Women's Group Crafts

I go to a women's group every Wednesday (except for the past several weeks. It's optional and I've been finding that things keep getting in the way and taking precedent first. I'm hoping that'll change after Thanksgiving) and we often do some fun things while we chat. Sometimes we play games, like Scrabble, or we just sit round and chat, or we do crafts.

For October we painted a couple of small plastic pumpkins.

Mine live on my horror book shelves and I'm ridiculous proud of them! Samhain and Halloween are my favorite holidays, and nothing reminds me of that more than pumpkins! And these being fake means that I get to keep them forever.

The paint came from Walmart's craft section, and I think the glitter and pumpkins did, too. The ribbon might've come from the dollar store. I'm not sure. But, I loved it and I kind of wish that I could find more of those pumpkins so that I could do another one at home.

Yes, one of them is Beeltejuice themed, leave me alone! :p I loved the cartoon as a kid, and I love the movie, too. I have fond memories of that movie and watching it with my sister Lori. It was something she wanted to do specifically with me and we watched it in my room, with the lights off in my bed and it was just...honestly great. We came from a divorced household and my dad got my siblings while my mother kept me. I didn't see them very often growing up and I often missed them. Lori and I used to send letters back and forth all the time, and I wish we still did. I miss that.

The little painted box up there is not something I did at group. I did that when I was 17 (I'm 32 now, until next month when I turn 33). Right now, there's nothing in it but I  may start to keep some beads or something in it instead soon. I'm not sure, but I'll figure something out, I'm sure. :)

Craft Supply Storage

So, I recently decided that I needed to get my craft supplies organized and clean up my room a bit. I got this giant plastic storage tub and it pretty well fits almost all of my craft supplies, with the exceptions of some yarns that are too big to fit right now, and some supplies I deliberately want to keep separate (glue, spools of thread, buttons).

And it also fits my completed projects, as well. That white rectangle you can kind of see in the middle up there is the cross stitch project I just posted about.

And here you can see some of my finished projects at the bottom, my pink butterfly blanket, a set of green gloves, and my orange mitts. along with tons of yarn. Yes, I'm aware I should've put that blanket on the bottom but it was too late by the time I realized it and I wasn't unpacking all of it again that day so it just stayed that way for awhile. :p

You can see in the background of some my pictures that I've got a big thread spool rack on one of my shelves. You can probably also see that in some of these pictures there are quite a few loose spools of thread just sitting in front of it. There wasn't any room for them on the rack, so they just kind of stayed in front of it. Well, the other day I bought a thread spool box and they all fit in it. Now, it sits next to the the thread rack, in front of some manga and beside some of my stuffed friends.

I recently bought a couple of things to organize my buttons. Here, I've got most of my buttons in a mason jar that I bought in the craft section of Walmart for $2 and some change. Beside it I have recycled a container that used to hold straight pins. I'm going to be making some stuffed amigurumi toys and I plan to use those tiny buttons for the eyes. They won't be going to kids or pets, though, so don't worry. I just wanted to keep them separate so I'd always find them easily.

A friend of mine from Tumblr is going to send me even more buttons and I'm actually pretty thrilled about that! :)

Eat More Cake Cross Stitch Kit

So, I found a stamped cross stitch kit and I had to get it and try it out! I found that I absolutely love cross stitch, too, and plan to keep up with it.

I could leave it like this or do back stitching to outline the words and make them easier to read. I think they're already really easy to read, but I think I want to try the back stitching so I'm going to do that in the next couple of days.

This is done with a hard canvas, so it's actually difficult to push the giant needle through it. At least a little bit difficult, but not enough to really bother me or deter me.

This kit came with a large tapestry needle, the necessary embroidery floss, instructions, and a needle threader. The canvas is some kind of hard plastic-like material. This is a stamped project and the stamp is color-coded so you know what color to use immediately just by looking at it. The instructions are really just stitch guides rather than a color guide.

I plan to frame this when I'm finished with it and hang it up in my bedroom. :p

Birds Embroidery Kit

This is an embroidery kit that I've recently bought and plan to start next month. I was going to start it the other day but I found that the embroidery hoop I have is just a smidgen too small and so I want to wait until I can get another one. I don't feel confident enough to just move the hoop. I know that's weird, but I just don't. :p

It's another stamped kit, although this one is meant for the stamp to fade away with repeated washings whereas I'm pretty sure the other one won't be doing that.

I can't wait to start it! :)

Follow Your Heart Embroidery

This is my very first embroidery project. It's a stamped embroidery kit that came with the pattern stamped onto the cloth, a needle, embroidery floss and instructions.

As you can see this is super rough, but it was fun and I found that I really enjoyed it and found it really relaxing. And when I was done, even though I clearly made mistakes and probably make anybody who is experienced with embroidery cringe just to look at it, I had a very satisfying sense of accomplishment! :)

My current WIPs

My current WIPs, as of US Thanksgiving Day 2018 are as follows.

