Still Alive Over Here!

It has been 2 whole months since I've posted in my blog.  One big reason...it's Winter Texan season!!!  For those of you who do not know, I live in an RV park and during the Dec-Mar season the park is FULL of northerners trying to get away from the cold weather...can you blame them?  So I lead several classes, including: Yoga, Aerobics, Strength Training, Belly Dance, Line Dance, Crafts, Wii Competitions and what ever else I can come up with to keep everyone active, mind and body!

So I have been VERY busy with classes!  One of my most time consuming classes is crafts.  I teach it once a week and I typically have to find the project, get supplies, test it out, get enough supplies for everyone and then teach the class. Some are fairly simple but some are soooo time consuming!  This week we made Trellis Necklaces.  So pretty, but cutting out 50 of them was tiring.

I LOVE new ideas, if you have any send them my way!!

Something I've finished in between classes....sorry about the CRAPPY pictures!

Handmade Gift Exchange Linky Party!

It's that time!!  The time where all the handmade gifts are finally in their new owners hands.  Now we all want to share our new items so we've been busy taking pictures and uploading them in a linky party!   It is so exciting to rummage through all the links and see what people have come up with.  You can browse too just visit this this link to Craftaholics Anonymous.

First I want to show you what I gave to my partner.  She loves lots of colors just like I do so I thought it would be fun to put a little spring in her kitchen during these short winter days.

A lime green Wash Blossom (dish cloth), a bright pink ChrysanthePad (hot pad or trivet) and a bright blue Scrub Bud (pot scrubber).  The wash cloth and hot pad are both made with 100% cotton.  The pot scrubber is 100% nylon and works GREAT on pots, rough feet and getting the grim off your precious tire rims!

Now for my gift! :)  My partner did great at reading between the lines of our email conversations and picked up on the fact that I teach yoga.  So she gave me a yoga mat carrier, with POCKETS!!  I think the pockets are so cool because you can fit your yoga belt, keys, lip gloss, drivers license; all together in one and head to class.  How AWESOME is that??  Check it out!

Ready for class!

Check out the pockets...ALL THE WAY AROUND!
And you can see the pretty green material on the inside...super classy.

It was a hit!

I love the colors and just the idea that it's handmade.  I mean really...who would have thought to make a yoga mat bag??  MY PARTNER, THAT'S WHO!  Kudo's to my partner Jody...best handmade, surprise gift EVER!

Have you ever participated in a gift exchange for someone you didn't know?  If not I suggest you do!

2011 Handmade Gift Exchange

This looks like so much fun!  Hurry up, sign up ends Nov 7th, 2011!!

Driving, Crocheting and the "Yart"!



New Gloves!



Initially you will wonder what this post has to do with crochet but keep reading...it's a funny story!

