Nerd Wars Tournament 5

What have I been up to? Well, lots of things. One of those rather time consuming and just as awesome things is Nerd Wars.

The basic premise of Nerd Wars is that you are on a team that centers around some kind of specific Nerdy-subject (sci-fi, science, books, all kinds of things). And over a period of 3 months you craft things to meet challenges which earn your team points.

I joined up with Club 33 which is the Disney team because Disney is awesome, it worked perfectly to build excitement for my trip, and it has so many great ways to connect projects back to the team (bonus points).

Here's what I made:

And one scarf particularly awesome lace scarf that I can't show here because its a gift for someone who may read this.

Today the next tournament started!

I think I have too many things to do.

As is too often the case I have one again neglected to post anything here for quite some time. Fail. The past few months have felt just insanely busy. Tis the season!

First and foremost work really really gets in the way of all of the things I really want to do. And to make matters worse my work doesn't stop at 40 hours a week. Every time we have a concert or special event there goes any "free time". The spring is definitely the worst. And just looking at the calendar May is the most ridiculous month. Between April 30 and May 25 the only non-work day is the 12th. Ouch. Although I do plan on taking a few other days off. Now if I could just get someone to do my job when I'm not in the office things would be rather more dandy.

So it whatever time is left to me I have all of the following things to do:

• House work: The cat is not pulling his weight around the house and I have to do it all. The little jerk.
• Yard work:  I think I had to start mowing a full month earlier with the weather so warm. And I've expanded my veggie garden. Here's hoping I keep more than just cucumbers alive this time.
• Friends: After years of being largely, but not entirely, anti-social it seems that I've recently managed to re-connect much more with some old friends. And I've even found new ones - whoa.
• Band: The music is kinda bad all too often, but I could never give up playing so i'm glad for the outlet.
• Video games: Bran got me hooked on World of Warcraft and now he's dragging me into Diablo as well. I try not to admit it but they can be fun. I just wish they took less time and or I could knit and play!
• Biking: Exercise is healthy and can even be fun, I should do more of it.
• Photography: My photos really are getting better I think. But as with all learning/improvement more time is always a sure way to better results.
• Reading: I really don't know how I did it but as a youth I would fly through books sometimes to the tune of multiple books in a week. I've been doing a bit more lately but sometimes it feels like I'm just slogging through them. And the library deadlines come up so quickly!
• Knitting/Crochet: Aside from the perpetual desire to be working on dozens of projects of my own I even have the opportunity right now to work on growing a bit of my own crafty business. Maybe I should learn lever knitting or whatever the supposed current fastest knitting method may be.
• Spinning: I am totally getting better at spinning. Latest discover is an awesome DKish single. Knit up so wonderfully.
• Other Crafts: My awesome sewing machine is practically begging me to use it more often. And wouldn't it be wonderful to work at sketching/doodling/zentangling. Oh and what about the sweatshirt that I've wanted to paint for myself for over a year.
• Relax: Eh, overrated!

Valentines

I have this idea for a super cute Valentines postcard with a fiber twist. And I thought it would be a perfect project to share with you all as a little diy project. But then I got distracted by life (happens quite a bit I'm afraid) and I've not yet actually made any myself yet. So today I'll figure I can still share with you my ideas and what I intend to create, and well maybe it will spur some ideas of your own!

My fascination with fiber post cards started two years ago when I participated in a post card swap. My fun knitted post cards are still one of my favorite crazy bits of crafting. And as a bonus they were wonderful valentines as well. When I participated in the same swap last year I wanted to be sure and once again include fiber. And I came up with my little crochet flower postcards. Another successful bit of mail-art.

So putting these past experiences together when I thought about making valentines this year I quickly came up with the idea of putting crochet hearts onto a postcard.

To start I needed a crochet heart. Alas I have yet to try any kind of patterning on my own so it was off to the interwebs. Happy I came across this perfect tutorial for a simple little heart on pinterest (which by the way is highly addicting and highly recommended). I made probably 20 of these little guys quite quickly one evening. The only modification that I made to the tutorial was to use the magic ring as my center instead of the first chain. This kept the heart neat and tidy with a solid center. My first attempt following the directions exactly was a bit wonky as that first chain stretched way too much.

