Here We Go Again: Berlin Edition!

I had a sudden realization.

And this whole post is going to seem ridiculous in juxtaposition with the previous post, but several years (4.5 – good golly) have passed since I wrote that, so this feels like a fresh realization.

If you had asked me, six months ago, what I would do with my time if I found myself with four months off, my answer would have been a list of projects and outings, things like:

Learn piano

Learn German

Go to all the museums

Go on hikes

Bake all the bread

Finally start that blog I want to have

Finish lingering sewing projects

Solve problem corners of my apartment

If you’re new here, you’re missing a key detail: I’ve spent the last nearly-four months without a job. I quit, got married, and moved to Berlin, Germany, where I now live with my brand-new husband.

With that in mind, let’s reevaluate how those last four months have looked, based on the list above.

Learn piano	Haven't touched it
Learn German	Doing alright, picking up speed
Go to all the museums	Only been to 3 of the MANY that I have access to
Go on hikes	I went on one before leaving Seattle
Bake all the bread	Nope
Finally start that blog I want to have	Hi!
Finish lingering sewing projects	Not even close
Solve problem corners of my apartment	Actually doing alright on this one

Now, here’s the realization: I'm not doing these things because I haven't given myself permission to do them. Instead, I have been looking at a list of things that, while they're necessary to complete, don't need to all be done before I do anything else.

The reality is that life will always happen. I will always have that list of things to do. So I need to schedule MY priorities in...or I'll never get to them.

So. Welcome to my attempt at prioritizing my life MY way and documenting it both to satisfy my unending need to document and in case someone else finds it valuable. Let's get rolling before all the lights are green.

Starting Over

Let's face it: I'm not a craft blogger.

I'm not good at design, I have no patience for photography, and my ability to consistently churn out projects is a travesty.

This blog is not beautiful. I won't have thousands of followers once I start it. But I'm tired of not doing anything.

---

Ok, let me start from the beginning.

Once upon a time, a recent(ish) college grad decided to become a craft blogger. See, she had many many unfinished craft projects and not too much to do in her spare time. She decided to produce two posts per week - one finished project and one lifestyle post. She had a schedule set and a bunch of ideas, so off she went.

And she learned a lot about herself, really! Mainly, the first few sentences of this post.

I'm not a craft blogger.

I'm never going to be a craft blogger.

But I'm sick of not really having a hobby. I did some swing dancing! It was phenomenal, I love it, and I want to keep doing it, but it's not going to be my hobby. In college, theater was my hobby. I spent about 20 hours per week either on stage, backstage, in the shop, or in production meetings. It was wonderful - I was painfully busy, but I was productive.

Then I graduated and got a job, as you do. And I suddenly had hobby paralysis. I tried to start a blog, I tried to start a YouTube series, I took up swing dancing (that lasted for a full year!), I kept sewing, I made friends, but none of them felt like my True Hobby.

A quick side story:

In college, my roommate had this theory (to which I wholeheartedly subscribe) that people make different decisions following the same decision-making processes. The way we presented it to people was to first ask them to describe how they shop.

I, for example, like to shop in groups, and I tend to stalker-shop. I follow people to all the different racks, rarely breaking off on my own. I generally go in with the intention of finding something trendy and cute, but leave with simple jeans and a tshirt.

We then inform them that that's how you find boys.

I, for example, like to go to parties in groups, and I tend to stick with my friends throughout the night. I follow people through all the different conversation clumps, rarely breaking off on my own. I generally go in with the intention of finding new friends and having a rollicking good time, but leave around 1:30am because I'm tired.

The reason I bring up the Shopping Theory is the same reason I brought up college theater: the reason I couldn't find my True Hobby. I don't have a True Hobby. My True Hobby is whatever I want to do right then. I like to be busy with many different tasks all at once: some just starting, some in progress, and some close to done.

What I feel like doing right now is trying my hand at blogging. I can't promise that I'll post consistently, but I can promise a lot of crazy, scatterbrained posts like this until I pin down exactly what I want this blog to be.

And I have a reason why I'm going to release this before it is anything that a real project is.

And that's because of the Shopping Theory.

You see, I've taken this business development quiz that pinpoints your career strengths. Without going into too much detail, one of my strengths is the Activator, who is a person who doesn't want to wait until everything is perfect to get going. I want to start NOW. You don't wait to start driving until all the lights are green, right?

So I'm following the Shopping Theory and acknowledging that if I wait until everything is perfect, it will never get done. Here it is, in all its imperfections. I'll improve it as I go. I'll tell you about all the things that I'm working on NOW because I can't wait for conditions to be perfect. I'm going to take my spare time one stoplight at a time.

Go Before Green.

(that's the new title, if y'all didn't notice)

(for anyone who's curious, it was called Tying Up Some Loose Ends before, which is WAY too long and complicated and has multiple e's in a row, so this is an improvement)

(ps feel free to check out my old posts from when I thought I was gonna be a craft blogger - the photography is awful and the instructions are unclear)

(sorry, this post is really long. I'm rather talkative, so I don't know what I promise in terms of post length, but I acknowledge the absurd length of this one)

(kudos if you've made it this far, but I also want to say that this blog won't always be this ugly. I promise)

Costume Party

A couple Sundays ago, I received a cryptic text from a friend. It read, "I need your help this week." And I got a follow up, "We need to... make a quilt... sorta..."

