Keeping Track Tutorial (NaMoBloPo #15)

Sister Diane of CraftyPod has been looking at keeping up to date with what your favourite bloggers are doing. I'm going to share what I do.

She mentions an aggregator called FlipBoard and this is what I use. It's a free app I've got installed on my phone. You can use it to keep track of multiple media sites, or not, as you desire. For me the main use is for keeping track of blogs. This is my first screen when I open the app.

The top section is what the app decides are the top stories from all the other boxes you have. Then below that I've chosen to have UK news and Technology news. I can touch any of these to go into them in more detail. Then this is my second page of the app (I only have 2).

From the top I've got Science news, Flickr uploads by me and my Flickr friends, Google reader (this is the one I use most), Craftzine, Twitter and Facebook. It's Google reader I'm going to concentrate on as it makes keeping track of blogs so amazingly simple.

First up you need a Google account. I defy you not to have one already. If you use Google+, blogger or gmail account you've already got one. If by some chance you don't just click here and create one. If you do have one go to http://www.google.com/reader, click on the red 'subscribe' button and think of a blog you enjoy reading. Type or copy and paste the blog address into the box and click 'add'.

Simple!

Now the clever part. Open your Flipboard app and one of the grey squares will say 'More'. Tap it then select 'Accounts' and 'Add an Account'. This is where you add your Google Reader account details.

And that's it. Now, whenever you want to see what's new with the blogs you follow you open Flipbook and tap your Google Reader square. It will bring up the most recent updates. So for example...here we have something from the book guru Knitting on the Green.

It gives me the main pic and a few lines of text. To read the whole post I tap and it opens up. I can comment on and read other posts if I want to. If I don't want to read the whole post I just stroke the screen to flip it upwards and move onto the next most recent post.

And that's it!

Aimless Patchwork

I have always liked the look of crazy patchwork and after pinning various examples decided that crazy log cabin was what I'd really like to try. I've accumulated a lot of scraps from various projects over many years and today I started combining them. Ta da!

I know with freeform crochet this is called scumbling. So I'm thinking of these as scumbles. I imagine I'll sew them together into some sort of quilt top at some point but really this is just an excuse to do a bit of easy patchwork. And it really is very easy. There are lots of tutorials around (check my Patchwork Board on Pinterest for a few) but here's my approach. I'll use this as an example:

This is the centre of the middle bottom piece from the first photo.

• Take a scrap of fabric and cut it to a square or pentagon - I wouldn't go any higher than 5 sides. Mine was roughly 2" across. Don't worry too much about measurements - just make sure all the sides are straightish lines.  So for me this is the bumblebee piece. 
• Your next scrap needs to be long enough to cover any one side of the centre. For me this is the dark red ripple pattern piece. Sew along one side (you can hand sew but machine is much quicker). Press the seam with your fingers and lay the piece flat. Trim the left end of the new piece to be even with the next side of the centre, moving in an anti-clockwise direction around the centre. 
• Your next scrap needs to be long enough to cover the end of the second piece and the next side of the centre. For me this is the beige with little trees and flowers on. Repeat previous step (i.e. sew, finger press and trim)
• Your next scrap needs to be long enough to cover the end of the third piece and the next side of the centre. For me this is the red flower piece. 
• Continue until you have just one more side of the centre to cover. At this point you'll need to trim the end of the last piece you added, the last side of the centre AND the right-hand end of the first piece you added to the centre into a straight line. This line does not have to be parallel to any other seam so don't worry about making it a square/pentagon if your scraps aren't the right size. The key thing is that this line is straight. 
• Your next scrap needs to be long enough to cover the end of the last one you added, the last side of the centre and the right-hand end of the first added piece (this is the lilac polka dot for me). Sew and continue anti-clockwise.
• Once it is big enough simply stop adding more pieces and trim the sides to your required size. If you have a lot of long, straight scraps you could even end up with an entire quilt top just from a single centre. I would love to see it if you do make one like that. 

There are a few other types of patchwork I'd like to try and I quite like not having any finished object in mind. Charities will always take quilts and blankets so if nothing else I can join them all together for one of those. And at the same time I'm expanding my knowledge of techniques. Rather satisfying. 

