I've got mono and I haven't been doing very much, but I managed to get this piece done.

This is the same pattern as my last braided cross stitch piece, but I stitched this one so the braids would really show up.

I bought two oversized straw gardening hats from work at CVS, and I'm going to convert them into straw bonnets adapted from this pattern from the simplicity website. Instead of sewing a rectangle around the crown, I'm sewing an oversized circle around the crown. I have selected a maroon taffeta with multi-colored polka dots for the first bonnet with matching trim, and a black linen with white embroidery on the second bonnet. This is not going to be a picture post alas, due to lack of functioning camera. But, rejoice in the fact, that hopefully when I'm done, I'll have a new camera and pictures for you.

Since last week, I've been hitting Jo-Ann's pattern sale like a mad woman hell bent on getting on with some sewing. Last weeks one dollar simplicity pattern sales scored by 20 patterns from two different purchases. Today, I took advantage of the 1.99 sale of Butterick and got some nifty hat patterns. Hopefully, I can get my bf to take me to get some more patterns tomorrow after work.

Last Week's Loot:
Simplicity Patterns: 3684, 5386, 2862, 2959, 2639, 4032, 4401, 4083,3894, 2870, 2581, 9769, 2851, 2935, 2665, 3686, 2860, 2895, 3758, 2698

This Week's Loot:
Butterick Patterns: 4210, 5004, 4732

I completed this days ago, but couldnt't get a good picture inside...





A closeup of the focal bead....

I finished my braided cross stitch practice piece!

I've made some progress! The big holes in the heart are waiting for some orange yarn, which is ordered and waiting for me to pick up.

A while back, I made my mom a key lanyard. Over time and very hard use, some of the beads in the lanyard broke, and she had decided she like it oriented with the clasp in front so she could clip the keys there. So, I restrung the lanyard with a few new beads, and correcting other beads for the "new" orientation.



She also wanted a little wristlet key holder for one key....

Here's a piece I started today. Please forgive the crappy photo. I need to remember to not photograph jewelry in crappy light.

I have a heckuvalot of projects to get done between now and the end of May, and I'd like to get back into the habit of crafting every day. So, I start with this piece:



I learned the technique from a used book I picked up at Powell's a few years back. I'd never heard of braided cross stitch, but it looked interesting. I had a devil of a time finding penelope canvas; I finally had to order online. I also invested in quite a quantity of Paternayan Persian wool yarn. So far, so good. It's hard to really tell the "braidedness" though, with such short rows. It should show better in the long rows of framing around the heart.

Favorite tool of the moment: tapestry needle threader:

Has anybody ever done a craft supply swap meet?
Is anybody in the Pittsburgh PA area who wants to do this?
Where's a good place to donate the rest of the unwanted stuff?

The craft room is way way way too full. I might scare people with the sheer volume of stuff I could bring.

big_girl, this is for you!



( More pics under the cut... )

big_girl, send me an LJ message with your address, and I'll send this off to you.

I put this together for my mom yesterday. She found her second set of keys and needed another key lanyard.

( Cut because it's a little large... )
I learned from the last one. After a year or so, on the first one I made, some of the larger glass beads have broken off. This lanyard is made mostly with wood, bone, and acrylic/plastic beads.

I was working on this for the musical we put on every year at Confluence.
( See if you know where this is from. )

And it reminded me of the meme that went around my friend's list a while back. I've been working on the stuff for this for a while.





The first five people to respond to this post will get something made by me! My choice. For you.

This offer does have some restrictions and limitations:


I make no guarantees that you will like what I make!


What I create will be just for you.


It'll be done this calendar year.


You have no clue what it's going to be. It may be a story. It may be poetry. I may draw or paint something. I may bake you something and mail it to you. Who knows? Not you, that's for sure! However, I *do* promise that it will be more than just a handmade card!


I reserve the right to do something extremely strange.



The catch: You have to put this in your journal as well. We all can make stuff!

And it reminded me of the meme that went around my friend's list a while back. I've been working on the stuff for this for a while.





