Rabbit Rattle

Crochet Rabbit Rattle for my friend's new baby.

Gardening Apron

Gardening Apron for a friend's house warming present.

No Junk for Us!

Handmade "no junk mail please" sign in Finnish.

Meet Cyril!

Cyril is an amigurumi pig, made for my nephew.

Boxy Matryoshka Pouch

Boxy pouch made with very kawaii Japanese fabric.

Saturday 26 July 2008

No Junk For Us

Meant to post this a while ago - Hubby made a ransom-note style sign for our front door:



It says "Ei mainoksia kiitos", which is Finnish for "No advertisements thank you", and it works a treat. Not only that, it looks cool and is - somewhat ironically - created from said junk.

Thursday 24 July 2008

At Last Us Brits Get Our Own Etsy!


It's called Folksy and it's in Beta right now. Check it out, buy stuff, think about making stuff and generally rejoice! Perhaps it's time to open a Cactus Lover shop...

A Wordle in Your Shell-like...

You absolutely have to check out Wordle, right now. It's a kind of pointless but utterly addictive and beautiful gizmo that creates art out of text. Here's one I made from this blog's description:


Go play! Thanks to Jess at How About Orange for the tip-off.

Sunday 20 July 2008

52 Days Unplugged: Update

I didn't post about 52 Days Unplugged last week and there was a good reason for that - shame. I didn't manage it at all. In fact, gave up and turned on the TV at 11am. I had had a bad night with VV and was exhausted. Simply didn't have the energy for housework, reading, crafting or other unplugged pursuits.

And this Friday just gone? Hopeless. I admit defeat. I love the internet too much - I just couldn't resist checking Google Reader and looking up a random fact about lunchtime (the fact wasn't on the subject of lunchtime, that was when I crumbled). One good thing is that I have come to realise that I don't love the TV as much. That stays switched off most of the time now and I feel all daftly virtuous about it.

Thursday 10 July 2008

Neat Little Hand-Sewing Tip

I read somewhere (can't remember where, sorry) that when sewing with a double thread you should cut two threads and then tie the end together, rather than use one long one and fold in half. I thought this sounded like a bit too much effort, but decided to try it when doing a quick repair job on VV's bouncer seatbelt just now. Works a treat! My thread always got tangled when using a doubled-over thread, but I put that down to my skinflint thread buying habits. Seems that is not the case, and it's actually due to the threads catching each other. When you use two threads aligned in the same direction, they glide past each other instead.

While I'm on the handy tips front, I put another one into action the other day. Well Mr Crafty Cactus Lover did. He was talking to me on the phone from work and wrote down some numbers on a nearby whiteboard. These included VV's social security number. But - eek! - he wrote them in permanent marker, and this was a board in a conference room. No fear, Ribs to the rescue. I read the other day (again, I forget where) that if you scribble over permanent marker with a non permanent pen, you can wipe the whole lot off with the board eraser. Also worked a treat. I rule!

Wednesday 9 July 2008

New Fabric, Yay!

Anttila has a sale on, so I popped into their fabric department. Lo and behold, lots of great prints at next to nothing - we're talking 1 and 2 euros a metre here! So, I bought these:



No idea what I am going to do with it all, but I just couldn't resist. Am now re-reading all my craft books and revisiting all my StumbleUpon favourites and Google Reader shared items for inspiration. (Sidenote: I vacillate between sharing and starring GR posts, so there's a lot hidden away in my starred list. I think I'll stick with shared from now on.)

Since I had this new pile of fabric, I decided to find a proper home for it. I cleared a shelf from our walk in cupboard (closet to you Stateside folks) and, voilĂ , a neat fabric stash cum sewing supplies shelf:



Sadly this does not include the enormous bag of cast-off t-shirts and other items that I also refer to as my stash (I'm such a hoarder, which is why I subscribe to Unclutterer). Must sort that out someday...

Saturday 5 July 2008

Nationwide Super Secure Emailing


I received this email from my UK bank, Nationwide (OK, it's actually a building society) recently. An admirable effort on their part to improve security and combat phishing attempts. But can you spot the glaring stupidity? That's right, my postcode is not XXXX XXX. I'm not telling you what it is, but it certainly is not that.

So, the whole point of the email - if your postcode is not shown like it is here the email isn't from us - is totally lost. I know why my postcode isn't shown: I'm an ex-pat with an overseas address, so my postcode isn't UK format. But really that's no excuse. Just flag any overseas addresses first and then leave them out of the mailing. How difficult is that?

Sending an email like this is laughable, and makes Nationwide look silly. It's very poor marketing too, from what is normally a most excellent building society.

52 Days Unplugged: Day One

Boy, was it quiet. Aside from multiple "I'll just look that up online..." moments, the day passed silently and rather restfully. Didn't get any crafting done, but I did sort out the next size of VV's clothes and put away all the too-small ones (he's in 68's now, at 2 months!). I also did lots of laundry and all the ironing. I reckon after a few weeks of 52-daying, the flat will be all the better for it.

I read quite a bit too, while feeding VV, which is when I missed the TV the most. Well really the digi-box. I could see it recording programmes (too embarrassed to say which ones; real trash) at 11am and 3pm, prompting a wistful sigh from yours truly.

All in all, I proclaim the experiment a success and one I shall definitely continue with, every Friday from now on.

Thursday 3 July 2008

Two Tricky Tables

As in tables that do tricks! First up, The Flip Table from flipfurniture, which turns from a neat coffee table into a dining table with stools. Excuse the pic size, but I couldn't work out how to save the full size photos from their site. Mosey on over to their site to check out the high quality pics yourself and to catch the video.






And second, a ingenious expanding circular table from DB Fletcher Design, best illustrated by this video, but you can also get the gist from these photos:



I just love furniture that transforms, hides away or otherwise does nifty things!

Wednesday 2 July 2008

52 nights - how about 52 days?

I'm rather late to the party on this one, but no matter. 52 Nights Unplugged was created by Ariel of Electrolicious as a way to control her addiction to the internet. I found out about it from a blog I've just subscribed to - My Spare Time - and have become intrigued. Thing is, I can't see hubby wanting to forgo TV or laptops for an entire evening. However, since I'm here all day on my own with VV, I could do a working day instead. Maybe Fridays would be good. Yep, Fridays it is.

I'll let you know what I get up to without any electronics. I'm already getting nervous...

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