I haven’t had much time to work on it lately but once I was near the end I raced through the last part. It doesn’t look much just cast off and unblocked.
I finally finished the shawl I have been working on for the last fifty years! Actually since mid January but you know when something feels like it’s been going on forever? That. I haven’t had much time to work on it lately but once I was near the end I raced through the last part. It doesn’t look much just cast off and unblocked. I don’t have the space here to block things out flat so I usually steam them. I cover my ironing board with towels and pin out whatever I’m blocking section by section. I steam the pinned out part and once it has cooled down I move on to the next part. It works okay and will do until I get more space. I knew from the get-go that I was going to add a fringe, the shawl pictured on the pattern was fringed and I really liked the look of it. Who doesn’t like fringing right? I started by wrapping the yarn around a DVD case. Using a scalpel I cut through one edge, it was wound too tightly to get a pair of scissors in, and ended up with a stack of yarn all cut to twice the length of the fringe I wanted. Separating the yarn into pairs I folded them in two. Then using a 2.5mm crochet hook I attached them to the edges. After I’d cut all the yarn out I started wondering what the heck I was doing. I had a feeling I was going to get bored halfway down the first side and the whole thing would end up shoved in a bag to languish unfinished until I got a bug in my drawers to finish it (I have a history). But surprisingly it went really quickly and wasn’t at all a pain in the backside to do. In fact I quite enjoyed it, sitting with my feet up, shawl over my knees, cup of tea on the side. I might fringe everything! To cast off I used the Zimmerman sewn bind off, I think it gives a much nicer edge. Mind you it curls really badly and needs some intense blocking to sort it out. I like the way the little holes look like hearts, they don’t on the pictures in the pattern so I may have done something odd but I like the effect. All in all a really nice knit, the pattern was easy to memorise and was quite relaxing to work on. The pattern is available free from here. Enjoy your Thursday!
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In the U.K. Mothers’ Day is this coming Sunday, it is also the start of British Summer Time so yay! The evenings will be lighter. I live right at the opposite side of the country to my family (believe me it is better all round this way) but that is no excuse (apparently) to not send a card, so I have made one and sent it merrily on its way to Yorkshire. I was undecided whether to make a rose or violet themed card but when I saw the paper with the rose design it made my mind up. My mother’s favourite colour is green and I had a lovely green paper which went with the rose paper perfectly. I always like to use a third neutral paper to calm everything down a bit and having picked my three papers I tore lumps out of them and stuck them to the blank card. Then I inked up the edges with a dark brown inkpad and using a stencilling brush and the same ink I “grimed” up the papers a bit and inked the white torn edges as they can glare a bit if left clean. Then using a couple of fern stamps and the same dark brown inkpad (I like to keep a fairly simple palette) I stamped randomly over the whole thing. I almost always like to stick a butterfly or moth of some kind on whenever I make any form of collage, I have a collection of them ready printed and cut out. I picked the one that most fit in and on he went. If memory serves the image is from here. I printed off the pink rose image, which I think is a Victorian scrap image I got from The Graphics Fairy. Then the fun part - cutting it out. I cut out the middle parts with a craft knife, for fiddly jobs like this I don’t use my trusty scalpel, I find it easier to use a pen-shaped knife. The round handle is much easier to control I think. Then a big old pair of scissors for the outline. Use the biggest that you dare, it makes for much smoother results. 3,000 foam pads later and it is stuck onto the card and not budging for anybody. Okay, maybe not 3,000, but it felt like it when I was peeling the backs off them.
Hope she likes it! Happy Tuesday :D It isn't blowing a gale, the rain isn't raining sideways. Nay, the sun is shining, the birds are singing and I have a vase of mini narcissus on my desk. I like the winter but by the time March comes around I am a bit fed up with it, so welcome back Ēostre Saxon goddess of Spring, it's about time love.
