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Tiny owl charm

I was sure I would be punished for this, but I took an hour out of my workday (or perhaps a little more) the other day to do some cross-stitch. I haven’t done cross-stitch, except as part of a general embroidery project, in a long time. I wanted something small, but fortunately I have a good library of patterns for small images. I ended up with a design modified from one in 2001 Cross Stitch Designs by Better Homes & Gardens.

When I say small, I mean small. I discovered as soon as I started to stitch that I had made some tactical oversights – in particular, stitching over one strand on 28-count Monaco does not allow for half stitches. However, I made some alterations and omissions on the fly and came up with what I think is rather a nice finished product.

Punk fish?

Escaping my work last night with a bit of crochet I decided to try to make a little Fizzgig kind of beast, but as I worked on it the design asked to be a punk with a mohawk. I’m not sure that would be anyone’s first guess on seeing it, but I am experimenting with new construction techniques and it was definitely useful for that endeavor. The pattern is below, anyway; apologies for the terrible pictures. My pattern conventions are here, and all decreases are made on right-side rows so you may use whatever technique you like, including invisible decrease. My guy is in scratchy acrylic worsted weight with an E hook; gauge is not important.

Part A. Make 2.
1. Magic ring, ch 1, sc 4.
2. Ch 1, turn; 2sc across (8 sc).
3. Ch 1, turn; *2sc, sc, 2sc*, sc 2, repeat *…* (12 sc).
4. Ch 1, turn; in FL only: 2sc, sc 10, 2sc (14 sc). [rem lps will be on the outside of the piece.]
5. Ch 1, turn; 2sc, sc 12, 2sc (16 sc).
6. Ch 1, turn; 2sc, sc 14, 2sc (18 sc).
7. Ch 1, turn; 2sc, sc 4, dec, sc, dec, sc, dec, sc 4, 2sc (17 sc).
8. Ch 1, turn; 2sc, sc 15, 2sc (19 sc).
9. Ch 1, turn; 2sc, sc, dec, sc 2, dec, sc 3, dec, sc 2, dec, sc, 2sc (17 sc).

The first one you make, finish off the yarn and attach eyes between rows 7 and 8, centered and about 3 stitches (of row 8 ) apart. Leave the second half attached to the skein.

B. Turn the second half inside-out and meet the corners. Sc row 9 to itself. I did this in inner loops only but it occurs to me now it should be outer loops only (FL of near row, BL of far row). This is 8 sc. Ch 1 and sc back again, putting an extra sc in the last st or on the side of the initial sc.

C. Open up the second half a bit and match the first half to it at the corners and magic ring. Sc them together: down the edges of the rows to the magic ring and back up again. In the following picture, step B is along the top right and step C goes around the equator.

D. If you want the mohawk to be a different color, FO. Otherwise ch 2. Turn right-side-out and stuff. Attach new yarn if applicable and sc closed (st row 9 of the first half to itself). Add additional rows with increases as necessary to get a good mohawk look.

In other news, I’m teaching a Sew-Op class on a parent’s birthday again – my second alterations class is tonight. Happy birthday, Dad!

Homemade iron-on patches

Craft Countdown #9 was robot iron-ons. It was getting close to 11:30 and I was worried about running out of ideas, so I started rooting through my fabric drawers. The top one holds flannel-ish material and denim, and I pulled out a small remnant of robot fabric. I loved this fabric, but there is so little of it, the options for using it are limited. I had thought about making iron-on patches out of it, but hadn’t gotten around to it.

What I had on hand for fusible web in sheet form was Wonder Under, so that is what I used.

I cut pieces, lined them up with the pictures, and ironed them down. Of course, it being 11:30, I did two dumb things: I started ironing one on upside-down, necessitating a later cleaning of the iron, and I peeled the paper off before cutting them instead of leaving it as a protective backing. They’re still cute.

Now I just have to figure out what to do with them. I have made these before, out of other fabrics that had nice little pictures, but they languish in a drawer for the most part.

Of course, making the business card case and the memo pad holder gave me a use for some of my commercial iron-ons, so maybe these will see use in such projects as well.