Midsummer Geisha

She's finished! The darling little geisha is finished and she is so cute!
Her name is Uzume (oo-zoo-may) and here she is in all her cuteness...

Now to return you to your regularly scheduled Spartans. Hopefully I will have one for you next week.




We have just passed the Summer Solstice (June 21) I was going to talk about it last week but didn't get to because of things outside my control. So you get a piece on it today! *grin*
The Summer Solstice (also known as Midsummer and Litha) marks the astronomical beginning of Summer and being in an apartment, Matt and I decided to forgo the bonfire (Apartment complexes tend to frown on that) and we decided to make a few God's Eyes instead.
"Midsummer focuses on the Sun God and the sun itself. God's Eyes are probably the most well known craft associated with Midsummer. South American in origin, they were made by the natives for both protection and decoration. They are actually decorative amulets made of two sticks placed to form an equilateral cross. Colored yarn or twine is wound around the cross, in alternating colors, to form an ‘eye’, and its four points symbolize the two solstices (summer and winter) and equinoxes (spring and fall)"
Thank you to this website for the info (gotta love copy paste)


We chose a sun like color for ours (I was hoping for variegated yarn, but alas, none was to be found) and got to figuring out how it was supposed to work (seriously, who needs instructions) after a few false starts I got mine finished and added a Buckeye we found in Ireland, attached with copper wire. This first one was all one color, mainly because I didn't have any other colors I could use.

I decided to take pictures of the process the second time around and now I had a second color I could use too.
I started with the orange and then added in the white, alternating the colors every few wraps to get the lovely pattern you see.

 Adding the white in was tedious, if you caught your hand on it it would pull right out and then you'd have to unwrap a little to reset it.

(I know it looks like the Texas Longhorn colors, just ignore that fact please)

Well that is all I have for you today, the link I posted has good instructions on how to make a God's Eye of your own if you like. Have a good week everyone!

The Yarn Lies!

As I mentioned in my last post, I am currently working on a crocheted geisha for a friend of mine (she will need a name by the way, you should start working on that) and I was hoping to have it finished for today's post. I thought it would make for a nice easy little post in the midst of a busy week, but noooooooo, it just couldn't be that easy, could it? Of course not, nothing has been easy this week, NOTHING I TELL YOU!!!!
*ahem*

So the yarn I bought for the dress/body portion of the geisha is this beautiful soft dark dusty lavender color and I bought it because 1: my friend loves purple (I briefly thought about doing it in bright pank... very briefly) and because the package claimed it was the correct weight for the project, it is a brand I have not gotten before (I usually stick to the cheap stuff since these are not wearable items) and I thought, with it being a tiny bit more pricey than my normal yarn (don't worry, I bought this one on sale) it would all be ok since the package SAID it was the correct weight.

Oh how wrong I was...  

I started with the geisha's hair because I had that yarn first and then I made the geisha's head and put them together (so cute!) and I started on the body after that because I needed a break from the black yarn (black yarn is a bitch to crochet! especially with a small hook) I decided to do the dress/body, I was rocking along on it and had gotten pretty far into the pattern when I thought to myself
'self, that looks really small, you should check that against the head'
so I listened to myself and checked and, yea, it was way too small. OOOOokay, we'll try this again with a larger hook because obviously the yarn LIED about what weight it is.
*finds larger hook* (stupidly put smaller hook away)

I started once again on the dress/body and got not quite as far along and thought to myself
'self, that still looks kind of small, check it again'
so I did and it was still too small (THIS WILL NOT BE A BOBBLE HEAD GEISHA DAMMIT!) OOOokay, now what?
I'm so glad you asked...

It's now time to fly by the seat of my pants! (looooooohohoooong paaaaaannnnnttsss) (Homestar reference, I'm not crazy I swear) (yea right) I've been doing this crochet thing for... uh... 5 months now. I can TOTALLY figure this out.

okay, uh, start it the same then just keep adding til it's the size I need, okay then start making it a cylinder and decrease aaaaaaaannnnd TADA! I now have a proper size dress/body for the size of the head.
But remaking it 3 times means it ate up the only time I had to finish it before the blog today. Which is why you got this ridiculously long narrative/rant about the weight of the yarn being wrong.

Hopefully I'll have some pictures for you next week and maybe even a Spartan! (don't hold your breath kids) it just depends on how busy life gets... hopefully, not very.

See you next week!

Oh Hey Look! It's a Post!

Hello all! So sorry for my absence, the last few months have been crazy busy and I was doing good to just make it through each day.
I didn't have the time or energy to be crafty and I didn't have access to most of my craft supplies (which is kind of important to crafting) Matt and I have just moved into a new apartment, yay! Where we will be for a long long time, yay! That's on the 3rd floor, yay?
I really am happy with the 3rd floor, no really, I am. No upstairs neighbors. I have a great view of the dog park. It's a great workout every time I get home. (my legs and ass are going to look amazing after living here for a while) So yay 3rd floor!
And since we're going to be here a while I can set up my sewing and craft area and not have to worry about packing it up again in 3 months, WOOHOO! Which also means more posts here, WOOHOO!  Which might mean more people following and commenting, WOOHOO!

SO the one thing I have been making time for lately is cross stitch, more specifically the Hello Cthulhu cross stitch for Natalie (which I mailed this morning, btw) It took me longer than I had hoped, but I think with all the stuff I had going on I got it done pretty damn quick.
Here it is finished!

If you love this and want your own, you can commission me to make it, comment with your email and we can work it out.

Unfortunately I have no Spartans for you today and likely won't next week either, I have been working on a crochet geisha for a friend since finishing the cross stitch, so I will be getting back to the Spartans ASAP.

What I do have for you today is a fun and funky necklace I made last night.
I found these beads on clearance at Joann's, I liked how large they were and black and white are the colors I wear most, so it seemed perfect (also I needed a new shiny that I made myself, it's way more satisfying than always purchasing) I found them in a box last night and decided to put together a necklace, because they really are too big to do much else with

Once I shuffled them around a bit I decided on an order and then found some leather cord to string them on.
I used figure 8 knots (Boy Scout skillz FTW) on either side of the beads, because it is a larger knot and it's a little more fancy than just tying a knot.

TADA!
I'd have a picture of me wearing it for you, but circumstances outside of my control have prevented me from doing so...

And in other news... My hair is magenta, it was MAGENTA, but has calmed down some after a few washings.

That's all for today, I hope to have a bit more for you next time
Until then, craft on.

well damn...

I fully intended to write up a post for today and just can't see to get there. Exhaustion is not fun.

I'm hoping in the next week or so I will be on a regular enough schedule to get back to posting more frequently.

<3