so here is the scenario
i am knitting merrily along, when the tiny jump ring i am using as a stitch markers goes flying. it hits the floor and disappears into the netherworld, never to be seen again. growling i declare there has to be a better way….
a week or so later i am happily wandering around michaels trying to remember what i came in for when i spy jump rings on sale. ooh, i need those, i’m always losing mine. then i spy a string of tiny beads already on little loops, no idea what other people would use them for, but i immediately think they could be added to the jump rings to make stitch markers that are easier to find when i drop them, so into my basket both items go. i arrive home and deposit them on my sewing desk to finish…later.
weeks go by, i wander into my craft room, spy these strange beads on my desk, have no clue what they are for and prepare to put them in my give away pile. suddenly i see the jump rings beside them, and say “oh yeah, the are for stitch markers”, put both back on my desk and wander out….
weeks go by, i wander into my craft room, spy these strange beads on my desk, have no clue what they are for and prepare to put them in my give away pile. suddenly i see the jump rings beside them, nd say “oh yeah, the are for stitch markers”, put both back on my desk and wander out….
weeks go by, i wander into my craft room, spy these strange beads on my desk, have no clue what they are for and prepare to put them in my give away pile. suddenly i see the jump rings beside them, nd say “oh yeah, the are for stitch markers”, put both back on my desk and wander out…
weeks go by, i’m cleaning out my craft room for real this time, spy these strange beads on my desk, have no clue what they are for and prepare to put them in my give away pile. suddenly i see the jump rings beside them, and say “oh yeah, the are for stitch markers”, grab my needle-nose pliers, whip up a couple of dozen stitch-markers, but them in a neatly labelled box and stick them with my knitting supplies. (then give the spare beads away 😉 )
case closed 🙂 🙂 🙂
another mini project
wheels painted
i’m not a terribly neat painter, so these took a surprisingly long time to paint. i had to do one color at a time, then keep touching up where i over painted. but they are done, and i’m happy. i was originally planning bright red wheels, with yellow centers, but realized they would get lost against the red body of the caravan, so i reversed the colors. it’s hard to tell in the picture, but the very center is lime green. the outer ring is metallic gold, and the outer edge is sponged lightly with brown and antique copper, supposedly to look like they are dirty from driving along dusty roads, but i’m not sure that was quite successful. regardless i think they work.
i absolutely adore these wheels (photo by francesca sorbello.)
if i was a better painter i would try adding embellishment, but alas i’m not…
i admit i cheated…
i had a self imposed rule that once something goes in the giveaway box,there are no second thoughts, and no pulling them out. but this time the rule just had to be broken…
i painted up the top part of my caravan. the “chipped” wood look was poorly done, and just had to go. so i covered it with a shiny coat of silver metallic paint. then i carefully added a bit of “rust” at the edges with plain brown and copper metallic, to match the painted rust that was already on the roof (the only thing from the original that i am actually keeping.) it looked ok, but was too plain for the look i’m going for, so i left it to percolate. just as i was about to go to bed, i remembered the damask stencil i had in my paint supplies, and the mini shiva paint sticks that were already in the giveaway box, and loaded in the car ready to go. i ran out and rescued them. rules are made to be broken right? at least as far as crafts are concerned, and i think the result was worth it. i intentionally painted lighter and darker, because my gypsies will be a little run down at the heels.
of course the other rule that just has to be broken on this one, is not mixing too many patterns together. in this case the more the merrier.
you can get a glimpse of one of the fabrics i’m planning to use for the couch/bed in the background too, if you are interested.
now i just have to remember not to touch it for 24 hours, till the paint dries, so back to cleaning…
today’s mini project
as i excavated down through the layers covering my sewing table, i found this cork board partially done and the lettering pre-sewn for a different project long forgotten. the saying already had steam-a seam on the back, so i cut out the words (they were just sewn randomly on fabric) used my handy craft iron to stick them on and hung it on my wall.
i’m getting as much satisfaction in finishing up these little projects as i am from the fact the i can actually tell what color my rug is again! 🙂
i got wheels!
not a lot happening, since i have had multiple appointments the past couple of days but my wheels arrived 🙂
they are very nice detailed, and just need painting
i thought you were cleaning?
the purge is actually going well. i got 4+ large boxes of stuff for the charities. i’m taking a load over tomorrow for the local one and my parents are taking the others to the one out of town. now my only problem is i am running out of boxes!
but in the midst of purging, i found several of projects that i needed to decide if i would finish them or give them away. some of them are fairly involved so they went off into the do later pile, but a couple of them looked like they could be finished up relatively quickly.. or at least a good portion of the project. so i decide to get started and see if my vision was even reasonable.
