Little Hippy Boy

Since I've been crocheting, I've had many orders from my kids of what they've wanted me to make for them. I'm constantly making things for my daughter Ashlee, so of course my son Andrew wanted me to make him something special as well. He asked me to make him a bookbag. So one day, I took Andrew to Walmart and picked some camiflage yarn. I knew that his dad wasn't going to be too happy with him carrying this crocheted bag around school so I told him that I would make an overnight bag to put his things in when he goes to his grandmother's. He was cool with it and I started working on it. It turned out like a duffle bag with a drawstring at the top and a long handle to hang over his back.

He was so proud of his sack. He wanted to take it to school one day and I let him. He put all his books in it and his jacket. He wore it on his back like he was the cool kid of the block. When we got home from school that day, his dad was home early and witnessed him with his duffle bag. He was not too happy with me and told me that he was going to get beat up one day for taking that to school.

My response to him, "Well then I guess he'll have to learn to protect himself. All he has to do is put a big rock on the bottom of it and if someone bothers him he can swing around like David and the slingshot and fling it at them. If the bullies get hit with that, they won't bother him any more."

He never took it to school again.

Spring Has Sprung

Lately I've been taking a break from blogging and have finally decided to start up again. I've been motivated by the coming of Spring and decided that if I didn't do something else besides crocheting all day that I would eventually get burned out. The first sign of sring, of course, has been the warm weathere we've been having and Spring Break just around the corner. The other sign of Spring happened just this morning when my son came running in the house, screaming, "Look at the pool!!! Look at the pool!!!"

Our two little friends make another visit this year. I'm guessing they stopped by for a rest on their way to their summer home to start their family once again. I hope we'll get to see them again tomorrow, at least to stop by and say hi.

Spring also brought forth some inspiration through my purse designs as well. This purse had been a project I was doing for my mother. She wanted a black and white background with lots of flowers on the front. Ok, that's exactly what she got, but it wasn't quite what she saw in her head. I have learned since not to custom design purses for special orders. I'll sell it to someone who loves it and can't live without it. Actually, it might just be another purse for me.

The whole purse was felted. The flowers were of course felted seperate then later attached to the purse. I'm pretty happy with the turn out of this purse, it will definately catch lots of eyes.

Psychedelic Peace Purse

Gag Gift Triumph

Every year my family is invited to my house to celebrate our Christmas season with a White Elephant game. We bring a $10 gift to be put in the middle of the room while we all sit in a circle around the pile of gifts. We all pick a number and choose a gift accordingly in numerical order. This year however, I had two gifts. I had crocheted a ski cap for an aunt and decided to put it in the pile as a gag gift. My cousin Yvonne and I sat together on the couch, when she told me that she had number one, I thought her to be the perfect person to grab my gag gift. I, of course, having such a trustworthy face (ha ha ) coerced her into taking my gift. So, when it came to starting with number one, she got up to pick her gift. She himmed and hawed and looked over all the gifts, faking an attraction to the others and reached down and picked mine up. With a big smile, she unwrapped the pretty paper, and low and behold, the crocheted ski hat, pom pom included. She told me that her first thought was, "Oh shit!" but she played it off pretty nicely, saying how beautiful it was as she put it on, while we all rolled on the floor laughing. She even slugged me in the arm for talking her into picking my gift. However, after we all calmed down from laughing our asses off, I gave her the real gift. I knew she would love. A jewelry box with beaded embellishments over sari silk, made in India.

This was after I got slugged in the arm for making her pick my gift, but then pleasantly surprised after opening her real gift.

Russian peasant girl who lives in Siberia. The only thing keeping her warm is her ski hat, shawl and her O'Riley's white chocolate liqueur, which goes perfectly in a cup of hot coffee.

Ooooo, sexy Russian girl posing for the camera. Uh oh, getting into to the white chocolate, she's throwing out all her inhibitions.

That's it sexy Russian girl, feel the camera, be the camera, love the camera. Give me sexy eyes. That's good, now think nasty thoughts. MMMMMMMM good girl, that's the look.

Tis the Season To Be Nutty

Every Christmas I make and sell butter toffee and dipped pretzels. This year I decided I was going to take a break from the mess and stress of making my, soon to be, famous candy. However, people heard about it and were, lets say, less than happy to hear of the disappointing news. I felt like Santa, deciding to postpone Christmas. One person asked then another, then another, pretty soon I had orders and lots of candy to make. In a weekend, however, I managed to pull off 50 lbs of toffee, 30 lbs of pretzels and 10 doz. of my special buttery shortbread cookies, and that is only 1/4 of what I normally do each year. I'm glad I decided to do it though, it seemed to brighten up a lot of faces.

My Business Card

I thought I'd share my cool business cards my genius brother created for me. Are they perfect or what. I am so tickled as to how they turned out, I had to post them. Thanks bro.

Got Red Heart?

I, like many stittchers from the past, have collected oodles and oodles of acrylic yarn such as Red Heart. Where did it come from? WalMart, Target, Michael's, yard sales. Yes, I am guilty of swerving the corner after seeing the infamous yard sale sign posted out on the main street, just to see if they have any yarn. And yes, I have bought many a yarn from these yard sales. $.50, $.25, 5 for a $1.00. Leaving with bags of yarn, Red Heart, Home Spun, Caron. As the saying goes, one man's (or woman's) junk (yarn), is another man's (woman's) treasure (yarn). And yes, I have ended up with ton's of "less than fabulous" acrylics.

So, the other day, I had just washed and felted a couple of bags. As I was scanning the garage, searching for the perfect object to stuff into my wet felted bags, to form them as they dry, I came across two large bags of my "l.t.f.a. (less than fabulous acrylic) yarns, sitting there waiting to be donated to our "Warm Up America" blanket charity, and cancer hats. Then DING, the light balb went on. I grabbed some skeins of the l.t.f.a and stuffed them into the bags. Wow, I had just found a use for them and was so proud of myself for coming up with such a great idea to use to form my felted projects. It works great. There is plenty of air going through them even as they sit inside the wet bags, this way they will be able to dry on the inside as they dry on the outside. After the bags are done drying fully, pull out the skeins of ltfa and they will dry in no time. Put them away until the next time. Ok, now I have a question... how am I going to donate my ltfa's when now I actually have a use for them?