Herbert the Owl

My middle son asked me to make him a stuffed owl.

He even specified certain details he wanted the owl to have: "black pupils and flappy wings."

And as much as I...don't enjoy stuffed animals as much as my kids do, in an effort to be the ever-doting mom I am (um, not really....), I decided I had a mission to accomplish and a challenge to complete. So I checked my stash of yarn and whipped this cutie right up yesterday afternoon and finished it this morning.

This owl worked up really quick and easy and it turned out completely adorable. I used a basic hat pattern (+ several simple increases and inches) to form the body, and simple crocheting techniques to do the eyes and wings.

I present to you, Herbert the Owl

Here's the pattern in case you're interested in making your own Herbert or "whooo"-ever!

Supplies:

• J10 hook
• Worsted weight yarn. For the owl body, I used just short of one skein of Vanna's Choice "Barley," which is a chocolate brown with flecks of cream and black. Perfect & owl-y, right? For the eyes, any white yarn will do. For the wings and black pupils and beak I just used scraps of black, forest green, and orange.
• Stitch marker to put at the beginning of each round to keep track of your rounds.
• Tapestry needle to sew in ends and to make beak and pupil details.
• A few handfuls of polyester stuffing you can buy at a craft or fabric store.
• The pattern assumes you know basic crochet terminology and stitches.

First, make the body:

Round 1: Start with magic ring and 6 sc in ring
 (This great tutorial is where I learned to make a magic ring a few years back).
Round 2: 2 sc in each st, around
Round 3: 2 sc in next st, sc in next st around
Round 4: 2 sc in next st, sc in next 2 sts around
Round 5: 2 sc in next st, sc in next 3 sts around
Round 6: 2 sc in next st sc in next 4 sts around
Round 7: 2 sc in next st, sc in next 5 sts around
Round 8: 2 sc in next st, sc in next 6 sts around
Round 9: 2 sc in next st, sc in next 7 sts around

Now you're done with the increases and you'll just continue to crochet around until you have a body shell that's as tall as you want it to be. This particular owl measures approximately 10"x10".

Don't tie off the body just yet. Leave it attached to your skein of yarn until it's time to stuff!

Set the body aside and make two eyes. 

Start with a magic ring and 6 sc in ring.
2 sc in each st around
2 sc in each st, sc in next st around
Go one more round of increases (2 sc in each st, sc in next 2 sts around) if you want the eyes to be bigger.
Tie off ends but leave a long enough tail to sew onto the body.

Next, make two wings--you can use two colors or one, it's up to you!

Start with magic ring and 6 sc in ring.
2 sc in each st around
2 sc in each st, sc in next st around
2 sc in each st, sc in next 2 sts around
2 sc in each st, sc in next 3 sts around
Tie off ends and leave a long tail for sewing the wing together and attaching it to the body.
Next, fold wing in half, and sew together from the top down the round side of the circle, only halfway down so that half of it is closed and half is open.

Approximate the placement of  owl eyes and wings and grab your tapestry needle. 

Attach the eyes to the body by sewing around the whole circle. I like to put the eyes right next to each other so they touch ever-so-slightly.
And the wings need to go on the front-ish sides of the body. Sew those on, too!
At this point, it's all coming together, you just need to add the details!

I'll be the first to admit—sewing in the details is not my biggest strength. There was a lot of guessing involved but I think it turned out okay.

Beak:
Take two strands of orange yarn and just...sew a beak, starting right between the bottom of the eyes and working your way down to form a triangle. Tie off and knot ends on the wrong side of the front of the body.
Pupils:
Then, take two strands of black yarn and sew pupils. I just guessed how to do this and it worked out pretty good.  You can use your magic ring circle to guide your needle! Tie off and knot ends on the wrong side of the front of the body.

Now that everything is sewed on, it's time to stuff and close!

