Hippo!

A baby knitted hippo! From the Knitted Noah's Arc book by Sarah Keen (http://m.bookdepository.com/Knitted-Noahs-Ark-Sarah-Keen/9781861089151) 

And I can't remember if I showed you my dinosaur when it was all done! 

So, umm, been a while!

I've been gone for ages! I've been so busy with life that I just haven't had time to craft! And that sucks! :) 

But here are a few things I've done in the last almost-year: 

Penny helping me with a project I later frogged. 

Home/ bedroom renovations.. How amazing are LED LIGHTS? way more exciting than the small wall I knocked down. 

I made quite a few hedgehogs.. I've made like 6 of them now. :)

Also crocheted a dinosaur! he is Huge and beautiful, if a little unsteady on his feet.

And that brings me to my current dinosaur! Another stegosaurs!

Dinosaurs!

I'm not dead!

And I learned to knit properly! So I made dinosaurs.

I used Tina Barry's Knitted Dinosaurs book, which is fantastic to make these:

I made another bear... I think I have a problem.

I was talking to a work colleague, and we got to talking about crochet, because she's just getting back into knitting and crocheting. I was in the middle of making my hedgehog from my (rather long ago, I will admit) last post, so I had it with me and I showed it to her.

Then we got to talking about other things we've made, so I mentioned my bear habit. She'd just found out she was about to become a grandmother, and asked if she could commission one! I brought in a couple of my pre-made ones for her to have a look at. She loved the white one, and the baby is a boy so she asked if it could have blue accents.

Easy :)

Here he is!



I even learned to tie a tie properly - figured I may as well do it properly. That's a half-windsor knot. :)






I SOLD MY FIRST THING.


I should really sell some more.
I did just buy a house.
Speaking of which, I may start posting some of my house-craft things in the future too. I haven't done much, but I will be doing a few little things.

Hedgehogs

I have this gorgeous wool.




So I made a hedgehog!!

It's a going away present for my work. I'm being seconded to another branch, so I made something cute.

Its a Hippo!

Its a pretty little hippo. Lovely soft bamboo wool. made with a 3.75mm hook for the green and a 3mm for the cream wool. Then add two saftey eyes, and fibre fill.

Where is the green sheep?

My friend is having a baby! 

And I decided I wanted to give her/baby a copy of Where is the Green Sheep by Mem Fox - a gorgeous storybook kids love - and since she's a kids librarian, she knows its adorableness. 

So I made this to go with the book. (I haven't bought the book yet, otherwise if put it next to my sheep in a photo!)

He's pretty adorable! Worked out so much better than I had hoped! :) 

I made up an interesting oval thing for his nose, it took me a few goes to get it right - and I doubt I could replicate it even if I tried haha. 

He doesn't stand up, but that's cool - he's soft and squishy and likes to dance to the songs from Tangled. 

I'll take another photo tomorrow, cos the wooly part of Green Sheepy looks washed out in these photos!

You should read this picture book- it's pretty adorable. It's always a hit at story time for all ages. :)

Overload of Bears!

I made a new bear! I gave him bigger eyes and a smaller nose.. I like the change.




Proof he does have a nose, and gorgeous eyes.



And yesterday, just before I finished the white bear, I got bored and took some better photos of my other bears in nice strong daylight lighting conditions.





And sexy!bear:



Next, I'm making some more crochet angry birds. I feel like finally completing the set.

Another Shark Hat

So, I'm finally back after the busy summer period. I was working 6 or 7 days a week, and then I also had to read all of the Wheel of Time books from beginning to end because that is what you have to do when the final book comes out. So between the jobs and reading the 14 Wheel of time books in two months, I didn't craft much. But now I have a hat. I made my boss a shark hat, because he loved the one I made for me.

I'd love to say I could give people that pattern, but I can't because I totally made him up as I went along.

Doctor Who Pattern

Put up the pattern for my Doctor Who quote on my Patterns page :)

Scroll to the bottom

It's just a jpeg file, so just right click to save it and I don't have a colour chart for it because I just chose a colour that looked pretty :)

Poor little neglected blog.

I've been so super busy lately, Christmas and things, and the fact that I got myself a full time job finally! HOORAY!

So that's my excuse: I got a job. And I'm still transitioning into it, so I'm still at the stage where I come home and fall onto the couch because my brains been overloaded with new information all day. But I am still making things, it's just going very slowly :)
Incase I don't post again beforehand, MERRY CHRISTMAS! :D

Sheepish

Made a little sheepie! :)

Not sure if he'll be a Christmas ornament or get legs or how I'll finish him, but... Adorable! Haha.

The Angels Have the Phonebox!

Quote from yet another fantastic episode of Doctor Who, Blink.

Next time I decide blackwork looks amazing and I need to have a go, remind me that lots of little lines are annoying, and that performing this act of blackwork embroidery on 28 count evenweave is a bad idea, please :)

But isn't it coool?


I love blackwork embroidery.


