Poké Ball & Mario Mushroom revisited

This week has been fun. In addition to the crochet geekdom, I also had a great baking day. I know I seem to be baking a lot, but I do love it and I was making muffins to freeze. Plus it makes everyone happy to have yummy baked goodness. Its a feel good activity for me. So I made Apple Pie Muffins along with more Oatmeal Chocolate Chip. The dozen I didn't freeze (out of about 5 dozen total) were gone in less than two days. I also made Chocolate Chip Loaf. LOVE IT!! It was a Pintrest find. I don't do the frosting on this, because I think its amazing by itself. But click the link to make it yourself and just see how tasty this this. I make two smaller loafs instead of one big one because I find it to cook better that way in our old oven (made the big loaf the first time I tried this recipe and the middle fell out the bottom. Hence I make two smaller loafs). I ended up freezing one loaf, but I really want to take it out now. . .  This kind of stuff never lasts long around here.

There was also a Walmart trip where I bought a 10 lb box of poli-fil, among a few other things. I didn't realize it came this big. The box is huge and opening it up was amusing, talk about a lot of poli-fil in one box. It doubled in size. This should last me a while and is cheaper than getting 20 oz bags at a time like I was. I really do love that I found this, even if it is so big and I have to figure out where to store this. 

DVD For a reference to how huge this box is. (Dragons are also super awesome)

POOF it grew crazy big.

On to the crocheted things. I finished stuffing last weeks Little Lambs. They're all cute and fluffed with little faces now. Super cute!!

I started out with making Poké Balls (although I wish I had started with the mushrooms because they take a tiny bit longer. But they all got done so who cares right?). I made a pair of Team Rocket balls along with the classic and a green Poké Ball. 
I've said it before this is a great pattern and as long as you do your slip stitch at the end of your color change rounds this comes out great. You can make your Pokémon friends super happy and catchin 'em all with these babies. I do want to find some sort of container to put in these to make them hallow and add little Pokémon in them at some point. Something to look for in the future. . .  Rating Time!!

 

 ▪ Pattern Readability - 5 Yarn Balls. This pattern reads Great! Nothing confusing in this one.
 

▪ Ease of Pattern - 5 Yarn Balls. This is a great pattern for a beginner.
 

▪ Adjustments - 5 Yarn Balls. No adjustments needed.
 

▪ Final Product - 5 Yarn Balls. Your Geek Will Be Ecstatic!
 

▪ Personal - LOVE!!! 5 Yarn Balls
 

▪Overall Score - 5 AMAZING Yarn Balls

Now to the Mario Mushrooms. Like I mentioned I wish I had started these first because even though they work up easy they take a bit more time. Doing the spots alone are a bit time consuming with 5 of them. 
So I made the two everyone knows, Grow Up and Get a Life mushrooms. I also made a purple poison mushroom. In the end on this one I went with just spots instead of the skulls you see sometimes because 1) I've seen them both ways when I was searching on the interweb, and 2) I haven't found a skull pattern I really like yet to put on this one. I know I could get dinged from hard core fans out there, but they do come both ways.
Like I said in the first post I made adjustments to this pattern when I had made it the first time and I still stand by those. . .  So time to get Rating!

▪ Pattern Readability - 5 Yarn Balls. They did a great job on making this easy to read and follow.
 
▪ Ease of Pattern -  5 Yarn Balls. Super simple, another great pattern for the beginner.
 
▪ Adjustments - 3 Yarn Balls. The two adjustments I made to the steam/face and spots really made the biggest difference in this pattern looking like it's supposed to.
 
▪ Final Product - 4 Yarn Balls. After the adjustments were made these came out great.
 
▪ Personal - 5 Yarn Balls. I love these guys and plan to make more if they are a good seller.
 
▪Overall Score - 4.4 Yarn Balls. Still an awesome pattern.

You can see the adjustments I made to this pattern in the first post on these guys. To see my first Poké Balls and Mario Mushrooms, click the Week Geek! link.

