Blogger being Blogger being dumb

What's happened to Blogger's follow button? Now there's just a share button instead. Why do I need to add all the blogs manually? It used to be so easy. Once logged in, you pressed a button, and you had new stuff in your reader.  But now I have to copy/paste everything, and sometimes it won't even work right. Ugh! See, this is why I moved the blog to WordPress... There you will find more recent updates, and it also looks a lot tidier than this place. I know I've been awfully quiet here lately, but I hope I see some you over there :)

Reminder :)

Hey! Just wanted to remind you that I have a new blog :)

I don't blog much these days, because school keeps me really busy, but there is a tad more activity on my other blog. Since I can update from my phone, I post a little bit more over there. Some more updates on what I'm doing, even when I don't have anything fancy to show you... Just to let you know I'm still alive :)

I have said that I'll keep this blog updated with major news and stuff, but now that Blogger has gone and changed the layout to something that is even more confusing than the old thing, I don't know... I suspect that this place will soon become pretty quiet. So please follow along to my new WordPress site :) Even if you don't have a WP account, you can still follow the blog, you just have to add the address to your reading list manually.

Hope I see you there :)

Moving the blog

Yes, that's right. I've decided to move this blog. Well, not exactly, because this will still be here, but from now on I consider my main craft blog to be my new one over at WordPress. Had some trouble with Blogger last night (long story short: Blogger ruined a rather long blog post, I got angry and decided I don't like Blogger anymore), so I imported all my posts from this blog into a new one. You can find it HERE :)

If you don't like WordPress for some reason, don't worry! I'll probably be double-posting for a long time, although I'll post on my new blog first, just to make sure I have a backup in case Blogger flips out again. Heh.

I have moved two of my other blogs as well, Bollan's blog and my tatting blog. The old ones will remain, just like this one, but I'm not sure how much they will be updated from now on. To be honest I prefer to post on WordPress, both because it's simply easier and because it works better on my phone.

So, I hope to see some of you over there :D

Craftiness of 2011 :)

First of all, let me wish you all a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! I know I'm a little late, but we've had our family visiting for Christmas, and after they all left, I kind of collapsed and haven't done anything productive for days. But I'm back now, rested and ready for the new year ahead. Will have lots of studying to do this spring (taking an extra class to make up for skipping one this fall), but hopefully I'll be able to blog a little as well :)

To make up for neglecting my blog the past months, here is a summary of the craftiness I did last year :) I didn't think I'd accomplished much, but looking back, I realize that I've done quite a lot! Starting with my own designs in chronological order:

Nesting Love Birds, a free pattern for Valentine's Day.

Three Cute Little Bear Dudes, all made after the original bear pattern (Forest Dwellers vol.1)

Cute Little Dudes - Forest Dwellers vol.4. All birds :)

Cute Little Dudes - Alien Invaders.

In April I got a smart phone, so I knitted a protective purse for it as soon as I could. Important not to scratch the touch screen! :)

Great Big Wasp.

Great Big Aphid.

Finally got round to finishing the Great Big (male) Firefly (to the left). Sorry about the pale picture, I'll never take photos in bright sunlight again! No pattern yet...

Great Big Crane Fly. Longest bug legs ever! Pattern will be done soon, I promise :)

My aunt asked me to make two little bugs for her, so I made these. Mini versions of the Great Big ones. I'm working on the patterns, but I have to remake them to get proper pictures. Hopefully the patterns will be done before Easter :)

Cute Little Dudes - Trick or Treat! vol.1. I had another set planned, but ran out of time (too much school work!). Will save the second set for next Halloween :)

A friend of mine wanted me to make a great big dragon that he could give to a kid for his birthday, so I made this. It's huge! Arms and legs are jointed. I was told the kid's birthday was in October, so I rushed to finish it, but then it turned out the day was not until November. Oh well. At least the kid was happy. From what I heard, the dragon was being fed dinner as soon as it arrived. That's a good sign, right?

Crocheted and felted witch's cauldron, a free pattern for Halloween. I had originally planned to make up lots of creepy stuff to put in it (eyeballs, severed fingers, bat wings, etc.), but once again I ran out of time. Will save the ideas for next time :)

As a Christmas present, I made this heart (from my free heart pattern) that I filled with nice smelling things and put in a pretty bowl with some pretty white stones.

