Decorating my Otterbox Phone Cover

I got a new phone a few weeks ago. I am really excited about it, but the only problem is it is so new that I could only get the otterbox in black. Now normally I would be okay with this, but one of my good friends that I spend a lot of time with has the exact same phone with the exact same case. It can make life a little bit more confusing by having two phones next to each other. Yes, they are set-up different, but who wants to check every time they grab their phones.

So, me being the crafty person I am started searching for ideas on how to cover my otterbox. I came across this blog post on pinterest that helped me kick start the process. From there the creative juices started flowing. What about polka dots? I love polka dots! :)

Here are all the supplies you need for this project:


First, I taped the whole back of the phone case and then painted the phone case purple as I wanted the sides to be purple.


Next, I taped around the square back and painted just that area yellow. This will soon be the polka dots.


After letting the yellow dry (REALLY let it dry! Otherwise it kind of peels off with the stickies. Plus, you can get rid of some of the tackiness of the adhesive by sticking it to fabric before sticking them to the paint.) stick the adhesive dots to the back.


Paint the whole thing purple again.


I accidentally bought gloss that is also a color, so I finished and then sprayed it a random color. :( It was really sad, but I did fix it and finished it with a gloss to hold it in place.

Here is the result:

Crocheted Hat Fever

I know I should be working on more 60 Quick Knits for Em and my blog. However, I have suddenly gotten an itch to crochet some hats. Ever since the trip to Stitches Midwest this August I have found my passion for crocheting yet again. I cannot explain it, but suddenly my eyes were opened to all the wonderful patterns you can crochet. Now don't get me wrong I still love knitting, but crocheting was one of my first crafting loves and I am happy to be back to it.



When I went to Stitches I saw this woman, Pam, at the Halos for Hope booth wearing a GORGEOUS hat (pictured above). When I saw it I knew I had to have it. I talked to her about it and she told me it was a crochet pattern that you could find in Annie's Attic - Chemo Caps and Wraps. She did not have any copies at that time, but by the end of the weekend I had purchased a copy that was signed by her! It was very exciting.

My friend Em wanted to crochet the hat as well so I had to try it out a few times to make sure it came out alright. (I tend to teach better when I have completed the project myself, especially because I can kind of freehand different stitches and fix mistakes as I go.) After making one hat, which has received many compliments from both my students and friends.



The pattern is rather simple but works up like a cabled knit pattern. It especially looks beautiful in a variegated yarn. Since I made the first one I made another and am about half way finished with a third hat. Last night I sat down and helped my friend Em through the process of crocheting the hat. She is not particularly comfortable with her crocheting skills, but I helped her successfully crochet the hat in just a few hours. (She only has a little single crocheting for the brim to do.) If she can make it through this pattern so can YOU! The only tricky thing is first learning the DC foundation (from back to front) followed by the Twisted DC Foundation. I looked up a YouTube video to help me get through the stitch a couple times and then it became second nature. Before you know it you have a beautiful hat.



Happy Crocheting!

Christmas 2010 Presents Post

I made all of the Christmas presents I gave this year. Because of that I decided to make one massive post with all of the Christmas gifts I gave out this year. Below are pictures and descriptions of each project and who it was given to.

Starting with my family, I made my sister a Noro scarf. These scarves are made by many many people and there are a lot of different styles and shapes. I picked a brown Noro that is very neutral colors and then I chose a skein that is full of all of the rainbow colors. The actually knitting is also simple as it is starting with an odd number of stitches, then every row you knit 2 then purl 2 across. Because of the odd number of stitches it creates the nice zigzag look of the scarf. Here a few photos to see what it looks like:

Click the picture for a picture of my sister wearing the scarf

For my brother I knit a hat. I was very inspired by the rather new 60 Quick Knits book. I was so inspired that about 6 of the winter projects I created were from the 60 Quick Knits book. This particular hat is called the Tweed Watch Cap. I chose Cascade 220 yarn in the following colors: #9458 - Bainbrige Island Heather (brown), #2424 - Heather Summer Night (blue), and #2452 - Turtle (green). Here is a picture of my brother wearing his Christmas present as well as a few close-ups of the hat:

Click the picture for a picture of my brother wearing his hat

My sister-in-law was gifted some beautiful mittens. These mittens are the Tweed mittens from the 60 Quick Knits book. The colors I used for her mittens are the following: #2419 - Heather Aster (purplish-pink) and #9921 - Caribbean Blue.


I made my adorable niece a soft sweater for Christmas. I used a pattern from Lion Brand called the Little Princess Cardi. I used Plymouth Yarn Dreambaby DK in a purple, blue, and green. Here is a picture of my niece's sweater.

Click the picture to see my niece wearing her sweater

My mom received a pair of mittens from the 60 Quick Knits called Checkered Mittens. I don't know the exact Cascade 220 colors I used for her mittens as I have no documentation for them at this particular moment. However, I do know I used a light blue for the cuff while I used a dark blue and magenta variegated yarn for the checkers. They were finished already over the summer and my mom finally received them on Christmas Eve. She really liked them and said her hands will probably stay very warm. Here is a picture of them:


My dad was the final family member I made something for. He also had a gift made from the 60 Quick Knits book. His gift was the slip-stitched hat. I made it in a burgundy and gold color. The specific colorways are Cascade 220: #4008 - Heather Ruby and #2415 - Sunflower. Here is a picture of the finished product:


Hope you enjoyed, Comments and Critiques are of course welcome!

Making Myself Some Mittens

Now that my booga bag is all finished it is time to start on my second knitting project. Em was making some really cute mittens with the flip-tops. I really wanted some for myself, so Em is teaching me how to make them. It is getting kind of warm so I won't need to wear them... however, I'm alright with packing them away. I showed you in the last post what the yarn looks like. Here is a picture of the first mitten so far:




I now have learned how to purl. :) After working on my mittens a little bit, Zoe gave me some yarn that she didn't want! I'm so excited.


