The Squiggle

This, my dear readers, is what I call "the squiggle." It is part sea creature and  part dust bunny. This is the first thing I ever attempted to crochet. I believe it was supposed to be a scarf. My friend, Fawn, was my crochet teacher. I still remember her reaction to Mr. Squiggle. "Meg, what the hell did you do? I don't know even where to begin to figure out where you went wrong...." I think I can see portions of where I went wrong.

I'm really glad I didn't give up despite my first attempt not being stellar. I'm even more glad that I kept the weird, warped piece as a reminder that all artists start somewhere and only get better with practice. The squiggle remains with my small collection of crochet things that I cherish. I have a feeling I'll use it as an example when I teach others how to crochet.

What was your first project? How did it come out?

I sense a trend going on...

So, it all started with a brilliant idea that came to me in the shower. I was trying to think of something small and quick to make that I could sell at a reasonable price. Geeky. This is what I came up with:

Thinking on the Legend of Zelda items theme, I also decided to make a Deku Nut:

I'm really enjoying making small, familiar objects. :) My next item in the works is slightly larger, but far more iconic of Legend of Zelda. Anybody want to take a guess?

John's Many Crochet Hats

John has one of the first hats I ever made. Or rather, he had it. It's dark green with white trim, all done in single and double crochet. It looked quite stunning and professional for a novice hat. A year after I made it, I actually took it back to fix it when I noticed that the ends weren't sew in properly and that I could make it longer.

John then lost it some place.

 He has a tendency to lose things. Particularly winter accessories. He's been through at least 3 different pairs of gloves/mittens. I playfully threatened to not make him crochet things if he's just going to lose them! So, he asked for a different hat in blue, which he wears quite often. Unfortunately the yarn (acrylic) is fuzzing in an unattractive way so I dragged him to my local yarn shop and let him pick a couple skeins in something high quality. He selected a Peruvian wool in this color. It's called Saddle Brown.

I'm using Laughing Willow's Lazy Cable Hat Pattern. So far so good!

Etsy Yarn-a-holics

I had a lovely surprise today when the team leader of Etsy Yarn-a-holics asked if she could share my tutorial on the team blog. As a member of the team, I am thrilled to see my work shared with a broader audience. Etsy Yarn-a-holics are awesome! Thanks for sharing my work, Pam!

Here's a link to the post if you're interested!

Valentine's Day Tutorial: How to Crochet an Amigurumi Heart

This tutorial is my first, so please bear with me! This heart fits right into the palm of your hand and is perfect to give to that special someone on February 14th. :) It's also fitting for Legend of Zelda fans all year round. More hearts, better questing! This project is suitable for beginners. You need to know how to single crochet, single increase, and single together (or decrease). If you're completely new to crochet, I suggest checking out YouTube for how to's on these stitches.

Materials: G size crochet hook
Any color you desire of worsted weight yarn (for the sake of this tutorial, I used Red Heart in Red)
Blunt needle (for sewing in ends)
Stuffing (like polyfill)

To create a heart, you start by making two different lobes. The first is sewn to the second, which becomes one contiguous heart.

Lobe #1
R1: Chain 3 and slip stitch into the first to create a ring.
R2: Sc inc into each stitch (6)
R3: Sc inc in each stitch (12)
R4: Sc in each stitch, work even (12)
R5: Sc in each sitch, work even. Fasten off. Leave a tail of a few inches.

Lobe #2 (and rest of heart)

Start in the same way as the first lobe, but don't fasten off. Slip stitch into last three stitches of Lobe #1. Make sure to tuck the tail from Lobe #1 in the following stitches.

R6: Continue to crochet around both lobes now, creating 20 stitches. If you've done this correctly, your stitch marker should be right in the middle between the lobes.
R7: Work even (20)
R8: sc in next 5 st, sc next 2 st tog, sc in next 8 st, sc next 2 st tog, sc in next 3 st (18)
R9: sc in next 4 st, sc next 2 st tog, sc in next 7 st, sc next 2 st tog, sc in next 3 st (16)
R10: sc in next 3 st, (sc next 2 st tog) 2 times, sc in next 4 st, (sc next 2 st tog) 2 times, sc in next st (12) Start to stuff the heart firmly.
R11: sc in next 2 st, (sc next 2 st tog) 2 times, sc in next 2 st, (sc next 2 st tog) 2 times (8)
R12: sc in next 2 st, sc next 2 st tog, around (6) Fasten off. Sew up the hole and weave in the end.

I may post photos later on to clarify the meeting of the lobes. Let me know if you have any questions or need any help!


Happy Valentines Day!

Tentative Goals for 2012

Happy 2012 fellow bloggers and visitors!

It's time for me to consider goals for this upcoming year. I'm amazed at the results of my first year of selling on Etsy. Fun facts: My best selling item was my little amigurumi Portal Turret. Most people found my shop by searching for items that either contained "Portal" or "Legend of Zelda." The little ewok is quickly becoming a best seller over the turret.

Goals:
-Complete my map and have a customer in every state in the US.
-Reach 100+ sales by the end of the year
-Be smarter about keeping tabs on expenses (like PayPal fees, shipping envelopes, ect).
-Create five more best sellers (5+ purchases of an individual item)

I think that's a good start for now. Hope 2012 has been great to you all so far!

Nearing 1st Year Anniversary

So, as the end of my first year selling items on Etsy nears, I thought it would be interesting to figure out how many different states I've sold items to. This is what I created. Not shown are my international orders to England and Canada :) I find it interesting that there are weird gaps on the East coast. Hopefully next year the map will be covered!