Tag: Crochet

Hare brained

by Irish Bees Don't Do Mondays, posted in Chatting, Crochet, Sewing

Usual run up to Christmas busyness. Most of the decorations are up, except for those with battery lights. Remembered to get some yesterday so just need to go through them and replace the old ones now. Am thinking of the winter solstice and having a bit of a feast and lights to celebrate the beginning of the new cycle of rebirth, the coming of the longer days.

Cake is marzipanned. Have got most of the Christmas dinner pre-prepared ready to heat up on the day. Am making stuffing balls from scratch today – a Mary Berry Biker Boots recipe (so named after mis-reading something about her) and will freeze them.

Finished my winter hare with her gift bag. She’s in place of a stocking for me. Absolutely loved making her.

Have modded the template slightly and made a smaller version:

Her little wooly jumper is crocheted from sequinned yarn.

Got two more ready to sew plus new clothes. I was lucky with a couple of charity shop trawls that found me some lovely dresses with sparkly sequinned tulles over ‘satin’ linings. The lining is great for making pantaloons and knickerbockers. One had a feather trim used for the feather hat above. Loads left. Of everything.

Also working out a crochet pattern to make a ballet wrap cardi (sadly using the last of my souki gold dust yarn – discontinued and can’t get old stock for love nor money) and a big flouncy tutu to set it all off.

Something I’ve not been able to get hold of are the wooden and hardboard boxes of easy peelers… they lend themselves to becoming a beautiful beds for winter hares with space around for small pretty packages. It’s become a bit of a mission to find then transform one.

Managed to finish off the baby blanket and hat for the local animal shelter charity shop. The pattern was fab. It was full of bobbles, shells and Biba windows (that’s my name for them cos they very loosely remind me of the Biba logo:

(bloody Foxtrot Oscar autocorrect… Biba to Boba twice now!)

When you’re crocheting biggish projects, a little variety in the stitches keeps it interesting and this pattern had that. The shop wants it after Christmas to put on their FB auction.

Even bought a gorgeous gift bag to sell it in; sets it off beautifully:

Who wouldn’t want to welcome a new baby with a ‘Guess How Much I Love You’ gift bag? Perfect.

My biggest happy moment recently was finding the Dr Marten brogues that Amazon cancelled the night before they were due to be delivered. Not from Amazon, obviously, but the DM shop itself. Not only were they in stock but cheaper and arriving on Monday. Marvellous. Really made up about that.

Challenging myself to make gingerbread and decorate with royal icing in time for the last wild and wooly meeting of the year. It’s just making the time to get down to it. I have the ingredients and adore the spicy smells in the kitchen while it’s being cooked. Delicious, warm and aromatic.

So, apart from the gingerbread, the Mary Berry Biker Boots stuffing and wrapping Monday’s brogues (can hardly wait to do that) pretty much everything that can be prepared early is done.

Looking forward to the solstice then Christmas Day.

Who Caved in?

by Irish Bees Don't Do Mondays, posted in Crochet, Uncategorized

I did. Got a Black Friday deal on the Adobe suite and am back in the Adobe fold. Sadly, There were tools that Affinity just didn’t have that clinched the decision. It’s still a great app and still does some things that beats the pants off Illustrator but it’s just not there yet. One thing Affinity does (at least for now…) is sell full programmes rather than subscriptions so the Affinity suite is still installed and can be used for its strengths when needed.

Christmas Hare
My Christmas fairy Harey is finished and looking sparkly and glam.

She’s instead of a stocking – see the gift bag? Apparently, there is something small but lovely for me for Christmas…. oooh! Don’t you just love waiting for the big day??!

Amazon … bleh. Ordered a pair of Dr Marten brogues (weirdly described as trainers) for Himself a couple of months ago. Despite not being available until between Nov 22 to 29, Amazon took full payment. Queried this as it wasn’t their normal practice but apparently, IS their new normal now. Okey Dokey.