Joe and I have been "kinda" looking at getting a new vehicle.  My Jeep Liberty has been a great vehicle but the gas mileage is not the best.  Miss Liberty peaked over 100K miles on our last trip to Kansas.  As if by clockwork things started going wrong.  A/C not all that great...a few hail dings here and there....2 windows wouldn't roll down anymore with out a heck of a lot of duct tape...and then the clutch went out.  After a couple of months of sitting in the driveway Miss Liberty went "under the knife" and got a new clutch...yeah!  But that still didn't help with the 15mpg and we really didn't know if we could fix, rig or ignore the next problem.  "Bulldog" Joseph spent hours online looking for just the right car.  Spaceous enough for just the two of us and our cleaning gear...high mpg...economical...manual transmission.  It's the last one that seemed to get us.  Saturday we got on the motorcycle with the plan to make this huge circle through KC, Lawrence and Topeka looking at some cars we found online.  Only one of those were manual....the first one we went to.  We already knew we wanted a manual transmission so why we went there first is beyond me but by the end of the day that's the only place we went to and came away with an appointment for Monday to bring in the Jeep for a trade-in estimate.  Then the craziness began.  "Bulldog" got back on the internet and found the almost exact same car in Omaha for $3,500 less...seriously how can we not jump on that?!  We called, they offered to hold it if we'd put some money down.  This was at closing time on Saturday night, they were closed on Sunday, if we played our cards right we could be there when they opened the doors on Monday morning...so we declined to put money down.  4:30 am Monday morning we are up, do our rounds and get on the road for a 4 hour drive.  We were within an hour of arriving and Joe thought he would call and let them know, leave a message, whatever.  Surprisingly it was answered and that's when we were told the car was already being sold.  WHAT??  Well apparently someone called after hours, got ahold of a salesman that was more then willing to take their deposit to hold it until Monday.  Well CRAP!!  On to plan B...we turn around and head to KC....but if any of your live near the Nebraska, Kansas, Iowa border you know there is some river flooding going on.  Needless to say we had to go out of our way a little to get the road we needed.  We called the KC dealer and said we could be there around noon...he was busy til 3.  We decided to keep cool in the movie theater.  FINALLY we make it to the dealer, wait, go through all the appraisal stuff, wait, sign papers, wait, and GET THE KEYS!  Ya wanna know how much we got for the Jeep???  $3,500  God sure has a sense of humor!  So we are the proud owners of a Toyota Yaris.  My husband thinks we could fit in inside our F350....and it looks like a go-cart so it has been tagged as the Yart.

On to the crochet portion!!  Since we were doing all this driving (we finally got home about 7:30 pm) I had time to crochet.  I've made these gloves on a a commission project for a friend and I really like how they turned out.  When I got this tiedyed, rainbow colored yarn I thought it would be a GREAT time to make another pair.  They are available on my Etsy.com store so get them while they're hot!



The last picture of me and Miss Liberty...crocheting away!



I'm guessing they took about 7 hours to complete these~

ECU (extreme close-up) purdy colors!



Available at my Etsy shop!



Got the keys and heading out!

Yart nose...

Yart butt...

Don'tcha think it would fit inside the truck??

SEE YA!!

Wednesday is Craft Day!

Good windy afternoon!!  It was 72 degrees this morning in deep south Texas and now at nearly 5pm it is 43 degrees...seriously.  When the weather changes here it is NOT foolin' around!  The good thing is that it never lasts long, a couple of days maybe.  So today was craft day at the RV park and it made me realize it's about time that I updated my blog.

Remember this pic from a few weeks ago?  

Well this is what the Rockstar blanket looks like now.  The star is finished but I still need to come up with an edging.  I hope the new owners will like it!!



Here is a picture of one of my newest projects.  I'm doing a mock seed stitch that I think is beautifully textured.  Using the Aran yarn with the flecks of color only add to the texture...I can't wait to see how this turns out! As a finished product it will be a smock type jacket with a couple of buttons on the front.  It already feels like it will be very warm...I wish it was ready for today!!!

Don't you just love this purple!!!  I'm learning a broomstick lace technique using large knitting needles.  This will be a shawl but I can already envision so many cool things to do with this technique.

The edge of the shawl will have these pretty little flower squares to finish it off.  It looks so dainty! 

This is a sample of the craft project for today.  It has been called both Indian and Mexican Weaving, so I guess it depends on where you are from.  This is my pinwheel design but there were soooo many patterns to choose from.  I may do another pinwheel on either side in red to resemble fireworks.

In other exciting news....

I have officially joined the Crochet Guild of America.  I am really excited about this venture.  I am hoping that I will be able to carve out some time in my schedule this spring to work on their masters certificate program.  

This weekend I will be attending a bellydance workshop event called Rio Raks.  I have not had the opportunity to do much dancing this winter so I will be one sore puppy!!  But a happy puppy will be I! 

Don't forget to visit my website!!  I currently use ShopHandmade.com but am SERIOUSLY considering Etsy since it is so well known and followed better than ShopHandmade.  Does anyone else use ShopHandmade?  Etsy?  Opinions and comments welcome!!

