Timewarp

I hope everyone had a nice weekend, and a happy Easter if you celebrate. Mine involved eating two servings of baby food: prunes and peas. (The prunes were easily one of the most disgusting things I've ever had, the peas were actually quite nice by comparison!) I kind of had a crazy weekend in terms of bloggables, starting with a shopping trip on Saturday. My original plan was to get this:

Hmm, that's not the picture I thought it was, but it does show some useful things. I got size 5 DPNs, not realizing I had already done so a few weeks ago, a charm I picked up on a whim, and some safety eyes. I also got that K hook, which will be explained momentarily.

Before you look at the next picture, explanations are in order. Remember how I made four ruffly scarves a while ago? And how I said I didn't want to make any more? Yeah, that's not going to work out:

My mom wants me to make a total of seventeen scarves for the members of a committee she runs. They're all going to be that white and blue ruffle yarn, except that black and white one, and a regular striped one using that blue yarn and white I already have. I totally would have said no, except she offered to pay me, and then I had this really great idea. (Well, I thought it was great....) A few days ago, I found this pattern for an Avatar blanket. And I really wanted to make it. Except the yarn for it would have cost about $40, taking into account I already have a few of the skeins I needed. Can you guess where I'm going with this? I asked my mom to buy the rest of the yarn I needed in exchange for making the scarves:

We had a pretty good coupon, so she agreed! Yay! I'm super excited to start working on it, and even more excited to have the finished product :). Right now, I'm going to focus on getting the scarves done. There was only enough yarn in that color for about half of the scarves, so I'm going to use up what I have right now, then start on my blanket! Speaking of which:

I'm already done with two of them, and I've also done a few inches on the third. 

I also bought a few other things: floss for the next segment of my HP cross stitch, and this frame:

Boy, am I glad to have this done! My aunt's birthday is this weekend, so it was perfect timing. Although the back is sort of ugly (yeah, I don't know why I used shiny duct tape either) I hope she'll like it!

I put one set of safety eyes to good use:

After finishing the head, making a new hair roll, and stitching down the collar and chest piece, all she needs is a crown! (And no, I have no idea how I'm going to pull that off.)

Just one more thing, I promise. I finally finished off the HP charm bracelet I've been collecting for for a while:

After messing around with spacing for a while, I decided not to use all the charms. In the end, I've kept the owl, crystal ball, dragon, "hippogriff," goblet/cup, tiara/diadem, and key. Basically, I left off the ones that take more interpretation. (Hey, they made sense to me!)

I'm pretty sure I warped time to get all this done. Seriously! Anyway, this is probably one of my longest posts, so I'm going to stop here. See you tomorrow!

Queen Amidala of the Naboo

I had a decent amount of this fabric, which I found in the basement:

My original plan was to make this dress, but I had forgotten the details of the instructions, and I actually didn't have enough. So.... I improvised! First, I was going to make a skirt, but it was a lot shorter than I liked, so I added a ruffle, which I didn't really like, so I sewed the bottom shut, added a strap, and called it a bag:

Before I got to that point, I cut off two pieces, one of which I used to make this maxi dress for my cousin's doll:

It started out strapless, but I thought my aunt and uncle might not appreciate that, so I made it a halter:

It goes well with the strings on the back of her neck.....

Can you spell creepy?! Speaking of creepy, check out the inside of Queen Amidala's head!

I started her last night, and here's what I had this morning:

I had and issue with making the hair/skin division even, so after a few tries, I just decided to do a sort of duplicate stitch over the parts that weren't the color I wanted them to be.

 I used an empty cardboard box for the base, and colored it red so it wouldn't show as much:

This morning I got up at 5 for a trip to my state's capital, but because of some cruddy weather, it got canceled, and know I'm stuck at home all day. (I'm not bitter, I'm not bitter, I swear I'm not bitter!) Luckily, I was able to put the time to good use, and I worked on patching up her hair.

Look's pretty good, eh? It took me over an hour, during which I realized I could never be a hairdresser is real life:

I got so frustrated, I had to resort to drastic measures. Anyway, due to my lack of safety eyes, I can't go any farther on the head (hence the cut yarn) so I did all the other pieces instead:

I have to admit, I didn't think the collar would fit around her neck, but I made it work. However, I was not as happy with the sleeves:

I like the shape of the one on the right a lot more, but I figured it would take forever to make two that matched. I just stuck them on under the collar, and they look fine. I haven't decided if I want to do the whole pipe cleaner thing. I think it might look better if I crocheted a little border instead. Finally, I made her hair:

which happens to look a lot like dog poop. And not in a good way.... I lost count of my rows five or six times, so I just guesstimated for the length. Once I get the eyes, gold metallic thread, and possibly clay (I might  have something that'll work) I'll be able to finish Her Majesty, but for now, I have a date with the TTT:

Have an awesome day!

The Force is with me....

