Pressing Pause on #Crafting365

My crafty mojo seems to have vanished!

After lots of busy, happy, crafty days of my #Crafting365 project I've found myself beset by a case of the winter "ughs", wanting to just curl up under a blanket in the evenings instead of flexing my creative muscles.

I did a bit of blanket square knitting on day 74, finishing the bright squares for my rainbow blanket and starting the blue yarn...

... and on day 75 I stitched a few flowers onto my floral cushion:

I was poorly on days 76 & 77, and only managed to knit these few rows. Not much, but better than nothing, right?

On day 78 I knitted some more blue squares and took some photos to celebrate the rainbow loveliness of all those colours together.

 

 

Then all I did for the next five days (days 79 to 83) was knit more blue blanket squares!  

(Including one which, rather annoyingly, I had to unravel and re-knit as the yarn had a small flaw which I'd not noticed while knitting squares in the gloomy evenings)

Again, this was better than nothing, and I was excited about moving towards finishing my rainbow blanket one square at a time...  but: ugh. After many days of having no urge to make stuff other than knit simple blanket squares, I was beginning to really want that creative spark back again!

I gave myself a week off from my 365 project, but a week after that all I'd done was knit yet more blanket squares in the evenings (mini ones this time for my scrap yarn blanket).

With almost three weeks without taking a daily crafty photo, I think I have to admit to having paused my #Crafting365 project. This is kind of embarrassing! But hopefully it will only be temporary.

I'm pressing pause for the moment and will (fingers crossed) re-start my daily making and photographing challenge sometime in the New Year. Taking a break mid-way through the year may seem antithetical to the idea of a year-of-daily-crafting project... but I think it's actually in keeping with the spirit of the project.

I set myself the #Crafting365 challenge to help kickstart my creativity and lately the small amount of crafting I've been doing has not been at all creative. The point of #Crafting365 isn't to force yourself into doing some crafting every day for a year simply for the sake of it, it's to encourage and spark creativity and at the moment that's just not happening! Much better to take a break, then re-start the project when I can actually do it properly.

In the meantime I'll still be making stuff and working on work and personal projects (of course!), just at my own pace until it feels like the right time to re-start #Crafting365.

#Crafting365 Days 56-73: Juggling Lots of WIPs + Trying New Things

It's been a busy couple of weeks, with lots of crafty goodness along the way!

On day 56 of my #Crafting365 challenge, I finished stitching the final few squares of the Christmas quilt I'm making for my sister. There's still lots of sewing to do before this is an actual quilt, but it's great to have the patchwork finished after all those hours of hand stitching.

When I tried to take photos of the finished quilt top, our little old lady cat demanded that I pay attention to her instead of this weird thing on the floor so most of my photos turned out like this:

On day 57 I did some relaxing knitting in the evening, and soaked up some creative inspiration from UPPERCASE magazine. UPPERCASE is always awesome but I'm especially loving this colour-themed issue.

I did some more knitting on day 58 and (with rainbows on the brain) I sorted through my stash of squares and planned out the colour order for my rainbow blanket.

Don't all those bright colours look delicious together?

Day 59 involved more knitting, although with slightly less colourful yarn than the stuff I'm using to knit my rainbow squares!

This is a much neglected project with a woodland animal theme. I've got lots of hours to put in on this if I'm going to meet my planned deadline of Christmas (and it's nearly the end of November already, eek!)

On day 60 I went to Renegade and spent several hours oohing over all the awesome wares for sale and doing a bit of shopping. In the afternoon, I visited the Foundling Museum to see their current (excellent and very moving) exhibition, The Fallen Woman. While enjoying a cuppa and a very tasty brownie in the museum cafe, I doodled a whole bunch of new project ideas on a napkin.

I love visiting exhibitions, etc, on my Nice Days Out but I also love the time to think that a day out on your own away from work and deadlines gives you. I often find myself scribbling down new ideas in cafes or on my train journey home after a busy day of going new places and seeing new things.

(Psst - that awesome crafty tattoo is a fun temporary one from Floss & Mischief)

I was feeling a bit under the weather for days 61-64 so I just ended up doing lots and lots of simple knitting while curled up watching TV. Not very exciting crafting, but better than nothing and look at all the squares I finished!

On day 65 I decided I'd had enough of all this sleepy knitting and had a Making Day - minimising my screen time to focus on Actually Making Stuff.