Make a Clock, using your favourite fabric

This is an idea that popped into my head a few weeks ago and I finally made mine yesterday so thought I'd share the process. 

You will need:

• A clock mechanism with hands (see note below about this)
• An embroidery hoop of the size you want your clock to be
• A piece of fabric big enough to fill your embroidery hoop
• Waste cardboard at least as tall as your embroidery hoop plus 2 cm.
• A pen
• (not shown) Glue suitable for sticking card to wood
• (not shown) Scissors

A note on clock mechanisms: You can get these quite cheaply in a number of craft shops and online. I do not like the sound of ticking and so I looked for something called a "continuous sweep" mechanism. Otherwise any clock mechanism will do. I found mine on ebay where prices went up to £10 per unit, but mine was about £3.50 inc postage.

On your card draw round the inner edge of the inner ring of your embroidery hoop. Then add on an extra 1cm on each end and cut out this shape. 

Using your scissors make a number of small cuts through the extra centimetre of card and up to the line you have drawn. You are effectively making  a number of tabs which will fold up at 90 degrees to the rest of the card. 

Put your fabric in the embroidery hoop and trim off the excess at the back so it looks neat from the front. 

Flip the hoop over and insert your card. You'll see that the flaps I cut earlier are now pressed against the inner hoop while the main body of the card is flat against the fabric. 

Once you are sure everything is fitting properly use glue to stick the flaps to the embroidery hoop (but not to the fabric - afterall you may want to change the fabric in 6 months and having it all glued on will mean you need to cut out more cardboard instead of just changing the fabric).

Using a skewer or your scissors and keeping your fingers clear, make a hole in the middle of your hoop, going through both the card and the fabric. The hole needs to be big enough to fit the shaft of the clock mechanism through. 

Follow the manufacturer's instructions regarding fixing the mechanism in place, placing of the hands and battery. 

Now put your clock up on the wall and sit back while time passes. 

Hints:

1. My clock hands kept colliding and stopping themselves when I first put it together. As they were plastic I got a dish with boiling water and dropped them in for a minute. I carefully fished them out and was able to straighten them so they now move smoothly over each other. 
2. Pliers may be useful for tightening the clock mechanism washers and nuts around the cardboard and fabric. 
3. As mentioned earlier, you are not stuck with this fabric forever. You can make it seasonal with special summer or christmas fabric, or show off some of your embroidery or patchwork. When you do want to replace it carefully remove the clock mechanism and undo the embroidery hoop. The fabric should just fall out and the card is attached to the inner loop so should stay in place. Put in your new fabric, tighten the hoop, make a hole in the fabric where it needs to be and replace the clock mechanism. 

If you use this tutorial please make a voluntary donation of just £1 towards my ongoing craft addiction. 

Chocolate Dipping Sauce Recipe

This simple sauce takes less than 2 mins in the microwave and is good on fruit and, for the true sugarholic, marshmallows!

You will need:

• About 40g of cooking chocolate
• Tablespoon of honey
• Knob of butter
• Microwavable dish
• Fruit/marshmallows
• Skewer/cocktail stick

Precise timings will depend on the power of your microwave, and if you don't have one you can use the traditional bain marie. 

Break the cooking chocolate into pieces and put in the microwavable container. In 30 second bursts, zap the chocolate until it has started to melt (For me this took two 30 second bursts). 

Remove the dish from the microwave and without stirring add the butter and honey. 

Put back in the microwave and zap until the butter has melted (for me this was just one more 30 second zap). 

Stir until smooth and serve while still lovely and warm. 

Additional options: you can add some cinnamon or other spices or a small shot of your favourite liquor. Just bear in mind with the latter that this will make the sauce runnier and so you may want to omit half of each of the butter and honey to compensate. 

Crochet Button Necklace

I made one of these on Friday but am finally getting my self organised enough to post the photos. There are soooo many tutorials for these. I browsed a few before starting but basically you get some cotton, thread on the buttons then start crochet chaining.

I'm pretty pleased with it! It's hard to take a pic of yourself in a necklace so luckily SB was here to model.