And how much does it look like some awesome foreignly written caligraphy from the back?


Still have to iron it and frame it, but Ive spent such a long time working on it, and I'm fairly proud of it, so it just couldn't wait :)

Bear #4

I finished bear 4! I think he's pretty damn cute. Gorgeously soft and a beautiful colour.
I also tried out some acrylic clear eyes instead of plain black ones (not enough contrast with body colour). Hand painted (with nail polish - three coats of pale sparkly blue, one of silver-grey) to give him gorgeous baby blues.




Love his eyes.

Tinkerbell

Bought this kit a long time ago. Decided it was time to stitch it!


I love this style. I think it is so entirely gorgeous. But, it's so not cross stitch. The whole thing was just back stitching and half stitches. And you had to stitch non-traditionally into the aida cloth. I almost couldn't, my OCD feelings really didn't like not stitching into the holes of the cloth... Having to make new holes in those perfectly aligned squares. Even to make this bit of pretty, I almost couldn't!


But she is finished, and oh so pretty. And sparkly!!




Her wings and the pompoms on her shoes are with awful-to-stitch-but-fantastic-looking metallic thread. Love this effect!!

Post 60.

My 60th post! I'm excited. Even if you aren't.

Today I bring my framed Doctor Who cross stitch from my last entry, and another bear. And a half. One and a half bears.

So, the framed piece:



Was a size 40x50cm frame (as far as I can remember haha) to give you some idea of the scale.
Tried first with a black and then a white border, but it just looked funny. So, I used the inset that came with the frame, backwards, which was just a cardboardy brown and it works so well! I love the colours together! Nice and mute. Sadly, not fantastic in my house because I go for the bright and colourful, so this just gets lost on my walls.. so I was thinking that I might sell it, and make myself another, on black....




Someone at the baby shower loved my first bear so much, they asked if they could buy one! So I made her this pale one, and then found this brilliant grey wool... so started bear 4. And bought some dark brown for bear 5. Haha.

Fire and Ice.

So, I ADORE this graphic.
It's from a brilliant episode of my newest Obsession (a.k.a Doctor Who), and is just a fantastic quote.


(I've tried to find out who made this, but I can't figure it out - if anyone knows, PLEASE TELL ME, I want to give them credit and a huge hug)



In fact, I adored this so much I turned it into a cross stitch pattern, with a few minor adjustments. Like the top of the TARDIS. And fixing the spelling of 'center' to the proper English, seeing as well, I'm Australian, and the show is English.

And then I stitched it.





It's stitched on hand-dyed aida, cos I couldn't find black 18 count ANYWHERE. (this is what happens when you try and dye white 18-count aida with 'Black Velvet' dye. It's a kind of blue grey. Which I actually quite like now. Wasn't sure at the start, but now I am a fan) and I used DMC thread 797. And like 60 metres of it, I guesstimated.


But it also GLOWS! I FOUND A USE FOR MY GLOW IN THE DARK THREAD!






Now to figure out if I can find a frame the right size.

Bragging, and not much else.

Guess who is the first result if you type 'cross stitch portal' into google images?

IT'S ME! 1st and 3rd! OR FIRST AND SECOND WHEN I TRIED AGAIN.




Oh, thats a little tumblr-ish of me haha. (Speaking of which, I'm on tumblr a whoooole lot lately)
But, anyway. That makes me a little happy.. my little claim to fame.

My Portal projects original blog post

I really want to put up all of my cross stitch patterns in an easy place.. but I can't add a page.. I think its broken. I might just upload them as images into a big long blog post and make a permalink or something. Maybe. I'll have to think about it. I should really have my patterns on my own blog. I did go to all that effort to make them.



I've got a MASSIVE cross stitch I'm working on, and I'd love to show you all.. but I want the whole thing to be unveiled at once. I'm thinking in a couple of days maybe.

I was also commissioned to make another of my bears, so I'm making a few of them up to sell too.

But no new pictures today.


ETA: I FOUND HOW TO ADD PAGES. THIS MAKES ME HAPPY. Now to figure out how to successfully add all my patterns to it.


ETA,A: I now have a Patterns Page. There is a link over to the right, right up the top. Only a few cross stitch patterns so far, but I'll add more as I feel like it!

More fluffy cute things.

What could this be?




It's a blanket!


A warm, fluffy and ridiculously light blanket.

I almost don't want to give it away, it's too fluffy and warm!


My cats totally agree.




Pattern:

10mm crochet hook
5 balls of Moda Vera's Blissful

CH 56, turn.
*DC into each sc. (55 total) *
Repeat until square.

Weave in ends, trim.

SO BORING TO MAKE, BUT SO PRETTY.

Bears!

Now I've made two bears.

I didn't even manage to follow my own pattern (from memory) so my second bear is bigger and fatter haha. He was meant to test my pattern and I FORGOT TO FOLLOW IT. Haha. I'm hopeless.

But he's still gorgeous. If a little lopsided.

Now I can send them off to their various new owners!