This week I'm not totally sure what I really want to work on. I was originally thinking of revisiting Yoshi, but I might want to do something different. I guess it will be a surprise next Sunday what I've been working on all week. So tune in!!

Oh oh we have a start date on the kitchen reno. We'll be getting things rolling mid April. WoooooHoooo!! Hopefully it will be wrapped up before I head to Arizona at the end of May. *fingers crossed*. We also settled on a back splash. We had the plan to do white subway tile with dark grout around the whole kitchen and do something behind the stove. Well we found this awesome stainless steal mosaic that we're gonna put back there. Should be awesome!!
 
This is one of our dogs, Nascar (parents love Nascar, the sport. I tried to get her named something else but since I was out of town at the time we got her, I didn't have much sway in the name debate. Her full name is Nascar 3, because she has a big white mark on her chest and my Dads favorite car was Dale Earnhardt Sr.'s 3 at the time. Still is actually. She is the first and probably only Nascar we will have). She was chilling with me as I was writing today so I thought she should make the blog. She's our 14lb Chi-weenie (Chihuahua-Dachshund) and about 5 years old I think now. She is such the lovable pup. Our other dog is Lugnut the 9lb Terrier-Chihuahau who will be 3 this year I believe. We had a small dog moment these past several years. Before them we had an American Eskimo named Paddy. Our big fluff ball. He passed in 2011 at the age 15.

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Happy Crafting!

Sheep Week

Started early on this weeks project, and as result I may have gotten a little over zealous with the Little Lamb pattern. I tried to make 5 and am now scrambling to get them all stuffed and finished. But YAY for a new flock. They are quite cute in their colorfulness. I managed to complete one and get all the others put together up to the legs, before I decided this blog post had to be written. So here are some progress pictures. . . .

Pre-stuffed

Stuffed and pieced together, still needing the legs.

The whole thing done now.

playing with the face a bit.

 I really do love this pattern, Anita did a fantastic job making this pattern. If you'd like to see more from Anita please visit her blog, link below.

Pattern By Anita Elmore
ASE Knits 'n' Crochets
http://aseknc.blogspot.com/
aseknc@gmail.com

Another 5 Yarn Ball overall week. This pattern is easy to follow, you don't have to make any adjustments, these Lambs are just so adorable, and I could make dozens of these. And a bonus is that Anita offers the free pattern on her blog for crocheters and knitters alike. AMAZING!!

In other news this week. . . .  Been having some back issues this last half of the week. Not sure how I tweaked my back, but I did. The heating pad I made earlier in the year was a god send. Helped me get comfortable so I could focus on the crocheting (as much as I could). Slowly getting better, but I wish it wouldn't have happened. I should probably go take some more Bayer Back & Body now that I think of it. Finally feeling better, but still a bit soar. Here's hoping I don't screw it up anymore anytime soon.

Our dining room is now home to our new kitchen appliances for the time being. So exciting! Another reason for my back to stop hurting is once the kitchen gets going I'm gonna be doing the painting of the room and I kinda need my back not to hurt for that. Shouldn't be too hard since the kitchen will be gutted when I get around to that. Still need to pick out the exact colors for things now that I think of it. Must get on that.

Finished all of Farscape last week. So happy they did the 3 hour or so movie thing of The Peacekeeper Wars to wrap it up. I couldn't handle how the show ended on that cliffhanger and then they got canceled. Speaking of canceled, I'm coming up on the end of Merlin. Started it this week after watching the first season of The 100 (good show, can't wait to see season 2). I really am liking Merlin and am sad that there was only 5 seasons, and super curious how its gonna end. I know it wasn't a planed end and am prepared for a big cliffhanger. It was nice to see Anthony Head in something else. I can't really call him Uther after him being Giles for so long to me, but it was nice that he wasn't like evil in this (a mean bastard at times, yes, evil he was not. Hell the poor man married a troll at one point), although the man can play evil. Since Buffy  I've seen him in an episode of Doctor Who and he gave us his music stylings in Repo! The Genetic Opera (and he sure as hell can sing). Not sure what I'll be watching next on Netflix, any suggestions??