And the very last thing I finished last year was a remake of the Kitty Princess, the first pattern I ever made and published. Gave it to a cousin for Christmas. I am in the process of rewriting the pattern and adding new photos, and hopeully it'll be done before school starts in about two weeks :)

So. That was all of my designs. I did some other things too, but a lot of the projects I started last year are still in progress, so I have no pictures to show you... I will post the few that I have, though :) Again, in chronological order:

In the beginning of January I took out Rose Langlitz's book Tasty Crochet and started crocheting some food. I was obsessed for a while, but I only managed to complete two things, a pear and a salami/lettuce sandwich:

I have more half-finished food items lying around, but no pictures... 

After that I knitted a new bag for my rpg dice, the Dice Bag of Doom! Pattern free for download on Ravelry.

My next obsession was bugs, as Lesley Stanfield's new book came out, 75 birds, butterflies & beautiful beasties. I made a black slug, plus some butterflies and caterpillars that I pinned to a cork board:

Then I moved on to Hansi Singh's bugs. I started with a praying mantis that never got finished, but I made earthworms, a sea slug, Kraken (giant squid) and a Blackdevil anglerfish:

 

 

Again, I have lots of WiPs that hopefully some day will be done. They are just too pretty to be stashed away in a bag...

During the summer I got started on June Gilbank's dinosaurs. I think I've started about five of them, but none are done yet. It's just silly, really. On one (the Parasaurolophus), all that remains is sewing on one last leg! Sigh. I think I have an aversion against finishing things :/

I found this really cool knitting pattern on Ravelry, of a dancing goddess figure:

The pattern itself is very simple (knit in the round, and it consists of only two parts, so very little sewing is required), but I wasn't quite happy with my knitting (uneven stitches and a few holes - I'm no good at knitting in the round on double-pointed needles!), so I decided to felt it. Unfortunately I felted it after stuffing, so it almost didn't felt at all. It just became sort of lumpy and disproportionate. I wanted to make more of these, but I'll have to do it differently next time.

The last project I finished last year (not counting the Christmas presents) was this little dice bag:

The pattern is Deep Sea Flower Dice Bag, found HERE. Well, to be honest, it isn't actually 100% finished, since I haven't made the cord yet. I just got so tired of knitting with that stupid yarn that has absolutely NO stretch what so ever, I just tied it with a piece of yarn to be done with it. Love the pattern and the bag, though. Plan to make more some time, when I can get my hands on some lovely multi-colored Noro, which the pattern is designed for.

And that was all. Whew! Longest post ever... (It's taken over four hours to write!) Well. My plan now is to finish the patterns for the things I made last year, preferably as soon as possible. I'll have a lot less time once school starts, and I think that if I don't finish them now, I probably never will. So one of my new year's resolutions is to finish all my Bugs, Dudes and any other patterns before I start any new ones. Have lots of projects going right now, but no new Bugs or Dudes before the others are done. Period. Will try to post again soon :)

Sorry!

I didn't mean to be gone this long! Had several posts planned, because I have quite a few new patterns to show you, but somehow that didn't happen... But I'm back now, after a much too long struggle with a math course. Took the final exam again just this Friday, and I have a good feeling about the result. I don't expect a brilliant grade, but I do expect to pass. What this means is that I can finally start my degree in biology! :)

Other good news: I've finally found a Blogger app for my phone that works the way I want it to. This means that I can write blog posts whenever I feel like it, and publish them whenever I'm online. This way I don't have to spend the evening by the computer, when I can crochet instead :D It also allows me to upload pictures directly from my phone, which is very practical. I don't really use my camera for pattern photos anymore because the flash tends to ruin the colors, which my phone camera doesn't. Huge plus :)

Reclaiming my craft space & new blog

Wow! Can't believe I've been gone this long, it sure wasn't planned. If I remember correctly I haven't posted anything here since January! I guess I warned you that I would be busy with school this semester, but I believe I've lost a couple of followers anyway. Oh, well.

Anyway, what I'm here to tell you is that from now on I will try to stick to craft related stuff on this blog, the way I meant it to be when I first created it. It all started a few weeks ago when I got a new phone. It's one of those fancy ones that let you go online and stuff (and not to mention play Angry Birds!), so I thought I'd try some mobile blogging. As it turned out, the Blogger app refused to accept the ymail address that's connected to this blog, so I'd have to register a new blog with a gmail address to make it work... I tried that, but after a while I decided that I wasn't happy with the Blogger app, and wanted to try something completely different. Like WordPress. It seems more complicated than Blogger, but once you get used to it, it really isn't. You can't customize everything, like you can with Blogger, but hopefully it'll come soon. So HERE is my new personal blog, where I post whatever crosses my mind - good or bad. I won't put up a permanent link on this blog because it's personal (and I don't have my name on there), so this is the only time you'll get the link. Hope I'll see you there :)