Bring together the front and back of the body in a straight line. Take your long piece of yarn from where you left off with crocheting the body (the yarn that's still attached to the skein) and slip stitch through both the front and the back stitches—4 stitches total that you'll go through at each slip stitch. Stitch that sucker closed across the top of the body, about 1/2 way or 3/4 of the way across.
Take your stuffing and fill up your owl to the desired puffiness and fluff.

Pick up your hook again, and continue the slip stitch until it's all closed. Tie off and weave in ends!

And...you're done!

Enjoy!

Cheery Rainbow Scarf

Find this cutie here!

Brown Beanie Pattern

I bought some of my favorite yarn to make some hats for my Etsy store, and here's a little something I designed. It is size 2T-5T and measures with an 18" circumference and is 7" from ribbing to crown.

Even though it's a touch time consuming, the colorwork is fun, easy, and it creates an amazing effect and pattern. 

This assumes that you have knitting experience + some stranded colorwork experience and know how to switch colors and carry the strand along the back of the work.

Materials needed: 

16" circular needles, size 6. 

I use two sets of circulars for my decrease, but you can also use 4 double pointed needles to accomplish the same thing.  

1 skein KnitPicks Comfy Worsted yarn for the main color. 

Approx. 1/4 skein for the contrasting color(s).

I used Bison for the main color and Light Blue, Carrot, and Creme Brulee for the contrasting colors.

Abbreviations:

K=knit

P=purl

MC=Main Color

CC= Contrasting Color

st=stitch

sts=stitches

K2tog: Knit two together

Directions:

With MC, cast on 88 stitches. Join to knit in the round, being careful not to twist.

For the ribbing, K2P2 around until the ribbing measures approx. 1"; this will be about 8-10 rounds. 

After ribbing is finished:

1. K 3 rounds with MC
2. *K1 MC, K1 CC; repeat from * all the way around 
3. K 3 rounds with MC
4. *K1 CC, K1 MC; repeat from * all the way around

Repeat 1-2 so so that you then have three rows of CC sts.
Switch to your second CC and do the same thing, making sure that you have 3 rounds of MC in between your CC rounds and that you have three rounds of MCst, CCst

Continue this until hat measure 5" from bottom then start the decrease.
I got a total of 8 stripes of alternating MC/CC sts before I started the decrease.

For the decrease, continue in the pattern and...

*K6, K2tog; repeat from * around.  

K around

*K5, K2tog; repeat from * around.

K around

*K4, K2tog; repeat from * around.

K around

*K3, K2tog; repeat from * around.

K around

*K2, K2tog; repeat from * around.

K around

*K1, K2tog; repeat from * around.

K around

K2tog all the way around. 

 Cut off a long tail, and string it through the remaining sts on needles. Pull tight. Weave in all ends. 

Valentine's Wreath

Tutus are not in my future wardrobe options, but I needed to use tulle on SOMEthing. Plus, I had this really cute pink fabric in my stash that could be paired with white to make something really cute. So....I created this wreath. It is most certainly a Valentine's Day wreath, but would also be amazing hanging in a little girl's room.

The flowers are made out of tulle and pink fabric, and there are two green fabric leaves tucked under the tulle.

Love it?

b&w stripey hat

Wow. It's been almost a year since my last crafty post.

Just. Wow.
 
I've been keeping busy crafting though, and am excited to share some new things here!

This hat I knit for an Etsy custom order, and it turned out really cute. The only direction I had from the buyer was that she requested the colors. She left the design up to me.

I used my basic adult sized hat pattern, and this Mother's Day Flower from Lion Brand website. I knit 3/4" black and white stripes, and the hot pink flower makes the stripes pop!

It turned out very adorable and hope that the recipient loves it as much as I do!

Cashmere Dimple Hat

I came across this pattern on Ravelry, and fell in love with it. The original pattern is from the Purl bee, which never disappoints.

I had two balls of KnitPicks Capra wool/cashmere yarn (color: Harbor) sittin' around and wanted to make something outstanding, but not too difficult or time-consuming.

