Quirky Q&A

Karen posted another quiz, and I’ve missed them so I’m joining in!

Do you have any quirky decorative pieces that you just love?

I’m big into fat acceptance so I have a collection of fat goddess figures that I just love. I don’t find them particularly quirky, but people do often comment on them.

There’s also this needle felted mushroom…thing that a friend got me for Christmas one year.

Do you have quirky food habits? What is the quirkiest?

I love dipping things. Fries into milkshake, crispbread and cheese into tea, crisps into peanut butter. Om nom.

Everyone has a favorite shirt. Do you have a favorite quirky piece of clothing? Maybe it’s super comfortable. Maybe it’s your favorite color.

I don’t think I do. My clothes are pretty standard. Although I must say I’m taking a while to get used to these leggings my Mum bought for me:

I’m so used to bright colours on my top half, not my legs. I love them though so there will be plenty of wearing for me to get used to it!

We all love to craft. Do you have quirkiness involved with your crafting?

I seem to be unusual in that I don’t really limit the number of WIPs I start. If I want to make something and I have the yarn then I’m going for it!

Join in if you feel like it 🙂

Hannah

xXx

Advertisement

Blogville Knitters Challenge: My favourite make

This challenge is from Karen at Nothingbutknit – feel free to join in!

I’m pretty certain my favourites are going to change over time, as I (hopefully) have many years of makes to come, and I’m constantly improving and developing.

But as of right this very second, I am still most proud of my first Lego blanket.

That is definitely my crowning crochet achievement. I never get tired of showing people photos of it! I made it for my Dad’s birthday, because Lego always reminds me of him, I designed the bricks, the layout, and the border all by myself, and I used up a hell of a lot of stash to make it. I’m happy every time I see it again.

Another particular favourite of mine is the needle felted bunny rabbit I made at an I Sew 2 workshop last year.

I had never needle felted before and it surprised me how well it turned out – it actually looks how I pictured it in my head!

So they’re my favourites, what are yours?

Hannah

xXx

2019 review

Well look at that, another whole year gone by. Once again I’m so glad I have my blog to remind me of all I’ve achieved over the last 365 days.

For a start, there were a lot more FOs than I thought.

Baby poncho x2

Kalinda shawl

Caron cupcake hat x2

Caron cake folded bag (I’ve still got this lying around. I really must give it away)

The teeny tiny llama, and a somewhat creepy amigurumi tooth

There were a few bits and pieces for myself

Flax Light for me

A scrappy neck warmer

Changing Staircases

But I think I’m most pleased with my blanket output this year.

Not one, but two full-sized Lego blankets!

Changing Tides, my first ever CAL

A baby Lego blanket with spare bricks

The super chunky green and purple baby blanket

A more traditionally coloured baby blanket

There was also a Mothers day card with crochet elements, which I know I can do better this year.

Outside of knitting and crochet, I tried my hand at both needle felting and beading.

Then for christmas I whipped up my Dad’s hat and a final headband.

That’s 24 total FOs, which I’m pretty darn pleased with.

With all these projects I also learned a thing or two:

Continental knitting

Foundation crochet stitches

Magic loop for knitting

Stretchy bind off

Needle felting

Crochet loop stitch

So I’ve had a great year and I’m hoping to make 2020 just as good, if not better!

I’m determined that this will be the year I finally jump in to sock knitting. I’m also planning to make a big dent in my stash and make a bit of a difference in the world by focussing on some charity yarnery.

I hope everyone had a lovely new years eve, and that 2020 is so much better to you than 2019 was (whatever kind of year you had).

Hannah

xXx

WIP Wednesday 11.09.19

Current WIP count: 7

I think I might be able to cross another WIP off the list this week, as there’s now only a week and a half left to add to my Changing Tides blanket.So much lovely texture on these rounds.

Flax light is now my portable project again. It’s nice to get back to knitting, especially when that knitting is just stockinette for the next 7 inches. I only need to engage my brain to count the stitches for the garter panel every other round, so it’s been a perfect TV/choir/subway project.I’ve also got as far as taking the needle felt unicorn back out of the box, although I haven’t actually done anything with it yet. My thinking is that if it’s right in front of me and ready to go then I’m more likely to pick it up and make some progress when I have a spare 5 minutes. We’ll see how that works out!

Hannah

xXx

WIP Wednesday 05.06.19

Current WIP count: 6

Isn’t sleeve-knitting annoying! Having to constantly turn the whole jumper around, having to go back to my old rubbish circulars because the KnitPro cable is too long, and come the decreases I’m going to have to work out how to use DPNs properly. #Firstworldproblems or what!

Maybe I won’t do full length sleeves. We’ll see.

