The Salinas Slut

I started this doll because I did not have any projects on deck.  As with the other dolls I have made, I get to the face, add the eyes and then loose interest, so she has spent the last 3 months kicking around the house and showing up in various places with out a mouth to voice any protests.  Pour thing.  She has been stripped naked, drug around by the dogs, and posed and photographed in inappropriate positions.  She has been through hell-Kinda reminds me of my childhood.  So we are having a couple of young-ins come to visit this week so I thought I would finish her up and send her off to a respectable family.  Here is her final portraits all 'dolled up'.

Crocheted Sun Visor for Nissan Versa

Every morning on my drive home I fight (unsuccessfully) to keep the sun out of my eyes.  During one of these mornings I came up with a wonderful idea to crochet a visor that goes the length of the windshield. 

I linked up 16 motif's and added a top border.

I inserted the strip between the window and the roof panel.

It came out really cute and work just how I had hoped. 

Goals for 2011

So looking the goals I set for 2011-here is where they stand
2 Yarn Bombs---One Completed Jan 5., second completed Feb 11.

Afghan--Still working on it-2/8/12 --So not quite a failure since I did not specify that it had to be completed in 2011 right?

 
 
 
 
 

Hooded Sweater for CAL on Revelry -Start in February 2011--So didn't happen!

I think I used the yarn for this project on the afghan.

A purse a month --Not quite. 

Here is what I did manage to get done in this category

Hairpin clutch.                                                                     Credit Card Case.

 

Made from Lion brand Amazing. 



Fat Bottom Bag-Made for swap                             





Doily baby blanket

A friend had made this blanket from a doily pattern and I just had to copy it.
The Pattern is the Exceptional Doily by Mary Werst.  The original pattern is meant to be a 13" doily. 
I used the entire skein of pound of love and had just enough to finish! I wish there had been enough left to do a fancy boarder. The finished size is around 40 inches. This blanket took about 7 hours start to finish. I love the way it worked up.  I am going to make one in blue, using a smaller hook size- Hopefully this will make the finished piece a bit smaller and leave enough yarn for nice edge.
I do believe that this will be my go-to baby blanket.  It was very well received at the baby shower (as told by my S.I.L.-I could not attend due to work).

I also made these hats.  They are the Baby Flapper Hat.

 

Tea Time

I have come up with a tea cozy for my tea pot. 

The bottom is the African flower pattern.  I actually followed the directions and worked the correct number of stitches.  I did change the HDC to DC and the SC to HDC to make the flower larger.

The rest was word vertically with a seed stitch.

I added a button and a loop to keep it on the pot.

As usual I used Simply Soft Yarn.  This is a quick and easy project to work up, It only took a couple of hours.  I think I need to go buy more tea pots so I can make more cozies!  I love seeing all the cute tea cozy people have crocheted.  My favorites are the ones loaded with flowers and textures.

Fingerless Gloves

These are my first creations using broomstick lace.  It is a simple technique that works up quickly.  This is a four strand loop.  The only draw back using it with fingerless gloves is that there is not alot of stretch to the stitch-or maybe it is the way I make it.  I will play with it some more and see what I come up with.

My first shrug

This is a shrug that I crocheted. The stitch is a simple shell design, here is a rough diagram.

While I am not wild about the fit, it is not bad for my first time and without a pattern. 

 I used Red Heart Soft in Grape.  I really like the feel of the yarn, especially compared to the super saver, however, when you consider how much you get for the price I feel that either Caron Simply Soft or Lion Brand POL are the more economic way to go.

January Purse

I found this pic on a blog (can't remember which one).

I fell in love with this purse and had to make one.  There was not a pattern so I just kind of made it up as I went along.  I actually started to write out a pattern for it, but my ADD kicked in and that never got finished!

The purse itself only took a few days to work up.  The liner I had some challenges with.  I wanted to make sure it was real stiff since the purse was not.  I used 3 layers of fusible webbing on each side.  On the bottom I used fusible webbing on the lining and also added a piece of plastic cut into an oval to make the bottom very firm.

Here is what I came up with.



Ultimate Sweater Machine

When I am learning something new, be it for work or play,  for some reason I can not just be happy learning as it is taught, or mastering each step before moving on to the next part.  Noooo, I have to jump ahead, make a mess, cuss, get mad, ruin some yarn, cuss, eventually throw something, possible break something, cuss, walk away and come back in an hour or so, go back to the beginning and then follow the steps correctly.  I do this with almost everything I do.  Sometimes I am able to figure it out when I jump ahead, but this was not one of those times. 
Last November I purchased an Ultimate Sweater Machine.  I wanted this to mass produce pieces for yarn bombing and I have to tell you-it is great!  I am not a knitter. I can knit basic stitches, but I am definatly crochet dominate.  I highly recomend this machine!  It took some time to work out the kinks (I refer you back to the opening paragraph).  Once I got going I was able to bang out some knit in record time.  Most of the items from the Yarn Bomb post were done on this machine.  All in all it took about an hour or so to realy develope the correct tensinion and presure to get it flowing smothly.  I have done some intarsia and one beanie.  This is my first pass at making a cable stitch.  I made a small swatch and then used it as a cozy for my water bottle.

I have made a lot of pieces.  I will post pics of all of them just before the yarn bomb.

Scaled Wrist Warmers

Here are some wrist warmers that I made.  The cuffs are done in a scalop stitch.  There were crocheted with Caron Simply Soft Yarn.  They were fun and quick to work up.

Starling Bag

Here is my Starling Bag. I realy like the way it came out. It was quick to work up and easy to line. It was crocheted with Peaches and Cream Cotton Yarn.  I think I will try another one using some acrylic yarn (I hate working with cotton). To find the pattern click here.

My First Yarn Bomb!

At my place of employment, there are a few of us who like a good practical joke every now and again.  A few weeks ago one co-worker (we will call her #1) played a joke on another co-worker (we will call him #2) by placing severed body parts (plastic of course) in his locker.  #2 assumed that I was the one who did this-I have no idea why..........so he decided to do this-

Very clever!  Quite a surprise to start my work day.  No these were not gifts, they are my items that were in my locker.  Quite Funny!

After some careful consideration I formulated a follow up prank.  I am a fan of yarn bombing and have been wanting to get my feet wet with a yarn bomb for a while now.  So off to the knitting machine I went.  After a few days and lots of Red Heart Yarn I was ready. 

Here is the state I found his locker in at the beginning of my shift

After about 5 hours of stitching, yarn stretching and accessorizing  his locker now looks like this

Here are some detail pics










I would be Leah.










I win!!