Cock-a-hoop

Think I'm only posting these earrings to torture myself - I made them a couple of weeks ago and on the first time of wearing I lost one of them.  I tried, unsuccessfully, to find it so have been left with visions of it lying in a gutter, lost and forlorn.

I'd make another one, but the hoops were customised from another pair of earrings and I've never seen them for sale on their own.  May just have to convert the remaining one to a pendant so it can live on.

The design was inspired by peacock feathers - have a strong dislike of the birds* but I love the colours in their feathers. 

* I dislike all birds, to greater or lesser degree, but my view of peacocks wasn't helped when someone once told me a story of a country house wedding where there were peacocks on the lawn during the champagne reception.  Apparently peacocks hate images of themselves which is unfortunate as the florist had used mirrors in the flower arrangements: a huge peacock fight kicked off with feathers and flowers and guests all fleeing in various directions.  Still, I guess it's slightly classier than the traditional wedding fight.

Roll up, roll up

I've been making paper beads for just a few months, inspired by these fabulous ones a friend brought back from Tanzania.

The Tanzanian originals are made of very thin paper and seem like they have several coats of varnish: they must take ages, both to roll and paint, but the effect is lovely.  

Mine are neither as colourful nor as glossy, but I do like the colours (the paper was an East bag).  I'm still working on getting mine as robust as the original - two coats of varnish rather than just one definitely help, I should probably do 3, but for me the pleasure is in rolling, which is therapeutic, rather than varnishing which is just sticky.

One of the things I like about wearing paper beads is that they are incrediby light to wear so there's no likelihood of taking someone's eye out with a swish of the beads.

Octopus ami

I seem to be on an amigurumi posting roll, so thought I'd post the amigurumi octopus which prompted me to learn how to crochet.  The legs on mine seem more flimsy than the original inspiration, but as far as I'm concerned he still ticks lots of small/cute boxes.  As you can see, he's a key ring, and apparently (he was made for a friend) he swings happily from the car ignition.

One thing which I like about crocheting amigurumi is that they largely use one stitch (double crochet in the UK, called single crochet in the US) and so, once you can cast on a circle (fab tutorial here), increase and decrease you're pretty well sorted.

Munch

What else can you call a caterpillar, other than 'Munch'?  This was the first amigurumi which I made up from scratch (rather than seeing something posted online and developing it from there).  I do have to give credit for the idea to OH who, for some unknown reason, requested a caterpillar.

Amigurumi are an odd concept, and other than the tiny neatness, can't explain why I like them (and some I don't like at all, falling on the wrong side of the kitsch line).  There is a definite challenge in making something as small as possible, (this blog isn't 'Titchy Stitcher' for nothing) but that can get obsessive, so I'm trying to restrain myself.

If anyone wants the pattern for this, let me know (it's written in relatively non-code speak, as I'm a novice crochet person).

Pod cast (on)

This is based on a People Tree brooch which a friend of mine was coveting - I was going to buy it for her birthday, but People Tree spent so long making it available that it was too late and I created my own version.  Shame, as an uber-ethical sale was lost, but at least I can console myself that I already had the thread and so nothing was shipped especially from Nepal.

Procrastination

Can't quite believe that I've finally started blogging, having procrastinated for so long - and have a feeling that procrastination may be an ongoing theme, but am going to make a real effort that it won't be (nearly called the blog Ultimate Procrastinator, but that got vetoed).

The plan is to use this blog to share with a few people what I've been doing craft-wise and to put some photos up online of both finished projects and work in progress (or, as the Embroiderers' Guild call them, UnFinished [stitching] Objects).  I'm sure that I'll digress into other things, but my current focus is on embroidery, paper bead making and dressmaking/pattern-cutting.