Talk to Me Tuesday: Um...yeah

I'm kind of boring this week, so forgive me.

Crafty Monday: Latch Hook!

I've been a bit lax with this blog, but finally putting this update together


I finally tried a new craft, and surprise - I love it! As with all crafts, if you look at it long enough, you'll want to try it. The latch hook section is in the same aisle as the punch needle and cross stitch stuff, so when I was buying my punch needle tool, I was also looking at the latch hook stuff. I wanted to try a smaller kit, one that wasn't tacky (harder than it sounds), so I settled on the simple butterfly. There were only 6 colors and about 1500 stitches? latches? doo-dads? I don't know what they are called, lol. It was easy enough to pick up, and once I was about halfway through I was feeling like a pro at it (it is always nice to feel like you know what you're doing).


I finished it on Saturday, but now I really don't know what I'm going to do with it. I think the easiest way to finish it off would be to make a pillow out of it, but for now, I just like looking at the back of it. In my opinion, the back looks nearly as cool as the front does. Either way I am really glad to have learned a new craft and I can't wait to go exploring to see what other people have created with latch hooking.


Now I'm really curious about one thing, does this make me a hooker?

Talk to me Tuesday: I always dress like this...

I need to figure out what size to save my videos as. I've done it the right way once or twice, but I forget which one it is.

Things mentioned:

• Grossology photos


• Grossology Exhibit


• The stitch I'm working on

Talk to me Tuesday: Pants and Disasters

Crafty Monday: I need some new shirts...

What I usually wear is simple: black t-shirt, jeans, and 3" flip-flops (I hate being short, so I'm a fan of tall shoes). Because I like to wear black shirts, I have a ton of them. Last time I counted I had a little over 50, and now I've added two more to my wardrobe.



Stenciling t-shirts is my favorite way to make them. I have tried iron-ons in the past, but after a few washes they start looking pretty awful. Instead, I use a freezer paper stencil and paint the shirts - Jennifer from Sewhooked.org has a great video tutorial on the process. I've made so many shirts with her method and I highly recommend it.


This weekend I did two shirts. The first is a simple text heart done in a beautiful magenta/fuchsia/pink color. I've actually had the image ready to be printed and cut out for a while, just not the motivation to do it. I've been waiting for the t-shirt bug to bite me. Oddly enough, I'm really excited to wear it. It is one of the most simple shirt designs, but I love it.


The other shirt could be considered slightly "controversial" or shocking to a random person reading it. Online friends have already responded with "I'm guessing it was a sticky situation...?" "This I've got to hear!" and my personal favorite "Don't we all have one of those?" It is actually something that was said in an episode of the only podcast that I can stand listening to: Emergency Pants. Shane and Bridget are the hosts, and they are hilarious. In Episode 10 Shane asks Bridget, "Did I ever tell you my horse semen story?"


The back of this one has a design on it, which is a rarity for me. I wanted to not be the freak with the horse semen shirt (too late), so I decided to do a little promotion of my own. The pants are in a light blue and the text is in the same white color *giggles* as the front of the shirt. I was very scared of this because the lettering is small and close together. The freezer paper that I have is kind of thin (waiting for the giant roll to be gone before I buy some heavy duty kind) so I was worried that the paint would bleed together and be a blob. I used a very thin brush and painted it on carefully. I was relieved when I peeled off the stencil and saw that it looked just fine!

I do have a number of other stenciled shirts in a flickr set if you'd like to see them! :D

Talk to me Tuesday: I fail

In this video I share my progress on my Twilight cross stitch and tell the story of how I fail at life.

Crafty Monday: Revisiting Old Crafts

I had work off yesterday because we were changing offices, so today is my Monday. No one tell me any different, because I want to be surprised by the weekend on my Thursday. Anyway, I meant to blog about this a few weeks ago, but had a lot of other super fun stuff going on (speaking of awesome, one of my favorite embroidery sites, Urban Threads, featured me!).

A few weeks ago I had a chance to get back to one of my favorite crafts: paper piecing. Paper piecing, also known as foundation quilting, is one of my most favorite crafts. My friend Jennifer Ofenstein (who runs the site Sewhooked - a site full of great patterns, tutorials, stencils, and recipes) is the one who first got me into paper piecing with her amazing Harry Potter quilt blocks. I learned to sew and started doing blocks and designing patterns (my patterns on the guest page of Sewhooked).

Paper piecing is one of my favorite ways to indulge in craft therapy.


all patterns from sewhooked

A few great links for paper piecing:

Sewhooked.org

HP_Paperpiecing LJ community

Flickr Paper Piecing Group

Flickr HP Paper Piecing Group