When we met up and talked, I got the whole story. He had been invited to an Adventure Time-themed costume party. In order to get into the party, you have to be dressed up, and there were no duplicate costumes allowed, so you had to sign up for a character on the Facebook event.

He decided to be Old Finn. He showed me this picture:

Photo found here

He also brought about three yards of denim and a blue tablecloth. He thought we might cut pieces of tablecloth out and hot glue them to the denim to look like a quilt.

I scoffed. If we were going to make a quilt, we were going to do it right. So, two evenings of crafting and many little pieces of fabric later, we ended up with this:

I built two small quilts out of denim and backed it in the tablecloth. We hot glued the decorations on to maintain a cartoonish look. Then, I stitched the shoulders together to create a quilt poncho of sorts and he dug up some rope for the belt. We used a grey shirt for the claw arm. 

This was also when I realized that I'm going to LOVE having kids and making them Halloween costumes!

New Year - Old Goals

Happy New Year everyone!

I'm not one for New Years resolutions - I've come to the conclusion that if I'm going to change something about myself or my habits, it's best to start trying RIGHT NOW instead of waiting for a kickoff date. But I know that they really work for some people, and I won't lie - I use January 1st as an opportunity to evaluate my current goals and adjust tactics.

So, in the spirit of reflection, let's take a look at one of my lagging projects that I finally finished recently - pillowcases!

For Christmas of 2012, I decided I would embroider pillowcases for some close friends and family. I successfully completed a couple and shipped them off to the recipients before I had a chance to take pictures, but here is one that I completed in time for Christmas and didn't deliver until November 2013:

Here are a couple that I completed late and delivered later:

And here's one that I didn't complete until just recently and was able to just hand to the recipient immediately:

The moral of this story? My goal last year was to get this blog up and running. This year, I'm going to be consistent about it. Fingers crossed, I'll get 52 posts up over the course of the year. The vast majority of them will be finished crafts. Dare I say that I will complete 52 projects this year??

Stay tuned - we'll see :)

Record Bowls

I had a realization about Christmas this year.

To be more exact, I had a realization about Christmas BREAK. This is my first year without a real Christmas break, so when it was suddenly December 23rd, I found myself without gifts to distribute. Until this year, I'd always had the week or so following Christmas to finish up the gifts for my friends and I would deliver them when I returned to school after the new year. Not so much this year.

Ah well, you live and learn, right?

So this year, I made a bunch of the same gift to distribute to people. I had some 45s sitting around that I never listened to, so I made them into bowls!

I followed this tutorial.

Start with some records. I used 45s, but this works for full-sized LPs as well.

Place them on an oven-safe bowl on a cookie sheet. Preheat your oven to 200 degrees. Pop it in. The tutorial says to set your timer for 8-10 minutes, but since 45s are smaller, I left them in for 5-8.

When the timer goes, pull it out. I used a different one of the same bowl to help with shaping. Watch out, they'll be hot, but they also cool SUPER fast, so some scorched fingertips were par for the course for me.

Voila! I learned that if you leave them in for longer, the vinyl starts to shrink, so you can make taller or shorter by adjusting the time in the oven.

I'm planning on covering the bottom with a neutral-colored paper. I'll add pictures when I've done that, but until then, enjoy!

Pillow Sweaters

'Tis the season to be crafty!

I'm in a place in my life where I want my home to be a grown-up level of festive, but I don't really have the budget or the stockpile of decorations to do it. So I'm starting that stockpile. Little by little.

This year, one of the things I'm adding to the stockpile is some new pillowcases. In case you were wondering, I consider sewing the fourth side of a pillow to be one of the worst things that a person could be forced to do. Right up there with talking with a close talker.

So, I took a look at my sofa...

...and realized that it wasn't exactly the most festive thing out there. I love those pillows and all, but they don't exactly scream CHRISTMAS.

Living in Seattle, I know that our thrift stores can get picked over pretty quickly. I also know that, with ugly sweater party season upon us, the selection of festive sweaters - ugly or not - would be pretty slim.
I had the bright idea to buy some thrift store Christmas sweaters to cover them up.

Then, I had the brighter idea to use CARDIGANS!

I snagged these three at Value Village and whipped up some cozy little sweaters for my pillows. Bonus: buttons. Because all of them have button closures, I just had to sew the four corners and button them straight over the existing pillowcase!

Behold:

Cozy little pillows.

I'm already formulating a new project to use this technique, so stay tuned for an in-depth tutorial!

Headwarmer - Free Pattern!

I mentioned in this post that I went to London for a weekend to audition for Star Wars. What resulted was standing outside in line for six hours in order to hand my headshot to a woman. Luckily, this was exactly what I expected.

Regardless of the fact that I knew nobody would notice me, I wanted to look my best when I got to the front of the line. Being November, I knew it would be cold. I didn't want to wear a hat because, um, hi, hat hair. So, at the last minute, I grabbed a ball of yarn from my stash to whip up a headwarmer on the plane.

This only took me about an hour, including trial and error on size and length. It still ended up a little wide and a tiny bit long (it slips down somewhat), but it did its job and I didn't have absurd hat hair!

Here's the pattern.

Using bulky weight yarn and a size H hook (adjust for gauge).

ch 11
skip first chain, sc in each across (10)
sc in first two, ch 1 and skip next stitch, sc in next 4, ch 1 and skip next, sc in last 2
sc in each across
dc in each across to length
sc last three rows

Sew buttons on the final three rows to line up with buttonholes created by the chains in the second row. BAM, headwarmer! Happy crafting!