Bead Embroidery; It's sparkly, I want it.

So last year, I was working with the Halifax Summer Opera Festival and one of the baroque operas was set in modern day. The theme was very opulent: Dolce and Gabbana Haute Couture. No mean feat. A friend of mine was in charge of that opera, and gosh was she perfect for it. Her and the artistic director worked together and brought to life this absolutely breathtaking masterpiece of an opera on a budget that shouldn't have allowed for such splendor. Okay, maybe I'm laying the butter a bit thickly here, but I was seriously impressed.

One day, while hanging out in the dressing room, I spied with my little eye some jewellery that was laying on the counter. With a few quick steps, I was over, ogling the dainty pieces that the artistic director had painstakingly bead embroidered.

LOOK AT THIS!!! It is incredibly beautiful. I sneakily took a few pictures... Thinking to myself I would attempt to re-create one of those mini masterpieces at a later time. And ha! For once, an hypothetical project did come to fruition. And it only took almost a year. *Pat myself on the back.*

I must have started at some point in April, maybe, not too sure. But we're now at the beginning of July, and I juuuuuust finished a pair of earrings. Granted, working on these wasn't a full-time job sort of schedule, it was more of a few intense evenings, a couple of weeks off, an afternoon here, another evening there. You get the picture.

Anyhow, it was quite the learning curve, as I never thought I had any talent at embroidery, let alone bead embroidery. There are plenty of good blogs and videos out there to take the absolute beginner from zero knowledge to being confident enough to make some jewellery that holds together and looks good. Thank you internet.

No pictures of the actual process were taken... I wonder what my camera was up to. Must have wandered into a snow bank or something... But eh, it came back just in time to see the final steps of the process. On the above photo, we see the backing - which is real yellow suede, possibly dear hide? - in the middle is a crucial albeit invisible part of the finished pieces - thin plastic cut from a raspberry container, to support the piece so that it can stand on its own - and finally, the embroidered crosses on a thick felt.

Once the pieces were cut out, because of a critical lack of experience, I had to re-bead a couple of spots around the edges. It's curiously easy to snip off the threads...

With the layers sandwiched together and whip stitched around the edges, it's time to do a brick border, where the beads are lying perpendicular to the edges, covering the joint. Surprisingly tedious. I think I did one half of the first earring, put the entire thing down and didn't go back to it for three weeks.

Zeal took over near the end, when it was decided that dangling bits would enhance the crosses. And while I was at it, might as well add the hook to the random crystal I'd been carrying around in my purse for a few weeks.

The finished earrings are sparkly! And obviously mismatched... I thought I would play around with different ideas. Plus, it might have taken another entire year to complete if I had decided to do both earrings the same. There is practically no fun in doing something exactly the same twice. Hehehe, I know, I know, such a rebel.

It might be a good idea not to wear them with a lot of other earrings though. They aren't exactly what one might call "small and dainty". More like "large and obnoxiously in your face". Perfect!

They didn't seem that heavy, and out of curiosity I thought I would weigh them, along with some other earrings in my possession. I was actually surprised that they are more heavy than the brass mandalas. Maybe I was fooled because they are bigger, softer, and just a bit flexible. They aren't uncomfortably heavy, but I probably won't wear them for 16 hours at a time. Should be easy enough.

Icelandic Fixation

What do you do when you've discovered your new favourite yarn? Mostly soft, a little scratchy, REALLY warm, deliciously airy. Well, sounds like you're describing icelandic yarn.

As I inch my time through life towards becoming an old lady, I thought why not speed up the process a little. Being a little old lady at heart in my early 20s is cool, right? Right.

Anyhow, winter serving as an excuse - ahem, WinterLikeOnlyNorthernCanadaKnowsHowToMake (and possibly Siberia, but that's far) - I decided to undertake a rather large knitting project. Large by my standards. It's not yet another giant scarf, those are actually quite easy, they're simply time exhaustive. It is a lovely sweater. After knitting a rather funny elfish hat with bells and using the leftovers for hand-warmers, I wanted an excuse to use the lettlopi yarn again. It's such a breeze to knit with; it has a wonderful, fuzzy texture, it's light and airy, and it's 100% pure icelandic sheep wool. And the Gods only know how much I love working with completely natural fibres. Acrylic can't compete with this stuff. From personal experience, pure synthetic fibres can't hold a candle to the natural ones. Even though technically acrylic is slightly warmer than wool (exact citation in a textile textbook somewhere in a box, packed away), it doesn't breathe as well, it's not as comfortable, and it doesn't retain as nice an appearance once a garment is knitted.

