I was thinking about a veil, but a crochet veil would have been too thick and bulky and I don't have the right kind of fabric to do a fabric veil. So she's veil-less.

I love her. As I was making her, my daughter was all, "She so pretty!" so she has 3-year-old approval. You can find her here.

And now... I have other softies I want to make. In addition to the pirate and witch, I'm thinking through a police officer, a ballerina. So now there's more on my list of things to make! :D

We'll Call Them "Learning Experiences"

2011-09-29T07:19:00.000-05:00

Anyone who's involved with anything creative will say (often in colorful language- at least I do!!) that screwing up is just another part of it. And after spending most of my "work" time the last three days on something that is now lost somewhere in the kids' room as I try to decide whether or not it's worth pulling apart and salvaging at least part of or if it's better just left as a "toy"- I'm really feeling it. So I decided to share a couple of my latest messes.

This is a tree. Yes, really. I like the basic idea of it, but the execution is... Well, it looks like an angry coat stand. With flowers on it. And feet. I like the idea for the roots, but the proportion is wrong. I like the general shape and idea of the tree, but without a lot of wire it's just not going to get there. One of my mottoes that I'm running with is, "If it's worth doing, it's worth doing well." (Who said that?) This is not done well. Since I have to start over anyway, I'm going in a completely different direction for this part of the project. I'm keeping my pattern notes because I think it's worth revisiting in the future but for now... Just not happening.

(Not the doll, she's a keeper! :D ) Honestly, I love this. I'm not too wild about the color of the base, but I'm loving the outside. The only problem is that it's a bit too small. It looks more like a fairy garbage can than the base of a wishing well. So now it is a "cup" for the kids and cats to play with.

What I've Been Up To

2011-09-28T07:31:00.002-05:00

I've been thinking about it and I feel kind of weird linking up to a quilt blog when there's definitely no sewing going on here, but I did want to make a post filled with pictures (ok, maybe not filled with) about what I've been doing.

I made this custom order!

This prompted my daughter telling me that she wants brown and pink puppy paws. She does need new mittens, last year's mittens are just a touch too small. And the boy is going to need some new ones too. So I'm thinking a brown dog set for my daughter and a bear set for my son. And I have scarves planned for this year. Only not yet. 'Cause not only am I working on other stuff right now, but it was 90-something degrees yesterday. And maybe slippers? Animal slippers? Or princess slippers? We'll see. I want some new froggy slippers for me too... I really need more hours in my day! ;)

And I made my snowman.

With a concave snow shovel. Turns out I didn't need black embroidery floss, 'cause the scarf covers pretty much everywhere I would have made little French knots. Next on my list of things to design is a little Christmas set, with Mr. and Mrs. Claus, an elf, a tree, and some other stuff.

Currently, I am working on this.

She's a fairy, with wings on her back. I super love the wings. I am making a little playset! So far I have the fairy, a well with a working windlass(!!!!!), I'm about 2/3 of the way through a tree (it is a real pain to crochet a tree that actually at least vaguely resembles a tree. For reals.) and I have a pond with fish, a table with chairs and possibly a tea set if I can swing it, and flowers and mushrooms left to do. And the base for it all, of course. And a gnome!! I was searching for ideas for a non-skirted doll to have 'cause not only did the set need a boy, but some little girls just aren't into dresses, and a friend suggested a gnome! (Thanks M!!)

Also, I'm planning on spending some time today organizing my blog a little better. So if you came here looking for a free pattern for a duck, you won't have to go searching quite so much.

And We Have a Winner!!!

2011-09-23T07:31:00.000-05:00

The Mac's House said...: Hmmm.. my birthday is coming in November so this is a good question. I will no doubt being something Nana related since my 3 year old granddaughter lives with us. So what would a perfect one be????? Maybe a goregous November day, taking a walk on the beach or Colonial Williamsburg or thru a nice tree lined street, enjoying the outside without having to worry about bills, chores, and just relax. Not necessarily do I have to be alone since I rarely am so I won't even think of that. No need for anything fancy, no big gifts just a peaceful day. No arguments, no crying from anyone allowed. LOL; Congratulations! I've sent you an email! No arguments or crying sounds like the best day ever. ;); Thank you to everyone who took part in my very first giveaway! I had fun reading everyone's responses and I will be having more giveaways in the future!

WiP Wednesday!

2011-09-21T08:32:00.000-05:00

Looking for the giveaway? Look here!

No linky this week 'cause the lovely Lee is working on a fabulous fabric collection, but I figured I'd post about what I've been up to! And am going to be up to. And am percolating in my little head.

Let's see... Still no quilting. OMG. I have sooooooo many crochet projects either on the go or in my head that I "need" to get finished, it's going to be a few weeks. I might make naptime my hobby time and nighttime my "work" time... But not right now.

I just finished a screwdriver. Well, I finished it last night. It's currently sitting on top of my computer as I try to decide if I'm going to make the rest of the tools and a toolbox before my son's birthday to give to him... Of if he would even care. Right now I'm thinking it would be looked at, and then discarded in favor of running after the cat. I have a few months, though...

Currently sitting in front of me, I have three parts of a little snowman waiting to be sewn together. I'll get that finished up today and then the pattern all written out and PDF'ed. I think I need more black embroidery floss. I'm hoping I have some tucked in one of my boxes o' embroidery floss, but I'm not sure. Between eyes, a mouth, and buttons, I don't know that I have enough.

And my latest thought? CROCHETED PLAYSETS for my little minis! Yeah!! And I'm working on a way to get their legs and arms to be poseable. I have to say, I'm pretty disappointed in the amount of plastic playset you get for your money these days. My first ventures will probably be a fairy garden and a clubhouse (for the childrens for Yule) and then I'm also thinking of an undersea playground, a PIRATE SHIP ('cause who doesn't love pirates?) and way off in the far distance, a castle.

And since every good blog post needs a picture... Here is my kids' room 10 minutes after I cleaned and vacuumed.

My daughter's favorite phrase right after I clean? "I making mess!"

Screwdriver

2011-09-21T07:30:00.004-05:00

If you're looking for the giveaway, click over here!

I am loving this scheduled post thing. Between breakfast and stumbling through coffee and getting up and down 50 times to get juice and wipe faces and find the remote and change a diaper and on and on and on... This really rocks my socks.

ANYWAY! It's a pattern! Yay pattern! I mentioned something about a screwdriver (sadly not the kind with vodka) and here it is! This is a quickie, but it's intended to be the first part of a set. This is just the right size for little hands.

Materials:

worsted weight light gray, red, royal blue
skewer
stuffing
hot glue gun

You don't need to put the skewer in, you can use a stuffing tool and stuff the crap out of the screwdriver shaft but it'll still be a little floppy.

Handle
1) ch 2, 6 sc in 2nd ch from hook, join with sl st (6)
2) ch 1, 2 sc in each sc around, join with sl st (12)
3) ch 1, *sc, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (18)
4) ch 1, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (18)
5) switch to red, ch 1, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (18)
6-13) switch to blue, ch 1, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (18)
14) switch to red, ch 1, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (18)
15) switch to blue, ch 1, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (18)
16) ch 1, *sc, dec over 2 sc* around, join with sl st (12)
stuff
17) ch 1, dec over 2 sc around, join with sl st (6)
break yarn, finish off, do not sew closed

Shaft
1) attach to row 17 of handle with sc, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (6)
2-17) ch 1, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (6)
break yarn, finish of, do not sew closed

Assembly
Measure and cut skewer so it will fit inside. I inserted the skewer into the shaft, took a mechanical pencil and drew a small line on the skewer two rows down from the end, then took it back out and cut to the line. Glue a small amount of batting around the end of the trimmed skewer. Insert into screwdriver shaft. Sew closed. If you press end flat and sew closed flat, you will have a flathead screwdriver. If you sew closed as a circle and draw it closed, you will have a Phillips head screwdriver.

Everyone Likes Giveaways!!

2011-09-19T07:15:00.005-05:00

Right?

So. Here's the deal. There are a bunch of fabulous things going on right now. I have over 100 followers, 200 FB followers, I've been blogging for over a year, I've made over 100 blog posts, and I opened up the store... Basically, we're way past due for a giveaway. AND... It's my birthday this week.

