Jewelry industry (or not)

From time to time, I play along with my beads. It has been more fun this summer, since my mother (and daughter) has been playing with me. :)

My mother bought a bracelet kit in a craft store, and I used the same technique for two bracelets. One in blue glass and waxed cotton cord.


And the second with freshwater pearls.


I am making a third one with tiny glass beads that I can wrap three times around my wrist. Takes forever, even for my skinny little arms.

I have a thing for green (and blue) (and pink) right now, so I also made this in macrame.


Oh, and I love all these glass hearts! A necklace is this.


And finally - yes! It worked!


I have made two so far but believe me, I will make more! I am so happy that I tried this.


Many more! I love felting and I love small embroideries made on free hand. So this is the perfect thing for me! So happy I tried it.

Felting stones

I was at a handicraft fair this weekend. So many beautiful things... and lots of inspiration too! I have so many ideas my brain is boiling.




This is what I've been doing this afternoon. It's a good thing I always buy a lot of material when I get the chance. This way, I don't have to wait to get the stuff since it is already in one of my boxes.



Yes, I have been wrapping wool around little stones, wet felting them. The idea is to make necklaces. We'll see how my idea works out. If you never hear about it again, it didn't work out at all. :)




Now, the hardest part. To wait for them too dry...

Slippers

I am up late tonight. Trying to get tired wnough to aleep well, in spite of the ache. There is snow in the air, and it hurts. No use to try to fall asleep then... So sincee I am getting pretty bored from lying on the couch doing nothing useful, I thought I could show you what I have been up to this week.

My daughter reealized that she had no slippers, they were all too small. She didn't seem too  keen on letting me knit her a pair, and not crochwt either. So I thought maybe I could sew her a pair or two. So I did.

The first pair (or really the second pair I made) ismade in felted wool. They used to be a cardigan that actually used to fit me a long time ago. It didn't anymore, so I threw it in the washer and felted it, and kept it for the right project. Since black and grey is not what young girls dream about, I tried to spice them up a bit by stitching them with sparkling silver yarn and adding some sequins. I think I succeeded, since she even agreed tomake them her school slippers. (As you might know,kids in swedish schools do not wear shoes inside, but it does get rather cold and wet on the floors this time of the year.)

The first pair I made was also made from clothes. A fleece sweater my daughter used to wear. And I am happy to say that I only had to use the arms, so I have most of it left. These are a lot softer than the thick, sturdy felt slippers above, but I think they are perfect for lazy days under a blanket on the couch, or after an evening shower before bedtime. 

Both pairs have leather soles, made from a bag of scrap leather I bought on a market a few years ago. The pattern is from marthastewart.com, but I will tell you more once I sit down by the computer for a while. Have some pictures from when I made the first pair.

It is getting seriously late now, so I think I better get to bed now. Hopefully to get a good nights sleep. I hope you will too, once it is your bedtime! :) Good night!

True optimist

 It's not always true, but when it comes to yarn I apparently am a true optimist. I reckon any small skein or ball of yarn will take me to the moon and back. At least! :) I have four balls of this super bulky yarn, Dream from Svarta Fåret. Each ball contains 33 m (36 yards) of yarn. It's not much. I feel embarrassed when I remember that I actually thought it would last for a small poncho and a pair of simple mitts. :) Haha! After knitting up the first ball, I was afraid I would only get half a poncho... 

 I really should learn from my mistakes. But also, I love the challenge of making the yarn last in some way. Like this time. I really, really wanted that poncho. Warm and cuddly. I think the color will go so well with my jeans. :) The original plan was garter stitch on big needles. That wouldn't do. So I thought I might prolong it some by making dropped stitches. And it worked! Yippee! It made the knitted piece 25% longer, which I think will be enough.


I also went up one number in needles, from 9 mm circular to 10 mm straight. I love using circulars, but all those yo's made it really hard to get the stitches back up on the needle once they had slipped down on the cable. And the yarn really calls for 10 mm anyway... I wish I had even bigger ones, need to buy me a pair. 12 mm perhaps.

