New blog! Again...

Okay, now I've become hooked on making beaded animals again, since I bought a new book and made a few beaded things for my Advent calendar. Of course I've also been inspired by Elsa's blog, she makes very pretty animals :) It's been some years since I was seriously into it, before I learnt to knit and crochet. I made quite a lot of animals, and now that I've started to make more I needed somewhere to post about them, with links to patterns and stuff. So I have made a new blog, because I'd like to keep using this one for my knit and crochet projects, and all the other stuff I write about. I won't be writing much on the other blog, it's mostly pictures, but there are some reviews of the books that I own and use.

This is basically what I've been doing the past few days, and now I'm finally happy with the layout and organizing of categories and labels and all that :)  So here it is, my blog of beaded animals :D

A link has also been added to the right sidebar.

Figs, anyone?

Well, of course I couldn't keep away from the 100 Flowers book either, and just had to try out a couple of patterns. A nice break from studying for my Latin test yesterday (which I think went well, by the way). I made a fig leaf and a fig (also made a ginkgo leaf, but haven't photographed it yet).

The fig leaf was actually pretty difficult to make up, because you don't crochet all the lobes the same way on the same round. You're supposed to make first three lobes, then crochet down the middle of the leaf (from the top to the stem), turn, and then make the last two lobes. Then you fasten off, re-attach the yarn by the stem and crochet the second round. That the last half of the first round has the back facing forward doesn't really show on the finished leaf (it's the two pointing down/left on the pictures), but I don't see why I couldn't finish the first round in one go, and then continue with round two without breaking the yarn. You just end up with four yarn ends instead of two... And on top of that, the leaf is sort of split open down the middle, so you have to stitch that up as well.

The fig itself was an easier pattern to follow, except that the book (which is English) suddenly switches to American terms in the written directions. However, if you look at the picture, it seems that the chart is correct. The whole thing is worked in double crochet, but I think it probably should have been hdc, because the stuffing really shows through the stitches, even after I tried to fix it with a yarn end :/

Oh, and look, my groundhog has arms! We are moving forward :)

Firefly & bombardier beetle

Okay, so I couldn't keep my hands off my new beading book, I just had to try out a pattern. My color selection is a bit limited right now, because some of my beads (important ones like black and white) have disappeared somewhere between my grandmother's, my boyfriend's parents's house and our apartment in Bergen. I have no idea where they have gone.. Together with the beads I have also lost some macramé bracelets I'd made along with all my macramé supplies :(

Anyway, as expected, the book being in French was not a problem :) First out I made this bombardier beetle, or Brachinus Explodens as the book calls it. The bombardier beetle is not a bug you'd want to mess with. If disturbed, it can shoot a spray of almost boiling hot chemicals from its behind, with impressive accuracy. The book uses clear nylon string like fishing line, but I use metal wire, which I guess complicates things. The legs are not quite like in the pattern, but I'm happy with them.

One critter obviously wasn't enough, so this morning I made another one :D It's a glow-worm, Lampyris Noctiluca, which I think is the common firefly. It's the female that glows, they don't have wings to cover their bums, and they use the light to attract males in the late summer/early fall. They do exist here in Norway, but I've never seen them. Fireflies are really cool, I wish I could see one in real life :)

Squares again

Okay, so I finally decided to switch the colors around on the squares, and here is the result. I'm quite pleased that I did it, I'd hate to do it in a few months when I have made loads of new squares. Anyway, here are some granny squares of my own design for the blanket, with the color scheme complete:

And a photo without flash, in case that shows the colors better:

Well, now I'm taking a break from the squares to work on the groundhog, hope to have him finished this weekend. After all, Groundhog Day isn't that far away :)

Books, glorious books :)

At the start of every semester when my student loan comes I usually spend a little bit of it on either new craft books or comic books. Today three new craft books arrived in the mail, and I thought I'd write up a little review for you :) First up are two crochet books, 100 Flowers to Knit & Crochet by Lesley Stanfield and Beyond the Square Crochet Motifs by Edie Eckman.

The flower book looks great, the patterns are arranged by difficulty and knit/crochet, and there is an index of all flowers arranged by color for easy reference. The book uses British English crochet terms, not American, but I guess I'll get used to that soon enough :)

The other book is all crochet, and the motifs are arranged by shape. Both books give the patterns both in written directions and charts, which is good. Lots of clear pictures.

The only problem with this book is that it's spiral bound, and that has made some of the pages stick together, I almost ripped the pages out of the book when I tried to separate them :/

The third book is a beading book, Petites Bêtes en Perles by Marie-Claude Burel.

As the name indicates, it's in French, and I don't know any French... I think the title means "tiny beaded beetles". Doubt the language will be a problem, though, the book has lots of pictures and charts in addition to the written descriptions. (Besides, I already have loads of German beading books, and I don't know German either...)

The book looks great, all the insects and arachnids are made to look very natural, and every critter is presented with its scientific name. For a geek like me, it's perfect :) There is a pattern for a praying mantis in the book, which is my boyfriend's favorite insect (and wasps), so I'm thinking I'll make him one for Valentine's. I'm not very romantic in that I'm not into pink hearts and stuff, so I feel the mantis will be a good gift :)

Eyes & granny squares

Got my latest order of safety eyes in the mail today, albino eyes in two sizes, and a color called 'blue pearl'. Not sure why, they are more silvery gray than blue, but with a pretty pearly shimmer. Now I'm ready to make albino groundhogs and husky dogs :)

About my granny square blanket project, I have finally decided to invert the colors and make two squares of each pattern with the same two colors. This is what I've got so far, three different patterns in four different color combinations:

I have (unfortunately?) found a new color combination of light blue and moss/pale green. That way I will get a total of ten squares of each pattern, and that makes at least 120 squares by the end of the year :) The only thing I'm unsure about is whether I should change the colors of the new combination with one of the old (if that made any sense). These two, perhaps?

I just fear that the new combo will make a distinctly paler square that stands out from the rest, so if I use the light blue with the green, and the moss green with the blue.  My boyfriend has approved of the pale square, and he usually helps me with the colors, but I'm not sure about this one... What do you think?

Don't know whether or not to use flash, the colors are messed up either way, so here's another picture of the same squares without flash... So, do you think I should switch the colors on these two?

Flu & crochet...

In spite of my great plans of finishing projects I have done very little since my last post. I've been sick since I had the swineflu vaccine on Wednesday. Although I feel better now my shoulder is still pretty sore from the shot, and I have no energy to do much crafting. I have found that when I'm sick amigurumi takes too much concentrating and is harder on my hands than "regular" crochet, so I've mostly been making granny squares. The purple wrist warmers are finished, though, and the purple granny square bag was felted along with them. All the other bags are crocheted, just need to be felted :)

I hate what the flash does to the colors, but there's very little light in our apartment and daylight is pretty hard to come by these days, so without it the pictures would just be a big blur :/

The groundhog has grown a little (the front legs are made but not yet attached), but I've fallen a bit behind on the secret crochet-along, which is now almost over. I have only managed to do the first four parts (head, hat, legs & body):

Not very happy with the girl's backside, it's butt-ugly (pun intended), so I was kind of hoping for a dress that would cover up her "cellulites", but she's going to have a snowflake dress, so I guess I'll only have to show her from the front when she's finished :p Instead of working more on the amis I've started the Block-a-month cal on Ravelry, and these are the squares I've made so far:

The bottom squares are the 6 inch Little Dahlia square pattern for January. They aren't anywhere near 6 inches, though, more like 4. Not sure what I'm doing wrong, I use the hook size (5mm) and yarn weight that the pattern recommends, but they just come out too small. The top squares are made from this pattern from last year's crochet-along (March), and even though the pattern suggested the same yarn weight and hook as the first, they actually would be bigger, so I had to make some changes to get them the same size. *sigh* I don't get it... Anyway, as long as I can stick to the same size I guess I'll be okay :) And again, the flash messes with the colors. That yellow-looking color is actually green...

Ten thousand projects!

Well, it certainly feels like it sometimes... In addition to the two (possibly three) crochet-alongs, I have several other projects going, all of which I hope to finish before school starts for real next week.

I've actually been working these color pencil holders since since Christmas, from a pattern by Amber Jolly (bought on Etsy, A. Jolly Shop). The red one is crocheted with double strands of yarn and a 4mm hook. What's strange is that I started the red one first, but only the blue is finished... The blue pencil is crocheted with thinner yarn and 3.75mm hook, and is perfect for crochet hooks :) I made a few changes in the pattern and stiffened the pencil with a cardboard roll (the ones in the middle of toilet paper or kitchen paper towels).

The next project I need to finish are these knitted wristwarmers for my mother. She used to have a similar pair, but she lost them, so now I'm making her new ones for her birthday. They only need to be felted, but I plan to make an owlet keychain in matching colors, so the present isn't ready to send just yet.

I crocheted this little bag to keep my RPG dice in, but it's too small for me, since it only holds one standard set of 7. The pattern is added to my other blog :) Please contact me if you find any errors, I had some trouble making this up (I'm not used to joining rounds of single crochet), even though I believe the pattern should be correct.

Finally I've been exploring the world of granny squares again :) I wanted to make a bigger bag for my dice, and I came up with a pattern, which is now also posted on my pattern blog, along with a tutorial for a basic granny square. The bags are really simple, if you know how to make granny squares you can do this without a pattern, but I have written it down anyway :) A lady on Ravelry commented on these bags and said she'd use them as soap bags, which of course gave me a new idea... Maybe, if I find the time and the money later this semester, I'll give soap-making a try. I mean, if I could make my own soap and sell them in these bags... They would be great as gifts, too :)

After the first two granny square bags I decided to make some in pure wool for felting. The colors are inspired by the Warhammer roleplaying game, where there are eight different schools of magic with corresponding colors (life/green, death/purple, shadow/gray, amber/brown, sky/blue, fire/orange, alchemy/gold, light/white). That means eight bags, five of which are now made (the blue is not on the picture). I have only felted one of them, though, I want to wash them separately in case the colors bleed. I will probably add photos as the bags are finished :)

The kittens are growing :)

A couple of days ago we went to visit the kittens again. We found them sleeping on a thick sheep's fleece in the couch, quite comfortably.

That is, until I took the first picture and the flash woke them up.

Tina was curious, but lazy.

Kristian, on the other hand, looked like he wanted to kill the camera.

Crocheting along...

As fast as time permits :) The Secret crochet-along is now on part 3, which I haven't had time to make up yet, but here are last night's pictures of part 1 and 2 (head & hat):

The Groundhogalong is also coming along nicely. The head of the thing is finished, and it looks like it will be a very cute groundhog :) I used a safety nose instead of embroidering it on. Today or tomorrow I'll get some money, and I think I'll order some new eyes to make an albino groundhog as well! I just hope the eyes will get here in time...

I am also considering joining a block-a-month cal, a group I found on Ravelry. You basically choose between 3 different square/block patterns that are posted every month, and at the end of the year you should have enough squares to make a blanket or something. Sounds exciting :)

Back to school

Woke up to 20 degrees C in our apartment this morning, almost comfortable :p I think it's getting warmer outside as well, so I'm hoping the indoor temperature will rise to a survivable level during the next few days.

Yesterday I bought school books for more than 3000NOK (more than 350USD), the most I've ever paid for curriculum books in one semester (yes, books are insanely expensive in Norway), but then I haven't taken as many courses before. Two linguistics classes, an Egyptology class and a full semester of Latin :) I think all the courses adds up to about 2.5 regular semesters of credits... I'm going to be very busy this spring! This means that I probably won't post as often as before, partly because my studies aren't that exciting, but mainly because I won't have time to do much crafting to blog about.

Today I have tried to tidy up my yarn stash, but with little success... I have too much! Bags and boxes everywhere, and nowhere to store them :/ I think I'll give up the tidying and start working on my Latin vocabulary instead. First class tomorrow, yay :)

Freezing!