A black afghan that will, eventually, go to a friend of mine. It's pretty simple and this picture isn't that great at showing off the stitches or anything, but it does show the width. I'm not showing off how long it is, that's not the length, that's the width. I just kind of shoved everything off to the side of my bed so that I could get as much of the blanket as possible in the picture.

It's just shells and V-stitches from a video tutorial by Yolanda Soto-Lopez. I'm using Red Heart Super Saver yarn in Noir, and a 5mm hook.

Earlier this year we found a small sack of my grandmother's yarn in the garage (along with a couple of warped wooden knitting needles; it's pretty humid where I live and they were outside for years so I'm not at all surprised they warped) and while I was in the hospital back in June I started working on this when I felt up to it to pass the time. I got this much of it done while I was there, but I still need to buy some fabric for the lining and a zipper. I'm also going to add a decorative button (also a hand-me-down from my grandmother). I have no idea what I'll use this pouch for when it's completed, but I'm sure I'll think of something. :)

This is a baby blanket that I started working on for my sister's step-granddaughter, Layla. She was just born this year and I'm hoping to get this out to her along with the butterfly baby blanket either around Christmastime or shortly after New Year's. I hope they like it. For now, it's only this large. But it works up fast. I just need to prioritize the yarn necessary for it. I keep thinking up other things to do that require different yarn! And you don't get much of this yarn per skein.

It's fairly easy, just V-stitches with a single crochet border when it's done. This is from a video tutorial by AhSel Anne. I'm using Bernat Blanket Yarn in Pixie Pink and a 10mm hook.

This is the start of another pouch. I've got quite a few stray knitting needles and I'm worried they're going to get lost, or broken since I now have some wooden 10 inches, and I'd just like to keep them all in one spot. I've got them bundled together (the wooden ones on their own, the aluminum ones also on their own, and the plastic ones that won't fit in this pouch) with hair elastics and will place them in this pouch when it's done.

I plan to have this pouch be zippered, as well, and it will also have an overlapping flap that will be secured with a button. And, of course, it will have a fabric lining. I'm going to go through my buttons in the next few days and decide what color I want to use for it and that will decide the color of the zipper and fabric, as well. I'm super excited for this! :)

The yarn I'm using for this is Red Heart Super Saver in Baby Pink, and I'm using a 5mm hook.

For now, these are all of my in-progress yarn projects! :)

Knitted Washcloth

This was another pattern from Jayda. It's not really functional as a washcloth, because it's acrylic yarn and not really that great for stuff like that. Although, I guess you could still use it for one. I made three of these, all different sizes, because this was actually my very first knitting project. They all look the same except for size because I used to same yarn for each, so I'm only going to post one picture.

This was something I did on a whim. Jayda is probably my very favorite youtuber and I just like to listen to her talk and watch her work sometimes. I had thought that maybe knitting wasn't going to be something I could do. I'd heard so many people say most people seemed to only be able to crochet or knit, one or the other, not both. And so when I tried to knit and couldn't get the hang of casting on no matter how hard I tried, I figured maybe that was me, too. I was sad, but I figured I'd just have to come to terms with it.

Then I saw the tutorial from Jayda and just thought I'd watch it for fun, but as I watched I thought...that makes sense. I could do that! And so I went ahead and got my knitting needles out and started the video over and started working. I had to start the knitting over several times because I kept accidentally dropping stitches or otherwise messing it up. But, I could see I was making progress rather than just running into the same problem over and over again. The first time I tried it, with a different tutorial from someone else entirely, I had trouble with the last stitch transferring to the other needle. It just refused to work. But this time, with Jayda's explanation and tutorial, I was able to do it without a problem.

(I lied, I'm adding another picture)

I'm so, so happy I was able to do this! I don't know how to purl, yet, but I plan to learn soon! :) She has a tutorial for that, too, thank goodness! My knitting needles were hand-me-downs from a neighbor who moved away (they've since moved back, though) and before they left, Patty gave me some of her old knitting needles and some books on knitting and crochet. I grew up just a few houses down from her, and her youngest son Matt and I used to play together when we were kids.

I used leftover Red Heart Super Saver yarn in Mistletoe for this. The first washcloth I made was 4 inches wide x 3.5 inches long, and I used US 6 needles.

The second one is done with the same yarn, and is 4.5 inches wide x 4 inches long. I used US 8 needles.

I can't really remember the measurements of the third one, or which needles I used for it. I just remember that the needles were the smallest ones I own and my stitching was so incredibly tight that I had to push really hard with my finger to move the stitches off the needles and it ended up with my finger numbing in one spot for a few days afterward so I haven't done it with those needles again.

Someone on Tumblr suggested I use a smaller yarn with the smaller needles (I should've paid attention to the labels for what size needles to use), but I haven't yet. I do plan to use the brown size 3 yarn for another washcloth, though!

So far my favorite needles to work with are the largest ones I mentioned.

Since I don't know how to purl, this is done in garter stitch.