The first five people to respond to this post will get something made by me! My choice. For you.

This offer does have some restrictions and limitations:


I make no guarantees that you will like what I make!


What I create will be just for you.


It'll be done this calendar year.


You have no clue what it's going to be. It may be a story. It may be poetry. I may draw or paint something. I may bake you something and mail it to you. Who knows? Not you, that's for sure! However, I *do* promise that it will be more than just a handmade card!


I reserve the right to do something extremely strange.



The catch: You have to put this in your journal as well. We all can make stuff!


What I've made so far:

I finished one project...



( And there's more behind the cut! )

I have been working on a few things, but not as much as I would like...

This has been in the works for a few weeks. I need to "antique" the sterling findings I bought for it, and then assemble. The picture doesn't do it justice, but I wanted to post before I forgot again.



This isn't very artsy, but I was tickled that I was able to find a purpose for something that had been sitting in a closet for 2 years. I tended to pile up my shoes outside my bedroom door, making the door hard to open. I took some towel holders that I had no use for as towel holders and turned them into shoe holders instead.



There's another rack above the two shown, but I couldn't get it into the picture.

I made two armitures thinking I'd make two gigantic hoop earrings. My daughter saw me putting it together and asked me to put it on a chain for her. Now it's a pendant. Oh sure, it looks done but there is a whole lotta filing to do. Very scratchy it is.










Question: Do you jewelry makers find it easer to file the individual pieces before assembly or wait until the piece is done and then file?

This is a very photo intensive post. ( Pictures of my crafting efforts )

Many apologies for dropping out!
Next year I'm focusing on improving my skills, would anybody mind if I posted that progress here?

Here are a few things from my holiday prep:


The Prize Turkey
a prop for A Christmas Carol.



And some ornaments.

Gifty stuff? Ugh, I've gotten started on a serious project for my MiL, but either I'm totally reworking it, i.e. cutting off the hard part and doing it an easier way, or putting it away until I've learned to use my flex shaft better.

In other words, I'm a mess this month.
Thank you all for keeping the fires burning!

I haven't posted anything for a few days becasue I was away seeing someone I haven't seen for a while, so I didn't do any crafting. However, my girlfriend did indulge me by taking me shopping at various bead and craft stores. At one craft store, we found a bunch of interesting chenille stems (if you're old like me, you know them as pipe cleaners) in iridescent, silver and glow-in-the-dark. I commented that I could probably make an interesting space-themed wreath using the glow-in-the-dark ones, so they were promptly bought.

I managed to have everything I needed to make up the wreath, and I did so today.

The "white" stars are made from the glow-in-the-dark stems.

( More pics under the cut )

Here's what I'm doing with the origami cranes I made in October:
( Click for picture )

My glass bead snowmen:

I went back and forth about adding one more line of garnets. Decided I liked it better less cluttered.

When I was reorganizing my craft stuff recently, I came across some half-finished projects. This seemed the perfect time to finish them off.

The cross-stitching was all done. I finished them off by sewing on a backing and adding a hanging string.

I think they would have been really nice. Instead I used rosettes. These are nice too. Not as nice as the garnets would have been, though.
( I can't seem to make it smaller. )

I filled in the form with smaller buttons and added a wire star at the top...




( Larger images under the cut )
I fashioned the star from a piece of wire that I had discarded from another project because it had gotten too bent. It looks quite rustic in this project, but I think it fits in with the nature of the piece.

I think it may be a bit too heavy. I plan on gold colored wire, 3 oblong garnets instead of the 5 steel beads, three wraps on top, four wraps on the bottom. That'll make for a more petite peice, no?

There was this big bag of shims I had. In my last apartment before I moved into my first house, the floor slanted badly. So I got a big bag'o shims to keep the bookcases level. The big bag 'o shims was more than needed so I used them to: mix paint, smooth grout, hammer on to save the finish of what I was actually hammering, hold my place in my giant book of home repair.

Hey! I thought to myself, why don't I make bookmarks outta them?

