Happy Birthday, Lisa!

I made a bag for my lovely red-headed friend, Lisa, modeled here by a not-so-willing Adler (please don't show my face, mom!)

The bag has no formal "pattern" - I just worked from handles down and stopped at two skeins. I used Cascade Yarns Prisma and a mostly matching silk ribbon. The bag is lined, albeit poorly (If you've read this blog you know how I hate to sew!) AND I got to use one of my "Made by..." labels. My second! Finally, I made a coordinating pouch to go with the bag.

Lisa's favorite dessert is brownies, so rather than a birthday cake, I made a birthday brownie tower! Yum!

Here is Lisa with her bag. She likes the bag, but not her hair, so don't look at it!

A Veritable Rainbow of Thready Goodness!

Despite the fact that I live in a metropolitan area populated with oodles of crafty knitters and crocheters, I cannot find crochet thread anywhere. Well, that's not exactly true. I can find plenty of medicore quality, white or ecru in size 10. Apparently there's lot of people doing doilies out there. (Not that there's anything wrong with that, yarngirl!)

What's a color-lovin' girl to do?

Well, THIS one ordered some yummy Monaco thread from Jackie at Crochetville. Her well packaged, reasonably priced box of goodness came last Friday from the Phillippines. I'm so thrilled!

I have lots of plans for these beauties - I'm going to make some minature Pooh and Strawberry Shortcake dolls to be friends with Soph's Polly Pockets. (Well, maybe the Groovy Girls since this thread is size 10). I'm also going to do some bookmarks for the bookmark swap. Maybe a few surprises as well!

I have a lot on my hooks right now but did manage to squeeze in a couple of "test" bookmarks over the weekend. I made a Norwegian Filigree bookmark in purple ombre and a pineapple in the orange/rust ombre. I don't really care for the pineapple, but Sophie does, so it's now hers.

Sadly, I misjudged the Eeyore colors - too purple. Oh well...I guess I'll just have to place another! Jackie? Jackie?

Grandma's Scarf

Grandma's Scarf
Originally uploaded by csabers.

Valerie asked me to make a scarf for her grandmother's birthday. Apparently, grandma likes blue feathers!

I made a two-skein scarf out of Bernat Boa for grandma, modeled here by the lovely Maris.

Ready...Set...VOTE!

Are you a Democrat? Republican? It doesn't matter! Please vote for me in the Stitch Diva flower contest.

I made a bunch of Stitch Diva's flowers for the competition and submitted them, but I could only choose one. Here's my entry:

Click here to be taken to my entry (you can only vote once):

I may not have the best flower but I hope I have the most friends! I'm especially concerned about that cute dog with the pink flowers.

Finally, thank you, Julie (skamamma) for voting for me before I even asked! xoxoxo

It was all a Buttercream Blur, Part II

So, if you've read my last post you know I made FOURTEEN (14) dozen cupcakes over the weekend and that 8 were for a wedding.

What about the other 6?

Well, Sophie had her big kindergarten graduation celebration (say that three times really fast!) and we were treated to a "Smile Presentation" which was a slideshow of all the students one at a time - very cute! So, for the after party I made 4 dozen "smile" cupcakes:


Finally, the last two dozen cupcakes were for Adler's end-of-year party. Since these were also the last I made, I have to admit they're nothing too fancy. Champagne cupcakes with leftover ganache and little hearts. Forgive the nasty cookie sheet - I didn't serve them that way. A girl runs out of trays making so many cupcackes!!

It was all a Buttercream Blur, Part I

(No crochet content in this post!)

So I spent most of my weekend making cupcakes. FOURTEEN (14) dozen cupcakes, to be exact, plus a 7" 2-layer chocolate cake as well. Crazy! You say.

I agree!

The first 8 dozen cupcakes were for Drew and Terra's wedding, which was held in Nathan and Adam's back yard. 4 dozen champagne cupcakes with white icing and 4 dozen chocolate with chocolate icing. Since there was no "wedding color" I just put a little flower on each, with glitter, of course (it was ME doing the decorating!).


Nathan and I picked out this cheesy stryofoam cupcake tree, which I covered with florist foil to gussy it up a little. Sadly, it wouldn't support my shiny silver chocolate cake for the bride and groom, so I had to put it off to the side. I folded some of the florist's foil to lay on top of the cake and added some cut flowers for decoration. I added extra to cover the pre-wedding boo boo inflicted by the groom (without his knowledge of course!).

I left before the wedding so hopefully nothing melted before the guests got to it!

Check out the carnage! My dining room and kitchen are completely covered in powdered sugar, buttercream and sparkles!


Part II to come...Smile!

Frangipani's Ribbon Hat

Crochetville villager Frangipani created a pattern for this lovely Ribbon Hat, which I made for Kelly.

After a struggle to find the right yarn, Kelly brought me some she found at The Fiber Gallery. It's Muench's Oceana, which is a multi-color viscose/nylon blend with little cotton flags.

I loved working with this yarn! It's light and has a really nice feel. I think it would have been a cool hat, too, if I hadn't paired it with Paton's Divine MOHAIR blend! Well, it was the only orange I had...


I added blue silk organza ribbon and Voila! A ribbon hat that suits Kelly very well. The shirt is a coincidence, btw, it just happened to be the one she was wearing when I brought her the hat.


Great pattern, Bec!

I am WHAT?

You are

What Rejected Crayon Are You?

Ask and Ye Shall Receive...

On Monday I mentioned I was going to try to do a Darth Vader helmet for Monkey, Adler's most loved possession.

I did.

Following are some WIP (work in progress) photos:

I made the helmet using crochet nylon and the lens from a pair of Sophie's old sunglasses. The helmet is in two parts, helmet and face mask. The face mask is attached to the helmet at the top only and has a band around the bottom that buttons in the back. Once buttoned, the helmet just falls down over the mask. The "grill" and raised "moulding" were done separately and sewn in.

Here are some photos of the finished work:


And of course the boy is quite pleased (cue scary breathing):



As you can see the ending transformation is truly frightening. Despite the fact that the helmet was custom made for Monkey, we decided to test the Darth effect on some of Monkey's friends - it's a good thing I made 4 buttonholes on that strap!

Darth Red Monkey and Donkey Kong - MENACING!:


Darth Hippo and Darth Lion - HORRIFIC!:


Darth Groovy Girls - WRONG!:
(gotta love the pigtails!)

Darth Kitty - FUZZY YET FEROCIOUS!:


Darth Bears - CUTE, CUDDLY, COWER BEFORE THEM!:


Darth Elmo - EERIE! (Do you think his scary breathing is high pitched?):


And for all you geeks out there - Darth LEIA (there IS another)!