The pattern I used is found here: www.ravelry.com veurfringurinn/weatherman
Available in both English and Icelandic, nominal cost of $6 US dollars. It's a simple pattern, excellent for a first time sweater project.

It seems typical for icelandic sweaters to be done in this sequence: knit the body from the hem up, knit the sleeves from the cuffs, join the body and sleeves in the round, work the pattern and the decreases in the yoke, knit the collar. And bam: wearable coziness. Don't skip over the blocking step. It's important if you want the sweater to fall properly. Plus, it smells like lanolin (wet sheep) while you steam it and it's great. Yes, trust me.

When you think about it, hand knitting is definitely not the right craft if you want to make a buck or two. It took about two and a half months of work - evenings and weekend-free time - to complete this piece. Cost for the balls of yarn came to about $65-70 CAD. So now you know, if someone ever gifts you a handmade sweater, it's worth gold. Seriously. There are no other pieces like it, and so much time and effort went into it, you better treasure it until the end of eternity.

As per usual, my efforts to document this project have been concentrated at the end of the process, hence there are only pictures of an almost completed, and completed sweater.

Colour work

Kitty helps

Done knittng

Blocking

Tah-Dah

Toastie-toes, or at least that's the hope

What is dreadful?
Spiders, Milk forgotten in the fridge, dog puke on the carpet, wet cat food... Many things, indeed.
Frozen toes though, they deserve a golden award. Frozen toes five minutes after a shower. Frozen toes that keep you from falling asleep for three hours until they warm up. Someone else's frozen toes in the back of your knees keeping you from falling asleep until they warm up.
So, in an effort to curb this dreaded thing, I decided to make myself some shmancy-shnice-shlippers. I vote we add this word to the Oxford Dictionary. Anyone to second the motion? Anyways, here's how I made these lovelies.

A while back - about a year or so - I came across this picture.

The pattern is just so attractive, and they look so playful. They became the inspiration for my newest pair of warm-feet-envelopes.

From previous experience, I knew that knitting slippers fully out of yarn - especially nice (read expensive) yarn, such as soft wool or other animal fibers - would deteriorate quite quickly on the pressure points under the feet. And require darning just a few short months after being completed. And since I refuse to use phentex, had to come up with a way to reinforce the bottoms. The lady at the yarn store suggested adding a soft leather sole - brilliant. But I thought I'd save myself the effort by dispensing altogether having a knit sole. In the end, I decided to knit an upper, and use suede for the sole. Quite like a simplified version of a mukluk really, which fits really well since I now live in Northern Canada.

And because I don't like doing anything the easy way, decided to come up with my own pattern and everything. I started by knitting a swatch in my chosen yarn, a fine, but not quite sock-weight baby llama yarn, to get my gauge. Once that was established and I measured my foot, I came up with a pattern that would fit nicely. And had fun coming up with a simple design, using two colours and somewhat fair-isle-esque technique.

After spending a few evenings knitting and binge watching documentaries, I had my uppers all done. You know what's really satisfying? Blocking the knitting once it's completed. Getting it to unfurl with the steam, and then lay flat and happy.

Once those had cooled, I seamed them at the back, and knitted a cuff in a bulkier yarn.

Then, while wearing one, I traced around my foot on a piece of paper and came up with an acceptable sole pattern. Which I then cut out of the suede. I'm not sure which animal it is, I'll venture and guess deer?

With an awl, I poked holes about every centimeter along the perimeter of the sole, then whip-stitched the upper to it. With any luck, they should last for a while and keep me toesies warm.
And if not, then I'll add a layer of rabbit fur on the inside.

 And voilà!