Despite being busy with school (and exams, the first of which is only days away!) I have managed to make some new crochet patterns. The next post will be about them, I promise :D

Changes :)

Today I decided it was time for some blog redecorating again. I started with Bollan's blog, which took me about two hours to get right, even with the new and easier Blogger tool feature thingy (I've had a glass of wine and can't remember what it's called!)... Finally I was able to give her blog three columns and space enough for both the gadgets and the blog posts! I still have some minor things to add, but they probably won't change things too much :) Oh, and by the way, can you guess what the background image on her blog is? I haven't added it myself, it was already in the default backgrounds added by Blogger :D

While I was at it I decided to change my own blog as well, but not as much as Bollan's. I've recently developed a thing for the color purple (not the movie, though it's wonderful and you should see it!), so when I found this background while searching for something for Bollan, I just had to have it. So there :)

I think my pattern blog is up next, but I think those changes will have to wait a little while. Tomorrow I'm going back out to my grandmother's, and while I'm there I can't really do much on the internet... Some time next weekend I'm going back to where I live during the school semesters, so I'll have to catch up with my online life then. See ya :) *waves goodbye*

New design & new job

Notice any changes? Yep. I've changed my blog design again! I just discovered that Blogger has a new way of customizing your blog that makes everything a lot easier. I can even have three columns, and I don't have to battle with the html codes :D Woohoo! You can still edit the layout in html if you want to, but I don't :p

Wednesday was my first day at my new job. It was also my last. It just didn't work out. Now, I don't want this to be a post about me writing bad stuff about my boss, because I don't like to talk about people like that, but seriously... When I asked for the job I expected to work the register, some cleaning and sorting around the store, being friendly with the customers etc. The customer is always right and all that... What I didn't expect was being told that I'm not chatty enough! Apparently I looked too much at the buttons on the register and the change I was counting when I should have been chatting with the customers! About what? Goddammit, I had been there for a few hours and I needed to see what I was doing so I didn't make mistakes :( I have never worked in a store before, she knew I needed training, but it didn't seem to be enough. She made a huge point (several times) out of telling me how important the customer was, and that it was not their fault when I made a mistake. Obviously! I never even implied such a thing, I smiled, said hello and was polite. That's the best I can do. She also told me several times that it was an unusually slow day, and that the line of customers usually were around the corner. She said it looked like I was struggling (which I weren't), she almost felt sorry for me (!), so I figured she was trying to tell me that I didn't fit in. She was probably trying to encourage me or something, but it didn't help much... Being told that I'm not good enough doesn't make me work harder, it just makes me give up :( It didn't help that I was the only one she'd found to work there either, I didn't want to be there just because she didn't have anyone else. Or because she felt sorry for me, or because she knows my mother! I'd still feel that she didn't think I was good enough. I'd rather be broke than depressed.

After three years in hell during High School (Junior High, I think is the closest term in English) I'm not very social or chatty person (in person, that is - online in writing I can be "normal"), dealing with new people is really scary, and I think smalltalk is pretty useless with complete strangers, especially when I'm trying to work! In my mind, and in the town where I usually live, the point of working in a store is not to talk to the customers from they enter the shop and all the time until they leave... She asked me to come back on Monday to get three more hours of training (so I'd have a full day), but I won't suddenly become a social butterfly over the weekend, so I told her to find someone else. (Well, I had my mother tell her, because I was curled up in a ball, unable to do anything useful for the rest of the day...)

Yesterday I got a new job! I'm going to be a cleaning-lady at the town hall, starting some time in July. Which suits me just fine :) I don't mind physical work, as long as the company is all right (in this case it means being ignored). So I still have a few more weeks of holiday and lots of time to crochet :D I actually applied for the cleaning job a good while before I got the store job, but somehow they managed to screw up when sorting all the applications, and I got a letter saying that I'd applied for the wrong job! Since my mother works there and knows these people (she's the one who told me about the job in the first place, since it wasn't advertized anywhere), and they apparently had no idea what had happened. They would sort out the mess and send me a letter saying my application was received. I never heard anything... I figured that the cleaning job was long gone when I got home, but then my mother told me that they just started hiring people yesterday! About a month too late... But hey, the screw-up means that I now have a job, so I'm not complaining :)

Html, you are not my friend...

Don't know if you have noticed some weird stuff going on with my blog lately, but if you have, it's because I've been trying to fix it up a little, and me and html coding just don't mix...