I think she's looking a lot like me nowadays. I told her that and she wasn't happy.

The only downside is that it can get a bit tangly. But hey, I can untangle laceweight so I figure I'll cope.

Definitely going to make more.

Mater's Cinnamon Buns

It's tutorial tuesday. And what better than a gorgeous recipe for something warming as the weather turns colder.

These things are fricking awesome. The smell is almost as good as the taste. If you can have made bread before you won't have any trouble. If you haven't made bread before, you'll be fine. 

Ingredients

1lb strong white flour

1 level tsp salt

4tsp ground cinnamon

1tsp grated nutmeg (mum says fresh is best but life is short)

2 x 6g sachets of dried yeast

2oz caster sugar

8oz sultanas

4oz chopped glace cherries (mum's trademark)

5fl.oz. hand hot milk

1.5-2fl.oz. water

2oz melted butter

1 large egg

Glaze

2oz caster sugar

2 tbsp water

Place first 4 items in a bowl. Sprinkle in the yeast and sugar, followed by the sultanas and cherries. Add milk, water, beaten egg and butter. 

Mix into a dough.Knead for approx 6 mins until smooth and elastic. Cover loosely and leave somewhere warm until roughly doubled in size (approx 90 mins).

Press air out and shape into 12 buns on a baking tray covered in baking parchment. Cover lightly with foil and  leave to rise for another half an hour. 

Pop into hot oven (210 maybe - she uses an aga, of course) for approx 15 mins or until sound like a drum when tapped on base.

While in the oven make the glaze, then as soon as they come out brush on glaze and leave to cool. But not for tooooo long....these are absolutely delicious while fresh and still warm with some butter. Mmmmm.

And it didn't end there. She also knocked up this sponge.

The topping is marscapone based which worked exceptionally well - it tasted very fresh as well as delicious. 

The jam is home made, what else. Note also the glace cherry. I am serious - Mum rarely makes a pudding that doesn't include them somewhere!

Twitter on Tutorial Tuesday

It's Tutorial Tuesday. And this week, it's Twitter.

What is Twitter?

Twitter is a free service where you can send messages to your "followers". Messages are a maximum or 140 characters long. So that's 140 letters, including spaces, punctuation, web addresses or whatever else you want to include. 

Essential vocab and basics

• Followers = people who are subscribed, or who "follow" your tweets.
• Tweets = the messages you send through Twitter are referred to as Tweets. 
• Reply = messages intended for just one person, but which will be seen by everyone following you. Adding a @ symbol in front of someone's twitter name indicates your message is directed at them. Example below. 

• @ can also be used to indicate who you are talking about. In the first of the hashtag examples below, as well as using a made up hashtag (explained below) I've also indicated who Sister Diane is. This means others can click on her name and see her tweets. 
• Retweet = a message someone else sent that you want to forward to your followers. Designated by the letters RT at the beginning of the message. It is also normal to credit the original sender by putting @[sender's name] in the message. 

• Hashtags = ways of following a topic rather than a person. People tag their own tweets with words which sometimes they've made up (first example below) and which more often are related to an event or topical subject (second example below is for the IKnit Weekender).

• When tweeting web addresses it is useful to use a service like tinyurl.com to shorten the URL. So for example, a link to one of my blog posts might be http://lixiemakesit.blogspot.com/2010/09/episode-20-of-podcast.html which is using up 67 of my precious 140 characters. Using tinyurl (free and no registration needed) it becomes http://tinyurl.com/38yz8jl which is only 26 characters. There are lots of other websites which will do the same kind of thing but I like this one. 

Reading Tweets

Option 1: You don't have to sign up to twitter to read people's tweets. This is worth remembering as it highlights that NOTHING on the internet is private. To read tweets without registering just go to twitter.com and type in the name of the person or the thing you are interested in. In this example I've typed in my twitter name (littlelixie) and hit search. 

I can now go further. I can click on any of the tweets from littlelixie or that are addressed to me (using the @littlelixie tag) and that takes me to my twitter homepage. Because I have not logged in the computer does not know I am looking at my own page, and is encouraging me to "follow" littlelixie. 

