Divinely Crafty

I finished the Log Cabin blanket that I started back in early May for the wedding of our friends. Finished size was roughly 48″x42″. The perfect size to throw over your lap and snuggle up with a cup of teas and good book. True to the best of gifts, it is a bit difficult to see this one leave my home. Made of odd bits of yarn left over from projects over the past couple years, making it was a fun trip down memory lane and they type of item that would give warmth of heart and body on as cold day. Several yarns were those that I dyed myself, including a small bit of my very first skein of hand painted yarn. There was even some that I spun from sheep which were raised on the farm where the happy couple lives. Definitely a project that I will do again once I have a good stash of leftovers that needs using up. I have a few new projects lined up to work on that will start me on that quest. It feels good to have made a “big” knitting project. It wasn’t the most complicated of patterns, but it did take time. I often shy away from the longer projects because so often I will go into a flare and not work on it for a time. (Not too different than me and my blog in that respect.) If I chose a smaller, quicker piece then I have a better chance of finishing in a reasonable time frame. I didn’t rush through this one, and only at the end when I was in a time crunch did I push myself to work on it when I didn’t really want to be working on it. True to my form, I finished it the day of the wedding with 3 hours to spare. Just enough time to get my daughter and myself cleaned up and ready to go. She was the flower girl, which in the world of a 7 year old girl is a much honored role. She was up first thing in the morning asking how long until the wedding. When I told her she had 7 hours to wait (an eternity in her eyes) she groaned and asked how many minutes that was. 420 met with several more groans.

We are in our final week before we leave for our trip to the Pacific Northwest of the US. My brother is getting married and it will be the first time back for my whole family except for me. I went last year to gather with several of my sewing mama friends, where I taught a little workshop on wet felting and then I went to a course on using hypnotic techniques as an element in the childbirth classes I teach. This year I went to get started on a holistic course of treatment for my fibromyalgia. Very different reasons. So much has changed. I know from my own experience that it will be odd being back in a place that used to be home and have it seem so foreign. It’s remarkable how much we have settled into life here.

There are always a million details that pop up at the last minute. With this being a month long trip I am expecting twice that. We are moving house (again) shortly after we get back so all that needs to be squared away this week in addition to all the normal packing business. Fortunately it is still pretty calm today with a week left to go, and maybe it will stay that way if we are lucky. Cross fingers and hope for the best!

Tags: friends, knitting, spinning, traveling

There are a whole big massive bunch of jewelry sellers at esty. That may even be a bit of an understatement. It can really be intimidating, not to mention exhausting, browsing through all the offerings listed. So much so that it might be tempting just to cruise over to a big name mega store’s site and order something that was mass manufactured, most likely in China, solely for the purpose of getting it over with quick and easy. But being a craftsperson myself, and committed to buying handmade, small production or one-of-a-kind goods whenever possible I sat down at my computer yesterday on the quest of finding the perfect pearl necklace for my daughter’s 16th birthday. (Fulling owning up to in my budget pearl=faux pearl, but luckily these days that doesn’t necessarily equate with cheap looking or poor quality.) She has prom coming up shortly after her birthday, and her dress (which she will also be wearing to my brother’s wedding this summer) just begs for pearls.

And so the search began. Pages and pages of lovely creations passed my eyes. A cup of tea, some rice cakes with almond butter, and a cup of coffee later I had looked at hundreds of pieces of jewelry, but nothing was jumping out at me as being the perfect piece. And anyone who has ever bought something for a 16 year old with very specific style and taste knows - it needs to be perfect. Especially when prom is involved! So onward I went, click by click, forging on in my quest. Then I found this seller. Brought to her page by one piece, I was drawn in looking at all the wonderful offerings in her shop. Such lovely work! And better still, I found at last a piece that I thought just might be what I was looking for. And bonus - she stated in the listing that she could make matching earrings. oooooo - I was intrigued. So I convo’d her (that’s etsy speak for I sent her a message) and asked what the cost of the matching earrings would be and if perhaps she could make a bracelet as well. I figured hey, it doesn’t hurt to ask, and a complete set would be great. She replied back - very fast - with a very reasonable price for the set and able to accommodate my time frame. (Yes, I procrastinate. A lot. ) After giving it some more thought, and spending time looking at my daughters dress, I had concerns if the color of the pearls would be to stark for my daughter’s dress, so I convo’d her back about this and a few other things, fearful that I was close to crossing over to potentially irritating buyer who asks a gazillion nit-picky questions territory. Again, she replied very quickly, giving me her honest opinion and making mention of some other colors that she had available. All whilst reassuring me that my questions were no bother and better to be safe than sorry when shopping online. How true that is!

When my daughter came home that evening, I eagerly showed her my discovery. (No way am I going to try and surprise her and risk her hating it!) She was pleased, but not as thrilled as I had hoped. So we talked. And we considered what it was that she didn’t like, and what she would want to change in order for it to be perfect. Eventually, after much imagining and discussing we had come up with exactly what it is that she would like. I sent another convo to the seller, asking her if she could make what was now a fully custom set and what the cost would be. True to form, she replied without delay, happy to make it exactly as we wished and at a price that was unbeatable. She would get started immediately and ship it the next day. My daughter and I both went to bed dreaming of the lovely custom made set that would be arriving at our home.

