Monday, September 26, 2011

I sold my first pattern on Ravelry!! Yay!! It was for my "Quick and Easy Coffee Cup Jacket".


I also wrote a second version of the pattern using UK terminology. It is now available for sale in my Ravelry shop "Deidre Eyles Designs" along with the original version using US terms.

I've also updated my info on my etsy shop: CrochetAlaCarte.etsy.com.

I've set up a Face Book page for Crochet A la Carte. Please feel free to take a look and "like" it if you enjoy it:0)  Thank you.


Friday, September 16, 2011

Up-cycled jean bag for me


I decided my daughter's up-cycled jean purse turned out so well, I would give my old favorite pair of Calvin Klein button fly jeans a new life! They were very old and had been "retired" due to great wearing in spots, but I hated to throw them away. I love the buttons on them!

Here they are after cutting the legs off. I'll probably use the legs to make a change purse and some of those microwave heating pads.

 Turned inside out to see how they look and lay before trimming them shorter.

 Trimmed and sewn inside out.
 And the final look after turning right side out.
 This is a gorgeous teal blue Batik material with various shades of greens, browns, blues and purples. Liner sewn and ready to install. I forgot to photograph the next part, but I sewed in several pockets for specific items; ie, cell phone (mobile), a tube of lippy, my business cards, of course!, credit and membership card wallet and a couple extra, just in case!
 

Tada! The finished purse!
 The handle is only temporary. It's a spare handle from something (not sure what) that I found in the house. I haven't decided what I want the handle to be yet... This one just clips on at the ends.
 This is a gorgeous wool blend yarn I had on hand. I just did a free form piece to go over the button to close. The colors matched the liner perfectly! It's like they were made for each other:0)
 The front pockets are perfect for storing my coffee cup cozies:)
 A pocket that's easily accessible for your lippy is a must:)
 And of course I couldn't forget my business cards. They need to be in easy reach! I placed it on the front side of the liner.

And there you have it! My up-cycled jean purse. A new life for a beloved pair of jeans:0)

upcycle jean bags



My daughter had an old pair of jeans that no longer fit and had holes in the knees, and as they had a lot of embroidered butterflies on them, I decided to make her a purse out of them. I cut the legs off, turned them inside out, and sewed across the leg openings. As the material is denim and quite thick, and as the crotch part is an odd shape, I had to fiddle a bit to get it to work properly. Here is the finished product.

 I let her pick out the material from my material stash and this is the one she chose. 
It looks like a sky with clouds so suits the butterflies really well, don't you think?

 The next step was adding a handle. I used 2 strands of embroidery floss, which she picked out, to crochet the handle. There was a bit of miscommunication on our parts; she wanted stripes and I thought she meant across, but after it was done she informed me she meant length-wise like a Rainbow! I did offer to redo it, but she said it was ok and that she liked it anyway:0)


 
 Attaching the handles was the tricky part. I crocheted the handle in sc, 6 sc across. First I worked several rows of sc. Then I worked 2 sc, ch 2, fed the skein of floss through the belt loop, then worked the last 2 single crochet. for the next row, I turned, then worked the first 2 sc, worked 2 sc over the ch 2, then fed the skein of floss through the belt loop again, and worked the last 2 sc. Then I had to repeat the whole process again to finish off on top of the belt loop. Doing it this way, I ended up with a bar of crochet behind the loop so the handle should be pretty secure.
 
 
 I'm thinking of making another handle and attaching it on the 2 front belt loops as well for added stability when carrying the purse. Maybe I could make them in the longer Rainbow stripes?... There was some embroidery left on the legs as well, maybe I will make a matching change purse...  She still has a few more old pairs of jeans with embroidery and embellishments...more purses anyone? :0)

Wednesday, September 14, 2011

Halloween crochet

Now that the kids are back in school, I've had more time to get things done. I'm concentrating more on my etsy shop and getting more items made to post on it.

For my cup cozies and coasters, I've come up with some Halloween items. 


This is a really cool felted cup cozy for Halloween. The spider's web is hand stitched in a fine weight wool yarn. Each "anchor" line is stitched separately so that if one gets caught and breaks, it won't pull the others. Each line of webbing going across is separate as well. This pin is metal with black and white rhinestones on the body. I found it at my local Michael's craft store.




  
This is modelled after my Molar Coasters. It's a rotten molar! Every dental care professional's worst nightmare!!

This adorable little fellow is cute enough to make any child (or adult) smile:0)

This cute little guy is the Molar Monster!  He's what happens when a good tooth goes bad!

Don't they make a cute pair?

It's Frankencozy! Isn't he just adorable? :0)

All of these frightening little fellows can be found in my etsy shop and I'm listing more every day.