Stay warm and be blessed!

T-Shirt No Braiding - Braided Rug

I have finally forced myself to finish my t-shirt rug I started last February. I really have no excuse as to why I just stopped but I did. Threw it along with the balls of t-shirt fabric under the couch and forgot about it...until yesterday. I was unpacking from our recent move to south Texas and found this long forgotten project under my couch. (If you are unfamiliar with RVs, I have a futon-like couch that allows me storage space underneath...not a lot of storage and not easy to get in or out of but works perfect to stuff yarn and other craft project inside...thus also working to store some of my wall hangings in the softness of the yarn while traveling.)

I taught a class on making rugs out of strips of fabric, I just chose to use my husbands old T-shirts. At the rate he goes through them I could probably make one for every RV in the park! This particular rug has 6 shirts in it. When I started this rug I wasn't blogging and didn't even thing about taking pictures and explaining how to strip a shirt so that it is all one piece and not a bunch of strips you'd then have to sew together....oh well, maybe next time!

There are so many ways to make a "braided" rug. For a traditional braid you would make thin strips then braid them together. Once you have sufficient braid you would just start to roll it into the shape you want, tacking it together with needle and thread as you go. That seemed like more work to me so I choose to crochet mine. I used the largest hook I could find, mine is a Q, and began chaining. The more chains you do the longer and skinner your rug will be, the less the shorter and fatter it will be...with the same amount of material of course. If you want it round just chain two and work an even number of single crochet (sc) into the 2nd chain from hook. Once I had my chain, I did a slip stitch (ss) into the back loop only all the way down both sides with 3 in each end for increasing purposes. And I just kept going around and around. If your work begins to curl just add a couple extra ss evenly around the piece of work and it will lay down.

Don't ever be afraid to rip something out. Yes I know you put a lot of work into it but if it's not right, and it is obvious, then it needs to be fixed! With practice you will find yourself ripping out much less often. And if you don't rip it out and fix it, every time you look at your piece all you will see is that flaw and not the beauty you created with your own two hands. Enjoy!

Blogging My Craft

So I've been reading a few blogs once in a great while but after reading the book "The Handmade Marketplace: How to Sell Your Crafts Locally, Globally, and Online", I realized that just reading blogs was not the only thing that would benefit this crochet sales endeavor. My main dilemma with selling my crafts has been keeping enough inventory to do a booth.

So you now would like to know why that is an issue. Well my husband and I started the great adventure of living in our RV full-time in 2007 and it is because of this great adventure I have the time to crochet but it is also because of this adventure that I have limited space for not only supplies but for my limited inventory. There are days that I feel I've shoved yarn in every conceivable nook and cranny I can find and am just waiting for my husband to open his sock drawer and I hear across the 32' travel trailer..."Uh...honey..." then I know I'm in trouble. AKA...time to sell some stuff! He always tells me that if something comes in the front door...somethings gotta go out the back.

OK, so back to the booth thing...not so much fun sitting in a booth all day by yourself. And to have a really GREAT booth you need GREAT props and table decorations and signs and nick knack stuff, and, and, and....did I mention the RV storage thing? So you see my dilemma. I have learned a lot from this book and one of them was that "to blog is to be"...that is if you wanna be noticed online.

I don't have a lot of items because crochet work takes time. Not all of the items I crochet are my own pattern either. If you happen to find something on my site that is your design and I have mistakenly left our your credit, it is truely that, a mistake. Believe me, I don't want to make a thousand of whatever it is you created...I traditionally make it once, maybe twice, then move on to something else. My love of crochet forces me to sell not for mere profit but for lack of space.

If you are not a crocheter but would like to commission someone to crochet something for you please contact me. If I know it is heading right out the door once I'm finished the happier I make the hubby!

I will give this blogging a try and hopefully if the stars align just right and God deems it fit this will be the start of a whole new season for Fabulously Flawed Crochet Creations!