Wolf's Craftstravaganza

[Pie]

I think you have inspired me to pick up a crochet needle, wolf. I remember doing it when I was a kid, learning from my grandmother. IIRC, it required significantly less manual dexterity than knitting. I hope so, because my knitting career was short indeed.

[wolf]

So one of my hippie friends decided that she wanted to have some tableware to carry around with her in the event that she would buy some fast food and not want to use plasticware. She bought a set of bamboo tableware when we were at an upscale culinary store in the mall. She's real into that whole sustainability thing. She drives a Prius and recently got solar panels installed on her otherwise conventional surburban roof.

She mentioned in passing that it would be really nice to have a case of some kind to carry it in. There was nothing available in the store. As we were enjoying some TCBY cones I said, "Well, it shouldn't be too hard to do something."

So I did something. I had in mind to sew something, but the sewing machine has been hibernating in a closet for several years, and I'm only a moderate sewer, anyway. I've been on a crochet kick recently, so I had some yarn and hooks within easy reach of my chair. So, the other night while I was watching Bones, I made a case. I put Velcro spots on it as a closure.

[Nirvana]

I think you may have found a job!

[wolf]

But I had told her that I would sew her a case. I was intending that it would be a fairly simple design, similar to the crocheted one, with a flap that velcros closed.

So, wolf heads off to the fabric store.

There are supposed to be women in the fabric store who actually know what they are doing, right?

I described my intentions to the lady at the fabric cutting table. I had decided that any pouch should really have a goo-proof lining of some sort. So I asked if they had any sort of fusible material that would be waterproof. "No," says the counter drone, "We don't have anything like that." But there's this stuff, it's waterproof. She leads me to a section of the store I had already investigated ... bolts of overpriced (and really ugly) vinyl.

No, that's not what i was looking for. But I didn't tell her. I pretended to finger the fabrics, because that's what you do in fabric stores. Eventually she went away and left me alone.

Which is when I discovered a bolt of fusible vinyl. It's a thin vinyl coating that you iron on to a fabric to make it waterproof. How about that ... exactly what I was asking for, but I had to find it myself.

It's a freakin' specialty fabric store ... staff are not only supposed to know every single stinkin' thread in the place, but also what do to with it.

Oh well.

Clutching the bolt of stuff to my chest, I then went a-wandering looking for fabric to please a hippie.

I think I found some good stuff.

Now, bear in mind that I have no idea how to make a pattern, or how to put this thing together.

I knew the basic shape I was going for ... a rectangle.

And I foolishly decided that the flap should be pointy. Making things pointy in sewing can be a challenge. And I decided on a really narrow seam allowance of 1/4 inch (this translates to "not much margin for error).

Part of the adventure involved ironing the vinyl stuff onto the cotton I had chosen. Okay, adventure translates to "trying not to burn myself with hot plastic while also not bonding hot plastic to my ironing board." This step went surprisingly well.

I've never worked with slippery material before, so there were a couple false starts because the fabric wouldn't feed through the machine quite right, but that is why Dritz makes seam rippers.

I should have done a proper photoessay of the whole process, but sometimes it spoils the magic when you know how it happens, right? Which translates to "I was so focused on the process that I forgot." And focused, that translates to I was really frustrated and I would have thrown the camera off the balcony with the sewing machine.

But since I live on the first floor, it would have been an empty gesture.

So, I made a lot of stuff up as I went along, ended up with a really pointy point on the flap, and found a very cool button to camoflage where I attached the velcro spot.

I hope she likes it.

And I hope that she doesn't offer me another ion cleansing footbath session in return.

[wolf]

I went back to the specialty fabric store and obsessed over buttons for at least 45 minutes, and picked one that was nice, but not quite what I wanted, and was $3.50 for two of the darn things.

When I got to the checkout there was a basket of clearance buttons. 50 cents for two. Moose buttons. Only ones in the basket. who would have guessed? Mother of pearl with nature scene handpanted by Chinese orphans buttons went back on the rack.

I love doing stuff like this.

When I say "I've been crocheting," I mean, "I've been crocheting obsessively."

I have finished ...

A scarf (standard winter type)

A triangle shawl with a shell border.

A bookcover.

An openwork (more girly) scarf from the leftover shawl yarn.

A cat toy (this was actually quite spur of the moment. I was at the home of the cutlery case lady watching V for Vendetta on her Solar Powered Television in her Solar Powered House and was crocheting the openwork scarf (which, interestingly, given what we were watching, is made with a V-stitch). One of her cats decided to try to help me crochet by playing with the yarn I was working with. She (the lady, not the cat) mentioned that she'd love to have a cat toy for said cat, but that just plain string was quite dangerous. I had some crochet cotton on my bag just in case I finished what I was working on. I wasn't but I set it aside and crocheted a little flat piece, and put a fancy shell edging on it. Less than 10 minutes work, and especially since she was paying attention to the movie, not me, it was really cool when I tossed it in her lap and said, "Here you go, one cat toy ..." People who don't do crafts get all impressed by that kind of thing.)

3 Hippie string market bags (two are based on the same pattern, but with a different size hook, so one is actually a wee bit smaller than the other, and another on a completely different pattern.

Two dishrags (there's a lot of leftover cotton from the market bags, but not enough to make another whole bag out of)

I'll work on some pictures of this stuff.

The scarves and the shawl are already wrapped for gifting, so I'm not able to shoot those at the moment.

[BigV]

Nice composite project, bamboo encased in hemlock.

It's awesome really, nice work!!

[wolf]

Thank you!

Okay, here's some of the crochet pile.

The bookcover and the hippie bags.

You can see that the multicolored one is bigger than the mostly cream one ... same pattern, different size hooks. Actually, what's interesting about that is that the yarn manufacturer's website (Lion Brand)has the same pattern with different hook size specifications listed multiple times. I actually prefer the larger version. Either of them will hold a ton of groceries.

It seems they vary the materials and hook sizes and use the same pattern for a lot of their freebies ... that openwork V-stitch scarf I recently finished seemed really familiar ... I made it for my mom a couple of years ago in a bulky weight yarn.

The yellow and white bag is a pattern from a different manufacturer (Bernat) and is more like the European openwork "string bag" type, except for the solid bottom and handle.

[footfootfoot]

Very cool, you are Über Crafty. When I was 17 I embroidered a panel from Cheech Wizard on my jeans. I stopped after that.

[skysidhe]

Very Nice Wolf! I am blown away.

You can sell things on Etsy, maybe.

[footfootfoot]

Could you, would you sell those on Esty or some such? Didn't Caseosene sell stuff on Esty?

[plthijinx]

Caseosene snort!...

very nice work there wolf!

[classicman]

Wolf, and I'm serious, start making afgans (sp?) You could make a killing!

[ZenGum]

Originally Posted by classicman

Wolf, and I'm serious, start making afgans (sp?) You could make a killing!

What, like, for the army to practice on?

[Big Sarge]

Originally Posted by classicman

Wolf, and I'm serious, start making afgans (sp?) You could make a killing!

wolf could breed afghans and sell them to pet stores

[Griff]

Love this stuff wolf!