Yet Another Gift...

Here's another wool pincushion I made as a Christmas gift! (I promise, this is the last pincushion!)

Local Yarn Shop Tour 2010

This past Thursday through Sunday was the yarn shop hop in Western Washington. I participated last year, making it to 13 stores. This year, Baby Luce wasn't as excited about visiting yarn shops as I was, even though I promised to find things to make for him/her. I managed to make it to 4 on Thursday, and Tom drove me to 3 more before church on Sunday. There were a few more I would like have made it to, but they were all a significant drive. Making it to my favorite local ones ended up working well! The patterns the shops gave out this year (each shop creates a free one skein project and discounts the yarn they use) were not as impressive as last year. However, I did end up with a super cute crocheted scarf pattern to try.

I found a few projects to start working on in the near future. I'll post again as I finish them, but for now here are the ideas.

This yarn is for a little baby hat. If Baby Luce is a boy, then this hat will have to be a gift for someone else.

I've also recently started following the Spud & Chloë blog and keeping an eye out for their cute patterns and yarn. Hilltop Yarns East in Bellevue happened to have them! The yarn was even their project discounted variety. I picked out this cute polar bear pattern and some blue yarn to make the middle sized teddy out of.

Main Street Yarn in Mill Creek had quite a few samples of baby sweaters knit and displayed around their shop. One of my favorites is found in Elizabeth Zimmermann's Knitter's Almanac, which I bought for a good deal.

Lastly I found this un-spun wool at Acorn Street Yarn in Seattle. I've been looking for some for a while to use with Wool Pets, a book my sister got me for Christmas!

Wall Art

I started working on these back in the fall, and pulled them out when I was reorganizing some of the things in my craft closet last week. I used a light table to make my own embroidery patterns, traced them onto some bright scraps of fabric from random fat quarters I had, and used 5 bright colors of embroidery floss to stitch them out. That's the state in which I picked them back up. I found that I had 3 small sized canvas frames and centered and stapled them. I liked the way they looked, but thought they could still use a little more flair. I remembered seeing a pattern in a local quilt store for a flower by Heather Bailey. I'm not sure if it's the same one, but I found some rough instructions on her blog for some cute pop-up flowers. In the sticky, 80+ degree heat we've had the past week, I made 2 flowers and a little bird while watch streaming Netflix directly in front of our fan. I made rough flower and bird sketches and cut them out to use as patterns. To finish the wall hangings off, I pinned the flowers and birds through the canvas, enabling me to rearrange them if I want in the future.

Flower Assembly:

1. Cut 2 flowers from different colors of wool (felt would also work).
2. Bottom layer - Stitch around the edges of one flower with embroidery floss.
3. Top layer - Stitch around the edges, but pull a little tighter so the flower petals stand up and out.
4. Make a small sized yo-yo to layer on the top.
5. Cut various sizes and thicknesses of yarn to create loops or sprigs to layer between the top flower layer and yo-yo.
6. Stitch through all the layers to connect them. You can add buttons, beads, brads, or leave them with just the yo-yo on the top.