Holey Socks!

By Rachel Scarlett

If you're like me, you probably have some holey socks deep in your drawer. Nice socks that you wore down and wished were still whole. Those nice warm ones you got on vacation in Alaska with moose or the ones you got for Christmas with skating penguins. I've had certain socks sit in my drawer for years because I'm just too sentimental (and frugal) to get rid of them... that is until this last holiday season. Our little family got lots of glorious extended family time this last Christmas. Seriously, if you want attention... have a baby.

Amongst that family were both of my grandmas. They are both wonderful ladies and have taught me all kinds of skills that I still use today; and I was able to learn a new one! My Grandma Scarlett showed me how to make a sock rug. And I was also able to clean out my sock drawer with a clear conscious! (Normal people would probably be able to do this either way). Really we were making mini sock rugs; they work great for a seating pad on the fireplace hearth.

My wonderful grandmas with my daughter.

So if you crochet, then this will be easy for you to pick up; if not, the directions might be a little confusing- but it's worth it!

 First you grab all your holey socks! I asked everyone in my family for their's as well...
Tip: Your rug will turn out more even if you use socks of similar thicknesses.

Then you cut them all up into 1.25 in loops. This whole project is looping loops together!

To get started on all this looping, double over a loop 2 times as you would around a pony tail (bottom left) and stick 6 loops inside it, folding them in half with the ends together (bottom middle). Then taking both ends of two loops- one on each index finger - pull the two ends of the second loop through the two ends of the first loop. Once you've pulled the loops through, you will take the next two ends of a third loop and pull it through that second loop. This will continue around to all six loops until it looks like the bottom right picture. Confusing enough? The bottom right picture shows my index finger through the last set of ends, this will be the one that you will start finger crocheting the next round with. Putting a large safety pin in these ends works well for keeping your place.

The bottom left is an advanced picture but it shows how to put loops in the next round. You will be inserting 2 loops in one space and 1 loop in the next, alternating until you've gone all the way around. So the second round will take up 9 loops and will look like the lower left picture before the loops are crocheted. Remove the safety pin and start crocheting around the round. The next round you will insert loops alternating between 1 and 2 loops and the process repeats until you get your rug to a desired size. Tip: If you are planning on doing somewhat of a pattern, then make sure you plan it out with the socks you have.

Below shows the progress after all of the blue loops have been crochet. As you can see in the lower left, I chose gray loops for the third round. The middle picture shows the third round almost completed and the lower right picture shows me putting in the fourth round with green loops.

Four completed rounds.

Below shows the fifth round laid out. For this round I had to combine the loops from a plain gray sock and one with stripes. I laid them out in advance so each kind would be distributed evenly.

As you can see, each round leaves a cool pattern of colors.

Tada! A craft that uses up old socks and creates a unique new hearth rug/cushion! I donated this one to my parents' fireplace and it will provide a nice soft place to sit next to the warm fire!

Below are two more I made upon returning home. My husband had some old army socks and I was able to make one big enough for my cat to nap on by the fire (below on the right).

 

Below is one made by my sister-in-law, Emma. She thought of some long sleeve shirts she didn't need anymore and brilliantly used the sleeves (instead of socks) to make her loops. This one is a little uneven because the size of the sleeves change from shoulder to wrist. Instead of making a pattern of rings (like I did) she just alternated colors throughout the whole project. I thought that was quite creative and it's something I obviously never thought of! She made this one to try out as a stool cushion. I love how creativity shows up differently for each different person!

The army sock rug; it may look too small but when she's really curled up she fits!

 Thanks for reading! I hope this inspires you, and if it does be sure you show me!

Merry Potato Christmas!

By Rachel Scarlett

'Twas the Sunday before Christmas, when all through the house,

Everyone was stirring, yes even the mouse!

If you are anything like me, I'm running around like a chicken with its head cut off trying to get everything in order for Christmas. I am doing a minuscule amount compared to last year, but then again I do have a baby to feed every three hours this year.... So that makes a HUGE difference. A huge wonderful difference :) 

So this last week, my good friend Hannah came over to visit and we had a fun little craft time. We both had it in our heads to decorate our Christmas gifts that were wrapped in plain brown paper. She had actually brought a big roll of paper and was planning on decorating the paper pre-gift; my gifts however were already wrapped. I had also been wanting to try my hand at potato stamping, so I suggested it and that's what we did. I love the 'stamped' look plus it was tons of fun!