A couple of weeks ago I noticed that Virkverket, one of the blogs that I read regulary, had got one of those neat little boxes on the bottom of the blog posts, similar to the like-button on Facebook. It's a nice way to see what people think, even if they don't have time to log in and leave a comment. So I asked her how to do it, and it's really not that complicated! At least it shouldn't be...

First of all, you can try by going into the 'Layout' tab of your blog. Then click on 'Edit' in the lower right corner of the 'Blog posts' section, and you'll see what to do :)

So I tried to do all that, and nothing happened. No neat little boxes on my blog... Then I tried to reset my settings to the default template or whatever (but of course I downloaded my old template first), and my blog went back to the standard Minima template, and all my widgets were gone. And still no boxes... It said that it would be easy to retrieve your old settings, but of course after the whole thing changed I couldn't figure out how to do that. I was stuck, and all my stuff was gone. I thought. Don't know what I did to get my widgets back, but I did it somehow. At that point I was so angry I wanted to throw my laptop across the room, but instead I uploaded my old template and decided I'd live without the boxes... 

I tried to add boxes to my other blogs as well, and the only one that it worked on was my pattern blog. Weird... I figured that was because I haven't installed some fancy ready-made template on it, but simply added a pretty background.

Yesterday I decided to try again, after another blogger (SUADDA) linked to this great site which explains step by step how to fix things by editing the html codes of the blog. You can find it HERE, but it's in Swedish... I can't remember exactly what I did, but at some point the boxes actually appeared on my blog. Hooray! I think it was when I reset my template to standard Minima. And then they disappeared when I edited the html to get three columns... Which really shouldn't mess with the ending of the blogposts! So last night I was up for ours, copying and pasting and editing that bloody html, installing different templates and resetting things and THEN some more editing, but there was always something wrong, and the darn boxes were just gone... I finally gave up and went to sleep.

This morning I decided to screw the boxes and install my old template again, and what do know! I have boxes! *sigh* I really don't know what was different from the first time I tried, but now it worked... My other blogs now have boxes, too :) I'm still not friends with the html thing, but at least I've learned enough to change the width of the columns, which I felt looked a little squashed. But now I'll stop tinkering with this blog, or it will come back and eat me one day!

Sorry about the long rant, I just had to vent a little  :p

New award! :)

Just a few days after my first one! Don't know what's happening :p I'm not very good at French, but I think it says "Your blog is charming/a charm" or something :)

I got this from Seelenfein, who makes a lot of very cute amigurumi and other cool things. Thank you! 

Can't help but feel like I left people out when I passed on my last award and could only pick seven blogs... But this time I'm supposed to pass it on to ten bloggers, so here's a new list :)

Häxan Sytant

A Crochet Ninja

cattisvirkar

Knit me!

Crochetra

Elsas pärldjur

Min Tråd

Tant Grön Välkommen

"Why keep to one project?"

Yellow, Pink and Sparkly

Award!

I got my first award, from SUADDA! Thank you very much, I'm thrilled you like the stuff I do :) Check out her blog, she makes awsome amigurumi!

The award comes with a few tasks. I should link to the person who gave me the award, I have to write seven interesting things about me, and I should pick seven blogs to pass the award on to. 

Don't know about the interesting, but here are seven facts about me:

* I have a tattoo of the Egyptian god Set on my right shoulder and a small snake on my back

* I have loved dinosaurs since I was little, and I would have become a Paleontologist if I'd been brave enough to study abroad as soon as I finished High School

* I hate to take the bus alone, especially short distances

* I am absolutely addicted to chocolate

* I studied Arabic language for more than two years, spent a semester in Cairo, but I don't speak a word of Arabic (only read & write a little)

* I met my boyfriend in an Egyptology course about two weeks before the final exam. We studied together, and after spending the summer holiday in different parts of the country we moved in together. We have now been living happily together for six years
* I love all reptiles, but crocodiles are a big favorite

It's taken me a while to pass on this award, because it was a little hard to find seven things to say about myself, but it was even harder to decide which blogs would get the award. There are so many good ones! So if you don't see your name on the list, it's simply because I could only pick seven (I would love to pick all of them!)... Anyway, here's my list:

Pysselstugan

En kreativ liten blogg

Fröken Elsas virkblogg

Livet som pysselkiise

Fiffel & tråd

Ulliga gulliga saker

Pysselstund

100!

