Complications and Completions.

I shall start off with saying it hasn't been too good of a week for crafting. Mostly with crocheting. I became very discouraged and haven't picked up my crocheting in a few days - almost my hand has been swollen a bit for some reason.

So, remember that overzealous attempt? Well, I tried stuffing it. And that didn't work out. Eventually I just gave up, cut my losses and started over. On a much smaller scale. I still have the piece I worked so hard on, but nothing to do with it. Oh well. I suppose that's my own fault.

In between letting my - swollen - hand rest from the abuse of crochet and the daily activities of life, I have been working on some plastic canvas. :)

Remember those ! block panels? Well, now one is a block! And I even took a couple pictures of the progress.

I decided it would be easier on my sanity if I did all the boarders first - trust me, after a total of nine, it's maddening. Those five boarders took me about two days to really do - mostly because I was having difficulties focusing for long periods of time.

Here is a picture of all the panels complete, and Buddy decided to come model for us. Isn't he cute? So, in retrospect, I probably should have taken pictures of the exclamation marks before I filled in the background. Oh well. Maybe next time.

It's really starting to come together! I even managed to alternate colours while sewing the panels together, it wasn't nearly as tricky as I thought it would be, even when I was sealing off the top.

And there you have it. A completed ! block, of the Vanish Cap variety.

I think the next one I'm going to work on will be the Metal Cap - green. But, I mustn't be too distracted by making these, as I now only have 12 days left to finish my amigurumi. I really don't think it'll take too much longer; I just need to sit down and work on it. My hand is feeling better now. It's odd, though, that only my own hand is swollen and stiff. I think I just overworked it when I was trying to stuff the big failure. Pregnancy probably doesn't help.

That's all I really have to post about for now. So, I shall leave you with these adorable pictures of Dinah and Buddy. :)

Current Projects

After a long week of slaving away on the project for the Woodland Creatures amigurumi challenge, I'm close to done - the body, that is. So, I ended up getting overzealous at the start of this project. I didn't want to make it too small, and in the process, I ended up making it bigger than I intended.

Here, it doesn't look too big, right? Well, I didn't think so either. And as I kept crocheting and crocheting, I realized that I may have been a bit too ambitious. Sure, I wanted to make a bigger than usual amigurumi, but I think I over did it! After days of crocheting - off and on - this is where I'm at!

Just ignore the lumps and odd shape, it's not properly stuffed yet. As you can see, it's quite big. I'm hoping that I'll be finished making the length within the next day or so - I'm hoping I only have a few more rows left. I also decided to do something I little different with my stuffing. I used beige nylon - pantyhouse. I figured, it's a BIG project, and I don't want to risk any mistakes of stuffing showing through, even though I'm using quite a small hook.

I think it's going to be quite the adventure stuffing this in the end, however I have my trusty STUFFING STICK!

It's not really a stuffing stick, I'm just using it as one. In fact, I'm not even sure what it's intended for. It was in a collection of crochet hooks and knitting needles I received from a friend of mine a while back. Hopefully it'll work well in assisting me with stuffing this monster.

On another note, I've acquired wire. Yes, wire. This is going to be a fully poseable project!

The one on the left I purchased at my local craft store, the one on the right, Wal-Mart. The price difference, almost five dollars. But, oh well. Wal-Mart didn't carry as thick of wire. So, it's all good. I'm so excited to finish the body, just to work on the rest of him and make him as poseable as possible!

I've been working so hard on him, this happened.

It's not the first time this has happened to me, however, this was a relatively new hook - luckily I had a spare one! Hopefully it holds out until the end of the project - and many more! - but, if not, I bought another one. :)

And in the meantime, I've been needing to take breaks in between crocheting - a day off here and there. And in that time, I couldn't just sit around and do nothing. So, I figured I would start working on some of those plastic canvas ideas I had a while back - I hadn't forgotten about them! They are awesome.

It starts off looking like this.

