A bit of everything...

Wicket making friends with another small dog at the Simi Dog Park

It's been one of those months where I look back and think "What exactly did I DO this month?" and mostly I just remember hanging out with people and taking Wicket to dog parks and such. I know I must have done more since it seems I was so busy, but it's a bit of a blur (and no, I wasn't drinking - much! :P).

I did list some things on ebay, deciding to branch out from just friends/friends of friends & etsy, so there's something.

And I worked on some Monkey hats! I made one intending to give it to my nephew, but then realized he probably already has one and then decided it would be cool to gift to Kami. :) And then I 'had' to make one for Hannah too ('cause, y'know, one cute baby in a monkey hat is great and TWO cute babies in monkey hats is SUPER great!). I also want to make some pacifier plush and intended to send a plush banana with the monkey hat, so I have one of those lying around now, unloved. Will have to do something about that!

Monkey and Banana (and the banana is a rattle!)

Just in case anyone is wondering, I do have this hat up for sale here on Etsy. :)

I have also been working on some designs for other animals because it's really just too fun. Unfortunately, it's not really beanie weather though, as it's now July and 90+ degrees (F). Bah! It's fun coming up with (mostly just drawn out) designs, though. I can't begin to explain just how happy I am that I can not only READ and FOLLOW crochet patterns now, but I can write them too. When I was in my late teens, I was always intimidated by all the abbreviations and terms and didn't even do more than a single crochet stitch and rectangular things. Now, I'm able to visualize what stitches and such work best to create a variety of shapes. :)

Some time has also been spent coming up with baby geekery because I'm really not sure there is ENOUGH baby stuff for the geeks & nerds of the world out there. And that just ain't right.

Oh, that's something else crafty I did this past month! I went through our wedding photos and some other photos and got prints! (it's only been 2 years now...) And I intend to mount some of them on wood and frame the bigger ones (will post how the wood mounting works out!). It was helpful to compare a professional quality 8x10 to a Costco 8x10 too. Costco's are pretty damn good, just FYI. The Bay Photo print looked incredible, but the differences were the type that could 1: be improved by editing just a bit differently and 2: barely discernible without looking for the differences with another photo right beside it. And for the difference in cost (a 20"x30" was $8.99 at Costco... 8"x10" was $1.50 versus $3-4... 4"x6" was $0.13 versus $0.25), I'm not sure how often I'll get the smaller prints anywhere but Costco.

New Baby Hat Design - Fox

I have a few designs sketched out for various types of hats and finally had the chance to crochet one. :) I give you, the baby fox:

This hat is available in my etsy shop and can be made to order. :)

I have also made several more "newsies" hats in a variety of colors and textures. Pattern for this hat is available on Ravelry.

Store review, non-acrylic yarn

I think I've mentioned it here before that I wanted to try to experiment with other types of yarn (I generally stick with acrylic and dabble with cotton occasionally). Well, after searching for quite awhile on the internet, I found a site that had a pretty good deal on bamboo yarn (eco-friendly, anti-bacterial, soft - win-win-win!), eKnittingNeedles.com. They have a couple of types of bamboo yarn for $8.99/3 balls or 1 ball for $3.99. The variety of colors is nice, the site's navigation it easy, and they processed and shipped my order pretty quickly. I recommend them if you're looking for an easy to work with vendor!

I have yet to actually work with the yarn as it's always difficult for me to use up something cool that I have (seriously, it's silly, but it's the "But if I use it for X, what if I want to use it for Y instead? I won't have any if I use it!" type of thinking). It is pretty ridiculously soft and silky though and seems to be pretty durable.

And I just ordered some huge cones of cotton yarn off eBay in neutral-ish colors, tobacco, crocodile and pink (which is a very, very pale pink). 8lbs of cotton yarn is coming my way from NC! :) I look forward to making baby hats with them, as well as some other things.

A couple of weeks ago, I broke down and ordered from Joann.com. Ugh. Anyone who has ever ordered from them knows how LONG it takes for them to process even the simplest of orders. But I like their Sensations Rainbow yarns and couldn't get some of the colors in-store. At least I got free (turtle-slow) shipping and didn't have to pay the outrageous fees they charge!

Sorry that this post is a bit boring. Since finishing up the owl hats I needed to finish late last week, it's been a whirlwind of activity over here! I finally got to meet my cutie-pie nephew and hung out with my SIL & her husband a bunch while they were in town, as well as seeing some friends who just recently moved back from out of the country... And I was a crochet fiend Saturday night trying to finish up some play food for my friends' daughter, Emma (cupcakes, fried eggs, a couple more cookies). Naturally, I can't find my 32oz bag of polyfill, which I needed for the cupcakes, so I had to run to Joann and grab another (40% off coupon FTW!).