Sock it to ya!

I gave some of the family crocheted socks for Christmas.  They were better than others that I had done, but they didn't have the "je ne sais pas" thing that knitters produce.  (You know, the fact you can get them on and they're not as baggy... not bagging crocheted socks, I just can't get them to work)

And so I am attempting the knitted sock.  OMG! To start with, there are many many many different patterns, do I want to start at the top or the toe? What kind of heel do I want? What are short rows? And, did you know that there are different types of cast on methods which are looser?
And I haven't even mentioned the 4 double pointed needle method, the 2 circular needle method and the magic circle (these are the ones that I found, there are probably more!)

And so it has taken me 2 months to produce a pair of socks that are wearable...

They are far from perfect, but they have a heel and a toe.
And holes, and a ladder, and are very baggy around the tops, and they were knit with 3 different methods

I am wearing them proudly :-)

Hit and miss....

This is how I am describing my blogging style.

Been a wee while, but back at it now. Thought about it before the hols but i was making lots of my Xmas pressies and didn't want anyone to see.....

This past year has seen an up take in the needle space, and I have knitted 3 scarf/shawls and a new love for lace weight yarn.

Here are a couple of crocheted ones about to pop in the Felt shop.

Both with lace weight,  one of them is doubled and the other is a Touch yarn.

Spinning a yarn

Thanks to the lovely ladies at Creative Fibre and Red Hill Spinners and Weavers I am hooked on spinning.

One of the ladies has lent me a wheel to play with. I think it looks good as a present under the tree!  

I think having done the drop spindle for the last few months has given me a bit of an edge, I'm all about the drafting (its the lingo) and having just one peddle it means I don't have to overthink to much.

I sound like an expert already which is definitely not the case!  I still have a long way to go, there is consistency to master and then there is trying to ply.  And of course, what to make with it!

Taking Pictures

I think I finally did it.
I do believe that my felt shop looks quite professional.  And it was all in the pictures!.

As with most amateur online sellers I have read a lot about how important the picture is to views and then to sales.  I have tried playing with the macro button, taking pictures when it's not sunny, replicating how magazines take pictures (in situ), and have plastered flip chart paper over things to make a light box, and yet I have never been happy with the result.  No to say that these things didn't work, because my pictures have definitely improved over time, they were just never as good as everyone elses.  

And then I grabbed the chance to get a free mannequin top.  She is my new best friend. I love her.   Now she has taken over my felt shop, and I like it.

 So much cleaner and easy to look at, I wish I'd done a before and after :-)

The wrong yarn for the job

I've got some lovely yarns in my stash that I keep starting a project with and then tossing aside because they just don't quite work.

It's a bit like that strange thing other people do called swatching,  I tend to ignore suggestions of the types of yarns to use for certain things.  This has quite often turned out well, and just as often turned out wrong!   Its also why I shy away from motifs a bit, just in case it doesn't work, then I can't reuse the yarn as easily.

This is the 4th time I've tried to use this bamboo yarn to make something,  and it's not 4th time lucky.

With a renewed interest in Tunisian Crochet I think that this one might be good for that....  so a frogging we will go (again!)  :-)

Shrug Hug

Love the library:-)

Cool crochet books and other fab ideas to get the creative juices flowing.

I picked up this lovely yarn at the Creatve Fibre Festival the other weekend and have been looking out for a brill project that's not too hard and is easy to do on the ever crowded train.

So I have chosen this Shrug Hug from a book called Custom Crocheted Sweaters by Dora Ohrenstein.

I've tried shrugs before and I've always had to frog them because they just didn't look like the picture.   For this one there has been research.  Lots of great reviews.... so I guess if it doesn't work...... must be me.... :-D

Poppies

I saw a lovely poppy on a tv presenter that was made from organza type fabric, so I tried to replicate it.
So I pintrested the how to.

A wee hint... if its not organza type material don't try and burn the edges, it catches on fire!

I cut 8 circles from 4 different red fabrics, 2 the same size from each one.  Sewed a button in the middle and random black beeds around the center. (I also did the back pin at the same time)   Covered the whole thing in fabric stiffener (called 'stiffy' teenager snigger)  left it over night and then seperafed the layers and made it look more 3d.  I like it :-)

Simplicity 1419, lisette

Last year I did a workshop on sewing a dress.

It got me hooked. I had been trying and trying to get in sync with the sewing machine.
I think I've done it!

I love this pattern. 
It's easy enough for me to understand and has enough technical bits and pieces to make me feel like I've achieved something.
This is my 2nd one, and both dresses are good enough to wear out of the house, and to work even!

Nail art

Its a bit harder than I thought it would be.
The whole hammering thing is a little tedious. And I think I was a little bit ambitious with the amount of nails I dcided to do for my design.

I drew my design on some graph paper first. Painted my bit of wood and popped the paper on top of the painted side when it was dry.

I finally finished hammering yesterday and now i can start with the weaving.
So far so good I think....

Where did JacBerCreations go?

Well, it didn't really say anything did it?
It's the New Year so what better time to have a change and become re-invigorated? 

I'm also mixing it up and not just crocheting. Yesterday we went to Bunnings and shopped for wood and nails. Very cool!  Today I am making a loom and am going to try weaving, I'm also going to do piece of nail/string art.  Once I've figured out how to make what I want I'll share the stages.

Yesterday I was trying to come up with my Cup of Tea and a Yarn picture.   This was the best bit...... 

I drew my design on the material with a pen and made a mistake. Once I'd finished my sewing I used nail polish remover to try and get the pen off.  Got some of it on the rest of the yarn. It bled..... A lesson learned...  I quite like the 'Cup of Tea' part though.

