Hama beads frenzy

I wanted to use my Hama beads for Christmas, so I made trees and snowflakes. Thr trees are 3D and standing on their own, I think I will add seed beads or something, and they can be used as name placement on the festive table.

The big snowflakes are destined to be coasters, and the smaller ones ornaments.

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Arbres 3D en perles hama et des flocons de neige, dont les plus grands seront utilisés comme sous verres.

Christmas is coming?

People on Facebook are counting.... 6 weeks till Christmas. But I won't count the days since last post..... So where have I been? Mostly playing Disney Magical World on 3DS. Video Gaming and no crafing means nothing to post, of course. Except crocheting snowflakes here and there.... and making these Christmas trees. Well, they are the second set I made, my mom took the first set !!!!

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Des sapins que j'ai crocheté entre deux parties de Disney Magical World sur 3DS. En fait, c'est le deuxième set que j'ai fait, car le premier est parti chez ma maman !

Mini pouches frenzy

Here is my creative train of thoughs. I love pouches. How can I make them more usable and trendy? Small is kamai. Plus the bag is made faster, and I can try different stitches on them. And mini pouches were born. The idea is to use them as key ring, to put coins, sd cards, usb cards, chapstick or anything you want.

I first ma de the lilac one, for me, and I finished it with a rainbow loom flower. I thought an elastic band would be practical to open and close the bag. And it mixes medias ;)

I then made the peach ones, and you can see the different stitches used.

Finally I made a beige in attempt to be more gender neutral....

I want to make those mini pouches for the Christmas fair this year, but I have no idea if people would be interested in them....

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J'adore les bourses, mais comment faire pour les utiliser de façon plus classe? Et ce qui est petit est mignon, et ça se finit plus vite, et on peut essayer différents points dessus. Et les mini bourses sont nées.

J'ai d'abord fait la bourse lilas, pour moi, et j'ai rajouté une fleur en élastique. Il me semblait que l'élastique serait bien pour fermer le sac.

Ensuite j'ai j'ai 2 bourses pèche et  une beige. Je voudrais en faire quelques unes pour le marché de Noel de cette année, mais je ne sais pas si ça intéressera qui que ce soit....

Crochet flower slippers

We can say only one thing..... why aren't mine looking like this????? It's my second attempt at making crochet slippers, with a different pattern, and they are still not good for my feet, somehow.... I suppose japanese feet are different from mine?

Pattern at Pierrot yarn

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C'est la deuxième fois que j'essaye de faire des pantoufles en crochet, avec un modèle différent, mais rien à faire, ça ne correspond toujours pas à mon pied. Il faut croire que j'ai des pieds très différents des japonaises....

Explication à Pierrot yarn

Star stitch purses

A while back, I was trying to understand the lovely (but tricky) star stitch in crochet. I decided to give it another go, and 2 purses were born : a green coin purse, and a pink phone case.

I find this stitch a lot of fun now, but it requires a lot of yarn !!! And the result is quite bulky.

And, weirdly enough, on Sunday my mother in law came up to me with a lovely book about the star stitch, because she couldn't figure out how to do it.... And here I am making a demonstration yarn and hook in hand. She lended me the book, so I will be making more star stitch projects...

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Il y a un bout de temps, j'ai essayé le point étoile, sans succès. Là j'ai réessayé, et youppie, ça marche ! 

Et j'ai fait un porte monnaie vert et une pochette à portable rose. 

Comme par hasard, dimanche, ma belle mère avait acheté le livre "Le point étoile, la star du crochet", mais elle ne savait pas comment faire le point. Et donc j'ai fait une démo, avant d'emprunter le livre. Je sens que je vais faire pas mal de nouveaux projets....

Back to crochet

Looks like I come back to posting about once a month.... oh well !!! I was in the middle of making critters on my rainbow loom, when I felt a sudden urge to go back to crochet. This was quite unexpected. But not so much, if you think that you hook a lot with rainbow loom things ;)

First I made this pineapple lace pouch. I love pouches. I don't know why, because appart from using them for knick knacks around the house, there is no real use for them. I wish I was living in old times when all ladies used pouches instead of handbags....

I also made a yellow one. Both are made with fine cotton thread. Size 20 I would say. I'm not sure, I used old thread I had.

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Il semblerait que je poste environ une fois par mois quelques jours... enfin !!! J'étais en pleine création de bonshommes en élastiques quand j'ai voulu faire du crochet. Après tout, on utilise un crochet avec le rainbow loom....

