Introducing...

I thought I'd say a quick hello and introduce myself to all of you. I am Gardenofevils, Auntie Ball, Sammy, Samantha or Sam depending on who is in the room at the time. Gardenofevils is my online name. Adoxograph and I met through that guy she lives with on Livejournal. Sarcasmo and I have been friends for about 5 years now, and little did he know that Kathy and I would become close friends too. So in a roundabout way, that is how I got be apart of this fine blog.

I am not the crafty type, or so I think. I went to school for theatre and ended up doing design work. I designed sound for shows, some lighting, and even a set. Most of my crafty ideas are born in my head and never make it out. I have stenciled in the past but more propaganda art rather than the flower stencils you see in a craft store. I've tried knitting but the results were apocalyptic. I just can't make art with my hands, but on occasion I do try.

I have nine small frames that are currently taking up occupancy in my hall closet. The idea was to stain them three different colors and hang them above my fireplace. Well, I've hand them for about six months now, and it doesn't look like I'll be staining them any time soon. I have a stack of art magazines that have some pretty cool images in them. I thought of maybe cutting stuff out, a la high school collage, and gluing them to the frames. We'll see.

Well, this turned into more than a short hello, and I apologize. If I end up making anything, I'll let you know. For now, I'll just look at all the cool stuff you guys make and kick myself for not doing anything.

infinite possibilities

First Off, Amy totally wins the award for Added Incentive because she all got pictures of projects up already. Yeesh, I just got home! :)

I am adoxograph, the queenofsheba, or Kathy depending on when and where we're talking, and the other sister behind this blog. As a trade, I make pastry. At home, I also make pastry, but sometimes I do other things too. Since my dear sister and I live some states apart, we found ourselves discussing our side projects, but phone calls about yarn are just not the same as actually seeing it. And thus, the germ of an idea.

So what is crafting? What are crafts? What can be included here? Simply, anything that is a project you're working on that seems to fit. I think girls with drills are sexy and covet one of my own, so if your craft thing right now is bookshelves, show them! If you perfect your purl or your lemon meringue pie, share it - but I'm going to ask pointed nosy questions about the pie.

Me, I was throwing away trash today and someone had dumped a perfectly stable yet ugly table thingy. I grabbed it and put it in the trunk, and maybe later today or tomorrow, I will paint it. I live in an apartment and never get to paint things. I really like to paint. I want to paint it this bright pale blue, like the underside of the porch roof at the camp in Cooperstown (there will be pictures for those who don't know that color). Then maybe some mosaic top, colors like sea glass. Or maybe not. We'll just have to see...

Hello, and welcome to our blag!

First, by way of explanation. Adoxograph had this wonderful idea, “we’ll start a blog, we can post pictures of all the things we’re knitting!” I was right on board for that, “ooh, that means that we’ll have the pressure of guilt to keep us focused on completing our projects!” (This is a big issue for me, I think I have at least 4 halfway completed projects, and several un-started but lovely project ideas.) The topic came up again and again in phone conversations and via instant messenger. We thought of folks to include, topics to discuss, topic tags (“yarn porn” for pictures of great yarns we want to work with). What we needed was a name.

Then, it came to us. We were talking about our motivations for acquiring these skills, so anachronistic in a time of knitting machines and ready-to-wear clothing. A sentiment echoed by both of us: “you know, I really just learn to do all of these things so that in the event of the collapse of civilization, I will have skills that will help me survive.”

With that, we present you with: Crafting for the Apocalypse.

So let’s get to work!

Hooray craft blog!

This is great! When sheba told me about this idea, I said "I'm in" before she even finished telling me about it.

So, I guess I'll start...I'm Amy, I'm 30 & I have 2 kids - a boy (Dallan: 2 1/2) & a girl (Julia: 7 mos). I have to sneak my crafts in wherever I can, usually in 10 or 20 minute chunks.

I have a couple of projects going on right now. I recently went to a scrapbooking night & got all of my photos from when my son was born organized so that I can start putting together his baby book. Man! That was a LOT of pictures! I actually discovered that I was missing a couple of sets of photos, that I'll have to go back & print off & integrate in to my sort box.

I also love to quilt. I started shortly after my son was born & my first quilting project was a quilt for his bed. This is what it looks like:



It's definitely not perfect by any stretch, but it's functional & it was a good first effort I think. :) Speaking of stretch - a little advice: only embark on a project involving T-shirt (jersey) cotton if you're prepared for lots of weird stretchiness & a good bit of patience. It was really hard to work with that stretchy stuff.

I'm currently working on my daughter's quilt. For hers I found a pattern for a jigsaw puzzle quilt & am using lots of Pooh prints & pastels for it. It's still a work in progress, but here's what I have so far:



I've actually done a bit more on it since I took that. I have two of the borders sewn on. The other two are pieced together; I just have to attach them & then I'm onto the batting & the back! I'm dreading the stitching in the ditch for this one b/c I have to outline each of the puzzle pieces...Yuck! Considering that, I'll likely be done with her baby quilt by the time she starts High School. :o)

Okay, that's enough about me for starters. As you can see, I am verbose!