Now, I bet you're all wondering, what the heck is that going to be? (It kind of reminds me of something from Harry Potter - Ravenclaw, even though it's blue and black) Before I show the next progress picture, I'm going to share what behind this looks like, because I think it's super cool!

Neato, right? And now, maybe this will answer your question of what the heck I'm making!

Looking familiar? I hope so! I've been keeping to a theme of plastic canvas projects - with the piggy bank, the book ends, and the pencil holder.

TADA!! Pretty sweet, amiright? It's the ! block (panel in this case) from the Mario 64 games! I did one for each colour. If anybody played these games as much as I did, then hopefully you'll remember which each colour did. Blue gave you the Vanishing Cap.

Green gave you the Metal Cap.

 Red gave you the Wing Cap.

And yellow gave you coins and other objects!

Now, let me tell you, these aren't small, at all. But, it's the only way I could work the pattern without it looking awkward.

See, pretty big. Now, I'm not sure if I'm going to just leave them as a single panel, or turn them all in to cubes. I'd love to make them into cubes, but, I'm sure we all know how tedious repeating the same project can be. At the very least, I want to make one into a cube - probably the blue one. I guess we'll see how I feel about doing the project over and over again from there - though, I do have enough of the sturdy plastic canvas to complete them all!!

Oh, I should probably share this.

This is the pattern I used to make the question mark, the rest I had to figure out on my own.

Now, on a new note, this Friday was Michele's last day with us at TADA. We had a small gathering for her, said words of praise and all that. Then, somehow, she throws me in to the spotlight on her special day. That lady is crafty, let me tell you.

And now that she's gone - though she will come back periodically for visits and whatnot - the group and associates want me to take over. I told them, as long as someone else is liaison between the clinic and the group, I can try my best to take over for the art courses. Until the baby is born. We'll be meeting this Friday as a group to discuss what we want to do. Michele is willing to stay in contact with the group until we're all back on our feet in terms of plans. I was thinking, as I've been gone for two years, that surely there are activities the group wouldn't mind repeating.

So, I'm going to look in to that, see if I can make a lesson plan that's a couple months of repeats until I get back in the swing of things myself. It's not a bad idea. But, we'll see on Friday.

And now, I leave you all with this.

Finished Projects and the Surprise!

Nothing too much to blog about today. I finished the baby blanket completely. Nothing too special.

I also started and completed the wall hang that my friend wanted me to make her. Here are the pictures I took of the process. :)

Here I took a full sheet of canvas and put the words on, not knowing just how much I would end up needing - a lot less than I thought, that's for sure!

Here it is, all cut out and the start of the background - she preferred the look of the long stitch to the single one. I agree, it looks much nicer!

And now, just a couple of fill in pictures.

I love how it slowly comes together and with each row the letters really pop out! She decided to go with the colours I used on my bookmark for the font and background. However, the border she chose, I didn't think would look too good, boy was I wrong.

A nice dark green. I decided to make a hang thread for this. I started by crocheting a chain, leaving long tails at both ends, and then just bordering the tails on to the canvas. It was pretty simple. :)

A close up of the chain attached.

And now, the finished product! So, you're probably wondering why it's hanging from two thumb tacks instead of one. Well, I didn't think it through - do I ever, though? - and the canvas I used was the flimsier stuff, so when I tried to hang it from the center of the string, it just kind of bent and drooped. My bad. I know better for next time, at least!!

And now, for the exciting news!! I am finally going to enter a contest on DeviantArt! I've been following the group Amigurumi-Challenge - http://amigurumi-challenge.deviantart.com/ - for a while now. They've had a few themes that I wouldn't have minded trying, but I didn't feel confident enough in my skills. This month is Woodland Creatures.

I asked if they would allow things like Pokemon and such, they agreed. At this point, I had so many ideas going through my head. This ball of yarn is why.

