Pearly Crocheted Mesh Bag

Another plarn bag. Yeah, I love to crochet with this stuff.

It's from this pattern on Ravelry. I kind of wish I had used a larger hook (I used the one the pattern called for) since the single crochets at the top and bottom are a bit stiff. The mesh section is also a little tight on certain rows.

The plarn is from big transluscent bags that come in cases of t-shirts my parents get for their screenprinting business. They're a little harder to work with than regular sized bags, since you have to fold them more times, and it's harder to keep the strands from knotting up. I really like the color of the finished product though, so it's worth the fight. The little black flowers are from some trash bags that I had used to cover my backpack in the back of the truck on the way to the camp.

In the picture it looks like the bottom is wider than the top, but in reality it's not. It's just the way the picture took.

New Grocery/Garden Bag

So I really like this pattern. It's the Market Bag pattern at Lion Brand Yarn's website. It's for their cotton yarn, but I did it with plastic bags. Because of this switch, I also used a "J" hook instead of the "H" they call for in the pattern.

Normally, I use softer/more pliable plarn (plastic yarn). It's easier to use the kind that WalMart bags are made of, mainly because they're almost all made of the same weight of material. This bag, though, is made from all those other plastic bags you get, such as: bread, carrots, toilet paper, paper towels, red beans, celery, tortillas, dry cleaner bags and many, many others.

This makes for a much slower construction. It also yields a slightly lumpier finished product. Over time I think it will smooth out some. The bottom flattened out a good bit after just the first use.

The bag is rather large. It's 14" wide at the bottom and about 19" tall (including the handle). It has a little stretch, but not much. Unlike other reusable shopping bags, it doesn't fold up really small or anything. He's a very sturdy little fellow though, and I like his colors.

My photography skills leave something to be desired...ah well. I'll get better one day. :)

Scrap Afghan and Plarn Purse (in progress)

I came across the coolest (to me, anyways) scrapghan on Ravelry about a year ago. It's a yo yo afghan. Use up a ton of tiny scraps too small for granny squares, make a blanket that doesn't have holes big enough for toes to poke through and ta-dah! Beautiful afghan. I'm kind of slow. I've only worked on it when I got a few spare minutes or in the truck between Louisiana and Oklahoma (we're in Oklahoma right now). So it's not too huge yet. I've got the yo yo's made, now it's just to put them together. Here's a work in progress picture of it. I like it, nice and warm for the little it is so far. I wasn't sure how much I was going to like it after I started looking at the yo yo's with all the colors touching. With the beige yarn connecting, though, it looks kind of stained glassy.

My other current work in progress (OK, one of my other) is something I got out of Interweave Crochet a year or so ago. I started it last Christmas while sitting in a deer stand because as much as I love hunting, I get bored easily. It's plain white plarn and brown variegated plarn. The white comes off of mostly WalMart or other such bags, the brown is from my aunt's Toys R Us shopping, Home Depot, Piggly Wiggly, and Albertsons for the most part. Some come from other stuff, some I've no clue where they're from.

The bottom of the bag is kind of funky right now. I think I may have messed up on the increases a bit, but once I put some stuff in it after it's done, the weight should rearrange it better/flatter. I've added a few more rows of the stair-steppy colors since this was taken. I like the brown and white together, it gives a nice tweed look.

This first one is with the picture in the magazine. You can kind of see the funky-ness of the bottom here.

And a closeup of the colors/pattern.

Hopefully this afternoon or tomorrow I'll get the stuff with black currants and mulberries up here. That's the other stuff I've been spending my time on. :)

New Soaps and a New Mold!

So I've been wanting a big 5lb loaf mold for soaping, but the prices are outrageous. Rather than break down and buy one, I convinced my dad to help me make one from scrap wood and a few nuts/bolts from the hardware store. The result works great! I got the basics from Keith Brown's wonderful tutorials on youtube. Go check them out if you're interested in making your own mold. My dad and I edited a few things, stuck washers on the bolts before the wing nuts, etc, but basically kept the same idea. SO without further rambling, pictures!









Both ends are removable. I drilled the holes wrong on one side, so I had to put me an up arrow to know which set of holes to put on the bolt. I spent about $4 to make this between the bolts and screws. All the wood was scrap. I recommend making it the 18" suggested in the videos. That's the perfect length to put Reynolds freezer paper in and not have to cut anything. I just stuck seperate little squares on the end pieces, screwed it down tight and taped down the big middle piece. It worked great, no leaks or anything.