So what does this mean for you? Well... Since you're supposed to get breakfast in bed for your birthday (or so I hear, never happened for me) I will make you breakfast. And send it to you.

Ugly couch not included.

But that's not all. I know I have some fabric-y followers and some crochet-y followers, so the lucky winner also gets to choose between:

~2/3 of a yard of this VeggieTales quilter's cotton

OR

~one of my crochet mini patterns. And not just my mini monsters, you can also choose between a snowman, a pirate, a knight and a princess. (To clarify, even though the witch, mummy, vampire, and ghost are bundled together, you would get to choose just one of them.)

Or really, you could choose both the fabric and the pattern if you happen to both crochet and love fabric.

Most of this giveaway is only open to US residents, 'cause international shipping is too spendy for me right now. Non-US residents can still enter to win the crochet pattern, but if you win you won't be able to get the breakfast or the fabric.

So how do you enter? Leave me a comment describing your perfect birthday present. You do not have to be a follower of my blog to enter. For example, my ideal birthday present is a day off. Like, completely off. A day where someone else does all the housework so that I don't have to play catch-up the following day AND watches the kids, while I'm somewhere far away in a spa getting a massage, drinking champagne, and relaxing in a hot tub. Yes please.

This giveaway will run until Thursday September 22 at 11:59 PM EST and I will do the draw whenever I get up on Friday morning, and probably after at least half a cup of coffee. I will use a random number generator to draw the winner. If you are a no reply blogger, please also leave your email address so that I can contact you! I will contact the winner via email and ask questions like, which prize do you want? Where the heck am I sending this?

More Minis!

2011-09-15T10:39:00.002-05:00

One more monster mini just in time for Halloween. Or, you know... In time for Halloween next month. *cough*

I was all, "I wonder what I can do with the zombie to make him a little different? I KNOW! I'll give him a severed arm!" So he has a severed arm. And raggedy pants. And I picked up a pale gray yarn yesterday and I want to make another one with gray.

So I finished all these fabulous minis, where are the patterns? They are on Etsy! I've decided to sell the patterns for my minis in my little store! I have plans for more, including a pirate, a medieval set, a Christmas set, and something with a mermaid (although whether it will just be a mermaid, or a set of fantasy characters, I don't know yet).

All of my other patterns will continue to show up here. I finally got some wooden skewers and I'm thinking of a tool set and little toolbox although I don't know if it's going to be for my son's birthday (I can't believe my baby is turning two in December!) or just more, "Here, Mama just made this!" And a rubber ducky and a box of chocolates and more food...

AND... There's been talk of a giveaway. I'll put up all the details on Monday!

WiP Wednesday

2011-09-14T08:23:00.000-05:00

I haven't done one of these in FOREVER!

What have I got going on... Well. I finished my third knit washcloth. Started the fourth one. 3/13. It seems much less impressive when I put it that way. ;)

As of tomorrow, I will be about 8 blocks behind on the Farmer's Wife. I've made absolutely no progress on that. I'm kind of ok with it, I've been doing a lot of crochet (A LOT!) I should probably try to balance out my time a little better so that I don't get burned out on crochet again.

So what have I been doing besides slacker-knitting? Well, I made a whole bunch of Halloween mini dolls for Cauldron Crafts (which you all should check out and join) over the weekend.

And I made this little guy (AND HIS BRAIN) yesterday.

And I have plans to make a zombie today. With a flower. After I clean the house.

I also need to track down every one of those stinking minis so that I can take better pictures of them. My daughter's scattered them to the four winds, but I'm sure they'll turn up. While I'm cleaning the house.

Linking up with Lee at Freshly Pieced- thanks Lee! :D

Cauldron Crafts!

2011-09-12T13:06:00.000-05:00

The lovely ladies from Fabric Donkey and Distant Pickles are hosting Cauldron Crafts! That is, all September long they have links and tutorials and fabulousness for Halloween! AND... If you link up with any handmade craft by September 30, you have a chance to win some beautiful fabric!

So... Here's mine!

They're about 4" tall. I had a blast making them! (Well, mostly. I also have bruises and blisters on my fingers from my needle getting stuck, but that's how it works!!)

And... My daughter loves them. LOVES them. "I have little mummy? I have little 'pire? I have witch?" Except she's not allowed to have the broom.

Here's the photobomb! :D

It's Here!!

2011-09-11T07:10:00.003-05:00

The store. It's ready!! Yay!! It'll open at 12:00 AM EST on Monday. (Yes, I'm in Central time. It's Monday somewhere! ;) )

Most of the things are made-to-order. I do have a little bit of stock on hand, but most of my crochet time that I'm not actively working on orders will be put towards making new projects. And sewing. I haven't sewed in a couple of weeks.

The shipping is a little borked. Right now, I'm using the priority flate-rate boxes and envelopes, which means that you can pay the same amount of shipping for a $20.00 as a $4.00. I know. On the smaller items, the shipping with another item is set pretty low so that if you order a few things that'll fit in the small box, you should pay around the same price. If you are ordering a few things, send me a message and I'll combine it into a custom order for you to save on shipping. I will be fixing the shipping in the future.

If you've seen something here or on Facebook that you want that you don't see in the store (sadly not Abby or Elmo or any other licensed characters), send me a message and I'll be happy to make a custom order for you! Custom orders are not limited to projects I've already completed, just let me know what's on your mind!

And... Finally... The coupon code! This is good for two weeks, so until September 26. OPENING01 is good for 15% off everything in the store (including custom orders paid for during that time), excluding shipping.

Banana, Revised

2011-09-10T07:46:00.001-05:00

Last year, I made a banana. I wrote the pattern with sport weight yarn, which is a little inconvenient. I never tested it out with worsted weight, 'cause I got images of these huge bananas dancing around. So, I wrote a new pattern with worsted weight, to be the same scale as all my other fruit. I'm replacing the pattern link on Ravelry with this one, but I will keep the old pattern around just in case you want a huge banana. Or have some yellow sport weight lying around.

Materials:

worsted weight yellow and dark brown
stuffing

Banana (make 2)
1) ch 5, sc in 2nd ch from hook to end (4)
2) ch 1, turn, 2 sc in first sc, sc2, 2 sc in next sc (6)
3) ch 1, turn, sc5, 2 sc in next sc (7)
4) ch 1, turn, 2 sc in first sc, sc6 (8)
5) ch 1, turn, sc in each sc (8)
6) ch 1, turn, 2 sc in first sc, sc7 (9)
7) ch 1, turn, dec over 2 sc, sc 7 (8)
8) ch 1, turn, 2 sc in first sc, sc7 (9)
9) ch 1, turn, dec over 2 sc, sc 7 (8)
10) ch 1, turn, 2 sc in first sc, sc7 (9)
11-14) ch 1, turn, sc in each sc (9)
15) ch 1, turn, dec over 2 sc, sc7 (8)
16) ch 1, turn, 2 sc in first sc, sc7 (9)
17-19) ch 1, turn, sc in each sc (9)
20) ch 1, turn, dec over 2 sc, sc7 (8)
21) ch 1, turn, 2 sc in first sc, sc7 (9)
22-25) ch 1, turn, sc in each sc (9)
26) ch 1, turn, dec over 2 sc, sc7 (8)
27) ch 1, turn, 2 sc in first sc, sc7 (9)
28) ch 1, turn, dec over 2 sc, sc7 (8)
29) ch 1, turn, 2 sc in first sc, sc7 (9)
30) ch 1, turn, dec over 2 sc, sc7 (8)
31) ch 1, turn, sc in each sc (8)
32) ch 1, turn, dec over 2 sc, sc6 (7)
33) ch 1, turn, sc5, dec over 2 sc (6)
34) ch 1, turn, dec over 2 sc, sc2, dec over 2 sc (4)

Stem
1) ch 2, 6 sc in 2nd ch from hook, join with sl st (6)
2-5) ch 1, sc in each sc, join with sl st (6)
break yarn, finish off

Bottom
1) ch 2, 6 sc in 2nd ch from hook, join with sl st
break yarn, finish off

Assembly
Line up both banana sides and whipstitch around edges, leaving either top or bottom for last. Stuff as you go. Sew stem to top of banana and sew bottom to bottom of banana.

Look what I made!!

