The Crafting Thread

[Auspice]

@surreality said in The Crafting Thread:

@Auspice I pretty much injured myself laughing when I saw the rock one. Pretty + Snarky + Mermaids = win.

The lady I linked it to loves it.

The only thing that'd stop me from making it (besides the cost! $5 per pattern isn't TOO bad, but not a cost I wanna pay up front..... but individually they are $7 each! which is a lot! most patterns top out at $5) is the metallic thread in them.

That stuff's a biiiiiiiiiiiitch. Pretty. But annoying af to work with. It just shreds all over the place.

[surreality]

@Auspice I feel you on the metallic thread. I do. I went so overkill on it for one project I haven't actually touched it since. If I can find a pic somewhere, I'll link it, and I think you'll understand immediately.

[Auspice]

@surreality said in The Crafting Thread:

@Auspice I feel you on the metallic thread. I do. I went so overkill on it for one project I haven't actually touched it since. If I can find a pic somewhere, I'll link it, and I think you'll understand immediately.

Last I used it was for our group project during steotch and all I stitched with it was a teeny little bat.

I had to use every last inch of what I was given to do it with. My first two attempts (2 strands, so) just shredded themselves.

I thought the lovely mink yarn I've never used because it breaks so easy was bad. Metallics are wooooooooorse.

[surreality]

@Auspice These were freeform embroidery... which when I started the first one, I had never actually done before. I would try to get newer/better pictures but I am pretty sure my mother has this in a vault somewhere, wrapped in acid free paper.

(For folks who don't know, I used to make designer doll clothes for a living. One of many insane jobs I've had.)

...it's all couched in metallics and then... overkill. I adapted a design from a Dover clip art book of art nouveau borders for it.

I am still hunting for more of that fabric.

[Auspice]

new project.
trying embroidery style I've never done before.

this is gonna be terrible

[surreality]

@Auspice That is so not terrible.

If it makes you feel any better, I hadn't done any needlework in years until about a little over a month ago. Doll clothes burnout like whoa. ALLLLLLLLLLLLLL of that shit was beaded/ribbon embroidered/sequinned/etc. all over the frickin' place, and all at teensywee scale. The pic above was the over the top one, though. 300+ hours on that from sketch to completion, and probably cost me $250+ for all that went into it all, no joke. (I miss you, 90s time and budget and optimism, even if it took me this long to get back to this.)

I have a concept I've been refining for... two weeks now? And just got around to the 3rd round of prelim testing last night after two false starts. (Read: 'This looks OK but for the amount of work this is gonna be, it needs to be better than this.' Wash, rinse, repeat.)

Partway through I realized I'd have to order special materials for it due to the size, because they weren't 'can get it at Michael's', and while there were options at amazon...

(It's full of fractional stitches. I hate me.)

...something too specific for amazon was going to make me hate life less.

I am now in that weird blend of 'anxious and super excited' because I just ordered the 'dammit I didn't want to spend this money!' fabric.

And that weird blend of anxious and super excited and 'oh gods I don't wanna clean the workspace please gods no' re: debating whether I should just wait a few months to order colors I will need for $$$, or wait one month and spend $$ (and fucktons of time and energy) to dye something custom (that may or may not work and result in having wasted $$ + time + energy and require waiting longer and spending $$$ on colors anyway).

If I could ramp down my default setting from 'ZOMG OVERKILL', it would be nice. But, well. See competition design of doom for how well that ever goes.

Irony: this design was supposed to be the easier one. It still is, but... the other thing I wanna do is converting this gorgeous carpet design I found? Which is dirt simple normally. Unless the carpet you wanna convert is one of those hyperdetailed tiny knots silk ones, which this... turns out to be. (Zoom in... what makes it interesting makes it 'hahahahahahhaahaha I'm a crazy person!) That I would dye stuff for, and even have the stuff to dye in hand! Great deal, and I love me some tencel! Thank you, ebay! ...but even charting that fucking thing feels exhausting as fuck and this other thing is simpler.

[Auspice]

@surreality said in The Crafting Thread:

@Auspice That is so not terrible.

It's my first ever attempt at thread painting and I am 100% this dog:

[surreality]

@Auspice Aspects of it are fairly free-form and sculptural, from what I remember of it. I haven't done it myself. (This is what I get for growing up with fiber people though, srsly. SOMEONE I knew growing up did it, and I can't remotely recall who at this point.)

There's a fussy tidy precise version, which the lady my mom hung out with when I was a kid did, and I just... no. A lot of more recent styles are a lot more abstract and look like a LOT of fun, though. https://www.instagram.com/chloe.amy.avery/ has some amazing stuff I've been drooling over, but I don't think my even lowish grade OCD would let me go there.

[Auspice]

@surreality OCD issues are part of why it's hard. I start wanting to make the strokes into a pattern or even them all up.

[surreality]

@Auspice Exactly. Same. I look at the examples on that link and I'm like OOH SO FUCKING COOL! and then am like 'nope I can't'. Especially love the combo painted/stitched things. My brain's like 'maybe just go there some day'.

