Craft

Getting Crafty - Techno-Style

Here's a cool site I found while I was surfing the web while trying to figure out what to do with this stash of vintage alarm clocks that I have:

Make

"MAKE: Technology on Your Time, published by O'Reilly Media. MAKE is a quarterly publication from O'Reilly for those who just can't stop tinkering, disassembling, re-creating, and inventing cool new uses for the technology in our lives. It's the first do-it-yourself magazine dedicated to the incorrigible and chronically incurable technology enthusiast in all of us. MAKE celebrates your right to tweak, hack, and bend technology any way you want."

This site rocks! Some of the projects include transforming a can of Play-doh into a radio, making an amp out of an empty tin of Altoids, and a DIY skating robot. Man... now technology is even better! There are a ton of cool projects happening at the Makezine Blog. (These peeps also do Craftzine, which is also cool and not so tech-y.)

My fellow craftsters might want to try this project: Suitcase bags made from Vintage Men's Suits. Post pictures of your projects!

I'm still trying to figure out what to do with the alarm clocks, but now I have a use for all those empty Altoids cans. Hmm...

Crafty Duct Tape

Duct tape rocks, doesn't it?

The Duct Tape Guys tell you how to make a wallet, rose, and munchie holder as well as how to rig your car to shoot an action movie. I mean, if you were wondering...

Maybe you already have a duct tape wallet? In that case, how about an Ipod holder?

Maybe you'd rather make a Marvin the Martian costume? Your call.

A regular wallet isn't good enough for you? Here's a really detailed tri-fold wallet pattern.

Do you need a Dress Maker's Dummy? Pretty cool if you can sew! (Wanna teach me?)

Come to CRAFT club tomorrow night and make your own wallet!

Meeting: A408 @ 8:30 PM

Upcoming Meetings

Our next meeting will be Thursday, February 23rd in A408. We'll be creating Inspiration Boxes out of mini craft boxes, modge podge, paint, magazine clippings, and whatever else you can think of! Bring old magazines, modge podge (if you have any - we have some), and knick knacks that you might like to glue onto a box. I have enough boxes for the first fifteen craftsters.

After that, we'll have a meeting Tuesday, February 28th at 8:30, room to be announced. We don't have a set craft yet, so if you have an idea, leave a comment! We may have some visitors at our meeting tonight; I'll let you know!

On Thursday, March 2nd from 4:30 - 6:30 PM, we'll be having a paper-making workshop with Cindy Ferrari from the CAPS program. If you want to come and learn how to make paper with Cindy, we're meeting in the Canevin sub-basement (under the wooden stairs) near the 3-D Design Studio. We only have space for a limited number of people so please let me know if you are planning to attend!

We'll be discussing our upcoming crafty field trip at our planning meeting the week after Spring Break.

RCK #2 - Crafty Valentines

Last week, the CRAFT club distributed our second Random Craft of Kindness to 100 SHU students, faculty, and staff. Our goal was to brighten your day! We were thrilled to see people around campus wearing the pins we created and hope the magnets are decorating your offices or dorm rooms. If you missed out this time, don't worry - we'll be doing another RCK soon!

RCK in progress - Valentine's Day 2006

CRAFT club meeting announcement

The first CRAFT club planning meeting of this semester will be Wednesday, February 1st at 2:00 PM in A 408. Can't wait to see everyone there! Tell you friends!

If you can't make it and still want to be involved, just let me know!

More Crochet Madness! Ole!

What do you do when your friend tells you she's getting married, um, tomorrow? You make this:

I copied a design in Stitch N Bitch Nation to make this ear warmer:

A Christmas pressie for my sister's cute evil kitten Icarus:

I made this with the pretty yarn Lauren gave me for my birthday:

This is the first hat I crocheted:

But surely not the last...

(This was also *inspired* by SnB Nation.)

Knit-tastrophe

I talked about it, wore it, and got to show it to just a few other CRAFTers... and I blogged about this on my blog, but figured that I should put it on here, too.

I finally knitted something for myself! My very own hat...

Knitting is a great hobby. Except when you screw something up and have to rip the thing apart because a drastic error that you can't fix has turned your latest creation into a twisted mess. Yeah, that happened today. I was making a hat--90 stitches around--and I was nearly finished with it. But there was a problem: the brim was twisted, which twisted the whole hat making it impossible for me to even think about completing it because, literally, I could not finish the twisted hat. I tore out more than 10,000 stitches and more than a week's worth of work without crying. That's a first.