Do you see the blue rubber band on the needle? I use it to remember when to start wrapping that yarn. The pattern is so simple, just knit 4 rows, then *k1, 2 yo* for one row, and knit the stitches and drop the yo's on the 6th row. But you see, 4 rows of knitting is enough to make me confused. Now I only have to think half as much. When the rubber needle is free, I can immediately see if it's time for yo's yet or not. :) That's me.

This is a quick knit. I would have finished it today, if I hadn't ripped it all up last night. I had used up two balls, and then realized the work looked all wonky on one side. The pattern said "k1, 2 yo the entire row", so I did. Even the last stitch was followed by yo's, which apparently was a mistake. Too much yarn that did not make a straight, good looking edge. So I put the needle through the stitches before the first row of dropping and ripped it up.

I also want to remind you, do you remember that post I wrote about felting ends together? It came in very handy in this project too. No ends to weave in, how lovely is that!

Some things old and something new

Relaxing by the computer tonight, a little exhausted after some hard gardening today. Totally unplanned, but it turned out great. We only meant to remove a few trees growing where they shouldn't (in our hedge), and ended up removing a lot more than that. We have a lot of lilac hedges in our garden, and some of it is very old and starts to look untidy. So we started sawing and snipping... and just couldn't stop. You know how it is sometimes, the more you remove, the more you find that also needs to be removed. I'm glad we have some left, but I can tell you that it's a bit more windy in the backyard now! :) But it will be great when the smaller plants now will get a chance to grow up into a fuller hedge. And the rose that now has a lot more space, I hope it will expand before the lilacs reclaim the open area between them!

Anyway, the other day I realized that I have a few things that I haven't showed you. Well, in the progress of making them of course, but not as finished objects. So here's the first one, my kurbits cozy. I use this for my phone. The reason I never showed you when it was finished, is because it's not really. I just started using it anyway... I was planning to make a lining, with two pockets. One for the mobile, and one for my VISA and maybe some cash. I sometimes stuff it all in there, but they have to cope with each other without being separated. I really should put a button in there, though. Since my mobile keeps falling out when I put it in my bag. And maybe I should make something so I can hang it around my neck. But I guess I never will.

The motif is needle felted, and it's far from perfect. Only my second try, still learning! :) My daughter asked me what it was supposed to look like, so maybe I better tell you too. It's supposed to be a heart (the red thing) and flowers and leaves. I was inspired by the Swedish folk art tradition of kurbits, go google it if you don't know what it is! It's very beautiful.

The second thing up tonight is this african flower bag. I have posted it before, both when felting it and later, waiting for a lining. And it will be waiting... No lining! Just a couple of buttons on the handle, not even a button to close it with.

I needed (or at least wanted) a smaller bag for a trip, and just grabbed this one. It doesn't really need a lining since the felting closed any holes in the crochet, and it's really sturdy. I just wish the handle was a little longer. It's a very easy bag to make, especially if you skip the felting part. I saw a bag like this on Flickr, maybe I can find it for you, and maybe I can tell how I made it, if you want me to. We'll see.

Finally, something new! My second seat cover for the wooden chairs by my crafting table. I saw this as an afghan square on Ravelry and had to try it. Take a look at the original, isn't it pretty? I used old wool I had and never had any use for, so I tried to use up the colors I happened to have. Quite pleased with the result. And the square was a lot of fun to make!

I wasn't sure how to end it all, but decided to end with a simple row of sc, and then chain stitches in every stitch, for some stability in the edge. It also gave the square a robust feeling that I liked, some kind of old-fashioned country style, not really sure how to describe the feeling of it. But I like it!

So, that was chair number two. At least one more to go, and I believe my daughter wanted something for here chair too. A great opportunity to play around! :D

I think I better head for bed now, think I have some more gardening to do tomorrow. If I will be able to move at all, might be rather stiff tomorrow morning... :) But it's worth it! Anyway, I love to be strong enough to be able to work all day, removing shrubs and cutting grass (with one of those big, hand-held scissors). I know I can't take that for granted, with this "old" body of mine. So I'm a happy girl tonight!