2011-09-09T13:13:00.001-05:00

EEEEEEEE!! This is possibly my favorite thing I've ever crocheted (followed closely by the banana split. 'Cause who doesn't like banana splits? Except my husband. Who is allergic to bananas.)!!!!!!!!!

It's cropped for thumbnail/avatar use, and ~~I'm too lazy~~ it would be inconvenient right now to upload another full-size photo, but here it is! Ever wonder what the heck a Craft Frog looks like?

THAT is what a Craft Frog looks like. While making this thing, I accidentally super-glued myself to the little wire crochet hook. Oops. Now I have a raw patch on my finger. Also, super glue won't glue wire to yarn, so it's a pointless raw patch. Although I suppose I did learn that it doesn't work...

This is my mix-n-match softie pattern (found here, here, here, and here) with frog eyes.

Frog Eyes
1) ch 2, 6 sc in 2nd ch from hook, join with sl st (6)
2) ch 1, 2 sc in each sc around, join with sl st (12)
3-4) ch 1, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (12)
5) ch 1, *dec over 2 sc* around, join with sl st (6)
stuff, break yarn, finish off, sew closed

Iris
1) ch 2, 6 sc in 2nd ch from hook, join with sl st (6)
break yarn, finish off

Assembly
Embroider French knots in middle of each iris for pupil, then sew iris to eye. Repeat for second eye. Sew to top of head.

More Boring Update!

2011-09-06T21:36:00.000-05:00

I'm getting stuff ready!! Less than a week and The Craft Frog on Etsy opens for business! After that it should be back to business as usual around here. I'll have a bunch of Farmer's Wife blocks to catch up on, crochet to plan out in time for Yule, all the regular stuff.

I hope everyone had a great long weekend!!

Back-to-School Dog

2011-09-03T16:05:00.001-05:00

I know that a bunch of kids have already gone back to school, but not everyone is there yet! And this little guy is ready to go back, too. Judging by the size, I'm pretty sure that changing the strap length would make the backpack work for Barbie, too. The backpack is functional and (with velcro) will stay closed. My daughter is happy to have a "purse" for her little animals.

This would work with the turtle or duck, again just with a different length on the straps. Also, learn my my assembly issues- the straps are easier to sew on BEFORE sewing the backpack together than after. Just make sure you face them out. ;)

Materials:

worsted weight red, black, teal, navy blue
G-sized crochet hook
stuffing
velcro (or other fastening device) and something to attach it with- needle and thread, hot glue gun, fabric glue, etc.

Head and Body (rounds)
1) ch 2, sc6 in 2nd ch from hook (6)
2) 2 sc in each sc around (12)
3) sc, 2 sc in next sc* around (18)
4) sc2, 2 sc in next sc* around (24)
5) sc3, 2 sc in next sc* around (30)
6) sc4, 2 sc in next sc* around (36)
7-11) sc in each sc around (36)
12) sc4, dec over 2 sc* around (30)
13) sc3, dec over 2 sc* around (24)
14) sc2, dec over 2 sc* around (18)
15) sc, dec over 2 sc* around (12)
stuff head
16) 2 sc in each sc around (24)
17) sc3, 2 sc in next sc* around (30)
18-25) sc in each sc (30)
26) sc3, dec over 2 sc* around (24)
27) sc2, dec over 2 sc* around (18)
28) sc, dec over 2 sc* around (12)
stuff
29) dec over 2 sc* around (6)
break yarn, finish off, sew closed, weave in end

Legs (make 2)
stuff as you go
1) ch 2, 6 sc in 2nd ch from hook, join with sl st (6)
2) ch 1, 2 sc in each sc around, join with sl st (12)
3) ch 1, *sc, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (18)
4) ch 1, in back loops only sc in each sc around, join with sl st (18)
5) ch 1, in both loops, sc in each sc, join with sl st (18)
6) ch 1, *sc4, dec over 2 sc* around, join with sl st (15)
7-8) ch 1, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (15)
9) ch 1, *sc3, dec over 2 sc* around, join with sl st (12)
10-11) ch 1, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (12)
12) ch 1, *sc2, dec over 2 sc*, join with sl st (9)
13-14) ch 1, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (9)
break yarn, finish off

Arms (make 2)
stuff as you go
1) ch 2, 6 sc in 2nd ch from hook, join with sl st (6)
2) ch 1, 2 sc in each sc around, join with sl st (12)
3) ch 1, in back loops only sc in each sc around, join with sl st (12)
4) ch 1, in both loops *sc2, dec over 2 sc*, join with sl st (9)
5-13) ch 1, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (9)
break yarn, finish off

Tail (make 2)
1) ch 10, sc in 2nd ch from hook to end (9)
break yarn, finish off

Muzzle
1) ch 2, 6 sc in 2nd ch from hook, join with sl st (6)
2) ch 1, 2 sc in each sc around, join with sl st (12)
3) ch 1, *sc, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (18)
4-5) ch 1, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (18)
break yarn, finish off

Ears (make 2)
1) ch 7, sc in 2nd ch from hook to end (6)
2) ch 1, turn, sc in each sc (6)
3) ch 1, turn, dec over 2 sc, sc2, dec over 2 sc (4)
4) ch 1, turn, sc in each sc (4)
5) ch 1, turn, *dec over 2 sc* twice (2)
6) ch 1, turn, dec over 2 sc (1)
break yarn, finish off

Eyes and Nose (make 3)
1) ch 2, 6 sc in 2nd ch from hook, join with sl st (6)
break yarn, finish off

Backpack Base
1) ch 8, sc in 2nd ch to end (7)
2) ch 1, turn, sc in each sc (7)
break yarn, finish off

Backpack Front/Back (make 2)
1) ch 8, sc in 2nd ch to end (7)
2-8) ch 1, turn, sc in each sc (7)
break yarn, finish off

Backpack Top
1) ch 8, sc in 2nd ch to end (7)
2-5) ch 1, turn, sc in each sc (7)
6) ch 1, turn, dec over 2 sc, sc3, dec over 2 sc (5)
break yarn, finish off

Backpack Sides
1) ch 3, sc in 2nd and 3rd ch from hook (2)
2-8) ch 1, turn, sc in each sc (2)
break yarn, finish off

Straps
1) ch 20 or until you reach desired strap length
break yarn, finish off

Assembly
Sew legs to bottom of body. Sew arms to sides of body. Whipstich edges of tails together and sew to back of body. Sew nose to muzzle and embroider mouth, then sew muzzle to head- stuff lightly just before sewing closed. Sew eyes and ears to head. Sew straps to backpack back. Sew bottom of backpack back, front, and sides to backpack bottom. Sew back and front to sides to form back. Sew top to top edge of backpack back. Attach velcro to hold backpack top closed if desired.

Etsy!

2011-09-03T08:50:00.000-05:00

Like, forever ago (and also yesterday), I mentioned that I wanted to open an Etsy store. Probably last year around this time. Well... It's happening. My grand opening is going to be September 12. I will be posting a grand opening coupon here and on Facebook, so stay tuned for that! I will also be having a giveaway (and who doesn't like giveaways??) very shortly after I open.

For the most part, it's going to be custom order things of a bunch of my crochet patterns. Not the really bad ones. (Snake, I'm looking at you.) I will keep some stock around, and I'm also going to (infrequently) list fabric that I want to de-stash.

I will absolutely continue to offer free crochet patterns here on my blog. For sure!!

Happy Mail Day!

2011-09-02T11:33:00.000-05:00

Technically, yesterday. But I couldn't check the mail until this morning.

After three years of faithful service, my diaper bag is falling apart. The lining is all ripped, it's just starting to get kind of sad. I'm getting out more without the children, and when I'm with them, one is completely day-trained with the potty... So I've been kind of looking for/wishing I had a not-diaper-bag.

I prefer big purses. I like to carry the kitchen sink with me when I go out- not really, but I have a big wallet and I like to be able to carry a book or crochet/knitting, plus a water bottle, medication, phone, etc... So this is really up my alley.

My bad lighting doesn't do it justice. I won this fabulous bag from Tiffany at This Crafty Fox. It's perfect- thanks Tiffany!

And... I will be opening up an Etsy store very soon. As soon as I can generate some stock, which will be mostly crochet things and probably a few sewn items.

