I'm Back!

Did you miss me?
I was gone for the time it took me to find the gloves I wanted to photograph.

Here they are, the color is still not accurately represented and I can't figure out why.

They are based off of mine, with some tweaks. These are made of pure alpaca yarn, I believe, though it seems that I have misplaced the yarn label, so I can't be sure. For once I was organized! I had kept the label to be able to know exactly what yarn it was. Now I can't find it.

Anyway, I got something crafty as well (more than one in fact, but I've only done one so far) for Christmas.
Since I am a very mature young adult, I wanted....a doll. Yes, that's right. A doll.

Not just any doll, though, I wanted a Waldorf doll. I wanted a little boy Waldorf doll.

Here's the thing though, so that I don't appear to be too strange. I wanted the supplies to make said doll. I wanted to prove to myself that I could make something using a pattern and have it turn out all right, because these dolls were considered a challenging sewing project.

So I got my doll. And I was very, very nervous about starting to make it. The fabric was nice, new, soft....There was so little of it, no room for mistakes. I gulped, took everything out of the paper bag that it was all neatly packaged in, put everything back in the bag and went back to being nervous.

Now, I'm nervous about starting any project with quality materials, but when I see those needles and that yarn, or that fabric, new and clean, just waiting to be turned into something wonderful....I am very weak.

It took me three hours. I worried for three hours, then started sewing.

It was all handsewn, luckily for me, and the hair is basically a crocheted hat sewn onto the doll's head, then you thread each individual strand of hair onto his head, oh my god, it took five hours and that's not even an exaggeration. It really did. So long, so, so, long. And my doll has short-ish hair, so I pity anyone who makes long haired dolls.

Without further ado, here he is, Theo, my adorable little doll that love.

Isn't he cute? So far, I've only made him that little sweater. I realized that the buttons are two different kinds of greens and I apologize, it will teach me to add finishing touches to things at 10 when the lights are dim and I can't see anything.

I will (eventually) make him a pair of pants and a t-shirt. For now, his top half is warm, so that's that.

He is 40 cm tall, blue eyes, bright red hair that is way too long but that I really don't want to trim.

There you go! That's the extent of what I've been working on.

Also, I thought I might add that this little guy was born under very good musical vibes. I said that I would post some music for you. I haven't done that yet, so here is a small list of the music that played while I spent hours threading hair onto a little plush doll's head.

Good Morning Sunshine, by Alex Day
It's Time, by Imagine Dragons
Radioactive, by Imagine Dragons
Love Is Easy, by McFly
One of Me, by Carrie Hope Fletcher
Some Coldplay but I can't remember what
A lot of Killers' songs

And many more that I can't remember, but those are always good.

Bye!

Finally

Hello!
Finally...what? You may be wondering.
Well, finally it has snowed and it was very nice to watch it come down, knowing that I didn't have to leave the house.

And finally, I was able to give my presents away (which is my favorite part about Christmas) and now I can show you the long anticipated gifts that I could not show you before, due to the fact the receiver of said gifts reads this blog.

First off, these little strawberries, made using this tutorial (it's in French, I apologize to the non-french speaking readers). I came across them in my endless wanderings of the Internet and thought, well, those are adorable, I have to make them. I decided to turn them into a key chain and there you go! Aren't they cute?

Next up, a little surprise.

These are the same pillow, just front and back. The first side isn't as pink as it looks in the picture. Anyway, I was originally going to make an iPad cover for my mom, then realized that I have no idea how to make an iPad cover so I made a little pillow instead. This was once again an excuse to practice my machine-sewing skills.
It even has a little flap so that you can remove the pillow and wash the cover, should it prove necessary. If you look, there's a little tag that I added in one of the corners. It's a little piece of Liberty of London fabric. A nice little touch that I was very proud of remembering to add right before pressing the pedal.

I also made my mom some fingerless gloves but unfortunately, I don't know where they are at the moment, so as soon as I find them, I will post them.

I may have to make a seperate post because Blogger is being weird on me and I'm not good with technology.

You might have two posts today! Lucky you.

See you soon, I hope.

Still waiting for some snow!

Hello!
I'm finally on winter break, which means that:

a) I'll be at home when the light is good to take pictures

b) I'll have more time to make things!

I have been working hard, despite the fact that I haven't posted anything in a while.

