18 for 2018 – February update

Happy Friday readers!

February is up, and it was not a very productive month for me craft wise, but on the bright side I actually got heaps of stuff done for work. So not much progress this month but hopefully I’ll be back on track in March 🙂

18 letters sent to friends – 0/18
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.

Still none this month, but I did receive a very nice card from some of my family in France that I will answer. 

17 new recipes tried – 8/17
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!

Three new recipes tried this month, some shiitake noodles (for which I completely forgot to take a picture), chocolate mousse choux and strawberry jam.

16 painted units of miniatures – 0/16
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.

Still none, as I didn’t take those up to Brisbane with me. But on the bright side I’m going to the hobby shop tomorrow with hubby to get some painting done! 

15 books read – 1/15
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.

I’ve read “Eleanor Oliphant is completely fine” by Gail Honeyman. I’ve really loved it, the story is told from the point of view of Eleonor and she is just the most interesting character. I am also currently reading “All the lights we cannot see” by Anthony Doerr and I’m really liking it so far. It’s taking place between France and Germany during WWII and I really enjoy how the book is written with switches between places and times. 

14 mitered squares added to my memory blanket – 1/14
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.

I’ve done one new square so far, yay! That brings the total of squares on this to 7 in total, so I definitely need a lot more if I want to finish it, but it’s a slow project that will probably take me years so that’s okay!

13 batches of biscuits made and eaten – 3/13
Again, with the bake-along this should be quite easy to accomplish!

Adding the choux here brings my total to 3 for the year. I’m sure I’ll make some more this month for hubby as he loves his biscuits! 

12 pairs of socks – 2/12
We have real winters in Melbourne, so hubby and I will definitely need new socks, I thought one per month was a manageable goal.

With hubby’s socks finished, I’m keeping to my goal of 1 pair a month! 

11 new stitch markers made – 0/11
I have been playing with shrinking plastic lately and I’d like to make new stitch markers using some cute drawings.

None this month but I have been drawing some plankton which I might use for this.

10 new movies seen – 4/10
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.

Only one more movie seen this month (I had to wait for hubby to watch movies when I was away) and that was Black Panther. I quite enjoyed it, I thought that the story was simple but well done and the special effects were spectacular! 

9 amigurumi made – 1/9
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.

No new one made this month but I did start to make a mini me from Kerry Lord’s “Edward’s crochet doll emporium”. I’m loving it! 

8 months cross-stitched on the snowblower diaries calendar – 1/8
This did not get worked on at all last year, so I’d like to finish it this year.

None this month, I didn’t bring any cross stitch on my trip up to Brisbane.

7 games of 40k played with hubby – 1/7
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.

No game this month either, maybe we will have one this weekend though.

6 new designs published – 2/6
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’ve been working on my shawl design as well as a new amigurumi design, which you may have seen if you’ve been over on Instagram. 

5 km ran without stopping – in progress
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!

I didn’t run much in Brisbane as it was so so hot but I’ve been back at it towards the end of the month and I think I’m going good still with this goal. 

4 LOTR squares finished – 1/4
Yes I know I’ve been making this for ages but 2018 is the year I get it finished!

No new square this month but I need to start the next one so that I don’t lose momentum.

3 jumpers knitted – 0/3
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.

I bought yarn for a second jumper, does that count? (trying to find excuses to add to my stash here!) 

2 getaway trips – 0/2
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

First trip planned at the end of March, I’m excited for some holidays with hubby, it will be nice.

1 thesis submitted – 0/1
I’m so keen to finish my PhD, so this is definitely my n°1 goal this year!

Not submitted yet, but I have now done my thesis review so I am ready to submit as soon as I have finished writing my thesis! Super excited about that, now I ‘just have’ to finish writing 🙂 

That’s it for me, I hope you have been doing better than me this month, and if not I think we all deserve a break 🙂

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Fan fiction inspiration

TGIF! 

This week has been crazy! My husband was away and work was so busy but I’ve ‘discovered’ a new fun thing to do. 

