Propped up

I told you this post would be late. TRF was quite a lot of fun, the first day I dressed as a christmas elf, which is what the wig I've spoken of was for.

it began as this

 grosgrain and velvet ribbon

 to cut the lengths evenly (so many strands)

and then became this, my own design...

the strands of yarn were sandwiched between the 2 types of ribbon and held together with elastic, the velvet ribbon being fuzzy side down on my hair. It grabs on and keeps the wig from slipping. It actually worked quite well. It was kind of funny how people didn't recognize me at first, since my hair is so dark, the white hair looks quite different.

My other props for the weekend included a Santa's helper hat

 and curly toed boot caps (unfortunately this is the unfinished product, I didn't get a pic of the finished ones and they got all mucky at faire)

finished they had bells on the toes (that lasted all of 20 minutes... I walk too hard apparently) and red painted around the ends to give the illusion of being fresh off the elf. hehehe.

another prop I hadn't gotten around to posting about is this pirate map
I got it for the first trip out to TRF this year and didn't end up using it for anything. I didn't like the straight finished edge it had, so I changed it.
From this

To this

(hooray fire)

I do not have Spartans for you today, I'm afraid I did not get them finished, between TRF prep and Thanksgiving cooking and baking and whatnot, I didn't have the time to finish them.
But what I do have Matt's towel, which I just finished last night!

It is a grand 18 inches long and looks quite nice perched on my love's shoulder.

That is all the crafty adventures I have for you for now.
Til next time

Cloud Nine

I truly enjoy sharing my crafty knowledge and occasionally I get to share my knowledge in the form of teaching a particular craft. This past Friday I got to teach my friend Sami how to crochet. She caught on quickly to the stitches I taught her and even practiced a bit on Matt's towel. I grabbed some scrap yarn to teach her to crochet in the round and she practiced all the stitches I had shown her, creating a bit of a poof. The yarn happened to be white and we dubbed the poof a cloud and just for our own amusement, I embroidered a 9 on it.

hooray

My other adventure for the weekend was actually a baking adventure! I made multigrain rolls yesterday afternoon. I haven't made home made bread since I was little and helped mom knead dough.
I used my new cookbook The Sparkpeople Cookbook, their recipe looked easy (I like easy) and didn't call for a lot of different ingredients. I was afraid for a bit when the dough didn't really rise at all, it may have been due to the humidity, I really don't know; but after the second rising they looked wonderful and then baked up nicely. They certainly aren't as pretty as they are in the book, but I think they turned out quite well and Matt seems to think so too. I'll probably make more for Thanksgiving.

Now for the Spartans!
This week is monumental, I have reached the first milestone in this project, I have gotten to #50!That is 1/6th of the way finished!
I wasn't sure when I started this project if I could actually stick with it, as my attention span can be a bit short... *ahem* But I seem to be doing ok with it. Right now I'm still kind of going through a "I DON'T WANNA!" sort of period with the Spartans (it's why I can't seem to not be behind schedule) but it will pass, hopefully soon.

Here they are!
49, his name is Batiatus and he is unclaimed

50! his name is Duro and he is also unclaimed

51, his name is Gnaeus and he too is unclaimed

Next weeks post may end up being late because I will be at TRF over the weekend and may not have it read to post in the morning. We'll see how the week goes.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Spoons

I don't haz them.
I had hoped to have my wig finished to share with you today, but this week I've been terribly afflicted by the Feckits. I've even had a hard time working on the Spartans. So I'm going to show you how the craftiness runs in my family.

This is a painting my Grandmother did

It's just 1 of many, many paintings we found while cleaning out her house. There were a few with the owls but I fell in love with it because of it's size, the painting itself is only 3.75 inches by 2.75 inches

I'm not sure where it will hang in my home yet, I found it just the other day, but I'll find somewhere for it to go.
My Grandmother was an incredibly talented lady, she made pottery, she made porcelain dolls, she sewed, she painted, she even ran a silk flower business for quite a few years. I definitely get my crafty tendencies from that side of the family.



I have an update for you on the Towel of Love. I did manage to find time to work on it this past week, I really want to get it finished soon so I can begin a new project to stave off the boredom with the Spartans, because right now I am definitely bored with them. It'll come back around... at some point.

Anywho, towel. It is a whopping 11.5 inches now (I think the last measurement was 9.25 inches) and I'm about half way through the ball, I think.

And lastly, of course, here are the Spartans for the week. 46, 47, and 48

The first 2 are homeless, the 3rd will go to James T.

46: Theron

47: Ephialtes

48: Jeff; he has a fly on his shield, according to James there was a Spartan soldier (General I think) who kept a fly fixed to his shield and when asked why he would reply "Any man who is close enough to ask why I have a fly on my shield, is close enough for me to kill" or something along those lines.

well, hopefully I'll find my giveadamn this week and be able to finish the wig for you all to see.
Til next week my friends

Crafting Rambles

I found that when I thought about what to write for today's blog... I had absolutely no idea what I actually wanted to write about. So I'm going to ramble a bit about up coming projects. I guess you can call it a preview of what is to come... eventually.

Directly on the horizon is a commission for a friend of my mother and 2 of her co-workers, pirate garb for an event. It should be fun to design.

I have a few stuffed toys I'd like to make for gifts, not sure why I decided to make them, but I felt the need.
Found some really cute flannel on sale that is perfect for what I want to do
Now all I have to do is find the time to do it... 

I finally located my craft plastic so I can make a new case for my pedometer, since the clip broke a while back and the phone case I have been using is beginning to get on my nerves. I just have to figure out how to make it attach to my pants. I'm thinking safety pins, because I'm just that high tech.

I will be making a few props and garb pieces for this next trip to TRF, I'll even be documenting the making of a wig, so you all can see (that's assuming my idea works...) the greatness once it's done and the process it took. I actually picked up materials for the wig yesterday and had to make myself finish the Spartans instead of start on it. This week will be getting super crafty!

I still want to crochet a Nac Mac Feegle at some point, I have a project lined up for after I finish Matt's towel, but hopefully it won't take too long, I think I'll begin work on the Feegle then.
I'd love to work on my crochet pattern designing skills (which is partly what the Feegle will be) not sure what all I want to attempt, but it should be interesting. Also on the crochet docket are some arm warmers, I was given the yarn and pattern book for my birthday this year, I might even get to use them by next winter.

I'm beginning to notice I plan projects really far in advance, I'm thinking maybe it's due to the Spartans taking up most of my free time and commissions taking up the rest of it. meh. what can I do? I can't quit the Spartans, I'm past the point of being ok with that and I've already bought all the yarn for the project...

anywho, enough rambling, here are the Spartans for this week!

43, 44, and 45

43 belongs to my friend Kari and his name is Balus

That is a chair leg he's holding, in case you were wondering.

44 is unclaimed, his name is Darius

45 is also unclaimed, his name is Cyntios

I think this weeks batch kind have doofy expressions, 43 not so much, but the other 2, they make me giggle a bit.


til next week, adieu