craft

We have been crafting up a storm this weekend. P. #1 had a friend over Saturday night. They spent time making little tokens of affection for each other. The little heart talismans are each adorned with a stitched "M" for the tow Madelines...the beads are traditional friendship bracelets. I was so pleased that they chose to spend their time this way, gossiping and playing their mp3's and being creative in their 14 year oldness.
After returning the friend to her house, we ventured out to Stitches West. Here were hundreds of amazing booths, all jam packed with everything for knitting and spinning...as well as buttons, books, patterns, and fantastic people sharing a love of the craft. It was very very inspiring, and after much restraint I narrowed down my purchases:
Here we have some hand dyed merino pin roving from Oregon, and two skeins of gorgeous handspun and hand dyed sock yarn from Northern California. There is enough on each skein for two pairs of socks! I am in love with these intensely saturated colors. Also from the Oregon booth, a different kind of needle craft.
This picture WILL go sideways, even though it shows up straight in the browser. *sigh* I think you can get the idea here. Needlefelting! I desperately want to make gnomes. The little sample balls of roving were also from the Oregon booth, Koolaid dyed leftovers from bigger projects. Isn't that book adorable! And it came with a felting needle taped in the cover.
After perusing the entire market (like going to 60 of your favorite lys's in two hours) we fortified ourselved with burritos and then charged on to Kinokuniya. I have been drooling over the Japanese craft books on various blogs across the board and had to snag a couple for myself.

The book on the left is full of wonderful bags, zippered pouches, cloth baskets, slippers, tissue holders and a cute tunic to wear over jeans. The one on the right is SO cute...patterns for tiny stuffies of all sorts, hand stitched from felt. Easy little projects for gifts, embellishments, and wiling away the crafty hours of wintertime.



Dd was skeptical at first, rolling her eyes and admonishing "Mom! You can't even read that." I didn't reply, but simply drove to Beverly's, grabbed a handful of felt and whipped out this adorableness in the time it took to make tea and drink it:



The little kitty is a replica of our own Princess Licorice. She was incomplete without her tiny crown. Her eyes are iridescent green beads, and I attached a stretchy black cord so she can dangle from my purse handle. Since she is a diva, well, of course everyone adores her.






The puppy dances from my knitting bag on the same type of cord. His cheeks are shmeary felt pen and his eyes are black beads from the endless stash (supplemented by garage sales) I love his sweet gesture and he is just a little charm, therefore I named him Lucky.
It occurred to me how fun it would be to make a bunch of these, for sale or swap. Whattya think?
The book actually is quite easy to follow, and has ideas for converting these into hairties, pins, pushpins for a bulletin board, or magnets (actually dd's idea.) Neat!