Craft Enabled, Domestically Disabled

Rose vest

I made this pattern out of yarn I got at Lambtown recently. This ended up being more challenging than i expected.

(a) I bought a pack of Random Minis from Canon Hand Dyes, a pack of twelve yarns of 18-20 yards per color, to make each flower with. However, they definitely did not have the same amount of yarn for all colors, and I couldn't technically finish all the flowers as they were supposed to be done. I ended up having to fudge it and fill in with my base yarn.

(b) The main yarn I had that matched was from Greenwood Fiberworks (lost the paper with the colorway on it, oops) and while it was great, I ended up running out before finishing the entire project as written. Luckily, I ran out on the neck piece bit and was able to fudge that too.

(c) I used the leftover yarn from this vest to finish off the edges. 

 

Stripey sweater, round two

I've made this sweater before. I got more of the Invictus yarn again and decided to remake it, but with a plain green instead of the brown that I wasn't too thrilled with before. 

This has been my theater project--I started it while doing tech for Something Rotten in September and just finished it while waiting to go onstage in Oklahoma. Hence why I'm ah, in costume, shoving the sweater over it and taking photos in the dressing room again. 

And finally, this year's Halloween costume

After last year's Mirabel, this year I did Isabela from Encanto, worked on all year here, here, here, here, here. I think I forgot to add the purse to these photos, but you've already seen it on the last link.

For those of you wondering, I've had making costumes for Luisa, Bruno (who we don't talk about) and the paint-splattered version of Isabela suggested to me. However, I think I'm not going to go for a third costume from this movie because I am not as obsessed with the other outfits as I am with these two. Not sure what I will do next year--I was considering doing the Elvis outfit from Everything Everywhere All At Once, but basically that's for sale already so never bloody mind--maybe I'll just take a break and do something lazy next year. 

Painting sets again

I've gone back to musical theater and painting sets again. This is the set for Oklahoma.

From what I recall, I painted the gray trim and then did the "weathering" on the insides of the house and on the walls and added the lines across the house. This involved using a sponge or rag, blotting the paint off, marking up the walls, then smearing it about, more or less. The gray had three layers of dark gray, white, then light gray, which sounded weird, but worked. 

Barn's not done in this photo, but I did the lines on this one and added the red weathering streaks. It was further weathered by others later.

The last time they did this show ten years ago, they rented an actual surrey, but it apparently took up most of the stage. People were instructed to build one this year. Unfortunately, it got cut from the show the last day of tech week for being too small (Curly and Laurey basically had lap-sitting going on and could not fit side by side, and the stage manager complained that the sides were bulging out), but here it is anyway so you can see it. Mostly worked on the wheels, especially the shape and roughing them out.

And finally, the smokehouse. I'm not sure if we call this "weathering" or not, but I basically used all the painting skills and experience I got doing the Urinetown sets to basically paint it like it's covered in diarrhea. I took a ruler and splatter painted/flung paint in lighter browns, black, orangey-red and yellow onto the walls and then sponge/smeared it about to blend it all. It looks sufficiently shitty!

There's a matching crossbeam that goes into those slots to hang a rope, which you can barely see at the bottom of the photo here. 

I would like to note that I wish that this sort of thing was valued as a job in the world. 

This summer's set painting

This was painting bougainvillea on an arch for the set of Much Ado About Nothing, which I did this summer. I roughed out the drawing on the other side but had someone else paint that one. 

I finished the second page of the maze scarf

Continued from here. Only...five more pages to go.

Christmas tree hat (smaller edition)

Years ago I made a very large Christmas tree hat. However, it's out of huge yarn, has huge lights, and I pretty much have to be sitting down the entire time in order to wear it to parties. Last year, circa late December, I thought, "I should make a smaller light-up hat," but it was too late to buy little Christmas tree lights to put one in. Hence, I put it in my calendar to make another one later on.

Here's the pattern I used. I thought it was pretty inventive with the layers of ruffles on the outside and then the inside sizing of the hat. I also won at Yarn Chicken for using the rest of my Christmas tree yarn, so huzzah for that.