One of my projects for the day was to finally cut out some more felt flowers for my in-progress cushion project. I ran out of flowers back in September and the project has been on pause ever since. It was nice to get back to working with all this colour!

I started adding the new flowers to the cushion on day 66 - pinning and tacking them in position ready to sew later. Finding the best place for each shape is a bit like doing a felt-y jigsaw puzzle!

The next evening (day 67) I did some knitting and some relaxing colouring in while we watched TV. This is a fun Evolution-themed colouring book which I was sent to review - well, you can't review a colouring book without actually colouring it, right?

On day 68 I revisited a project that has been sitting half-finished in my "in progress" box for years: felt bird ornaments from a vintage craft kit I bought way back in 2011. I am so terrible at finishing my personal projects!   

Fingers crossed I can finally get all the birds finished in time to display them this Christmas!

Day 69 involved yet more blanket squares. That yellow is growing on me more and more with each square I knit.

 

Then on days 70 and 72 I tried something a bit different from my usual makes.

I've done a few projects for docrafts Creativity magazine of the past couple of years and the magazine always comes with a crafty cover gift (or three!). I thought it was high time I used them to make stuff.

First up: card making with decoupage kits and coordinating papers from the Forever Friends range (very cute!).

The next day I put together some more card toppers - foiled Christmas designs, cute kittens and vintage-y florals. I don't have any of the proper mounts/dots you're supposed to use to stick the layers together, so I got creative and used double sided sticky tape and little pieces of white felt to create the 3D effect :)

I've never made any kits like this before and I don't often work with patterns and pictures, so dipping my toes into this kind of card making is proving to be a really fun creative challenge.

I was back to my regular crafting on day 72, doing lots of sewing with a kitty keeping me company!

Those Christmas pudding ornaments are based on one of the earliest tutorials I shared on my blog. I cut the pieces out last year planning (I think) on making a few different versions of the pudding ornaments to show how you could vary the pattern. Sadly I failed to write down what I'd planned to make and I've since forgotten! Oops. So, instead, I'm just stitching up the ornaments and I'll be adding them to my sample sale sometime soon.

Then yesterday (day 73) I worked on a whole bunch of different crafty things.

I almost finished the vintage bird ornaments (I need to buy some ribbon before I can actually finish them but at least they look like birds now!)... I finished the Christmas puddings... I put together some charming Gorjuss decoupage kits (more Creativity freebies) ... and I used some colourful crepe paper samples to make some stripy cards.

Right, time to stop blogging and to go do some more making...

#Crafting365 Days 49-55: Autumn Colour & Lots of Glitter

The past week or so of my #Crafting365 project has mostly involved snatching small bits of creative, crafty time between work tasks and other things on my To Do list. I'm half sad that I've just been crafting in these little snippets, and half happy that my #Crafting365 challenge made me focus and actually use that time to make stuff instead of just letting it slip away.

I must try and schedule some proper making days this month!

On day 49 I used the felt leaves I'd cut out the day before to make an autumnal branch. I'm not 100% sure this works (it maybe looks like the branch is on fire??) but I quite like it, and it was a very fun make. Three of these displayed in a vase would look awesome!

I'd actually painted this branch aaaaages ago - I painted a few twigs when working on this bird mobile, as featured in docrafts Creativity magazine, then chose my favourites to use as the base for the mobile. It seemed a shame to just throw away the leftover branch, so I kept it... waiting for just the right project to come along.

If you want to make your own autumnal branch, it's very easy. Collect a fallen branch/twig and (if needed) let it dry. Paint it white (I used two coats of white acrylic paint from docrafts' Artiste range). Cut out a selection of leaves in autumnal colours - I used felt but you could use coloured paper or card instead. Then when the paint has completely dried, use a glue gun to attach the leaves to the branch.

Day 50 was a very busy deadline day, so I just did some a bit of colouring in to help me relax and wind down in the evening. Have you caught the colouring in bug yet? I am well and truly hooked, and delighted that there are so many great "adult" colouring books to choose from these days.

Day 52 involved lots of glitter! I needed sparkly silver baubles but couldn't find them in the size I wanted, so I used some glue and lots and lots of glitter to turn plain white baubles into super sparkly ones. Messy but lots of fun!

I also did some more simple knitting in the evening, which was also my craft of choice the evening of day 52. Knitting these simple garter stitch squares is such a great way to switch off my brain after a hectic day of rushing around ticking things off To Do lists.

I couldn't resist taking a snap of my knitting with some leaves in the background. Such yummy autumn colours!