Holy T.A.R.D.I.S. of Galifrey its already week #12. Well I'm gonna do a a re-post this week and work on some more Poke Balls and Mario Mushrooms. Of course I'm gonna finish putting the poor Lambs together first, probably while I cry over the end of another show. Just kidding (no I probably will cry and curse and in general be angry and even a bit depressed about it. Its how these things go, Fandom Life Forever!). Return of the Geek Week! If you have any ideas or suggestions for this weeks project or a pattern/project you'd like me to do in the weeks to come, please leave a comment. I'd love to hear from you guys.

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Happy Crafting!

Off Week

As you all might know, I took the week off from projects. And you know what, I missed them terribly. I'm glad it was only for the week, and it will be a long while before I do this again. Its no fun marathon t.v. watching without something to do, I'm always working on something with my hands these days when I'm watching stuff on my computer. I did finally start this coming weeks project because I was starting to go a little looney without having something to work on. My brain kept passively arguing with itself. "How about we do . . . . no. What about . . . . no. We could . . . . No. Well what about this . . . . are you kidding?" And so it went. Too many things I could come up with to do required more attention than what a project would require. It was maddening. But I did get a few things done that were quite helpful.

Small, Medium, & Large tags.

Since I make my own merch tags, I took a portion of a few days to make up new tags. I needed a smaller tag to put on things like the Poké Balls and Mario Mushrooms. The two kinds of tags that I already have are a bit bulky for something so small. So I had bought a narrower ribbon a few weeks back on one of my Michael's trips and just never got to finishing the idea out. (heres how I learned to make my own merch tags). So simple to make, the biggest thing there is to do is make your design on the computer and flip it to the mirror image of it to print out and iron on your ribbon. So nice to have these now.

All I need for making tags. . . . Don't mind the Pocahontas sheet I iron on. It works for my needs.

1 of 2 Pizzas I made on Pi Day!

I also had a baking day. I just really, really wanted to bake a ton of stuff Thursday. So I made an apple walnut coffee cake and oatmeal chocolate chip muffins. So tasty! I planned on more but I actually ran out of some items and then I ran out of time to make them anyway. Maybe more muffins before the kitchen gets started (freeze a batch of them maybe so they will last longer?) But I got to make pizza dough Friday for pizza pi yesterday. It was a happy coincidence that it happened to be Pi Day. YAY nerds/geeks! So good pizza and baked goods for the end of this week. Its all gone now. The stuff never lasts long around here.

Apple Walnut Coffee Cake and Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Muffins. I need to make more of these (mostly the muffins, but really both.) YUMMM!!

I got stuff done this week that needed to happen. And I still have some of it to work on like Etsy listings. Really I kinda need to over hall my shop, but I want to have the prep work done for that before I shut it down for like a day. I was working mostly on things that need to be done before I leave for Arizona so my sister can work Woodburn for me. It was good to have the time for it.

This weekend we also moved the fridge out of the kitchen and down to the basement. Makes it harder to get food and prepare stuff but its gonna be worth it in the long run. Getting ready for the kitchen to get stated. The sink came in this week as well and this Friday we'll be getting the appliances delivered too. Can't wait to start!!!

.:Project Time:.

This week I'm going to be working on the Little Lamb pattern. Click the link to see the pattern or go to Anita's blog below:

Pattern By Anita Elmore
ASE Knits 'n' Crochets
http://aseknc.blogspot.com/
aseknc@gmail.com

I've made several of these before, but its been a little bit since I've made one. So new pattern to the blog, old to me. Here are two out of the ones I've made before.

Like I said I already started on this weeks Little Lambs. I have a white one waiting to be stuffed and more colorful creations to come. Might try some yarn eyes on a few of these instead of my button eyes to see how it looks.