The Ambitious Fool

- I hereby declare myself an ambitious fool!
Claimed she in a high and clear voice. Her ambitions had nothing to do with advancement within the societal model she loathed, the gain of power, or the amassment of riches. Grinning widely, she had a silent chuckle and thought about how much of a fool she really was. In short, she liked the idea of undertaking projects devised by her devilish mind. They promised growth of knowledge and sense of accomplishment, as well as a welcome new addition to her portfolio. The only problem she could think of was regarding her might-as-well-call-it-masochistic mind which rejoiced at throwing too much at once into the project pile, and then sitting back to enjoy the chaos that ensued. From experience, she knew that it would always come down to a tug-of-war between the desire need to keep busy and work on fulfilling  tasks and the primal need for quietness and regenerative sleep.

Alas, what could she do but try her best to reach a state of equilibrium between these two, which were demanded so voraciously by her inner self? And so, between the grind of day to day activities such as employment, house chores and a pinch of socializing, she aims to get through her latest list of projects and still get enough rest to not feel like a zombie on a daily basis.

The first step towards the realization of this goal is to limit the amount of time wasted on distractions that actually don't matter. For instance, aimlessly browsing the internet too often.

The second step is to keep a list of the projects that demand to be accomplished, and then arrange them by priority. Hence, here is the list of projects for the month (or two months? It might very well be too much, she is a fool after all, and has a sly keenness to overfill her plate):

- Class plan
- Class display material
- Actual class material
- Chart of scene breakdown for the opera
- Costume list for the opera
- Costume renderings for the opera
- The new scarf project which is, as usual, way too complicated
- Feather-fabric dress
- Two flower crowns for Spring
- High-waisted corduroy pants
- Using up some fabric from the stash for its intended purpose

Nothing is highlighted in red - yet. Orange means that it needs to be completed by the end of March. Yellow indicates that it must be completed sometime in April, possibly. Green denotes mostly personal projects, the ones that would be nice to get to, but if not, it's not a tragedy.
That is a good way to linger in a sane state of mind.

Finally a new project!

I know, I know. I have neglected to update this since last February. My bad, I'll blame it on being too busy for anything outside of school and work, and work, and work.

Buuuuut, now I'm in Germany. I just started a new job, which affords me loads of free time, so I'll be able to finally do some creative work. Oh creative work, how I have missed you these past months. I can't wait until I find a sewing machine here (hopefully), otherwise I'll have to sew everything by hand. Which is fine, but I can't say that my handsewing skills are quite as good as some other people I know... *cough* *Peryn* *cough*. :)

Soooo! New country, new projects. Let's start from the beginning. I arrived in Weimar two days ago, and a few hours later, the lady who has been in touch with me all summer came over to my apartment to give me some goodies, namely: a blanket, a pillow, a towel, chocolate, and a handy little book called "Wie man deutscher wird." Or, how to be German. Exciting!

The absolute first point in the book is about wearing slippers. Or house shoes. Oh German, I love you. Great, I didn't bring any slippers. Let's fix that.

Now, I can't just go out and buy a pair of slippers. That would just be too easy/logical/straightforward.

Naahhh, I like a challenge. Seeing that aside from two giant scarves, all I've ever really knit were a mitten and a half, half a sock, and some funky shaped dishcloths. This is going to be fun. Or will it?

Also, while I'm at it, might as well go all out. Not just slippers, oh no, ELF SLIPPERS!!

                                           

Something like this. I found the pattern online here:

http://web.archive.org/web/20101121072753/http://caron.com/projects/ss_chunky/ssc_elf_slippers.html

I couldn't have picked something easier, eh? Oh well, let's see how it goes.

So, having brought only the most minimal of sewing kit with me, I needed to gather the raw materials to be used for this future creation of mine.

I found a bastelladen (craft store) in town and went in. Bought three skeins of wool yarn (they didn't have any acrylic, it's a really nice store). In hindsight, I see that I chose green and yellow like my hair. I swear it wasn't on purpose, it just happened. There were so many pretty colours to choose from: navy, dark red, a nice pink, they were out of purple though. I hope those three skeins are enough, I don't really want to buy more. Pure wool like this isn't exaclty cheap. Also needed to get knitting needles and yarn needles. I want to get the pack of five straight knitting needles, but I wasn't sure they were going to be quite long enough for the width of the work in the first stage. So I got a circular one.

Note to self: next time I travel, I should bring my knitting needles and stitch markers with me. They take virtually no space, and I wouldn't have had to buy new needles, and now I have to get creative with the stitch markers, because the store didn't have any. Also, I would have saved about 10€.