Now to end this... My mom brought my bag to work with her... and someone really really wants me to make another one, for her daughter. Her request was some bright colors. So, I headed over to Loops and Links and picked out some more yarn. My mom was bringing it into work, telling her how much it would cost, and then she can decide if she really wants it. The best part is, if the woman decides she doesn't want it... my mom said she will pay me to make her a bag :)!!! Well that is all, pictures of the colors for the next booga bag, coming soon...

Spring Break At Last

It is finally Spring Break. That means I actually have time to knit and crochet and update this blog :)... First, I want to show you my booga bag! I finally finished the i-cord today when Em came over. (She actually did the finishing steps on it... because I was really really slow :( )... Below is a picture of my booga bag before the wash:


And here is what it looks like now!:


...

Now that I'm finished with my booga bag, it is time for a new project. So Em is going to teach me to make this awesome flip-top mittens :)... I already have the yarn picked out for it!


The best part is. I got the yarn for it as part of my birthday present. My amazing boyfriend gave me a gift certificate to Loops and Links for my birthday... :)

My Bold Booga Bag

I have been wanting to learn how to knit for a while. Now that I met Em it seems like more of a possibility. We are working together to create a Booga Bag. Em let me pick out some colors from her stash and I picked a rose colored Lion Brand Wool along with a yellow colored Cascade 220. To create the booga bag I started with the rose colored Lion Brand Wool to make the bottom. I then decided to switch to some of my leftover Caribbean Sea colored Cascade 220, which I used for Katie's scarf. Now I'm using the yellow colored Cascade 220, which is kind of more gold. I really love the colors because they are just so bright and make me really happy :). The pattern calls for 64 rows tall and so far I have about 22 rows, so I am not quite half way. I have about 26 more rows of gold, then I'm going to switch to the Caribbean Sea for 4 rows, then finish with the rose color for 4 rows.

Here is a picture of what it looked like about 10 rows ago:

Picture Problems :(

So last night I decided to upload pictures, the problem was that whenever I tried to upload pictures it would give me some sort of error. I realized later that it was because my iPhoto library was very full. I realized that there was a trash in my iPhoto library that wasn't cleared and was holding almost 700 pictures! Deleted some pictures and now I have pictures uploaded. Then it took a long time to upload the pictures to flickr and by the time I did all of this is was about 12:30 am. So I decided to go to bed without an update. So, I'm updating today.

First I added a picture of Mr. Whiskers (the cat I made for a friend for Christmas):


Then I have pictures of the baby bibs for Taylor Ann:



Finally I have pictures of the "fancy" scarf:

Beautiful Bridget's Etsy Shop

Sorry for the bad quality, I just took these pictures on my photo booth on my mac. These are pictures of a scarf I got from a pretty good Etsy shop. The scarf is the Porch Swing Scarf in Purple. The Etsy Shop is called Beautiful Bridget and you can find the shop here. You should check it out sometime if you are looking for nice warm scarves.

One of the things I have been looking at is this:

I just think the colors are gorgeous and it definitely does look like Cotton Candy... however, I just do not have the money to spend on it yet, maybe in a few months... we'll see :)

Hope you enjoyed this little post of mine!

New Years Eve = Last Picture Post... Or is it?

So today is New Years Eve. I actually have plans to go down to Appleton, WI (20 minute drive) to hand with some college friends. I'm looking forward to this and I'm also looking forward to showing you the other three projects I made for my cousins :)

First baby elephant head for Jena (Pattern can be found here:



Baby duck head for Tara (Pattern can be found here):


Head of the Yeti for Brad (Pattern by Roxycraft):


The Yeti didn't turn out exactly the way I pictured it to. I'm probably going to do this character again, but I'll try to alter the pattern a bit to make it look more the way I would like it to. I'm also thinking of creating a cow for my sister... we'll see what happens.

Also as you may have noticed if you follow me on twitter I have finished crocheting a garden scarf. I also have started making a bib. Hence, there will be more pictures on their way... Maybe even tomorrow!

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

PICTURES!!!

So I really shouldn't be wasting the time posting these pictures, when I actually have a stack of homework sitting next to me, but it is 8:22 in the morning and I do not feel like it is necessary to start homework at this hour. Especially, after I worked over 6 hours on homework yesterday. Anywhoo... I'm posting pictures finally! So please let me know what you think. First, this is the little penguin I finished a while ago, he/she is for a friend of mine for Christmas. I think he is pretty cute. More pictures on my flickr account if you want to see more pictures.



Then I'm in the process of finishing two different types of polar bears for Christmas. One is a ball and the other is the type the penguin is. Here are some pictures of the uncompleted little guys...





Hope you enjoy the pictures. I'm hoping that in a couple of weeks, I'll finally have time to at least finish the polar bears I started. :)

I swear I'm still alive

This week has been rough, really, really, rough. Tension is high and I just haven't had time to post anything. However, I am back to tell you I did, indeed, finish my cute little turtle. Here are some pictures to enjoy:





As always comments and constructive criticisms are more than welcome. Oh! Pattern for this turtle can be found here

Next time I'll try to post some pictures of my latest project, a cute little penguin. :)

Squirtle's Turtle

So, what am I up to lately you ask? I actually started working on a turtle for one of my 20 or so Christmas gifts. I am using a pattern that I bought from Ana Paula on etsy. You can see her shop here. I'll post pictures of my progress as I go. I just don't want to post pictures, yet, because I do not have much done. Maybe when I at least finish the shell and stuff.