This is as far as I've gotten thus far so bear with me and make a picture in your head.

My plan is to sew them onto a piece of card stock. Now sewing into the heavyish stock really isn't so easy, in fact I found it to be pretty darn painful/ineffective when last I tried. The solution is to poke holes wherever you'll be brining the thread up. I plan to hold the heart on the cardstock on a piece of corkboard and then poke holes just inside of the shape. This way I can invisibly stitch the heart securely down onto the postcard. I will also tie off the thread in a number of different places so that if the thread breaks in any one location the damage will be localized and the heart will stay securely on the card.

Now unfortunately all of the card stock that I've managed to find and purchase really isn't a particularly heavyweight. And so in order to give my postcards a better chance of surviving the mail I add a second piece. This also serves to hide the backside of the sewing. Last year when I was doing this with the flowers I was thinking glue but knew that glue would probably not survive the journey still completely glued. I then had the brainchild of sewing the cards together!

It really is amazing how one can take tools that seem so geared towards a specific craft and morph them into the perfect tool for something a bit less obvious. Stitching around the edges of the cards fastens them securely together quickly, simply and cleanly.

Now if you don't have a sewing machine there is also the option to do something more like my first knitted post card. In that instance I placed (well I poked, but a hole punch would be easier) holes around the outside of the cards and then just sewed loops around the outside. This method adds its own decorative element as well.

Once everything is together you really can mail them just like a regular post card. Albeit at a higher rate. The postcard is too thick to fit in the postcard rate so you can use a regular letter stamp $0.45 now and then you need to add a $0.20 non-machinable charge.

I can only hope that the friends and family who will be receiving these Valentines enjoy them as much as I think I would. Snail mail really is so much fun!

Fiber Arts Friday: Nice and Squishy

So I've had a pretty serious lack of online presence lately that is mainly owing to all of the ridiculous amounts of work but also contributing to that is the fact that pretty much all of the time not spent at work or work events has been going into crafting.

I have managed to complete quite a few little goodies at this point that I'll take home to (hopefully) be sold at the Christmas Market. But with the deadline of Thanksgiving its rather inevitably that I feel quite rushed to get things done. Good things do always seem to take time.

The other day however I was  putting on an old scarf that was a gift from my Aunt a number of years back. It was a simple crochet pattern but the bright fluffy yarn has made it a favorite for a number of years now. "I must make some of these" I thought.

A few days later I found myself at Jo-Ann's and wandered the yarn aisle considering the myriad of options. Choices are one of the many banes of my existence. How am I supposed to choose! But I had a friend along which always helps and a sale price plus a coupon made the $ less of an issue. I grabbed two skeins of Lion Brand Wool-Ease Thick & Quick in a gorgeous deep orange rust color. The yarn has the advantage of being super soft and squishy plus being machine washable.

Back home it sat for a few days as I worked on other things. Then Wednesday night I decided I wanted to start on it. I checked the band and it called for a "N" hook. I checked my hooks and my biggest regular hook was "H". D'oh. I knew I had some bigger hooks somewhere from way back when I crocheted the rug for my kitchen. But I had no idea where I'd stored them. After much thinking and some searching, I was scouring the craft room when it dawned on me and I found the hooks stashed in a box of miscellaneous craftiness.

The smallest hook of the bunch was "P". Well at least I was getting closer. I tried out the P hook but the loops looked insanely large. So I reverted to the H and started a few rows of double crochet. It was ok but the fabric was just too dense. I ripped it out, was at a bit of a loss, and considered buying another hook. However before doing that I decided to give P another try.

Of course the loops were still huge but I was more comfortable and just went with it. After a bit of testing I settled on 10 stitches which gives me 5 or 6 inches. It is insanely easy going and after 2 nights of sporatic work I've used up all of one skein and have somewhere in the neighborhood of 4 feet. I still want to add more length but it'll be an easy project to finish.

I think I need to work with bulky yarn more often (and buy more yarn to whip up one or two more to sell).