You could bookmark each person you wanted to "follow" but it would be a bit tedious switching between pages to keep up to date. That is why I could recommend Option 2....

Option 2: Register with Twitter and "follow" people as this then groups all their tweets together each time you log on. If you are worried about online security just use a different name to your real one. Simply click on 'sign up' at twitter.com and in 30 seconds you can have your own account. 

Navigating a Twitter Page

Once you have logged in, this is roughly what you will see. 

The five labelled sections are...

1. This is where you type your tweet. It can include web addresses, plain text, numbers, hashtags (#), @ symbols etc. Just remember that what you type will probably be seen by others unless you have altered your privacy settings (see below for more).
2. This indicates how many characters you have left. If it goes into negative numbers then you will have problems sending that tweet. 
3. This is where your own tweets show up once sent, plus the tweets of anyone you are following. 
4. This is your little dashboard showing the tweets you have sent, who are you following, who is following you and how many 'lists' your tweets appear in. I am not going into lists here as that is a bit more advanced but easy to understand once you are used to twitter itself. 
5. This is where you can search for a topic (i.e. knitting) a hashtag trending topic (such as #iknit) or a person (such as Bill Bailey). You can also save searches. 

How to Follow People

Find someone you want to follow and go to their twitter page (use the search tool described above).

Underneath their twitter name is a button that says 'follow'. Click on that while logged in and you'll get all their future tweets. 

Things to Remember

1. Your tweets are public unless you change your privacy settings. If you want to do this log in and click on 'settings'. At the bottom of the screen is a 'protect my tweets' tickbox. This means only people who you have approved as followers will see them. This is good if you want privacy, but bad if you want followers as it makes it impossible for people to casually come across you. 

2. You will probably get followed by some strangers. But not too many and you can block people from following you if they are being annoying. 

3. People may not be who they seem to be. You can sign up with any name on Twitter and there is no identity check. Someone may be tweeting as Lady Gaga and it turns out to be your cousin Eric. 

4. You can get lots of free and paid for apps for 3G phones that mean you can tweet from your phone. They vary in what they offer a reliability so look at reviews in the app store before you download anything. 

5. Never ever ever ever share anything you would not mind everyone knowing. For example, no email addresses or phone numbers unless you immediately want to get spammed to Herne and back. It's also easy to fall into the #tmi (too much information) trap as tweeting can feel like you're just texting your friends. 

6. Twitter.com recently announced that at any one time 3% of the servers were taken up with tweets about Justin Bieber (small teen canadian singer who teen girls can not get enough of). So don't bother tweeting about him because there's enough info out there already. 

Tweeters I would recommend

• Littlelixie - this is me!
• Craft Gossip - be warned, they send A LOT of tweets. 
• Craft - the O'Reilly craft magazine. I love their blog.
• Ravelry - got to be done really
• CraftyPod's Sister Diane - the Dude. 

There are zillions of others - try Nickerjac, Woollywormhead, yarnharlot, or the name of just about any crafter or shop you can think of. 

If you found this blog post useful then tweet it to your mates!

Tutorial Tuesday - on a Wednesday

One of the things I like best about Ravelry is the 'Friend Activity' page. To reach it you log in, click on 'friends' in the 'my notebook' menu, and then click on the 'friend activity' tab.

I have this as my ravelry bookmark page so it is the first one I look at each and every time I log in. It is fascinating to see what my Ravelry Friends are knitting, favouriting, queueing and commenting on. Often I'll see someone queue or favourite something and then see mutual friends do the same until almost the whole screen is made up of one pattern. These are the 'must make' patterns of the moment and often are just transient. However, some of them stick and become the pattern giants of the knitting and crochet world.

While cruising the forums I saw a thread where a knitter had asked how to find a list of all the most popular patterns. Someone had kindly responded with not just one, but three lists! Each subtly different.

In the following descriptions if you click on the links you'll be taken to Ravelry to the results of the search itself. These lists depend on Ravelry users so may have changed between me posting this and you looking at them.

The first search was for 'Most Popular'.

