Tuesday, April 27, 2010

Win a 2011 Fiber Farm Share and Help a Puppy

It's a win-win giveaway to help a pup that had a fall and his owner is incurring the costs of the not-so-cheap vet bill.


The basic idea is to buy a pattern from the owner who is a knitwear designer in order to raise money to cover the cost.  Then let Susie at Juniper Moon know and she'll enter you into the giveaway...

If you're interested in helping Crush, check out this post at Juniper Moon Farms for details or this post at Flint Knits' blog.




Friday, April 23, 2010

Finally... Stitchin Knit

And after over a year of development and testing, no further ado...

You can find it via Fonts.com here or via MyFonts.com here if you're interested!
And the PDF files are now available through the gallery view...


Monday, April 19, 2010

How to Use StitchinCrochet with... Adobe Illustrator (Final Steps)

Here are the final steps in the StitchinCrochet video tutorial series which began a few weeks ago with an example star pattern.

Step 4:


Step 5:


Thank you so much for following this series!

Thursday, April 15, 2010

New Font: Fancy Pants

I can't believe I forgot to tell you all, but I released a new font last month, and apparently in the rush of having my parents visit I forgot to post.


Fancy Pants is my first attempt at a semi-linking cursive script.  It was developed from some sketches I did last year (I KNOW!!) and finally got around to converting and tweaking.  It's available from MyFonts.com and has a bold and italic version available too.  I also had a bit of fun writing this really mean "dear john" letter to no one in particular.



Monday, April 12, 2010

Poached Pear Souffle Cake

Thanks to the Tartelette Blog and her generosity in sharing recipes, I was able to make my own Poached Pear Souffle Cake.  Both of us were feeling a bit sick and under the weather.  The signs of spring were hiding behind the clouds and cold weather, until we went into the grocery store where there was a plethora of pears awaiting our consumption.

I immediately remembered Tartelette's recipe from back in December and grabbed six mini pears.  So glad I did.  This is a really beautiful recipe with gluten-free alternatives.  The smells from the poaching opened my sinuses and really were a relief!

Photo evidence of my cooking adventure:
 

Thank you Tartelette for sharing your cooking prowess!!

Sunday, April 11, 2010

Quick Gifts 3: Crochet Baby Headband



Lately I've been seeing lots of baby headbands with giant flowers attached to them.  So, I thought it would be nice for my friends who craft to have a quick guide to make their own.  I made this band for my cousin whose baby has a head circumference of 16.5" but really, it's a flexible enough pattern to adapt to any size (width and length) all you need are the measurements.  After crocheting the band, a set of buttons is sewn onto the end and the double-crochet stitches allow the band to be buttoned tighter or looser depending on need.

I used Regia Silk and a 3.5mm crochet hook.


 Here's the basic pattern for the band:
  1. Chain 11 stitches.
  2. *10 single crochet stitches into the first chain row, turn work
  3. 10 double crochet stitches into the first single crochet row, turn work*...
  4. Repeat between *...* until desired length.
Continue in this manner, alternating between single and double crochet rows until you have reached your desired length ending with a single crochet row or a picot edge if you desire.




Sew your buttons on one end making sure they fit into the gaps between double crochet stitches.

Make a crochet flower!  I used the "Irish Rose" pattern from Leslie Stanfield's Book  100 Flowers...  It is also called a three-layer Irish Rose, and the exact pattern I used from the book can be found on Lion Brand's site here.  P.S.  I used the buttons from the headband to secure the flower.  It also makes the flower changeable!

Enjoy!





Sunday, April 4, 2010

How to Use StitchinCrochet with... Adobe Illustrator (Step 3)

I started posting tutorials on how to use the font I created, StitchinCrochet, with Adobe Illustrator.  In today's post, I will finish off the tutorial on how to use those symbols from the font to arrange the final center row, and then the points of the star.

Step 3: doubling the single crochet stitches


Step 4: adding symbols for the star points, and finishing
See post here for the next steps.






Thursday, April 1, 2010

How To Use Stitchin Crochet with... Adobe Illustrator

This is the first tutorial using StitchinCrochet, the crochet symbol font I designed last year.  I realized after many requests that a "how to" would be nice to share with you all.  So, without further ado...

Our example pattern:


Preparatory steps and prerequisites for this tutorial: download/install/purchase font (you can do it here), have adobe illustrator, basic knowledge and skills within Illustrator.  Next, open a new file, type the necessary symbols using stitchincrochet as your font (I used: 0O&1@23K>), then Menu>View>Show Grid...

Video Tutorial here:
Step 1: Setting up your workspace and starting with a center chain stitches and slip stitch
























Step 2: Arraying the second row (2 single crochet stitches into each chain stitch)

Stay tuned for the final steps in preparing your crochet star pattern!

Step 3 can be found here.

Final steps can be found here.