Why Corporate Meetings Are, Yes Kids, A GOOD Thing

I would like to tell you kids a story.

I woke up this morning at the proverbial butt-crack of dawn, half past five, to arrive at work at half past six and drive three hours to an all-day training course that was completely irrelevant to my job.

But guess what? I got two new designs for plushies out of it!

Now, if only I could figure out a way to actually generate and store TIME while I'm sitting in these meetings, that would be great.

noisypitta.etsy.com

New Customised Amazon Store

Hi y'all! Don't know if you've noticed, but I have a new banner at the top of the page here...I hope that it hasn't ruined your enjoyment of my little corner of t'Internet, but I couldn't manage to find a widget that looked right in the sidebar and blah-de-blah, I'll stop boring you with the geeky stuff. Anyway, Amazon offers a service where I can create my own little mini-store with all the books I recommend, so I've done that. I've included some books on amigurumi, some crochet technique books, and some other books with different kinds of patterns, mostly garments. I've completed at least one pattern in most of them, or had them highly recommended to me. So have a quick browse if you like, and I hope it helps you sort the wheat from the chaff, as it were, since there are so many crochet books out there to choose from!

noisypitta.etsy.com

Even the Experienced Ones Screw It Up Sometimes, Don't They?

I would just like to confess that I've been diligently crocheting granny squares for a few days now...I have five lovely, identical (except for the yarn) pieces. As I said below, they were all in the standard double crochet open pattern...

...but...

I have just, right this second, realised that I've actually been doing an extended double crochet. So now that I've realised, I have to do the rest of them the same, AND, it's going to continually bug me that I've screwed it up from the beginning.

From now till I'm finished, you can picture me crocheting granny squares, with a quiet snarl under my breath. Grr.

noisypitta.etsy.com

Crochet Ain't Just For Yarn, Ya Know!

I spent the Christmas break this year with my husband's family, in Warwickshire. As per usual, we spent Christmas Day at my in-laws' house, and on Boxing Day we made the hour-or-so long journey to Northamptonshire to visit Auntie Val and Uncle Trevor's house and see the extended fam. Amongst the revelers was my cousin-in-law Julia, with whom I proceeded to TOTALLY GEEK OUT over crochet! Julia does a lot of her crochet in natural alpaca, which she gets sent from Stick Chick's Etsy site in America. However, the most interesting of her crocheting endeavours is what she does with various types of wire.

"What's that you say? WIRE?!?! Why, I've never heard of such a thing!"

You better believe it, buddy. Actually, I have seen wire crochet around several places, but I've never met anyone who does it. Until now, obviously. Anyway, she does lovely jewellery pieces that are unique and stylish, for example, the bronze wire and satin ribbon cuff below:

Ooh, or this butterfly hair clip:

Have a look at her other creations in her Etsy shop, juliaemily.etsy.com.

I know what you're going to say next: okay, NP, so when are you going to start crocheting crazy metal stuffed robot things?! Uh, probably not soon, especially as I'm still grannying. But I will definitely have to keep it in mind...Hm...

noisypitta.etsy.com

Ooh, Aah! First Look Granny Squares

Since I KNOW y'all have been DYING for this...Have a look at my first granny squares!

I'm totally geeking out over these babies! They're so fun! Okay, sorry about that...Moving on.

I gave into my OCD self and decided to make all the squares exactly the same, in the "basic" granny square pattern, e.g. three dc in each cluster, one ch between clusters, two ch to turn a corner...You get my drift.

Till next time...

noisypitta.etsy.com

...And the Clearout Begins!

Well, okay, so it's a little early for Spring Cleaning, but I figure it's about time for my yarn collection to have a little "detox". In other words, it's time to get rid of all the crap lying around that I haven't ever used! I still find myself wanting to go out and buy new wool, but I literally have NO space in my house for more yarn...

So, a detox it is.

I have spent rather a long time trying to figure out how on EARTH I was going to manage to get rid of all my yarn, given that it's all different gauges, colours, lengths...GRR. I have finally settled on making a patchwork granny square quilt, with monochrome granny squares in all different colours. I will make each square as big as I can/need to with the amount of whatever yarn I have, and then work on stitching them together. No pics yet, as I haven't started, but if y'all have any suggestions as to where I can get some interesting granny square motifs, lemme know. I'd like to NOT do them all exactly the same!

Wish me luck, and keep your fingers crossed it doesn't look like complete crap.

^_^

noisypitta.etsy.com