Looking at the top 8 (since my screen is displaying 4 in a row) we have...
1. Ishbel by Ysolda Teague (shawl)
2. Baby Surprise Jacket by Elizabeth Zimmermann (baby cardigan)
3. Fetching by Cheryl Niamath (gloves)
4. February Lady Sweater by Pamela Wynne (cardigan)
5. Monkey by Cookie A (socks)
6. Clapotis by Kate Gilbert (shawl/scarf)
7. Calorimetry by Kathryn Schoendorf (head band)
8. Turn a Square by Jared Flood (hat)


The second search is for 'Most Projects'.

Again, let's look at the top 8.
1. Clapotis by Kate Gilbert (shawl/scarf)
2. Fetching by Cheryl Niamath (gloves)
3. Baby Surprise Jacket by Elizabeth Zimmermann (baby cardigan)
4. Monkey by Cookie A (socks)
5. Calorimetry by Kathryn Schoendorf (head band)
6. February Lady Sweater by Pamela Wynne (cardigan)
7. Saartje's Booties by Saartje de Bruijn (baby booties)
8. Jaywalker by Grumperina (socks)

Probably no surprise that 6 of the 'most popular' are also in the 'most projects' list.

Lastly, we have the 'Most Favourites'.

Top 8 time.
1. February Lady Sweater by Pamela Wynne (cardigan)
2. Saartje's Booties by Saartje de Bruijn (baby booties)
3. Star Crossed Slouchy Beret by Natalie Larson (hat)
4. Owls by Kate Davies (Jumper)
5. French Press Felted Slippers by Melynda Bernardi
6. Lace Ribbon Scarf by Veronik Avery
7. Shalom Cardigan by Meghan McFarlane
8. Travelling Woman by Liz Abinante (shawl)

Here we see only two cross-overs from the previous lists.

"So what?" I hear you ask.

Well, anyone noticed the names appearing in these lists? Or rather, noticed the names that are not appearing? I know I've only arbitrarily taken the top 8 but there is no Norah Gaughan, no Ann Budd, no Kaffe Fassett, no Debbie Bliss. In fact no mainstream names other than Elizabeth Zimmermann. Jared Flood and Ysolde Teague are certainly big news in the knitting world but still relative newcomers and might not be on most people's lists of the top knitting designers in the world. And yet....these lists show whose patterns knitters are really enjoying. Which ones they like and which ones they come back to time and again.

And for me that is a very interesting thing.

Tutorial Tuesday - F is for Freddie

I posted this teaser pic about 5 weeks ago. I can now reveal it was.....

A very special cushion for my sister's birthday. She is somewhat hippo crazy and so when I saw the fabric at Ikea in the spring I knew it had to become something for her. Adding the initial was very easy. I got hold of some double sided fusible webbing - the type of thing which you use to hem trousers without sewing. You can buy sheets of it here (scroll down - no affiliation). If you didn't buy sheets of it you'd just need to be a bit more cretive with the trouser stuff but it would still work.

I played around with some fonts first to get an F I liked but then just ended up drawing one freehand. I cut the webbing (which has paper on both sides) to the right shape and ironed it onto my dotty fabric. I then cut the fabric to the right shape around it and ironed it onto the hippo fabric. I think that would hold it without the need for sewing but for neatness I went round the edge with a small zigzag stitch in a suitable colour.

The cushion pad comes out thanks to some plain yet yummy buttons on the back.

I admit I was pretty chuffed with this one.

Did I stop there? Never. One of the gorgeous tutorials I've been gethering on this page (also in top menu bar) was calling to me....bunting.

Is there anything as cheerful as bunting? And it was very easy to do. I literally just followed this tutorial. Except I used a piece of ribbon instead of bias binding.

I really want to make some for me!

Tutorial Tuesday - Podcast Competition Winner

Welcome to Tutorial Tuesday! For a kick off I have compiled all the suggestions you submitted as part of the podcast competition plus a few of my own favourites.

So the challenge was to comment here or on the podcast site leaving a link for a last-minute christmas present tutorial. The list is.....

• Easy Owls to sew (from Lauri) Pooch bought me a cushion like this about 2 months ago and I *love* it!
• Handpainted Santa Plate (from Ivy) Would also make a brilliant "baby's first xmas" present.
• Tea Towel Bag (from AlisonK) This would also work brilliantly with my knitting bag tutorial here.

