Craft Hope~ Bracelets for Russia

My friend Michelle rocks.
She is a busy artist/business woman/mother so getting together to art and hang out does not happen as often as we would like, but when we do... watch out!
Most of the time we just chat and brainstorm, but last Friday we made stuff. Cool stuff!

It was her idea to make bracelets for Craft Hope... Project 12: Orphan Outreach.
Here are photos she so graciously shared.. it was late in the evening and I forgot my camera. doh!

Most of the bracelets in the wagon were made by Eve & Ann last fall for their GS troop. 

They donated them for Craft Hope. 

I crocheted a pile from my handspun foozles and beads. They are in there somewhere...

The cuffs in the front were made by Michelle. 

My favorites? The collaboration bracelets... Michelle sewed my crochet bracelets to her cuffs.

You can see one here... it's the second from the left.

The second one? I totally snagged and kept. >:)

Here is a link to Michelle's post about it. With more pics!

Blog Slacker~

I know..... I have been a blog slacker.
Been busy being mom and hippie housewife. Trying to slow down a bit and absorb some summer energy.  Gardening, canning, puttering in circles around the house and sending a few car loads of stuff we have outgrown to Goodwill.

Today my Ruth is taking me out for a relaxing lunch, and after I will take some more shots of what I have been up to....

NEWS....
Last weekend I updated the shop with some pretty cool things!
Yarns, journals, new pins, embellishments! New Stash Purge items!
Go and see~?

          

          

AND....
VERY exciting news....
Next week, Tues. July 13th we (Jackie, Liz and I) will be doing another Paperclipping.com/Live show!
Topic is an art journal tutorial....
How to Make your own 'Free Range' art journal!
This show will be filmed in my art studio.... in the Material Whirled!
Too much fun.

xo
see you soon!
reenieout

Hoarder? Frugal? Thrifty? Green?

Call it whatever... but there are some things I just cannot toss into the landfill.

My biggest thing is yarn, fiber, fabric...

I just know I can reuse these items until the point of practical disintegration.

Please do not call the Hoarders show people on me. (Have you seen that show? sheesh. Poor people. It does put things into perspective though.)

Here are some shots of my insanity...

This is my thread jar. It sits next to wherever the sewing machine is. All thread snips and pieces go in there. They look so pretty all tangled up in there!

I will eventually card these into a batt and spin into a yarn.

The jar itself is made from knotting strips of fabric scraps together.

This is the snibble and foozle bin that lives under my studio table.

 All fiber and yarn pieces go into this bin.

My local yarn shop from PA still saves foozles for me to add to this bin. (love you all at UT).

Snibbles are tiny pieces of yarns... Foozles are a but longer, and can be used for more things... Both phrases were used by my great-grandma. 

Contents of this bin will also eventually be upcycled into handspun yarns. 

There are actually two bins full right now, perhaps its time to start carding?

There are many other things I do to reuse my stuff... stay tuned for more posts about my green/hoarder/frugal tendencies. The madness goes on and on...

Cabled Dreams Journal~

Another Journal~

Available (for now) in the Shop (Material Whirled) on the Journal Page!

The cover is quilted with a lover-ly hydrangea-esque floral pattern.

I couched down strands of a coordinating handspun yarn with matchy-matchy threads.

The acid green knit cabled panel, is a gauge swatch for a project I never got started. Which is fine, because it was really meant for this book.

The closure is an old green coat button and a chain of my handspun.

Inside the front cover is a pocket made from some painted canvas, great to hold your pen or cell phone.

Cover measures 7 in. x 9 inches closed.  

Perfect size to slip into your knitting bag~

           
Inside hand bound pages measure 6 1/2 x 9 (largest)... others vary under that.
108 pages (counting front and back)
Pages are a collection of scrapbook cardstock, printed lined papers, copies of a yarn pattern my late memaw had written out by hand (my mom just found this and sent to me).... there are many clear pockets and places for you to slip in notes or pics...

  

12 of the pages are my art collages... created specifically for this book from old craft books, parts of my paintings, ephemera I have hoarded, yarn sample cards, etc. etc. etc.
Also cards made with my new yarn-ball stamp I carved...
Embellishments are sewn, glued and taped in.
I am sure there are other things I am forgetting to list here, so some things will be a surprise! (teehee)

 

Consider this a Jump Start for your art and journaling! 

A collaboration~ between you and me :)

What can you DO with a book like this?
Record your knitting projects....

Journal you thoughts, dreams, plans, prayers and intentions...

Write out your grocery and to-do lists.

Glue or tape in your favorite photos...

I can go on and list things for days... 

I took a kajillion pictures for you to see, there are more on the journal page in the shop. 

 

One-of-a-kind! You will be the envy of your knitting group~ 

My Creative Process~

It's random that I blog about my creative process... mainly because it is a part of me that is constantly working and I suppose I take it for granted.

I have been trying lately to focus on what makes my brains tick. You know, to try to break it down a bit, to soothe the beast.

So for my latest round of handspuns I have taken the time to focus on what has inspired me and be more specific about communicating that here.

A dear friend and mentor gifted me with a set of delicious Tracy Porter vases.

I have found them very entertaining and inspiring. They move about my home and studio based on color and theme and my moods.

I recently chose four of them because their color schemes were haunting me. SO... I chose some fiber and carded some batts based on each vase's color combos.

Here is the story of three of them. (number 4 is still in progress)...

Yarn #1... Coral Plumes... (my name for it)

LOVE the colors of this vase, salmon, coral, olive green, black and beige.

So... this yarn is all about the colors. Love how they bounce off one another.

