Still Not Over the Holidays? Design Your Own Sweater!

I just found a funny website where you can "knit" your very own over-the-top holiday sweater! Check it out here.

My Crafty Family

My brother-by-another-brother Matt (see here for an explanation) gave me some awfully crafty Christmas presents. I'm so impressed with his ability to get me gifts that I genuinely like and want. I'm especially enamored with the book shown above, Knitting for Peace. Now I've just got to figure out which of the projects to knit first, and when. I guess I can use my new knitting calendar (see below) to work out a schedule.

Sisterly Love

My sister Sarah knitted me this amazing felted bag as a Christmas present. I'd known she was making it (we knit together so it would've been hard for her to hide it from me) but I thought it was a present for my mom. Sarah used a lot of her excess yarn to make this bag, including some bits and pieces she got at a yarn swap at Karma Knitting. That makes me love it all the more. And the fact that it perfectly fits my stuffed Totoro is another endearing feature, of course.

Uncle Tom: Getting Into the Crafty Holiday Spirit

My Uncle Tom was a true craft buff this holiday. Not only did he participate in our annual Christmas ornament crafting extravaganza this year (see photo below of my brother Adam, cousin Alex, cousin Mariah, mother-in-law Barbara and me painting wooden ornaments on Christmas day), he also brought his own craft (a wreath he decorated with little Christmas figures) to my parents' house. And yes, he is mocking my Craft Buff profile picture in the photo shown above! But really, with his skills and enthusiasm, don't you think Uncle Tom should start his own craft blog?





Oh, and one other thing: in the group photo above, my cousin Mariah is painting glitter on a gift she asked for (and received for) Christmas- pepper spray. As she was leaving the house that evening, my dad said to her, "Oh, Mariah, did you decorate that thing you're holding? Is it an ornament?" She very sweetly replied, "No, that's my pepper spray. I decorated it with glitter paint." My dad quickly backed away.

Happy Knitmas...

Every year my knitting group holds an annual get-together at knitter extraordinaire Stacey's house in Alden, NY. She decorates her old Victorian beautifully for Christmas, and it's the perfect place to have a glass of wine (or a peppermint martini) and hold a knitting-related gift swap. We do a "dirty Santa" exchange, where everyone draws a number and each person can choose between a gift that's already been opened by someone else or a fresh, unopened gift from under the tree. I was the happy recipient of a really cool yarn winder from Rhinebeck, and then the sad loser of that same product when someone else mercilessly swiped it from me. But it all turned out okay in the end, when I opened the lovely and useful book Super Stitches Knitting by Karen Hemingway.

Holiday Posts, Delayed

The past 10 days have been a whirlwind of activity here, hence my long blogging silence. I have a backlog of photos and information to post, which I'll get to sometime today or tomorrow. For the moment, however, I'd like to share an awesomely cute photo of Isobel and Ophelia with one of the blankets I helped their mom Becky to create.

Beaded Santa Earrings

A woman on my block makes these cute Santa earrings. I bought a pair ($15) for my mother-in-law, who is currently traveling from San Francisco to Buffalo and therefore will not, I hope, read my blog before Christmas! I don't want to spoil the surprise, but I wanted to feature these because they're just so darn cute.

My neighbor is thinking about getting a small business started and I'm eager to support her effort. If any of you are interested in purchasing a pair of earrings like these- a great gift for any Christmas lovers in your family- please contact me and I will arrange to have them shipped to you. It's a little late for this year, but you could always buy some and save them for next Christmas.

Zippers Galore

Here's a little gift I made for yet another anonymous (because she hasn't received it yet) friend. It's a zipper coin pouch- made from 8 small zippers, which I purchased a while back at the East Bay Depot for Creative Reuse, one of my favorite places in the world (this is probably another one, if I ever get there to visit). Talk about imagined treasure- EBDCR takes the cake.

But I digress... I intentionally stitched this with a bright yellow thread and wanted it to look handmade so I made the stitches big and visible. There's no official opening to this little bag- all eight of the zippers function. Cool, no?

Holiday Dogs

Today's craft adventures included making two jaunty little scarves for pooches I know. One was a gift for my adviser's dog, Toby, and the other for my dog-nephew and downstairs tenant, Ebenezer. These scarves were super quick to whip up- I just cut 2 big squares out of holiday fabric (snowmen on one side, stars on the other), cut a diagonal line to create 4 triangles, and then sewed 2 triangles together (snowmen and stars back-to-back). I cut in a buttonhole in order to slip one end of the scarf into the other to secure it and called it a day. Oh, and I also added a piece of elastic to the end of Toby's, in case it didn't fit him (it's hard to recall a dog's neck size from memory...) Both dogs looked super cute in their new accessories, but I've only got photos of Ebenezer (aka Eb, Eben, Beezer, Pretzel Man and/or Love Love, depending on who's talking to him!)