So, the soaps that were made (a few weeks ago now, haven't had time to post this...). I did 3 types: goats milk, shaving soap, and the loaf one. The descriptions are in this post.

Goats Milk:

Still not too fond of the look of this one, but here's the Shaving Soap:

And my favorite of all the one's I've made so far, done in the fancy new loaf mold is the Peppermint Chocolate Swirl:

What do you think, world? :P My picture taking skills haven't improved - these were done by my dad with his  fancy camera he uses to take pictures of deer and stuff when he's hunting.

Dog Food (et al) Totes

I don't know where I first came across them, but subsequent searches have led me to find this awesome use for plastic dog/cat food/deer corn bags. Since we're at the camp in Oklahoma right now, I actually have a good bit of time to work on crafty stuff. I'm trying multiple patterns out to see which I like best, and then kind of making up my own. The first came from here, and my mom and I made it like that minus the lining. Here is the result:

The second and third ones I did all by myself, as my mother was busy. The second was from here. I prefer the sides and bottom of this one over the first bag, but I like the way the picture shows better on the first one.

Third off, I made my own pattern somewhat. I used this page as a basis of a pattern. I wanted the picture of the deer to show up nicely on it, and as the pattern for this cuts out everything, I drew out what I wanted on newspaper to make it fit. This is my favorite one so far that I've done.

I want to make one of these next. I don't know that I'd put it inside out for the white like they do, unless I cannibalize a puppy food bag with a cute picture on it. 

Sigh. I need to learn to take some better pictures. Any suggestions?

Making Plarn/Plastic Yarn

(still working out taking pictures, kind of bad with cameras some days...)

About a year and a half or two years ago, I came across this stuff called plarn online. Basically, it's the use of plastic shopping bags to make yarn to crochet or knit with. I've seen a bit of knitted plarn, and haven't really liked the look of it. Being a novice at knitting, I haven't given it a shot yet. Having crocheted since about the third or fourth grade, I felt much better about playing with plarn in crocheting. Since I first learned about it, I've come a long way in my crocheting with it. This is my attempt at how to make a ball of plarn from bags.

First off, get clean bags. If they're dirty, either wash or throw them away and find some clean ones. Lay the first victim out flat on your work surface.

Next, fold it in half.

And again.

And one last time.

Now take your cutting utensil of choice and remove the bottom of the folded bag. This is the section seamed together. Just cut off as much as needed, no need to waste any, unless you do like me and cut too much off. 

Continue to cut up the bag into about one inch pieces. If they're a bit bigger, it's ok, same for being on the small side. Dispose of the handle at the top.

I used a rotary cutter today since I was sitting at the dining table and had room for the mat and wanted a change up from scissors. But my usual weapon is the scissors. I use a pair of those titanium blade ones the late craft center at WalMart had. The better your blades, the easier time you will have.This is with the scissors. Same process.

Right now I'm making a big batch of varigated colors all with white background. This is what I had cut up for colors so far this morning. The box of white next to it is going into balls of white yarn and came from the un-inked sections of bags cut for varigated.

To put your yarn together, take 2 pieces of bag. Pull them open and place bag A (strip farther to the right) over top of one half of bag B (strip on left).

Pull the right tip of bag A up through the right tip of bag B.

Pull them together firmly to make a small knot. Don't pull too hard or else it will begin to tear the bags. However, the smaller the knot you have the less it will show up in your stitches.

Ball it up, bind with a rubber band and cut up some more!

I don't just use grocery/shopping bags. I go for pretty much any kind of plastic bag that comes through my house that I can repurpose to keep it from going in the trash. These bags here are all from bread, toilet paper in big packs, carrots and the like. They are a bit harder to crochet with, but I like the look of them as well.

When crocheted, they come out looking like this:

Crocheted Plarn Bag

A while back I made this bag with plastic shopping bags and vhs tapes. The bags I used to get this pearly color were a kind of transluscent white. When you cut the bags for the plarn and start crocheting though, it comes out nice and opaque with that pearl-like sheen. The black edging came from old vhs tapes. I just used the tape straight off the reel, no doubling over or carrying another yarn with it. Warning: The tape is harder to do than the regular plarn. It also kind of has a squeaky noise if you use a metal hook that can get on your nerves after a while.

The pattern came from an old issue of Crochet magazine, can't remember which one. The original pattern, when done with cotton yarn, has a lot more give and stretches a bit. With the plarn, I used the same G hook that the pattern called for, so it doesn't have the same kind of stretch just by the nature of the materials. When you're using plarn, especially on the smaller hooks, be careful and take breaks. It is more strenuous on the hands than normal yarn.