Felting ends

 Hi there! Won't stay for long today, it seems I caught whatever my husband had last week so I'm heading back to bed soon. Just wanted to pop by and say something, so I thought I could share a little something I learned the other day. We went to the bookstore with the kids, and I found a basic book about crochet on sale. Brought it home of course. Learned a few things, and this one really came to use immediately. My snöstorps knitting is pretty loose, so when I had to start on the second ball of yarn, I didn't know how to fasten the ends. Then I read about felting ends together. It goes like this:

Pull the fibers apart, approximately 10 cm on both ends. On the new ball and the yarn your knitting at the moment. You might have to cut some of it away, so it doesn't get too bulky. I didn't have to, since some of the fibers fell off during the pulling...

Lay one over the other in your hand, and sprinkle hot water on it.

Start rubbing the ends between your hands, and they will felt together to one single strand. Leave until it's dry. It's worth mentioning that you can only do this with wool that will actually felt, no superwash or other materials.

Since I have virtually no patience at all, I did this right before bedtime, and when I woke up I could start knitting at once. Maybe you knew all about this, but it sure helped me! Now, I'm off to bed again. Oh, almost forgot to tell you. I've finished the snöstorp now. It's done. I only have to add a few buttons, and then I'll show you. Eh, and maybe get a little fresher too, I'm afraid I'm not very photogenic right now, and I want to show you how I plan to wear it. I'll get back to that!

Unfinished crochet

 I think it might be a good thing for me, showing you all my unfinished projects like this. Why? Well, it makes me want to finish them to show you how they turned out. And that has to be a good thing.

This basket belonged to my mother-in-law, who passed away seven years ago. She was a crafty lady, and has painted this basket herself. She used to keep some embroidery in there, I think. It felt right to bring it home and use it for crafty stuff. Now, I keep unfinished projects that I'm not working on for the moment in it. On the picture it's filled with bags that I intend to line. I don't really like making lining, since I'm not very good at it. But it gives a more worked feeling to the bag, so I'll do my best.

This is another bag I am meaning to line, and maybe add a zipper to. It is crocheted in wool and felted. I didn't have enough yarn to make a whole handle, so I had to improvise. I wanted to try beads for the handle, but I thought it would roll off the shoulder if I used only beads. So I crocheted and felted part of a handle until I ran out of yarn. For the rest of the handle I used wooden beads and felted wool rolled to balls.

 I'm not sure that I like the way it turned out. I used a wire to thread the beads on, but it is rather uncomfortable in the crocheted part. And it looks a bit weird, doesn't it? I'm thinking about making a new handle, but I don't know how yet. I bought the yarn on sale since they were deleting the colors from the product range, so I can't buy more. Maybe I can find something else in my yarn boxes.

Yes, one more. This was actually the first one. I was meaning to give it to the church sewing circle's annual charity auction, but it was never finished and then my kids got ill and I totally forgot about it. Yes, I'm a bit ashamed. Especially since it's almost done. I just need to attach the handle and line it. Maybe add a zipper. But I'm not completely ashamed, I am honestly a bit relieved too. I only said I might give it away, and then my neighbor forgot about the might and I felt obliged to give it away even though I didn't really want to. But I do feel ashamed that I forgot about the auction and that I didn't donate anything at all to be sold.

Yes, I do love African flowers! I made this one before the two above, but put it aside for a while. This one is supposed to be for me, but so far I have only made this one hexagon... I guess I have enough to keep myself busy for a while. But if I know myself I will probably get started on a few new projects before I finish all of these...

Some unfinished business

Oh, I know I've been boring lately. Not posting too often, am I? I hoped I would have something fun to show you, but all I seem to have is an endless row of unfinished stuff. No, that's not entirely true. I do have these, I finished them last week. But how much fun are they really?

Cozy and hopefully warm, yes, but not too fascinating. So I guess I have no other choice than to show you some of my unfinished (and in some cases unsatisfying) business. Too many for one post, so let's start with the knitting.

I was tidying the mess (and indeed, a mess it was!) on and around my worktable today, and found some things I had almost forgot about. This mit was one of them. Last winter, I thought I would try making cables. Turned out it was not my best skill, and here it is now. I'm thinking I might give it a second chance, maybe influenced by the first snow that fell here last night. Winter and cables seems right somehow.

