An Admission Requiring Courage.

[mightynancy]

Thanks, John! I have worked hard to develop skill in this area. It's fun hard work, but work nonetheless. :)

I actually came back to this thread with a tidbit for Listener. I just remembered that a local university football star is quite well-known for his work in crochet!

Craftzine.com blog: Boise State Football's Ian Johnson Loves to Crochet

Crafty guys rock. My husband helps me make jewelry.

[siouxz72]

man... I wish I was crafty as my insanely good sister(mightynancy). But hey, I can cook! so there! I can also cross stitch if I really want to. And I'm teaching myself how to crochet. I can make all ya'll a real nice bookmark if you'd like!

[mightynancy]

Ooh yeah, Siouxz can cross stitch! I have a work of hers hanging in a place of honor in my house. It's beeeyootiful!

[Listener]

Anyway, these are the hat and booties i mentioned before.

Edit: I guess it didn't work. Oh well, go to my picture gallery on my profile and you will find them. Sorry.

I had a quick peak. I love the lavender/wisteria color. They really are beautiful.

[Listener]

Why does this make me like you more?????

Aww...shucks, Missy.

[Listener]

I love to sew! I sew a lot of my daughter's clothing. I can't cook worth a lick, so sewing is my lifeline out of homemaker purgatory.

Outstanding. We have smocking to die for...we have puffed sleeves that are perfect...we have a white outfit that is stunning.

I am not worthy.

[Listener]

man... I wish I was crafty as my insanely good sister(mightynancy). But hey, I can cook! so there! I can also cross stitch if I really want to. And I'm teaching myself how to crochet. I can make all ya'll a real nice bookmark if you'd like!

Cooking's good. I've never had much luck in that department.

Good luck with your crochet!

[Listener]

Here are some thoughts for those who are hesitant to learn a new craft skill.

If I was going to write a book, I'd call it...

LISTENER'S GUIDE TO THE COLORFUL WORLD OF MISTAKES.

I have unpicked hundreds of rows of knitting in every possible sort of yarn...wool, cotton, acrylic, bamboo.

I have unpicked thousands of machine stitches...after sewing fabric back-to-front, upside down, and wrong side out.

I have never done a single cross-stitch that did not require several hours of undoing and redoing.

But best of all is my very first attempt at knitting. I did a basketweave sweater for myself. It was beautiful. It took forever. Did I mention that I learned to knit from a book? The book failed to mention that when joining yarn at the end of the ball, it is best done at the beginning of the row. I joined it wherever it ended. Twelve months later it started to unravel at 10 different spots. Moths would have been a more merciful end.

This thought: mistakes happen...rather than fear them, I've learned to stay awake, and learn from them, and laugh (later) that some lessons are best learned only once.

Edited August 28, 2008 by Listener

[WANDERER]

I spent my youth hemming and rehemming countless hems *they usually lasted until I washed them*. I had a go at quilting and started a little patch with a girl on it about 10cm square and never finished it. As usual it started to unravel after a short amount of time. I actually have a friend that can't slice cheese and she has about the same focus on doing that as I do on sewing...I know why I'm so bad at it. I have sewing ADHD.

You have to really love doing something to undo and redo it over and over again......but I can really appreciate the smocking pics...they are just lovely.

I am happy to undo and redo knitting and crochet projects *THEY ARE SO QUICK TO UNDO YAY*. BTW thanks for the jumper tip. I made one many years ago with my mother's help and ended up with one sleeve longer than the other *neither of us realised...it looked like I had gotten the hang of it..LOL*...but I really had a lot of supervision and I have no idea how to do it again. I would have joined the wool anywhere for sure on my first jumper attempt. I'll bet I would have been rewinding wool.

[Truegrits]

mightynancy, your work is beautiful! My sister loves to sew, and made her (only) daughter the MOST beautiful dresses. She also made her (4)sons beautiful suits. I cannot even imagine making a suit. I do not like sewing at all. I do not even hem with a needle and thread; I iron a hem with that stitch-witchery stuff...

I did make an attempt at knitting...liked it fairly well, but not enough to continue.

My passion is making jewelry. I love both the designing and the actual making of it. The females in my family pretty well know what they will be getting from me for Christmas and birthdays...

[cintiejo]

I love to Craft. I have a craft room that is stuffed full of material, scrap booking supplies, beading, yarn and yes a treadmill. I don't use the treadmill for exercise, it's used as a stand.

[kona0197]

I feel sorry for those on dial up. I'm on broadband and it takes forever to load those pictures.

[Listener]

Keep going everybody. I'll be back in two days.

Anybody want to share what their favorite handmade item is that someone else did?

[Iggy]

I feel sorry for those on dial up. I'm on broadband and it takes forever to load those pictures.

Broadband should not be slow. It is quite possibly your computer. When was the last time you cleaned the temp files and did a Disc cleanup and Defrag?