I’ve also made a bit of a start on the needle felt unicorn kit I got for my birthday, and I have to say I’m really not sold on the polystyrene base. It was much more enjoyable making my freeform bunny.

Thankfully all the other bits and pieces are freeform so it should be plain sailing from here. I think. I mean, the instruction photos are tiny so it’s kind of hard to tell, but I’m sure it’ll be fine!

And this is another bobble week for the Changing Tides CAL so it’s taking me a wee while.

But I’m bobbling along and enjoying myself.

Hannah

xXx

2019 Birthday Presents

I didn’t get much yarn for my birthday. I thought I’d got none at all, but then my Aunty came later in the day with four skeins of cotton and an amigurumi book.

Maybe people thought (rightly so) that I’m still working through the 30 skeins I got for my last birthday so I didn’t need any more!

However, I did get quite a few other crafty presents.

I’m particularly excited to try this needle felt unicorn kit.

It’s got a polystyrene base that you felt onto, which I’ve never tried before, so that should be interesting.

There’s a sun catcher that Mum said she got because I love dragons.

Lots of papercraft goodies including a little crochet stamp!

Even something for my baking.

This looks so much simpler than painting different colours onto the side of a piping bag as I’ve been doing for years.

So I’ve got plenty of goodies to play with over the coming weeks. I might even share the results if they don’t go horribly wrong!

Hannah

xXx

Happy Easter

My family have never done Easter eggs, but once us chiddlybods got a bit older we started exchanging little presents instead. This year I decided to get crafty with my gifts.

When my parents visit they like to stay at a particular hotel, which has a massive picture on the wall of a Tunnocks Teacake wrapper (it’s a Scotland thing. We’re very proud.) and every time my Dad walks past it he says how much he likes it. So I decided to make him a mini version for his Easter present.

Of course I forgot to take a photo before packing it off because I’m a dingbat, but here’s a picture of the wrapper in case you don’t know what I’m talking about.The hardest part was definitely having to eat the teacake to free up the wrapper. Oh the sacrifices I make for my family 😉

Then it was Mum’s turn.

Funny story about my Mum – she is absolutely terrified of birds, can’t even stand to be in the same room as one, but she loves robins. I don’t know if she would ever go as far as touching one, but they are the only birds that don’t make her run away and refuse to return until they’ve gone.

So I just had to have a go at needle felting a little robin for her.I’m not sure it’s as good as my rabbit, but you can tell it’s a robin and that’s enough for me!

I felted a safety pin to the back so Mum can wear it as a brooch if she likes.And of course there had to be an Easter card as well.Does your family celebrate Easter? Do you have any family traditions? Let me know in the comments!

Hannah

xXx

It’s new hobby time again!

Alternative title: I love stabbing things.

A while ago one of my choir friends gifted me some needle felting goodies so I could give it a try. For some reason I built it up in my mind so much that I couldn’t even try in case I got it ‘wrong’, so the whole bag just sat in my crafty drawer unused. But I still really wanted to try needle felting, so when I saw that I Sew 2 was hosting a workshop I signed up straight away.

The workshop was taught by Lynn McGill of Lin Pin (go check out her page) and five of us showed up despite Storm Gareth raging outside. The others had all been before, but they were so friendly and welcoming and I didn’t feel like the odd one out at all.

Most of us decided to make Easter bunnies so Lin gave a quick tutorial on how to make one. The way she explained it is quite like amigurumi; it’s much easier if you break down what you want to make into simple shapes. A sphere for the head, an egg for the body, cylinders for the front legs and so on. She also showed us different ways to roll and fold the wool, and how to neaten up the edges.

Then it was our turn. I briefly considered making a psychedelic rabbit because 1. I loves colour and 2. Look at all the beautiful options!

But just this once I decided to be sensible and stick with one colour. I chose this hank of grey because of the flecks of light and dark, just like you’d get in a real rabbit’s fur.

At first I was a bit too gentle, scared of breaking the needle or stabbing myself or that dreaded getting it ‘wrong’, but Lin gave me some pointers and a big scoop of encouragement and I went for it.

Funny thing is, I did break a needle.

And I did stab myself. Several times.

But it wasn’t the end of the world, and after 2.5 hours I had created something that I’m so proud of.

I made that!!

At the end of the workshop I was chatting with Lin and I mentioned that it might be nice to add some flowers to the grass base, at which point she started loading me up with various colours to take away with me! If this is what all I Sew 2 workshops are like then I will most definitely be going back for more.

So now I know that needle felting is really very easy and I can actually do it, I’m going to dig out that bag of bits my friend gave me and get some pretties made. Watch this space!

Hannah

xXx