I’ve been choosen to go on a desert Island!
Well, not me but my crochet!
Shaz, on her blog thesockgarden which has fantastic photography of her witty creations in situ, (I mean, whats not to love!)
does interviews with fellow craftspeople and this week spoke to amyorangejuice. I really enjoy reading how other people got started doing what they love and where their inspiration comes from.
One of the questions was:
If you were stuck on a desert island and were allowed to take one new crafting project with you based on something you admire in another shop, what would it be?
Amyorangejuice replied that she would love to master crochet and would like to take something from my shop as inspiration! Talk about chuffed! So thank you Shaz and amyorangejuice, you’ve made my day!
Must stop experimenting…
I didn’t realise how much of a short attention span I must have, there’s me, complaining about my boys and their severely short attention spans and it turns out they must take after me. This keeping a blog thing has made me realise that I’m great at getting ideas, often turning them into reality (either by mistake or design) but what I am incapable of doing is following them through with further progression - its always onto the next idea.
So no more! I have ‘experimented’ with my last new idea, I am only going to explore ideas I have already set in motion, like this one I started yesterday…
Its made from scraps of Amy Butler fabric I’ve had for a while, a bit of an old dress, an old shirt and a favourite but broken necklace, and of course a bit of crochet, a double shell trim that I extended to fit the flap.
I boxed the corners and lined it with interlining to give it some stiffness so it retains its shape. I’m now envisaging a whole range of them, all the same shape but with different fabrics and crochet bits SO I’M NOT GOING TO LOOK IN OR WRITE IN MY IDEAS BOOK. I’m going to work on this for a while, and my curtain ring jewellery, I think that can go a lot further too.
So it is written down I am only going to work on those two ideas, although its half term next week so If I manage to do anything it will be a miracle!
On a last note, the latest issue of that fab magazine Beads and Beyond has a tutorial for my Miyuki earrings. Those flowers are what I made that evening necklace and my beautiful green bracelet from as well - ooh - another idea I need to pursue…
A cushion fit for a pin
I do think its nice to have nice objects around you, they inspire you, make you smile, remind you of those special moments. I have too many of these objects, I’m a complete hoarder of shells, stones, photos, bits of glass, old cotton reels,prints and of course various crocheted objects! Fortunately for me my boys appear to have inherited this too, much to my husbands annoyance - so not only do we have my special bits, all right, everywhere, so to do we have their equally special objects (though theirs do seam to feature lots of elastic bands…)
I have a range of beautiful crochet hooks, threads and scissors, but looking at my pincushion I realised that it is functional, definately not beautiful.
The perfect excuse to make a new one, though I got a bit carried away with ideas
So these will be going into my folksy shop!
Vintage Lace
No ramblings today, I’m busy making jewellery - new ideas - will post more when I have something to show!
So a nice piccie
Crocheted flowers waiting to go onto hairslides
and a bit of shameless promotion
I’ve put my Vintage Lace bracelet that I made for February’s issue of Beads and Beyond in my folksy shop - its a good Valentines day present!
Playing with rings
So I’ve been writing my latest tutorial for Beads and Beyond and basically Its how to cover curtain rings and what you can do with them. I did this a while ago and have had a few bits of jewellery in my folksy shop and some buttons in Claires Buttons in Cardiff.
I’d forgotton how versatile this technique is, and I’ve been using different things to cover like bracelets.
My first experiments:
What do you think?
Still tinkering…and crocheting!
What do you think so far then? I have to say I’m mega impressed with my ability, it did take lots of staring at the screen, copious amounts of shouting at it, a wide range of colourful language and a little bit of wine and some pointers from spoiltcatover on crafteroo - but I think its getting there. I want to try and get a slide show on the right hand side linked to my Folksy shop flashing up images of what I do, otherwise at the minute it just looks like you’ve stumbled upon some random crochet rantings!
