Spinning & Craft Time with my Toddler

It was a big spinning day for me. I spun a whole vhs tape, which yields a lot of "yarn." Then I wound it on the ball winder. Big mistake. I spun it super tight thus making it an "active" ball of yarn. It tangled like crazy when I was trying to ply it with spun plarn. Next time I'll roll it into a ball. It should only be used on the ball winder when it is plied with another kind of yarn. I was able to ply it with the plarn, and I rolled it into a ball instead of using the ball winder. I wanted to have a nice example of it for my class tomorrow night, and it is the perfect amount to finish the bag that I'm working on.

It was the drop in craft day at the library. Their project was making mittens. They provided 2 different pages with mittens on them, markers, scissors, hole punches, yarn, and foam stickers. My toddler decorated these mittens and I cut them out and sewed them together. I just love the faces that he made on them.

Here is the 2nd page that he decorated. I wonder what is coming out of the bottom of the left mitten?

This is the back of the 2nd page. I think it looks like a monkey with his tongue sticking out. I love it!

I personally think that his creations are perfect. The only help that I gave was in using scissors, a hole punch, and the yarn to join the 1st mittens. I also helped to remove some of the foam sticker backs and to return the caps to the markers. I feel that it is important to allow children to be creative with as little interference from adults as possible. The mother and son who were sitting across from us had a different situation going on. The son obviously did not want to do the craft project (throwing a fit). When I looked at his mittens, it was apparent that it was the mother's craft project. If your child isn't into it, then don't do it. It is suppose to be a fun experience for them, not a "you have to" experience. I use to teach preschool. I would provide tools for a project and just let the kids figure out what to do with them. Occasionally there was some instructions, like "that is for painting and printing with." However it was 90% hands off on my part. This allows the child to develop their skills and creativity on their own. I learned so much from watching them. Children are so very creative. Its inspiring!

Plarn & VHS Tape

Last night I knitted this Christmas ornament. I just need to sew it closed and stuff it. I started a 2nd one today. I want to make 3 this week to meet my personal deadline of making 3 a month.

I also made some plarn and wound a bunch of plarn on my ball winder.

I did some spinning today as well. This is the vhs tape that I am currently spinning. I spun some plarn and plied it with itself, and I spun some plarn and plied it with some spun vhs tape.

Here is the spun and plied plarn and vhs tape that I made today. I currently have 7 rounds crochet for the bottom of a new market bag. For some reason this yarn squeaks when used. The last vhs tape that I used didn't squeak. The last one I spun on a drop spindle and this one I used a spinning wheel.

This bag I started some time last year. It has brown and cream colored plarn that is spun then plied with itself. I made some more spun / plied plarn for it today and began crocheting the sides of the bag. I didn't get very far before I ran out of plarn.

Tonight was my quilt guild meeting. I worked on both of those plarn bags during the meeting. I also started this drawing during the meeting. I love my sketchbook. Not only can I doodle in it, but its also good for taking notes.

Sunday - Dyeing, crocheting, and up coming classes

Today I finished crocheting this plied white plarn and boa yarn bag. I plan on sewing a white lining in it and adding some white store bought handles to it. It is really nice to touch.

Today was also the last Sunday school class where we dyed wool with Kool Aid. This is the work of three of the 4th graders. They took their time and as a result this might be the brightest skein from the 5 classes. They also made some matchbook notebooks.

I also made 2 quilt blocks tonight for the box exchange for my quilt guild. Since its a secret who is working on who's box, I'll post pictures of all the blocks that I've made in April when the box exchange is over.

This week I am teaching 2 adult classes at two different libraries in Massachusetts. On Wednesday the 24th I'll be at the Chelmsford Main Library from 7 pm - 9 pm. This workshop will be on making plarn (plastic bag yarn), plastic bag wreaths, and a demo on fusing plastic. Supplies will be available, however if you come it would be helpful if you brought some plastic bags, scissors, and a wreath frame. On Saturday the 27th I will be at the Brooks Free Library from 1 - 2:30 pm. It is at 739 Main St. in Harwich, MA. For this class we will be making plarn, plastic bag wreaths, and tarn (t-shirt yarn). Supplies will be available, however it would be helpful if you brought plastic bags and an old t-shirt. I am really looking forward to both classes. It should be a lot of fun.

Plied Plarn & VHS Bag

I finished crocheting this bag tonight. I just love movie nights when working on a project with a simple pattern. The change that I made to the pattern that I posted last was that when I switched back to the smaller hook, I single crochet 2 in one space then 1 in the next space. This bag is about 11" to 12" on the bottom, 12" high (not including the handles), and 13" wide. It feels sturdy, and it looks like it can hold a good bit of stuff. It does have some stretch to it, which adds about 4" to the height.

