Granny Craft #1--Handy Notepad Holder

What kitchen is complete without one of these handy dandy notepad holders????  This is the original pattern courtesy of Annie's Pattern Club, copyright 1983:

 I had initially tried to stay true to the pattern, and do the adorable little strawberries and flower...but my craft ADD kicked in big time and I felt rushed to finish it so that it wouldn't be added to my ever increasing WIP pile!  (Only made worse by the huge influx of fabulous patterns and books!!!)  This is my modern take on the little memo pad holder:

At first I thought it was really awful, but now that I've given it a flower with a vintage button center, I'm quite liking it and considering making another or two in more modern/prettier colors.
Well, what do you you guys think???

Crafty Fridays

About two years ago, my sister and I started having Crafty Fridays.  I pack up a bag of crafty supplies and my two older kiddos and invade lanikins' house.  The kids run wild while she and I laugh hard and work on our current projects, and occasionally even finish something!  Two weeks ago, she painted this for me to use as a model for my hats:

Such an upgrade from a boring styrofoam head!  My kids think its creepy but I love it!

So this Crafty Friday, I had a plan to attempt the PDQ hat from the book The Happy Hooker, which I recently received in a personal swap with redflags from Craftster (you rock!)  Its a nice basic, beginner hat. Looks simple enough, no?

 I quickly realized that something wasn't right, following the instructions as written, this hat was turning out to be pretty tiny, so I frogged it and started over with a hook two sizes larger than indicated.  (yes, I do have a pretty huge head).  Changing the hook size definitely made it big enough to fit around my huge dome, but by the time I got to finishing the flaps I realized the dang thing was too short to cover even a little bit of my forehead.  I started adding rounds and boy did that screw it up royally!  There were lots of giggles and jokes about knights and even the Gordon's Fisherman...but was it awful.  Can't even bring myself to post a picture of it!
So, there will be no "results" photo this week from Crafty Friday.  ;(  I did spend Saturday night playing with the pattern a bit and came up with this, which will not be modeled by my lovely styrofoam head (who remains unnamed, suggestions?), since my head is much bigger than hers and it looks silly.

Now that I've got this whole "hat thing" out of my system, I've decided I will spend my Sunday digging into those granny craft patterns!

Viva Craftster!

Today I would like to take a moment to sing the praises of craftster.org.  My super cool and major talented sister Lanikins nagged me for quite a while to check it out, telling me how much fun it is to see people our age doing crafty stuff just like she and I have been doing every Friday night for the last couple of years.

This wonderful site and all the wonderful projects and people involved have been such an inspiration to me!  Everyone there is so friendly, talented, kind, encouraging and willing to share ideas, tutorials, and the like.  Organized craft swaps through Craftster have been one of the most fun things I've participated in since becoming a boring stay at home mommy ;)  Plus, I met my awesome friend Emma there, which I'm so thankful for!  (As a matter of fact, she's the one talked me into this whole bloggy-thingy!)

So I've been a little "swap happy" this month, despite telling myself I would back off the swaps a bit after all of my holiday crafting madness.  Two of them were supply swaps, which I keep telling myself will help me de-stash, even though we're really just trading a box of stuff for another box of stuff!  This week I received a fantastic box stuffed full of crochet pattern books, magazines and leaflets from the 70's and 80's...SCORE!!!  I've had so much fun flipping through them, flagging pages like crazy, and have even started two giggle-worthy "granny crafts" (stay tuned!)

Future postings will likely be pictures of finished projects done for Craftster swaps, as I really enjoy making things with someone's specific likes and tastes in mind and seems to be an added bonus when I like it so much I'm tempted to keep it for myself!  I'm currently working on some paper crafts that I'm really happy about, and will share soon (gotta wait for them to find their new homes first!)  AND since I've received all these wonderful craft books in swaps, Lanikins and I have some Friday fun times ahead!

Tink

My youngest, Babygirl, is thoroughly obsessed with Tinkerbell.  I have no idea how many times she has watched "Tinkerbell and the Lost Treasure"...she quotes it, sings the songs, and "turns red" when she gets mad just like Tink.  Fantastic to watch her hold her breath and puff out her cheeks, arms crossed, checking herself in the mirror to see if her face is turning red yet!  Needless to say, it was a very very Tinkerbell Christmas at our house, and I was determined to make her something to do with Tinkerbell.  After an attempt at an amigurumi version of the Fiesty Fairy that I wasn't happy with, I decided to go another direction.

I remembered how difficult it is to find dress up shoes that will fit a 2 1/2 year old and realized Babygirl needed slippers.   I found this great, easy to follow pattern through Ravelry http://goodknits.com/blog/toddler-slippers/ , only made a few changes on the last couple of rounds and added sparkly pom-poms and voila!  Tinkerbell slippers.

Today was the first day I was able to get her to try them on, because she is bugged by things that are "too big", which in her world usually just means she doesn't like them!  Its ok, they are a little loose, and maybe by the time her tiny feet have grown a bit she'll decide she likes them.

An Accidental Cowl

A little background:  I seem to be on a never-ending quest for a great lacy scarf pattern.  I've tried all different weights of yarn, different sized hooks, even tried to create my own pattern for a change.  I have lost count of how many I have given up on or frogged in frustration because they were too wide, too skinny, too lacy.

The other night I came across an irresistible sale on Lion Brand Thick and Quick and decided to give it another go.  I decided that this go-around I would go straight to the source for the perfect lacy scarf pattern and headed over to the Lion Brand Yarn website.  This one seemed to be the one, http://www.lionbrand.com/patterns/L0435F.html, even called for the super bulky yarn I had just purchased!  Set to work with enthusiasm and then about two rows in realized that this scarf was going to be way too wide, but decided to proceed, thinking maybe someone else will think its wonderful.  A couple more rows and I decided no one I know would wear a scarf this huge and decided to keep going until I ran out of yarn and sew it up the back.  I am SO happy with the results!

 I've been wearing it constantly since I finished it and think I will need to make more in different colors!

Here We Go!

Two and a half years ago, I quit my full time job that I loved very much to become a stay at home Mommy.  I would be lying if I said that I have never looked back, but I sure have embraced the change in my life!  I never realized how many little wonderful things I was missing while I was at work, like mid-day toddler giggle-fests, or just being able to be ready and waiting at the school when the end of day bell rings.

Staying home has definitely reduced the overall pace of my day, which has actually given me time to remember the kinds of things I like to do for me.  I have always liked crafty-type stuff, but always had very little time to do it.  So as the days passed, slowly the art and craft supplies started coming out of storage, and little by little, I realized that I really, really enjoy making stuff. 

Now that it finally feels like winter here in Colorado, and the hectic Holiday Season is over, I am looking forward to staying in and getting some good old fashioned "granny crafts" completed!