To be honest, I had the yarn because I was going to make this hat, but I had to rip it out six (yes, six) times due to twisting while joining the stitches, casting on too few stitches, casting on too many, not doing the cabling correctly, dropping stitches in the first round, and something else but I forget.
So, I concluded that hat just wasn't meant to be, and I'm so glad it didn't work out between the two of us.

The pattern is very straight-forward and you just have to trust it. I also found that a row counter thingy worked very well to keep me organized. Then again, I have a very bad short-term memory, and can't seem to remember what row I'm knitting if I don't have it written down or counted with some sort of external device.

The pattern calls for 1 1/4 inches of ribbing for the cuff but if I were to make it again, I'd make the cuff 1 1/2 inches long. My hat fits perfectly, but I could see how it would be just a touch short on some heads.

Happy knitting!

Yarn-Wrapped Wreath

This week's project was super easy & super cute.

Gather your supplies:

• wreath form: styrofoam or straw wreath (keep the plastic wrap kept on if you use straw) or scroll down for a really cheap trick.
• yarn: one large skein will be just fine.
• ribbon or extra thick yarn from which to hang the wreath. You could even knit or crochet a long i-cord or braid several strands of yarn to keep the yarn look consistent.
• hot glue gun & glue sticks or craft glue 
• felt sheets from the craft store (or if you have a lot of patience, you can knit 100% wool pieces and make your own felt....um....have fun with that.)
• sharp scissors

Wreath

1. Choose the backside of the wreath. Dab a piece of glue on the back, and stick your yarn to it. Let it dry a little bit. I had to wrap a small section of my straw wreath in duct tape so the hot glue didn't melt the plastic wrap. But I don't think it's that big of a deal.

2. Start wrapping! ...and wrapping...and wrapping.... This doesn't have to be perfect. In fact, overlapping the yarn at different points gives it a nice texture. But, it's totally up to you.

3. When the entire wreath form is covered in yarn, secure the end with glue.

QUICK TIP!

For a couple of the wreaths, we used polyethylene foam pipe insulation tubes. At our local Home Depot, you can buy 4-pack for about $2.75. You circle it up and duct tape the ends together. Each 3-foot tube makes one 13" wreath. This is obviously an amazingly cheap alternative to the $5.99 styrofoam forms you can find at your craft store.

There are two downsides to the polyethylene:

1) The circumference of the tubing is not very wide, so it makes for less decorating space. BUT WAIT! For the gray wreath pictured below, Ali doubled up the foam...she made a big circle, then cut a shorter piece to fit inside the first circle. She duct taped them together, and got a great width for the wreath.
2) The hot glue melts huge holes into the foam. Here's a solution that I've found to work: glue the beginning of your yarn onto the duct tape seam. And if you choose to cut yard-long pieces of yarn and wrap that way, you'll have to glue each yarn seam to the already wrapped yarn on the back. Another solution would be to use basic craft glue that won't leave holes in your wreath.

Now the fun stuff begins.

Felt Roses

1. With sharp scissors, cut a square. The larger the square, the bigger the rose; the smaller the square, the smaller the rose.

 2. Round the corners of the square, cut a circle, then cut a wavy spiral

Leave a little circle at the end of the spiral.

3. Starting at the beginning of the spiral, start rolling it up. Fiddle around with rolling it tightly and rolling it loosely to see the different results you get. Put a dot of glue on that circle that you left at the end when you cut spiral, and attach the rolled-up rose to that circle. Trim that bottom circle if it sticks out too much.

Lovely, aren't they?

The next obvious step is to merge these two creations:

• Choose the top of the wreath.
• Decide where you want the flowers on the wreath, then glue them on.
• Attach your ribbon or yarn or i-cord or your hanging device of choice.

Here's our finished products:

I used one polyethylene tube and Lion Brand Thick & Quick yarn. 

It was very easy to wrap since the yarn is so chunky:

  Ali used Hobby Lobby's I Love this Yarn and two polyethylene tubes duct taped together. I love the width of the wreath, and it's a great size:

 This was a straw wreath form wrapped in Paton's Classic Wool:

Have fun!