It was all the store had at the time, and I have been really wanting to do that project I was talking about with the brown fuzzy yarn - which is now on hold - and I figured, might as well just get the giant ball, as it's the only yarn I've seen - out of four shops! - that have the colour closest to what I need! Needless to say, the idea I had for the amigurumi challenge is brown - this shade of brown. With a ball this big, I'll have more than enough to do the challenge and the other project I have in mind. :)

I have until the end of the month to complete the project for the Amigurumi Challenge, which should be more than enough time. I'm hoping it only takes me about a week to completely. I know, I'm being optimistic. It'll probably take closer to two weeks.

So, until this is finished, I'm not sure I'll be blogging too much. However, I think I might do little teasers on my DeviantArt - http://wykked-as-syn.deviantart.com/ - as my work progresses. And maybe a blog or two in between. :)

Ta ta for now!

Paintings, Blankets, and More!

I think I shall start off with what I was up to today. This morning I decided to make a special appearance at an art group I helped found and name over two years ago - live got in the way in that time and I had to stop going for quite a while.

I got the idea to show up from running in to another founder of the group - there are three of us, Michele and Sally are the other two - the other day. It had been a while since I'd seen them, and I heard that Michele was leaving the city within the next week or so - of course I had to go!

The group is located at a mental health section of a clinic in the north end of my city. It was founded on the premise that art is a good way to help ease depression and anxiety - I used to co-host depression/anxiety groups for almost two years. The three of us banded together, with the blessing of the clinic to create TADA

The
Artistic
Dreams
Academy

Named by yours truly. :)

Anyway, I went today, and it was fantastic. It has expanded so much since I last went, I barely recognized any of the people there. Michele and Sally gave me a formal and heart warming introduction as the girl who inspired, helped create and name the group. I haven't felt my face turn red is such a long time. However, following that announcement, it was said that Michele - the woman that kept the entire group function - would be leaving and needed someone to fill her place - all eyes on me.

I have been considering the idea, but it's a lot of responsibility. It's not the I don't want to, it's just that I don't think I could. Michele was a liaison between the group and clinic, planned majority of the art classes, did the accounting, sent out reminder emails, set up guest speakers and just all around kept the group strong and happy. I would love to fall back in to being a host, but I'm not sure I'm ready. After a couple of years of rough times, I'm slowly starting to get my own life back together, I'm not sure if I could assist others in remaining happy and confident in life.

Though, I will continue to attend and help where I can. But, with the baby coming, it would be too much, I think. But I love the idea of getting back in to art. :)

This is what we did today.

Michele had the group choose a picture of a fish - she had a bunch of printouts. She made each of us draw our fish on to a thick paper - let me tell you, it's been years since I've picked up something and drawn, but I didn't do too shabby! From there, she made us outline the colours we wanted to use in crayon, as you can see in my picture. This is the reason for it.

The crayon creates a waterproof barrier between the paper and paint. It makes the edging that we outlined really stand out. I used a white crayon to make the little bubbles you see. Also, you can't see it in the picture, however, all but the face and fins are done in a subtle glitter paint - I haven't painted in longer than I haven't drawn!

I had considered drawing out some seaweed or coral, but I really didn't feel confident enough to attempt such a task, so I just painted a blue background. This is the end result.

I rather like it. It's not too bad for doing something artsy for the first time in about two and a half years - maybe one day, I'll look through my photos and see if I still have copies of stuff that I used to draw, some of it is on my DeviantArt, but not much.

You can check it out here: http://wykked-as-syn.deviantart.com/gallery/47472845/Drawing

A lot of it was before I really got in to drawing. And as you can see, none of it is my own work - I can't draw without looking at something. Need to see the picture in order to put it on paper. I know, I fail as a drawer, but oh well. :)

Here is what Michele and Sally decided to do with everybody's finished work.

I think it's pretty cool. Michele called the art lesson "Aquarium", clever, eh?

Anyway, the art group is every two weeks, however the group meets up every week. On the weeks it's not art, it's EDIAGD - Every Day is a Good Day. It's part of the depression/anxiety group, it's something the people can go to in order to continue the healing. Sally is the founder of this, and runs it. Basically, you just go, talk about things that make you feel happy, and good - just hang out and socialize, really. It's fun, and relaxing. It's a nice getaway. As I've stated before - I have first hand experience with battling depression (and anxiety).