Boring Update

2011-08-31T08:08:00.000-05:00

Booooooooo-ring... I promise.

I didn't do any sewing this past week, so there won't be a Farmer's Wife post. I don't plan on doing any until at least Friday.

I did, however, get some knitting done. Not a whole lot, but some. I have some more planned for today. Maybe. I have a crapton of cleaning to do, and I'm trying for all I'm worth to get the new Sims Medieval expansion to work on my computer (it's not, I have to call tech support later and tell them that they either need to refund my money or send me a disc 'cause anything installed through their Origin gateway doesn't function on my computer). And if I do get it working, by some miracle of miracle-ness, I'll totally be playing that tonight. ;)

The Farmer's Baby

2011-08-25T09:28:00.001-05:00

Well, to be fair, he's almost two. And he's decided that I can't take pictures without him being involved. At least the older one will come and sit beside me so she can see the screen. Him? He has to stand directly in front of me and peer over the top of the camera (or try to), usually pointing at the LCD on the back.

Anyway. This week's blocks came together REALLY quickly. I spent one naptime tracing and cutting template pieces and the foundation patterns, and then the next naptime I sewed everything together, with enough time left over to get some crocheting done!

Block 6- Big Dipper (templates)

Block 66- Periwinkle (foundation pieced)

Bake Sale Tray

2011-08-24T11:29:00.001-05:00

Remember way back when, when I mentioned something about a dessert-themed crochet project? OMG I'M POSTING A CROCHET PATTERN!!!

When I was a little girl, I was involved in Brownies, and then Girl Guides. UK/Canada's version of Girl Scouts. Every year there would be at least one bake sale. I always loved bake sales. And so, here is a small sampling of what you would find at a bake sale!! Cupcakes, Nanaimo bar, chocolate chip cookies, and a jam tart.

For those not familiar, Nanaimo bars... I don't know how much of that is the truth. But. I know that they were named for Nanaimo (I actually lived in Nanaimo for a few years) and everyone loved them when I was growing up. Basically it's a crumby/cookie base, with a custard-flavoured icing (also delicious in mint) and then a layer of hard chocolate on top.

I made two cupcakes. The one with the cherry on top is a red velvet cupcake, and the other one is just a regular cupcake with strawberry icing.

The cupcakes and tart are all stuffed, just lightly enough to hold their shape. If I didn't attach them to the tray, I would probably stuff the stuffing out of them. Or into them.
Also note that while you theoretically could crochet the tart base and sides as one piece, you would end up needing to stuff from the indented top and it would take a lot of fussing with to get it to look right.

Materials:

worsted weight baby pink, red, dark red, medium brown, dark brown, tan, white, black, yellow; sport weight medium green
stuffing
G-sized crochet hook
glue gun if desired

Nanaimo Bar (make 3 dark brown, 1 yellow)1) ch 7, sc in 2nd ch from hook to end (6)
2-9) ch 1, turn, sc in each sc (6)
break yarn, finish off

Cookie (make 2 for each cookie)
1) ch 2, sc6 in 2nd ch from hook, join with sl st (6)
2) ch 1, 2 sc in each sc around, join with sl st (12)
3) ch 1, *sc, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (18)
4) ch 1, *sc2, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (24)
5) ch 1, *sc3, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (30)
break yarn, finish off. Make french knots with dark brown for chocolate chips.

Tart Base
1) ch 2, sc6 in 2nd ch from hook, join with sl st (6)
2) ch 1, 2 sc in each sc around, join with sl st (12)
3) ch 1, *sc, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (18)
break yarn, finish off

Tart Side
1) ch 18, join with sl st, sc in each ch, join with sl st (18)
2) ch 1, *sc5, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (21)
3) ch 1, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (21)
4) ch 1, *sc6, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (24)
5) ch 1, sc in each sc around (24)
break yarn, finish off

Tart Filling
1) ch 2, sc6 in 2nd ch from hook, join with sl st (6)
2) ch 1, 2 sc in each sc around, join with sl st (12)
3) ch 1, sc, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (18)
4) switch to beige, ch 1, sc in each sc around (18)
break yarn, finish off.

Cupcake Bottom
1) ch 2, sc6 in 2nd ch from hook, join with sl st (6)
2) ch 1, 2 sc in each sc around, join with sl st (12)
3) ch 1, *sc, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (18)
4) ch 1, in back loops only sc in each sc around (18)
5) ch 1, *sc5, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (21)
6) ch 1, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (21)
7) ch 1, *sc6, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (24)
break yarn, finish off

Cupcake Icing
1) ch 2, sc6 in 2nd ch from hook, join with sl st (6)
2) ch 1, 2 sc in each sc around, join with sl st (12)
3) ch 1, *sc, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (18)
4) ch 1, *sc2, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (24)
5-7) ch 1, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (24)
8) ch 1, *sc and hdc in next sc, hdc and sc in next sc* around, join with sl st
break yarn, finish off

Cherry
1) ch 2, sc6 in 2nd ch from hook, join with sl st (6)
2) ch 1, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (6)
break yarn, finish off, sew closed

Strawberry Half- do not stuff
1) ch 2, sc6 in 2nd ch from hook, join with sl st (6)
2) ch 1, 2 sc in each sc around, join with sl st (12)
3) ch 1, *sc2, dec over 2 sc* around, join with sl st (9)
4) ch 1, *sc, dec over 2 sc* around, join with sl st (6)
5) ch 1, dec over 2 sc around, join with sl st (3)
break yarn, finish off, sew closed

Strawberry Stem
1) ch 2, sc4 in 2nd ch from hook (4)
break yarn, finish off

Tray
1) ch 24, dc in 4th ch from hook to end (first 3 ch count as dc and ch) (22)
2-14) ch 3 (counts as first dc), turn, dc in each dc (22)
15) ch 1, turn, sc in each sc, sc2 in end of each row of dc, sc in each bottom loop, sc2 in end of each row of dc, join with sl st
break yarn, finish off

Assembly
Whipstitch edges of cookie parts together, right sides out. Turn tart filling inside out (so jam is facing up). Nestle inside tart side and whipstitch top edges together with tan. Stuff, then sew on bottom. Layer bar pieces with two brown, the yellow, then the last brown. Do not whipstitch- sew through all four layers just inside the outside edge. Sew top edge of cupcake bottom between rows 7 and 8 of the cupcake icing. Attach strawberry stem to top of strawberry, push strawberry flat and attach to pink icing. Attach cherry to white icing. Arrange and glue on tray if desired.

Farmer's Wife Thursday!

2011-08-18T08:15:00.001-05:00

It's another one! And I'm all caught up now! Going forward I think that 2 blocks a week is way feasible. I also saw a Civil War sampler floating around and I may give that a go. I think it has... 56 blocks? So I might do one block a week. We'll see.

The blocks this week were kind of a mixed bag. I had to template piece three out of the four blocks and I'm surprised and pleased with how well they turned out, for the most part. They still need a lot of trimming and my points don't REALLY match up, but I have a real love-hate relationship with those templates. And, of course, silly me has just been using paper templates instead of making actual templates. BIG mistake. Huge. 'Cause when you run your mechanical pencil around the paper, it degrades the paper in a big way. Some of my templates (ahem, 7, 13, 20...) are really starting to be a little worse for wear. So going forward, I think I'm going to HAVE to make actual templates. I've been saving my cereal boxes!!

I'm trying to decide what pair to do for next week. The next two in the book are one I *think* I can rotary cut for and one will need to be foundation-pieced... And then the two that I'm thinking about (I saw a REALLY striking Strawberry Basket on the Flickr group and I wanted to give that one a try) will probably just be rotary cut. Plus, the one it's paired with in the book? EASY! Probably one of the easiest blocks in the book.

Enough of my blah blah. On to the blocks!

Block 64- Peace and Plenty (rotary cut)

Block 53- Jackknife (templates)

Block 74- Ribbons (templates)

Block 10- Bow Tie (templates)

Oh, Those HSTs

2011-08-16T16:57:00.001-05:00

When I first started quilting, I thought HSTs (half-square-triangles) were these mystical, magical things that only the really good quilters knew how to use. You know, the REAL quilters. I made a couple of quilts with HSTs in them and I didn't really understand them, so I viewed them as a necessary evil.

