Tag Archives: craft

New website!

Hello everyone!

It has been a while since I last wrote directly on this blog, a lot of things have been happening in the background. I have still been crafting a lot but I have decided to take my crochet patterns to the next level by starting a business! I’m super excited and a little scared about this new venture (but mostly excited!).

A few of my designs 🥰

I will try to keep on posting here, especially about my sewing (I have some exciting updates with my hand quilt and Clark’s quiet book) but if you’d like to read more about my crochet updates, I now have a brand new website where I’ll be sharing new patterns, free patterns from other designers as well as exciting events/contests/giveaways happening around the web (mostly on Instagram and Ravelry).

I hope to see you over, and I’m looking forward to sharing about sewing here again!

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Filed under Crochet, miscellaneous

18 for 2018 – October update

Happy Monday!

I’m a bit late this month but here is my update for my yearly goals. And guess what? I’ve finally made my stitch marker!

18 letters sent to friends – 4/18
With the interstate move I would like to keep in contact with friends so I want to make the effort to send them handwritten letter throughout the year.

One more this month, I still need to print out pictures of baby Clark and send them to friends overseas.

17 new recipes tried – Completed in July
If you’ve been following me for a while you will know that I love cooking and baking so this should be pretty easy. Plus, the monthly bake-along will definitely help me with this one!

My MIL and I made a shepherd’s pie, and it was my first time trying her recipe, it was super yum!

16 painted units of miniatures – 5/16
My husband and I play a miniature game and one of the fun parts is to build and paint our own miniatures. I haven’t done much last year so I hope to catch up this year by painting more models.

I’ve had no time to paint this month, I prioritised crochet instead!

15 books read – 9/15
I’ve decided to tune down this goal from last year, as I don’t have a lot of time to read. But I feel like 15 would be a good number to reach this year.

One more book, I’ve finished ‘Your baby and child’ from Penelope Leach. It was a nice read and I’ll probably go back to it as Clark grows older.

14 mitered squares added to my memory blanket – 5/14
I have started a knitted memory blanket using my scraps of yarn from previous projects (mostly socks) and I’d like to see it grow this year.

None this month.

13 batches of baked goodsmade and eaten – Completed in August
Again, with the bake-along this should be quite easy to accomplish!

I’ve made banana bread and peanut butter cookies this month.

12 pairs of socks – 4/12
We have real winters in Melbourne, so hubby and I will definitely need new socks, I thought one per month was a manageable goal.

No new socks this month.

11 new stitch markers made – Completed in October
I have been playing with shrinking plastic lately and I’d like to make new stitch markers using some cute drawings.

You guys! I’ve made it!!! I used different finishes, some rings to fit on knitting needles and clasps for crochet.

10 new movies seen – Completed in May
We go to the movies almost every week, so I think this goal will be easy to reach, but it will give me a change to blog about movies I see a bit more.

We went to see Venom this month.

9 amigurumi made – 7/9
I obviously love amigurumi enough to design some! I want to precise that those 9 amigurumi will be from other designers, I might even participate in another ami-along.

I’ve made a cute little jellyfish for a friend’s baby.

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8 months cross-stitched on the snowflower diaries calendar – 2/8
This did not get worked on at all last year, so I’d like to finish it this year.

No cross stitch this month again.

7 games of 40k played with hubby – Completed in September
The good thing with painting miniatures is that I will definitely want to play more (I’m hoping anyway) and this will definitely be a fun activity to do with my husband.

We’ve played some more model games with hubby and his best friend who visited us.

6 new designs published – 3/6 
As you know I already have two new designs that I need to write up and publish. I have also started on a knitted shawl design using the beautiful yarn I got in NZ. Very excited about this one!

I’m currently working on writing up Nate the Narwhal’s pattern and I’m also working on a design for the amigurumi.net yearly contest.

5 k steps walked every day – 7/31
I changed this goal. I am still trying to keep moving during my pregnancy to not transform into a couch potato! Hopefully this will help me keep healthy despite the weight gain.

Still not great last month but I’ve now recovered okay so I should do better in November.

4 LOTR squares finished – 2/4
Yes I know I’ve been making this for ages but 2018 is the year I get it finished!

Definitely been working on a square but I don’t have enough time it would seen to actually finish it!

3 jumpers knitted – 1/3
Similarly to the need for socks, I will need more jumpers this year! I already have the yarn and a pattern for my first jumper so I’m hoping this goes smoothly.

Almost finished the first sleeve on my second jumper, getting there. 

2 getaway trips – Completed in July
We are trying to save money for a house deposit this year, but I’d still like to get a couple weekends away with hubby. We already have one planned, we will be going to the Bendigo sheep and wool show in July

1 thesis submitted – Completed in June
I’m so keen to finish my PhD, so this is definitely my n°1 goal this year!

And that’s it! Have a great week!