Wigilia

Every year we celebrate a Polish tradition on Christmas Eve, called Wigilia. For the last couple of years, I've hosted the Wigilia at our house. On Saturday I attended a cooking class at the Broadway Market that reviewed some of the traditional dishes prepared for the holiday. One tip I learned from the presenter is that tub butter can be softened, molded into decorative silicone baking containers such as the dinosaur ones pictured below, refrigerated to set, and then easily removed from the mold and used to decorate the holiday table. An easy way to get crafty with your butter at Wigilia or any other celebration!

Shh! It's a Surprise!

The trouble with making lots of gifts at the holidays and having a blog that features my ongoing craft adventures is that I can't post about what I'm making without fear of being found out by my loved ones. So here is a little tidbit-- I can't reveal what I'm knitting, or for whom I'm knitting it, but viola! Something for someone. Let's just say that it involved lots and lots of yarn and size 19 needles, so the going was quick. I'll post the item in all its glory after December 26th.

Scoring at the Salvation Army

The other day I went to the Salvation Army with my sister. Since she recently purchased a home, Sarah is on the lookout for furniture treasures. Although we didn't find any gems of the furniture variety, I did find 4 really cool Christmas items. My favorite is the crocheted granny square Christmas stocking pictured above. This is a really simple project if you know how to make granny squares- it's just 16 granny squares sewn together. I actually found a tutorial for this online and am including it at the bottom of this post. Someone's hard work cost me a measly 49 cents.



I also found this flat Santa door decoration for a whopping 99 cents. I think this is probably from the 1960s- can anyone out there date it?



Yippee! I'm so excited- a Makit and Bakit ornament kit! This was originally $1.29 (the price tag is still visible) but I bought it for 49 cents. According to the package, this item was produced in 1978, which is approximately the last time I made a Makit and Bakit kit.



My new Santa holiday mail bag was also 49 cents. He seems to be from the same era as the Santa door decoration, and was made in Japan. He already has some holiday mail in his belly.

*****
Tutorial:

Granny Square Christmas Stocking

By Pat Smith ©2000

Materials:

4 oz. each color red, white and green. (Will make several)

Crochet hook Size G

Yarn needle

Make 16 red, white and green granny squares.

Rnd 1) Starting with white ch 4 join with slip stitch to form ring. Ch 3, 2 dc in ring. *Ch3, 3 dc in ring.*

Repeat from *to* twice. Ch 3 and join with a slip stitch to beginning ch 3. Fasten off.

Rnd 2) Attach red in any corner ch 3 space. Ch 3, 2 dc in space, ch 3, 3 dc in space. Ch 1. *3 dc, ch 3,

3dc in next space, ch1.* Repeat from *to* twice. Slip stitch to beginning ch 3 and fasten off.

Rnd 3) Attach green in any corner ch 3 space. Ch 3, 2 dc in space, ch 3, 3 dc in space. Ch 1. *3 dc in next

ch 1 space, ch 1, 3 dc in next corner space, ch 3, 3 dc in same corner, ch 1.* Repeat from *to* twice. Slip

stitch in beginning ch 3 space and fasten off.

Rnd 4) Attach white in any corner ch 3 space. Ch 3, 2 dc in space, ch 3, 3 dc in space. Ch 1. *3 dc in next

ch 1 space, ch 1, 3 dc in next ch1 space, ch 1, (3 dc, ch 3, 3 dc) in next corner space.* Repeat

from *to* twice. Attach with a slip stitch to beginning ch 3 and fasten off.

After you have all 16 squares made, you sew them together with white yarn. See diagram.

Poinsettia News

I'm getting into the holiday spirit these days. Here's my latest craft project. This poinsettia wreath is a Martha Stewart kit- I used my 40% off coupon, yippee! There were a few leftover crepe paper flowers when I finished. Not sure what I'll do with them, but I'm sure I'll find some use.

I bought this kit because I love poinsettias, but was under the somewhat mistaken impression that they're toxic to cats and I should not have them in my house. In reading online, I find contrary opinions on this topic (see here and here and here). I probably won't buy a real one, even if the evidence on their toxicity is contradictory, so I'm quite pleased with my wreath.

Squirrel Zombies & Sleigh Bells

When my siblings and I were little, my mom made us ornate Christmas stockings from those kits that always catch my eye at the craft store. They're more traditional than my usual crafting fare, but when my husband and I spent our first Christmas together (after being together 6+ years-- the long-term impact of what began as a bicoastal relationship) in 2006, I knew he had to have one too. My nod to his love of the macabre can be found if you look closely at the squirrel. It has red fangs.