But, come the evening of the Nov 21st, Amazon say they shoes can’t be shipped and they’ve cancelled the order. Got a refund a day or so later so no money lost. Just not a great customer experience and pi**ed off cos the shoes are gorgeous and would have made a brilliant present.

Fairy

Back to fairyland. As always, having made one, better ways of doing some things became apparent so have modified the template and am making a smaller one as a tree dec to trial my ‘improvements’. Making the first one was actually a lot of fun and really enjoyed it.

Can’t believe Christmas is just a few weeks away. We’re putting the tree up on the first and looking forward to decorating with some gorgeous new decorations. The Animal Shelter bazaar is this Sunday, as well, so will be attending.

Baby Blanket and Hat

The crocheted baby blanket is some seven rows from the finish. Matching baby hat is ready, complete with pom-pom. This is for the animal shelter bazaar if I can just get on with it but am being pulled In a few different directions at the moment. Fingers crossed. If not, they’ll auction it on their Facebook page before Christmas.

TK Maxx had some adorable ‘Guess how much I love you’ gift bags and I already had matching tissue paper just perfect for the baby blanket. Will make a lovely present for a new mum and baby for Christmas.

The Moffymakes Etsy shop is not getting a tickle or a tit. Not an admirer, let alone a sale. The high prices might be off-putting but the yarn is very expensive. The baby blanket being donated to the shelter is much, much cheaper.

Do I care? Not really. Am as stressed as Charlie about it:

Gracie is nearly as upset:

Anyway, the time to marzipan the cake is near! The cake smells very heady and alcoholic…lush! Christmas is wonderful and am excited, as usual, for its coming.

Life goes on

by Irish Bees Don't Do Mondays, posted in Chatting, Crochet, Sewing

And all is good.

Christmas is looming and still gives me thrills. So, am loving all things Christmas related. There are two Christmas cakes (fruity fruity!) being given a weekly dose of brandy feed in the traditional poke-it-with-a-knitting-needle-and-pour-a-good-capful-of-brandy-all-over-the-top kind of way. The plan is to keep one for Easter but we’ll see how that goes.

Also making a Tilda hare Christmas angel. Tilda hares are my favourite Tilda make. Made a few some year’s back so am giving one a makeover and making a new one.

Gathering shiny trimmings is glorious. Amazon delivered a spool of white Tulle; plan is to make a tutu gathered around the tulle rose trim in the pic. Amazon also delivered a spool of really shiny gold metallic twine. Thinking about potential with the sewing machine cording foot on the wings.

Stuffed and ready for stitching together.

Using haemostats to grip and push the stuffing into the little spaces makes the tedious job of stuffing a little less laborious and boring.

Last Christmas I got a box of wool felt pieces, perfect to cut some wings from. Tried out a few ideas… metallic thread with inbuilt decorative stitches (hard to follow a path as the stitches are somewhat unpredictable (as in the needle moves forward, forward, back, side, middle, other side, middle, forward, forward or some other variation). Tried the cording foot with some gold thread. Tried Angelina Fibre. Not hugely happy with the results:

Have some other ideas to have a go at… and more felt… so will maybe have a play later today.

Have been busy with other things that have gone much better. Made this little fella for the local Shoebox Appeal:

Sweet little fella! Hope some little one somewhere loves him to bits when he gets shipped off for Christmas.

A lady at the Wild and Woolies crochet group is organising the appeal locally. Not that Wild and Woolies is our crochet group’s official name – It’s what I call it.

Another lady there makes hats and blankets for the neonatal unit in Crumlin hospital. I’m just working on a baby blanket to donate. The hat is already finished:

The blanket is about three-quarters done.

Delighted with myself for spotting what I think is a beeaauuttiful pottery teapot in a charity shop. It was twenty euro so not a cheapy-cheap find but worth every cent.

I did a Google Reverse Image on it; apparently it’s a Mucros pottery from Killarney. Why would anybody give this away??!! Am now looking at a Honey and Blue teaset from the pottery shop… The shipping would be expensive but so would the cost of fuel, tolls and, no doubt, parking if I went there by car … hmmm

Beautiful but a bit bonkers is the new lightbulb in the lounge lamp:

It’s Colour-Me-Happy and I love it.

Finally, must finish a vintage cross-stitch embroidery initial:

It’s to be framed and is a present for somebody I’m visiting next weekend. Nearly done.

It is done. Unpicked yhe blue flower and the scrappy leafy things and restitched them.

It needs a press, I didn’t hoop, you see. I didn’t want to. Then sort a frame out. I have a wooden one that is perfect. Needs a colour wash and maybe a dry brush of gold acrylic to lightly szuzh it up.

That’s a job for later on.

Love my life! Me and my fab shoes are off out later, DMs if it’s wet, (new and gorgeous) shoes if it manages to stay dry!

Be happy and smile from the heart.

Five Stars

by Irish Bees Don't Do Mondays, posted in Uncategorized

Tried Mary Berry’s Very Best Fudge Cake…

The fudge ganache is freshly poured in the pic so still looks shiny but it dried down to a gorgeous matt colour. It’s very rich but every bite is full of flavour. Am giving it five stars (or the 5 arse inches rating in every slice).

Made two small Christmas cakes and have poked them with a knitting needle and started the weekly brandy feed. Got a few months before they need marzipanning so they’ll be good and rich by then.

What else have I been up to? Went to see Sarah Millican at the Gaiety theatre. Third time but still makes me laugh.

Joined a crochet gang about 2 months ago and enjoy the weekly hooks ups. Pun intentional. Currently crocheting loads of little crochet granny flower squares. I drew up the symbol pattern for it (just visible in the pic) in Affinity Designer so chuffed with myself on many fronts there:

I need 99 squares. Still about 30 to go and the sheer tedium of pattern repeat has me totally demojoed. Then there’s the thought of sewing or crocheting the squares together… and crocheting a border … all very daunting.

Have two other baby blankets on the go so have other projects to pick up and alternate. My intention is to have all three done by Christmas and maybe on Etsy.

Onto yet more fresh stimuli. Have always loved art nouveau and the resurgence of Art Nouveau designs and graphics have got me going. It’s brilliant to feel passion igniting my creativity but am kind of concerned that burn out will follow. Totally self-induced. So the reference books are out on the table full of bloody gorgeous designs and an online Liz Kohler Brown ‘Make sellable graphics’ course has fired me into taking action by presenting a new challenge… can I come up with a compilation of Art Nouveau-inspired spot graphics, borders, repeat patterns, etc, etc, etc? Yes I can. With Affinity Designer, that I’m still learning. On a Mac and an iPad. The interfaces are not exactly alike, not least is not having a keyboard just ‘there’ for the shortcuts.

Let’s not leave things there. Let’s up the ante. Cross stitch patterns. Recently got a book of vintage cross stitch alphabets. Have cleaned them up digitally and created a clean grid and replicated the pattern. The grid is now a template and the design below is to fit a frame specifically for it. The available space to surround the initial with corners, borders and fillers clearly delineated so it will have some breathing space in the frame:

As you can see, there’s a lot of dead space around so have started bringing in some little graphics like the flower. So far have only got one petal converted into cross stitches… it will be a big job.

Of course, I have cross stitch books to look at for inspiration for borders and doodahs. Therein lies yet another avernus. They’ve inspired me to do another two cross stitch pictures. A sampler… to be designed first (why keep things simple?!) and a gorgeous design from an Emma Congdon book.

On top of all this is the 30 day Glyphs trial. Make your own fonts with Glyphs. Am keen. It’s right up my street and Skill Share have a course on making fonts with Glyphs. I’m on it.

Let’s not forget the sketchbook club… or a big bit of serious academic work… year 2. Did finish a one-years remote art therapy diploma so have that under my belt. Doesn’t mean the list of to-dos gets any shorter.