There is a third group that goes on, every Sunday, in the morning - Art in the Park. Michele and Sally started this as I was diving in to my own problems and started to leave TADA. It's a brilliant idea, I've been once before, ages ago. The group just gets together in the nearby park and just draws. Anything. Nothing special. Could be the sky, the trees, the grass, something make belief, anything at all. But, that might be something I'd consider going to. I just need to find out the times.

However, next week is Michele's -surprise - going away gather - she hates the word party, she doesn't like parties, at all. After she left today the rest of the group started planning it all out. Sally - who works at a grocery store in the West End - is going to be getting a cake, as she gets a discount. The rest of us all pitched in what we could to get Michele a going away gift card to Curry's - an art store. I felt a little bad that I didn't have much money on me - I usually don't carry cash - but I pitched in what I had. :) So, I'm pretty excited for next week.

Now, I bet you're all wondering how that ultrasound of mine went last week. Well, let me tell you, it was pretty amazing! There was a minor complication, the baby didn't want to face the right way for a while. First the baby was facing my spine, all snuggled in to momma! Then, the baby turned the right way, but wouldn't let the technician get a clear view of the face. But, in the end, we got it.

Noticed how I haven't said the gender yet? Well, let me tell you something. I called it. For almost three weeks before the ultrasound, I just had a gut feeling about the gender, no idea why, my head just kept telling me what it was, pure confidence, no hesitation. I was right. And it sure made Alex one happy Daddy! It's a boy! I've never seen Alex look so purely, openly and truly happy. His face lit up, it was like the planets aligned for him and for the moment, he felt as truly happy as a human being could possibly feel. He glowed, he beamed, he was giddy. He held my hand and just couldn't stop grinning like a loon. He always told me he wanted a son, more than anything, a son to raise, to teach, to love and hold. I know he would have been happy if it was a girl, but I know this means the world to him.

And yes, we already have a name picked out - we had a name for a boy and a girl. Our baby boy will be called Killian. Killian Alexander Hare. Flows together nicely, eh? Ten points to those that get the name reference. :)

Oh, so I have finally gotten around to stuffing the pillows, see!

I've explained four out of five of these pillows in a previous post. The green pillow I did not do, nor did my friend Amy. A girl I used to know did it for me - it's where I got the idea. It's still my shirt, she just made it in to a pillow. And I do appreciate that she did that, especially because I would have never thought of it on my own. Because of her ingenious idea, I now have ways to preserve my shirts. :) 

However, there is no zipper installed on this one. So, the stuffing is stuck in, and is in real need of a fixing up. Alex kept sitting on it without realizing it and kind of flattened it. >.> I want to put a zipper in, but I'm not sure I have the heart to change anything on it. I don't talk to her anymore, but I did appreciate the friendship while it was there. But, not much to be done about that, I suppose...


In other news. I have started that other baby blanket I wanted to make. At first, it was a toss up between these two colours.

Naturally I opted for the blue, it's just such a nice colour! It's very vibrant. And the yarn is so soft! It's Charisma. I love the feel of it.

So, the pattern called for this much.

But, I only ended up needing three balls. I'm still not fully finished - I've got maybe two rows left, but I've been getting distracted by everything - it's a very..tedious and monotonous pattern. But, I've been working on it since last Sunday. Here are my progress pictures - I didn't take as many as I probably could have, but I didn't see the point with this.

This is the point where the pattern really starts to show itself, and a perfect capture of the blue. 

From this point on, it just reminds me of cake. Well, right now, a rug, because of the yarn ends - you have to change colour every row, it was a bit annoying, but oh well. Here is the pattern - it's a downloadable PDF (mine was on a label that I bought, though): http://www.yarnspirations.com/baby-blanket-196854.html

See, doesn't it just look like one giant cake?! At this point, I'm most of the way finished. I'll probably sit down and do the last couple of rows tonight. And after that, start on a new commission from Amber.

