Craft Enabled, Domestically Disabled

Stitches West 2022

Because this will go on forever, the pics will be below the spoiler cut.

Stitches West 2022: The Princess Diana Collection

I went to Stitches West this year. This post will have JUST the photos of the Princess Diana Quilt Square Collection below the cut:

Halloween is back this year (preliminary photos)

So a "Scary-oke" event is coming back this year and being held at the theater that I've been performing at/working at recently. So I actually have a reason to wear a Halloween costume this year, more or less. I didn't feel like going whole hog and knitting a costume for months this year still, especially given that we're once again kinda living in fear about whether or not things get canceled again or whether we just shrug, wear masks indoors and party on anyway.. However, I did buy these wings at a thrift store a few years ago and kept them around the house.

Back in 2019 or so, I saw someone in a skirt with these kind of butterfly wings in it. I asked her about them and she said that she'd cut them up and sewn them into a skirt.. I kept that in mind.

This year, I found two more sets of the same wings that turned up at the same thrift store. So I finally had enough wings to try the skirt thing!

With the first set of wings, I hand sewed them together at the front to turn them into a poncho (I note that they didn't have any elastic holders or anything like that and put that on the top. Then I cut the other two sets of wings in half at the narrowest point and used FrayCheck on the edges and let them dry. I bought a 2 inch wide or so elastic and pinned the wings to the band and hand sewed them around. They overlap at the sides since my waist was narrower than the entire set of wings put together. Then I hand sewed the edges together.

I note that since the sides had some extra to them, I left holes in the sides for either adding a pocket (I'm not sure if I would with these though, it's rather thin material) or to put a pocket belt on under the skirt and then be able to access my phone.

This isn't the entire costume as yet--I've ordered 2 butterfly masks, one for eyes and one for nose/mouth--on Etsy to add to the whole thing, and I probably won't have the wig on because 2 masks is gonna be enough to put on one head. But you get the idea.

Pocket hole demonstrated here. 

Edited to add both masks I got off Etsy:

 

The Hamiltie

In another edition of "Jen Makes Strange Gifts For Friends, Hope They Like It!", here is the Hamiltie. The friend went to Hamilton for his last birthday. 

For whatever weird reason, I always wanted to try making a tie. I don't know why since my dad's dead and before this year I haven't had any dudes in my life for a long-ass time, much less any that were into ties. I saw this Hamilton ornament on Ravelry and wanted to do something along those lines, but noticed that the logo was just out of felt, eh....

I quickly found a suitable fancy tie pattern (Collar and Tie on Knitty) that was double sided (and is supposed to be knit in the round on DPN's), but you're supposed to knit that on the bias, which to me ruled out trying something Fair Isle to do the logo. Then I remembered that years ago I bought some cross stitch waste canvas because I liked the idea of being able to cross stitch on other items. IDEA! I can finally use that stuff...Also, this reminded me of my phase where I was cross stitching a bunch of Hamilton slogans and called it the "Ham Sampler Platter." 

Knitting the tie was tricky. I bought this fancy yarn, Cascade Yarns Sorata, which is out of freaking baby llama(!!!) and silk. I couldn't get the gauge quite right. The pattern gets gauge with size 1(!) needles, and I could get the stitch gauge with size 6's but was about four rows bigger than the row gauge. Normally when making things I prioritize making sure stitch gauge matches because when you're usually making stuff like scarves or sweaters or skirts you just knit for a certain length. However, I had some issues making the tie come out the right size and shape, so I had to take it out and redo it, starting the bias large middle section when I had 26 stitches on rather than 35.. I also had to knit each side separately rather than in the round as intended so I could cross stitch on one of the sides.

After I eventually got that working and done, I had to figure out the waste canvas issue and re-design a logo that fit the size of the tie, which of course came out smaller than I expected. I found a logo somewhere in cross stitch but it was too big for me to use, so I had to figure out how to size it down. 

There's not a whole lot of information out there on what I was trying to do, i.e. cross stitch on knitting. That's about why I'm writing this post in case anyone else tries it. It looks super easy if you're just doing it on regular fabric, but the few websites that mentioned anything about doing it on knitting said you had to have interfacing in there to make it less wiggly. I hate interfacing, but since I had issues the last time I did any major project and tried to not use interfacing...okay, fine, I got the stuff. The online instructions said to sew it in, but there was no non-fusible interfacing to be had in Joann's, somehow.