I think I may have used some sort of magical force yesterday, because I did this:

And this:

All I have to do for the purple one is tack those ends down, which I'll probably do when I'm done with this. And yes, that is a tuba mouthpiece. I didn't feel like moving it. (It is only now occurring to me that if I had put the scarf on the other door handle it wouldn't have been in the picture.) For the other one, I have that little blob of yarn to do, then I'll be all done with that. And I think I'm going to take a nice, long break from ruffle scarves. While they are highly addictive, too much of a good thing is a bad thing. (By the way, I gave my friend the first two scarves today, and I ended up giving her both of them. I tried one on this morning and I wasn't a fan.)

Once I finish that business, I'll be free to start on my next project, which I've already done the prep work for:

OK, honesty time. I actually already started this, and I got half-way through the first row before I realized that I had started it one size too small. I ripped it out, highlighted the numbers I'm supposed to be using, then started the fourth ruffle scarf. Apparently they've become stupid-therapy for me. :)

I mentioned yesterday that I bought yarn to make Yoda:

See? Yoda yarn! Anyway, I was on Craftster on Sunday, and I found these awesome patterns for Star Wars mini amigurumi people/other things. I linked all fourteen patterns, but she has different deals for different numbers of patterns (that didn't make any sense). I'm going to get two: Yoda and the Ewok! Ewoks are my favorite. Seriously. I get more emotional over that one ewok dying than Qui-Gon, Padmé, and Obi-Wan combined. (Oh, right. Spoiler Alert!) I have everything I need now except the safety eyes (Michaels doesn't have them, but JoAnn apparently does) and the patterns. 

All the red lines in that paragraph are bothering me. Obviously, Blogger is not a Star Wars fan! :)

I've blabbered enough today. Go look at some yarn! See ya!

And you didn't believe me....

See?

And you didn't believe me when I said I was going to finish things! Here's a rundown of what I did:

• I finally did the hair for this doll  again. I did a little research, and I ended up using this tutorial from K and J Dolls blog. You might be able to tell that I skipped the last step, but it just didn't look good. Also, the hair is very thick in the back. I'm not totally happy with it, but I'm so over this project, it's now officially done!
• You might have been expecting this one: the camouflage beret I showed you on Friday. It turned out really well, with a little surprise at the end. I was a little nervous about running out of yarn, so I switched to an olive green when I started the crown decreases. It looks pretty cool, and I did make it a little slouchier than the panda beret. The other major difference is the ribbing. For some reason, it didn't hold in the panda beret, but it did for this one. I think it has something to do with the blocking. I did block the panda beret, but since the camo one is acrylic, I didn't see much of a point, and I just left it as is. The one thing I don't like is that I have a few loose stitches in the decrease section, but it isn't too noticeable, so I'm calling this one a success!
• Speaking of blocking, I finally blocked Branching Out, completed a month ago. Umm, yeah. I (uncharacteristically) procrastinated a little bit on this one. Mostly because I was afraid I would completely ruin either my first lace project, or my mattress. Both are fine, so I really should have done this weeks ago! However, I have yet to get a picture of this yarn with an accurate representation of the color, and for some reason, it's not on the website.
• I know I said I was just going to work on stuff I had already started, but I started two projects. I had this awesome, soft, lovely t-shirt that I would have worn every day. Except it was kind of see-through and the neckline was loose and awkward. So, I did what any logical person would do: I made it into a scarf. I didn't use any tutorial in particular, but there are tons available online. On Wednesday, there will be another one, showing how I made mine!

Unsurprisingly, I didn't finish everything I worked on, like this:

I used the other half of the shirt to make this little crop top. It's pretty much all set, I just have to finish hemming the bottom edge. I'm doing it by hand, because I don't really trust my sewing machine. Just a little blind stitch, nothing fancy.

It makes me happy to have stuff cleared up and put away. I also did some research on how to take better pictures, but no guarantees! Have a good one!

Bad Hair Day

I think she's having a bit of a bad hair day:

Let's back up a bit, shall we? Here's where she was when we last left her:

Then, on Saturday afternoon, I put her together:

I decided she needed some clothes, to help hide how disfigured she looks:

That's better! Next, some hair:

Not too bad, considering I didn't use a tutorial or anything. But you know, that dress is not very attractive, especially in the back:

Why don't we take in the sides with a little blind stitch:

And add a new sash:

Much better! But know that I think about it, I don't really like the hair like that. Let's try pulling the front back under the rest:

And putting some matching ribbon on it:

At this point, I decided to embroider a face, but I also took out all of the hair before getting a picture of it. Oops! So here's what she looks like now:

We're back to the beginning of the post. I decided I wanted to use some black yarn for her hair this time, but I also decided to practice on another project first:

I don't even know what this was supposed to be, because I didn't use a pattern, but it now has a little bit of hair. And yes, I am planning on filling in the middle. Maybe.

This took up most of my free time this weekend, but I did a couple of little silly things I'll show you tomorrow. Because there are a lot of pictures in this post.

You know what is hard? Eating ice cream with your non-dominant hand. I don't know why it is so much harder than most other things (like writing) but I discovered last night it is. Randomness requirement for the day? Mission accomplished!

Have a great day!