Here's the hat pre-decorations and lights. I'm still working on the lights and decorations at the moment.

Tapestry

I haven't updated things in a while, so here you go.

I'm friends with someone involved in the San Juan Tapestry project (hi Mary, now I'm updating!) and worked on it last sometime pre-pandemic when I was visiting in the area. Now Mary's moved over here and I went over to her house the other day to work on the current tapestry. I worked on the white hair on the crow lady (not quite done in this photo) and the yellow/green/brown grass on the fox photo below. I don't do embroidery very often, so it was good to do some more of that.

Costume purse

'Made this pattern to make a purse for the Halloween costume so I have somewhere to stash the phone. the original pattern is in chunky yarn, but I did it in DK to match the rest of the costume. I did 14 rows in continuing circle pattern to make it big enough to hold the phone.

Heartalls

A few months ago I saw this pattern, fell in love, ordered the book, and then gleefully got my pattern on September 6. Finished September 23.

Customizations I had to do:

(a) It's a worsted weight pattern, but I found some Cascade Yarns Anchor Bay yarn (50% cotton, 50% superwash merino wool) and I thought that would work much better for a hot weather shorts project, because while I loooooove worsted, it's not for summer. The Anchor Bay yarn worked great, but I note it's DK yarn. I got the gauge as per the pattern with that yarn, but when I actually started making the squares, I had to add another row to make each square 4.5 inches. Not too bad.

(b) I like that the pattern is customized by squares for the size of the waist, hips, and thighs, and that even though all of mine do not line up together, I managed to come up with a perfect fit. That said, I had to make a few extra rows to cover the butt and to make the legs longer because (a) I don't do booty shorts and (b) given that crochet has all the holes, I wore biker shorts under these and wanted the legs to cover that. So, one row of 8 squares for the waist, a second row of 9 for the hips, a third row of 10 for the rest of the butt, then 2 5-square rows for the legs.

(c) I did some customizations around the heart bib because doing it as the pattern said seemed a bit too small (it looked weird to me to be that small at the waist), but adding a few more rows to the heart made it too saggy. Finally I went with what a friend suggested and added some stitches in between the points and the waist 

I'm planning on adding some pockets into it that would tuck in at the waist because I think I could fit some in for my phone, but I haven't gotten that far yet. I was able to fit one of my pocket belts underneath it to hide a phone, so it may work. 

Tiny shawl

TypePad is Having Issues today and one of them is that it won't rotate my pictures. But you get the drift.

I bought this fancy silk/fuzzy yarn at Stitches and making a tiny shawl was what I could do with it. 

Emma Overdress

I wish I'd written down when I started this one. Presumably spring 2022 when Bridgerton season 2 came out and I got obsessed with Kate Sharma's wardrobe and I wanted to make pieces like it. It feels like longer. I spent something like $90 on yarn (ok, had a gift certificate for some of that) for three skeins of fancy purple yarn made with size 4 needles. 

I had a lot of issues with it, especially the fiddly edging/hem, and put it on hiatus for awhile. I didn't do the cabled belt because doing cabling with tiny needles made me insane. I ended up crocheting the bottom edge because the bottom edge was making me insane. I spent a lot of time on the fiddly hem on the edges and I'm not even sure you notice all that work. I pulled out the top a whole lotta times and redid it.

But it's finally done. 

Here is the first photo, taken alone in a public bathroom :P

And some better ones, taken at home.

 

Yarn holder

 

I got this pattern to make a ball holder. 

Sun prints of yarn tools from my bag

Done at work. Here's how it started.

How it looked after 15 minutes of baking, pre-bathroom rinse:

And in the end:

Lego flower bouquet

I asked for and got a Lego bouquet for my birthday. Then I bought a few rose sets and a heart with flowers hanger at the Lego store last weekend.

I got a new outdoor table (my indoor one is covered in computers, so I have no table space), so I was finally able to put these together.