Etsyhookers Challenge - Voting Open

EtsyHookers Team Members are having a challenge ~~ Members were asked to create a crocheted item either for or about animals. As you can see, we have very creative crocheters in our group!

Here are the entries ... Come vote~~ http://etsyhookers.blogspot.com/
Voting is open until June 15th.

Hooker Spotlight ~ UnravelMe

Happy Hump Day ♥ Which reminds me that I haven't featured a Hooker in awhile.

Browsing through the EtsyHooker Team's shops, UnravelMe really caught my eye. Her work is creative, fun and includes housewares, scarves, hats, patterns and all sorts of goodies! I love the colors and textures that combine to give her work that special look.

Come on in and browse around for yourself!

Hooker Spotlight ~ warmandsoft

Today's Hooker Spotlight features warmandsoft ~ A fantastic shop full of crocheted items. My favorites are the shawls!


We are three partners in this shop!
My sister-in-law (Hatice) and I (Meltem) started this shop. My sister-in-law - Hatice is loving knitting and crocheted. Our friend Hulya with her brooches to join us. We are selling handmade warm and soft scarves, shawls, hats, mittens, gloves and great brooches in this shop. We are adding new items day by day.









Hopefully you will stop in this shop!

Hooker Spotlight ~ Le ChatCrochet

As I was browsing around I came across this fun shop and realized she was a sister hooker! I love the variety in her shop and her unique and clever designs.



Here is a snippet from her shop bio:

"Im a quarter Swiss, quarter German and half Dutch girl born and raised in the Netherlands and have shared already more than half of my life with a French boy. I often long to see mountains, crave foreign food and couldn't stand to live in the 'narrow' countryside anymore. But yet I feel firmly rooted in the Dutch culture. Tulips are my favourite flowers and I'm proud of our sobriety. Frugality is a virtue in the flat lands where I grew up. Since I was a child I've learned to craft with scrap, leftovers and reused materials to save money. Now with the necessity to save our Earth reuse has a gotten new dimension. I'm proud to present you with Dutch design made exclusively with materials that were destined to have ended in the landfill.






I'm glad there is a lot of recycling and upcycling going on on Etsy and proud to be among such artists and sellers! Yet I still see a lot of yarn artists who buy new yarn for their creations where the materials are literally on the street. With all due respect I hope to open their mind a bit if they happen to stumble upon this shop. I hope to surprise the unsuspecting visitor who was just looking for a crocheted item with the beauty of reused yarn. If any other recycling yarn artist reads this please contact me, I would love to link up with you!!!"



Stop by her shop and see more great work!

Hooker Spotlight ~ Smudgekitty

This weeks spotlight is on Smudgekitty ~~


"Smudgekitty is specifically for my handcrafted items. From bookmarks to bath stuff...to afghans...and of course, my favourite: Cuddly Stuff, dolls & toys. All items offered here are from my own design, or are being sold with permission from the original designer or copyright holder. If a designer's name is not given, it is my own design".

These are too cute ~~~~~~





I am sure she would warmly welcome you to her shop! So stop by, any time!

Hooker Spotlight ~ MountainsideCrochet

Today's Hooker Spotlight features MountainsideCrochet.



Although she makes household items as well as sweet children's items, it is the plushies that grab my attention.




"I live in the foothills of the beautiful Blue Ridge Mountains in western South Carolina.

I'm a crochet crafter of cute critters and household items, and anything else that strikes my whimsy. I started making crocheted plush animals for my children when they were young, progressed to my grandchildren, and now create for children everywhere."

Don't you just want to spend the day fishing with this guy?



Or have a garden tea party?



Visit her etsy shop to see more....


And don't forget to visit me on etsy, shophandmade and artfire.

Hooker Spotlight ~ HandsDelight

It is below zero here today... So Cold

Today's Hooker Feature has made with love items that are toasty warm!

HandsDelight is a stay at home Mom that loves to crochet in her spare time. Spare time is defined when not keeping track of all her children and homeschooling two of them! And her work is fabulous




I hope you will enjoy her shop as much as I do!

It Pays to Experiment~~

Presenting my newest bowl titled "Poppies". It is made with a new found technique that gives stability and thickness.

For quite awhile I have been trying different ways to make my felted bowls stonger, thicker and overall sturdier. And I think I just found the easiest way. So easy, in fact, that I am hand slapping my forhead as if I should have had a V8. And there is an added bonus of terrific color enhancements with this method as well.

Normally I would use one strand of worsted weight wool yarn and work my magic. This does produce a great felted fiber in the end, but for vessels and bowls, I would prefer a thicker stronger fiber. I've made a few bowls in which I would crochet double length, fold them over and sew them together to form double thickness as in this bowl:


This method takes alot of calculating as one side needs to be a bit smaller than the other, but does have a great result.

I have also tried crocheting two strands of worsted weight together which works ok... but doesn't felt with that finished look that I like so much.

My amazingly simple discovery is that by crocheting one strand of worsted weight along with a strand of fingering weight will give that little bit extra to the product that gives the bowl added stability and helps keep their shape. The bonus is that I now feel like a painter mixing my paints because combining different color shades gives the bowl it's own unique colors!

I start with two strands of wool ~ one worsted weight and one fingering weight


I changed my hook from H to J


And then I go to town:


The colors will blend during the felting process so the individual stitches and colors will not be visable when completed. I used two different yellows in Poppies, and as you can see, the shades blend to form one color with a bit of heathered look.

So, now I have met one of my 2009 resolutions (finding ways to improve my products) and it is only January 3rd! Can you see my smile? I have a beautiful green one drying now that will be posted later this week.

Hoping you will come visit me on etsy, artfire and shophandmade to view my new work during 2009

New This Week ~~

For those of you who celebrate Christmas, you know what a busy time of year this can be. This past week I have finished my holiday shopping, wrapped all the gifts, cleaned the house in preparation for overnight visitors and finished up some projects at my day job.

In addition to that, I have been working getting organized for 2009 with brand new banners, labels and inventory. I am so excited to have matching sew-in labels to my new banner and avatar. Look for a contest coming up in January to name my cute little sheep. I think we will have fun with that one! My new banner and avatar was made by hbcorner:


Here are my sew-in labels made by greenbeansnstrings:





I have spent 3 weeks getting my new Artfire studio organized and I am just loving it over there. I still love my etsy shop and will have some great surprises for everyone in 2009 both at ArtFire and etsy!

I was still able to add new items to my shop this past week. Including:

This gorgeous felted bowl ~ Scalloped Blue Bell $25



This lovely knit necklace ~ Lovely Lavender $8


This sweet crocheted pin ~ Winter White with Vintage Button $5



And this chunky, very, very red knit scarfette with wood buttons $25



I will be closing my shop early Monday morning and have a reopening on Saturday December 27 so I can enjoy time with my family.

I hope everyone has a very Merry Christmas and more importantly, enjoys their friends and families during this coming week! Merry Christmas everyone ♫ ♪ ♫ ♪ ♫