PS: Help me out! To fringe or not to fringe? that is my question. Let me know what you think in the comments!

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Thanks for visiting! Be sure and check out the rest of the Fiber Arts Friday blogs!

Fiber Arts Friday: Not so much progress

So after pretty much kicking butt last week at the whole getting stuffs done this week was not so good.

I had every intention and didn't think it would be at all difficult to finish up the Max sweater. I mean all that was left was the band! Alas life had other ideas in mind. Friday night was cleaning and seeing Bran, Saturday was a rushed last big of cleaning then the Renaissance Fair. Sunday and Monday were spending all day with my Aunt & Uncle working on the house (or all too often watching him work and wishing I could help). There was indeed some knitting in there, but it was sadly minimal. Tuesday was the only decent free day and it did indeed have much knitting. In fact on Tuesday I crafted all of the strength right out of my hands. That was new. Wednesday was a bit of time but then Band and seeing Bran's new apartment. And Thursday was dinner with Bran's family and more new apartmentness.

Holy smokes how is a girl supposed to get anything done around here?

The Max sweater is however amazingly enticingly close to finished. Its a bit tricky because I have to take all of the stitches (300ish) off of the needle and onto waste yarn to try the sucker on to check on the band size. I have in my head that I must must must finish and block this weekend. I can not wait to wear this sucker.

I did also get in some reasonably decent spinning time. I have probably 2-3 ounces completely prepped all the way into roving form (yay hackle) which I've found easiest to work from. 1.4 of it is all spun up and waiting on a TP roll for plying. Most of that is just one nights work (Tuesday) so I fully expect that I ought to have a plying mate all spun up for it this weekend. I could theoretically ply but I think I'll let it rest a bit first. Plus I'm going to aim to get another few ounces of washed locks flicked and drawn into roving.

Lastly on the fiber front this week I started a new project. Not exactly the most brilliant way to get all of the other stuff done but so it goes. But it's for the Scarves for Special Olympics project. And it so happened that the yarn was on sale in Michaels when Bran drug me there. I'm just doing a simple double crochet pattern with holes in the shape of a heart. It's great because it takes approximately no focus and can be picked up/put down at any time. I actually started it at the Ren Faire and it worked quite well anytime we were sitting and waiting for a show to start. It is super happy news that this year they gave us colors that can be had in "Red Heart Soft". Previously it was all regular Red Heart Super Saver yarn which is rather dreadful (but cheap). The soft is quite akin to my super favorite cheap yet soft yarn: Simply soft. Hooray for that.

Thanks for stopping by! I hope you'll come back and read about more of my goings-on. 

Be sure and check out WISDOM BEGINS IN WONDER! to see more Fiber Arts Friday Blog Amazingness.

Hexes

A while back I absolutely fell in love with this bag made by Alice at Futuregirl Craft Blog. The project idea has stayed in my mind for quite some time now and I'm proud to announce that I've finally completed! Actually I finished the project in February sometime but I'm rather behind on my project reports so I'm only getting to it just now.

Instead of the simple two sided bag that Alice made I wanted to go with a decently big 5 sided bag. Somewhat similar to the reusable grocery bags, but for my craft projects.

The most awesome thing about this project is all of the colors. I spend so much of my life being a very neutral person, but I really do also have a bit of a wild/offbeat side. So this bag is a little bit of an outlet for that side :-)

Poor Bran had to suffer quite a good bit of time spent wandering around Joann's trying to pick the perfectly multi-colored fabric to complete my bag awesomeness. I finally settled upon the white background with colored dragonflies and I love how it turned out. Yes, it is very busy. But the colors work wonderfully together.

And if I was going to be sewing a lining I always figure I might as well add pockets to hold stuff! For this bag I put in a smallish drop pocket on the bottom of the above picture (self invented terminology so take my word for it), a small pocket at the top right side, a long pocket running down the whole left side (for long needles), a divider across the back/top for patterns/papers, and both long and tall slots for hooks and or needles also along the back/top.

I probably overdid things on the pockets. But that's kind of how most things end up once I get going...

Kinda odd to have needles sticking out of a crouched bag...but that's just how I roll.