SYTYC Auditions- I made it!

For those of you who hadn't guessed, the football buddies were mine! I made it through the first week of voting - thanks for all the votes, friends! Here's the entry as it appeared:Meet "Annie" and "Jake"! My husband is a huge San Francisco 49ers fan and our kids love screaming at the tv....er, I mean, watching the games....with him. I made these little friends to join the party! "Annie" loves to tail-gate so I made her a watermelon to share: And "Jake" is in his 49ers jammies with a blankie to cuddle with at bedtime. And because I love accessories (but hate picking them up all over the floor), I made his blankie "attachable" -- two loops for his arm to slide through.These two have become very well-loved friends around our house, especially during football season.
Now, if only the 49ers could get to the Superbowl!

I love Sock Monkeys!

I freaking LOVE sock monkeys! I always have, although "always" for me didn't start when I was a kid, but after my son was born in 2007 which was when I first saw one. I guess I'm way late to the game. My mom showed me a package of the Rockford Red Heel Socks (which I later found out is the original socks the monkeys were made out of) and printed on the back of the package was instructions for sewing your own sock monkey! They actually printed it on the package! Brilliant! Anyway, I still haven't made an actual sock monkey toy yet, but my friend Valerie showed me a photo of a sock monkey hat and asked if I thought I could do it. Um, whether I can or not, it was way too cute to pass up! She wanted him in a gray/blue/white color scheme for her youngest son who's just 3 months old. I made it a little big, partly because I had to estimate his head size (I was so excited to get started that I didn't wait for her to send me his head measurements) and partly because it's the middle of summer here and the hat won't really be needed for a few more months. And I'm so excited -- she wanted him as an earflap hat! I LOVE earflap hats on little boys! Makes them look so cute! Okay, I'll be honest -- I love earflap hats on anyone. I wish I skied so I could wear them on the slopes.
He's a keeper! I was so happy with how he turned out -- and I'm just a big enough dork -- that I'm making one for myself for our christmas tree cutting expedition this winter. We'll see if Kev will be seen in public with me and my new monkey hat. :) More of these will be in my etsy shop soon, in any color scheme you want; stay tuned!

Evy's brown hat

Evy, the new daughter of my close friend Shannon and owner of the cupcake hat from a previous post, is also the new owner of this little brown number. It's an open-weave summer hat, with a lacy trim and a detachable teal flower. Shannon told me exactly what she was looking for (for newborn portraits) and I searched through loads of free patterns online trying to make one small enough but breezy enough for the summer. I really should give up the pattern hunt because none are exactly what I want and I usually end up making up my own anyway. But then I run the risk of reinventing the wheel . . .

This little hat is so tiny; when I was working on it I kept thinking, "This will be way too small for her, even if she is brand new." Well, apparently you do lose some of the memories as your own kids grow up because when I tried it on her, it was just a little too big still!

As requested, I made the flower detachable on a pin back so her mom could switch out the flower depending on what she was wearing at the time. Love love love it! And in honor of its tiny owner, when I write up the pattern it will be called Evy's Summer Hat! Look for it in my etsy shop, coming soon!

more baby gifts

Kev's coworker Christy is expecting a little boy any minute now, and before the school year ended the teachers had a party for her. I made a taggie blanket and a tiny airplane for the little guy.

This airplane is my new fave of the amigurumi I've made. Amigurumi is Japanese for (roughly), "crocheted stuffed toy" and there are many, many books out there devoted to patterns for cute little toys. I couldn't find any free patterns online for an airplane . . . and I hate paying for patterns until I absolutely can't do it myself . . . so I took off trying one of my own. Several tear-outs later, here he is!Christy said as soon as she brought him home her girls commandeered him for themselves! I guess he's a hit!

I won Week 3!

