Sick Day

Hello.
I'm home sick today. Here are the things I'm thinking about doing:

I started knitting this sweater soooo long ago. I'd love to get it finished in time to get some wear out of it. The problem is that I think I made some adjustments to the pattern and I'm not sure if I wrote them down anywhere.... Also, I just can't seem to decide if I want it to be short sleeve (as the pattern is written) or long sleeve. Long sleeve will take longer but I think I would wear it more.

I also should get started on this pile of vintage dresses to be mended. Some of them are mine and some are for the secret project. And now that I think of it there are actually more dresses in need of mending in the craft room... yikes.

The third one from the bottom is a gorgeous dress from the 60's that I was wearing last night and I sneezed so hard that a little section of the zipper ripped out. haha.

I'm also reading Love in the Time of Cholera for the third time and listening to First Aid Kit's album The Big Black & the Blue for the hundredth time and absolutely loving both.

It's snowing like crazy here. On a clear day you'd see the Empire State Building in the distance. Not today.

Hope you're cozy and well.

Booze + Cozy = Coozie

Hi.

It's summer time. Summer time means sitting outside, grilling, biking, and (for me) drinking some delicious beers with my buds.

But sometimes my hand gets a bit too chilly when holding a frosty beverage, and the can starts to perspire, and I kinda wish it could match my outfit... haha... Sometimes a girl (or guy!) needs a coozie. A lovely, felt, hand-stitched coozie.... Are you sold on this idea yet? Want to know how to make one? Lucky you.

And remember, soda cans need some love too! So even if you're not the beer drinking type, you can still enjoy this craftiness.

Okay, let's start:

Here's what you'll need:

-2 or more pieces of felt in nice colors (I prefer a nice wool/acrylic blend)

-Embroidery thread

-A sewing needle

-Scissors

-Ruler

-A 12oz can of your preferred delicious beverage. Don't crack it open until the end! You'll want to be able to use it for reference, this is much easier to do if the can is closed (trust me, I accidentally got a lap full of Tecate once... it's true).

The first thing to do is decide which colors you want for the inside and outside. I chose light pink for the outside and yellow for the inside. I like pastels...

Now cut out a rectangle in each piece of felt. The outside color should be 9" x 4" and the outside color should be 9" x 4.5".

Now fold the inside piece of felt in half and sew a running stitch about a 1/4" in from the edge. Start at one end and finish about 1/2 an inch from the opposite end.

Now's a good time to do any embellishing you want to do on the outside piece of felt. I decided to cut out a heart. I stitched it on and then freehand embroidered the word "beer!" onto it.

Here's a close-up. Not my best embroidery of all time but it gets the point across.

Now take your inside piece of felt and turn it inside out so that the stitching faces the inside of the tube. Place the outside felt over this and pin it in place so that the extra felt from the inside piece sticks out over the top.

See how the sides of the pink felt don't overlap, they just touch? And they meet right over the seam from the yellow felt? See that? Okay, let's keep moving along.

Pick out a nice color of embroidery thread and do an X stitch from the bottom of your coozie all the way to the top of your outside piece of felt. You're bringing everything together now and it should look something like this:

Now fold over that inside layer and use some more nice X stitches to secure that in place like this:

I keep the can of beer handy to pop in and out and make sure my coozie is about the right size. And you're done now! I prefer not to put a bottom piece on in case I'm drinking from a tall can but it would be super easy to do and I'm sure you can figure it out on your own.

Now go make a few more for when you have company over because your friends will be super jealous if you're the only person at your place with a sweet coozie.

Party Time! Excellent!

Confession Time

I don't like machine sewing.

I have a sewing machine.

I bought it because I just wanted one and this particular one had a photo of Martha Stewart on it.

I imagined myself as a natural sewist (I think that's what they're called, right?). Well, I'm not good at sewing with the machine. It turns out that I don't like ironing, measuring, pinning, or uh... sewing. At least, not yet. I hope to be better at this some day. Right now I mostly practice sewing just by taking up the hems on long vintage dresses.

Tonight I was reminded why I shouldn't sew while singing... and drinking...

The above photo illustrates what happened about six times.

Oh well, some day I'll be better.

Get Dressed!

Hi there.

Here she is! I'm pretty pleased with how this little doll turned out. I hope she'll go to a little kid who will give her a lot of love.

Here she is in her little body suit (I decided to make her a body suit so I wouldn't have to make her a top and underwear). It's made out of a sock. Isn't that neat? It was so quick to sew up and I really like the cheerful color.

And here's a detail photo of her little sweater. This is the fourth project I've done with this felted sweater. I've also made two pairs of mittens and an iPod cozy, and the sweater only cost $2! And I still have a lot left! I've gotta buy more funky wool sweaters.