Today I received another convo from the seller with a picture of the set. If I was eager before, I am twice as much so now. And my daughter is beyond thrilled. It is indeed perfect - better than even we had imagined when creating it in our minds!

I hope that the seller - BeadsByEvelyn - doesn’t mind me posting a picture of the set that she sent me. It is just too beautiful not to share. She assured me that it this is a quick photo that doesn’t do it justice, but even so, the beauty of it is breathtaking. I can’t wait to see it up close and personal.

Made of Swarovski pearls and crystals in white,almond,peach, and bronze.

For reference this is the dress that it will be worn with.

The set is matched perfectly to compliment the dress and will be even more stunning with my daughters rich ginger/brown hair. I can’t wait to see them on her, in her lovely dress with her hair done up, ready for what will undoubtedly be a magical night.

It seems that there is at least 2 birthday parties a month that my littlest gets invited to. I often said it over the years with all my children, and it hold true to this day - my kids have a much more active social life than I ever did.

With all of these parties to attend however comes the obligatory gift. I love it that here in England they don’t do a ceremonial opening of the gifts during the party. Instead the birthday girl/boy opens them afterwards and sends thank you notes to each guest. So much nicer than the risk that your gift will be less glamorous or exciting than another’s, and it takes the focus off of the loot grab aspect of a birthday party. But nonetheless, while not ‘required’ a gift is traditionally expected and what child wants to show up empty handed. We have a very tight budget in our house and as much as I hate to admit it, £200 of birthday gifts throughout the school year just isn’t in it. Its times like these when I am glad that I am a crafty mama. I can turn a few surplus bits and bobs into a lovely gift that if I were to sell in my shop would fetch a price well above what I would otherwise spend on a gift.

This weekend was the party of a sweet girl who loves her accessories. The perfect opportunity to break open the bead boxes and see where inspiration leads. Insisting that her friend would love something pretty for her hair, Anja decided that hair clips would be the project of the day. So we rooted through all the sparklely goodness and negotiated a pleasing pattern from which to create some lovely hair clips. (I had to explain that as much as she loved that single giant black bead it would not compliment her selection of pinks and yellows. Not to mention fit.) Naturally they had to be dangley - mere sparkle does not suffice in the fashion ethos of a 7 year old. And a bow - nothings complete without a bow.

Using wire bases that I use in making earrings, and hanging them on the clips with jump rings for maximum dangle, topped off with a little ribbon bow we made a sweet pair of hair baubles. Anja was pleased with her contribution to the effort of placing the beads on the wires in the pattern, carefully replicating my original example. She even astutely pointed out that because of the little purple bead at the base, they were not symmetrical. (They have been studying symmetry in school and she is most fascinated by the concept. )

From our collaboration of design and labor came these beauties.

We gave them a test run in her hair to be sure they dangled appropriately, which they did. I’m not posting that picture though because up close there was no denying that she was in desperate need of a hair washing. Bad (tired and in pain) mommy seems to have let it go a bit too long! As I mentioned earlier, there is no opening of gifts at the party, but it was reported back to me today that a certain girl who had a party this weekend was wearing very lovely set of hair clips that were being ooh’d and aah’d over by the girls on the playground. I am pleased with this, and am considering refining the design (attaching the bow was a bit fussy - there must be and easier way) and possibly offering them for sale in my etsy shop.

Tags: baubles, birthday gift, hair accesories, jewelry, mother daughter crafting

In amongst keeping up with all that life hands us, I have managed to work on a few crafty projects. Shortly after I returned from my trip I got a custom order through my etsy shop to do some hand dyed yarn that was based on the colors in The Very Hungry Caterpillar. It was a fun order to do and I was very pleased with the results. But it really drove home the fact that even though I am feeling a bit better than I was earlier this year that I am far from ready to take on any real work. I put all the energy I had into the project and then proceeded to go to bed and not get up for several days. I am bummed about my limitations, but it was fun to do and helped me remember the thrill I get from making pretty things.

With limited budget (as in zero budget) for acquiring of new yarn for my stash, and a need for a significant but not too brain taxing project I decided to give a Log Cabin style blanket a try. It is a stash buster project using up all the odd bits and bobs left over from other projects and a few odd skeins that have been with me for way to long and needed to be used up or given away. My original intent for it was to just make something for the family. We can always use another nice warm blanket. But then I remembered that our friends are getting married in late June and it would be a perfect wedding gift for them. They are very eclectic people and it is definitely an eclectic blanket. So far it measures roughly 2ft x 2ft and I am hoping to make it no less than 4×4. I might need to raid some yarn from my shop to meet that goal but if ever there was a reason to do so, making the perfect gift for good friends is as good as it gets.

I have a few other projects that I would like to get started in the next few weeks. I had hoped to make a shrug with some nice cotton that my friend Anna gave me last year before I go to Seattle in July. I’m not sure that I will get to it by then, but it would make a good project to work on while I am there if I don’t finish it before hand. I have another project planned that I really want to get done before the end of June, but again I am not sure that it will be possible. Its another gift for another wedding and I can’t say anything more because the recipient just might be reading this blog. But if I don’t get it done before that wedding I will give my apologies and get it to them as soon as possible. Hopefully before their first anniversary!

Tags: hand dyed yarn, knitting, log cabin