the first was this birdhouse. i bought it a while back, ’cause it was on end of season clearance, and i thought it had good potential to become a caravan for my realpukis
the goal is a gypsy/bohemian look so i went through my file of saved tiles and printed off this one for the floor. i sealed it with a spray coat of clear matte varnish to keep it from running or rubbing off too easily
the wheels were the next to go. i thought the original ones were dorky looking and now that i have decided to finish this, i ordered spoked wooden ones instead. they should be here in a couple of weeks. the inside got painted with a coat of bright yellow. once that dried i rethought my plan and printed a yellow and blue tile instead to go between the wood beams, then painted over the yellow with a mix of blue, olive green metallic and teal metallic mixed together loosely. ie, i stirred them till they were partly, but not completely blended, then brushed them on trying not to overbrush so the color was partly streaky. i only did one coat so the yellow shows through in spots as well.
here you can see the wall and ceiling beams and tile
of course in keeping with my plan, the great craft room cleanup continued between coats of paint 🙂
the beginning….
i have two craft rooms and both of them are a TOTAL DISASTER! i tend not to do any of the zillion projects i’ve planned, because i look in the room(s), get depressed, then just close the door and walk quietly away. i’ve been dealing with some fairly severe health problems with my kids for the past couple of years, so when i get a break, cleaning is not high on my list of desirable things to do. but enough is enough, i’m declaring war on the clutter and am going to get rid of all the craft supplies, and half finished projects that i have absolutely no interest in anymore and make room to do the ones i do still like. i plan to blog it, just to keep from quitting halfway, like i always have before…
here is my before picture of the first room
i actually got a pretty good start today. i’m trying to be really ruthless and only keep craft stuff that works somehow with my dolls, or the mom’s support group i lead. the good thing is i have a couple of charities that would love most of the supplies i am getting rid of (anything that makes it past the garbage heap) the bad news is that doll stuff includes sewing (fabric, thread, lace, elastic etc, etc) knitting (yarn, yarn and more yarn) props (miniatures of all sorts) and more. and the mom’s group requires most of the paper, paint, glue and other sundries that don’t fit my dolls :sigh:
hue shift done
it’s been a long time since i’ve had time to write here on the blog. life, and particularly my kids, seem constantly conspiring to keep me away. i’m hoping to have more time to blog and work with my dolls this fall, but we will see how it all plays out.
in the meantime i realized i never posted a picture of my finished blanket
it actually is square, the picture is just cockeyed…
the red and black one has all the squares done, but i haven’t quite decided what to do with the border, so it is on hold for now.
eatsleepknit yarnathon
every year i say i’m not going to do it, and every year i do anyway….. join in the eatsleepknit yarnathon that is. erin and her team of knitting kitties keep coming up with such fun new challenges that i can’t resist. though true to my quest to keep as much as my crafting as possible bjd related, i try to adapt the challenges to doll sized whenever possible.
this years year long challenge (or kal if you prefer) is to knit a hue shift blanket. my girls really don’t need any more blankets, but i couldn’t resist this pattern – with all its possibilities. done in laceweight on 1.5mm
i played with the color picker and came up with two different blankets to try. one is a 3 color shift, and each block of 9 squares will rotate to give it a more abstract feel.
i’ve done about 2/3rds of the squares but because i am doing all of the same squares at once, only one block is completely finished
the second is more like the original and reminds me of a tropical sunset with the bright pink/orange/yellow hues fading into the green/blue/purples of the water
the pink row isn’t attached since i am adding an orange row in between the yellow and pink to make it flow better. it was really hard to find the right orange as the laceweight yarns weren’t quite the right hue and the one that was perfect only came in heavier weight. unfortunately it turned out to be a yarn that was impossible to separate into single plies, without the yarn calling apart :sigh so i am doing it with an orange yarn that is just ok (especially since i’m not a fan of orange to begin with) but i think it works well enough, and the progression really needed an orange to smooth out the gradation between yellow and the peachy pink
it’s a very addicting knit, since the squares go fairly quickly and it’s it keeps changing so there is always something new to see.
monet’s garden dress
you got a glimpse of megs new dress in my last post , but here it is in all it’s glory
this is one of the dresses i made for the esk persian dreams kal. i took quick pics done just to verify i had finished the hexes dresses for my kal, but meg couldn’t resist trying this one on. this is one of those hate to love colors. it was pretty in the skein, muddled when wound and then started looking like clown barf when i started my “hex”. luckily i persevered because now it reminds me more of a monet garden painting.
now i really need to make her some proper leggings to wear under it before we go to the wedding next week