Thursday, May 15, 2014

Update!

I'm finally done with all things school related for the semester. Got out pretty good- one B amongst a sea of A's! :D Even managed to dig myself out of my project hole.

Got my Mother's Day stuff done:
This is for my Mother in Law.

This is for my Nana. Used her favorite bible verse

My mother is pretty hard to craft for so I took the easy way out with flowers and lunch with my sister in tow.

I did a patch for a friend to get some practice out of the way. I found a 10 pack of rectangular patches for a $1 at Wal Mart. Didn't know what to put on them until her!
"Octocutie" patch!

Still got a few projects I'm working on. One is Gunter from Adventure Time! Hopefully he'll be done by the weekend. Here's what I got on him so far.
13" on SC in black -.-
There's some more needlework in my hoop. This is meant for a friend's house warming- so hopefully I'll get it done by tomorrow. I need to add a frame of flowers and birds.....need to get an actual frame too.....
We're humorous. ^^
So even without school, I'm a busy little bee. Thankfully, I actually enjoy this. I'm looking forward to doing a lot more cross stitch this summer!

Monday, May 5, 2014

30 Day Crochet Challenge: Day Six

Perhaps this challenge was too much for me? Gotten a little behind, so let's start with day six and I'll answer the others at the end.

 Day 6: What is your favorite piece that you’ve crocheted?

That feels really hard to say. It seems that I always am picking a new favorite with each pattern I complete.




 It's between these two. They were custom designs by me and some of my first attempts at crocheting my own patterns. The newsboy was for my news paper teacher and Prince Gumball was for a friend.

Day 3-5

Day 5: How long did it take from the time your learned how to crochet, to finish your first project?
  
Not long actually. I picked it up really quick and jumped into amigurumi immediately.

Day 4: How did you learn how to crochet?

I pretty much answered this in Day 1

Day 3: Do you have any other WIPs (works in progress)?


Don't remind me! xp

Sunday, May 4, 2014

May the Fourth be with you!

This is a little late, but I decided to compile a list of Star Wars crafts!

  1. Star Wars Pillow Cases
  2. Quick Light Sabers
  3. It's a trap! Ackbar Puppet
 

 



Sadly, I was busy at work today to do much Star Wars type celebration today. :( Hopefully you were able to have a great day and you still have an hour left to do one of these crafts! (However you do not need a special day to get your geek on.)

Tutorial- How to put hair on a crochet doll

Do you love making dolls, but don't know how to do hair? There are many different ways out there, but this is how I like to do hair.

This is a photo tutorial I took while adding hair to a recent order. Here's our model:


Step 1: Choose your hair color! I chose a dark brown sports weight yarn. This tutorial should work with any weight yarn. However, when making the wig cap, I suggest you use a medium weight version of the color you choose.  

Step 2: We will start making the wig cap. In this version, I am using an H hook since that is what I used to make my doll. An easy way to make a wig cap is to follow the directions you used to make the doll's head. Keep crocheting in the round until you're done increasing and then do one round of single crochet.    
    
Started out with Ch2 and Sc 6 in the first chain


Be sure to match up the cap with your doll's head as you go along, just to make sure.

It's like making a little hat for your dolly. :)



    
Step 3: Once your done with the wig cap, finish off and leave a long strand of yarn for sewing. Sew the wig cap onto your dolls head. You can leave the left over yarn as your first strand of hair.   
     
  Step 4: We will be making strands of hair. The easiest way to do this is by wrapping your yarn around a long, sturdy object. This can be a piece of cardboard, a DVD case, or a thin book. It only needs to be as long as you want your hair to be. Remember: the thickness of your object will contribute to the length of your hair. Wrap the object as much as you want. When you're satisfied, cut the yarn off the book.
  
   
I chose my text book for Tech Writing! :D Anyway, wrap your yarn around the book as much as you want. I had to do this a couple of times to achieve thick hair. 





 Step 5: Take one strand of the hair and loop it in half.


Like so.

Stick your hook through the stitch where the hairline and the skin tone meet. This is where we'll be starting with the hair. With your hook, pull the looped yarn through the stitch- BUT DON'T PULL IT ALL THE WAY. Wrap the tail around the hook and pull it through the loop already on the hook. This will make a knot that will anchor the hair into place.










Continue to do this all the way around the hair line. Start and stop where you want the bangs to be. You can go all the way around to cut bangs later. It's your choice!

 If you feel this is the look you want for your doll, then feel free to stop! If not, then continue to add hair around the wig cap as you just did. If you do not want to do the full head of hair, you can "cheat" by adding a row in the middle of the cap and than another row or two around the top of the cap. Since I was instructed to add as much hair as possible, I added hair to every single row of the wig cap.

A thick, lustrous head of hair!
 Step 6: Hair cut! The yarn won't be even when you're done. Also this is your chance to give your doll some style~

Finished!



 I hope you enjoyed this tutorial and found it helpful. If there are any questions, please ask! This is my first tutorial.

Happy crafting!

Bertie









Thursday, May 1, 2014

30 Day Crochet Challenge: Day Two

Day 2: What is currently on your hooks?

Nothing right now. I just finished a darling doll for a friend.

 However, I am going to get started on a Gunter doll this weekend!