journal

Intro to Dresser Re-Dressed Series

After cramming my apartment’s and studio’s stuff into an already occupied one bedroom (large one bedroom) apartment the decor is bland, messy, crowded, and bland. We have okay stuff, just too much and not nice furniture. I hodge podge of old-roommates’-off-the-curb-hand-me-down-thrift-shop-standard-just-graduated-college-and-have-no-money furniture. It’s so true. Our small stuff is great, […]

journal

Hi to Tomorrow!

I was going to post today but a few things came up and I have a fun post planned for tomorrow instead. I need to take some pictures and it was too dark by the time the thing I wanted to post about found its way back to the apartment. […]

journal

What the! Where did the Archive Go!?

Geesh. Okay, so thank goodness someone was finally like “free pattern archive, what the heck is she talking about?” Not an exact quote, but that’s what I would have been thinking. So the last time I updated the archive I succeeded in setting every single page of patterns in the […]

fabric - journal - patterns & tutorials

A Walk in the Park Apron

A Walk in the Park

This apron sure is a walk in the park to make. It’s so fast and easy to whip up in an evening or morning, or afternoon for that matter. Use a pattered fabric for your main piece. Something kind of darker and kind of “filled” works well to hide stains and smudges from cooking. I’m always wiping my hands on the sides of my pants because I’m used to wearing my studio apron just about all the time. I made this apron a bit more wrap aroundish for that reason.

journal

And the wool goes too….!

Mary L. from Chicago! Now what’s this all about? Well, if you scroll down to the bottom of this interview you will see a contest for some roving or some hand dyed yarn. The post mark deadline was the first and now all the results are in. I had Jason […]

book review - journal

The Woollyhoodwinks vs. the Dark Patch

I am a fan of full disclosure, so I want you to know upfront that the fine people over at Immedium Publishing emailed me last week and asked if would like to review this book and sent me a preview pdf. They thought you might like to hear about it. […]

journal

Sewing with Style

I am not sure when I first heard of Burda Style, maybe a year or so ago, but I have always enjoyed their open source ways. While researching Burda Style I became more drawn into the Open Source aspect of it, which seems to be the foundation for the site, […]

crochet - journal - knitting - patterns & tutorials

Switchy Swatchy Swap

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While working at the yarn shop I mostly came into “knitting” questions and troubleshooting so that increased my progress exponentially when compared to crochet. So I make little swatches. Sometimes from a stitch dictionary, sometimes from my head. Then I put a border around it. I try to do a different stitch and a different border each time. Or if I have a hard time with a particular technique, I do it again and again until I get it right. It has helped so much and I highly recommend this practice for anyone trying to get comfortable with new techniques. Mix and match crochet and knit borders to get an idea on how to work with the two techniques. My knit/crochet version of a sampler.

journal

Simple Beginnings with Simple Crochet

I cannot remember how old I was exactly. Nineteen maybe eighteen. I remember I had graduated high school not too long before that. Before England, after graduation. So somewhere between 2000 and 2003. My friend and I were starting to look into crafts. We were determined to be artists, not […]

journal

And the winner is….!

I collected up all the entries: And picked a witness. Molly, being the chief safety officer, presided over the drawing to make sure there was no fooling around, foul play, or cheating: Suspense! Who could it be? Congratulations Nicole! I just sent you an email to get your mailing address, […]

journal

CRAFT:08 Give Away!

Hey there folks! I have my issue in my hands and it is such a winner. Not only do I have my first ever published tutorial on page 58 (preview here), but all the other articles are amazing! They have a huge section on weaving, many articles from many artists, […]

fabric - journal - patterns & tutorials

Stitch Clutch

Stitch Clutch
Hi ya folks! Success! Well, haha, kind of. No embroidery still, but some stitchy goodness all the same. This clutch was originally inspired by a few different sources. I wanted to create a light weight, thin, lovely gift to feature in Kro Postal for starters. I had a need to use of scraps of fabric that I had laying around. I wanted to try my hand at machine appliqué as well as using the sewing machine to draw. It was so fun to make and even better to give as a gift to a friend who is far away and could use a package of goodies.

journal

Going Wrong Again

It’s so funny how some weeks are a bust. Polymer clay gone wrong and now embroidery (which I’m usually just fine with). I spent all day today working on today’s pattern, seriously for the last 7+ hours straight, when I finished I was so excited until I realized one horrifying […]

journal

Polymer Clay Experimentation… Gone Wrong.

I had such great plans. I cleared my schedule to play in my studio last night with polymer clay. I had such high hopes. I was going to make some awesome beads and pendents and they were just going to be amazing. I was going to document the whole thing […]

journal

Pack-O-Fun

My original thought was to scan one of the old issues of Pack-O-Fun that my friend Deb sent me and make it into a pdf that you all could download for free. I decided it would be fun to include some research on the publication’s history and found that it is indeed a living history! I found Pack-O-Fun’s website here, it’s now being published by a company called Amos Craft Publishing. At fist I wasn’t sure if it was still the same magazine, but after digging around on the website, I became convinced that if it wasn’t the same publication exactly, it must have been strongly influenced by Pack-O-Fun.

journal

Uncopyrighted Blogs, Dollars, and the Studio

I have been reading a blog for awhile now called Zen Habits and was thrilled with (cough, woops! I am so sorry about the, um, gender mistake, I knew that too, it was seriously a typo, I was thinking too many things while writing, thanks for the correction Amy) his […]

journal

July Project List

They have put together a great collection of July crafts over at Tipnut. And it turns out they put a Crafters Medley together for June too, so if you missed it, make sure to check it out for some great project ideas. I am fairly sure I saw this artist’s […]

journal

Hello Nerds

This weekend from pretty much Thursday on was such a bust in the studio wise. We have friends in town for another friend’s wedding and Jason was in the wedding party so we had dinner to go to and he had to go super early saturday and we didn’t get […]

journal

MollyCat gives Vinegar the OK!

Having just moved into a new place last month and unpacking everything there is a ton of cleaning going on. Granted I’m not spending 6-8 hours a day cleaning and unpacking anymore, but I’m still spending a couple of hours each day to get things where they should be. One […]