Christi Friesen inspired sculptures

I ran across the artist Christi Friesen a little while ago and I was just blown away by her polymer clay art. I like to fiddle with clay myself sometimes, so I used her tutorials to make a few things.



The first is a "focal bead" made by following the principles in one of the tutorials. The smaller beads I made out of scraps to kind of have a similar feel to the focal bead.



This guy was my favorite! He's not as polished at the owl in the tutorial, but I learned a lot while making him. I wish I still had him, but I traded him and the beads away in a craft swap on Swap-bot. I guess I'll just have to make another one. :)

To see more stuff people have made inspired by Christi Friesen, I found this neat Flickr gallery where people post pictures of their CF-inspired work.

Purse Scarf

I was trying to find something to do with some Lion Brand Wool-Ease Thick and Quick yarn I've had lying around for ages, and I ran across this Purse Scarf pattern. It has everything I love in a knitting pattern - fat yarn, big needles and lots of holes! All of that equals quick knitting, which is nice for me; usually I am a very slow knitter and sometimes I just want some instant gratification. I started and finished the whole scarf in just one evening.





Now I'm working on a scarf for my husband that is exactly the opposite - thin yarn, tiny needles, tightly woven fabric - it's going to take a miracle for me to finish this! I'll probably finish it just in time for the spring thaw, haha.

some Christmas knits

Santa Owl, which I made last week for a swap on Swapbot. I used the pattern Edmund Owl for the body, using Lion Brand Fisherman's Wool on size 6 needles and knitting it slightly shorter than the pattern says. The hat I made by making a cone out of glittery red felt, then gluing on cotton ball trim and a sprig of holly. The eyes and beak are felt that I fabric glued on. The scarf I knit longways in garter stitch using Bamboo and Ewe yarn in red, using size 6 needles and casting on 95 stitches.




A cute little snowman that I just knitted for my sister. I used the pattern Mr. Flurry. I knit the body in Lion Brand Wool Ease with size 6 needles. The hat and scarf were also done on size 6 needles in some unlabeled pastel blue baby yarn I had lying around. I had made one of these snowmen for my mom a few years ago and my sister kept bugging me for one, so I hope she likes him. :) The one I made for my mom I knit in Lion Brand Homespun and it ended up about twice as big as this one.

The snowman is knit flat and then seamed up the back. I've always done seams kind of haphazardly, but I started sewing the snowman up and I hated the way it looked so I actually looked up how to seam things properly. I ended up trying out a mattress seam and it worked perfectly! You can't even tell where the seam is. :) I was very pleased. I guess you learn something new every day. ;P

Again, if you want to connect on Ravelry, my name is "kallyn."

Some Knitted Scarves

These are some scarves I've knitted in the past for myself and family members.



This is a skinny accent scarf that I made for my mom. It's done in Lion Brand Glitterspun in one repeat of a simple feather and fan pattern with garter stitch border. It's a little scratchy, but it looks cute with a black peacoat.




This is a scarf I knit for myself and it's one of my favorites! I used Moda Dea Cache yarn in the "siren" colorway. The scarf is just a generic drop stitch pattern with garter stitch and I really like the way the thick and thin nature of the yarn makes the dropped stitches look so interesting. I also knit it on size 13 needles, which are much larger than the gauge on the label, which makes the wool softer against your skin than a tighter knit would be. It's also easy and fast to knit because 1) the pattern is very easy to memorize, 2) it's knit on big needles, and 3) for my particular tension it always takes me exactly two skeins of this yarn to make one perfect length scarf with nothing to spare. I think I've made three of these total, but I've given away the other two. I get compliments on this scarf when I wear it out, which always makes me happy. :)




This picture isn't very good but unfortunately I don't have a better one. This was a scarf I knit for my sister. I used Baby Alpaca Grande yarn in the 2050 color, which is one strand each of orange and pink. The pattern was the Short Row Rib Scarf from Magknits, but since Magknits doesn't exist anymore you can find the pattern here: http://www.clipclip.org/clips/detail/10110/scarf This scarf has beautiful drape, but my sister says it does tend to shed a little fuzz. It's very soft and cuddly.

I like to knit in general. If you're a knitter too, you can follow me on Ravelry; my username is kallyn.

Artist Trading Cards - The Four Elements

I joined an artist trading card swap on http://www.swap-bot.com and the theme was The Four Elements with one card for each element. Artist trading cards are small pieces of art that are 2.5 x 3.5 inches and you decorate them however you like and then include your contact information on the back of them. They're supposed to be a way for artists to connect with each other. Anyway, here are my four elements:



First we have Earth. I made a base of cardstock and then cut a piece of felt to the same size. I punched holes in them and threaded them together with ribbon, then attached some sparkly leaves (I didn't make the leaves, they came from the craft store :)).

Next is Air. I made a double thickness cardstock base this time and fronted it with some blue origami paper that I drew some wind patterns onto. I cut some clouds out of more origami paper and shaded them with glitter, then attached rhinestones to the wind whorls.

After Air is Fire. This one is more abstract than the others. The base for this is thick cardboard and the front is some shiny origami paper. I attached some ribbons and rhinestones in an angular pattern to suggest flames.

Last is Water. The base is again thick cardboard, which I wrapped with multicolored ribbon. Since this covered the back as well as the front, I attached some cardstock to the back so I could write on it. The fish is made from felt and ribbon and the bubbles are rhinestones and seed beads.

I had a lot of fun making these and I was a little sad to part with them. My husband liked Earth the best, but I think I like Air. It just seemed cheery to me for some reason. :)

Greetings

I've been doing a lot of crafty stuff lately, so I thought it would be nice to give it all a home other than flickr or a folder on my computer. A lot of it is stuff I make for online craft swaps. I like to work in a lot of different mediums, so expect a bunch of different stuff!