Gettin' Crafty for St. Paddy's

Maybe it's all this talk of an upcoming trip to Ireland. (And yes, by upcoming, I mean 2013). Maybe I'm just ready for spring. Whatever the reason, I'm feeling it's high time to swap out my felted hearts for some St. Paddy's Day appropriate decorations.

Over the years, I've amassed quite a few St. Paddy's Day decorations, thanks to friends, family and having spent a semester living in Ireland. I have a beautiful tablecloth embroidered with shamrocks, a figurine of Irish snowmen, and a collection of St. Paddy's Day kitsch, which includes a set of super classy plastic shot glasses. But that's not enough for this Irish gal and so I have a few plans for adding to the collection this year.

Source: youaremyfave.com via Michelle on Pinterest

Despite having an ever growing collection of houseplants, one houseplant I don't have is a shamrock. I know, right! Actually, back in college, a friend gave me a shamrock for my birthday. Cleverly referred to as "Sam the Sham," the poor little shamrock had a lifespan of about four months before dying of neglect. Hey, it was college and I was easily distracted. It's a sad story, but I'm ready to do better by Sam the Sham II. Time for a live shamrock to be a permanent Irish inspired decoration in the cabin. 

Source: Uploaded by user via Ada on Pinterest

I found these little knit shamrocks on Ravelry last spring. They're made using little bits of sock yarn and I have all sorts of green sock yarn I'm looking to use up. I probably won't "bejewel" my shamrock, but I might knit up enough so that I can make a St. Paddy's Day garland with them.

Source: blog.craftzine.com via Ada on Pinterest

I found this adorable embroidered Irish gal when I was wasting time on browsing on Pinterest the other day. I think she is just about the sweetest thing I've ever seen and she definitely needs a place in the cabin this St. Paddy's Day. I've been doing a lot of embroidery this winter, finishing up a tablecloth I started last winter, so my embroidery chops are all warmed up this project. I just need some supplies - a hoop, muslin, and transfer pencil - and I'm totally making this sweet little Irish lass. 

By the way, if you're looking for some simple and effortless St. Paddy's Day decorations, Katherine over at Irish Italian Blessings has some super cute (and free!) St. Patrick's Day printables. Remember, everyone's Irish on St. Patrick's Day. ;)

Are you preparing for the wearing o' the green yet?

 

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Happy Valentine's Day! And a free knitting pattern

It's a late update for me, but I do hope your Valentine's Day has been full of happiness and time with loved ones. Anyone doing anything special or is everyone waiting until the weekend to actually celebrate?

Valentine's Day's always been pretty low-key day around here. Despite my best intentions, I've never managed to get the house decorated for the holiday and it's one of those holidays that's totally devoid of tradition for me. But this year, I finally got my act together and knit up some little heart decorations with some scrap yarn.

I had enough leftover red Brown Sheep Lamb's Pride wool leftover from other projects to make four little hearts. I felted them up, pulled a ribbon through them and now they hang merrily in a row in the living room window. They make me smile every time I catch them bobbing away out of the corner of my eye.

Pre-felting:

Post-felting: 

As my Valentine to you, here's the pattern for my felted/knitted Valentine's Day heart decorations:

Knitted and Felted Valentine's Day Heart Decorations Pattern

Any errors in the pattern are my own, so do let me know if you have questions!

This is a great way to use up some scrap yarn and the hearts knit up very quickly, so you can have a stack of fuzzy hearts to scatter around your home in no time.

Ideas for your felted hearts:

• Embroider the initials of a bride and groom-to-be on the heart and use as a gift tag for a wedding gift. 
• Knit up in multi-colors and use for Christmas tree decorations
• Hang in your windows (like I did) for happy little Valentine's Day decorations 

It's been a busy couple weeks around here. We had company this weekend (hooray!) and now with the middle of the month upon us, deadline day is once again neigh. It's nose to the grindstone time around here, but all is well. 

Happy Valentine's Day!
 

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O' Christmas Tree

We finally got our Christmas tree this weekend. I'd like to tell you how we tramped out into the woods on Saturday morning through the freshly fallen snow in search of the perfect tree. How we paused to make snow angels. How we hemmed and hawed over which tree to bring home. How a spontaneous snowball fight broke out.

In truth, we looked at exactly one tree - which from a distance looked pretty but ended up being a spruce tree and spruce trees, in my honest opinion, smell like cat piss - before settling on the balsam fir that's currently in the living room. The entire process of getting out of the truck, selecting the tree, chopping down the tree, and throwing it into the pick up bed took approximately 4 minutes.

I explained to Andy that our Christmas tree reconnaissance was going to look kind of half-assed on the blog. "Hey, we got an awesome tree," he said.

It's true.

This year we opted for a vertical, slim tree, rather than a short and squat tree. The slender tree takes up no more space than the chair that was sitting in its place. It's nice to have the twinkly lights and sparkle of the tree without having the tree take over the room. We aren't constantly bumping into tree branches and that seems to be keeping the ubiquitous balsam needles at bay as well, at least for now.

I have no desire to having a "matchy" or "elegant" Christmas tree. My mismatch of ornaments and Christmas decorations come from all sorts of stages in my life. We don't have a whole lot of homemade ornaments, which I suppose is indicative of the fact that we have no children (our own or nieces or nephews) in our lives. We have just a handful of homemade decorations:

My aunt made this little bell out of a teeny flower pot back in 1994. I know that, because "Ada '94" is written on the top of it. For a while, my aunt painted flower pots of all sizes to sell for supplemental income. The small business never really took off. I wonder where she'd go with an Etsy account . . .

Here's a "Tantalizer" circa 1970 via 2011 New Year's Crafting weekend. It is hideous. Therefore, I chose to display it as prominently as possible.

The vast majority of ornaments on the tree are mine. But Andy made this painted globe back in the day. The picture doesn't do it justice, but it really is quite pretty.

The most ornaments on the tree are Hallmark ornaments. That's because my grandmother is a Hallmark fanatic - we're talking like Hallmark Club card holding fanatic. It just isn't Christmas until you've gotten this year's ornament from Gramma.

As you might guess, through the last 25 Christmases, I've amassed quite a collection. These are some of my favorites:

Madame Alexander Irish Dancer. I got this either the Christmas before or the Christmas after I spent a semester in western Ireland.

I'm not sure when I got this little angel, but she reminds me so much of all the Sunday school Christmas pageants I was in. In fact, when you press her halo, she recites a Bible verse my mother said I once read during a pageant. I don't remember.

I got this little suitcase the Christmas during my six months living and working in London. My real life suitcase is almost identical to this ornament, right down to all the bulges!

This isn't a Hallmark ornament - it came from Harrod's Christmas World display. I picked it up during my time in London. Harrod's is well known for its teddy bears so a Christmas tree ornament that featured a teddy bear and the Harrod's green doorman outfit was just too much to resist.

Andy's declared this year's tree the prettiest Christmas tree that's ever been in the cabin. I've only seen two Christmas trees in the cabin - this year's and last year's- but if those are indeed the only two trees that have graced the cabin's living space then yes, I totally agree. Prettiest Christmas tree ever.

Is your Christmas tree up? What are some of your favorite ornaments? 

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