Monday, July 9, 2012

Pinterest lied to me

If you are a lady, you've probably heard of Pinterest.  You may even have an account which you are using to post inspirational pictures for your wedding and/or baby rather than using it to post pictures of cats as God intended.  As those of you who aren't Inspiration Board maintaining heathens know, the internet exists so I can get crochet patterns and look at animals.

For those of you who are not ladies or gay men, Pinterest exists for ladies/gay men to post thinspiration, inspirational decor/wedding pictures, DIY/craft projects/food, and adorable animals.

I finally caved and followed two pins for crafts I convinced myself I would have the time and/or ability to do.  One of them involved the creator referring to questions about how to do the project as "ridiculous."  As in, she was used to dealing with ridiculous questions since she teaches elementary school.  I bought some supplies, but am still afraid of gluing myself to either newspaper or the table.  Or both.

But I figured I had to be able to make luminaries since I had both jars and stickers.

The problem with spray paint is finding a flat, even surface that won't be ruined if uncontrolled paint mist gets on it.  Most flat, even surfaces are either things you don't want to get paint on or in areas--like rooms--that you don't want to risk getting paint mist on.  Other than the hideous sun slowly roasting us all, the outdoors' other great disadvantage is a lack of flat surfaces.  Good things would be not worrying about suffocating on paint fumes.

Maybe some people are able to evenly spray paint things and not have them eventually tip over onto newspaper, but I lack that skill.  And while it's probably not entirely Pinterest's fault that the 804 faced Zeus' wrath twice in one week, severe thunderstorms are not conducive to spray painting shit.

These will probably get finished once going outside stops being like walking into an oven.  Or I'll put some flowers in them, take a tasteful picture, and put them on Pinterest to torment others.



Thursday, July 5, 2012

USA! USA!

Warmth for Warriors  collects knit and crocheted hats for US soldiers.  This summer, they're taking donations of cotton washcloths.

Washcloths have been a good portable crochet project since some of my other projects have either gotten too big or require a pattern book (and I don't have any small cross stitch projects going right now).  I was able to get five washcloths from two colors of leftover yarn, but I didn't do the borders until I'd finished the top three.  Which means that two of them don't have borders, but it's the thought that counts, right?

For those of you playing along at home, it's an easy pattern:

Chain 23
HDC in 3rd chain from hook, HDC across
Chain 2, HDC in back loops of all stitches

And just keep doing that until you've got a square.  Remember, ignore your turning chain.  The HDC doesn't play by society's rules, man.

For the border, join the yarn with a slip stitch.  SC around.  For the sides, wonder what the hell counts as a stitch, then just jab your hook in wherever the spirit moves you.  For the second row of the border, SC in back loops only.  Consider the finished border and wonder if you screwed something up somewhere.