Now I know I’m actually rather late to the party but I’ve started reading Harry Potter fan fictions (because ❤️ Harry Potter) and especially ones with the very questionable (but so awesome) Draco/Hermione couple. 

I have to say I am in love! And now I totally ship Dramione! 

I got quite inspired from stories I’ve read so far and so I’ve done a bit of drawing. 

Those are just outlines of the characters (I do want to draw them with more interaction but I need to make sure I know how I want them to be first). 

And then I’ve drawn this, which I’m actually quite fond of. 

(In case you wonder, Punksalad is my deviant art ID 😉)

Let me know what you think and have a great weekend! I’ll be working hard on that table center and hopefully finish it 🙂

X

Harry Potter frenzy!

Happy Friday lovely readers!

I will soon be visiting the UK and while we are there we have planned a visit of the Harry Potter theme park. As you may know, I’m a HUGE Hp fan, so, in the spirit of my upcoming trip, I have made a few preparations. 

First off, I finished my Hogwarts robes, which I made for our Harry Potter Halloween party last year. I took this test to know which house I belonged to, and I got Ravenclaw! 

The robes were wearable for Halloween but I wanted to improve them a bit, so I put binding on the sleeves and I added a button and some elastic band to close it off. I also needed my house crest so I started stitching it on 14 count aida, using this graph found on Pinterest. 

I changed up the colours a bit and this is where I’m at. 

I also acquired some Hogwarts book as you can see, just to be ready for when I finally go there (after all, I’m a Ravenclaw and we like to read ahead!). 
I also made up this layout for an embroidery project I have in mind. 

I used a bunch of HP related symbols and phrases and put them all in a heart. Oh, and did I mention I LOVE Harry Potter yet? 

Now, back to stitching, I haven’t yet found a way to enchant my needle to work on its own. 

X

Appa… Yip yip!

The year has most definitely kicked off for me, I was back to work this morning. But on the bright side, it means that I am back to my dedicated evening crafting time (no more impromptu Settlers of Catan game on a Wednesday, let’s leave this madness for the holidays!). 

So yesterday we went back to stock up on some crafting goodies (Dylan is making another giant 40k board, it’s going to be awesome) and I found a pyrograph. The great thing is we practically got it for free (new year’s sale I love you).   

I’m decorating my yarn crate 🙂

It’s actually harder than it looks, the tool gets really hot so I have to go little by little. 

As you may have guessed from the title of this post, we are watching “Avatar, the last air bender” at the moment. I loooove this show! It is one of those cartoons that are good when you are a kid but just get better when you re-watch them. And so in the spirit of Avatar, my first new yarny project of the year: the bending blanket!   

 I designed the chart for the 4 nations (Air, Water, Earth, Fire) based on the symbols from the show and I’m making a corner to corner blanket. The ends are going to be annoying to weave but hey! It’s all part of the fun!

Have you guys also been inspired by a show/movie you watched or a book you read recently?

Welcome spring!

Howdy everyone!

It is the first of September, which means winter is officially over. Yay! I’ve got a few exciting things planned for this month, I am going on the Great BarrierReef and it is my birthday on the 21st.  I’m also going to go dress shopping for my wedding next year (that should be fun!) and I have plenty of craft projects I’d like to do.

I am currently testing out cross stitch on clothes, because one of my friends’s birthday in October. She loves Pokemon (so do I) so I’ll cross stitch her favourite Pokemon on a shirt for her. I’m currently doing Gengar on a tank top (getting ready for summer!)

On another note, I’m enrolled in this massive open online course on edX on superheroes (nothing to do with my PhD on fish immunology but I love superheroes so I HAD to do this!) it’s really fun and it’s great for creativity as we have to create our own super hero! Here is a little preview of the introduction of my hero black raptor.

I know it’s a bit cheesy but I had fun drawing that! So I might be posting some more pictures of my “comic” later on as the course continues.

Have a lovely week everyone!

 X

Emma