[kona0197]

I fix computers. I know how to keep the system running fine. If you must know this is a new build. XP SP3. Those pictures take forever to download.

[john doe]

They pull right up for me. Maybe you should call the Geek Squad? Probably just a poor software setup.

[Iggy]

Back in the very, very early 60's, Grandma attempted to teach me to crotchet. I sat in front of her, and copied her exactly. When she got up and stood behind me, she saw that I was doing it 'wrong' and she thunked me on the head with her crotchet hook.

After about 4 times of this, I got so fed up and angry with her, that I took her empty pill bottle full of crotchet hooks to the cellar where Daddy had his welding things, and I welded them inside of the pill bottle. She never thunked me on the head again! I HATE to crotchet.

My Uncles best friend's wife taught me how to knit. Again I sat in front of her and copied her exactly. When she stood behind me, she saw that I was doing it back wards. She laughed and said as long as I always do that, then the garment will come out fine. My knits and pearls are done mirror style from the rest of you folks. I really don't like to knit. I tense up my upper body too much and it is painful after a bit.

She also taught me how to embroider. Same thing- I do it mirrored from most everyone else. I also have made up my own stitches. I love to embroider. I will take plain pillow cases, or 100% cotton dish towels and put my own patterns on them and embroider them. I am not very good at doing the satin stitch- though I will do it and have.

I hunt used book stores and thrift stores for children's coloring books and story books. Old books- dating from 1970-ish and older. When the pictures were actually cute and told it's own story. I outline them in black crayon and then iron them onto the fabric. Or trace them onto plain paper, reduce them in size, then outline with black or blue crayon and iron them onto the fabric.

During the 6 years that ex husband and I traveled all over the 8 states of the West coast - I embroidered the yokes, shoulders, collars, button fronts of chambray shirts and sold them. One I sold for $500. It was of three Canadian Geese in flight. This I did in the silken threads I salvaged off of the telephone lines from the jobs that my ex did with Stromberg-Carlson. I just could not see throwing away this beautiful thread. With each job there was at least a full paper grocery bag of the thread - and that was after I salvaged it and rewound it on Popsicle sticks. If I remember right there were 8 solid colors and 8 different multi-colored threads.

My favorite chambray shirt I did, was using the multi-colored thread and embroidering a garden of flowers across the back yoke. I wore that until the shirt literally fell apart. The embroidery was all that remained. I gave it to my little sister and she appliquéd it to the lightweight denim skirt she made her youngest daughter, which by the way has now been handed down to said daughters baby daughter! Embroidery by Aunti Iggy, skirt by Grandma.

I also embroidered home made aprons, pillow cases and even the top boarder of sheets, place mats and napkins for family.

This is something that I need to get back doing. It really relaxed me and brought me peace. I quit, because I couldn't see what I was doing. I was just too vain/lazy/??? to get that magnifying glass that hangs around your neck- I'm not vain anymore.

I have tried cross stitch and I just feel like it is not worth the effort. Perhaps I need to try it again.

[kona0197]

Poor software setup? Like I said I'm a guy that runs a shop where I fix computers. It's NOT a poor software setup.

Thanks for the insult.

I highly doubt it's a issue at my end. The pictures are big. They take time to download. I'm on a 1.5 Mbps connection.

By the way anyone who goes to the geek squad is getting over charged and they hardly know how to work on a PC.

[john doe]

Poor software setup? Like I said I'm a guy that runs a shop where I fix computers. It's NOT a poor software setup.

Thanks for the insult.

I highly doubt it's a issue at my end. The pictures are big. They take time to download. I'm on a 1.5 Mbps connection.

By the way anyone who goes to the geek squad is getting over charged and they hardly know how to work on a PC.

Well, the problem's not on this end because they come up great for me. Maybe it's because I'm closer to the equator than you? But you're closer to the Prime Meridian than me, so that should even things out. Maybe there's a sunspot where you live that doesn't affect the rest of us?

Maybe it's because I'm running on a T-1? :o:o

And maybe that's why people call the Geek Squad is because they hardly know how to work on their own computers. Geek Squad says they're awesome, Dude! Why would they lie about that?

[Iggy]

I fix computers. I know how to keep the system running fine. If you must know this is a new build. XP SP3. Those pictures take forever to download.

Kona, that is nice that you fix computers. When was the last time you did a defrag? Emptied your temp files? Etc? I thought you worked for Wal Mart? Wal Mart doesn't offer that at their stores- so are you licensed and bonded to do that?

I knew a guy who claimed to do that. Cost a co-worker of mine $1500.00 to download some programs for her kids. When he got through he had messed it up so bad it wouldn't even boot up. When she called Microsoft to help fix the problem, they told her too bad. The guy who worked on it was not authorized to do so and Microsoft would have to charge her a lot to clean up the mess and she would have to send them the computer. She took the puter to a reputible repair guy in jtown, he told her it had been totally erased! DOS had been wiped out! At least he only charged her $50.00 to put everything back on.