Amber wants me to make her a wall hang with the Robin Williams quote "You're only given one little spark of madness. You mustn't lose it." So, I'm pretty excited to start that, a nice break from crocheting. :)

But, after that, I have a new project in mind. I shan't say just yet. But, I shall let you all know, it involves more FUZZY YARN!! I have a very love hate relationship with it. Emphasis on the hate. But, I can't resist using it, especially when it's just so perfect. And soft.

And speaking of yarn. I was talking to a lady in the TADA group while I was there. She's moving soon and wants to be rid of a lot of things she's not using anymore. Yarn, she has a bunch of yarn. And pattern books. She said that because I'm pregnant and able to use it, she's willing to just give it to me. Only thing is I have to go pick it up. And send her an email to let her know I'm serious about it. I feel so grateful already and I haven't even received anything yet. I think I might send her that email when I'm finished blogging. Which would be now, as I am out of things to say. :)

Hopefully I'll have more to post in a few days!

A Wild Venonat Appeared!

After nearly a week of diligent work, I have finally completed my newest project! It took a while, and it was torture on the hands, but I worked diligently on it. I even made sure to take lots of pictures to show my progress. :)

It starts with this adorably fuzzy circle - one strand worsted weight, two strands of the purple fuzzy yarn. :) Luckily, because of the thickness of it all, I was able to work in a larger hook size - not that it felt much different on the hands at that point.

This is what it looked like as I was beginning my decreases - not so easy when the loops are a bit difficult to see. But, I managed! And it turned in to this fabulous ball.

Here is a very good lighting photo. My phone has been on the fritz with taking pictures. I might eventually invest in an actual camera. Anyway, as you can see, it's pretty big - bigger than the Ghastly I made ages ago, yet only the same amount of stitches I use in a Pokeball. :) I really need to find my measuring tape to see just how big this guy it - I'm not sure if I hid it on the cats or if they hid it on me. >.>

This was the next step, figuring out the face. It took a while, but I eventually got it. The teeth are sewn on with an actual needle and thread - I got annoyed at trying to do it with yarn on such a small piece!

And here we have the creation of the cute little arms - I know, they look nothing like they're supposed to, but I was trying my best! Besides, these look adorable. And claws just don't seem easy to make. :)

This was the fun part - making the antenna! I decided it would be a good idea to make them poseable, that and I don't think they would have stayed up without doing so.

Isn't it coming along nicely? Then we ran in to a problem, I really didn't like the eyes.

Even without eyes, he's still pretty darn cute!

There, now isn't that better? And guess what? I'm almost finished at this point! Just needed to make the feet and sew things on.

Surprisingly, I made the feet on my first attempted and they turned out pretty good! I had to write down the pattern so I wouldn't forget when I went to work on the other foot.

Last pose before he's finished!

Voila! Venonat lives in dark forests, in the underbrush, where very little light reaches. This is the best I could find, and it worked out perfectly!

As always, my works are for sale. However, I just haven't figured out a price for this guy yet. So, feel free to ask. :)

Also, be sure to check follow me on DeviantArt - sometimes I post teasers before I blog about them here. :) Also, somebody suggested to me that I start using Instagram..? What do you all think? I have no idea how to do it, though, so I'd have to look in to it.

And now my hands are in need of a serious break - I didn't realise a crochet hook could actually pierce skin, until I did it. >.> I also punctured my finger a couple of times with a yarn needle, even got under the nail once. So, that was an experience. Well worth it. :)

I also have some exciting news before I wrap this up. We get to find out the gender of the baby today! In five hours! I'm so excited!! We even have a friend coming from out of town to be there with us - she's really close to us. :) However, due to her coming down, she will be staying for a couple days. Which means I probably won't be doing much crafts. But, we shall see. She's the one I'm making the scarf for - you know, the scarf that totally got pushed to the farthest depths of my closet, yeah, that one.

Anyway, that is all for today!