Well, now I know. And now I have even more knitting needle. Almost all of them in this exact size. 

I'll start these right now! In progress pictures will be posted as the slippers come to life, if all goes according to plan.

Update 21. September, 2014

There, my houseshoes are done!

Just in time for me to get a huge cold. Now I can wear my slippers, drink all of the tea, and be ultra lasy while my cold wanes away, hopefully soon.

 

First picture is the basic knitted shape, done in mosaic pattern. See how it's knitted flat, rather than in the round. I thought it was strange at first, until I realized that in order to get the toe to curl, you have to sew it together while pulling
tightly on the yarn.

Second picture is one slipper just sewed up, next to an already finished slipper with the cuff done in ribbed stitching. The cuff is also extra long so that it can be folded over.












This one shows the cuff being knit in the round.

And the finished pictures, with the cuff folded over. SO COMFY!

Also, according to my German book, tip #50 tells me that I need to do an exaggerated bye.

Tssssssssssssschüüüüüüüüüüüüüüüüüüüüü-hhhüüüüüüüüüüüüüüüüsssssssssssssssssssssssssss!

3 months until I graduate

I've been in university for a while. At 22, I'm in my fifth year at Dalhousie University. They call it a victory lap, and I refer to it by that name too, though it feels more like the last struggling jerks of a fish that has been out of the water for too long and is on the verge of dying... Okay, maybe a little too morbid. But sometimes it does feel that way.

I pride myself in being an excellent student. My work is always on time or early, and I put all of my heart into it. Maybe it makes me a loser without a life, but eh, I don't care and neither should anyone else.

I'm going through all of my mental lists of things I need to do before the end of the term, and it doesn't seem like that much. Then I come back to the reality of the day-to-day routine and realize how busy I really am. I'm taking my four final classes, all of which are more or less a giant sewing lab in different areas. In three of them, I get to make clothes for someone else, and luck and a bit of magic made it so that it's all for the same person. I asked one of my friends to be my model for my 19th century tailoring class, and he also happens to be in the 4th year acting class. Now it gets weird. In my fourth year Show class, I'm the cutter for one of the actors, who happens to be my friend who's also my model for tailoring. And since I'm combining my fourth and third year classes, I also get to work on the show in my third year class, where I am my own first-hand, or basically my own minion. It's a confusing and interesting time when I'm trying to sort out what goes where for those two classes. I also refer to myself as cutter Audrey and first-hand Audrey in turn, depending on the day.

Then, my fourth class is aesthetics of historical dress, or Lynn-dom. We are basically reproducing garments from the 1700's in Louisbourg after its foundation in 1713 until the English took over in 1745. I am my ow model in that class, and though it is sometimes (incredibly) painful to sit through, I'm making an effort to change my attitude toward it to enjoy the class. I do love historical reproduction, and I'm doing myself a dis-favour if I'm always in a foul mood going to that class.

I also realized that I always refer to what I'm doing in terms of century. !9th century tailoring, 18th century Lousibourg, and 14th century garments (that's show class, the department is putting on the Decameron).

Throughout all of this class-related excitement, I make it a point to work on my own projects, to bump up my portfolio. To date, I've made my first bodysuit in black burned-out velvet for circus class. Yes, circus class. I needed some sort of physical activity, and circus is just perfect. The hoop is certainly my favourite, since I seem to get lost in the silks. The rope is growing on me, and trapeze is also really fun. No upper body strength makes it an unending challenge, so until I can hold my body up using only my arms, I'll be stuck doing basic stuff.
The bodysuit is basic, a front, a back and two arms. It was my first time dabbling with stretch, and though this isn't the best fabric choice, I'm quite happy with the way it turned out.

This weekend, we had the day off on Friday, and I decided to travel to the north of the province to Cape-Breton and to visit the Louisbourg fortress with one of the student societies. I figured that it would be the cheapest way to visit it, and it would be a fun weekend. I've now learned that it doesn't always go according to plan, and instead of a weekend visiting landmarks of Cape-Breton, we spent the entire weekend eating too much food in a chalet. Good job guys. On the bright side, I went snowshoeing for the first time ever, and I had brought two projects to work on during the drive and throughout the weekend.