[Auspice]

250x250 grid on 18 count aida.

Because the ladies I stitch with are all doing the Harry Potter SAL and gdi. I love how the house banners look from part one so..... here I go.

[surreality]

@Auspice You have my empathy. Also, swear to gods the oatmeal/natural is the least crazymaking.

"Eh, instead of cutting something up again, I will just use this piece of black we got for this test run."

^ I regret this. This was stupid. I am definitely suffering for it. Still torn on whether I hate it more than the white, though, which felt like deck chair material.

[Auspice]

@surreality said in The Crafting Thread:

@Auspice You have my empathy. Also, swear to gods the oatmeal/natural is the least crazymaking.

"Eh, instead of cutting something up again, I will just use this piece of black we got for this test run."

^ I regret this. This was stupid. I am definitely suffering for it. Still torn on whether I hate it more than the white, though, which felt like deck chair material.

I just bought more black the other day because I fucked up cutting some black.

Dear brain: add 3" border means per side. Not two sides.

So I have an entire thing of black only good for small shit now.

But hopefully the new one is big enough for two projects: my Pixel solar system and the Star Wars black work pattern I got my hands on.

I have talked myself out of doing the black work in shades of grey......except I went worse. Two metallics.

Haha

[surreality]

@Auspice I feel you. I feel you SO HARD.

For black and the other stuff... while everyone SWEARS by the ottlites? I have LED lamps from Lowe's that are STUPID CHEAP by comparison and, bluntly, work 1000000000x better. I dunno if they're dead accurate on color, but I use them for working and now just use the portable ottlite for quick phone pics of things.

This one: https://www.lowes.com/pd/Utilitech-13-25-in-Adjustable-Stainless-Steel-LED-Desk-Lamp-with-Metal-Shade/1000003090 (Also dammit I do not need this: https://www.lowes.com/pd/Hailey-Home-Descartes-29-in-Blackened-Bronze-Led-Rotary-Socket-Table-Lamp-with-Metal-Shade/1000966736 but now I want one so much. So impractical, I do not have the desk space for that, but but but but... sometimes I'm grateful I'm broke.)

Seriously... these things are my salvation, and made working on the black suddenly almost normal vs. trying to work with the ottlite. And you can't beat $20 for a stellar crafting lamp. (They carry the same kind in a clip-on for the same price, too.) We ended up getting one in Florida because I was going crazy without one in the general dim hotel light, and we hadn't realized how much of a difference it made. They seem to go in and out of stock in the different colors for some reason.

Though you need to use more than the usual two strands, considering the cost of metallics... take a peek here: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07PQXY5J7/
I have a major metallics weakness, and know I'll use them a lot, so it ends up being super worth it to get stuff like that rather than single spools or small hanks, unless I need something super specific. Quality on what I've gotten from them thus far is excellent, and I like some of the colors I can't find elsewhere.

I figured out roughly how much I'd need for the final version of this thing, and since I'm committed now... yeeeeeeup, I'mma be dyeing some shit, 'cause there is NO way I'm spending $200+ on basic floss. That is just noooooooooot happening. Plus, finding 6 skeins of 42 colors without running all over the state to every Michaels and AC Moore is just all the frickin' NOPE in the world.

[surreality]

I FEEL CALLED OUT BY THIS MEME.

[surreality]

This morning, me: "I'm going to make some damned progress on this fucking thing today."

This morning, me five minutes later: "OOoooh, what's this?"

This afternoon, me: "I will just see if they maybe have the right fabric. Doubtful, but they might!"

This afternoon, twenty seconds after finding out they (as predicted) don't have the right fabric: "Let me see what else they've got that might work!"

This afternoon, twenty seconds after that: "This print is gorgeous."

This afternoon, my mother, simultaneous with the above: "This is why I can't bring you anywh--that print is gorgeous!"

This evening, me: "I do not want to swap out this color even if it'd probably only take a little over an hour... I'll try something weird to totally waste some time, because why not?"

And that's how I ended up staring at a random thread doodle of a Bulgarian stitch sample I guesstimated how to do from a scan of an antique leaflet in a language I don't speak or read on a wee square of cheapass buckram.

This is so my life.

<writes 'I will not derail into something else that will take forever just because I don't want to replace a color goddammit' on the blackboard 1000x>

[Olsson]

You get more and more good and less sexualized miniatures of female warriors and the like these days in miniature wargaming which I am enjoying. Painted these two up semi-recently.

But also demons.

[Auspice]

it's not fair that such a small section takes so many hours.

[surreality]

@Auspice That looks great so far, though. Lot of colors for that space (and close together, too, eeee).

Also, owl. I mean, how can you go wrong when you owl!

[Auspice]

@surreality It's Hedwig!
I have so so so so so so much more of the first pattern drop for the HP SAL to do. <sob>

In other news, this is my new favorite pattern and I am buying it soon, I swear to glob: