September 25, 2009

A cap Sanna (á-là Jennifer Lopes)




This picture of Jennifer Lopes in a cute cap made many Osinka girls lose the head and so it was for me. As it is not a very detailed picture it became quite a puzzle and stimulated our own imagination and creativity.



I chose rather thick 100 % wool yarn (Mark Kattens Tuva) as I wanted this cap for winter. Crochet size 4, needles size 5, needed appr. 150 gr.

I re-made mine at least 10-15 times in some places before I reached the result I was satisfied with. The body of the cap is crocheted but when I was making a visor it turned out it’s too rough, so I knitted it instead.



September 24, 2009

Silver Clay

I am a very curios person; the family calls me “Curios George” for reason as I always want to try something new. I have been making simple bead jewellery for quite a time and heard a lot about the polymer clay. Then I came across a completely new technique- silver clay, which is pure silver blended with some particles and has a consistency of clay. When burnt in high temperatures (in kiln or by torch) these particles burn out and you get a piece in fine silver.

I enrolled myself to a course and this is what we managed to do during the two days we were there.

Pendant Black Current.





It is a technique when you have a real leaf, for example in this case from a black current bush and paint it with silver clay in the form of paste. You need to apply 10-12 layers and let the piece dry completely between the sessions of painting. Then you attach a holder and decorate with the clay syringe if you wish. I also added a white pearl later.

Small pendant Colourful beads





The same technique, although with a much smaller leaf. Three colourful beads were added later. When choosing leaves it’s better to go with more robust, like black current, pelargonium etc as very thin or fragile leaves can crack under the weight of the clay.

Pendant Old Runes




We also made pendants from the clay and decorated them with artificial zirconium stones. It is important to use specially created stones as the natural ones will crack in the process of burning.

The results were amazing, although it was not always easy to reach the look you have in your head. It’s a lot of fun to work with this technique and you can also continue at home as it does not demand complicated and expensive equipment.

For help and inspiration I would recommend books that I bought myself, by Irina Miech:
Metal Clay for Beaders
http://www.amazon.com/Metal-Clay-Beaders-Irina-Miech/dp/0871162334
Inventive Metal Clay for Beaders
http://www.amazon.com/Inventive-Metal-Clay-Beaders-Exciting/dp/087116258X/ref=pd_sim_b_3
More Metal Clay for Beaders
http://www.alibris.co.uk/booksearch?qwork=10207155&matches=11&author=Miech%2C+Irina&browse=1&cm_sp=works*listing*title

There are of course many other sources, just google it!

Double Chocolate bolero


Some time ago I spotted out a very beautiful bolero that girls from osinka were crocheting on-line. That actually means that there is only a picture and knitters are making their own versions by choosing similar patterns. Very often the things done this way are extremely different from the original photo and sometimes in my humble opinion are better than the original. Many thanks to the girls!

In my case I used the pattern they suggested and the method of crocheting (in one piece) plus sleeves but had to adjust it directly on my mannequin for a tight fit.
The original was in black and other girls versions were mostly monochrome, yet I wanted to make something in several brown colours so I went for two shades of chocolate: milk and dark. The yarn is viscose/cotton.


As the yarn was rather thick it took barely a few days to make this piece.


Bookmark “Italian traffic light”












Every September millions of school children and students start their new academic year. At my favourite site we organized a lace competition “School start”. Works sent to this competition could be done in any of lace techniques, and should be connected to the world of studies/school.

My choice was to make a book mark in tatting (frivolité) with beads. In Russian lace making there is a technique called ANKARS, which appeared rather recently. I had a wonderful book by Rina Stepnaja. Tatting in Ankars Technique (http://www.labirint-shop.ru/books/156305/ ) and wanted to practice in making this unusual very beautiful lace.

When I chose the colours I was thinking of bright fall colours: red, yellow, green. Later when I was done (rather successfully) with the project I needed to choose a name for it too, and then I suddenly remembered our trip to Rome, some years before. The most impressive thing I saw there (besides the tiny cars) was their traffic lights. The upper, red light was at least 2-3 times larger than the others, yellow and green. Approximately like in the picture here:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/acampada/1102958493/

We read in the travel guides before the visit to Italy that there are only two kinds of pedestrians there: the quick and the dead. We tried to be the former ones and I guess the huge red lights were meant to help us with this. Yet I should say they did not really work, cars were moving no matter what light was on.

So my little bookmark has disproportional 2-head red “light” and “normal” others.

More about ANKARS technique and books you can find at this page:
http://www.beadsky.com/make_gallery_ankars.php?ln=en






Wine red bolero






Wine red is one of my favourite colours. Not so sticking-in-the-eyes as scarlet or classic red yet nobody will pass unnoticed in this hue. And in combination with pink it really looks great.

Since a long time I got as present two balls of violet cotton yarn of rather unknown origin and did not know what to do with it. Besides the very limited quantity I found out that it gives away colour easily and it was not a good idea to use it as it is. So I decided to dye it to another colour.

The dyeing process went very well and the bolero does not give away any more colour.

The pattern I found in a knitting magazine Diana from 2006. I am not however completely satisfied with the result, as I find it too short and constantly trying to mode up when I raise my arms. So it is possible I’ll make some alternations later.