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Happy Crafting!

Back Again With the Rag Dolls

Rag Dolls!!!

My three Rag Dolls: Wednesday, Mona, and Alice.

So this week we're revisiting the Rag Doll pattern (here's the link to the first Rag Doll post). I managed to pull out two of these girls. Love my Wednesday doll I made and really want to keep her. I had some fun playing with their hair this week as well. I did forget to get to get more pictures of these two. But I have a few more then the last time I did a post on this pattern.

Head/Body of . . . we'll call her Mona?

Wednesday in pieces

I'm not sure why I wanted to make a Wednesday doll but I'm glad I did. I think she came out super cute, even if I had originally planed to crochet her collar. Because of the weight of the yarn I used for her skin tone she came out a bit bigger then the other two girls, and her dress is smaller for the same reason. Yarn weight matters people, just as much as your hook size.

I chose to give her little white socks instead of the black tights purely because I didn't want all the black to be over powering on this doll. And I stand by that choice. Wednesday Adams might be a child of the night but on something like this there is such a thing as too much black. Again I am super tempted to keep her for myself. And am very happy her pig tails came out so well. They aren't braided because of the bulk of so much hair, but I don't think that takes away from her either. 

It was interesting to pick out Mona's colors because I had no clue what I was gonna do with her. I had this darker tan body with an orange bottom. I'm glad she came together and looks great with the yellow, orange, gray combo. I was a little scared that these three colors wouldn't come together and I'd have to try something else. I'm also glad that the black belt stripe I put in her dress came out so well too. It was another element I was nervous about working. She was also going to have just dark brown hair but I didn't have enough of the yarn I picked out so she got the black as well, mid design changes aren't all bad. I played around with her hair a little and gave her a fish tail braid. Its super cute and since its not tided off you can always take it out and give her wild hair (like Alice) or split it into pig tails, even try to french braid it if you'd like.

I'm in love with this pattern. The hair is the most laborious part of the whole design but its a labor of love. And made easier if you outline the hair line first. Trust me on that one. The boots are also a bit that needs all your attention but as long as you follow the pattern your in for easy work. 

The only piece of this pattern that I have yet to use are the boot cuffs. I thought about putting them on Mona, but decided not to in the end. Looking at that part of the pattern, I feel there my be a better way to do them. Maybe try them next time??

▪ Pattern Readability - 3.5 Yarn Balls, only because the way its written is different from the normal crochet vernacular. If your not used to this pattern it can trip you up pretty bad, especially when you get to the boots.
 

▪ Ease of Pattern - 4 Yarn Balls, only reason its not a 5 is because of the readability. Fairly simple pattern to follow otherwise.
 

▪ Adjustments - 4 Yarn Balls, I changed how the whole arm comes together and it made a big difference in assembly.  Plus making the leg design work for what you want to do is simple and so is the dress design.
 

▪ Final Product - 5 Yarn Balls all day long. Weather you change it up like I have or just follow the pattern straight on it is an excellent final project.
 

▪ Personal - 5 Yarn Balls. I even like the laborious parts to this project. Too much fun with these girls.
 

▪Overall Score - 4.3 Yarn Balls. This could have rated higher if it wasn't for the pesky wording.

So along with my crocheting this week and part of last week I've been watching this AWESOME sci-fi show, Farscape. I wish I had know about it when it was on the air over a decade ago but alas I missed it. But Netflix is awesome to have its 4 seasons. Unfortunately I'm almost to the end, and have to find somewhere to watch the two part ending (or at least I think thats what the Peacekeeper Wars are). This show is like Battlestar Galactica and Firefly combined, but with more aliens. So much love for all these shows. If you like your Sci-Fi, you should watch all three of these for mentioned shows.

