Bella Dia

Crochet a Basket

One of my favorite crochet books is Simple Crochet by Erica Knight (it's in my sidebar under "Favorite Crafting Books")  Her designs are easy and uncomplicated but produced from unusual fibers that really emphasize texture.  One of the fibers she uses is jute and I've been wanting to try it out and make a basket.  It's not very comfortable to work with, obviously scratchy, but not too bad for a small project.  The basket is my design - just single crochet worked in the round.  I filled it with our latest rock collecting finds - the black rocks are obsidian! 

Thrift Finds

Things have been busy here but I was able to make a quick pass through the thrift store the last time we were in town and I found a few treasures.  I'm still loving these Japanese mugs...

and I bought some wool jackets for the first time.  There's a few stuffies that I want to try and I thought this fabric looked good.

I have no idea what I'll be doing with these little wooden soldiers but I thought they were cute and only 50¢ so in the cart they went.

I was happy to find a whole box of unused vintage Christmas cards too.  There are six different designs and each one has a little activity on the inside.  There are more pictures over on my Flickr page if you're interested.

I'll be back...

We had a nice little get-away to southern California to take the kids to Disneyland and the beach and to take me to the Japanese bookstore and Ikea.  It was a great trip but now I need some time to get back into our routine, clean house, and take pictures of some of the things I got to share with you.  I also have several tutorials that I've been meaning to write and photograph.  I'll be back next week with lots to post about :)

Happy Easter! Happy Spring!

Oh My!!

I am so excited!!  My tea cozy won in the Cozy category of the Softie Awards! I think this is the first time I have ever won anything!  Thank you so much to everyone who voted for me - gosh, makes me feel warm and fuzzy all over!  Thanks to Terry to for all her hard work in organizing it.  You must visit her blog Softie's Central to keep up on everything happening in the softie world- she is definitely the go-to-gal when it comes to softies :)

*The picture above is a new "Sew Happy" pincushion series I am working on but it expresses exactly how I feel today!*

Inspiration Monday

All of these images are from Marie Claire Idees March 2007 issue.  The only place I have found it is in Borders but you may have better luck finding it if you're in a more metropolitan area.  This issue seems especially full of stitchery projects.  I don't speak French but I enjoy looking at the pictures anyway. 

I am really tempted to make an afghan like the one above.   That open kind of stitch works up really fast and I think it would be so much fun making the flowers and decorating the blanket afterwards.

I love these delicate handmade dishes.  For fun I'm going to try something similar with Sculpey.  I can use little dishes to put stuff in - I've always got lots of "stuff" sitting around!

Look at this great idea!  The directions on how to make it are in the back of the magazine (in French) but it wouldn't be too difficult to figure this out.  This organizer would be especially nice to create a small craft area where space is limited.