Plain boring packages...

So this is a pretty easy project and besides the paint, anyone would probably have all the equipment in their home. You just (1) Draw, (2) Trace, (3) Cut, and stamp stamp stamp!

I drew my tree out on wax paper and then retraced over it to leave an indent in the potato flesh. I used a utility knife to cut downward about a 1/4 of an inch into the potato of the tree outline, and then horizontally from the outside inward (also a 1/4 inch deep) leaving the stamp elevated. When loading the stamp with paint, it only needs a small amount. Too much paint with just make a smudged looking picture. And I would definitely practice stamping a few times before the real deal.

The image above and to the left is a simpler design as an ornament, using the roundness of the potato.

I thought Hannah's snowflakes turned out pretty well, and she used a whiteout pen to add little dots to make a pattern. For the golden dots on the right, I just sliced a small potato in half to stamp with.

Overall, I think all of these turned out great! It was a really fun and easy way to add some decoration to brown paper. I will definitely be bringing potatoes back for some future project; maybe for greeting cards or even for making a pattern on fabric!

This craft was especially enjoyable because I got to share ideas and time with one of my greatest friends! It's so much fun (and inspirational) to create with other people. Her red ornament stamp is something I never would have thought of; my mind would have made it too complicated, but it turned out to be my favorite stamp! I hope everyone finds some time to be creative with someone this Christmas, whether it be through wrapping presents, cooking, decorating the tree, or even by putting a lot of thought into a gift you're buying. Share the Love!

Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night!

Extra trees to use for individual gift tags.

The gold zigzag pattern on the reindeer package was added with a paintbrush.

The Key to an Epic Ugly Sweater

By Rachel Scarlett

A short post about ugly sweaters!

I assume you are all familiar with the popular ugly sweater parties nowadays? Really they have turned into wear-the-tackiest-Christmas-garb-you-can-find parties. The best ugly sweaters are the ones that are found in thrift stores. The ones that were legitimately made by a company in one era that look absolutely ridiculous in this one.

BUT you can also MAKE one to battle the tackiest of sweaters. I think there a few key ways to achieve epicness with your old plain sweater. They are repetitiveness and telling a story. Throwing a bunch of dollar store items on an old sweater is most effective when done with some order in a repetitive pattern. However the way I am going to show you is telling a story, and maybe you don't think this one is epic but maybe it can give you some inspiration ;)

As you can see I chose a favorite Christmas movie and made a scene that was telling a small part of it. Really I was inspired by some faux fur I had and I really wanted to use the crazed Abominable Snowman. I mean what's more tacky than fur on a sweater? By the time Christmas comes in the movie, everyone unites together and it's a happy ending with Rudolf leading Santa through the storm and a happy Abominable Snowman topping the Christmas tree!

The Abominable Snowman himself was made by roughly cutting his body parts out of fur and his hands are dollar store pipe cleaners. The star he holds is cardboard covered in glitter and he stands atop a mound of cotton ball snow.

His face is glittered foam from the dollar store and random googly eyes I had. His ridiculous teeth are plastic pearl beads.

I believe the fur used for the reindeer was from a caveman costume my mom made for my big brother almost 20 years ago... the old fur was starting to separate from the fabric.... pretty tacky. The antlers are more of those pipe cleaners from the dollar store and the reins are just one long continuous ribbon. And as you can see, I used different sized googly eyes for each reindeer.  

Rudolf with his foam sparkle nose....

Snow made from cotton balls and the tree is made from tinsel garland from the thrift store with an old ribbon I had. I glued on some beads that look like Christmas lights but they're hard to see. 

To make this sweater a little more lively, I continued the reins onto the backside to a simple picture of Santa's sleigh. The sleigh is a combination of that glittered foam and pipe cleaners, and the snowflakes are just foam- also from the dollar store.

I definitely could have taken things to a whole other level by making a waving Santa from the sleigh, adding better and more visible ornaments to the tree, and perhaps a banner of 'Merry Christmas' on the backside above the sleigh.

Happy Ugly Sweater Making!!!