Recently, I did the Summer Sampler Series which was AWESOME for skill building and things kind of clicked into place. And now when I run into them in the Farmer's Wife blocks, I'm honestly a little relieved that I can rotary cut and not use those templates!

HST math: The magic number for squares and rectangles is (finished size) + 1/2. So if you wanted a square with a finished size of 1 1/2", you would cut a square 2". The magic number for HSTs is (finished size) + 7/8". So if you wanted a finished size of 1 1/2", you would cut a square 2 3/8". Theoretically. However. HSTs are tricky little things and having them be an extra 1/8" is usually a good thing. You have to trim them anyway... and it's easier to trim an extra 1/8" off than to adjust or start over because you've ended up with it being a little too small. So I always add an inch to my finished size. So for finished size 1 1/2", I would cut a square 2 1/2".

There are 101 ways to do HSTs. Ok, maybe not, but there are a few. Here are two, and if neither one floats your boat, there are other ways just a Google-search away!

For both methods, you start the same way. I want my finished HST to be 1 1/2", so I cut myself a 2 1/2" square out of both fabrics. For the first method, you line up the squares together, facing each other. Draw a line from corner to corner.

Now sew 1/4" out from the line on both sides.

Cut along the line.

Now you have two HST squares, ready to be ironed!

The other way, line up your square with the bias line on your cutting mat (or ruler).

Line your ruler up with the bias line.

Cut.

Now do that with every single one of your squares. Then line up your triangles, one of each fabric with right sides together and sew a 1/4" seam along the long edge.

Now you have your HST squares ready to iron. HSTs tend to run in packs, and if you iron the seams to the side, you can end up with REALLY bulky points. I iron my bias seams open.

And then if I'm sewing them together, I iron the seams to the sides just like with normal blocks.

But before you sew them together, they have to be trimmed. Have to? Well... Yes. Because you're sewing them together on the bias, they're going to be a bit wonky by the time they're ironed. They'll be more parallelograms than squares.
I use a small cutting mat to trim them on. My small cutting mat is 12"x12" and it wasn't very spendy. Totally worthy purchase. Plus, it marks the quarter and half inch lines, and that helps A LOT.
Line up your center seam with the bias line on your cutting mat. Since I want a 1.5" finished size and this is now a square, I want it to be (finished size) + 1/2", or 2". I want all of the edges of my square to meet or overlap a 2" square on my cutting mat.

Line up the ruler with one of the 2" lines.

Cut.

Now turn the cutting mat clockwise 90 degrees.

Line up your ruler and trim again. Keep doing it until you have your square at the right size.

This cut down (ahahaha) my cutting time tremendously. I find that sometimes I have to shift the square to line it up again, but it's just a small shift and I'm ready to go. No repositioning the square, no contorting myself into funny positions to get it done. And then repeat for however many squares you need!

This is the Peace and Plenty block from the Farmer's Wife Sampler.

Thursday on the Farm

2011-08-11T08:06:00.001-05:00

Pseudo on the farm. With quiltyness. No actual farm.

I am almost caught up. I would probably be caught up if one of my "works in progress" this past week hadn't been being sucked into a video game. Dragon Age II. And I would actually probably be done that if I hadn't started over when I was halfway through. It's just that I realized that I preferred Fenris to Anders, and by then I was already stuck with Anders... Er. Sucked into video games. Almost caught up. I think I have to make 4 blocks this week and I'll be caught up to "everyone else." A couple of the ones coming up look a little tricky, and then there's a HST block which is time-consuming but not really difficult, and a super easy looking block. So I should be able to do it. Even if I do get sucked into video games. And then, of course, crochet to do.

This is my only sewing project on the go right now. And it might stay that way for a little bit. (At least until I finish Dragon Age II.)

I did go a little out of order this week. While working on Century of Progress I saw Cats and Mice and was all, "I totally know what fabric I want to use for that!" so I did that one and its mate. Paris Cats, of course, and then a fabric that reminds me a little of tail-less mice. Or tail-less sperm. But I didn't realize the sperm thing until after it was all together.

Block 58- Mother's Dream (templates)

Block 77- Seasons (templates)

Block 51- Hovering Birds (rotary cut)

Block 17- Cats and Mice (templates and rotary cut)

Block 34- Flock (rotary cut)

Block 107- Windblown Square (rotary cut)

Block 46- Hill and Valley (templates)

Block 18- Century of Progress (foundation pieced, and the last seam will not iron flat)

Summer Sampler- Done!

2011-08-08T17:12:00.001-05:00

So I'm done. And by done, I mean the blocks are going to be bagged up in the closet until I can get batting and backing fabric for it. The original idea was to do two of each block but I don't have quite enough fabric for that, so it's going to be a FMQ skill-builder wall-hanging. That's the current theory, anyway! :D

Bad lighting, story of my life! I live in a small walk-up and getting outside for some natural light with two small children seems more hassle than practical. And ant hills all over the yard... So. Bad lighting!

Here are the individual blocks that aren't in my other post. I had a LOT of fun making this and I learned a lot (including a better HST way that I like and paper piecing)!

Block 8 was a snap. After I got the time to do it, that is! :D I love this block. I've totally gone from, "Ugh, dreaded HSTs," to, "Yay! HSTs are easy!" (I'm planning a post in the near future all about HSTs.)

Block 9... My rows don't match. I've decided that it adds "charm" and is not worth taking poor Francois to half the block. I really like how the pink and blue look together!

Block 10 took forever. Not because it was difficult to put together but because my sewing time was cut down quite a bit.

Block 11 was supposed to be string pieced. I did not string piece. I thought it would look kind of funny to have only one string pieced block in the quilt.

Block 12 came together pretty quickly. I like the idea of doing the star points with the background.

Farmer's Wife Thursday

2011-08-04T09:00:00.001-05:00

Crap on a stick. I had half a post all written out and I was in the middle of putting pictures into it and it just vanished. I am less than amused.

Anyway. I have 12 blocks done now, so I'm a little over half done. I'm hoping to be caught up by the end of the week. It's a naive hope, but everyone needs a goal, right! ;)

I learned this week that if there's a row with a lot of bias-y sewing, I need to paper piece or something. I have two blocks that I'm not really happy with (and I may go back and redo later) because they ended up really wonky.

It was baby feet last week and kitty paws this week. I swear, crafty things are like a magnet.

Block 72- Railroad (rotary cut)

Block 24- Country Path (templates)

Block 79- Silver Lane (templates)

Block 86- Squash Blossoms (templates)

Block 26- Cut Glass Dish (rotary cut)

Block 40- Friendship Block (foundation pieced)

Block 54- Kitchen Woodbox (foundation pieced)

Just Wednesday

2011-08-03T18:04:00.000-05:00

It's just Wednesday. I had company over the weekend and uncooperative baby nights, so I didn't get my butt in gear in time to do WiP Wednesday. I'm ok with that. I'll do an update anyway!

I'm all caught up with the Summer Sampler. Pics on Friday or Saturday and more talky when the final block gets posted.

I didn't get as much Farmer's Wife done as I wanted, but I've done some. More talky tomorrow. And pictures. Many pictures.

Apparently it takes a long, LONG time to ship to me. Fair. But I'm excited that it got here! Fabric Donkey! Go! Look! In addition to sharing wonderful sales and doing super awesome giveaways, the raffle for her beautiful quilt is still going.
(And yes, those are tiny 2-year-old hands in the picture. She just couldn't wait to get her little hands on it either.)

I think that's all for today. It's too hot to think!

The Farmer's Frog?

2011-07-28T15:12:00.001-05:00

Yeah, I did. With a bunch of beautiful little blocks popping up all over Blogland, I was all, "I need something to cut down on my scraps!" Right. I'll say I do anyway. So...

I got sucked into the letters. I'm really big on history and each letter is a picture of what life was like back in the '20s.

I also got sucked into the blocks. I started out from block one and did a couple. Super easy, super fast. Then came the first applique block and I was all, "Um... No." So then I figured I'd do a couple from the end. Wrench is the exact same pattern as Churn Dash, just with different colors... So I did both of those. And then I was all, "I know! I'll do them in the order they're presented with the letters!" So while I haven't actually completed all of them, I'm doing the "mate" of the first four I finished. Then I'm going to start from the beginning and work through the letters.