Du coup j'ai fait deux bourses en fin coton (20 je crois, le fil est trop vieux pour avoir encore l'étiquette !). J'adore les bourses, même si ça ne sert pas beaucoup, à part pour mettre des trucs dans la maison. J'aurais aimé vivre à l'époque où toutes les dames utilisaient des bourses à la place des sacs à main....

Evolution of a design

If you are a rainbow loom crafter, I'm sure you came across loads of Youtube tutorials to make little animals in rubber bands. After training with those, I decided to make my own kawai critter. On the right you can see the final cutie bear. Change the ears and you get a rabbit or whatever. I have to say the quality of the elastic bands play a big role on the final look.

I'm planning on writting a tutorial, when I'm sure of the design. Below you can see the different attempts.

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Si vous utilisez un rainbow loom, je suis sure que vous avez utilisé les différents tutos sur Youtube. Après avoir fait mon apprentissage, j'ai décidé de faire mon propre bonhomme super kawai. Mon préféré est cet ours blanc. En dessous vous pouvez voir les différentes variations. Notez que la qualité des élastiques est importante pour le rendu final. Je compte écrire un tuto prochainement.

Spiderman, rubber Spiderman...

One of the first rubber characters I made with my rainbow loom is Spiderman for my man. This is why it has a keyring thingy already ! And you can make your own with the tutorial here.

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Un des premiers bonshommes faits avec mon rainbow loom est Spiderman pour mon homme, c'est pourquoi il a déjà un porte clef dessus ! Tutorial ici.

Own design rubber mouse and bear

You know the drill.

phase 1 : Learn the technique. And if you get cute little characters in the process,it's even better.

phase 2 : Create your own. Of course, it's the fun part, but also you can't stop wondering if others haven't come up with the same thing just five minutes before you. It's the joy and problem of the internet :great access to loads of ideas, but it feels everything has been done already.

Anyway, I decided not to let it ruin my fun, especially when I make little creatures I will have to be a heart of stone not to let my grandma adopt some of them.

If you follow my blog since some time, you might have noticed I love little cute things. So of course my animals are minimalistic. There are also technical constraints : I would need loads of white rubber and other neutral colours, when in shops you mostly get rainbow neon colours. As one animal requires more than 50 rubber bands...you can do the math yourself.

Also, these are destined to be keyrings or charms. And you don't want anything too bulky for that. Small is better. So here I present to you.... Mini mouse and mini bear (looks a bit like an ewok too)

Voici 2 de mes petits animaux que je viens de créer avec des élastiques et un rainbow loom, une souris et un ours, qui demandent plus de 50 élastiques ! mais ils sont tout petits....

A tree of rainbow loom critters

Once again, I left this blog silent for a long while. Can't be crafty and showy all the time. Unless you've been living into the wild for over a year, I'm sure you are aware of the rainbow loom phenomenon. Personally, I first saw them at the supermarket in May or June, and I have to admit I was tempted, very tempted. I love to try new crafts. But then it seemed to be making rubber bracelets,and so I thought it was a bit expensive just for that.

But then mid July I got a loom half price. It's the summer holidays, I wanted something new to do, etc....

Phase 1 :Interrogation.

 How does it work ? Note that in France you mostly get the cheap versions of the loom, and the instructions were written so tiny in foreign language that I had to go to the web directly.

Phase 2 : Disappointement.

Instructions are all YouTube videos. I love diagrams and written instructions. Videos take too much time, pausing and waiting for video lags.... And the bracelets I made, when I managed something that doesn't unravel on its own, were a bit disappointing. Too large or dodgy. I like the inverted fishtai design, but that's about it.

Phase 3 : Go beyond the bracelets.

This is where my good old friend Pinterest got handy. I wanted to see what could be done with rubber bands and loom. And I discovered the cute critters. It was hard to master, I spent a lot of time following YouTube instructions, but here they are !  I have to make some more, and try and design my own, like the pink rabbit.

Hours of concentration and fun coming my way !

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He oui, moi aussi je me suis mise au rainbow loom, après avoir résisté vaillamment 2 mois. Au début ce fut difficile, avec les instructions en microscopique et langues bizarres, mais les videos de youtube aident bien. Je ne suis pas fan des bracelets, du coup j'ai du vite chercher ce qui se faisait d'autre grâce à Pinterest. Et me voilà avec mes petits personnages, qui rappellent les amigurumis !