craf·te·ra·ti

I’m moving my craft postings over to a new blog called CraftCake. There I’ll be posting about crafts and cupcakes! I may still post about some stuff here – but i’m not really sure yet.

the website is http://www.craftcake.com

I was in Starbucks on Monday and they have some cool yarn ball decorations. I got some photos on my iphone.

I have been busy working on christmas gifts. I decided to make (almost) all my holiday gifts this year. I was a crocheting machine the past couple of days doing to 2 gifts from start to finish, and finishing off a knitting project. That leaves me with one complicated project that is 75% done and 2 new projects to start. I also have some jewelry to make.

Last weekend I let my sister go shopping in my yarn stash. She filled a grocery bag. What does it say about me that this didn’t even make a dent?

I have a baby hat that I really need to finish and send off be fore the baby outgrows it. Thankfully I made the 3-6month size. Then I really want to do some spinning. I haven’t done that in about a year!!

It’s been over a month since I last posted, but I swear I’m still alive!

I haven’t been doing a ton of crafting since I’m spending most of my free time working on powderroom.net’s relaunch. Still I’ve been playing with resin jewelry and itching to knit. I haven’t spun in FOREVER but I need to get the craftroom in progress straightened out so I have somewhere to assemble my wheels.

I’m going on vacation next week and I decided I need to knit something for me. I’ve decided to do the Debbie Bliss Catriona vest(ravelink). I got some nice green merino style from knit picks. It’s all written instructions so I decided to write the cable pattern up. I screwed it up the first couple of times but now I think I’ve got it. I also realized it’s very important to look at the size not just the number of the needles required. This calls for size 6 (4mm). However it’s also common for size 6 to be 4.25mm. So when I did my gauge swatch I was way off, and I’m always exactly on gauge. So I dug out my other needles that were 6/4mm and got gauge – yay!

Now I just need to figure out what size to make. This pattern has tons of positive ease but looking at photos on ravelry I’m pretty sure as a busty gal I want negative ease.

I also wanted to make a Greenery hat (ravelink) after seeing helloyarn’s version. I have this gorgeous dk superfine merino that calls for the same needle size as the pattern. However after spending the time to do a tubular 2×2 cast on and a few rows I had to abandon hope that it would actually fit my enormous head. I guess my options are to add a repeat or use different yarn. Oh well.

Does anyone have a copy of Interweave Knits Winter 2006 issue that I can borrow or buy?

I’ve found some places that have it in stock online but most of them want $7 to ship a $6 magazine.

The Renegade Craft Fair is this weekend at McCarren Park (of the Pool fame) in Brooklyn. I think my sisters and I are going on Sunday. The weather looks good and the stuff for sale is pretty nifty. This is what I got when I went a couple of years ago.

I think we may also go check out the Brooklyn/London Telescope.

I have been slow on the crafting lately because I’ve spent tons of time gardening. Which is kind of like live crafting in the dirt, right?

I have gotten a few things done though. I finally reknit the neckband and wove in the ends on my Rusted Root. I only made it a year ago . I gave it to my sister Natalie. I also did some work on longtime hibernating Tempting II which is for my other sister Vanessa. I’m probably more than 3/4 done with it. Gotta finish though!

I have also been playing around with making resin jewelry. I am definitely in the mood to make jewelry but need space. My craft room has been a big pile of junk since I started working on it. One night this week I went down and moved all the boxes to the side so I can get rid of the non-craft junk. The main thing being the exercise bike that blocks all walking routes. Now I need to clean a spot to move it to.

I have also been itching to spin. I haven’t done that since I moved back to NJ a year ago!

I have always wanted to learn how to do glass blowing/glass working. I discovered there is a glass studio in Newark that offers classes/workshops called Glassroots. It’s a few blocks from the Broad Street station. They have a 6 week glass bead class that I am interested in taking. The only thing is it’s at 6pm on Tuesday nights.

I also found there is a studio in Blairstown called Solar Furnace Glass. It’s on Camp Wasigan Road – which seems to be pretty close to Sandy’s house. Have you ever seen/heard of it?

I have been organizing a craft room for my mom and I in our basement. In doing so gathered all the yarn I own…and lets just say it scary. So I took out all the yarn that I know I won’t use – all acrylic – LB Homespun, red heart, etc. Some of it is even in bags! I am even making my mom get rid of her crappy acrylic yarn.

So anyway I wanted to donate it and so I just did some searching and Halycon Yarn has a listing of charity groups that will take knitted items and/or yarn.

http://www.halcyonyarn.com/charlinks.htmlÂ

I am probably going to send mine to Knit-Net since it’s the closest and most of my yarn is random and not really suited to blankets.

Remember my last post where I complained about Webs taking over two weeks to ship my order? Well I just got an email from them apologizing for the delays and offering a free shipping coupon to anyone who ordered from December 25 to January 15. I’m glad they recognized this problem and tried to make it up to their customers.