Thankfully, I did a sample knit after finishing the tie and tried it out, because man, I had some problems. Ironing in the fusible interfacing worked great on the sample (much less so on the actual tie, which kind of barely stuck by comparison...oh well, it was in enough for my purposes), but the waste canvas did not work so great.

(Note: since I used an embroidery hoop to do the cross stitch, I really did not have any wiggle issues with the project. Some parts of the sample actually went over where I had the interfacing, but I didn't have problems cross stitching there. I don't necessarily feel like I really, really have to have the interfacing if/when I try this again.) 

I had read some stuff online saying that when pulling out waste canvas strings, you had to get the project wet first, make sure your floss didn't bleed when wet, blah de blah... So after cross stitching a bunch on the sample, I did the bottom third of it by just yanking out the strings dry and barehanded. It was pretty easy to pull out, but snagged on the yarn on the sides on the way out. I tried wetting down (slightly) the rest of it and it slightly snagged less... but it still snagged. This was something nobody mentioned running into online anywhere (again, why I post this if it comes up for you). 

Also, as per whatever website I read this on and can't recall, you really should use thicker strands when cross stitching on something else. Two strands was kind of flimsy looking, so I did further cross stitching with all full six strands in. 

After noodling around trying to think of something else to try that wouldn't make the baby llama yarn snag (I debated ordering water-soluble waste canvas online for a while, but felt like waiting on delivery time might slow me up on finishing it, and given how things had been going I wasn't sure if I'd have to scrap the whole thing or start over or what...), I was Googling around not finding much and then I saw some stray mention of tissue paper somewhere on Craftster...

That's the idea that worked, folks. Put down a layer of tissue paper (in this case, I got some yellow) and layer it in. Tie on the bottom, then tissue paper, then put the waste canvas on top of that and then load all the layers into the embroidery hoop. And that worked! You don't see much of the tissue paper and it was easy to pull out of the sides after I pulled out the waste canvas strands, which snagged not at all this time :)

So, whew, it's done and I didn't have to start the whole thing over again. Huzzah. And now you know the special trick to try (plus what recommended tricks did and didn't work) if you ever want to try doing cross stitch on a knitting project. 

 

Happy Halloween

I STILL CAN'T GET ANYTHING TO ROTATE RIGHT and if I keep trying, there goes the rest of the day.

But there you go: Princess Leia ceremonial outfit. Sideways. 

The Princess Leia Carrie Fisher Tribute Sweater is finally done.

My Halloween costume this year

For whatever insane reason (since half the population I'm around doesn't remember the 80's), I decided to go as Rainbow Brite this year.

For the first time in yonks, this required actual sewing for a costume. Which is to say I found a thrift store dress and sewed on the requisite decorations.

I was going to knit the whole dress, but I started this about two months before and it took me over a month to work out how to knit the arms, so there you go. On the other hand, it made it easier to do the legwarmers/boot tops. I got a pair of Converse and painted them up a bit.

No, I didn't really get a better picture until the dead last minute of Halloween, why do you ask? Also, I thought I WAS smiling :P

Not my vest, but I wish it was

Lili does amazing work!

Gavle Goat 2005--Don't Blaze Me Bro

The ugly holiday sweater I've been thinking about for almost a year is finally done!

What is the Gavle Goat? Read and laugh here.

Front and back.

Approximate steps to making it:

1. make a basic sweater using the Perfect Sweater pattern from Mason Dixon Knitting.
2. Get feltable blue and white yarn and knit a square panel that fits across most of the front of the sweater, knitting the blue in stockinette and the white in garter.
3. Find some gnome and gingerbread patterns on Ravelry and make some adjustments to them, do some crocheting. Make up bows and (feltable) arrows. Add a little moon because I'm moon-obsessed.
4. Make up a Gavle Goat pattern, kinda based on the aforementioned stuffed goat except flat. Copy the fence that I've seen in goat pictures online.
5. Pin and sew the pieces on to the blue and white piece.
6. Break out my felting needle and felting stash and hand felt up a little flame. Felt-attach it to the bow/back piece with the hand needle.
7. Get a small battery pack of white lights at Rite-Aid. Poke the lights through the front piece to simulate (a) stars, and (b) how they light up the horns. Carefully put some extra sewing in between each light to hold it in place. No, I am never going to wash this sweater.
8. Sew the entire front piece to the front of the sweater. I left a hole in the white section by Santa for messing with the battery pack.
9. Make up some crocheted lettering and sew it to the piece.
10. Write up an explanation of what the Gavle goat is to put on the back (see below), because clearly one is needed for the general public.
Go out and buy iron-on T-shirt transfer paper (for dark shirts) at Office Max. Grab a medium green T-shirt and very tediously follow the very specific instructions to iron it on. It's not perfect, came out a bit blurry in spots, but it was hard enough to do that I'm not gonna worry about it. I sewed it to the sweater with a sewing machine and zigzag stitch, and then realized the edge looked a bit rough.I crocheted an improvised goat pattern around the border (inspired by a hen edge pattern I found on Ravelry) and sewed it on both with a sewing machine and with yarn by hand.Sewed the parts of the sweater together.

Here's shots on the mannequin:

And on me:


Here's the text on the back of the sweater.

In 1966, someone in the town of Gävle (pronounced "yeah-vleh"), Sweden, got the idea to make a giant traditional Swedish Yule Goat every December and erect it in the town square. On New Year's Eve, someone set it on fire. This has led to an over 40 years long tradition of burning or otherwise destroying the goat approximately every other year or so (even years seem to be likely). Sometimes it's burned right after it’s built, sometimes it gets burned before they finish it, and sometimes they just get stolen. For the record, the town of Gävle does not want to actually burn the goat. They would like to not have to remake the goat every year, or sometimes twice a year--they would like to save it for later. At this point, two different organizations are erecting goats, because they need backup. It costs around $30,000 American dollars to erect one goat.
Every year the Swedes insist on putting up the goat, though they do attempt to make them less flammable. This isn’t going so well, as techniques such as freezing the goat with water don’t actually work. The Swedes especially don't like the fireproof solution that turns the goat brown, because that makes it less pretty.
People are paid to guard the goat--firemen, police, hired guard, volunteers, taxis, the Home Guard, an infantry regiment at one point.... but that doesn't always prevent burning. Heck, people will run out in the middle of a heavy blizzard to burn the goat. Once money to pay the guards runs out, the goat usually ends up burning.
There is a fence around the goat, but it's not exactly the world's most badass fence. Because the Swedes like things to be pretty, the fence is rather small and easily jumped over. Putting webcams on it doesn't prevent burning, but does lead to several helpful flaming goat videos on the Internet. As for catching the burners, it very rarely happens. In 40+ years, only four burners have been caught at it, and so far none of them have paid for the damages.
Of COURSE people take bets on the goat's survival.
Goats have been run over by a car, kicked to pieces, and thrown in the river. The webcams have been hacked. One year some guys tried to bribe a guard to look the other way while they attempted to grab the goat with a helicopter and haul it to Stockholm. Four men burned the goat in 2012, got tattoos commemorating the event, and posted pictures of them along with an anonymous confession on the Internet…and they still weren’t caught.
This sweater is to commemorate the burning of 2005, in which a guy dressed up as Santa and another guy dressed up as a gingerbread man showed up with crossbows and shot a flaming arrow into the goat, burning it down. Not only were these guys not caught, they were featured on Sweden's version of the "Most Wanted" TV program.

I'm thinking of doing a series of ugly holiday sweaters. Next up: Hawaiian....

 

My Gavle Goat sweater in progress

I finally got back to working on holiday sweaters again. Here's the execution of the Gavle Goat:

I finally designed and finished the main logo at the heart of the piece. Since I took this shot, I've since added little LED lights, sewn on a slogan, and need to finish sewing it on to the front.

I FINALLY got my goat explanation text printed and ironed onto a shirt. then sewed it to the sweater. Now I need to come up with some interesting trim around the text. Oh, and sew the whole thing together before the office party on the 2nd, of course...AND finish a NaNo novel. Eek. Well, it's almost done...