Crafting For Those Buying A House (i.e. The Brain Dead)

Things have been a little stressful this week a Chez Moves A Lot. Aside from entering the we’re-closing-this-week-and-still-have-a-million-things-to-pack stage, I was also involved in a couple of minor auto incidents this week. Of course “minor” is a relative term, as in not really an accident per se, but still going to cost me a fortune. Needless to say, any type of crafting that takes stringing together more than two thoughts at a time is more than I can handle at the moment. I tried cross stitching a little, but it took waaaaay too much thinking and concentration. I also toyed with the idea of making some of the tulle produce bags I read about on Katy’s blog and then had to research for a while, but I figure dragging out my sewing machine might not be the best use of my limited resources at the moment (if I could even find a surface to put it on!) But at the same time, during those times I do need to just sit and not pack anymore I need something to keep my hands busy. So I’ve been making a lot of washcloths, and cat toys.

The washcloths I really like to use as facecloths, but honestly, how many can one person really need? So I had to start making them for my mom too. Unfortunately the cotton yarn really does a number on my hands, so these can only be worked on for so long.

Enter the toys. Now I have not really ever had any use for knit/crochet toys in the past. In my opinion they were basically the epitome of everything wrong with handmade. They had a million fiddly little pieces that needed to be put together, and mostly the seemed…well, kind of hokey to me. But the soon-to-be, much anticipated arrival of Baby Boy Radtke happened to coincide with a new Lion Brand catalogue I got that featured some crochet animals, so I found myself scouring the web for cute toys to make. Now believe me, there is really a lot of uggg-ly stuff out there. But I was able to find a few cute ones as well. Lion has some really cute ones on their website (who knew?) And then I found these. Too. Cute. For. Words. (Go ahead – click the link, I’ll wait. You’ll be happy you did!) The problem is, although these toys are all super cute, they’re still pretty fiddly with lots of little pieces. This didn’t stop me from buying a few patterns and a ton of colors of 2 different yarns. But even these patterns are beyond me right now. I do have a finished snail body without a shell or face – actually kind of creepy. Hopefully once things settle down, I’ll come back and finish it.

So now I’m down to cat toys. I’ve made these and Sunny the cat seems to love them:

I see a few more of these in my future, seeing as they are ridiculously easy and we have a multitude of spoiled cats in our family. My mother’s already asking where Izzy’s is. I stuffed a little catnip in for Sunny as well, so he’s pretty happy. Of course he won’t leave me alone while I’m making them, which is a little annoying.

While searching through Ravelry for some other ideas, I found the Korknisse. I know Melissa had made them before, and at the time I just didn’t really get it. I think maybe I didn’t realize there was a cork with a face on it in there? But for some reason it just made me smile, so I had to try it. It took no time at all and just cracked me up. My friend Christine and I were talking about having to have “Happy Toys” on your desk at work to make you smile, and this fit the bill perfectly. We even have a few corks at home, so I’ll be able to make a few more – and I’m sure Toby won’t mind opening a few more bottles of wine to sacrifice the corks.

So all in all, it was a pretty productive weekend, in little tiny ways. I really should be packing more, but I’m sure it will all get done. And at least Sunny will have a few new toys to play with at the new house!