Seeing Green

 It's almost June and the nature is getting greener every day. I've drawn inspiration from the nature around me in making a pair of slippers as a present for a friend. The green felt goes beautifully well together with the multicolored beads. Lovely, if I may say so myself :)

In the anticipation of a beautiful summer I (with A LOT of help from my dad) built a humongous vegetable grow box on our back yard. When empty, it looked like a coffin in the middle of our little garden. I was so tempted to troll the neighbours with it but thought they might not appreciate my morbid sense of humor.. But it's a great box, it's now filled with 200kg of dirt and some vegetables which hopefully will grow and bear fruit (or veg more like) and after harvest time it can serve as a handy place for our friends to curl up in and die of envy brought on by our superior feast of vegetables!

A 30 Minute Painting

 I've been looking for something to hang on our livingroom wall for over a year without any success. Solution: make some art! I bought a 60x90cm canvas, four tubes of guache paint (white, black, indian yellow and turquoise) and a brush. Then I started painting mixing together different shades of grey and layering the paint in crossed strokes. I added a few dabs of yellow and turquoise and mixed them up with the grays and voilá! A piece of contemporary art in 30 minutes and with 30€ total.

Love the way it turned out!

After hanging it up on the wall I realized I should've picked even a bigger canvas. Though this one at the shop seemed enormous, once hung it looked tiny. Might have to consider making a bigger one.

You Can't Always Win..

Sometimes it's fun to act on a whim. Especially when knitting. If one has the time, like I do, it's fun just start a massive knitting project with just a hint of an idea of what you are about to create. It is risky and sometimes it pays off. And sometimes.. Well, sometimes you end up with a lot of yarn wasted.

By now I should have learnt that all those brilliant ideas of mine for sweaters and jumpers just don't work in reality. The splendid ideas turn into knitting disasters every single time, and still I find myself pushing my luck about once a year.

Most my crafts are to die for (modesty aside), but I have to say this time I have spent quite a lot of scrap yarns and time into a project that failed miserably; a stripy crocheted and knitted tunic-dress that makes me look like Mrs. Santa. Oh boy have I been delaying publishing this disaster. I haven't been jumping for joy at the thought of posing for the photo. I've gained quite a bit of weight and look puffy enough as it is and even more so in this newly knitted circus tent. But I'm taking the bullet today and sharing my embarrasing project. I craft. I make mistakes. I'm still an awesome woman. (plus an awesome hair dresser, I just cut and dyed my own hair!)

Happy knitting everybody and better luck with your craft projects than I've had! :D

Scandinavian Spring in Color Charts

Yarn Tourists in Tallinn

Photo from jujukerho.fi

 Ooh, I've visited heaven on earth! Keravan Käsintaitajat, our local craft association organized a day trip for us to Tallinn, Estonia, where we visited Karnaluks, an Estonian craft supply wholesale store.The store is a massive maze of boxes overflowing with yarn, embroidery threads, zippers, buttons, beads, and everything imaginable. If you ever visit Tallinn, this place is definitely worth visiting. It is easy to get to, it is close to the bus station and a few kilometres away from the port, but finding the shop entrance might be difficult for first time visitor. On any given day there is most likely a Finnish bus outside unloading crafty tourists who come from overseas especially to visit Karnaluks, so there's most likely someone outside the building at all times to tell you where the entry is in case you find it hard to locate.

Some of the supplies are incredibly low priced, but some are the same as retail prices in Finland, so if you are looking for a bargain, you better study their website well and look for the bargain deals before you go in. Note also that some of the products don't include VAT regarding you buy over a certain number of them, so keep your eyes open when checking the price tags at the location, buying 10 spools might come cheaper than buying 8, so buying in bulk pays off here!

Photo from jujukerho.fi

Here's my stash:
- 50 skeins of DMC Embroidery cotton, single color
- 25 skeins of DMC Embroidery cotton, variegated
- 6 skeins of Scholler + Stahl Filzi unspun wool yarn
- 2 skeins of Novita Huopanen unspun wool yarn (just because the color is no longer available in Finland)
- 2 zippers
- 7 skeins of Lane Cervinia's Val Gardena wool blend yarn
- 5mm crochet needle

TOTAL: 65€

The yarns I bought were close to the retail prices I'm used to paying, but the zippers, embroidery threads and the crochet needle were more than 50% less. It was well worth the trip!

Adding so much embroidery threads to my stock called for complete make over on my thread box. I spent all day yesterday organizing it but it's much neater now!

 Can't wait to start another embroidery project, my stock looks sooo much nicer now :)

Bullion Stitch Roses

Huzzaah, another embroidery-milestone passed! I have expanded my repertoire of stitches by learning how to do the bullion stitch. There are loads of helpful videos on YouTube (and twice as much unhelpful ones) that teach you how to master this stitch, but the one that I actually understood was a video that shows you how to do Bullion Roses and French Knots that are used to embellish the Bridge of Roses socks by Knitters Brewing Company. Click here to see the video.

Happy knitting, everyone, hope you enjoy the video, I surely found it useful!

Quick Photo Enhancement Tutorial

The wonderful thing about Etsy is how supportive people are. There are a lot of helpful forums for generic discussions on selling crafts, supplies and vintage, guides to help newbies get started and loads more. When ever I've encountered a problem on Etsy, be it pricing, pictures, new banner etc, I've always found people on the forums extremely helpful and happy to be of service. I have recieved so much help through the forums I am myself extremely happy if I can pass on any nuggets of info to someone else in need.

Handmade Beaded Necklace

Yesterday I came across a lovely lady, Terri Richard, in one of the forums and we soon engaged in a very lengthy conversation about improving one's photos. Terri lives in Newton, North Carolina and makes wonderful unique jewelry. Due to her disability she is unable to be in the workforce, so her Etsy shop, Havenwood  is a good possible source of income for her and her husband Bill (who judging by the way she talks about him is an angel sent to earth).

After just a few convo's my heart had warmed up to her, she's a true trooper and has overcome a lot! In effort to try help her out with her shop I took one of her pics and thought I'd share how she can improve it in a matter of seconds. As this is as simple as 1-2-3, I thought I'd share this nugget with my dear blog readers too. I'm by no means a pro, but here's a quick tip on how to get your white background even whiter.


Before you start, check if your camera has a "set white balance" function, most cameras do. White balance (WB) is the process of removing unrealistic color casts, so that objects which appear white in person are rendered white in your photo. If you don't and you have a picture you've taken against a white background but that does not look white on your photo here's how you can tweak the picture using pixlr, a free online photo editor.

1) Go to http://pixlr.com/editor/ and open a picture you wish to work on

2) Go to "Adjustment" and select "Curves"

3) Grab the curb and drag it up.

You will see pretty quickly which way to drag it in order to achieve desired effect. Don't over-do it, always make sure that the item you have photographed looks natural. If you can't get the background to desired shade of white without distorting the other colors, go take a better picture and use plenty of natural light!

4) Save.

See the difference? It's a small, but significant change, and all in a matter of seconds.

Handmade Beaded Necklace - before

Handmade Beaded Necklace - after

Handmade Beaded Dangle Earrings - after

Handmade Beaded Dangle Earrings- before

Handmade Peace Sign Earrings - before

Handmade Peace Sign Earrings - after

Hope this helps Terri or anyone else willing to get their white backgrounds look crisp and clear with a flick of the wrist :)

All featured jewelry on this blog post from Terri and Bill's shop at www.havenwood.etsy.com published with their permission.