The next one is newer. Do you remember the trouble I had, trying to machine felt a purse and a mobile cozy to the right size? Well, this is the too big mobile cozy. I thought I'd keep it for myself, since I have a rather big mobile phone. I thought I would make something colorful, like Swedish kurbits. I really like the way it's turning out, but unfortunately I broke my last felting needle and was unable to finish it. Have to get new ones soon!

This one is the actual custom ordered cozy. This one belongs to the category unsatisfying unfinished business. I managed to get the cozy the right size, but then she wanted the motif of a wolf. Oh my! Never thought it would be so hard to make. I just started needle felting motifs, and I can truthfully say I'm not very good at it. Yet, anyway. I hope to be one day. What you are looking at is supposedly a wolf howling at the moon.

Someone close to me admitted it had looked like a rabbit to him, and he had the courtesy to say so when I had come this far. Thank you! (Love you anyway!) So now it looks like a rabbit to me too. Rabbit or not, I don't really like it. And I really like to be proud of the things I make, especially if they are for someone else. Now I'm thinking about how to make it better. Felting a wolf is so hard since I'm not good enough to make details. And embroidery on such a thick material, in the shape of a cozy seems too hard to do. Grateful for any suggestions! 


This one is something I really long to get started on. This is the first attempt I made at that felted purse with ribbon embroidery that turned out too big. I'm thinking about turning it into a small handbag. I will felt a long handle for it, line it with red, silky fabric and make some embroidery on it. Red. I searched long and hard to find the right pattern, and I think I found it.

When I knit purses and bags for felting, I cast on with a cotton yarn. Then I start knitting with the wool. This way I can sew the bottom together very neatly. On this one I happened to use red cotton, and it looked lovely! Red and gray are winter and Christmas to me. I'm thinking that this tiny little handbag would be perfect for any Christmas related party where you need only a pretty little something for your mobile and maybe your wallet.

This last project is the only one I'm actually working on for the moment. A friend wanted me to make a very special hat for her husband for Christmas. It will look like a brain when it's done. Hopefully!

Last but not least, I would like to say thank you and welcome! Thank you for all the lovely comments on the African Flower bag, I've walked on clouds for days now. I could never imagine that my little how-to would lead so many people to this blog. So do feel welcome, both you who just passes by and those of you who liked it enough to stay with me for a while. I'm very glad to have you, and I hope to find new friends among you!

A purse for the purse?

The language can be so confusing sometimes, especially when it's not your mother tongue. All the nuances and different meanings of the words... I try my best to find the right words for things, so feel free to correct me when I'm wrong or not making any sense! They didn't talk much about knitting and crochet in my English classes in school...

I want to show you this little thing today, it's a little purse. Not for money (I think) but for those little things you keep in your handbag and never seem to find when you need them. A purse for the purse, so to say... (What would you call that??)

This is the one I crocheted after trying to felt a knitted one to the size I wanted. I only felted this by hand, to have more control over the process. That's why you can still see the stitches. 

The lady who ordered this one from me really liked the cerise flowers on the gray background on the one I have, so I pulled out my ribbons to try to create the same feeling on this one. I hope she will like the result, I am quite pleased with it if I may say so. Some trouble in paradise though, the ribbon embroidery created a mess on the inside, so I realized I would have to line it to stop the future content of the purse to get tangled up in the ribbons.

I can honestly say I feel more at home with my hooks and knitting needles now, than I do with my sewing needles. And she wanted a zipper too. There is no other time then now when I have inspiration for something, so I dug through my fabrics and actually found something suitable in the right color. It used to be the body lining on a girl's dress and I managed to cut out a piece that was (almost) big enough. One inch more would have been lovely, but it was close enough for me. I used my sewing machine to attach the zipper to the lining, and then I hand stitched it to the purse. I liked that method, and it gave a neater result than I had hoped for. So now I will present this purse for my lady friend and hope she likes it!

Taking shortcuts don't pay off

 I'm a lazy person. It's really just a fact. I am. I always try to find the easy way around, and don't do more than I have to. Sometimes that works just fine, sometimes it doesn't. This post should really be about felting samples. Or more correctly the lack of felting samples. It's a good thing, you know, to make a sample to see how much your knitting will shrink when you felt it. But of course it takes time and effort, something a lazy person would avoid....