Then these are some extra ones you might like:

• House Christmas Tree Decorations - I've made one and they are very easy. Print or trace them onto red or green card and add some glitter glue for xmas fun!
• Jewellery Pouch - I've made two of these and plan to make more. I use mine everytime I go away.
• Pouches of sweets/nuts - use 'bauble' or xmas tree shapes and you've got a great and cheap stocking filler. 

So drumroll......the winner Mr Pooch pulled out of the hat is......IVY! Congrats to you and please email me your address to littlelixie at hotmail dotcom.

Later this week I'll be posting a book review, plus the chance to win the book.

Knitting Bag from a Scarf

I bought some beautiful vintage scarves when my sister was here a few weeks ago. I thought at the time they would make good knitting bags. Here is the story of what happened to the first one.

Materials:

• Scarf - big enough to be folded in two and make a bag. 
• Lining - same size as the part of the scarf you want to use.

These can be any materials at all but two slippery materials will be harder to sew than one slippery and one cotton type or two cottons.

• Ribbon for drawstring - you need 4.5 x the width of the bag
• pins, thread, scissors (rotary cutter etc makes straight cuts easier but not essential)

STEP 1:

I gathered my materials together. I used a cotton FQ as the lining but you could be cunning and use another scarf.

I liked the red band at the top of the scarf so I used the two ends and cut out the middle.

I wasn't paying any attention to measurements - I just cut a length that looked good in relation to the width of the scarf. I cut the lining the same size.

STEP 2:

I put the lining right sides together and sew straight round 3 sides, leaving the top open. Then I put the right sides of the scarf together and sewed across the bottom and then up the sides - but leaving about 1cm unsewn where the red band started to add the fastening later on. See cunning digram.

Red arrows show where the line of stitches skips a centimetre.

STEP 3:

For me, this is the most difficult step because it totally defies logic and I don't have a picture because I did it wrong (again) the first time and had to rip back and start again. So...deep breath. Turn your lining right side out and press the seams. Leaving the scarf with right sides together. put the lining pouch inside the scarf pouch and match up the top edges. Pin around the edge so you end up with the right sides of your lining and scarf together but hidden from view.

STEP 4:

Sew around the top of the bag leaving an gap big enough to pull the whole thing inside out through. I'd say about 2.5 inches but it's up to you. If this is your first one leave a bigger gap.

STEP 5:
Pull your bag inside out using the gap you left. This is mine, with a yellow circle showing the gap.

This can be quite fiddly but is worth taking time over. You could iron it at this point but I'm not big into ironing so I skipped that.

STEP 6:

Push your lining inside the bag and smooth everything into place.

You'll still have that hole, but we're about to close that. You are going to sew a line of stitching around the outside edge of the bag to keep the lining secure and smooth inside so pin it to start you off and then sew just a few mm from the edge.  Action shot.

STEP 7:

You are now going to sew two more rows of straight stitches around your bag to create a cranny for the ribbon to run through. Take a good look at this technical diagram:

The green circle is where in step 2 we left a little gap when sewing the sides of the scarf. The yellow oblong shows the stitching around the edge of the bag (no laughing at my messy stitching) from step 6. So that leaves the two blue oblongs to show where the cranny stitching goes.  How far apart the two rows are depend on how thick your ribbon is. I used skinny ribbon and so mine was about 1cm. Try and keep it even all the way round.

STEP 8:

Almost there. Using a bodkin or some other needle, thread it with half your ribbon then poke it through the gap from step 2 on one side.

You are going to go all the way around the bag without coming out of the gap on the other side, so you'll end with the bodkin appearing again from the same place where it went in. Now flip the bag over and do the same thing with the other half of your ribbon. If you've used thick ribbon take a minute to make sure it's laying flat inside the cranny, then tie the protruding ends together to make sure they don't get lost.

Ta da!

STEP 9:

Fill with wool or whatever else tickles your fancy and feel proud of your achievement!

This would also serve well as a toiletries bag, or for clothes pegs, or toys, or sweets, or as a lavender sachet for drawers or....practically anything really!