Vote and win....again?

Yes again! Here is another chance to win a customised diary. The diary in question will be the exact same diary as blogged about previously and with your favourite colours. All you have to do is name the amigurumi doll that I made in the last blog. Simple huh? Same rules and conditions apply only this time a winner will be picked at the end of July and posted within a week of confirmation with the winner. One of the stipulations is that you have to be a follower of this blog and the other is that you have to comment in the section below with the name of your choice.
I forgot to take a pic of Aynsleys finished diary although I do have a pic of it while in progress. Just to let you all know that she has received her diary and is very pleased with it.

Here is the ami again looking very 'emo' in her punk pink wig and
black skinnies with suspenders and white vest.

Aynsley diary while I was working on it. She chose pink,orange and white.
Just imagine it without the ribbons on the side and that is how it looked.

Finally, I got it updated with pics.Good luck to everyone and I hope to see some good names.....Chow!

Quick pics and post.

Okay everyone, I am not in the mood for a long blog today and since it is a public holiday and the sun just reared its head I just want to do a quick update.
First of all, I have decided that I will do another give-away soon so watch this space. Secondly, I have completed my little free spirit amigurumi and made her some outfits. The blog that features them ,By hook, By hand is so amazing and I cannot get enough of it. The are so many free pattern for this ami's clothes that all the stress that came from making her has completely dissolved and I am revelling in the delight of this little wonder. See for yourself...

Edwardian style dress that I modified a bit. Reminds me of Alice in wonderland.
Oh,and darling little blue pumps to match.

Ready for the beach in yellow hot pants and a whit vest.
I love that she is poseable

Blowing a kiss in her white vest and aqua skirt with pink and green ruffles
and there are the pumps again.

Isn't she adorable? It is so rewarding making something yourself and even better when it actually looks good, well to me anyway. I still want to make her some leggings and fur boots and maybe a funky pair of skinny jeans. Last but not least, I am working on another blog and hopefully it will get going soon but I will write about that another time. Maybe this blog was not as short as I thought it was going to be but by now you should know me. Maybe a bit lengthly but definitly worth it so till next time...Chow!

Confessions and Creations.

Sub heading: Better worried than evil!

To better understand  my sub heading I will have to delve a little into who I am. Okay, so far you know that I love to craft and I can out-talk almost anyone on any particular subject but let me introduce you to my 'little me'! As a child I was extremely empathetic and a tear was often shed over road kill, prejudices, sad movies and the like. I always bought the ugliest teddy so that he would know what it was like to be loved and on the rare occasion, performed a heart transplant or two on a stuffed creature. I remember as a child tucking all my toys into my bed and falling asleep on the floor because there was no space for me in the bed, true story. I never kept pets and tell people that I am not an 'animal person' but the truth be told, I cannot stand out living anything and am so scared of getting attached to a creature that might not stay around for as long as I do. I never quite out grew this and even though at times I feel like I have been desensitized and that I have seen it all, all it takes is a tug on the heart strings from a advert about human endurance or a heart-felt song to get the old water works running.

Now lets get to the matter at hand and you will hopefully see where I am going with this. Remember that free spirit amigurumi I was talking about? Well many a tear of frustration has been shed over this doll and it has taken every ounce of determination to see this thing through. Since the pattern is not a local one, some of the items needed to complete this project had to be substituted with something local. For example, our pipe cleaners are half the size of that required by the pattern and while I have no idea where to find a wooden dowel for the neck, a clothes peg has worked quite nicely. There is however one thing that for the life if me I could not substitute and that is the safety eyes. All I can find is 'googley' eyes and that is definitely not going to be the look I am going for. There was only one thing I could do and it is shameful to say the least. This is my confession and hopefully not one I will ever do again. I scoured the china shops for the most pathetic teddy I could find. Why pathetic? Well , maybe because no one would buy it and what I was about to do with it is far more humane than condemning him to a life in the bottom of a manky old box in the store, ridiculed by his more attractive comrades. So I finally found a very dilapidated bunny. I bought him for ten rand, took him to the shop and put him out of his misery. (please send your children out of the room as the next part is extremely unnerving) and cut his face off. There, I said it! I gouged out his eyes and transplanted them onto my amigurumi doll. I had no choice, I had to do it. Was it worth it? Yes, I suppose. Would I do it again? Not anytime soon.

Only made one shoe. I have to figure out my camera so that I
can get better pics than my miserable camera on my phone.

Little poser! The pipe cleaners are great at getting her 'poseable'.

Why so worried little ami? Maybe it is because you only have one shoe.
Don't stress, it will get done and so will your hair.

