28 Friday Oct 2011
Posted in Etsy, My ramblings
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Remember I told you about my custom made earrings from Etsy in this post? Well, they arrived this morning all the way from Bahrain. Oh Joy!!
Here they are: the cutest little turtles for my ears.
Needless to say this morning’s chosen earrings are no longer in my ears. (At this stage they don’t even warrant a large photo.)
I love my turtles!! Thank you so much Dafni!
28 Friday Oct 2011
Posted in My ramblings, Other people's crochet
Genius or hideous?
27 Thursday Oct 2011
Posted in My crochet, My ramblings
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Apologies people, but I’m just testing out Flickr’s cool feature where you can post a photo from your Flickr account directly to WordPress.
If this works, you would probably want to know a bit more about these cushions. Well, I made them for my brother way back in March. I used Stylecraft Special DK and the eight blocks are from Jan Eaton’s (brilliant, fanastic, addictive) 200 Crochet Blocks book (you can find a link to the book on the right of this page). The squares are: Big Round, Lacy Cross, Begonia, Mesh Fantasy, Edwardian Fantasy, Catherine Wheel and Circle In Square.
Okay here goes, I’m going to hit the Post button and see what happens…
Update: It worked! Yeah!
25 Tuesday Oct 2011
Posted in Etsy, My ramblings
Etsy has recently launched a very handy little feature. If you have a Facebook page and an Etsy shop, you can now link the two with a handy “fLike” button on your Etsy shop Homepage. This means that whenever someone fLikes your Etsy shop, they automatically also like your Facebook page! How cool is that!
I linked the two a few minutes ago and immediately Etsy told me I have 154 likes on my Facebook page. Brilliant!
It would be super duper nice if you, my dear blog readers, could visit my Etsy shop and fLike my shop, and thereby also fLike my Facebook page. There hasn’t been much activity in my shop recently as I’m working hard to create stock for the Christmas markets. Whatever is left over after the markets will however be put up for sale in the shop, so stock levels will increase towards the beginning of December. My Facebook page however is a bit more alive 😉
Other Etsy shop owners who read this blog should also think about linking their Etsy shop to Facebook (and/or Twitter). It’s a win-win situation!
I hope to see your name as a new like on my Facebook page, soon!
21 Friday Oct 2011
Posted in My ramblings, Other people's crochet
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Some people really shouldn’t…
18 Tuesday Oct 2011
Posted in My crochet, My ramblings, Pattern
My husband and I visited Hampton Court palace on Sunday and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. My handbag of choice for the day was my Larger Than Life crochet handbag. Looking back at the photos of the day I realised, once again, what a thing of beauty it is. Seriously. I’m not even afraid of sounding vain because I’m just totally in love with my crochet handbag.
In this photo I’m wearing a Green Velvet Travelling Cloak, courtesy of Hampton Court Palace. Its soooo much fun and it really gets you into the spirit of (Tudor) things, but what stands out in this photo, is the handbag.
Now that I’ve whet your appetite, you probably want to know a bit more about this bag. It’s official name is the Larger Than Life Bag by Cecily Keim. Mine is done in Rowan Handknit cotton, the blocks are “Willow” from Jan Eaton’s book 200 Crochet Blocks, and instructions for the construction of the bag, as well as the Willow pattern, is published in the Interweave Crochet magazine – Spring 2007. You can see more of these Larger Than Life bags in the Flickr group.
I loved, loved, loved crocheting the blocks and playing with the colour combinations. I was very scared of the sewing involved in turning the crochet blocks into a proper handbag. Luckily I have an amazing husband who helped me every step of the way. We finished the bag on 7 March 2010 and I couldn’t be prouder.
If you want to make a crochet statement and scarfs are not doing it for you anymore, have a go at this bag. You can’t go wrong!
18 Tuesday Oct 2011
Posted in My ramblings, Terrific Tuesdays
Today’s Terrific Tuesday isn’t so much about a cheerful holiday snap, it’s an example of the power of positive thinking – and it happened to me this very morning.
When I get off the train at London Waterloo, I can take one of four busses to work. Bus numbers 76 and 26 I catch to the right of the exit, and bus numbers 4 and 172 I catch to the left of the exist. I usually go to the right. The traffic was really bad today so it took ages for a bus to come. I was first in line at the bus stop but I waited and waited and waited. I sent one of my colleagues a text messages saying that I may be late. Still I waited and waited. After about 25 minutes I spotted a number 172, which meant I had to give up my space in the front of the queue and run to the bus stop on the other side, but I didn’t mind as I would finally be on a bus. Nope. As I turned around (huffing and puffing) I saw that it wasn’t a 172 that I had spotted, but in fact a 17, and in the time that I had ran to the other bus stop numbers 76 and 26 had arrived at the bus stop where I was waiting for 25 minutes!!!
Here’s where it gets interesting. In stead of being angry or irritated I just laughed at myself. I also thought that maybe there’s a reason why I shouldn’t be on the 76 or the 26. I had already told the people at work that I may be late, so there’s also no need to stress.
About three minutes later a black cab pulled up at the bus stop and out of nowhere the lady who opened the door, turned to me and asked whether I wanted a ride to the office! It turned out to be a, now heavily pregnant, trainee lawyer who I had worked for a year ago who had been standing in the front of the queue waiting for a 172 or 4 bus! A.M.A.Z.I.N.G.!! I was at work in a jiffy, had a lovely catch-up with Zoe in the back of the cab, was dropped off right in front of the office, and then Zoe insisted on paying for the cab!
I’m so happy that I stayed happy!
(Photo taken in Regent Street on 1 August 2010)
I hope my little example of looking at the bright side of life will inspire you to do the same. Have a Terrific Tuesday!
18 Tuesday Oct 2011
Posted in Etsy, My ramblings
…and the CEO has a granny square cushion on his couch!!! I think Etsy is in good hands.
You can read the article, and see the video here.
12 Wednesday Oct 2011
Posted in Etsy, My ramblings
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As sales in my Etsy shop are a bit slow, I thought I’d support fellow crafters and be a buyer on Etsy – spread the love, pay it forward, what you give is what you get and all those lovely things, right?
I’ve had two great experiences with earrings that I bought from fellow Etsy sellers in the past. I bought ruby red felt rose earrings from bunkleberrystudios in Northern Idaho and green crochet earrings from Fr33na in California. I love wearing them – it gives me such a thrill knowing that they were hand made and not mass-produced in a factory somewhere, and I always get compliments when I wear either one of these two pairs of earrings.
Today I bought Plexiglass turtle earrings from Dafni, a Greek lady living in Bahrain. The earrings are based on this turtle brooch,
but I like the colours of this cat brooch,
and want the earrings to look like these exotic bird earrings.
Where else but on Etsy can you have colourful inexpensive earrings custom made for you by a Greek lady living in Bahrain who will post it to a South African-born, Brit?! Small, but very colourful and creative, world indeed. I love it!
12 Wednesday Oct 2011
Posted in My ramblings
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Granny square hot pants!
With my beady little eyes no granny square shall go unnoticed.
As seen in Stylist magazine, advertising Toni & Guy’s Hairmeetwardrobe.
crochetime 