Butterfly Inspiration and New in My Shop

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My butterfly bushes are among my favorite plantings for a very obvious reason.

Those last two are hydrangeas, but who's keeping track?  These beautiful butterlifes are exactly why I'm so excited for a trade I made with a friend on Friday -- a truckload of rocks I had been using as garden edging for three baby butterfly bushes she dug up from her yard.  They're a really great light purple variety that gets much taller than the varieties I already have.

The best part, these butterflies have served as my inspiration for my newest addition to my Etsy shop, a set of Butterflies in Flight note cards.  (Click on the photos to go right to the listing.)



I love how the pretty patterned papers coordinate with each other and how some of the butterflies hover above their cards.

Some other note cards currently in my shop (new last week -- I hadn't announced them yet!).



Birds & Owls Note Cards





 Happy Thanksgiving Cards

Autumn Blessings Note Cards

If you like what you see I hope you'll pop over to my shop and take a closer look!  Enjoy your holiday weekend and be safe, my friends!

Zig Zag Market Bag is Finally Here!

As I promised in last week’s Yarn Along post, my Zig Zag Market Bag pattern is finally available!  You can get it here by clicking the buy now button below (for just $2.99!), downloading it from Ravelry or visiting my Etsy shop.

Zig Zag Market Bag is knitted in worsted weight cotton at a gauge of 4.5 stitches per inch on size 7 needles -- you'll need a circular needle and DPNs.  I used Knit Picks Dishie in Azure.

I know I’ve said more than once how much I was looking forward to telling you why this bag so great and different than other market bag patterns.  So, in no particular order, here goes!

1. This is a sturdy, sturdy bag.  Lace “zigs” and “zags” add horizontal stretch and visibility (and fresh air for your produce!) but stockinette panels give the bag stability and shape and keep it from stretching too much.  The uniquely constructed and reinforced bottom gives the bag even more stability from the bottom up and helps the bag keep its shape—I can guarantee you’ve never knitted a bag like this one before.

2.  My unique solution for a sturdy, non-stretchy handle tops off all the sturdiness.  It doesn’t stretch like garter stitch or roll like stockinette—win!  Just one handle makes it easy to get items in and out of the bag with one hand, leaving your other hand free to guide your little one(s) through the farmer’s market.

3.  Unlike other market bag patterns I’ve seen out there (yes, I did a little research first!) it features a twisted cord drawstring to keep produce and other goodies in and little hands out.  A closure is a necessity if you ever have to put the bag down while it’s full.

4.  And finally, it’s pretty (of course!).  I find the zigs and zags to be more interesting than mesh lace all slanted in the same direction, and I like the look of the eyelets for the drawstring.  And the picots!  I love them.

I hope you enjoy knitting this bag—and using it—as much as I have.  If you knit it, please let me know what you think!

Sweet, Sweet Basil

Do you see the difference?  In the basil, I mean.  If you look closely at the same view in yesterday’s post, you’ll see that this basil is fake.  I needle felted the leaves from wool roving and knitted icord with wool yarn for the stems.

I grow sweet basil in my garden during the summer months and dry it for year-round use, but I have to buy supermarket basil other times of year if I want it fresh.  A few weeks ago I bought basil and was inspired by the cute plastic sleeve it comes in.  I like the way it looks, and I like the way basil lights up my kitchen, especially in its colorful plastic wrapper.  Who knows, maybe I’ll save another sleeve to store my fresh, homegrown basil in…just for fun.

In a few weeks I might have enough basil to bring in from outside, but until then I’ll enjoy having wool basil on my kitchen windowsill.

The Fruits of My New Craft

I’ve taken up pottery as a way to take a break away from home—and have fun, of course—and to learn a new skill.  And I was surprised to realize how much I like it.  Actually, I LOVE it. 

It is so much fun to create in a new medium and to see a lump of clay become something recognizable, something I dreamed up in my own head and shaped with my own hands. The instant gratification of an object created in mere minutes (compared to the hours and hours of a knitted sock).  The mystical glazing, the colors that look nothing like they’re supposed to.  The magic after a piece’s final firing, shiny pottery in vibrant colors.  The ideas and the endless possibilities.

Tonight I’m excited to get some plates back from the kiln.  After tonight I’ll have just two more classes left, and I’m already so regretful.  Why does my class have to end so soon?

Here are the fruits of my new craft—five little strawberries that came out of the kiln last week.  They’re so bright and shiny and they make me happy just looking at them.  In the next few weeks I’ll glue magnets on the backs with a special epoxy and pop them in my Etsy shop.  I hope they’ll make another strawberry-loving family just as happy to look at them and happy celebrate the upcoming summer and berry-picking season as much as we are.

Lots of Needle Felting & New Etsy Shop is Open!

I’ve been busy making needle felted creations for spring, and many of them are for sale in my brand new Creating a Family Home Etsy Shop.  It’s finally open!  Please visit to check out my seasonally inspired handmade items: needle-felted creations, seasonal home décor and wreaths, original knitting patterns and knitted objects.

I finally opened this Etsy shop after years of people telling me to do it. And before Etsy existed, my friends and my husband told me I should be selling my handmade items on Ebay. I admit, at the time I just didn’t get it. Why would people want the things I make? Why wouldn’t they want to make these things themselves? I couldn’t understand why someone would want to buy handmade items—I really thought that if you wanted handmade items, you made them yourself. By hand.

After a less-than-successful stint of selling felted purses at a big, high-end flea market, I decided against it. It just wasn’t fun for me at the time and I couldn’t imagine there being much of a market for felted bags. Even though many, many people stopped by my table and told me much they liked my felted purses and hand-knitted hats and scarves, not that many people were buying them. I ended up selling the leftovers to co-workers and giving them away to friends. But now I know that I should have sold them on Ebay, or later on Etsy.
 

So now I know. It finally hit me when I saw the interesting creations my fellow bloggers are selling in their Etsy shops. And I’m finally finding out about the value people place handmade items these days—I think a lot has changed since my felted-purse-flea-market days and I’m so glad!

Just like when I started my blog, this new outlet has given me renewed energy and excitement for my crafts, and I’m getting ideas for new projects all the time. I don’t necessarily make my objects to make money; rather, they are things I’m inspired (driven, really) and want to make for the sake of making them.  (I'm also a process knitter, rather than a product knitter, but you may already know that by now.)

I hope you’ll stop by occasionally to see what’s new in my shop.

Thanks for visiting,

Kelly