Category Archives: Arts & Crafts
the beard hat
My friend Marie has decided to be a Viking for Halloween, and she asked if I could make her a crocheted beard. I used this pattern because I was feeling too lazy to figure it out myself, and I chose Lion Brand Homespun yarn to give it a slightly more realistic look. It’s quite a silly thing. I posted some pictures of it on Facebook and I’ve already had requests to make more of them.
costume parties = love
Okay, I know. I never update. But that’s what happens when you work 40 hours a week and have little time to do anything interesting. And if I have nothing interesting to write about, what’s the point of writing? Guess I’ll just have to start looking for things to post about.
But oh! I did do something interesting this weekend. I went to a party, yes!, I went out and socialized, and made an ass out of myself, as I tend to do at parties. I suppose I’m normally a fairly reserved person, but when I go out to social events, I kind of let myself go. Anyway, it was a toga party at my former roommate’s house, and because people were dressing up as actual Greek and Roman personae, I had to do the same. And so I was Medusa.
I decided to be Medusa only because my sister had been Medusa for Halloween a couple of years ago and I figured I could borrow her wig. Well, the wig kind of sucked; but I was already set on Medusa, so I went out, bought a new one, and attached a variety of snakes to it (with thread and wire). For the costume, I used this old snake-skin-patterned dress that I’ve been trying to get rid of for years. Glued some fancy-looking metallic gold ribbon along the top, then used the leftover bit for a tie-around belt. I attached some gold tulle fabric from one of my sister’s old dance costumes to the straps of the dress, as a sort of cape. Covered my face in makeup, put in some hoop earrings, wore a pair of strappy sandals, and ta da!–Medusa. Not the best costume ever, but it served its purpose, and a lot of people seemed to like it.
I’ve got two more costumes in the works (one for Halloween and one for a rock star party). I’ll write up some entries for those once they’re closer to being completed.
upcycling > recycling
Those of you who know me well probably know that I’m somewhat of a recycling fiend. I pretty much recycle anything I can; I do so partially because it’s better for the environment and won’t end up in a landfill, wasting space, and partially because I feel like it’s just kind of stupid not to reuse things that can be reused. Why make new things from scratch when you can make new things from old unwanted crap? And why take stuff to the recycling center when you can upcycle it into something new, which will save energy?
Take, for example, bags made out of… bags. In my case, I like to crochet bags out of plastic grocery/shopping bags. This is done by cutting the bags into strips and making a sort of plastic yarn, called “plarn.” Here is a bag that I’ve made in such a manner:
It’s crocheted out of beige Kroger bags. Pretty neat, huh? I really like making these bags, but they take FOREVER, mainly because you have to cut up tons and tons of bags just to get enough yarn. And since I try to use reusable bags when I go grocery shopping, I have to get all my bags from other people. Right now, I only have a few people donating their bags, so I have to wait until I have enough bags to make another plarn bag. (If you’re interested in sharing some of your bag hoard, let me know! I could really use some more donators…)
Here are some other upcycling ideas I practice:
- Using paper towel/toilet paper rolls as cable tidies (e.g. extension cords). It keeps them from getting all over the place and tangled up with each other.
- If you have pets, especially cats, you probably already use plastic bags for their, erm, waste. Cereal bags are also great to use – they aren’t recyclable, but they’re sturdy, so why not use them to collect kitty poo before tossing them out?
- Rather than buying wrapping paper, boxes, etc. for giftwrapping, which can be expensive and usually just gets thrown away after it’s used, try using what you might already have on hand. Wrap your presents in fabric, which won’t get destroyed in the opening of the present and can be reused (although I haven’t tried it yet, furoshiki seems really cool). Reuse boxes, even food packaging (if it’s clean, of course). Instead of buying tissue paper or some other packaging material like styrofoam peanuts or bubble wrap, try cutting up old magazines and using the crumpled scraps instead.
I’m always looking for new ways to upcycle and reuse things, so I’ll probably have more posts like this in the future. And if you have any creative ideas, I’d love to hear them!