Before my binge watching of the lovely Farscape, it was Once Upon A Time, up to the current season and before that is was the last couple seasons of Bones (I'd already seen the first 5 or 6 seasons before I stopped watching when it aired). All stating from the beginning of February. I'm a marathoner of television when I crochet, its what I do. I really do have to have something to watch, but sometimes I can get away with audio books when I crochet. I only run into small problems doing that when I have to read the pattern closely, I stop listening to the audio when I do that. So I opt for watching movies or t.v. shows instead.

As for next week I'm gonna take a break. We're getting closer than ever to starting the kitchen and I think a break from projects is in order. I will say that I might pick up a few of my unfinished projects or start on something for the following week, but its still gonna be a laid back week for me. So take care my lovelies, and hopefully I have something to post about other then what the new weeks project will be next Sunday.

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Happy Crafting!

P.J. Pal week

Well I guess this will be the second week that my crochet powers surprise me. I didn't think I could make all the pieces of this weeks project in one day, I was wrong. Putting in a full day can accomplish a lot apparently. Although my hands wish I hadn't done that. The joints in my fingers were a little sore the next day so I just sewed my P.J. Pal together. Two day project that I thought might take a bit longer. That was for the first pal of mine, the cute kitty. Then I took a little more time to make the second, awesome mouse. These guys were fun to make up and figure out their ears. I had help making the cat ears from another pattern for a smaller stuffie. I was smart and actually wrote down these patterns I came up with, so I don't have to guess the next time I want to make these animals. I don't always write things like this down and kick myself when I need to recreate something, its a flaw I'm working on. I think I need to work on my cat face a bit but all in all both their faces came out pretty good. What do you think?

Kitty Cat in pieces. I thought the yellow cat went well with the multicolored yarn.

All done up. I even added a butt flap accent to this one. I thought it looked cute.

Awesome Mouse . . .  I combined the orange and black for this one.

My camera washed out the nose for this one a bit ... but I swear it has a nose. This is not a Voldemort mouse! Love the mouse ears here. Super cute.

 

First week for a 5 Yarn Ball rating all around!!

▪ Pattern readability - Easy to follow and nothing complicated in this pattern. 5 Yarn Balls 

▪ Ease of pattern - This is very easy, I'd give it a beginner rating. 5 Yarn Balls

▪ Adjustments - Nothing that had to be adjusted. Although I did cut out a portion of the head because I didn't find that it was needed and in the long run makes it easier to attach the body to the head when assembling.  Also very easy to change up and build off of the original pattern. 5 Yarn Balls

▪ Final product - These come out looking so darn cute, you'll want to keep them. 5 Yarn Balls

▪ Personal - Whats not to love about these guys. 5 Yarn Balls

• Final score . . . 5 Yarn Balls. Easy math this week.

All three of my new P.J. Pals together. Love making these guys.

In personal news we are getting closer and closer to starting the kitchen reno. We are starting to pick things up, this week we're going to get light fixtures, sink,  and the faucet. We already ordered the big appliances a few weeks ago. And we've been slowly packing up the kitchen to get ready. We just can't wait to get started. So Exciting!!

I also learned that when making pumpkin pie only use Libby's pumpkin filling. Tried the Kroger brand filling and failed. I'm a little sad by this because I was trying a new crust recipe. Cream cheese crust was good though. The pie was okay, but nowhere near my best. I thought the recipe on the filling can was weird when it didn't call for cloves (I added some anyway because you can't make pumpkin pie without cloves. That's just madness).

PROJECT TALK: So I left this coming weeks project up to my mother to pick. I couldn't decided and she was on hand. And out of the past projects I've done for the blog she picked week #1's project (Click the link to see that post again). Which means I'm going back to the Rag Doll pattern. I don't have a set plan for these ones but I think I'm gonna give one a mohawk. Maybe make a Wednesday doll?  Its a thought anyway. If you have any thoughts of what I should do please comment, I'd love to hear from you.

I still have some work to do to get my inventory ready for Woodburn, but it is going faster than I had thought. I just hope I can keep up this pace. *Fingers Crossed*

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Happy Crafting!