My plate is overflowing and I need at least two new sets of teeth for the biting off more than I can bite, let alone, chew. The feeling of what is set out for me to do is overwhelming yet I WANT to do them all.

Some minor setbacks along the way are to be expected. Remember that pic of the crochet squares above? Charlie thinks it’s a very good box for a chap to grab some shut eye in. He’s having a groom and getting his pyjamas on as I type.

Groan 🙂

After all these years…

by Irish Bees Don't Do Mondays, posted in Uncategorized

Been using Photoshop, Illustrator and InDesign for over 20 years. Admittedly, I did get cracked copies and was very much a pirate in the early days until I became proficient and loved them. Then I bought the programmes. But, my love affair with the suite finally came to an end and I kissed goodbye to the ever-flakier and capricious software just last week. The Adobe suite licence came up for renewal and I cancelled all but After Effects. Adobe had p*ssed me off once too often a few months ago and that’s when I bought the Affinity suite. Is Affinity awesome? Nearly. It needs a lasso tool and the curve layers… so, so many get generated. Gah.

I’ve been working on a collection of art nouveau spot graphics and other elements using Procreate on an iPad. Trouble is, the graphics need to be vectorised. Inkscape trace works well enough. There’s Adobe Capture (free) but is also a bit of a PITA. Then they need to be taken into Affinity Designer. AD then presents a list of Curve layers a mile long. Grouping elements together takes forever. There has to be a better way. So, awesome? Nah. Is Illustrator? Nah with knobs on. Caught somewhat in the devil’s bargain, but there you go.

I’ve also got myself onto a Blender course and given myself a year to see if I can live without AE as well. Love After Effects. Dear God. It’s like crack cocaine.

So, depending on how it goes, I might go back to Adobe or I might not. A year will give me time to decide.

Meanwhile, scammers are just everywhere. Like herpes! I posted something on Done Deal and within minutes had two messages saying they were interested in the ‘item’ I’d posted and could they talk to me on WA. Apparently, this is a known scam strategy… get you off the DD private messaging… then what they do if they’re successful I have no clue. Both got refused and blocked.

Then listed some crocheted baby things on Moffymakes

Within 5 minutes got a message to say my account had been blocked, please contact the Etsy security team… but , amazingly *ahem* was able to carry on happily listing a few other things…

followed by another message asking me to contact the Etsy support team… apparently, a potential buyer tried to make a payment but their payment couldn’t get through… please contact Etsy to verify my banking information …

Both reported and blocked. Very annoying.

They give me a sore head.

Go stick the boot in, Ted!

Found a fabulous vintage collection of cross stitch alphabets on the Gutenberg site. Pretty crappy state but cleaned them up and can use them fairly easily:

The set above still need cleaning up but have two sets done already and tried out a pattern:

Also very excited to have a book of Art Nouveau cross stitch on its way from a private seller on Amazon so not new, but seeing as the book is out of print, I don’t care. Just loving the potential.

Lots to be busy with. Sketch book group, crochet group (several crochet projects on the go… ), academic work, digital artwork, motion graphics and planning on some Tilda sewing before Christmas as well.

Oh, also trying out Glyphs – font making software. Free trial for 30 days (I think) then decision time. It’s 300 euro so not cheap but have a course on Skill Share on font making with Glyphs so worth taking a deep dive before parting with a substantial chunk of change. Bottom line is no chance of getting bored.

Posted the Call the Midwife blanket (above) on Moffymakes. Not sure if I want to part with it… we’ll see if it or anything gets bought. The traffic on Etsy is immense. Listings are only something like 36c a month (though you have to pay 17 euro to register) so costs are fairly minimal. It’s the online equivalent of stack ’em high, sell ’em cheap. My site will probably never get noticed.

Sounds like I’m full of gloom and despondency but am pretty sanguine. Once it’s listed, it’s put away and forgotten. I’d like to get enough to be able to donate a nice lump to the KWSPCA so fingers crossed.