Weekend Project: Chair Makeover

Please excuse my grainy cell phone pics.  I brought my camera, but no memory card...

One random day after work, over half a year ago, my coworker asked me to join him to rummage through a "free" furniture pile near our workplace.  Boy, was I glad I joined him, because I fell in love with this chair.  Although the colors were a bit disconcerting, I saw the potential in it.  Plus, I could tell that the materials used were top notch.  The chair was lightweight, yet very solid.  I adopted it and vowed to find a purpose for it and to find a new color scheme.  All this ended up being a very pleasant and easy weekend project.

New Projects!!!

Today, I've brought home a whole host of crafting materials to bring on a new wave of "craftastrophes!"

Sooo.... I didn't win the lottery...

...BUT  I totally hit the jackpot with my finished infinity scarf!

It was a fairly simple pattern, but it is so gorgeous and looks very complicated (at least to my untrained, novice eye).  I used a 5 sts = 1" US 7 (4.5mm) gauge yarn in a mustard color, 3 skeins of 100m/50 g.  It's 30% Bowlder (Jadeite) fiber, 50% fine wool, and 20% silk, which drew my attention because the texture of the yarn was pretty luxurious.  I used 8 mm knitting needles with this yarn to get that looser effect.

Instructions:

Cast on a multiple of 3 stitches to the desired width of your choice.  (I did 42 stitches).  I then K2, P1 (I'm not familiar with knitting speak, so in lamens term, I knit two stitches, then purled one stitch all the way across), for every row until the desired length.  I wanted to be able to loop the scarf once around my neck and still have the bottom loop hit about 1/3 down my torso, which needed all three skeins.  I would check my progress by holding the scarf against me to make sure the length is correct.  To complete the loop, I twisted the scarf several times before attaching the two ends so that it's permanently twisted.  To combine, I left about 18 inches of yarn at the end and started single crocheting the two ends together, but there was not enough yarn leftover for that.  So, I just used the crochet hook to wrap the yarn through the two ends, kind of like stitching.  BUT that's very unorthodox.  I found a site with more legit ways to combine two knitted pieces together:

http://www.learn2knit.co.uk/knitting/joining.php

Enjoy!

Origami Flower Ball Thingy

As I've mentioned in a previous post, one of my goals was to make an origami flower ball thing just because it's badass.  I was inspired by the above YouTube video made by Chloe Dao.

There's no way I have the space for a ginormous flower ball made from whole construction paper sheets as Chloe had done, so I used pre-cut origami paper.  I cut those squares down to four even pieces, because a) I had in mind that it would make a cute ornament for Christmas (which I totally didn't finish it in time for) and b) it's only for fun to see how long it would take to do.

I've been working on it off an on at my desk at work during lunch.  As you can see, I have two of the 12 flowers completed.  Each flower uses up 5 squares, so you need a total of 60 squares per ball.  I cut up 15 sheets of the full sized pre-cut squares into 60 sheets of 1/4 sized squares.  I pretty much followed the video above to make the cones.  Once I had five cones, I taped them together with tiny pieces of scotch tape (which was not visible at all).  I'm going to wait until I have all 12 flowers completed before I start assembling.

Framed Peg Board: Desk Reorganization Project

Okay.  I have a problem.  That problem is my desk.  I swear that it is messing with my creative productivity.  It's true!  A messy work environment makes you less motivated to start projects because you have to clean first before even starting.  Who wants to clean?  Also, it's harder to find things when you're messy.  And finally, I can't even sit at it.  There's nowhere to put my feet.  It's a serious problem.

Here's another angle in case you don't appreciate the full mess

As you can see, it's looking cuhrazy!  There's a giant pile of mail, random frames taking up space, my laptop, tape, paper clips, remote controls...  They are all fighting for space on the surface of my desk (and let's be honest, underneath it, too).  Never to fear, though.  I have a plan (as always).  I am going to add two shelves: one to put my new filing system (just adding everything to binders in protective sleeve covers) and relieve my poor subwoofer of my hardcover books, and the other one to put my sewing machine and sewing basket (to make more room on the floor for my legs and feet).  I am also going to hang a peg board above my desk.  It will house my mail organization system, my office supplies, my cameras, and my paper cutters, which are ALWAYS in the way of something.  Essentially, I want to take the surface of my desk right now and make it vertical.

BUT, I'm me, and I can't simply hang up a peg board, now, can I?  Nooooooooooooo.  I have to make it look pretty.  So, I'm going to paint it and put a frame on it, then buy cutesy filing stuff, and, lucky you (not really), I'm gonna share how I did it!

I know I said I was going to be better with posting more often

Progress Report:

Hello, everyone.  When I first started this blog, I was adamant about many different goals.  The first of which was to post something in The Eventless Planner blog once a month.  After the first post in October, I failed to post for the month of November already.  ALREADY!  Well, if at first you don't succeed...and all that jazz.  I've completed another post for December just in the nick of time!  Here's the link:  Backpacking at Pt. Reyes, Day 1

As for my other goals, I've actually made good progress on some of them.  I did fail to meet the deadline, though...  But I'm still proud of myself.

Goal #2:  Finish MIL's throw by Xmas.  Did not happen, but you know what?  It will be finished by the end of this week (post coming soon).

Goal #4:  I'm legally married.  Yay!  My maid of honor actually "did the honors," which was really special.  Completed.

Goal #5:  Finish thank you cards.  I've completed them, but I can't write off this goal yet because I've only distributed about 50% of the remaining.  I'll keep you posted.  =P

Goal #6:  Finish my mother's scarf.  I've restarted this project and have a better pattern.  So far, probably 10% done.  Still didn't make deadline of Xmas...boo...  New deadline:  Before I leave for Chicago in a week.  Wish me luck!

Goal #8:  Steamer Trunk Bar.  As you can see from a previous post, I've made some progress with it, but I will still keep the status at 5% completed.  No deadline has been set, though, thank goodness.

Goal #10:  Origami flower ball thingy:  I've made more progress at work.  I'd say I'm about 33% completed.  Again, no deadline.  I'd brought the origami paper home, thinking I'd have time to work on it, but this year's celebrations were a lot more busy than I expected.  Hence, lack of success with my Xmas deadlines, and I didn't even touch this project.  EEKS!

Goals #3 and #7:  Didn't even touch.  =(

Goal #9:  Embroidery hoop earring holder.  COMPLETED!

This goal was inspired by a Pinterest pin that I found.  It involves an embroidery hoop, cross stich fabric, and paint.  =P  It sounded simple--and it was--but I still ended up taking longer than expected to complete it (~3 hrs).

The Materials:  Newspaper, 14 count cross stitch fabric (I used Aida Stardust 15" x 18" Gold Dust fabric), black acrylic paint, a paintbrush, and an embroidery hoop.  Not pictured is Terrifically Tacky Tape.