I hope to get that sorted at the weekend, absolutely EVERYTHING crossed and every possible good vibe you could send this way will be desperately needed!
In between dipping my toes into code, I have been doing some crochet. I have a craft fair at Brackla in Bridgend next weekend so need to build up my stock.
I’ve been playing with the flower design for the scarflettes and I really like the ruffly aspect to them
And found a nice way to use up some old buttons too.
Well, thats all for now folks, if I don’t delete everything this weekend I’ll see you next week with some new Ideas I’ve been working on with the curtain rings.
Romantic Bracelet
14th January 2010
Ta-daa!
My latest tutorial - Vintage Lace, a bracelet worked in wire with freshwater pearls, and on the front cover too! (If you squint!) I love this bracelet, it looks complicated but like all good things, is actually quite simple.
So if you fancy a go get the latest Beads and Beyond Magazine, and if you do, let me know, i’d love to see how you get on!
Log Cabin Crochet (and a pie)
11th January 2010
You know when your doing something, then you get an idea you just have to try right away?
I was having a productive day, working on my next submission for Beads and Beyond magazine and it was going well, then I ran out of thread for the last bit. Can I get any more - can I ******. Admitidly it was old, but for heavens sake, why do maderia have to regually change their codes and colours? So I got out my wool to just wollow in the beauty of the colours (everyone does that, don’t they?).
As I was making the pie for tea, filling was left over coq au vin from last night (makes the best pie, really rich and tasty) I started mentally putting together colours, then using the edge of the rolling pin to nudge them in groups, then I washed my hands and the pie got a bit side tracked.
But how exciting is that little bit of crochet!!
Snow! (and jewellery and gloves)
Friday 8th January
I’ve been amiss with my photos lately, so this is a bit of a catch up! Firstly though - we’ve finally had some snow! Here in Barry we have been watching the news as though we were in a bubble separate to the rest of the country, absolutely nothing. Tuesday night that all changed and Wednesday saw us building a huge snowman and sledging on our trusty tray at the local park! Fandabi-dosy!!
The snow was so thick we couldn’t find anything to decorate him, hence the white on white effect we went for!
For every plus there has to be a minus - we are now on day 3 of the boys off school, the snow still hasn’t melted but frozen and living at the bottom of a steep hill means lots of painting, hide and seek, telly and the odd bit of fighting, actually, being honest, lots of fighting at the minute - having boys is like having dogs I imagine, they need lots of fresh air and exercise!
However, they are occupied at present so I have a few moments. The secret santa that Vonnieorganised was wonderful. I received a gorgeous necklace off glamglass
as well as a beautiful Christmas tree decoration, brooch and selection box for the (very happy) boys!
I sent mine to Ali of craftmatters and luckily she loved it, Ali and her family are big into Christmas, so I made her a Christmas tree decoration, and the boys did too, a notebook and she loves baking so a Christmas cookie cutter in a little bag.
Well, my monsters are stirring so my time is up - hopefully next post I’ll be able to show some crochet…
A bit of freeform crochet
31st December 09
Just a brief one today, I wanted to show you what I had a go of yesterday. My wonderful mum and dad got me a brilliant book ‘Freeform Crochet and beyond’ by Renate Kirkpatrick, as well as some new hooks and wool, but more about those later.
I finally got to play a bit yesterday. The pictures are really good, Istruggled a bit with the explainations though thats probably due to my left handedness - but there are some great idea’s and starting points. It’s certainly stimulated lots more ideas for me.
Anyway I had to have a little go
Crochet wings (lazy j stitch)
Bullion Knots
Spiral surface with loops
My sample square. I worked another lazy j stitch but carried on to make a flower and attached them all to a simple treble background. I love the raised sections of the lazy j stitch, though I think I ‘ve worked them ‘differently’ and the spiral without the embellishment is gorgeous, but the simple addition of the frill is a great idea. I have loads more I want to try - but the raised sections have certainly got me excited!