Emma

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Filed under miscellaneous, WIP, Work in progress

WIP – Orbit the Dragon

Happy Monday readers!

I’m sorry I didn’t post progress shot earlier but I have been madly crocheting on my two dragons, hoping to finish them before the end of the month. Which means that I got my missing yarn last week, hurray!

I finished part two for both dragons on Friday and there were already a lot of parts! I do love how colourful they all look though.

And today, I finished part 3, which means that I only have the assembly left! I’m very excited to get both of those finished but I’m dreading all those small parts to sew on, especially as I intend to have those as baby toys, so everything needs to be extra secure.

I’ve been really enjoying making those, they are going to be so cute!

On other unrelated news, I just got informed that yesterday was my blog’s anniversary! I can’t believe that 3 years have passed already, and I really wanted to thank you, all my blogging friends, for still being here and being so amazing ❤️

I wish you all a great week

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Filed under CAL, Crochet, WIP, Work in progress

Finished socks

Happy Monday lovely readers!

I hope you’ve had a great weekend filled with good food and craft. I just realised that I forgot to share my last two pairs of socks with you.

My husband’s Aunty recently contacted me and asked if I could make her and her husband a pair of socks each. Considering I’ve been way behind with my sock knitting goal and that I knew I was going to see her when I went to Brisbane, I thought it would be a great challenge. What I learnt from that is that I can indeed knit a pair of vanilla socks in a week, but I would probably not do that again as I didn’t have any time to do other craft during this time.

This pair was for her, as she mentioned she liked the blue colour but didn’t want very dark colours mixed in. This was a breeze to work with and went quite fast as it was a size 9.

A bit more tricky, these were size 13 and seemed to take forever but I really liked finishing them, especially considering I managed to match them quite well!

My next pair might be a pair for baby, I need to see if I can still use my DPNs, which I haven’t used since I’ve discovered I could knit socks on short circulars. I think I might also not bother with a heel, and just make him tube socks that would hopefully last him a bit longer.

I hope you all have a wonderful week!

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Filed under Knitting

FO Friday – Aragorn square

Happy Friday everyone!

I have exciting news, my thesis is due on Sunday but I have started the submission process today so I am officially done writing my thesis! It is really a great feeling and I’m so glad it’s done.

But of course you’re here for the crafty bits and I also have something quite exciting to share. Slowly but surely I am tackling the end of the LOTR blanket this year, and I have finished another square, Aragorn!

This means I only have 2 more squares to go before I can join my blanket. After over 2 years in the making I’m almost going to be as happy to finish it than I am to finish my thesis!

I have had issues staying motivated for such a long project, which is a shame because I love graphs and I would love to make more in the future. Do you have a secret to stay motivated on huge projects?

Have a great weekend!

15 Comments

Filed under CAL, Crochet

A parliament of owls

Hello lovely readers!

I have decided I would like to make some handmade gifts for our baby shower coming up in July, to thank our friends and family for coming. I have decided on little amigurumi keyring using a free owl ornament pattern from Josephine Wu. I just love how cute those look and they are quite easy and fast to make. Which is great, considering we are planning on inviting lots of people!

I have completed one so far but I’ve crocheted a few more, which need to be stuffed and have eyes and beaks added. So far I’ve decided to glue the felt on but I might secure the pieces with some extra embroidery if I have time.

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Hubby and I have decided to use a whole heap of colours and I think I’ll hang them on branches on the day for some extra decorations before people take them home 😊

Have you hand made small gifts for people to take home after a party? Did you feel like people appreciated? I’d love to know what your thoughts are on this!

Emma

36 Comments

Filed under Crochet, soft toys

FO Friday (slightly late) – Bibs

Hello everyone and happy weekend!

I was meant to post this yesterday evening but I got home from work and was completely knackered so I couldn’t be bothered. I do think it is time to share though!

You may have noticed that I’ve been pretty inconsistent over the past few months in my posting and I’m my following of your blogs. I’ve been busy, true, but that’s not entirely all there is to it. I’m super excited to annonce to you that I’m pregnant with my fist baby! I’m now four months in, and starting to regain some more energy, so I think I will be crafting more and posting back on my regular schedule.

Of course, as soon as I found out I knew I had to make something straight away. I turned to Pinterest as I often do and found a very good tutorial to make bibs. I’ve already got warned by my family and my in laws that babies drool… a lot! And that you need long bibs so this pattern was perfect. I’ve set out to make plenty of bibs in cute fabrics (I’ve bought a few different patterns with animals on them). I don’t know the gender yet so I’ve just been getting gender neutral ones so far. I also had some stashed fabric in pink that I’ve used and I figured that it wouldn’t really matter even if it was a boy, because they’ll spend most time in the washing anyway, right?

Anyway, after much rambling, here is my first bib!

