Thing-a-day.com

I made one of these a couple of months ago and love it. It’s a knitted cup cozie with a pocket for your hand. What’s really nice about it is that your hot coffee or in my case hot tea, makes it a thermal pocket - perfect for those winter mornings. I’ve been prototyping this for my Etsy shop this weekend. It’s another one of those things that I’ve been meaning to fine tune, and never got around to it. The idea came about while I was bouncing around ideas with a friend. She said to make a knitted handle, and for a few days I couldn’t figure out what she meant by that, because just a knitted handle (like a mug handle) wouldn’t be able to support the weight of a drink. I finally came up with a pocket on a cup cozie so you have something to hold onto if your cup didn’t have a handle on it. The pre-warmed pocket from the beverage was an added bonus. Knitting this takes longer than I’d like, so I’ve been playing around with fabrics as well. Hopefully this week I’ll have something up. This one looks a little short, and I’m thinking of eliminating the bottom section…

Ok, so I didn’t make any truffles, I got to listen to a seminar by master chocolatier Joseph Schmidt, who showed everyone how to make ridiculously beautiful chocolate bowls and tulips. His technique was a lot easier than it looks - think balloons. He also showed a shortcut on making truffles (not shown, but still his line of truffles). He was a very charming old man, and free truffles after a loooong day of work wasn’t so bad.

I did more knitting on my scarf. My brain has been thinking too much this week. Mindless knitting has been good….

No picture for this post, but your imagination will work just fine. I’m visiting my friend and her baby who is very sick in the hospital tomorrow, and put whatever snacks I could find in my house together for her.

1. Chocolate - truffles & Hershey’s with almonds

2. Cookies - oatmeal raisin, some crunchy buttery cookies, and one with chocolate in the  middle

3. Cheerios

4. Saltines

5. Peanut butter sandwich

I’ll probably bring her some real food for lunch, and those can just be snacks for later. The pizza place by my work has a fantastic spaghetti pizza….

I fell in love with this, and started my own scarf to experiment with shibori felting. I have a bunch of Lamb’s Pride Worsted onesies that I thought would be perfect to use up in this piece.

I saw someone else make this as their thing-a-day, and I wanted one too, so I made my own. I used fabric scraps, yarn scraps, and other odds and ends as stuffing. It’s a good way to recycle those little bits that you would normally throw away.

I decided to sew today. I really wanted to make a tote out of some canvas that I bought a while ago, but I couldn’t find it. hurrumph. So I pulled out other fabric that I bought last week to make a sewn version of my knitted circular “berry” clutch. I figured sewing them would be faster than knitting, and I think it will be once I figure out my pattern. The progression has been frustrating, and I’ve had to rip out seams several times. It looks easy, but is actually more complicated than I thought. Or maybe I’m making it more complicated than it should be? We’ll see. My only successful sewing today was hemming a pair of jeans that were too long for me.

I wasn’t sure if I was going to make mitts, but I decided to complete the set to go with the booties and hat. Now, I need to move on from chocolate brown….

Finished the third anatomical knitted heart of a custom order for my etsy shop. It’s not very adventurous since I’ve made a few of these before, but my hands were working on something nonetheless.

My original anatomical knitted heart was inspired by a friend who was going into heart surgery a couple of years ago. I was worried about her, so I knitted her a new heart. She took it to her surgeon and told him that they were actually going to perform a heart transplant instead of her planned operation, and presented my homemade heart. He didn’t crack a smile, but I really enjoyed her effort.

I’ve thought about rigging it to actually “beat”. It’s on my list of things to do….

I finished the other bootie, and in the back is a hat that I made last month that’ll go with the booties.

I only had time for one bootie tonight. The pattern is here.

I have a 2 in 1 thing a day: cheesecakes and makeshift holders. Take that.

Tomorrow is my dad’s birthday. My parents’ only request are handmade birthday cards. I thought I’d do something different this time. Who doesn’t like a pop-up? I found a great tutorial on Instructables.com that includes this template print out.

Today I rolled some Vietnamese spring rolls. I think my favorite thing about this is the sauce: hoisin sauce + peanut butter + a little hot water to mix + a dash of chili pepper. Yum.

I’ve had this idea in my book of ideas for a while now, and finally made it - a knitted postcard.

I had a teacher in high school who thought it was so great that our postal service will send anything that you slap postage on. He sent a banana in a clear plastic bag to his brother. It wasn’t fresh, but it got there.

I like the idea of sending something unusual through the mail -in this case, something soft that would pass through the hands of people who are not used to touching soft mail. Also, I like the idea of sending knitted love, because anyone who has received a knitted gift knows that it is a labor of love.

Though it’s knitting, I did try something new with this piece. I made the cables without using a cable needle - just dropped 3 stitches off the left needle, knitted 3 sts, and picked up the dropped stitches. It’s not as bad as it sounds. There’s less juggling around without the cable needle.

I wasn’t sure what I wanted on the front, and after charting different images, I decided to go with a couple of classic cables. It’s also a good way to use up knitted swatches. I used a piece of matboard that was laying around, and used a hole punch to make the holes. This is one of those times when a pair of man hands would be handy, but a determined crafter will do just fine. Now all I have to do is decide who I will send this to. blog

I made a bird with a broken wing so that I would love it more. There are too many perfectly healthy plushies out there - I have no sympathy for them. Last weekend I saw a Broken Heart Robot, which I guess inspired the broken wing. It’s strange to see emotions other than happy, on toys, and it made me look at toys in a new way. Why shouldn’t we empathize with them?

Anyways, this is my first attempt at making a softie from fabric. I knit way more than anything, so I thought I should try something different. I did sneak a little knitting in there with the scarf. I think it’s cute. I wrapped it they way I like to wear my scarves.

The materials are all from what I have laying around. I tend to keep things for future projects, and end up with too many things. I hope to make good use of my collections this month. I have a drawer of socks with holes in the heels and toes. I can’t wear them because they bother me too much, but I did cut one up for the stuffing for my bird. I plan to use the rest of the socks as stuffing for other projects too (don’t worry, they’re all clean). The belly of the bird is made from leftover fabric of one of my favorite dresses. I got it from a thrift store and had to trim off 5 inches because it was too long for me. The legs are made from 6 paper clips.