Enough with failures: here's a success!

Since I haven't ever kept ANYTHING that I've knitted since learning how to knit just over a year ago, I made a hat for myself. It's a great hat, and every time someone says something about it and I tell them that I made it they're uber impressed :-)

I did use a pattern on this one, and it's from the Stitch 'n Bitch Nation book (the Bzzz Queen Bee hat pattern). It's a simple pattern, though I wish I had done it on some circular needles so I wouldn't have a seam... but that's how the hat I mentioned earlier this blog went wrong. I'll figure it out someday. Just not today. Not after ripping out a whole hat. Sheesh.

Anyway, here's my hat!

And I also (obviously) had a great time making the alligator :-) Thanks for all the sweet comments!

Knit-o-gator

I made this for someone special and, well, I just have to blog about it because it's so darned cute! I'm pretty proud of it, too. I made it without a pattern... I actually just sort of made it up as I went :-) It took a long time, and I knitted a couple pieces individually and then sewed them together, but it's a masterpiece of alligator, if I do say so myself.

(And before anyone asks: no, he does not have any feet. It's supposed to be that way.)

Click below for more photos... They're super adorable!

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Crochet? Ole!

You know how I said was going loopy for crochet? Here are pictures of the projects I have created, um, this weekend due to my rekindled addiction to yarn:

This earflap hat is for my brother. He's always had a penchant for crazy headgear:

For my sister, a pretty striped scarf with a flower hat to match:

Mom gets this purple striped scarf:

And a pair of these, if I finish 'em by Christmas:

Loopy for Crochet

Okay, I'm admit it. I may have a bit of a "problem". Every since I learned how to crochet, I've gone a bit loopy... I'm off the hook... I'm running out of crochet-themed puns! Seriously though... these years I've been missing out. Crocheting is the bizzy bomb! I've made one and a half scarves (I'm finish #2 tonight) and two hats so far. I'm out of hand... and LOVING it! At a party the other night, I learned how to make a granny square... yay!

Anyway, I've come across some rockin' patterns I'd like to share:

Yarncat's Flapper Hats

Yarncat has some FABULOUS flapper-style hats that are totally cute and so easy that even I, a newbie crochet artiste, can figure 'em out.

Cape & Flowered Cloche

Lionbrand's Cape is cute, but what I really dig is the crocheted flower on the side of the hat.

Cute Flower Hat

Another Lionbrand gorgeous creation! I haven't quite figured out how to follow the directions but you more experienced crochet artists might enjoy it.

Community Quilt

Just so you know: collection boxes for the quilt "squares," 7 x 9 inch segments of knitted or crocheted fiber, are in the following locations:

1st floor Admin elevator
5th floor Admin outside 502 (Writing Center)
basement Canevin by Maureen Vissat's office

or you can use campus mail to box 126B.

Remember: our goal is 100 squares by the end of January! Get knitty, CRAFTsters! ;c)

Random Craft of Kindness #001

Greetings! If you are visiting this site because of a recent fun note in your inbox, welcome to CRAFT! In an effort to inspire the world around us to smile, the CRAFT club recently sent out a the last of our beautiful friendship bracelets to 43 random folks around campus. We hope our small contribution to the world made you smile. If you weren't the "victim" of a RCK (Random Craft of Kindness), near fear: there's always next semester! ;c)

Go, Go Yarn

"I'm not sure if I can get behind the knitted boot recently featured on Knitty Gritty. I completely applaud the designer for her daring, and I think it's totally clever. Cute, even. But I could never wear them. And neither could you, probably. If you're NOT a knitter, you might get away with it. You know?

Fashion-forward, cutting edge. But a Knitter wearing them? Every friend and family member would know that you'd finally gone right around the bend, and you'd never live it down. It's only a small step from that to making knitted chaps, and that's just not okay."

Yarn-A-Go-Go

Postcards from the Edge

I'll bet those poor bored postal workers love this community craft project:

PostSecret

Procrastination Project #001 - The Hipster PDA

I'm totally going to make this over winter break! ;c)

Hipster PDA

The Hipster PDA (Parietal Disgorgement Aid) is a fully extensible system for coordinating incoming and outgoing data for any aspect of your life and work. It scales brilliantly, degrades gracefully, supports optional categories and �beaming,� and is configurable to an unlimited number of options. Best of all, the Hipster PDA fits into your hip pocket and costs practically nothing to purchase and maintain. Let�s make one together.