I've figured it out, though. The first few blocks are really easy and fast, so you get sucked into it. Then you come across something like block #7 with a millionty HSTs. So you do it, because you tell yourself, "It's only one block, surely the rest of them can't all be like that!" And because you've already become a part of the Farmer's Wife collective, you can't stop. ;)

I'm using a combination of the templates, foundation piecing, and rotary cutting. I absolutely refuse to use the templates when all I'm cutting out are squares and HSTs. Rotary cutting is MUCH faster. And while templates are kind of a pain in the ass to use, it's way easier to fussy cut with templates!!

So here's what I have finished. I'm trying to get caught up to the 18 that "everyone else" doing the Flickr QA has done, and then I'll just be doing two a week. I'm planning on updating my progress on Thursdays for now... (And yes, there are assorted baby body parts in the pictures. He refused to not be a part of the whole experience.)

Block 111- Wrench (rotary cut)

Block 30- End of Day (template)

Block 2- Autumn Tints (rotary cut)

Block 20- Churn Dash (rotary cut)

Block 1- Attic Windows (foundation pieced)

WiP Wednesday!

2011-07-27T07:33:00.000-05:00

Wednesday just seems to keep happening, like... every week!

This week... What's been going on this week. Well, I finished my Butterfly Garden quilt top and now it's stashed away in a closet with the backing fabric. It's looking like it's going to be a donation quilt. While I think it's pretty, I just don't love it.

The Summer Sampler Series is going pretty well. Today's block is a millionty HSTs and we have errands to do outside the house today, so I may not get it done until tonight or even tomorrow. Here's my blocks so far:

Crochet- I actually have done some! I just need to do some more. :D

Potty-training- I'd say we're about halfway there! She's pretty much day-trained, now we just need to work on using the potty in public places (public toilets terrify her, I can't say I blame her) and diaper-free nap and bedtimes.

Thank you Lee! Go and check out Lee's great blog and other WiPs!

For a Good Cause

2011-07-26T22:11:00.000-05:00

You know how I mentioned The Fabric Donkey earlier today? Well, in addition to posting about super awesome fabric sales (which she does, at least once a day most days), she has a blog AND she quilts.

She joined the rest of us in the kaleidoscope QA, and her beautiful quilt is now going to be raffled off for a very good cause.

This is her post with all of the details.

My Baby Ate My Template

2011-07-26T08:43:00.000-05:00

No, really.

The part on the right is the bit I fished out of his mouth. This is the same boy who went to the ER for swallowing a toothpick. Sigh. Luckily it was after I'd finished using it. The template, not the toothpick.

I realized that I'm over halfway through the Summer Sampler Series and I haven't really said much about it, so here it is. A lot of pictures.

Block 1 is my favorite block I've ever made. I have moments where I look at it and go, "Did I really make that?" because I love it so much. Not that it's perfect... I made a measuring/cutting error with the pink and if you squint you can see that the HSTs are a little big. I absolutely love it though.

Block 2 went together really quickly! I think this would be cool as an entire quilt with this block 'cause it would be the crosses and squares. I may try that sometime in the future. At least a doll quilt. :D

Block 3 is actually redone. I initially had all of the different fabrics paired up beside each other, but I didn't love it. It didn't look balanced to me. Now I love it. I didn't think I would like that background fabric as a background fabric, but I really do!

Block 4, or 50000000 HSTs. There's a couple of spots where it doesn't line up, but I'm pretty happy with it overall. Most of the time on this block was spent... trimming HSTs.

Block 5, my first paper-piecing adventure ever. I love paper-piecing. Love! Do not love ripping out the tiny stitches that you need for paper-piecing.

Block 6 was a mess. Just a mess. My paper-piecing template was a little too small, so in order to make the block 12.5", I had to sew a very scant 1/4" seam. I'm trying to pretend that it's a part of the design that they're off center. I may have just redone it if it already wasn't my second go-around on this particular block. I have a pile of diamonds that are now scrap because of a measuring error. I do like working with diamonds but I'm accepting that this block is the total screw-up of the bunch.

Block 7 doesn't quite match up, but I really love it. Part of my love is the background I think, I really love the daisies on blue (Pick a Bunch, by the way). Equilateral triangles are fun!

While I was making this, I realized that I loved samplers a lot. Enough to get involved in the Famer's Wife QA! So I ordered my book. I'm really excited about making it. The blocks are 6.5" which means that I can use a bunch of my scraps! That is, if it gets delivered correctly...

This brings us to the whining portion of the blog entry. I was the lucky winner of The Fabric Donkey's latest giveaway. (The Fabric Donkey is awesome. For reals. Go there!) And I never win anything. This totally made my month. Except... With the way my luck runs, I'm almost positive that it was delivered to the wrong box. Yesterday (probably the day it should have arrived) our mailbox was TOTALLY empty (a very, very rare event. I think it's happened twice in the almost-three-years we've been here) and I saw a parcel key in the box next to ours. Now, it could be that it hasn't arrived yet (it's coming from the complete other side of the country) and if that was it, I'm hoping that my neighbours will be wonderful enough to at least drop it back into the post box for the mailman to redeliver. I need happy fabric thoughts! ;)

Butterfly Garden

2011-07-24T15:58:00.001-05:00

I finished the top. And now it's probably going to sit folded up with the backing fabric in my craft closet for a good while. I don't love it. Part of me wants to get it finished so that it's done and over with, but batting is spendy and I've already spent crafty money this month. (More on that when what I got actually gets here. A hint, I drank the Kool-aid.)

It's five really easy block patterns. Those are 8" blocks with 1" sashing. The pieced border is 4", the pink border is 2". It looks pretty much the way I expected it to, and while I think it's pretty to look at in the picture, I think it's just that it's not really me. I may end up donating this quilt. I am very pleased with the sashing and how I (mostly) got it to line up.

But! Between this top finished (and the back figured out, but not sewn together) and my kaleidoscope finish, my sewing table has a lot more room on it. And now I can crochet like mad without feeling like I need to get this done first (because I started it first).

Francois Went Missing Today...

2011-07-23T15:40:00.000-05:00

... and I panicked.

Francois is not my son, nor my cat... Francois is my seam-ripper.

I named my seam-ripper. I realized one day that I spend an awful lot of time ripping seams. It feels like every time I sit down to sew, I'm ripping seams. (I'd like to tell you all how much it sucks to rip out 1.5 length stitches out of paper-piecing, but I'm not going to.) It tends to be a very unpleasant experience, filled with cursing and occasionally stabbing myself with the seam-ripper, and squinting because it tends to be white thread against a light-colored fabric back and I don't have the foresight to leave my reading glasses in with my sewing machine.

Since I spend so much time with my seam-ripper and wanted to make the idea even just a little more appealing, I decided to give it a name. Not a friendly name, not someone I'd want to sit down and have coffee and gossip with, 'cause that just didn't cut the mustard. Every once in a while, even our best girlfriends make us a little (or more than a little) frustrated, so a Nancy or a Samantha, or a Michelle just didn't seem right.

I needed a man's name. And not just any man. Bob? No. Chuck? Not so much. No, I needed a man's name. Something that would conjure up images of swarthy men with ripply torsos and sexy accents. Someone I would look forward to spending some time with, even if it was just to stare and drool.

Francois is halfway there. Swarthy, yes. Accent, yes. Football player shoulders and ripply abdomen, not so much. Then again, Francois is on his last legs. He doesn't so much rip seams anymore as he does bludgeon them apart.

Thankfully, Francois was found. And it really does help. Spending time with Francois is more appealing than ripping another damn seam.

Snake

2011-07-21T16:54:00.001-05:00

What's this? A crochet pattern? Why, yes it is. Not an awesome one... ;)

A few days ago, my daughter came to me talking about snakes. She wanted a snake. She wanted to go outside to find snakes right now. Snake this and snake that, everywhere a snake snake. I have no problem with snakes. I like snakes. Hold them? Sure. Reptiles and amphibians are my bag, baby. The only problem with this snake theory is that we live in the South, which I've come to realize is next only to Australia (where I think even the people are poisonous- no, not really) in its poisonous inhabitants. If we were in the Pacific northwest, I'd take the kids outside and hunt around for a garter snake. Here, though... No thanks.