So now my doll is almost complete and it really was worth all the heart ache and sweat. She really is a cutie and while she is a little 'off' in certain areas, I think she has loads of personality. I made eye lids for her and she had a terribly evil look on her face. I have to ability to turn any ami evil with my odd placement of eyebrows and eye lids. I took them off and replaced them with new ones, sewn at a different angle and now she has a more worried look ...but that I can live with. Her ears are off too and I am still contemplating adjusting them.

The awesome thing about this amigurumi doll (to add) is that I get to make loads of wigs for her in all different styles and colours. I am looking forward to that the most. Oh, and the the clothes making. I love making petite outfits for the dolls.
For a more in depth tutorial, look no further, here is a complete step by step photo tutorial to help you with your intructions. I found this very helpful and she has loads of amazing pics of finished dolls and hopefully one day I can make a doll that looks half as good as hers.

Slimming and slumps

Have you ever been in a slump? You know the kind, where it s so hard to motivate yourself that not even the yummiest shopping trip can put a smile on your mug. Well that is where I am at the moment, slumpish. I cannot blame it on my diet which is going swimmingly well by the way, and I definitely cannot blame it on lack of funds as it is my turn for the *goi goi (will explain this later) and a few extra days at work did not hurt either. I cannot blame it on the flu I have had for the past week since I am on a wonderful flu medicine  and I cannot blame it on the broken computers (at work and home) because I have my trusty old laptop that looks as if it was dropped out of a ten foot story building window, with wires that can only resemble a 1950's horror film monster, because it dutifully clicks on every time I open it and races through the Internet with the enthusiasm of the road runner (.....beep beep).

No, actually I cannot blame it on anything tangible. It is simply a state of mind that I am in where not much can cheer me up. The problem with being in a slump is that things build up. Projects build up, dishes build up, washing build up and swaps build up. I have decided to karate kick (or Tae bo kick which is more appropriate) this thing in the butt. I have decided to claim my life back form the 'slump monster' and get back on track. Firstly I am going to do the thing that I love the most, make a list. There is nothing more motivating than crossing things off of a list. Secondly I am going to draw up a calendar and mark all my swaps and make a timeline for when I am going to finish all of them.Thirdly I am going to spring clean my work room and make space for productivity which I am hoping is going to flow out of me like never before. I will sort out my correspondences and finish all my wips (works in progress). There is nothing more revitalizing than getting your affairs in order, taking control.

Now that I have made my declaration of pro activity (...?) I will get into some craft stuff. I bought some uber delicious felt this week and have absolutely no idea what to do with it, any ideas? I am hoping that once I am in full control of things that I will be more inspired to create. I also have started a 'free spirited amigurumi' doll that strongly resembles a Blythe doll and you can find it here at this amazing blog which offers free crochet and felt patterns for the most adorable dolls and their clothes. The swap that was mentioned in the previous installment was cancelled due to the postal strike in Canada and even though this has bummed me out completely, I am still going to make my ami. The ami that got the most votes was Belle and her rose so that is going to be interesting. I still have to contact Aynsley about which ami she chose but in the meantime her diary is completed and looking amazing. I want to post a picture but will wait till she gets it first so as not to ruin the surprise for her. The diary will be posted this afternoon. At least that is one thing that I can cross off my list.

So while I go kick some imaginary butt in Tae Bo and tackle some very real dishes, I will say good bye and leave you with the thought of maybe tackling some 'slump monsters' of your own or even creating a to-do list that puts life in a bit more perspective. So for now....Chow!

*Goi goi is a xhosa word for money pool. There are 3 of us and each week we pool a certain amount of our wages together and each week we take alternate turns in claiming it.

And the winner is......

E-blogger has been up to tricks lately and since it is not allowing new comments from some people I have decided to indirectly enter some into the competition via swap-bot. So just to recap, here are the entrants.

1) DonaaKay
2) Anonymous (aka Toupti)
3) Batmamma
4) Marilize
5) Principeta
6) Aynsley
7) CrazeyCatChick and last but definitely not least
8) Gooseberry
And the winner is .....................

Number 6 .
Congratulations Aynsley.You will be contacted shortly with the rest of the details. 

I would like to thank everyone who participated in my draw and appreciate the support shown.Unfortunately there can only be one winner but I might host another give away soon and hopefully e-blogger will play nice next time. I have a screen shot of random.org's choice but since my computer was upgraded (or downgraded actually) today by our not-so-handy handy man, my microsoft office is missing in action and I cannot save the screen shot as a j.peg file so it is available as a e-mail upon request if necessary.

Vote and win!

I have a swap that I signed up for today and I am pretty nervous because the others who are in the swap are really good at what they do and even though there are only 4 of us, I really want to impress.
I have been brainstorming all day and I have so many ideas bubbling inside me that I cannot  pick one. I have decided to ask for help and have put up a poll to see what you think would be the best choice to knock the socks off my partner.

