Fun with photos

While I was planning to buy a new camera, one of the options that existed on the more expensive cameras I looked at (but didn't buy) was a gadget that meant you could obtain a black and white photo with just a bit of colour. For example, one red strawberry....

or why not one pink bunny...

Well as you can see, I didn't need the more expensive camera. I found PicMonkey!

Abby on While She Naps has a great tutorial on how to achieve these fun effects. Enjoy!

Squares and stripes

As usual, I've got lots of projects on the go. Sometimes, however, I just feel like doing something new and actually finish it! That's what happened with this pink/purple square in granny stripes. I was looking through my stash and thought "hmm, these colours look nice together", and started a granny stripes square without really knowing where it was going to lead. I still don't really know what to do with it, but it's finished! It's 21 cms square and I just love it. Don't ask me why, maybe it's the colours or the texture, probably both. At the moment it's on my table being admired.

The other week I bought some lovely grey bobbly yarn in a sale, thinking I could make a cute amigurmi mouse out of it. But the sheer bobbliness of it made that impossible. It was very diffcult to use with a small hook, and any increasing or decreasing was practically invisible. So I got out my 4.5 mm hook and started to make simple sc squares. The texture of them makes a very effective washing up cloth, and with the ball of yarn I managed to make four. Yes, I know it sounds extremely boring, but this means we will spend less money on the expensive washing up sponges we've used until now. My little cloths are very kind to the  crockery but they have enough friction in them to actually remove the dirt, and they're machine washable too.

That's the wonderful thing about crochet, you can very easily just rustle something up without any special material, and even without a pattern. Bye for now!  

Little shoes in little boxes

More about these down below...

Well our weather has cooled down a bit this week - not a bad thing in my opinion. Of course everyone likes to have an early summer with deliciously warm temperatures, but it seems to have sprung from winter straight into summer without passing by spring. My strawberry plants are still thriving. There are some little green strawberries on them now, but with the cooler weather, I need to find a way to protect them from the damp soil. I remember my dad used to use straw, but I don't have any straw! I'm wondering if there's anything recyclable that would do the job. Any ideas? In the meantime I took this photo a couple of days ago when it was still very sunny - I think they look lovely from this angle. Tomorrow we're planning to buy some cherry tomato plants to put in some bigger pots on the balcony, despite the cooler weather.

Today I went into the chic shop I got past every day on my way to work and showed the shop owner my rainbow sandals. It was a bit late in the day so we didn't have time to talk for long, but she admired the little shoes and we've agreed that I should pass by another day and discuss what she can do for me. She's also going to advise me of the cost and has kind of offered to put them on display in her shop, and give people details of how to buy or order a pair directly from me. Wasn't that nice of her?

I have made another pair of these baby shoes - this time with organic cotton yarn. It's a bit thicker than my usual Catania yarn, so even though I used the same size hook, the finished shoes are a little bit bigger.  They're for my friend's baby boy who is four months old.

Following a question in the comments, I've taken a few (not very good quality) photos of how I make the strap. I hope this will make it a bit clearer.

First of all, make 18 ch (and when you join the other colour, do it more carefully than I did!)

Then dc back up the chain, and onto the heel of the shoe, until the marker

When you get to the marked stitch, work another 18 ch

Then dc back towards the shoe and attach the yarn to the base of the dc remaining on the heel

Now you just need to weave in the ends and add buttons and hey, presto!

I have a very old stash of children's magazines in French that my middle daughter was subscribed to when she was about six. For a while now I've been wondering what I could do with them, and then early this morning I had a brainwave! My initial plan was to use them to cover boxes I would make with old cereal boxes. But that would mean lots of measuring and cutting out and gluing and it seemed far too much like hard work. This morning's brainwave was a single word - ORIGAMI! And look at what I came up with:

The origami pattern I found is so, so easy. Since I made the box in the photos I've made two more. It would be more accurate to say I've made six boxes, actually, as you need two boxes when you count the lid, each of which is made separately. The pattern is the same, you just make the lid a bit bigger by starting off with a bigger square. Here's the page I chose (the video is especially useful), but if you just type origami box in any search engine you'll get lots of examples. The ones I've make with my comic book pages is just the right size for the baby shoes, so I'll be able to send them to my friend in their very own box. Cost of box - nothing at all, and it's recyclable. Oh and I forgot to mention that my wrist is a lot better. Happy, happy, happy.