So I sanded; stained; drilled holes; added some copper paint; made tassles out of string, plastic beads and wire. Voila! A wooden bookmark! A wooden bookmark? Who wants a wooden bookmark? What good is that?

( Wooden bookmark )

Also made and much more practical-- earrings to add to the keychains I made. So simple I made 12 of them. Since these don't suck, I'll not put them behind a cut.



Much more practical than a wooden bookmark.

Well, I completely failed at crafting in November. The wire "divider" in the beaded cross I was making broke in 2 places. While I was trying to figure out how to fix it, a whole lotta life happened, and completely derailed anything artistic or crafty, except food. Huh, I should have posted about that, because I sure did lots of cooking!

Anyway, I'm more than ready to get back on the horse. I have lots of presents to make this month!

I did a little bit of stitching on one of my cross-stitch projects (no picture).

Just before Thanksgiving, I came across a project in a magazine (couldn't for the life of me tell you which one it was). I thought that it was clever and would probably be easy, and set to work aquiring (or finding in my stash) the bits needed. I'll give out a shout to SCRAP (http://www.scrap-sf.org/) without whom I could have not done this project.

I started this on Saturday...


I'm working on filling in with the smaller buttons now, and it should be done by tomorrow.

Still workin' my saturdays away.

I need more practice my martial arts instructor's mantra.

I'm always hoping that every piece can be 100% made by me. Slowly but surely, I'm getting there. I'll never be making tiny necklace chain, but....

I posted a million photos here, at my craft blog.
This is why I haven't posted much lately

I've been working like a crazy woman.
By the end of the weekend, I'd like to make a dent in the holiday card list. I wonder if it isn't too late tonight to finish one of the two cards I've got started. Or maybe i could be a good girl and fold some of the laundry... Le sigh, being a grownup sucks.

All those components I made before deciding on what I was going to do for the key chains were sitting in a hot pink box-- mocking me. So I made earrings out of them-- that'll show 'em. Well, some of them. But it made the whole box shut up about it.

(The picture's a link to my craft blog where I write about everything I'm working on, if you haven't already seen it from my regular journal)
I'm working through charm bracelet ideas one at a time.

I also worked on the beaded chain. That thing's going to take some finishing. I've finally mastered consistency in the links, something I've struggled with, but I think I need to harden the thin, half-hard wire a little bit more and check every little tucked tail. I think this piece will be finished tonight.

I decided on one design because I'm lazy, plus I didn't want everybody saying they liked another one better.



Now I have an idea about presentation that involves a bag of shims I found when I cleaned up my craft room. . ..

hmmm, not very productive today.
I made the snowman for the holiday charm bracelet, and started the angel. No photos, camera's AWOL.

I started out wanting to pound metal, but kids falling asleep right next to me makes me less likely to want to make a lot of noise.

it's not done yet, but it's on it's second day and making progress!

I finally got everything together for my copper etching. It did not work out well at all. The resistor I used, nail polish, peeled off in less than 10 minutes so I had to stop.

One good thing-- I know it works in principle. I just need to find a better resistor.

Lookit:

Here's a challenge for us.

This week, I pledge that each time I sit down to craft, I will work on or complete a project that I have previously started.
This is why

my unfinished project cabinet.
There are several drawers under this, but they're even more jumbled.

I'm especially happy to do this now because I got a new tumbler, and I really can complete things and have them really shiny and ready to go!

I am a bad crafter. I start and never finish many projects. But there is one project that I must finish-- or start, even.

When we moved into our first house in July of '07, I was awarded a craft room. It looks like it might have been a nursery-- about enough room for a twin sized bed, a closet and maybe a TV stand.

However--- this was the room where the 'things we don't know what to do with' got dumped into since the day we moved in until today. It is now just a junk room. You can't walk into it-- it's too much of a mess even for a junk room. You had to lean against the door and push hard just to get it open. Every time I thought about fixing it, I'd try to open the door, peek in at the mess and give up without even trying. It was that overwhelming.