The swap is for a fairytale character amigurumi and I really want to do a human (female) form as opposed to a monster or something ,I played with the idea of Mike or Sully from monsters inc. but I want more of a challenge.The swap is for the end of next month, although I was hoping to get started asap.
These are my choices

• Thumbalina in a purse that is a drawstring purse that resembles a flower when closed (remember that she was tiny so the purse will make it more apparent as thumbalina)
• Cinderella was another idea I was 'toying' with (get it? lol) and to make it a bit more like Cinderelli, I want to do outfits, one all raggedy and the other a ballgown and to top it all off, removable glass-ish slippers.
• Ariel crossed my mind as well and was thinking about making her the human type but also I want to make a tail that she can just slide her legs into.
• Alice and Dinah is a classic and will work up quite quickly since she is all the craze at the moment.
• I also like the idea of Belle in her yellow dress and as a bonus I am not too shabby at making roses so I think that would be a nice accompaniment
• Rapunzal is the newest characture to hit the big screen and since I have not watched 'Tangled' yet, I think the only thing I can add is hair.. alot of hair.
• And lastly, I was playing with the idea of Mulan, Tinkerbell, Snow white, Jasmine, Aroura,Little red riding hood and some others.

So now for the good part. Remember that Ribbon woven journal? It was in my last blog for those of you who just joined us. It is an A6, hand woven, ribbon journal that is lined and has 144 pages.  Well, I am going to make one customized journal to one lucky follower and all you have to do is:

• sign up to follow my blog,
• vote in the poll 
• and leave a comment for this post of what you think will make the best amigurumi.

The winner will be drawn a week from today and if you are the winner then you will be contacted via the name you commented with. You will then be asked for your address and you favorite colours for the journal and it will be sent to your address. The winner will be chosen using www.random.org and the journal will be posted a week from the day they were chosen. The prize will be sent via regular post with a track and trace number. Good Luck to all of you.

Disclaimer:
 The comment of each player is just a suggestion and while the winning choice of amigurumi will be made, might not be the one I choose to send to my partner.The prize stated above will be sent to the winner and the trace number will be emailed to their address. I cannot be held responsible if you do not collect your prize or if the address you gave is incorrect. If the winner does not respond with their address for two weeks since being chosen then a new draw will take place.

*edited to note*
Please note that to qualify for the prize you will have to leave a comment as well as voting because your vote is annonymous.Thank you.

Dreams of a diary.

For the longest time I had this vision in my head of covering a diary with ribbon and I never saw it through because I thought that it might just be one of those things that seem like a great idea in your head but not so in practice. Yesterday I heard of two deaths and was thinking about what I would like to leave behind when my time comes and since I do not have any children, I decided that I would like to be remembered as a person who always loved to create and try new things and decided that this was as good a time as any to try something which I had only day-dreamed about. I sat down today with oodles of ribbon, a little blank A5 journal and some double sided tape. This is what I came up with (please do not pay any heed to the work table)

Diary from the back

side view.

I cannot believe that I had never tried this before and even though it took quite a while to weave all the ribbon into something decent and a bit of a tedious job, the result in itself made it very worthwhile. The only thing that I would have done differently was to add a ribbon on either side to tie it closed but I will do this on my next attempt. I am thinking of offering a tutorial the next time I decide to make one of these, so that will be something to look out for.

The second project which I have been working on was a cute little box for my embroidery stash. Lynn B's offers a great free tutorial with excellent photo's and all credit is due to her for this stunning little 'stasher'. I followed the tutorial, pic for pic and was very happy with my box. I had never tried making something like this before but it was really easy to make and I was so surprised by how great it looks that I actually made another. The first box was not completely smooth sailing and all I can say is thank goodness for ribbon and glue, which hides many a number of sins. This was my first attempt:

Finally, I found a great project to use my little geisha cross stitch on.

side view of the box

Inside of the box.

I must say that my second box was much better and I was able to avoid most of the mistakes I experienced with the first box. Unfortunately the second box was only a few hours old when it was given away to a friend who fell in love with it and I never even took a pic before I passed it on. I used plain pink for the inner box and a pink with white polka dots for the outer cover and lined it with felt and it was really neat and a bit simpler than the first. I will definitely be making another and was thinking of making some with African 'shwe shwe' material for a nice ethnic spin.

* Lynn B if you are reading this , I hope I have done you proud and not made too many faux pa's. 

I hope you have been inspired to tackle a challenge that you have been contemplating or something which you have doubted will look right in practice, because I too did not think that I would be able to make either of the top 2 projects look half presentable and when push came to shove, I surprised myself and regret not trying it a long time ago. So, While I go get creative by making another box I will take the time to bid you adeaux  and till next time...Chow!