The knitting continued on day 53...

I finished the orange squares and started knitting with the next colour: yellow. My mum was slightly concerned that I had started a crazily bright orange blanket (she is not a fan of orange) but I explained that these squares are just for the orange and yellow section of my happy rainbow blanket. With just a few colours still to add, I am getting quite excited about seeing this blanket come together!

The next day (Saturday) was supposed to be day 54 of my #Crafting365 project, but I took a Nice Day Out and went to Bath and spent a long and lovely day exploring the city, visiting lots of museums and exhibitions and generally enjoying the glorious autumn sunshine... then when I got home I just crashed on the sofa and forgot to do any crafting! Oops.

One of the exhibitions I visited - Nahoki Kojima's amazing Honey Bee paper cut sculpture, at the Holburne Museum - was kind of crafty? But that really doesn't count, does it?

So, instead, I am counting Sunday's craftiness as day 54. I've skipped two days of this daily project in about 50 days, which isn't too bad, right??

On Sunday I took a break from all that knitting and added the final rows of squares to my Christmas Quilt (I'm making this as a gift for my sister - you can read all about it here). 

I'd hoped to get them all stitched by the end of the evening, but with a few inches left to sew I started getting tired and thought I'd better put the project down before I stitched the wrong thing or stabbed myself with a needle! Just a few more stitches then I can start on the actual quilting! (exciting!! scary!!!)

Then I was back on my knitting obsession on day 55, but not loving knitting with the yellow yarn as much as the orange. So, I decided to mix things up a bit and alternate between knitting squares in three of the remaining colours: green, pink and yellow. These shades look so great together - so bright and zingy, like yummy boiled sweets (hard candies).

P.S. Here's a bonus photo from last week: a smart-looking pencil I was using in some step-by-step tutorial photos, with the actual (short, scruffy) pencil I'd actually used to make the project :)

#Crafting365 Days 36-48: The Joys of Embroidery, and of Orange

Time for another #Crafting365 catch up! Time flies when you're having lots of crafty fun...

On day 36, I cut my hair. I'm not sure if DIY haircuts really count as a creative task, but I am counting this one anyway! A bit messy, but not too bad and my hair has been looooooong for ages, it's a nice change to have it shorter again.

Day 37 was all about embroidery. You know that feeling when all of a sudden you just have to work on a particular project RIGHT NOW? I just could not resist the urge to work on some embroidery... so I sketched a whole bunch of new patterns and started stitching up this one which has been on my To Stitch list for, like, ever.

On day 38 I dug some pretty fabric out of my stash to plan something new. I adore these colours together.

The embroidery obsession continued on day 39. I thought I didn't have the right sized hoop to stitch up the patterns I'd sketched earlier (I think I used to own the size I needed but used the hoop to make a mobile? and then forgot to buy a new hoop to replace the one I'd cannibalized for my project? That seems like something I would do, anyway) ... but it turned out I had a bigger hoop that worked okay, hurrah hurrah.

On day 40 I started a new shade of yarn for my happy rainbow blanket: a lovely zingy orange. I am loving orange at the moment, and was actually wearing my orange cardigan (pictured at the top of the post) while knitting these squares :)

The orange-square-knitting continued slowly over the next few days, but I squeezed in some other crafty things too. I spent the afternoon of day 41 sticking lots of things into my "things that are too beautiful or interesting to throw away" scrapbooks. It's been such an age since I've added to my scrapbooks, I used up a whole glue stick adding all the new clippings!

Then on day 42 I was doing some filing and rediscovered a vintage pattern that had been "lost" for ages (because I'd put it in my filing pile along with accounts paperwork, etc, instead of a place where you'd think to look for an embroidery pattern - oops!). I'm delighted to have found this again and am really looking forward to stitching it. The pattern is designed for tapestry wools, but I'm probably just going to stitch it up with standard embroidery thread/floss. I'm also quite tempted to adapt the pattern to make a felt applique of some kind? Decisions, decisions.

By day 43, I was building up a nice pile of the orange blanket squares...

... and was finishing up the orange yarn on day 44. I'm knitting large garter stitch squares from each ball of yarn, and using the leftovers to knit mini moss stitch squares for my random patchwork blanket. Sticking with my orange obsession, my next chosen colour = a bright satsuma orange. So cheerful!

