Look at this beautiful Granny Squre afghan I found at Goodwill on Friday! It's awesome. I can't beleive someone gave it away. Kind of sad really that someone spent so much time on it and then no one in their family wanted it. Oh well - it has found a good home now. I will pretend that my grandmother made it. I do have a granny afghan that my grandmother Thelma made so it fits in.
via lifehacker.com
Lifehacker has an interesting set of instructions for making a lamp shade out of yarn. Basically you blow up a balloon, coat it with vasoline, then wrap yarn soaked in white glue around it.
When it dries you pop the balloon (popping things without worrying about any acne scars removal) and wham you have a funky retro lampshade.
I happen to have a scad load of yarn so this piqued my interest. Not sure I would actually make it but its an interesting idea. I bet you could go in some other sculptural directions with this as well...
Like perhaps you could use different shaped balloons and get some sort of vase shape.
via lifehacker.com
Check out this really cool article on Lifehacker on how to make a moss terrarium. This is for sure on my To Do list. I love moss. About 5 years ago I visited a friend's parents cabin up in the North Georgia mountains and while I was walking around up on their trail I took a piece of moss. When I got home I placed it next to my front steps and now I have tons of it growing. I like the idea of the zen simplicity of moss and a rock in a small glass bowl. This would be great on my desk at work. Ok, not next to the rackmount equipment or anything, but just to add a bit of green to the area.
I was reading the new issue of Knitty magazine and they had a review of a small portable wood weaving loom. I've always been fascinated by weaving and I know my niece Lydia is too. This intrigued me when the reviewer talked about the kids being really into using the loom.
This might be a good Hanukkah gift for my nieces, eh? Here is the manufacturer's page - schachtspindle.com
Cricket Loom
Schacht Spindle Company
$135
11" x 18" x 6"
weaving width: 10”
Here's some quotes from the review in Knitty:
The first thing that struck me when I unpacked my Cricket was the quality of the materials. It’s wood, not pressboard or plastic. It comes with everything you need to weave your first project: two stick shuttles, a warping peg, threading hook, two table clamps, and 8-dent rigid heddle reed and two balls of yarn. The tools included, again wood, are suitable in size for both children and adults – no mini threading hooks or shuttles...
Once I got to the party and demonstrated the basics, the loom was swept
away by a group of kids ages 4-10. I only heard from them when the
sharing wasn’t happening. In true post millennium fashion, the kids
traded off between the Cricket and a Wii.
About once a year I get a "craft bug" and decide to try a new type of project. About 3 years ago it was knitting (again) but I never finished the scarf I was making. Truth is I am a terrible knitter. I am adding stitched, dropping stitches, some are big, some are small....its a mess.
So this year I heard about the knifty knitter, a knitting loom and decided to give it a try. In the course of the weekend I made a hat! Here is Adam modeling the hat for us. This was made with a Bernat cotton 4 ply yarn.
