My Creative Space

The space currently has a few ongoing projects around as usual. The hood project is still around - progress is slow. There is another tank to tee refashion somewhere and there is one in-progress book. There is also this -



It's another cup sleeve in an all-cotton Anchor Magicline yarn.

The tutorial can be found here.

See what other creative peeps are up to over at the home of creative spaces here.

Have a creative day, friends.

Pin Project 4 - cosy cups from now on.

This easy crocheted cup cozy or coffee cup sleeve is something else which was pinned on my ‘Things to make’ board on Pinterest.

The tutorial can be found here.



This is a 100% cotton yarn by Anchor called Magicline. It comes in several colourways and varigated patterns. I think this one is Splash.

The cup sleeve worked up really quick and this is what I finished up with.



My cups of coffee which I have at work will from henceforth be nice and cosy. I like the happy rainbow colours.



I started crocheting another one last night using another colourway of the same cotton yarn from Anchor. I'll show it to you in another post.

Have a wonderful day friends.

A quick loomed cowl

There's a new yarn shop in my local area and they have a 'Knit night' on a Thursday evening. I went along one Thursday, met some really nice ladies and had fun. I had taken my big purple Knifty Knitter round loom along and picked up some Artesano Superchunky alpaca and wool blend yarn. Before I knew it, I had a third of this cowl done by the end of the evening. It didn't take me very long to finish it off either.



It's lovely and warm. I love the colour too.



Now I have a nice cowl wear when the day is cold, the weather's decided to take a bit of turn and it's gone pretty mild around here. Typical.

Hope your week's going well, friends.

Little lovelies

Here's handful of lovely little purses which I finally got around to finishing and photographing this weekend. I had wanted a couple of nice large wooden buttons for two of them and managed to pick some up yesterday.



On the inside, there is a slip pocket for cards and a zip pocket for coins.



These were made using a Keyka Lou pattern. They are great for using up bits of fabric. I've also used up the last of my flat split rings on these. I need to get some more.

The hood project is going slowly. This weekend, I've mostly been messing about with another handbound journal and a couple of small quick crochet projects. I've also decided that I'm keeping the lovely journal I posted about recently for myself and I've started doodling in it. All in all, a crafty and relaxing weekend ... so far. Mr CraftyAdy thinks that it's all really displacement activity and that I am really trying to ignore the pile of ironing languishing in the corner awaiting my attention. He's probably right.

Hope you're having a lovely weekend, friends.

Pin Project 3 - my first bookbinding project

I’ve always wanted to have a go at book-binding. In particular, I was very much taken by the beautiful leather-covered journals I saw on Etsy. So when I came across this great tutorial on long-stitch binding, I pinned it to my ‘Things to make’ board on Pinterest.

A friend had given me a lovely bit of lavender coloured leather a while back to experiment on – not sure what it is – I think it is dyed calfskin. It’s suede on the inside and lovely buttery smooth on the outside. I bought some 140gsm off-white cartridge paper, cut the A4 sheets in half and folded the A5 halves into small groups of pages or signatures.

As the leather was so soft, I glued some white cardstock onto the inside to give it a bit more body.



Then I hand-stitched the signatures into the cover.



It was fun sewing and knotting each signature individually.



Here is the resulting journal.



I attached a long strip of leather to the over-flap with a few cross stitches.



The strap wraps around the journal.



This little journal has 200 pages (well 200 sides) in it.



I love the long-stitch pattern on the spine.



The tutorial was easy to follow and I was super-duper happy with the end result. I have to now figure out what I want to use it for and I also have to make a few more of these lovely books as they would make wonderful gifts.

I saw, I pinned, I did!

Pin and Do Number Two

Another interesting project which was on my ‘Things to make’ board on Pinterest was this superb Rapunzel wig tutorial.

Missy Moo desperately wanted one as soon as I showed it to her. After a trip to the yarn shop and a fortuitous find of three 100gm balls of chunky yellow yarn in the bargain basket priced at 99pence each, the project was underway. Another trip to a local craft store yielded a bunch of cheap wire-stemmed roses (found in the bridal craft section) and a dig around in the depths of Missy Moo’s wardrobe resulted in the finding of an old pair of white tights.

An evening was spent measuring and cutting the yarn. A quick bit of sewing and we got this.



We could have done with a bit more yellow yarn – you can see the gaps in the yarn and the skullcap which was made from the old tights showing through. But we didn’t have any more yarn and had to make do. The flowers were fastened to the braid and Missy Moo could not be more pleased with the resulting wig. I added a loop at the end of the braid so she could hang it off her wrist and keep it off the floor - I didn't want the end dragged all over the wet playground at playtime.



She wore it to a book character day at school and was exceptionally happy in her Rapunzel costume.



Another project pinned and done - and in the process, one little girl had herself a deliriously happy day at school.

Pin project No 1

The first project I did off my ‘Things to make’ board on Pinterest was the tank to tee refashion. Inspiration came from the tutorial over at Crafterhours.

So far I’ve made two. (I know I've shared this refashion with you before - but I wanted to note that this was a 'Pin & Do' project.) This one here ...



And the second one here.

A third is on the way soon. I'll be back shortly with more Pin projects.

Pin and Do

Sarah London (she of the wonderful wool-eater blanket pattern) recently blogged about making a start on doing all those wonderful things she’s pinned on her Pinterest boards. “Stop pinning start doing” was what she said and I thought “Oh yes! I can go with that completely.”Sarah also shared this ... (number 3 made me smile - I can spend hours on Pinterest)



Pinterest is a new thing for me – I’ve only been on there for a few weeks and I love it! I haven’t got as many pins as some people but I find it a great source of inspiration and a fab way of bookmarking projects.

