Coming soon...

I'm currently working on a dog made with the same reclaimed sweater yarn as Odette Octopus. I have everything except the arms done (my least favorite part since they're so frigging fiddly)

Additionally I'm working on a green animal...I haven't decided what it will be...the body for most of the animals is the same so I have lots of choices. I'm thinking another dog but maybe a monkey? Or maybe a green moose? What do you think I should do. I also have patterns for a lot of other animals as well.

I'm an alternate for a Treasury!

I have yet to be featured in a Treasury (at least to my knowledge)...but for the second time, I am an alternate in one! I'm almost as excited for that as anything.

For the longest time I had no idea how to even find out if I was in one or not. And then I didn't know any way without scouring the lists looking for the star indicating you were in it...and then I heard about Craft Cult and Craftopolis. If you're just looking for Treasuries that you are featured in, Craft Cult will do the trick...and it also lets you know how many people have favorited your shop (and who) and how many have favorited what items. Craftopolis is mostly for dealing with Treasuries, which is why I forget to go there...but it lets you know if you are an alternate in someone's Treasury which I think is neat.

I'd really love to create a Treasury or two of my own but I just don't seem to be on the computer at the right times. But I can tell you what I'd probably have the theme as....something along the lines of repurposed/recycled stuff..since that's what I do when I'm not knitting (well, even sometimes when I am!) I'd probably feature something by itsourearth, zJayne, delightfuldeceits, JeansAndaSweater, ElephunksTrunk or one of the myriad other shops that have really cool repurposed/upcycled stuff that I am totally envious of!

Recycling Sweaters

I went to the other thrift store today to see if I could find any unravelable sweaters (is that a word? unravelable?)....and I found three! So yay for that...it means that more of my stuffed critters can be repurposed yarn from sweaters. This website has the info that I used to figure out how to do this, and which sweaters are actually worth attempting it on. Its great...it cost me $1 per sweater....so for $3 I have loads and loads of yarn either for stuffed animals (with the unknittable scraps being great for stuffing) or for whatever other things I can think of. yay!

I love thrift stores!

You can almost always find great stuff at thrift stores, at least if you have time and patience. Sometimes you find nothing, but other times you just hit it big. For all that my town is small and fairly remote, we have two fairly good thrift stores. The smaller of the two, I mostly check in once in a while to see if there is any yarn. Twice now I've gotten some pretty decent hauls. This last time (yesterday) I got some stuff by Cascade Yarns, three skeins DK weight for $3 (and their price tags originally were $4.95 a piece!) and three small mystery remnant balls that will work great either for my repurposed stuffed animals or maybe some doll clothes.

I just get to feel great when I rescue things from thrift stores and garage sales...take them from non-use and make them into something (hopefully) cool and loved.

The other, bigger thrift store, they have a $3 bag day every Friday (whatever you can fit in a paper bag for $3....dang good deal, let me tell you) And it is where I get fabric remnants to be made into reusable gift bags and the like. I also can dig in the boxes in the back (things to be thrown out) and take whatever I want for free. Some of it is in perfect or near perfect condition! Its just that they are so overloaded with stuff they can't sell it all (who buys regular cotton tshirts at thrift stores? we all have too many already!) and we're not in a location where its viable to ship extra stuff to 3rd world countries or whatever.

I get tshirts for my rugs and purses, tank tops for bags, sometimes more fabric bag there....occasionally some ribbons or lacy stuff to add to my bags. Its just really fun seeing what I can find in 20-30 minutes of digging around. I've walked out with multiple large bags before.

Oh yeah...then there is the fun of hunting for sweaters that I can unravel for yarn (only ones with the right seams work)--cause even if I pay full price for the sweater (I think its $1, maybe $2) that's still a great deal for the yarn. Sure, I've got to do some work to get it...but still! Odette Octopus is one of the critters made from a sweater yarn, I also have a hippo and a spider...with lots and lots more yarn to go! I may get sick of the color before I run out of yarn!

Newest Critter

So...I was messing around with some partially made stuffed animals (just the body with legs). I had two of them and was being goofy. I randomly stuck some eyes on it and thought, hey...add some arms and it would be a little alien critter or something.



Haven't done that, but Nathan (my boyfriend) suggested doing an octopus instead...so, here she is...Odette Octopus (made with yarn from an unravelled sweater)