It’s Soap Time: Making Swirl Soaps

In an effort to reduce the crafting stuff that I have, I’m working on de-stashing … including the soap making stuff that I have.

I got a kit from Brambleberry to make a swirled melt and pour soap.  Some thing I haven’t done before and didn’t think was possible.  It’s not the same as a swirl in a cold or hot process soap, but it looks pretty cool

As you can see the top of the bar was sprinkled with light gold mica in a clear layer.  The rest of the bar is swirled white, pink, blue and purple.  The process takes a while and some attention, but I’m really happy with the results.

Rawr!

Yay for a husband who likes crafty things!  C wanted something cute for his desk for the holidays, and he likes dragons…. so …. Rawr was born!

Rawr was created from a pattern on Ravelry - Baby Snow Dragon I think he's adorable, and C loved it!

Holiday Crafting Pics & more

This year, like every year, I crafted my way through many of my gifts.  it's not always possible to make gifts for everyone ... but I do try.  I like the touch of handmade, and the items are created specially for each person.  So here's some of this year's goodies.


A Crocheted scarf made from one skein of 100% sugar cane fiber yarn.  It's super soft and silky and not too heavy for my warm weather family. The scarf pattern came from Craftsters

Then a knitted dishcloth as we're all trying to become more "green"

A Soap Tree, idea from Martha Stuart!   Made of glycerin soap in different colors and stacked to make a pretty and useful tree.

And then there's the bag .. a copy of a Nordstrom's bag with a hand braided handle in Chocolate and Turquoise.

Of course, since my family celebrates Christmas, we need Santa hats!

And then the remainder of the soap from the trees got swirled into these very cool marbled soap bars using a technique I got from Brambleberry's Soap Queen TV


I had a great time making everything, and I hope that everyone who got goodies enjoyed them!

Bentos ~ The modern lunchbox

Lately, I've been making my own lunches ... trying to cook at home rather than buying food for a combination of health and financial reasons.

I discovered bento boxes, a Japanese method of packing lunches that are fun to view as well as eat.  Traditional boxes are packed with rice, protein, and vegetables .. in that order.  I've adapted them a bit more to my style, but since I enjoy asian food, it's easy to do fairly traditional boxes .. but I like more vegetables than is traditional.  It does mean that I usually need to pack a snack box as well or I get hungry in the afternoon.

I'm also trying to lose weight, yet again, so the smaller box sizes help to limit portions as well. 

If you pack lunches, for yourself or others ... consider giving bento boxes a try.

Sites for Bento Ideas:

• Just Bento
• Bento TV (video tutorials)
• Just Hungry (recipes)
• J-Box Bento supplies (online supplier)
• Lunch in a Box - Bento Store locator

 

Crafty Fun for my niece

Since I'm fairly sure that my young niece doesn't watch my blog, I can post this here.  My Mum found a cute little bag, and I made this one after the pattern. 

The pattern is very simple, crocheted with Vanna's Choice and Vanna's Choice Baby acrylic yarn and a size H hook.

A very cool new initiative - The 3/50 Project

I first found out about the 3/50 Project on Craftsters.org.  The idea is to help save our local stores.

The idea behind the 3/50 project is that spending money at our local independant stores returns 68% of what we spend back to the community ... for large chain stores, that number is as low as 48%, and for online stores it can be as low as 0%!

So shop smart, but where you can. Shop local.

Check out the350project.net for more information and to join in the cause.

I can Knit and Weave!!

I actually knit this up a little while ago, but it looks like I can finally knit!  It takes a lot longer than crochet for me, but then there's the whole bit about practice.

This simple dishcloth is the Woven Seed Dishcloth from Ravelry and it took about four tries to get the stitching right.  I started it, then went to the 2nd session of my knitting class and learned that I had been doing the pearls all wrong!  No wonder it looked wrong .. but it got fixed.

Weaving!

I got a loom at Stitches West!  a few months ago and finally pulled it out and wove.  It was easier, and harder, than I thought it would be.  Warping is easy on the Ashford Knitting Loom (I have the 20" one) and the weaving itself is simple to do, but hard to master.  The warp is Wool Ease in 2 colors, and the weft is a blue handspun that I received in a swap. It's more warp faced than I planned, but I was pulling in the weft more than I should without really understanding what I was doing.