On one side the fabric is plain cotton and on the other it’s flannelette. I’ve heard they are great materials for baby items as they are soft and washable. I’ve already cut a few more and assembled a couple as well already but I forgot to take pictures before I left home so that will have to wait. I am just so excited and can not wait for baby to be here. Have an amazing weekend!

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Filed under miscellaneous, Sewing

FO – hubby socks

Happy Wednesday everyone!

I’m sorry if today’s post looks a bit weird, for some reason my computer refuses to let me write a new post so I have to write on my phone. Hopefully the format isn’t too off.

I have finally finished hubby’s socks and he was pretty pleased with that! With autumn coming up in Australia it was about time too!

I’m just so happy with how the colour matching worked out, I think they are almost perfectly aligned 😊

I think that was a good way to finish the month too, I’m looking forward to sharing my 18 for 2018 on Friday with you.

18 Comments

Filed under Knitting

Happy New Year! 18 for 2018

Happy New Year everyone!

I wish you all good health, happiness and lots of creativity for this new year and I hope that all your dreams to come true for 2018.

You may know that last year was all about change for me, with moving houses, a new job for hubby and working on my PhD from home. This year, I want it to be about growth. My hope for 2018 is to grow professionally, hopefully finding a post-doc, but also personally. I would like to grow my crochet and knitting skills and also to grow as a designer. I’ve been really encouraged by your kind words and I’m very excited for what’s to come.

Last year, I kept on seeing the 17 for 2017 goals and this year I’ve decided to join with 18 for 2018. I will keep you updated every month with how my goals are going and hopefully I make it through most of them during the year.

18 letters sent to friends
With the interstate move I would like to keep in contact with friends so I want to make the effort to send them handwritten letter throughout the year.

17 new recipes tried
If you’ve been following me for a while you will know that I love cooking and baking so this should be pretty easy. Plus, the monthly bake-along will definitely help me with this one!

16 painted units of miniatures
My husband and I play a miniature game and one of the fun parts is to build and paint our own miniatures. I haven’t done much last year so I hope to catch up this year by painting more models.

15 books read
I’ve decided to tune down this goal from last year, as I don’t have a lot of time to read. But I feel like 15 would be a good number to reach this year.

14 mitered squares added to my memory blanket
I have started a knitted memory blanket using my scraps of yarn from previous projects (mostly socks) and I’d like to see it grow this year.

13 batches of biscuits made and eaten
Again, with the bake-along this should be quite easy to accomplish!

12 pairs of socks
We have real winters in Melbourne, so hubby and I will definitely need new socks, I thought one per month was a manageable goal.

11 new stitch markers made
I have been playing with shrinking plastic lately and I’d like to make new stitch markers using some cute drawings.

10 new movies seen
We go to the movies almost every week, so I think this goal will be easy to reach, but it will give me a change to blog about movies I see a bit more.

9 amigurumi made
I obviously love amigurumi enough to design some! I want to precise that those 9 amigurumi will be from other designers, I might even participate in another ami-along.

8 months cross-stitched on the snowblower diaries calendar
This did not get worked on at all last year, so I’d like to finish it this year.

7 games of 40k played with hubby
The good thing with painting miniatures is that I will definitely want to play more (I’m hoping anyway) and this will definitely be a fun activity to do with my husband.

6 new designs published
As you know I already have two new designs that I need to write up and publish. I have also started on a knitted shawl design using the beautiful yarn I got in NZ. Very excited about this one!

5 km ran without stopping
This doesn’t seem like much but currently I can’t run more than a few minutes without having to slow down to a walk, so I’d like to be able to actually run without dying for 5 km!

4 LOTR squares finished
Yes I know I’ve been making this for ages but 2018 is the year I get it finished!

3 jumpers knitted
Similarly to the need for socks, I will need more jumpers this year! I already have the yarn and a pattern for my first jumper so I’m hoping this goes smoothly.

2 getaway trips
We are trying to save money for a house deposit this year, but I’d still like to get a couple weekends away with hubby. We already have one planned, we will be going to the Bendigo sheep and wool show in July

1 thesis submitted
I’m so keen to finish my PhD, so this is definitely my n°1 goal this year!

That’s it for me, I hope that you have your goals sorted if that’s your thing and again I wish you all an amazing year!

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Filed under miscellaneous

Cardinal bird finish

Happy Monday!

I have a finish today, yay! This is from the kit that the lovely Claire sent me for my unbirthday in July. It’s a little cardinal bird and it’s on my project bag that I am going to (eventually, in a very long time) cover in cross stitch.

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Isn’t he cute? I had a lot of fun stitching him, and because I’ve only been using one strand to stitch on this tiny canvas, I still have plenty of thread left!

Thanks again Claire, is was such a thoughtful and lovely gift ❤️

I hope you guys all have a great week!

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Filed under Embroidery