Those pics came up fast, real fast for me, and we are experiencing a monsoon storm as I type. When the monsoons hit here in AZ, we generally experience a dramatic slow down of our servers. My T1 will respond like an aging and arthritic broadband:D Thus instead of the internet pages turning zzzip, they react like:okay, I am a moving, fast-like an old bunny. As compaired to dial-up- I will move when I want to, if I want to and just maybe in this month- no- this year- no, definitely this decade, so there!

I defrag my computer every day. I delete temp files every day. I run a virus scan hourly. If I don't my 'puter will drag. I don't fix computers- my 'puter guru has mine programmed to do all this. At the money my employer pays him, he better be good!

I just ran a speed test: this is the result- Download Speed: 1090 kbps (136.3 KB/sec transfer rate)

Upload Speed: 1366 kbps (170.8 KB/sec transfer rate) the pictures load with no delay at all.

Edited August 29, 2008 by Iggy

[mightynancy]

Sorry about the pics...I've never heard of them loading slowly for anyone, and I have shared many times on other boards. The biggest is 189K, and the smallest is 77K...not terribly large for today's connections.

I wholeheartedly agree that mistakes are educational! I taught myself sewing, with advice from books and people online. I try to learn a new technique with each big project, so "educational opportunities" abound. My next biggie is DD's baptism dress. The new-to-me technique will be a scalloped hem. The bottom edge of the dress is straight, the stitched part of the hem is scalloped...gives a shadow effect and will be embellished with a spray of embroidered flowers at each peak. :) I'm ordering the swiss satin batiste soon so I can get to work. Her big day is in January. :)

[kona0197]

Maybe it's because I'm running on a T-1?

Maybe that's why you do not have an issue. I'm on DSL. I miss my cable connection.

Kona, that is nice that you fix computers. When was the last time you did a defrag? Emptied your temp files? Etc? I thought you worked for Wal Mart? Wal Mart doesn't offer that at their stores- so are you licensed and bonded to do that?

Yes I work at Walmart. No Walmart does not offer that service I offer that service for a flat fee from my home. I am not licensed or bonded yet I do guarantee my work and learned how to do this from my Microsoft certified Uncle. Also learned a bit in school.

I defrag my computer every day. I delete temp files every day. I run a virus scan hourly. If I don't my 'puter will drag. I don't fix computers- my 'puter guru has mine programmed to do all this. At the money my employer pays him, he better be good!

OVERKILL. You are going to wear out the hard drive. You don't need to defrag every day. Google that. It's the ruth. Once every other week will suffice. I use Auslogics Defrag. It's free and works better than the stock defrag tool. You should have a virus scanner that scans all files you are using but to have it running a scan over and over? That's a watse of memory and will eat your hard drive alive. A bit paranoid as well. I've never gotten a virus unless I wanted to get one for testing.

Sounds like all you need is more memory...

[SMG]

To the OP-

My father was also an avid crafter. He knew how to knit, crotchet, cross-stitch, how to work a sewing machine and even cook! Did I mention he also worked on the railroad? He learned all of these things from his mother and his aunt. He taught my brother how to do these things. In turn, my brother taught me how to crochet. You are in very good company and should in no way feel "less manly!"

I'm a lady and I'm petty hopeless with all fabric related crafts aside from crochet. I keep hurting myself unintentionally with knitting needles, sewing machines, emboidary needles, etc. Anything beyond replacing a button or putting on an iron patch, and I'm hopeless in the sewing arena! In short, I'm a KLUTZ! This perplexes my family, seeing as both my parents are/were very craft gifted. My mother whips out a quilt a week unless she's feeling ill!

[WANDERER]

LOL Kona...I'm on dialup and the pictures load up *at the usual dialup speed* for high resolution pictures. Not quite long enough to think about making a cup of coffee. 600 by 400 pixels is usual size... the bytes are a bit hefty...but if you're into craft you want the photographic quality to the degree that you can count the stitches and beads ; ) .

[Listener]

Back in the very, very early 60's, Grandma attempted to teach me to crotchet. I sat in front of her, and copied her exactly. When she got up and stood behind me, she saw that I was doing it 'wrong' and she thunked me on the head with her crotchet hook.

After about 4 times of this, I got so fed up and angry with her, that I took her empty pill bottle full of crotchet hooks to the cellar where Daddy had his welding things, and I welded them inside of the pill bottle. She never thunked me on the head again! I HATE to crotchet.

I love this story. I can't remember how many times I've gotten irritated at instructions...I would have done the same welding, except they would have been my hooks!

Otherwise, your resourcefulness is stunning. I would have loved to see that chambray shirt before it finally disappeared.