I'm making some 18th century stockings in silk jersey to go with my 18th century outfit. I decided to handstitch them for fun (I'll embroider them too once I get silk floss) and I got a good chunk of work done on them. It's a very funny-looking pattern, but I'm really happy with the way they look. The next thing I'll be doing after I finish them is making a little pair of shoes look like 18th century mules. The stocking reach up about half-way up my thigh, and they'll be held in place by a peach-coloured ribbon. I left it at school, and that's why I'm using a measuring tape on the picture... You get the idea. It's really nice to work with silk jersey, it's so soft. Did I mention that I looooove silk?

 Another little project I brought with me on the trip is my first pair of mitten. I finished the first one on the drive to Cape-Breton on Friday, and started the 2nd one on Saturday. It's the easiest pattern I could find, and the next logical step after mastering the giant scarf.

Future projects include the 18th century shoes I mentioned, a pair of 18th century pockets, a skirt for a friend of mine, and possibly some new miniature paintings. I only have six full days of class this week, and two days with only one class, thanks to reading break that kicks in next week. Around doing assignments and plucking away at my honours thesis, I think it leaves ample time to work on a number of these. As long as I skip on sleep, but that shouldn't be a problem.

During the Holidays

I'm very fortunate indeed, to have a whole three weeks off for the holidays. For the last few years, I was only able to come to my hometown for a few days, then I had to go right back to Halifax for work.
Luckily, as my different little jobs are with the university this year, they ended when class ended, and will resume when classes do.

I don't recall the last time that I had three weeks of nothingness in front of me. Was it when I was still a teenager? I think so.

Anyhow, so far I've kept myself more or less busy. Definitely not at the infernal pace that I keep during school, but I'm not just sitting in the living room, though I will admit that I really like my spot on the couch.

What is there to do in Canada in Winter? Well, here are some suggestions:

1. Playing Monopoly, and not just any Monopoly. The Canadian edition, in French.

    

2. Building an insulation layer on my body for the upcoming months. Sounds gross, but I haven't stopped eating since getting here. It'll eventually get used up once I go back to Halifax and don't have time to eat.

3. Pulling out the Winter gear and going to the Ski Station for a day. First time in about five years, I did surprisingly well.

4. Thoroughly enjoying my time off. Even if it's just day-dreaming, watching the Food Network, or that series called Ancient Aliens.

5. Hanging out with my siblings. It's the first time in three years that the four of us are home at the same time.  

6. Napping on the couch. By myself, or with Stella.

                                             

7. Unwrapping Christmas presents.

8. Listening to all sorts of music. Mum likes to listen to Christmas music on the radio, and my brother recommended the new Stromae album. My sister listens to terrible things, but then she's 16...

9. Decorating the fridge.

10. Helping out with the Christmas baking. That includes preparing, baking, plating, and eating. These are two huge plates of sweets. And the containers behind them? Still half full. 

11. Enjoying the company of extended family. Playing chess, battleship and chase the puppy with them. The girl in pink is the only cousin my age. She studies in Alaska, so for the Holidays she came south... To Canada and norther Maine. Ha!

12. Catching up with friends that I haven't seen in a long time.

13. Knitting.

14. Mum decided to give Christmas dinner this year, we had twenty-something people in the house. Thank God, that's only about half of my mum's side of the family...

15. Following Christmas dinner, we have a lot of turkey leftovers. Guess who'll be eating turkey leftover in every meal for a few days? Turkey soup, turkey à la King, turkey sandwich...

16. Saying goodbye to this year's tree. After being in the house for over three weeks, it's really dry and shedding pine needles every time you look at it. We removed all of the ornaments, and put it outside on the front porch. We still have a plethora of Christmas ornaments around the house though. It's my mum's favourite time of the year.

17. Sitting by the window and watching the snow falling. It's been a fairytale holiday season so far, a truly white Christmas. It's been snowing almost every day, and we've had a few snow storms in the last two weeks.

18. Reading books, doing research for school. Can't be completely on vacation...

19. Running errands by, uhm, tad-bit chilly temperatures. Solution to fight the early morning cold? A second pair of socks.

20. Finishing a really cute rag doll.

21. Making a pillow from a piece of a quilt, and making a fluffy hair-bow. Yes fluffy!