Finally!

I'm finally done with all of my August gifts! Hooray! Now I can finally get going on my back to school projects. Or I can even read a book (Currently I'm in the middle of Anathem by Neal Stephenson)!

As promised, here are the photos of my finished projects. If you would like me to make a tutorial for any of these just let me know!

A watermelon hat for my niece's first birthday. I miscalculated the size of it (by a lot - this was my first time not using a pattern), so I had to weave some ribbon around the brim to tighten it (I really didn't want to start all over). This way the hat is going to poof so she'll look like Strawberry Shortcake, and she can have the hat pretty much forever since she can't grow out of it.

Total cost: $20 for yarn (I wanted to try my hand using the higher-quality yarn at my local yarn shop).

This is my nephew's fort kit. I made it out of a flat bed sheet, pillow case, clothesline, clothespins, and a flashlight. I sewed a cinch into the pillow case, and crocheted a pouch to hold the clothespins. The Fort Sam sign is just fabric paint on a piece of scrap fabric that he can pin to his fort when he sets it up.

Total cost: $21.

The Kindle case for my sister-in-law. I lined the inside with red satin (the top picture). This is the first time I've ever lined anything I've crocheted. I really hope she likes it - I unfortunately don't know her very well, but I know she likes blue and loves her Kindle. This shade of blue that I used looked so perfect with red (I know, the picture quality really isn't that good).

Total cost: $0 (What I didn't have on hand I was able to get from family members).

My mom's bookmark. I crocheted this out of embroidery floss to make it nice and thin. My mom loves vintage books, and I had one that I had bought to do another craft with, but I decided against that for right now. I love making bookmarks, and I think this is one of my prettiest. :-)

Total cost: $3 (for the book).

Dave's niece's ponchos - one for her and one for her new American Girl doll. I had originally planned to make them other matching accessories (like hats and scarves), but I ran out of time. Oh well - that just means I have a lot of time to make those for Xmas - maybe a whole winter set? :-)

Total cost: $0.

Some other fun stuff that's been happening lately:

My mom had a bunch of pots that she wanted to get rid of, and this is the one I got. I replanted my cactus that I got from Walgreens into it. I also discovered that repotting a cactus without gloves HURTS. Even in places where you think there are no spines there are painful spines.

My mom found a craft book that she had bought in the '70s. This is such a cool book, because it's like vintage squared - the book is about crafts that were big in the 1900s-1930s. It actually has a lot of really cool embroidery patterns in the last couple of chapters - I'm excited to try them out!

Well, that's all my fun stuff going on. Until next time! :-)