I'm making a little bag for a friend. A bag to keep small things in, to make them easier to find in her purse. She liked my knitting money purse, so I was making her something like that. Knitted and felted in the washer. I bought yarn made for felting, and the lady in the yarn shop told me it would shrink something about 40 %. I trusted her, neglected making a sample but did my math (I've always been good at math) and calculated how I should knit to get the size I wanted. Only, it wouldn't shrink! The first time in the washer (in 60 degrees C) it shrunk 2 cm. Less than 10 %. Ok, I had another try, put more stuff in the washer to get more friction and waited. Well it was smaller, but still only 25 % shrinkage. I even tried to felt it by hand but it didn't help.

It's not huge, but a little to big for it's purpose. At least I think so. So now I'm making a new one. But this time I crochet. I always feel more in control when I crochet than when I knit. Hopefully I will get it right this time. I will probably run out of yarn though, so I hope my husband can take me to town tomorrow. The too big bag will be something else. I have some thoughts...

This mobile phone cozy was felted together with the too big bag. It's for a woman at my husbands work, she wanted a cozy with a wolf. Interesting enough to see what that will look like in the end... This one felted better, maybe because I had hand felted it a bit before putting it in the washer. (It has some light fibers all over, since it caught some yellow from the tennis balls I use for friction when I felt.)

But still, it's a bit too big. It's very spacious even for my phone, and the phone she is using is smaller. Sigh! So I guess I'll crochet a new one when I'm done with the gray bag. At least I'll have something to do.

Felted African Flower

 Felting is so much fun! I made a bag out of the two big African Flowers, although it was a bit tricky since I was running out of yarn. But I found a way.

The African Flowers are so pretty, don't you think? One of those things I can't stop making.

I made the stitches between front and back in green, since I was getting short on gray. But I don't mind, I think it can be really pretty with visible stitches. 

The handle was the biggest problem, I don't know how many different options I tried... But finally I found a way to make it with the small amount of yarn I still had left. Chains in green, and a round of gray.

I didn't dare to put this bag in the washer machine, it would probably shrink too much. So I felted it by hand on my washboard. Not as hard as I thought it would be. I'm pleased with the result, except for the handle.

 It looks kind of like a wet, dead animal... A bit better now though, when it is a little drier.

I think felting is so exciting. Everything looks so different once felted. The only boring part is that it takes forever to dry...

I have already made another one. In blue and beige. I  I felted it today and am impatiently waiting for it to dry. I am sorry to say that I forgot to take pictures of it before I felted it, I was to eager I guess. So I'm going to let it hang around until it's completely dry, and show it here then. I'm thinking about lining both of the bags, so you'll get to see the finished result of them both. Hopefully in a near future!

I'm thinking bags

I was searching my yarn boxes today. I was going to the church sewing circle and had to start a new project. Preferably something that I could donate to the charity auction said sewing circle has every year in November. I was thinking mitts. I started looking for thin, soft wool. And... well, I'm not quite sure how it happened, but here you have the result.

 How did I end up in the boxes with my chunkiest wool? Or the box with itchy wool? Well, anyway... The colors. I blame the colors. For some time now, I have been dreaming about crocheting something with pink and green. Most likely a bag, with flowers. African flowers. For me...

The small one is for me. I just couldn't help myself. Hard to catch the colors in the autumn light, but it looks kind of vintage to me. In reality at least. I'm thinking some kind of old style bag, maybe. Rather small. I might try felting the whole thing when it's done. If I dare. I'm even considering lining, that's a first! But I still had nothing for the sewing circle...

Looked around on Flickr for inspiration, and found this, a felted bag with one big African flower on each side. That's something for the charity auction, I thought. Well, I can tell you the ladies at the circle loved my flowers. Only problem is, I don't know how to continue. I don't think I have enough yarn... I love buying on sale, but since everybody else does too, it's impossible to get more yarn. I had one ball of gray and one ball of beige (the color in the middle of the flower). And neither one will be enough for a bag. And they don't look great together... The green and pink are just pieces of the same ball, which had four different colors and won't do either. So now I have to think. Wish me luck with that! But I love them too much to frog them though, so I have to come up with something.