Felted Basket

My sister is getting married in October...so I volunteered to do something crafted for the kidlets that are going to be at the wedding...

I also wanted to make the basket that her flower fairy daughter will carry down the aisle and throw leaves from (rather than rose petals! Too cool!)..

So daughter, Cutie, loves pink and princess and fairy...the wedding is fall colors, chocolate and moss and persimmon...so the I made is felted wool, moss green, with a scalloped upper edge in chocolate brown. It is my first felted project, and it turned out really neat!
I forgot to take pictures of the pre-felted project, but I will take pictures of the post-felted project. The first basket I did was all brown, and took exactly one ball of Wool of the Andes Highland Bulky, in Fedora...I added some persimmon Heathered WOTA fingering yarn for two rounds, and hated it, but after some SERIOUS felting (two runs in the washer, with some hand felting in between) it stiffened up nicely and looks kinda neat--as a bowl not a basket.
The pattern I based mine off of is the felted bowl pattern from the book Felted Crochet...only I can't seem to follow a pattern when there's so many interesting things to do, so it is actually quite different. The major difference between the first one, all brown, and the second of moss, is that I used 2 hook sizes smaller on the second project.
I'll try to post the exact pattern here--I adlibbed ("scumbled") the edge, so the number of stitches was not right at the top of the bowl for the type of edge I did...more later because I must now go wash a cat...

This is adorable...

a little pumpkin. :-)

Finally, an update.

I have not posted here for months...a year, actually--if you read my other blog, the non-craft one, you'll see that I got incredibly sick and haven't been able to post much.

Well, I'm on Remicade now, and doing MUCH better...hence finally being able to post. I have been crocheting like crazy, since I got bored with the Knifty Knitter thing, and will be getting all my projects together with pictures and everything...

I FINALLY got my invite to Ravelry, a knit/crochet community, and I'm going to get all of my stuff together over there. I'll post here, too, but the pics and stuff will be on Flickr, and linked to Ravelry.

Whee! Workin' away...

Looming...

A few months ago (okay, last fall) I was down at a friend's house, and she was busily wrapping fuzzy yarn around this legoland-style red spiked wheel.
My reaction was, "WHAT is THAT?"
She explained to me (whilst looping away) that "it" was called a Knifty Knitter, and that she got it at Wal-mart (her favorite shopping therapy store), along with a bunch of really fun yarn, and she was making scarves.

I must say honestly that I kinda turned my nose up at it as a cheesy fad...but come June, bored and stuck at home because of health issues (if you really wanna know, read my other blog but it's pretty eccentric. You are warned.), I got the urge to crochet again. This is something I take up every once in a while, then quit either because the yarn is crappy, or the patterns are impossible to read. I have a monstrous time trying to learn the argot, and usually quit in frustration. I've been "playing" with crochet (with very little to show for it) since I was like, 12.

Then, I was visiting another friend, and lo! her 10 year old daughter was busily wrapping away on this gaudy yellow chunky plastic ring...and what was being produced was PRETTY!
Color me officially intrigued.

As a side note: I hate Wal-mart. I don't do crowds well, and for some reason Wal-Hell seems to attract a great deal of pushy, obnoxious, desperate-looking overweight (quintessential Americans?) people. Did I mention I don't do people well, either? My friend calls it my "agoraphobia" but I'm not sure that's accurate...needless to say I spend a lot of time at home, and working with animals (I do reptile rescue)...but I digress, brutally!

Where was I? Oh, yes, Wal-mart...believe it or not, I was intrigued enough by this knitting tool that I braved Wal-mart (with my sweet and wonderful husband as guardian) to get the kit and some yarn. Had I known the kit was available at JoAnn, I would have gone there--however, I didn't discover this until I went there later that week for more yarn (once again, hubby running interference. I've been 3 places alone in the past 3 months...but once again, I digress)...

So, tool in hand, pretty textured yarn in the other, instruction booklet in front of me, I proceeded to knit.

Now you know: This blog is about what I am creating/learning to create with this centuries-old knitting loom (yes, I did some research--there are some great handmade looms out there!) that ProvoCraft has brought into faddish popularity by making the "tools of the trade" very colorful, chunky, and non-threatening--therefore easy and possibly viewed as "not really knitting" by outsiders, as I once was. ;-)

Oh, this blog is ALSO about cooking, creating art in whatever form I find it.