I made myself a hat that I absolutely love and that I have been wearing for the last three days since I finished it.

 It's a Ravenclaw hat again! I've made a lot of Harry Potter related things, none of which I made for myself. There was a lot of yarn left from the hat I made my brother, so after about two evenings untangling it (for some reason, I always spend more time untangling my yarn than actually knitting) I started making up a random pattern.

I had a hat that I really liked that I made this summer with a huge pompom on the top, but when it got colder and I had a reason to wear it, I realized that it didn't fit over my ponytail. Oops. So I made this one really big, with 10 cm of ribbing, then used bigger needles to make the top, which is about 15 cm. It looks slightly like a mushroom.
Now the pompom. I love hats with pompoms, but whenever I make one, I end up wasting so much yarn! It's a little shameful. If anyone has any good pompom patterns (haha, alliteration), they would be welcome.

I also made a penguin this afternoon.

 

It's not as cute as I had pictured it in my head, but I think it's endearing in its own dysfunctional way. I might name it Jack. Why Jack? It's the first name that popped into my head. Like Jack Frost, I suppose. 

I'm also working on a huge knitted sweater. It's not very interesting to knit, pretty much just stockinette for a mile, but I can't wait to wear it because it looks very comfortable. I'll keep you updated on that, so far I only have the back completed and a very small portion of the front.

Bye! Stay out of the cold!

The season's upon us...

Hi!
The mornings are colder, we have had some snow (I love snow) and it's getting darker, making it harder to take decent pictures: the holiday season is definitely here!
In preparation for that, I have been working on some little - and not so little - projects.
First off, we are getting our Christmas tree next week, so I decided to make a little bird.

He is hand sewn using this pattern, although I added wings. I drew a basic wing design, cut it out on two pieces of fabric together and randomly machine-sewed lines all over it to make it stiff. I then pulled at the edges to fray them and give them a "feathery" look. I did the same with the tail. These birds are incredibly easy to make, I've made quite a few as gifts.
I still have to add a ribbon to hang him up on the tree.

I have also been working on presents. I have a huge pillow that I made a pillowcase to last year: it's really comfortable and warm, perfect for reading, and my brother really liked it. So, I went ahead and made him one too.
His is a bit smaller, 24" by 24", and has many squares of different flannel. Do you know how hard it is to find boy-themed flannel that isn't too "baby-ish"? It took me a lot longer than I thought it would just to find four patterns that looked nice together and would match his room.
The one thing that I refused to do with this pillow that I had done with mine was to hand sew it. I love hand sewing, don't get me wrong, that's what I usually do, but there were so many squares! Besides, I need to work on my machine-sewing skills and this was just straight lines.
I'm really happy with how it turned out. The pillow itself is a little weird to photograph, so this is just the fabric I used.

Music notes, skater, cool gray and Native-American inspired drawings that you can't really see here.


Last but not least on today's list of finished projects, a knit hat for said brother.
Ravenclaw is the Hogwarts house of choice around here and my brother is no exception. I made him a Ravenclaw scarf last year and this year, he asked for a hat. Easiest hat ever; I used striped yarn, 74 stitches, 6 inches of 1/1 ribbing, decreases until there are four stitches left, done. It took me about two hours. It looks like a ski hat, but it's a little shapeless when no one it wearing it, so here is a detail of the knitting.

Bye! And Happy Holidays for those who have already started celebrating!

Fingerless Gloves Complete!

Hi!
I learned a valuable lesson while making these gloves, a truth about myself: I love fingerless gloves, but what gets me is the fact that I have to make two of them. I barely have enough focus to make one, but two? No way. Yet, here they are, my gloves that will serve the noble purpose of keeping me warm and still allowing me to change the song on my iPod.

These are made in 100% merino wool on size 4.5 needles. They're basically a stockinette tube with some ribbing along the edge. I made up the pattern as I went along. The color is darker than in the pictures and I'm really happy with the end result. You can't tell in these pictures, but the gloves reach up to my elbows and the reason I like them so much is that they aren't bulky, which means I can easily wear them under my sleeves.
That's one project complete, which is always wonderful when you're working on three at once. Next on the list: my mom wants the same ones for Christmas, except that she wants thumbs on hers and doesn't want them to be quite so long. So here we go again!