One of my boards is a ‘Things to make’ board. This is where I pin stuff that I have seen which I think I might like to have a go at making.



Once in a while, I will share with you my Pin projects as and when they come off my creative space. I actually have a few to share and will do so shortly.

Do you use Pinterest? Have you done or made anything from your ‘To do one of these days’ board?

Another tee to tank refashion

Mr CraftyAdy was throwing out a bunch of old tees a couple of weeks ago and I snagged them for refashioning. I already refashioned one here.

This is another.



And here is a third one cut up and ready to be transformed.



If you fancy having a go, you can find the tutorial here.

I hope you are having a good weekend, friends.

My Creative Space

Hello friends! My creative space is rather crowded this week with 3 projects on the go simultaneously.

First up is the crocodile stitch hood. This is going well. So far, I have finished the cowl part and have just started working on the hood. The pattern is made up of two parts which will be stitched together in the final finish. This is the finished cowl ...



And this is the beginnings of the hood ...



I had not worked with skeins of wool before - otherwise known as hanks. When I started the cowl, I just snipped the bits of yarn holding the hank together, found one end and started crocheting. Bad move! I soon found myself having to unravel and untangle myself ever so often. Hugely annoying. Thankfully I got to the end of the cowl and decided to spend a bit of time unraveling the messy skein and rewinding it into a centre-pull ball which you can see in the photo above. This is sooo much better to work with. Now I know, I have starting planning a DIY yarn swift project involving a recently purchased cheap lazy susan from Ebay. The idea is to make something that works like this. Hopefully, this will enable me to wind my skeins into balls quickly and easily. I'll keep you posted on that particular project when I get it started.

Back in the space ... up next is a small project I've wanted to do for a while now but just had not gotten around to. The project involves this stack of folded cartridge paper ...



I'm going to try to turn this stack of paper signatures (each sub-stack is called a signature) into a little handbound journal. Somewhere in the depths of my wardrobe is an offcut of some mauve-coloured suede leather. Perfect stuff for a cover for the journal. I'll keep you updated on the progress of this one later.

And finally, based on this fabulous tutorial, I am almost finished making Missy Moo a Rapunzel wig for Book Character day at school on Friday. Here she is trying it on for size. The end of the wig finishes right by her heels. It actually just sits on the floor by her heels.



I still need to weave in a dozen or so little pink roses and tie a small wrist strap onto the end of the braid to help her keep the thing off the ground when she is running around school on Friday. She is extremely excited about Friday and can't wait to show her fun wig to all her friends.

There are a couple of tee-to-tank refashions in progress somewhere around here to. Busy busy busy! Just how I like it!

Find out what else is happening in other creative spaces around the world over at the home of creative spaces here.

Have a creative day, friends.

Easy stitch marker

I wanted to make a stitch marker for my crochet projects. A quick rummage in my chain-maille box yielded a reasonable sized lobster claw clasp. Add an aluminium ring and a small bead and I got this ...



It’s easy to use and took me less than a minute to put together. And it does exactly what it was meant to do.



Next time I pop into the craft shop, I’ll look for slightly bigger lobster claw clasps and maybe some little beads or charms.

We had snow last night. This morning the temperatures have risen and it's all now very slushy, brown and generally icky. Hope you're having a good weekend, friends.

The hood project is underway

The crocodile stitch neckwarmer was the warm-up project … the supporting act if you like, for this lovely project.

This is how mine has started.



This is a Fyberspates sport weight 4ply yarn called Scrumptious … and believe you me, it is truly scrumptious. 45% silk and 55% superwash merino wool. It’s so soft and has that wonderful sheen you get with the silk blends.

I am very excited about this project. Can’t wait to finish it especially after seeing all the wonderful versions on Ravelry.

Have a wonderful weekend, friends.

The crocodile stitch neckwarmer is finished!

The crocodile stitch neckwarmer I started a few weeks ago is now finished! Yay!! I lightly washed it, gently dried it and blocked it and it has made it's debut this week as we're presently experiencing very cold weather.



I realised when I was doing this that I had inadvertantly made it smaller than it ought to have been by using a 4mm hook. The pattern calls for a 4.25mm hook which doesn't exist over here in the UK. We get 4.0 or 4.5 - and yes, I hear you, I should have gone for the 4.5 or above but I made a beginner's error by moving down instead of going up in hook size. I have also discovered that I tend to crochet quite tightly - note to self ... loosen up!!

When I got to the end of the number of rows etc in the pattern, I realised I had almost run out of yarn and couldn't really add any any more rows in the same colour. I thought it might loosen a bit once blocked. It has loosened somewhat and thankfully does fit around my neck! If it hadn't, it would have ended up as a neckwarmer for Missy Moo.

I haven't found a suitable button or toggle yet. So far, I've been wearing it with a little hair-stick as a pin fastening it close. That works really well and I think I will stick to using a pin instead of a button.

This was made from 2 balls of Baby Rooster which is a 100% machine washable fine Merino wool. It's halfway between a 4ply and a DK I think. Very soft and not at all scratchy - which is good for me!

Can you see the bit of crochet and the dark red yarn at the top of the photo? That's my next project which is the Marte Crocodile stitch hood. I bought some incredibly beautiful 55% merino and 45% silk blend yarn at the weekend and couldn't wait to make a start on my hood. Very excited! I'll keep you posted on my progress later.

Have a great day, friends.