Salvage, recover, recycle

This week I came back from a short and very enjoyable visit to the UK. It was lovely to see everyone and to give my little crochet gifts to the children. After the wind and rain that fell upon me for (almost) all the time I was in good old Blighty, it felt decidedly spring-like when I got back. Here's the gorgeous view of Mont Blanc that I had from the plane on the way down:

Beautiful, isn't it? Mont Blanc is so majestic and I feel so privileged to see it almost every day from our bedroom window (depending on how cloudy the sky is). But the view from the plane was really something special.
Well, it felt so spring-like and bright that as soon as the weekend allowed it, I started to spring-clean our flat.
I have inherited the hoarding gene from my mother's side of the family but I do try to fight it! Today I decided that the old cream handbag I bought about five years ago had actually reached the end of its life and I wouldn't be using it again. So off it went to the bin. For about five minutes. Then the salvager inside me sent me right back to get it out again.
The bag was synthetic and badly stained, and I knew I definitely wouldn't be using it again. So why, you may be asking, did I get it out of the rubbish bin? This is why:

That stained cream synthetic bag had hidden treasures! One key holder, one lovely buckle, two rectangular metal rings and a 12cm metal zipper. I reckon if I'd wanted to buy all that stuff it would have cost me quite a lot. And being a crazy crafter, I know I'll use them. The moral of this post is: Throw away what cannot be used again, but don't forget to recover and recycle all the hidden treasures first. Have a great weekend!

Lining my monster

I know that in theory, for amigurumi crochet stitches, you have to use a much smaller hook than is usually recommended for a given yarn size. The idea is that the stitches will be very close together and any stuffing will not be able to escape through the holes. The reality, however, is a different story. I recently machine washed one of my toys before giving it away and the polyester fibrefill that I had stuffed it with really did want to get out. There were little fluffy bits all over.

When I made the little ball for baby Alfie, I wanted to be sure the stuffing wouldn't escape, so I enclosed it in the end of a nylon stocking. The result is great. It was easy because it is just a round ball shape, so no need to deal with fiddly small limbs.

I'm in the middle of two projects at the moment, and I've decided to line them too. One of them is almost finished so I should be posting it in the next day or two. Lining it not only helps for washing, it also means that when you're finishing off, your hook doesn't get mixed up with the fibrefill. So good news all round. Yes, you do have to make the lining and sew it up too, but it really is worth it.

Any experience with lining or not, and are there any disadvantages with lining that I've not thought about?

Recycling

I have quite a stash of yarn and I must admit I often give in to temptation when I see beautiful yarn reduced in the sales. I recently picked up some orange and yellow yarn and hopefully you'll eventually see what I made with it. At the same shop I bought a new bag of polyester stuffing, but when I got hope I started to think about recycling.

I try to recycle lots of things. The plastic bags that the organic sliced bread we eat comes in are used again and again, I even take paper bags with me when I go shopping to avoid using new ones. I do keep things that "might come in useful" and they often do eventually. Today I bought a beautiful skirt in the sales but it's slightly transparent. I don't own an underskirt, but I had kept an old black viscose skirt whose waistband had gone loose and that had become very thin and soft, but that I couldn't bring myself to throw away. So I cut off the old waistband, and turned a hem in the top of it, thread through a piece of elastic and voilà I have a recycled underskirt!

I also own lots of polyester scarves, some of which are worn out too so I've cut them into small pieces and will be using them as stuffing for a future amigurumi project. I'm sure it's also possible to recycle yarn but I don't have any old jumpers to unthread so I'll make my way through my stash first. Do any of you have further recyling ideas?