Monthly Archives: June 2013

And we have branding!

Posted on June 25, 2013 | 4 comments

When my good friend Becky started to push me (and I mean really push!) to start this venture, I knew that I would need some outstanding images to accompany the work. But, I had no idea what I wanted or even how I saw myself. All I knew was that all the best crochet people have excellent branding and if I wanted to even contemplate joining their ranks, I would need some too.

Enter the Amsterdam Small Business Network an Joanne Lew-Vriethoff. Via the network I saw Joanne’s work and was immediately in love with what she does. I could feel in my bones that she was the designer for me.

I approached Joanne and she came back with an excellent quote package to create a banner for my Facebook page and for this site, so I jumped at the chance.

I supplied a few images of myself and of my daughter, along with a vague, high level idea of what I had in mind. I had seen this image of my friend Tammy and thought to myself: that image sums me up too! I have so many things on the go at once, I should illustrate that.

What Joanne created for me absolutely blew my mind. I’ll be perfectly honest; from my description (or lack thereof), I wasn’t sure she had enough to go on to make something that I could connect with, but it was like she crawled inside my head and pulled all the best bits out and put them on paper!

Once the banner was created I was so happy that I knew I couldn’t stop there. Next was a postcard and then, business cards! I’m so over the moon with the results, now I have to just sit down and get them all printed. Can’t wait to have them in my hot little hands! I’m now also thinking about going down the Etsy route, so there will be even more work to do in that case.

Thanks again to Joanne, and to Sharon and Marjolijn from The Amsterdam Small Business Network for hooking us up. Now I just hope that I can pay it forward…

4 Comments

Posted in Branding, Projects

Tagged branding, crochet, cute, illustration, Joanne Lew-Vreithoff, logo, marketing, MissNeriss

Image

WIP 1 of about 10…

This is a bag that I’m working on for a friend. I’m loving the way that the colours work together. I was a bit apprehensive at first, because colour-matching is something that I really struggle with. I just seem to miss that gene…

Yarn used: Drops Big Merino in 06, 07, 09, 10, 16, 20

The original pattern can be found on Attic 24, for free!

What do you think of the colours?

5 Comments

Posted on June 18, 2013 in Drops, WIP

Tagged bag, Big Merino, crochet, drops, haken, merino, project, WIP, work in progress, yarn

Rainbow Cozy

Posted on June 17, 2013 | 6 comments

Here’s something I whipped up the other evening on the couch. I’ve been so in love with this rainbow yarn from Hjertegarn since I stumbled across it in my local yarn store last year. But it was one of those yarns that looked beautiful as a ball, but terrible when made into anything. In the end I managed to make a woolly hat for myself, and some gorgeous ombre owls, and finally the yarn has found it’s place in my heart as this beautiful mug cozy.

The colours work wonderfully together, and it was just the right length that I could miss out the mustard section of the yarn.

If you’d like to make this one for yourself, you can find all the instructions (for free!) here.

6 Comments

Posted in Projects, Tutorials

Tagged alpaca, coffee, cosy, cozy, crochet, haken, handmade, mug, ombre, yarn

Pinspiration #5

Posted on June 5, 2013 | 5 comments

The last few weeks have been flat out. Ridiculous. I lost a weekend making Roary 1.0, running out of yarn and having to start from scratch on Roary 2.0 in time for Monday (the yarn to finish Roary 1.0 is coming home today!), I’ve been busy making multiple Yoda and Rupsje hats (info and patterns to come on those soon) to send to Australia, plus the neon bug has bitten hard. I’ve been churning out owls and whales like nobody’s business!

Here are the whales that I posted on Pinterest yesterday:

Aren’t they adorable?

So what have I been doing on Pinterest this week? Well, to be honest, not a whole lot. You see, about a month ago my daughter somehow managed to crack my iPad screen (also known as my extra limb). It was still usable, until my lovely husband stepped on it early one morning after my daughter had been playing with it on the floor beside our bed. In his defence, early one morning actually equals the middle of the night (that’s how early she gets us up) and it was still quite dark. He couldn’t possibly have seen it.

So, off to the insurance it has gone to have the screen replaced. My iPad is my main connection to the world outside my home, so I’m feeling a bit lost without it. What a shock to my system to actually browse the Internet using a PC!

However. The yarn that I have grown to love over time and have found a use for almost every variety is from Drops. I use Paris and Cotton Light religiously for amigurumi projects, and the Big Merino is fast becoming my favourite for lovely warm hats. I’ve also found a fabulous supplier here in the Netherlands: Hobbydoos.nl. Well, to be honest, there are loads of great suppliers here (remind me to write about on my faves soon), but this one is fabulously reliable and most importantly: fast.

Here are some of the Drops patterns I’ve been inspired to make lately.

This one is actually for a project I’m starting very soon, I can’t wait to get started.

I’ve been looking at this bag for quite a long time actually. I love the colours.

Blankets are historically not my most favourite project, but this one looks great to have in the car or over my lap on cold evenings…

How cute are these piggy slippers. I love all things piggy. In fact Peppa Pig is our family favourite.

Pot-holders don’t usually light my fire, but these could convert me…

What I also love about Drops is that the site is international and multilingual and has about a gazillion free patterns for knitters and crocheters. They’re all well written and easy to follow.

What’s your favourite yarn? I’m becoming a yarn hoarder, so the more tips the better!

5 Comments

Posted in Drops, Pinterest, Projects

Tagged amigurumi, crochet, crochet pattern, drops, haken, pinterest

Minigurumi

Posted on June 4, 2013 | 7 comments

Increasingly, amigurumi is the crochet genre that I’m finding the most joy in.

Here are a couple of mini-projects I’ve undertaken of late:

I came across these awesome whales on Pinterest and when I clicked through to the original post, I was ecstatic to discover a free pattern!

I did make a couple of changes to the pattern, however. As I prefer to use as few joins as possible, instead of creating and attaching the fins and tail, I integrated them into the body of the whale.

Fins: Ch4 and join into the same stitch before continuing around.

Tail: Ch5, HDCin 2nd stitch from the hook, HDC, SC, slip stitch into the next stitch. Repeat, but SC into the same stitch, then fasten off and change colour.

This baby penguin was found on Craftsy, and is of course by A Morning Jup of Jo Creations . I keep meaning to make the larger penguins too, but as I say almost every day, time is not my friend!