Happy Tuesday This was started well over a year ago, I wanted to make a little, shaped book, it would be bat-themed, it would have dingle-dangles and ribbonny bits. I made a template, got all my stuff together and began. Typically I ran out steam about half way through and stashed it in a drawer; I always do that, I’ve a Halloween album lurking somewhere that’s even older than this. For some reason while I was cutting out a sticker sheet this afternoon I got a mad urge to dig this out and finish it off. I’ve a lot more supplies than I had when I started so I managed to get it all done within a couple of hours. Please to excuse the excessive watermarking, I was going to post the pictures individually but realised that there were just far too many so I ended up combining them to save your browsers, you’re welcome ;) Click on the images to embiggen. The pages are all cut from old food packaging, two pieces stuck together to make it more sturdy. They were then covered with decorative papers and the edges were inked up before sticking on the various bits of stuff that make up the layouts. Most of the images used are from The Graphics Fairy, I’m not sure where the labels came from, I just googled I think. I have a mini tag punch for the little tags, then just poked holes in the page and wired on the beads. The words here are all related to bat symbology, dream meanings and the bat as a totem animal. I downloaded a font as I don’t have one of those label makers sadly. If I did it would be like that episode of Dexter’s Laboratory where he and DeeDee label the whole house. I love the way the ink looks on this linen effect cardstock. The bat’s breath label is one of my Halloween labels. I think the rhyme is Cornish, it’s like one of those superstitious verses to ward off bad luck like saying “Hello Mr Magpie, how’s your wife?” Airy mouse is a nice name, in Yorkshire a bat use to be known as a flittermouse, which shares the same Saxon origin as the German fledermaus. See, it’s not all cutting and sticking this, you know . I am partial to black feathers, but boy do they ever fly about the place, I almost dread opening the bag.
I am pleased that I finally managed to finish this, I hope you like it. Happy Wednesday. TTFN I keep finding things to get obsessed about, first it was the airmail stickers and now.....washi tape! I know I’m a little (fashionably) late to the party on this one but now that I’m here I am totally making up for lost time. The seeds were sown at the end of last month when I was looking for something to finish off a journal page; I remembered some fancy tapes I had bought at Christmas and stashed away and thought I might see if any of those worked. One did. I wondered why I’d been dismissing all the millions of online posts and articles on the stuff out of hand. Why hadn’t I seen it before? This stuff is brilliant! I’ve found a couple of U.K. based eBay sellers who have good selections reasonably priced (here and here) and also The Works have some mini rolls in store currently. I have quite an enviable collection now. I have to find something a bit more stylish to keep it in than an old box but it will do for now. I can’t pick a favourite but the birds on a wire and tape measure ones rank pretty highly; obviously I had to get an airmail one, two obsessions with one stone :) My diary is pretty colourful now and mail is going out looking very jaunty. Speaking (typing) of The Works they also have some Papermania stuff in at bargainous prices, I got these awesome mini buttons from the Portobello Road range for – wait for it.......99p! I love stuff with our dear old flag on it and these buttons are perfect, what they are perfect for I don’t know as yet, but definitely perfect for something. I’ve listed some new stuff in my store, the bracelets from a couple of posts ago and two new ones along with two necklaces. Made a couple of things for myself too. I found a silk rose while out walking the other day and after a clean-up it has made a lovely hair clip. Keeping the rose theme going I used my one large flower cabochon to make a ring to remind me of my home county (for non Brits the white rose is the emblem for Yorkshire which is where I’m from). People often donate to the crafty cause and I received a pair of gigantic lampshades; I’ll be honest they are of no real use to me as I don’t have lamps to fit them, also they were in a bit of a state. I did manage to rescue the trimmings though and after a soak in some of that oxygen stain remover powder they have come up quite nicely. So I now have some pretty cream coloured fringing. Granny chic is where it’s at and I’ve a book to prove it! I’ll probably save the frames from the shades and ditch the fabric, it being beyond redemption. I don’t know what I can do with the frames really but I know I’ll regret it if I throw them away. No cupcakes this week but I did get a bit festive and cooked a ham. I know! It’s not even Christmas! Truth is I managed to over order at Christmas and a great lump of gammon has been lurking in the freezer since. I cooked it in Coca-Cola as per Nigella’s recipe. I always cook it this way as it’s so good. Of course I didn’t go all week without something sweet and I fancied these oaty biscuits from an ancient Be-Ro recipe book. These things have been going since the year dot and mine is knocking on a bit. The recipes are still good though and these are known as Crunchies, they taste a bit like Hobnobs if you can get them just right. That’s me all caught up, I’m going to get out my poor neglected knitting now.
