I am the Kat that Walks By Itself

Hello peoples! I spent a lot of time today rearranging my computer desktop to change the way my social media stuff is organised. Hopefully one of the consequences of this is that I'll stop neglecting y'all on Dreamwidth.

But, on to the proper topic of this post - 2025 Goals for Craft stuff (as distinct from goals for my entire life). I figure that since it's still currently January, I can get away with not having posted this, like, on New Year's Day. Though one advantage is that I've actually completed a few of these goals already, in this month of January! I don't really want to call these "New Year's Resolutions" because that seems too burdensome. But it's fine to make plans, yeah?

( Read more... )

That's probably enough to go on with.

There is a kind of compliment I am given that makes me sad for the people giving it. "You are so talented," they say. "I could never do that."

Gah! Don't say that! Just... don't. Don't even think it! You can, you can, you can so do that. Don't give up before you even start!

(Do not make the bird sad.)

Why do people fail to even try? Three excuses, and two real reasons. ( Read more... )

Does anyone know why "knitting" starts with a silent 'k'? (goes and looks up knitting) Ah, it is related to "knot". Middle English. Doesn't explain why the 'k' became silent, though. Oh well.

So, I have decided to forget the needles and explore knitting with two hooks. This is different from "knooking", which uses one hook and a long trailing string or ribbon. Instead, you use two (Tunisian crochet) hooks and position them like knitting needles, only they have hooks on the end. This is apparently quite common in Portuguese/Turkish/Egyptian/Peruvian knitting, though they also have specific techniques which involve looping the working yarn around the back of one's neck, which I don't really feel like trying at this point. Maybe at some other point.

The advantages of two-hook knitting:
1. It is much easier to pull the yarn through the loops with hooks than with needles.
2. One is less likely to drop a stitch, because you don't remove the stitch from one hook until you have the new stitch on the other hook, and also because it is less easy for a stitch to slip off a crochet hook than a knitting needle, because the hook itself tends to get in the way.
3. It is much closer to needle-knitting than one-hook knitting is, which means I should be able to follow directions meant for needle-knitting.

The disadvantages of two-hook knitting:
1. It is harder to put the hook into the required loop than a needle. This is the trade-off. One thing that happens is that instead of the hook going into the loop that I want it to, it also catches the loop below, which can be messy, confusing, and cause an unintended stitch-increase. This may get easier with practice. It may also be easier with pointier hooks, I'm not sure.
2. I haven't yet found any videos on YouTube that show this method of knitting.

So far, it's promising. Done a garter stitch swatch, and have switched over my current one-hook-knitting project to two-hook-knitting. Slow going, but practice should hopefully make somewhat perfect.

A follow-up to this post -- I have figured a way around the scratchy edges, a way which may mean I end up using the 0.3mm thick aluminium after all.

The answer? Folding over the edges. For the thicker aluminium, that is a bit difficult, and it ends up so thick at the end that it won't fit into the bracelet-bender. But with the thinner aluminium, all the folding makes the edges stiffer, which means it actually does work as a bracelet.

Yay!

I am Quite Pleased with myself today, because after a saga of bracelet experimentation, I finally succeeded! Well, 95% succeeded. Good enough.

Okay, so what am I rabbiting on about? As you may know, I am being all artisan-y with my own Etsy store Essence Of Eclectic (mostly jewellery). And I keep on trying new things.( Read more... )

020 Shellac Cells?

This week I tried to make "shellac cells" (or "shellac lacing") following the method used by Annemarie Ridderhof here ( https://youtu.be/JUz97lBoOKI ) and here ( https://youtu.be/o10Z-_hnwJU ). Not having any encaustic wax, I tried doing it on bare wood. And I tried... and I tried... and I tried... and I tried...

The wood (actual wood, not MDF) was laser-cut 25mm (1 inch) disks purchased from here: https://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Timber-Wood-Base-Disk-Circle-Shape-3mm-Thick-10mm-to-100mm-Diameter-Earrings/222738298555
The shellac was made up from shellac flakes ( https://www.bunnings.com.au/feast-watson-250g-shellac-flakes_p1567019 ) bought from Bunnings a few years ago. Freshly dissolved in methylated spirits. No problems in dissolving it, there were no lumps or anything like that.

I am feeling very disheartened about this fail.

013 Another Method of Jewellery-Making With Acrylic Pour Sheets - Part 3

I take the two sole survivors of the previous videos and turn them into earrings!

011 Another Method of Jewellery-Making With Acrylic Pour Sheets - Part 1

The most common method of using acrylic pour skins (made from nothing but dried poured acrylic paint) or acrylic pour sheets (made by pouring acrylic paint on sheets of paper or plastic) is to cut out shapes to fit inside bezel settings, glue them in, and then cover them with a protective surface. This gives you a pendant or charm. In this video, I am prototyping a different method, which will create a pendant, charm, or bead.

Materials:
White Foam Core Sheet (you can also get it in black)
Acrylic Pour Sheet, made with Jo Sonja Acrylic Paint on Kodak Ultra Premium Photo Paper
Very wide double-sided tape
Judkins Diamond Glaze

Tools:
Scissors
Awl
Sizzix Big Shot die cutting machine
Cutting die (lots of little hexagons)

Tell me what you think!

Fluid Art Experiments in Black and White and Red and Blue
This one took me three attempts to render - it crashed the first two times, I don't know why, so I re-did the editing from scratch. And while I was at it, added some music to the closing bit.
This video is a continuation of the same session as the first video. I've just been breaking it up into smaller bits, because I think that fifteen minutes is a good length for a YouTube video.

So tell me what you think! Ask me questions! (And possibly even subscribe, if you do that kind of thing.)

I made another video! Introduction to Hook Knitting. It is not perfect, but still informative.