Thanks so much to all who voted for me last week! I finally won one -- pretty happy about it! Week 4 is up and ready for voting so come on by and see if you can guess mine. www.soyouthinkyourecrafty.com. And here's my entry for last week:

I was really excited for this week's Dollar Store challenge for two reasons: first, I love finding useful stuff really cheap and second, my darling sister's birthday is next week and I had NO IDEA what to get/make her so I decided to kill two birds, as they say. I wandered the aisles and came home with the following assortment:
Three plastic plates, four candle holders, a plastic table cloth, two plastic bowls and some nail polish. Several hours of drying time later, behold the Girls' Night Out Serving Set!
My sister holds a regular Girls' Night Out at her house and let's be honest - who doesn't like pretty serving dishes - so I made a 3-tiered tray and a coordinating standing bowls. Everything is securely attached (with great amounts of E-6000) so it won't collapse mid-party. The bowl stands are two different heights to help add visual interest to the table. And there are lots of colors represented here so it can be used with other serving bowls that my sister already has. And in case it's not obvious, I used the nail polish to lightly decorate the glass pieces. Now I just have to box it all up and send it to her, hopefully in time for her next

Ellie's Bucket Hat, request #2

When I went to deliver the first two bucket hats (to her mom at the school where she works) another lady saw it and immediately requested one! I love when that happens! Same size and style, but a different color scheme. This one totally reminds me of strawberries and cream! Yum!

And that giant red flower - I just love it.

summer hats

I love it when I get commissions for projects . . . not commissions as in "income besides salary," although the little extra spending money is nice (it supports my yarn addiction) but as in "requests to make stuff." My friends have been hooking (ha - hooking, get it? as in crochet hook? yeah, I'm a dork sometimes. and it's late) me up with new ideas and projects lately and I've been up to my elbows in soft fibery goodness. Recently I was asked to recreate a hat that had been a baby gift but that the little girl in question had grown out of. The original was crazy cute, but it had been handmade and bought at a bazaar in Seattle (I think) and there wasn't really a way to get a new one so with the original in hand, I went to work. The original was brown and light pink, soft and floppy, with a small brim and a cute flower just off center. Her mom wanted the same basic shape and style, but bigger and in more summery colors so she could wear it right now. I loved it so much when it was done, I made two. In honor of its tiny owner, I named the pattern Ellie's Bucket Hat. Now my daughter wants one. . . :0)

cupcakes!

Recently, our close friends had a baby (Yay, Shannon & Jerrid!) and their theme for her room is cupcakes. . . so of course I had to contribute! I've made rag quilts before but this was my first foray into the world of applique. I drew out the cupcake onto cardstock (and erased it so many times I wore through the paper) then cut them out in pieces. I used my old-school Singer sewing machine (given to me by my husband's grandma soon after we were married -- and I LOVE IT!) to "draw" on the frosting lines and affix the cupcake cups, then sewed the whole thing together. I wanted a more finished look to the edges so I put on the border pieces instead of just ragging the edges -- I've done both types of edging and like both about the same. Then into the dryer to begin the ragging.

They also wanted a couple of crocheted cupcakes for her decor so I made 4 little cupcakes, each one topped differently. I think my fave is still the swirled frosting with sparkly sprinkles.

And because I think that every little girl deserves a cupcake on her birthday, I made her this little cupcake hat. I was planning to bring it to the hospital when we went to visit her but she decided to make her appearance a little early and we were out of town. My friend Valerie saved the day and brought it to her for me.

I love that they love cupcakes as much as I do -- I had a complete blast making all this cupcake stuff. Mmmmm, cupcakes.......time for a bakery run.

I'm In!

So, I've been told by a "few" people that I'm kinda crafty so I decided to take a chance and put my skills to the test. I entered the contest over at http://www.soyouthinkyourecrafty.com/ and made it though the auditions; now the season has begun and I need all your votes! I can't tell you which project is mine because of the contest rules (anonimity is HUGE with them) but those of you who know me will be able to tell. Go to their site and vote -- it's free, fun, and I need all the votes I can get! Thanks everybody!

Blog button

I designed a blog button! It's my first ever, following this fantastic tutorial on www.oikology101.blogspot.com (her tute is especially for blogger so it was crazy easy to follow!). Because I'm so excited I added the button to my sidebar (----->) and you can grab it for yourself, too. Just copy and paste the info in the text box and it's done!

Now to get this made into a real button I can put on my purse. . . . :)