What I am working on now...

When I really should be doing something else more important...The pattern is from Umami by Ezura Yoshimi (ISBN4-579-1085-6).

Actually, this is sort of important. I have promised myself this bag for a while now. I am using a super-synthetic snake skin that I bought at Fabricland from the remnant bin. I finally have a project for it. I am finding the gathers more challenging than I thought I guess because it is kind of hard to see the thread on the fabric and, because my new sewing machine is proving sort of difficult to work with. It is not a fancy machine--I just bought a cheaper brother machine because I wanted to make sure that I wanted to continue to sew--but now I sort of regret it. I loved the brother machine that I had when we lived in England but this one is not so easy to use. Anyway, I will post the project after I have time to photograph it.

Murakami mits

Just taking a quick peek at Ravelry before I am out to pick up my daughter and I saw these amazing mittens that combine two of my favorite hobbies: knitting and Haruki Murakami! Tora says that the mittens are knit with the following quote from a Wild Sheep Chase: "You'll never see that woman again...Because you thought only of yourself." A Wild Sheep Chase by Haruki Murakami

More at Tora's blog: knittingalot

February is for finishing...wait it is almost March...

Despite signing on to "February is For Finishing" on the Toronto Ravelry forum of the same name, it is now almost March and I am not done...guess that is because I added a purse to the line up in addition to the scarf and hat that I am re-doing from last year's super-lovely alpaca purchase. BUT, too the rescue is the latest greatest coffee and a kick in the pants challenge from the folks at the Toronto Craft Alert! Run, don't walk to post, share, and finish your craft projects for a chance to win a basket of goodies from local artists, crafters, and shops worth an estimated $700.00! Details here...

The Yudu

May have to invest in one of these! Via Sister Diane viacraftstylish...One of the coolest things about going to CHA is seeing lots of brand-new craft supplies and tools. I thought I'd take a few posts here to share some things that had my crafty fingers tingling in anticipation.

The Provo Craft booth was mobbed with people during the show, and it was all because of the Yudu. It's a portable, all-in-one screen printer, and Provo had a whole fleet of them cranking out screened T-shirts for an excited crowd.

Yudu's design is pretty genius: It comes with a metal mesh screen. You cover it with a sheet of emulsion, and place a transparency (printed from your home printer) over the emulsion. Then the Yudu's built-in light table exposes the emulsion

You can pull a bunch of prints, and then—here's the best bit—wash the emulsion right out of the screen. Then you can reburn it with new designs again and again. The print area is 11 inches x 14 inches—sized for a T-shirt front, but you can print all kinds of fabrics and papers.

Yudu uses water-based, nontoxic inks, which come in lots of great colors.

There's a great, detailed video tutorial over at the Yudu website, along with diagrams, inks and accessories, and more.

'Scuse me now...I need to go screen print everything in sight.