Got back to our apartment today, and it was just over 3 degrees Celsius inside! No time to unpack, just to turn all the heating on, and then we curled up under a pile of blankets, with hot water bottles (yes, plural!) and tea. We lit lots of candles and had a very quick dinner, and now I plan to stay in my chair until bedtime :) Poor Glyptodon had to rest on a hot water bottle, he was so cold. I still have both my alpaca hat and wristwarmers on, and I have trouble typing... It was actually warmer in the fridge! Now, a few hours later it's almost 8 degrees, practically summer :p

I'm looking forward to tomorrow, hopefully the apartment will have warmed up a bit more, and I'm going to buy lots of new school books. Always the most fun part of the semester :)

By the way, this is what it looks like when I go back from a holiday.

To start with, I pack very little yarn, a few balls only, because I know what I'll end up with... The strange thing is that I rarely need to buy colors that I know I already have, so I don't end up with several balls of colors that I use very little of. Quite practical :)

A new crochet-along!

I will be participating in the Groundhogalong, crocheting a super cute groundhog from the pattern by June Gilbank (PlanetJune). The cal ends on February 2nd, at Groundhog Day :) On that day the groundhogs come out of hibernation, and if they can see their own shadow, the winter lasts for another six weeks. If not, spring has arrived :)

The crochet-along has a group on Ravelry, found here, and a Flickr group found here. Buy the pattern and start crocheting :)

A night out and more yarn :)

Yesterday we were supposed to meet all the people we haven't had time to see earlier this holiday, so we went out early to have lots of time. First we stopped at the yarn store so I could buy some more yarn :) It's more or less the same colors that I bought last time, but this yarn is for felting (and the other yarn is superwash and won't felt). I need it for a new project I've started (surprise!), which I'll post about later :)

After that I parked my boyfriend at a cafe while I went looking for more craft stuff. I had put Tunisian crochet hooks on my Christmas wishing list, and when I didn't get any, I decided to buy them myself. This is what I ended up with: two metal afghan hooks and one bamboo, the tiniest circular needle I've ever seen (only 23cm/9.5 inches long, perfect if you can't use double-pointed needles to knit small things in the round) and a regular crochet hook with a bamboo handle. It cost me a bit, but I think it will be worth it :)

After the shopping we met two of the friends we've seen several times this holiday, the other ones couldn't come after all, they apparently had some trouble with their dog. I understand the dog is fine now, though :) I got a delayed birthday present, an RPG dice set with pretty purple dice with weird shapes :)

Haven't played with them yet, but the few rolls I made last night weren't exactly good... Maybe I'll donate them to The Boll, she likes to play :) I understand that all roleplayers are extremely superstitious, some won't let other people borrow or even touch their dice. I have no problem with other people using my dice, but I have found the ones that work for me (a mix of my own and by boyfriend's), and don't like to use other ones...

Anyway, after dinner we went to a pub where a friend of a friend works. It was very dark and very hot, but a cool place. I was of course crocheting all night on my new project, and ended up with some yarn ends. I gave a piece of string to my friend, and this is what he made of it:

He calls it his minion...

Oh, by the way, I have become totally hooked on the soundtrack from the new Sherlock Holmes movie. If you haven't seen it yet, you definitely should! The music is great, sort of gypsy style with violins, mandolin and a broken piano :)

Finally, in this very long post, a picture of some pretty grafitti on a wall:

Happy birthday to me :)

It's my birthday today :) Well, technically it was yesterday, since it's now past midnight. I'm 27, and rapidly closing in on 30... Should I worry? I don't feel old at all, not much older than I felt 7 years ago. 

Earlier today we went for a walk at the frozen lake, and it was extremely cold. About 12 degrees freezing. I had a knitted alpaca hat, and my newly washed hair was tucked in my jacket, but the inch that was exposed actually froze stiff... 

My mother-in-law gave me some money for my birthday, and I thought I'd spend most of it on yarn in fancy colors (I need them all!). The yarn shop had a 20% discount on all yarn, so I  went a little bananas :) This is the yarn I usually use for small amigurumis, and for my granny squares:

I can also mention that I'll be participating in a crochet-along at Veronica's blog Ulliga Gulliga Saker. You find the crochet-along here. I understand it will be something like an amigurumi, but otherwise it's a secret. The pattern will be posted tomorrow, I hope. I'm so excited :)