I would like some feed back on what people think of it.

New tote bag - WIP

Two days ago I started crocheting a new tote bag in the round. I am using spun and plied plarn and vhs tape. I started off with a huge ball of yarn. Then I wound 3 skeins of it for a friend's birthday present (for tomorrow), and the bag ate up most of what was left. It looks like I'll be spinning more vhs tape this week. This is the first time that I have crochet with the vhs tape. It gives an interesting look when plied with the white plarn.

Two nights ago I crochet most of the bottom of the bag. Last night I was one row away from being done with the bag, but I was not happy with how it looked. So I frogged it (ripped out the stitches). I was trying out a new pattern where I use two different sized crochet hooks. One for the bottom and for the very top of the bag, and a large hook for the center mesh area. So today I tweaked the pattern a bit. I'm much happier with it now. I'm hoping to finish it tonight.

The pattern:

- With an I hook (I couldn't find my J hook), crochet a flat circle to the size that you want the bottom of the bag to be. If you want a pattern for this part, let me know. Otherwise I'm assuming that you know how to do this step.

- Next single crochet (sc) in a stitch (st), chain (ch) 1 and skip (sk) a stitch. Repeat for 1 round.

- Then switch to a size P hook.

- Now sc in every space (sp) until you reach the length that you want. Christi from fatbottombags says not to make it more than 13" long, because it will stretch to much. This will make your mesh sides.

- Then switch back to your I or J hook.

- I haven't gotten to this part yet, but I will be following Christi's fat bottom bag pattern for it. You will sc twice into every space for one round.

- slip stitch (sl st) the next round.

- In this round you will add your handles. You can either chain the same amount of stitches that you will skip to create the handle, or you can chain 25 stitches and skip less than that for the handle. Christi says to take the number of stitches in the round and subtract 40 from it. Then divide that by 2. That will give you the number of stitches between the handles.

- Next sl st for 2 to 3 rounds. Then bind off.

This is a much faster way of making the market bags than I have done in the past.

Here is an alternative pattern by Cindy at myrecycledbags. I'll be trying out this pattern next.

May The Force Be With You

Today is my anniversary. I wanted to give my husband something special, so I made him a Yoda and a Chewbacca finger puppet. His 2 favorite Star Wars characters. For Yoda, I used the same pattern that I used to make the snowman from "Knitted Finger Puppets" by Meg Leach. The ears and light saber are one row of single crochet. The head of Chewbacca is the same pattern as Yoda's body. Then I just had to make his body a little bit larger. The sash is silver ribbon. I used boa yarn for Chewbacca. My husband loves them.

Turn your jeans into a long skirt

First you have to use a seam ripper and remove the inner seams. You also have to seam rip up to the base of the zipper on the front, and up to the belt loop on the back (between the pockets).

Turn your jeans inside out, and fold them in half along the center of the back / butt. Then draw a straight line from the center belt loop to the bottom of the pants. Pin them and sew along that line. I used a hem stitch. You might want to put a denim needle in your sewing machine.

Next cut off the excess fabric, fold it over, and hem stitch the raw edges down. I made sure to stitch over the first stitches so as not to make the skirt even tighter.

Over lap the front flaps how you want them, pin, and sew them using a hem stitch.

Take a large piece of paper (I used a leaf lawn bag) and lay it inside of the skirt. Lay out the front of the skirt how you want the center panel to be. Then trace around the edges.

Add at least a half of an inch around the traced edge for seam allowance then cut out your pattern. Pin your fabric to the paper and cut it out. You can look at the post from yesterday to see how I picked out my fabric. Sometimes seeing a picture of it vs in person gives a nice perspective on what you would like more. Next fold and sew the raw edges of your fabric towards the right side of the fabric.

Insert your fabric into the skirt and pin it in place. Then sew it using a hem stitch (I'm referring to the same stitch that is used on t-shirts).

I had a hole on one of the knees of my jeans. So I stitched over the hole several times. Then I used a cute iron on patch to cover it. I just so happened to have a matching patch in my house, which is weird since I don't usually buy them.

Next cut off the bottom seams on your jeans. They are to hard to sew over. Then roll and sew the new bottom hem of your skirt.

Voila! You have a nice new denim skirt made from a worn out pair of jeans

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Here is the back of them. They are a bit tighter than the jeans were. However that was a good thing for me since I was constantly pulling my pants up, lol.