Day 45 saw more blanket square knitting, and more embroidery. My handwriting can be a little illegible at times, even when I write "neatly". My mum thought this pattern said "Poe the PEST..." and, well, she has a point, doesn't she? (It actually reads Be the BEST version of YOU). Terrible handwriting aside, I do love stitching handwritten text - though it does involve lots of teeny stitches to get round all those curves.

I finished my trio of embroidered designs on day 46 (I'll blog about the finished pieces soon, I promise!). The fabric I'm stitching on is so pale, I've taken care to keep the back of my work neat and to not carry any threads between sections.

 

I was feeling a bit sleepy on day 47 so I opted for something super simple: adding some more blocks of stitching to my scrappy cross stitch project.

When I do some cross stitch or embroidery and end up with a bit of thread/floss left over that's too short to really be worth keeping but long enough that it could be used to stitch a few stitches, I set it aside. Then when I've collected a few threads I use them to add some more blocks of colour to my patchwork project. I am so pleased with how this is turning out, and I adore how it's growing organically over time depending on the other makes I've been working on and what threads happened to be left over.

Then yesterday (day 48) I was gripped by the sudden urge to make something leafy and autumnal, so I grabbed some felt and got snipping! Fingers crossed this turns out how I'm picturing it in my head...

#Crafting365 Days 24-35: A Knitting Obsession and a Needy Kitty

I don't know about you guys, but I find that the arrival of autumn always re-ignites my love for knitting. I've been knitting blanket squares like craaaaaazy over these past couple of weeks! My knitting has been making regular appearances in my daily #Crafting365 photos, but even when there's been no yarn in the pics there's been some knitting happening behind the scenes...

On day 24, I did some knitting and cut out my festive embroideries, ready to turn them into felt ornaments (you'll find the free patterns for these designs here). I used tracing paper to make the circle template - the semi-transparent paper makes it easy to perfectly position the template to frame the motif.

On day 25, I did some work on my Christmas quilt... and did some more knitting.

By day 26, my pile of re-knitted blanket squares was thirteen squares high, and still growing...

... and I (entirely predictably) did a bit more knitting on day 27. I also did some "cutting and sticking", making a few "thanks for your order!" cards to send out with my shop orders. These photos are of some of the gorgeous vintage scissors and sewing threads I inherited from my grandmother.

The next few days were very hectic, as I had a looming deadline. I did a small amount of knitting on day 28 (I'd not noticed how bent that knitting needle is until I took that photo!) ...

... did a little bit of work on some candy corn -themed tutorials on day 29...

... then met my deadline on day 30 (yay!) and collapsed in a bit of a heap on the sofa as I'd come down with a horrid cold (boo!). I spent most of the rest of the day curled up under a blanket with the cats keeping me company (our cats are very pro-blanket, especially blankets with a person underneath them) feeling a bit sorry for myself but very glad I'd managed to meet my deadline.

I tried to do some knitting in the evening but only managed to focus long enough to knit these few stitches. Better than nothing though, right?

The blanket-y theme continued on day 31 as I did some more blanket-square knitting and started sewing together some mini squares to add to my patchwork blanket. I'm sewing the squares together in blocks of one colour then slotting the shapes into the blanket, creating a Tetris-like pattern. 

On day 32 my #Crafting365 projects had to fight with our little old lady cat for attention! She is being super needy at the moment and loudly demanding lots and lots of cuddles. I tried to ignore her while sewing some more shapes onto this cushion but she was very determined and just jumped straight up onto my lap and sat on the felt. Luckily there weren't any pins in it at the time, and she didn't do any damage to the project with her sharp claws!

 

Our old lady kitty was still insisting on lots of loooooong cuddles on day 33, so I switched to a smaller project that I could stitch with a cat curled up on my lap: finishing the embroidered felt baubles. I'll have a tutorial for making these up on my blog sometime soon!

I let #Crafting365 take over my schedule on day 34 for a hugely enjoyable day of making and crafty brainstorming. It was wonderful! I worked on a whole bunch of different projects, including my geometric cushion which is now almost finished (yay!). 

Then my knitting obsession returned full force on day 35 with yet more blanket-square knitting and lots of happy hours spent working on my mini patchwork square blanket. I added some more squares to the blanket, then wove in a whole bunch of yarn ends.

This is definitely the downside to making patchwork blankets, and the smaller the squares the more ends there are to sew in! It's a very relaxing way to spend the evening though: a perfect simple, repetetive task to do while chatting and watching TV.

I expect there will be lots more blanket squares and lots more yarn ends popping up in my #Crafting365 posts over the coming months...