So my bright idea, "Do you want Mama to make you a snake?" "Ok!" So I made a snake. It's crochet, so it's a little stiff. It looks kinda like a cross between an adult novelty toy (ahem!) and an eel. But *she* calls it a snake, which is the important part. I'm thinking I might track down a sewing pattern for a snake, simply so that it's a little more floppy and coil-able.

I would have preferred to use felt for the tongue, honestly. So if you happen to have red felt laying around... Also, the body can be made longer by making more rows of sc in between 6-75. It's 16" long, as written. Stuff it loosely so it has some movement, and by "shape" I mean to flatten it out so that the circumference is more of an oval than a circle.

Body (stuff and shape as you go)
1) ch 2, 6 sc in 2nd ch from hook, join with sl st (6)
2) ch 1, *sc, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (9)
3) ch 1, *sc2, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (12)
4) ch 1, *sc3, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (15)
5) ch 1, *sc4, 2 sc in next sc* around, join with sl st (18)
6-75) ch 1, sc in each sc around, join with sl st (18)
76) ch 1, *sc4, dec over 2 sc* around, join with sl st (15)
77) ch 1, *sc3, dec over 2 sc* around, join with sl st (12)
78) ch 1, *sc2, dec over 2 sc* around, join with sl st (9)
79) ch 1, *sc, dec over 2 sc* around, join with sl st (6)
break yarn, finish off, sew closed

Eyes
make 2 French knots on head

Body Stripe
1) ch 69 (or 10 less than the rows of body), sc in 2nd ch from hook to end (68)
Tongue
1) ch 2, sc in 2nd ch from hook (1)
2-3) ch 1, turn, sc (1)
4) ch 4, join with sl st, ch 4, join with sl st
break yarn, finish off

Assembly
Sew body stripe to top of body, starting at the tail and working towards the head. Sew tongue onto front of "face."

WiP Wednesday!

2011-07-20T08:45:00.000-05:00

It's Wednesday again! I'm currently being serenaded by a tantruming two-year-old, which tells you how my day is starting. ;)

Let's see. Works in progress. I finished my Kaleidoscope. Mostly. Thread-snipping will be completed today after I get today's Summer Sampler block done.

Speaking of the Summer Sampler Series, these are my blocks so far.

I'm a little daunted by the paper-piecing today, if only because I don't have a printer and will have to spend some time meticulously tracing the templates off my screen. That's probably going to be the longest part of the whole process.

Crochet- I started a project. I'm almost done the same project. Hopefully I'll get it done up soon. Now that the kaleidoscope is done, I'm going to try and get the Butterfly Garden finished up (at least the top) and then try and get back into crocheting. 'Cause there's a few things I *need* to get done.

Happy Wednesday! Don't forget to check out Lee's great blog and other WiPs!

Kaleidoscope- Done!

2011-07-19T14:44:00.001-05:00

All done. Ok, not ALL done. I still haven't washed it, and I need to go through and snip the loose threads off (maybe tonight during Deadliest Catch if I can stay awake?) but it's quilted and bound (binded?). It'll need to wait to go through the wash until probably this weekend. I can't realistically do laundry without my husband at home, and he's working a long shift every day this week.

I meant to have this done last night, but SOMEONE swallowed half a toothpick and I was at the ER until the wee hours of the morning. He's ok, he's just tired.

It's 4x6 blocks, with a 2" and a 4" border. I used the C&C machine quilting thread, which a lot of people say will randomly break for them even if they have their tension set perfectly. It did the same thing for me until I wound about four bobbins from it, then it was fine.

This was a lot of learning and a lot of firsts for me. This is my first pieced back (I'm not counting my reversible quilt, 'cause that's really two tops). There's about a yard of that black fabric and everything else is what was left over from the front. This is my first pieced batting. And this is my first quilt that's really FOR ME. I can sleep under this at night instead of "borrowing" my son's big-boy quilt that I'm actually going to transition him to using soon because the crib-size one is getting too small.

I learned a lot about my machine. With the Brother xl2600i, the feed dogs don't drop. It comes with this little plastic "darning plate" that I am now throwing away. I always had issues with my top thread being WAY too loose when FMQ, so I decided to give it a go without that stupid darning plate. No more tension issues (from that). I learned that there's a trick to threading it too, you have to REALLY make sure that it's threaded in one of the places it needs to be, and it's impossible to see from the outside. Yeah, I want a new one.

I also learned a lot about fabric quality. And I machine-sewed the binding on instead of hand-sewing for the first time ever.

It's a bit sloppy in places, but overall I'm really happy with it. I love it. Thank you to Elizabeth from Don't Call Me Betsy for hosting this QA, it was a lot of fun!

Who Is That Craft Frog?

2011-07-15T11:15:00.000-05:00

I've been doing this for a little over a year now and I figured I'd take some time to blah blah and tell you a little bit about me.

I'm Joy. I grew up on the west coast of Canada in a temperate rain forest. I've always been into crafty things and learned the basic knit stitch as well as cross-stitch as a child, but neither one really did it for me. It wasn't until my late teens/early twenties that I really found an outlet for my crafty-ness.

A friend taught me basic crochet and I expanded on that online. I'd played with polymer clay as a child, but I started making 1/12 inch scale miniatures with it as a way to fill my time at work.

Unfortunately, polymer clay miniatures require a lot of dedicated time, which I can't do right now. I can't even sit down through a cup of coffee, so dedicated miniature time is hopeless. When the kids get a little older, I'm hoping I'll be able to get back into it a little more.

I met my husband online, playing WoW. We moved to Wyoming and got married and I got pregnant with my daughter. We moved to Alabama about halfway through my pregnancy and I gave birth to Rachel here.

She turns three in just a couple of months. She inspired me to take crochet from blankets and afghans to toys.

Shortly after she was born, I got pregnant with my son, Marcus.

Here he is about a month ago, he's had a haircut since then.

So what do I look like?

My daughter was 5 months old and I was barely pregnant with my son, which tells you how old that picture was. I look about the same, just fatter, no bangs, and my hair goes through phases of pink, purple, and blue.

I still play WoW, I raid as a gnome priest. I read, as much as I'm able to. I got into sewing right before my son was born and I'm really enjoying it. I'm a little burned out on crochet, to be perfectly honest, which is why there haven't been as many crochet posts lately.

It takes a lot of patience to be able to get anything crafty done around the house. They seem to materialize whenever I get started on anything.

From almost the time I get up in the morning until the time I go to bed, one or both of the children are up. They're big into crafty things too. Every day, some version of the question, "Where did you put my (ruler, yarn, crochet hook, fabric, etc.)?" seems to need to be asked.

I also have two cats.

Who love crafty things.

I am a stay-at-home-mom and I absolutely love it. I'm a bit of a smart-ass (better a smart-ass than a dumb-ass). I prefer pie to cake, coffee to tea, cleaning to cooking, wine to beer (although a good margarita conquers all). I love the rain, nothing makes my day like a good thunderstorm.

WiP Wednesday!

2011-07-13T07:41:00.000-05:00

It's...

Thank you Lee!

I'm waiting for my coffee to percolate. So. This may not make much sense. ;)

Crochet-wise, I'm at the same place I was on Saturday. But there's more Deadliest Catch recorded, so more crochet will get done. I think I can manage to be done by the end of the week. (But don't hold me to that. ;) )

You know how I said I joined the Summer Sampler Series? Well... I was kind of on the fence about joining and then thought, "Oh, what the hell." I ran through my stash, came out with a bunch of bright fabrics, and joined the Flickr group. I am SUPER glad I did.

This is my favorite block I've ever made. And today's block looks just as fun. I can't wait for naptime to get sewing!

I got a little ahead on my kaleidoscope.

The back is going to take a lot of thought and a lot of piecing, and I want some time to be able to do that AND quilt the sucker. And since I'm going to be FMQ-ing the stuffing out of it (well, not really the stuffing part) I'm going to need some time for that too.
The vaginas are gone.

I was debating fussy cutting for them but I just didn't have enough fabric.

Butterfly Garden- I got my borders mostly cut and started sewing them together. I just need to cut a few pieces of my solid and I'll be completely finished cutting (for the front). Sadly, this is probably going to sit as an unfinished quilt top for a while until I can get some batting for it. Batting is spendy!