A Cosy Granny

I've been using up my stash unpicking WIPs that I've fallen out with and having a general crochet tidy up.

The crochet rug was the first result of this new weird more organized approach to my crocheting life.  And this is the second.
Feeling the love once more for the granny square, I have just popped this one into my Felt store and am busy working on another with a very retro black border.
Will 2015 be another year of the Granny?

A crochet rug

This week I finished a crochet rug that I had been mucking about with for a while.
Its made from Zpaghetti yarn, which is kind of like tee shirt yarn.  I got the yarn early last year because it was on sale and after having had a bit of a play I put it away feeling very uninspired. 

Since I've had time to have a good look on pintrest well....

I quite  like how it's turned out :-)

My first non granny square blanket

I found this pattern in an Inside Crochet mag, and it looked so pretty I decided to give it a go.
Normally I am put off by lots and lots and lots of motifs joined together, it all seems too hard and fiddly. I am glad I kept at it, so happy with the result, and I am unashamedly totally proud of myself for finishing it.
My mum bought me a great basket which sits next to my chair in the lounge, and leaving all the yarn and the blanket bits in it made a big difference to my motivation, it was harder to put away than a wee canvas bag :-) I had three other other projects on the go to which also helped me not to get bored:-D

Back to blogging!

I am inbetween jobs at the moment, so I have no excuse not to post about all the crafting I've been doing to  fill in the 'when I'm not job hunting' time.

Rather than tell you all about everything all at once I thought I'd stretch it out a bit.

Todays pics are fowers made from egg cartons which I think turned out alot better than I thought they would.

I got the instructions from watching a few different YouTube videos.

Cushion cover and a Cosy

These are my creations from this weekend.

I had promised a couple of cushion covers to a lovely lady before Christmas so I thought it was time to get my A into G and get started. One is going to be a hexagon motif and the other a granny square one.  Should have them ready to pop in the post next week :-)

And for a break in between motif crocheting (cos I just have to have more than one thing on the go) I replaced my tablet cosy after if went missing a couple of weeks ago whilst I was zipping up and down the country.

And I  sewing news..... I did something to the machine so its been at the shop for a couple of weeks. (So you can guess it wasn't a good 'something') and I'm just waiting for another Cake pattern for a skirt and wraparound cardi.   Cool!

I Made A Frock!!

Totally amazing, well done me :-)
Might have noticed I'm feeling a bit chuffed with myself.
I won't tell you it was easy, and I can't pretend its been done correctly,  the facts are though, that it looks like a frock and almost fits right :-D

Sewing Cake.com had great tutorials. The hardest bit was the edging around the neck, probably not helped because I'd cut it out the wrong way around, which I could have fixed, except I'd sewn the blumin thing on about 5 times because my thread kept breaking (I also learnt there is a right and a wrong way to change a needle)

So I think this was my prototype. The material was $4 a metre so I'm quite happy for this to be a wear around the house frock.  I will take what I've learned and make one that can be worn out in public with pride.

Also, next time I won't choose a rib, it was so hard to cut out and it wriggled constantly when I was sewing.

Now back to the crochet.....

Sewing Adventures in a Cyclone

Eager to begin my Tiramisu frock, I braved the beginning of Cyclone Lusi and took myself off to Otara and The Best Fabric Outlet Shop in Auckland

Fantastically helpful.  The chap there let me know if the material I had chosen was one that the pattern recommended and also helped me to pick the right interfacing, (which I learnt had to be stretchy to match the fabric).

Feeling comfortable with his acceptance of my ignorance I even asked him to show me what the selvage was, and he didn't bat an eyelid at how little I knew. 

His disclaimer for helping me so much: If it didn't work out right don't blame the guy at the fabric shop!  I assured him that if it didn't work out right it'd be the sewing machines fault, so that's fine.

I might try cutting it out tomorrow......

Scary Sewing Stuf...... dum de dum dum duuuum

Kat over at  Modern Vintage Cupcakes and I run into each other in Wellington occasionally.

I adore her sewing. Good grief this woman whips up a frock in a matter of minutes I swear!

I have admired one of her frocks in particular and after double checking with her, she is certain I can master it. Yes, I was very honest with my sewing machine exploits, still, Kat encourages me.So in the mail today was this:

Now to shop for material :-) 

Back in the Saddle again......

Hurrah!

What's the best way to get creative? 
Join the Freeform Crochet Along for International Crochet Month on Ravelry 

I did this 2 years ago and I had a blast and made this:

Which, whenever I wear it my family cringes and I get loads of compliments (though I have also learnt not to wear it when I want people to actually listen to what I'm talking about - apparently it's distracting :-) )


I was a few days late so had to crochet like mad the last couple of evenings to catch up

Here are my scrumbles* so far:

*Scrumbles is a technical term for freeform which I've chosen to translate to 'blobs of creations put together'

So far I've done 3 stitches I've never done before, including Tunisian Crochet which I'd avoided.
I'm very much looking forward to seeing what it turns out to be.....

Its 'That Time'

Been a while.

Crochet has had a bit of a back seat lately as That Time came along.

My spare time is taken up with searching for the elusive hair I can feel sprouting from  my chinny chin chin

My yarn funds taken up with trips to the naturopath who provides me with fabulous 'no drugs' drugs to help contain my HATE towards everyone, including those I love and those I don't know at all.

My crochet sits neglected as I feel listless and ummotivated

My eyes have bags as I don't sleep and toss and turn the night away in hot sweats (yes I know its been summer and everyone else is the same. Mine's different!!!!!)

Its been a while.....

The no drug drugs are doing their thing. life has started to be normal again :-) crochet projects are under way.  Watch this space :-)