Yarn #2... Bohemiam Floral

A fun, hippy dippy color scheme that never would have occurred to me on it's own.

I mean... primary colors with pink? LOVE. love love love.

I dug through my stash and found some really flowery glass beads, some wooden pink rose beads from a vintage necklace and a yellow gold heart and some leaves...

I created some coiley clusters to round it all off.

Yarn #3... Papillon

At first this yarn was about the colors. I did not want to put a butterfly in the yarn because that just seemed a bit too contrived. Then I found these glass chrysalis-like beads in my stash. Perfect! The cream silk finishes it all off with a diva-luxury.

Yarns are available to purchase (while they last) in my Handspun Shop!

and no... the vases are not for sale (smile).

Be careful what you wish for...

'cuz you just might get it.

Hello from Woodbury-Downs...

the protector elf given to us by our friends...

he looks like he is snoozing but if you get too close-- watch out!

You know? I have everything I wanted out of life.... and am very happy where I am.... facing 40 in a month. Love my girls, LOVE my husband, have amazing friends and family.

Life is good.

Ezmaralda the beautiful one in her usual perch on my studio table.

New project I am obsessing on....

prototype #1... plant hanger made from chunky black yarn.

Prototype #2.. made from my handspun with cats applied in place of beads.

meow!

Prototype #3 still on studio table... pics to come when finished.

Yesterday I spent several hours at Michelle's studio, creating and chatting away.

I met two new artsy friends, Janne, who is visiting from Norway, and Teri, who lives locally.

We had a blast...

You can see pics here on Janne's blog...

my camera battery was dead so I did not get any shots.

I Need a To Do List~

I slept in a bit this morning...

and then spent over an hour browsing on some new-to-me design (interior) blogs.
Sounds like a colossal waste of time, but OH, so much inspiration! Not so good for the ADD though, now my head is swimming with even more things I want to make and do!

Here are some links if you are interested in that sort of thing...
Some are new (to me) and some I have been following for a long time~
decor8
Design Sponge
decoFabulous
made2create (some great DIY home decor ideas)
The Yvestown Blog
Supermarket Sarah (some raw kitschy displays)
Brooklyn Limestone (great decor/design/ renovation ideas)

Sunday we hit the Pearl in Portland for lunch and some walking around.

Here are shots of the window displays at Anthropologie!

Made from plastic water bottles... which I totally want to try to make for some spring decorations around here.

Yesterday I finished up some serious custom yarn orders~ phew!
They are gorgeous, but were so very time consuming.... . I have a case of spin-ass-itis, which means my back hurts from sitting and spinning for hours and hours. duh. I could get up and stretch occasionally I suppose. I just get into what I am doing and forget.

My Ann was feeling under the weather yesterday. No extreme symptoms, just achy, nauseous, and slightly feverish all day. Hopefully she feels better once she wakes up today. We missed a group excursion to see the Percy Jackson movie. which was very very upsetting for her. Maybe we can see it today?

Paul's flight was delayed in SLC because some woman refused to remove her ipod for religious reasons?! So they kicked her off the plane, started up the runway, then had to turn around so they could remove her checked luggage from cargo. Nice lady. sheesh. What religion would that be? anyone?

So not sure what today will bring... until Ann wakes up. Will snap some pictures to add here once I get to the studio.

Here are some of the Knit Pins I have recently put in the shop.

HILARIOUS!

There are 24 Knit designs, 9 Spin designs and 4 Crochet designs. Go see!
xo

Reenie's Remains Journal

I am taking an online class, taught by the magnificent Mary Ann Moss called

"Remains of the Day".

Today I completed the cover, which I am fantastically, exuberantly excited about.

I took a kajillion pics, but only posted a few here... the rest are in my flickr.

I will narrate for you...

Here are the fabric pieces, all sorted out and chosen ( I spared you that step),

with some of my handspun foozles to go along.

Sewing in process... the bird embroidery came from my gram's crazy (OCD) stash... and I love how the edges are all yellowing with tape marks, so I let them show.

Mary Ann, I put this pic in for you,

because I cannot work without help from one of my babies, same for you it seems...

This is Rufus, helping me choose yarn placement.

I couched the handspun strands by running zigzags over them willy nilly.

I love the line and texture the yarns add.

Some of the yarn foozles were beaded.

I created loops from the handspun all over for fun.

Here it is all finished and closed. I still need to decide on a closure of some sort...

There is a vinyl pocket sewn to the flap, I put a pic of my rascals in it to show it is a pocket.

This is the back... with the bird embroidery. See the vinyl pocket? I put a moo card in it to show where the pocket is. I just cut up some of those vinyl bag thingys that pillow cases and such come in. Friends now save them for me, which is good as I don't buy a lot of things that come packaged that way and the vinyl gets upcycled!

Plus it is stronger than transparencies or page protectors.

Detail of vinyl pocket with moo card...

On the inside cover flap I used vinyl to make some pen and marker holders.

I put a piece of old denim on the back of the printed fabric before sewing the vinyl down to give it some stability to help hold the weight of the pens.

Backside...

On the other side of the liner I sewed a denim pocket and again secured it to the back of the fabric with a piece of denim.

Backside...

I was thinking this pocket can hold Petunia, my beloved Storm.

Finished book is 9x12... so I have to re-figure my pages before making them.

I prefer working in a larger book and know if I made the recommended size I will not use it.

Go big or go home I say! haha.

I am looking forward to getting my pages sewn together... I have started to select book pages and such and was surprised how much larger format paper and books I have to use! YAY for hoarding.... haha.

MORE in my flickr Art Journal Album here.