Happy Wednesday! Go check out Lee's great blog and the other WiPs!

Saturday

2011-07-09T11:42:00.000-05:00

I realized I hadn't posted this week except for WiP Wednesday, so here's another post.

Ready?

Nothing.

Sigh. I did do some crochet this week, I got the legs and arms finished for my son's red puppy and sewn on. Although I am glad that I didn't get it whipped up earlier, because...

... my son picked a lovey! So now I need to make a tiny pink bunny for his puppy instead of a bear. Shouldn't be too hard to do.

Kaleidoscope is going. I've got all my blocks done and I'm procrastinating from trimming them up. That's on tap for today as soon as I take out the garbage, and sweep and mop. Maybe, if my son is still napping, I'll start sewing them together. Maybe. We'll see.

A couple of finished blocks, pre-trim.

I started cutting the border pieces for my Butterfly Garden, but that stalled out when the sewing instructions for the KQA went up.

I also joined... Summer Sampler Series! 'Cause I need more ongoing projects, right?

Those are my fabrics. I went stash shopping and this is what I came out with. It starts Monday. I don't know that I'm going to be able to complete all three blocks in a week, but I'll definitely give it a try!!

WiP Wednesday!

2011-07-06T07:56:00.000-05:00

Thanks Lee!! Happy Wednesday. Tired Wednesday. Coffee Wednesday.

I only have one picture for you today.

As always, please excuse the horrible lighting. To be perfectly honest with you, I wasn't really loving it after I got the blocks done. But then I added the sashing and now I love it again. I've decided on a pieced border and another border and those will be going on soon. Need to cut, sew, then sew some more.

I whipped up these really easy shorts this weekend. Took a couple of hours, my daughter calls them her "pinky shorts."

Ok, I lied. Here's another picture.

That's a picture with all my prints in it, the prints are pieced together. Tomorrow's step is going to be finishing up the blocks and I'm pretty sure that once the blocks are together, I'll have to complete the quilt top and start looking at borders. I have a layout all written down on paper, and I try not to let anything formulate on paper for too long because, well, I have small children. Who like paper.

Nothing yarn-related this week. At all. I have a date with some DVR'ed Deadliest Catch today during naptime, and because I have issues *not* multi-tasking (anyone else?) I'll probably sit down with some crochet or some knitting. Something.

Potty training is in a holding pattern, which is to say that it's going about as well as can be expected for only doing it "casually." Our apartment laundry is on site, but it's really no place to take small, busy children, so we're going to need more panties. Tomorrow. And then we'll start actually potty training. I'm so done with changing diapers.

Shorts!

2011-07-02T17:48:00.001-05:00

In one of the remnant bundles I'm always raving about, I got some pink seersucker. My first thought- "I suppose I could use that in a quilt" with a dirty look. My second thought- "I have a little girl. Maybe I could make a skirt?" My third thought- "She's not going to wear a skirt. I wonder how hard it would be to make shorts?"

Turns out that it's SUPER easy. I used this tutorial and they took no time at all.

I can't really speak to sizing, I saved the pattern as an image, opened it up in Paint and zoomed in until it was about the size of paper the tutorial mentions, and traced it on printer paper. Yeah, having no printer sucks.

But with that method, they fit pretty well, with enough room to grow that she may just be able to wear them next summer. And she totally loves them. I have more seersucker, but I need more elastic.

(And my stripes are straight.)

Kaleidoscope!

2011-06-30T15:29:00.001-05:00

So after making a post about how I was joining the Kaleidoscope QA I haven't really talked about it. I mean for me, with my tendency to babble on about everything.

This week's step was piecing together the prints, which I've done.

And tonight after a certain little boy goes to bed, I'll probably start playing with a layout. But. These are all the prints against the natural background.

(And if you look closely you can see a little girl's knee in the upper right corner.)

I'm a little undecided about borders. The fabric that inspired this whole thing was this-

-which a friend pointed out looks like abstract vaginas. (Thanks Bree. :D ) I decided against cutting it up into triangles for two reasons. The first being that I felt it was just too large-scale of a print to really translate well into triangles that size, and the other is that with almost a yard of it, it was going to overpower the other prints in the front and there are some that it doesn't really "go" with.

So. It's going to be a border, and what's left I'm going to toss on the back. It'll probably be pieced into some kaleidoscope blocks on the back, depending on how much is left, but we'll see. There are going to be two borders. The other border is going to be a 2" border and is either going to be the natural-colored background, OR this awesome green blender that I'm going to use for binding.

I'm flopping back and forth on it. I'll probably end up polling the Flickr group, but if anyone has any input here, please share!! :D

And this is going to be the "main" fabric of the back.

The vagina fabric goes really with with it, and so does the green (which is going to end up on the back if it doesn't end up a border). It's going to be pretty pieced together, and while I have a few vague ideas of how I want the back to look, nothing concrete.

WiP Wednesday!

2011-06-29T08:37:00.000-05:00

Thanks Lee! Happy Wednesday! I finished my purple kitty (and sewn stuff) earlier this week, so I'm feeling like I actually accomplished something.

Sewing: My background for the Kaleidoscope QA came yesterday and I cut it really fast. I cut out three strips of WOF at a time, had them folded in half, stacked them, and cut. Took no time at all.

AND...

I started sewing my blocks together. I ran into a slight snag though. SOMEONE cut all of the long hydrangea strips (and I think the rose ones too, but I don't remember) 1/8" too short. It's a pretty specific amount to be short on every single one, and I can't think how it happened. Ugh. So now I'm a little disheartened.

Crochet: Nothing since Monday.

Those are two different projects. My son likes the pillow that I made for his sister, so I may need to finish that up before my dessert-y project. We'll see how the week goes.

Knitting: Still washcloth #3. Still no progress. I keep meaning to do it as my "sit down and do something with my hands while I watch TV" project, but it never ends up happening. And I haven't watched a whole lot of TV this week. I have two shows on the DVR just waiting for me.

And another AND....

My latest WiP that I'm the most proud of- my daughter is potty-training! YAY!!! I'll spare you all the details, but we'll say that day 3 (which was actually the first full day after one evening and one afternoon) was accident-free. I lucked out. She decided that she was done wearing diapers and wanted to be a big girl. This probably means one of two things- this is too good to be true and she's going to backslide in a big way for some unforseen reason, or her brother is going to be impossible to potty train. OR (and this is what I'm hoping for) I get lucky with potty training because neither one of them sleeps through the night in their own room yet.

Bedtime Kitty Sewing

2011-06-28T15:34:00.001-05:00

June's monthly softie is a bedtime kitty. And to complete the little set, I made some really quick and easy sewing projects! There's a blankie, pillow, and quilt.

These are all made from scraps. They're all put together pretty much the same way.

Blankie
I chose two scraps that were 5 1/2"x4 1/2". Put the top on your surface facing up, put the bottom one on top of it facing down (so that your right sides are together). Sew around three edges (my seam was about 3/8"). Turn out, fold about 3/8" of the last edge down so the raw edge is inside, slip stitch closed on the last edge, topstitch around entire blankie.

Pillow
Same thing. My pillow sides were 4 1/2"x2 1/2". Put the right sides together, sew around three edges (3/8" seam), turn out, stuff lightly, slip stitch closed.

Quilt
I didn't want to mess with binding on this thing. The quilt top measured 10 3/8"x10 3/8", so I made a bottom to match and cut out a third piece to go in the middle as the batting. Top on the bottom, facing up. Bottom on top of it facing down, wrong sides together. The third piece goes on top of the bottom, and it doesn't matter which way it's facing because you'll never see it. I basted the three pieces together to make sure that they all fit together smoothly. Sew three edges together (standard quilting 1/4" seam for this one), turn out (keep the middle and back together to make sure that the middle piece ends up in the middle), slip stitch last edge together, and quilt as desired. I topstitched around the edges, then did straight lines 1/4" off the seam.

And... It is a little easier to slip stitch closed if you also sew just a little bit of the edge you're going to turn out through. Leave it big enough to fit all of your fabric through.

(The lighting it really bad, but if you squint you can see it at the top.)

So all put together:

My daughter loves it. There's going to be a slightly more boyish version in the near future!

And... I got my background fabric for the KQA today, so I'll probably be spending my night cutting that up!