Enjoy your Sunday. TTFN I have been mildly (madly) obsessed with airmail stickers lately. I very nearly bid on some George V silver jubilee ones on eBay but managed to stop myself as that would've been a bit too ridiculous (even for me). I collected a bunch of vintage airmail sticker images and made my own retro ones. I think most of these are American, the bottom ones were in use in Britain at the time of George V's silver jubilee (1935), the same ones were in the lot I was going to bid (waste money) on. After making those I wanted to make some myself and I went kinda nuts with them. As you can see I haven't limited my mail to aeroplane travel, oh no, we got Zeppelins, hot air balloons, a bat (hey, I am what I am). I love the chubby little jet plane. Anyways, they are available to download in the usual way (click on the downloadables link in the sidebar, click on the image you want and be whisked away to the download page), they are in jpeg format so easy to get at.
To make them into stickers (if, like me, you don't have sticker paper) just print them out, coat the back with remoistenable adhesive (envelope glue or lick and stick as I prefer to call it). When it's dry, just cut them out and when you need one just lick it and stick it. I would use them in conjunction with the usual (boring) airmail sticker that the post office provides just in case they are party poopers. Usual rules apply, you can use them in your crafts, stick them on your mail whatever just don't print them out and sell them, that would be rude. Enjoy your day TTFN This week has been mainly about trying to organize my stuff to make crafting easier. I am, I have to confess, extremely anally retentive when it comes to my supplies (or anything else really). In my defence I haven’t much spare space so I have to use what I have wisely. As I reclaimed more beads from old jewellery and got some new beads in the mail the container I was using was about at bursting point so it was time for a rethink. I had some plastic containers that Chinese food came in and I bought some more from a hardware store and sorted the beads by colour. My paper beads already had containers, those compartmentalized bead boxes, those aren’t sorted by colour, but kind of roughly by shape. Yes, I know, there are quite a lot. They are such fun to make though it’s hard to stop. I made a few more. I was experimenting with hollow cones and whacked another couple of charm beads out while I was at it. I do like the pink and black magazine advert page; I have a few of those so I can make different shapes in the same colours. Once everything was organized it was time to make some stuff! I busted out the memory wire and made a couple of bracelets. I do like memory wire bracelets; it’s like wearing a stack of bangles without the unnecessary clanking. As the sun was shining and the birds were tweeting I thought I would go for some pretty colours. Showing a picture of the pink one to my friends I was asked if I was poorly. I actually found it quite irritating (though obviously I didn’t say that), as though I should confine myself to only making the things which fit in with other people’s expectations of me. I am a bit gothy so therefore I can only like black things *sigh*. To clarify I like lots of colours, I just tend to wear black a lot. It was my brother’s birthday this week so I thought I’d better make a card. Cards for men are not the easiest of things to make but as I tend to make all my cards like mini collages I just do the same, trying to match the palette to the recipient. I’m still keeping up with my art journal and as February drew to a close it was time to punch out more inchies (or inch and a halfies to be exact) to prepare for March’s pages. I like doing it this way as it’s easy for me to keep up with. If nothing happens for a few days I can fill them up with small drawings or handmade stickers (so easy to make using envelope adhesive, or lick and stick as I like to call it). I also make one and two page entries in between the month spreads. On the subject of making my own stickers I decided I wanted to make some airmail ones, aren’t the current ones dull (British ones I mean)? So I’ve collected a bunch of images of vintage airmail labels and will make some up along with some of my own design which I will probably make available for downloading when they’re done. I really want to start a “Happy Mail Project” in which a bunch of people send each other a nice letter, fancily decorated via snail mail in a monthly round robin sort of a thing, I’m going to float that idea among my friends see if anyone is interested. Fanfare for this week’s baked treat! I may have outdone myself, these are a coffee flavoured cupcake with an almond buttercream. I would have use hazelnut extract for the buttercream if I’d had it but I didn’t so almond it was and they were sooo good!
Enjoy your Sunday. TTFN |