( Since NaNo, I've doved (doven? droved?) in with a clear determination to have my own, real, working craft room. )



Here's some old stuff and half finished stuff that hasn't seen the light of day in over a year. Also, I bought this bookcase off the street for 12 bucks about 5 years ago. It was warped and dirty and missing a lot of it's shelf-holding hardware. I took it home and fixed it up and reinforced the back. . . the move has not treated it kindly. It looks almost as beat up as when I first bought it.



It's progress. It may take quite a long time to get the room where I want it but at least I've started. Thanks Nano!

tonight I got so much done!
I restrung a simple necklace for a friend, she plays with her necklaces all the time, so I sanded out the focal bead and used a heavier wire, hopefully it will hold up this time.

Then I did more repair- my mom gave me a rosary from long ago that had started to fall apart.

one reason it took me so long to do the repair, is I wanted to find beads to replace the originals. It turns out that these are impossible to find. And I had no idea when I first took it from her that they were plastic, and therefore degraded after 35 or 40 years and would crack very easily. I'm afraid she won't be able to use the piece now, but this is what she wanted, and I don't know when she got it, if it was for something special. So I just did as she asked and replaced the missing beads. I need to glue the crucifix back together, since it also broke.

And I started work on a necklace and earrings set.

I'm going to wrap the focal componant with citrine drops, I believe, and then make a beaded chain.
I wonder if anybody on the gift list would like these, hmmmmm.

So, I did the theoretical workup of the number of people I might like to have presents for this upcoming gift giving season.
And the number comes to almost 100.
Yikes.

Fortunately, about 50% of them fall into the "send their family some cookies" category. or "give them something little if you happen to see them" category.

I feel pretty cavalier looking at those names. But it's ok.

Now to figure out what the others would like.
I'd like to have general categories settled by tomorrow, so I can enter the second week of November with a clear direction.

Does anybody have any suggestions for what the Male types like for Christmas?
the craftgrrl suggestions were mix cd's and maybe food.
I'm not totally satisfied with those.

Hmm, I wonder if anybody needs an iPod case or something....

I've been digitizing some cross stitching patterns by converting them to graph from txt files. The result is here in my craft blog (http://happyturnip.blogspot.com/). I put it there as a way of keeping record. I started doing it, because I started actively stitching the pattern from that site, but everytime I tried to print the pattern straight off, it gets borked very badly. So, I started doing that with a link to the original site.

Alas, this was the only pic taken of my costume. But, at least, you get to see my hat.

(Quicky post, sorry, it's late and rush rush rush, but I won't sleep if I don't get this done.)

I'm toning down my pace now, tho I still have crafting heavily on the brain.
Nov. first I made two pieces:


And yesterday I played with Kumihimo braiding. (no pics, the braid left my house already. oops)

Today I focused on trying to tidy up my poor house, but I did some sketching for a charm bracelet I want to make to donate to my Mother in Law's church craft bazaar.

And I still don't know what men like that I can craft. besides food. Oh, gift list, why are thou so full of males?!!! I can't Make a Bakugan!
I know there was a post a few days ago over on craftgrrl I'll bop over there to look at responses tomorrow!

I fell asleep last night before I could post the day's progress on the cross...

Well, it's November. And many of us want to continue and keep challenging ourselves.

Would everybody please take a moment to update us in the comments here, or in a post in the next day or so, on your goals for November?

Maybe you're only halfway through your crafting month? Perhaps you're going National Novel Writing Month and you'll be unavailable for crafting. Or you've settled on a new unifying goal for this month?

In the next couple of months, I think we're going to regroup a bit and advertise the com again, so hopefully we'll have some new faces and introductions coming up.

Thanks, and congratulations for making it through October!

Poll #1289651 What shall we do?
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All

What shall we do with the community until next October?

What would you like to see more of in the community and challenges?

I realize that some of you are already into NaNoWriMo, and congratulations on your first day!

I did the orange section tonight. I am somewhat surprised at how hard the small sections are to do.