This is post number 100, can you believe it? It's not even a year since I started this blog... Since then I've created a number of new ones, the latest is my Book Blog, where I post pictures and reviews of all my craft books, and some other hobby books as well. It's not all done yet, I have a few books left to post about, but I'll get there :)

Spring cleaning on the blog

As you may have noticed by now I have got a new template for my blog :) I finally realized I needed a template with two sidebars to make it look less messy, and I think I've achieved that. I wanted a black background for the text so I wouldn't have to go through all my previous posts to edit the font colors, and this is one of the few I could find. I really like the blue background color, it didn't turn out as crazy as I feared :) There are two things, though.. One is that the column with posts is very narrow, which makes my posts very long (as if they weren't already!), and the other is that I had to remove the header picture of Bollan:

I have also added a box called 'Categories' in the right sidebar, in the hope that it will make it easier to find stuff on my blog. The tag cloud at the bottom is now mostly for my own sake, I have way too many tags for anyone to find anything. So, if you are totally uninterested in my personal life and only want to see the things I make, just click on the category 'crafting'. I know that some posts contain a lot of different stuff, so no category is completely 'pure', I hope you can bear with me, it's a little late to edit them now... I'll  just try to separate my posts a little better from now on :)

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.

New blog!

My beloved plushie, The Great Boll, has finally got her very own blog! I created it a few months ago when I had a brilliant idea, but I haven't found the time to sit down and write a proper introduction to Bollan and her adventures and family life. Yesterday I suddenly discovered that the blog has two followers, and I realized that it was time to put thought into action. Now there are already a few posts, and more will follow shortly :) Now, she already has a Facebook page, and there are about two hundred pictures of her on Flickr, so the new blog is a place to write a little bit more about some of her adventures. I feel like the little info in photo comments doesn't always do her justice :)

You find the blog here, and I have also added a permanent link on the right sidebar.

Blogs, blogs, blogs...

On my Advent calendar blog I have now posted a knitting pattern for a tiny santa hat, here's a picture of Tiny trying it on:

I have also posted the pattern on my old pattern blog, and for that reason I have changed the blog title, description and (maybe somewhat confusingly) the url. You will now find my pattern blog here, the old url does no longer exist. (I have changed the links in my old posts, but in case I've missed some, I thought I'd mention it in a new post..)

My crafty Advent calendar :)

Just wanted to post the link to my Advent calendar blog, now that it's up and running. Should have done it yesterday, but time just keeps escaping me.. So here it is, hope you like it :)

(I will make a permanent link on the right sidebar when I can find a pretty picture to put up..)

A final exam and possibly a new blog

Well. My Sanskrit exam is now over, and I think I did allright. Not exactly brilliant, but then I have now idea what the level of the course really is. As the only student in that class I guess I should know, but...

After much deliberation today and last night, I have now decided to make a separate blog for my advent calendar :) That means I am one project short, because I have also decided to make all my holiday projects holiday related. I'm not completely happy with the layout of the new blog yet (can't find a template I really like), so the link will be posted later. I plan to spend the evening figuring this thing out :)

Hello

This is my first time blogging in a place like this. And in English. Don't know if my English is good enough to write long posts about life and everything else, but I think I have to start somewhere and see what happens :)

A little about me:

• 
  
  Norwegian
  
• 
  
  Female
  
• 
  
  26 years old
  
• 
  
  Living with my boyfriend
  
• 
  
  Just moved into a new apartment
  
• 
  
  Study linguistics at a university (with Semitic languages as my main interest)
  
• 
  
  Totally obsessed with hedgehogs
  
• 
  
  Love all kinds of animals (except spiders and tapeworms)
  
• 
  
  Allergic to anything with fur (which is tragic, because I'd have a whole zoo of animals if I weren't)
  
• 
  
  Love to make stuff (although I'm not very creative, I usually follow patterns)
  
• 
  
  Need to knit or crochet when I'm not doing anything else
  
• 
  
  Impulse shopper of craft supplies, especially yarn and beads
  
• 
  
  Share house with an ever growing yarn stash monster :)
  
  
  

Yes.. I think maybe that's it about me. Like I said I'm always knitting or crocheting, and recently I've started to make patterns of my own. It takes quite a lot of time, since I don't have too much time to knit or crochet to begin with (being a student and all), but I have opened a shop on Etsy (where I have been a buyer for a couple of years, username "hepp"), and so far I have posted one pattern. I will be posting pictures of future projects here on this blog, and hopefully my shop will be filling up soon :)

So, I hope I have not bored anyone to tears with my ramblings. When I find the time, I'll try to post some pictures, too :)