A Vlog test

Knit Vlog Test from TomatoTea (Katrina) on Vimeo.

Decided to try out Vloging. I kind of like it.


Don't worry, there's no talking in this video. Just super fast knitting.
Time lapse is certainly one of my favourite film techniques, showing an event that takes a lot of time in just a few minutes.
Planning on doing this for as many crafty projects as possible, hoping that it will keep me inspired and let me see how far I have come with projects and finish them!

WIP Wed Thurs Friday

Neckerchiefs!

I love 'em.

Here are the finished ones from the last WIP blog posts. These will go on to OOAK tomorrow morning.

Heres another in progress knit up in Noro Silk Garden. Yum!

Old paper has been torn up to be made into another recycled journal and buttons have been sewn onto hair snaps for myself.

   

In other news, OOAK are looking to interview UK crafters for their blog so do get in contact if you fancy a bit of free exposure.

WIP Wednesday

Seeing as I have a huge collection of buttons, i thought it best to use them for something! Although not entirely original, I've been making button hair slides which is actually quite addictive and good fun.

I was given a spark of inspiration from a friend of mine. She sewed buttons on to canvases in the shape of a heart in her friends favourite colours. Being a button maniac, i thought, why not cover a whole canvas in buttons?

I've been making neckerchiefs ready for this winter. I've got so much hand dyed yarn laying around, I thought i'd knit up a ball to see what it looks like. This yarn is called Hot Treacle :D

In other news, i've been beavering away working on www.ooakhandmade.co.uk with a friend of mine. Its a small collective of UK artisans selling their work in one place. It opens up for business this Saturday, so if you have time, i'd really appreciate you guys having look and giving any feedback!

Holy smokes! She posted something!

Well, its been a while, hasn’t it?

Apologies to everyone who follows and reads this blog. I am still making and in fact blogging, but have neglected The Crafty Tea Break for far too long.

Usually, this is where i’d type about what i’ve been doing and why I haven’t been blogging.

But i’m not going to do that.

Instead, i’m just going to post pictures and get right back to it!

Ps - Happy Belated 2010!

Dyeing Spree

Just a quick post to show the fruits of my labor Wednesday morning. The red/orange fibres are Massam tops, the rest are English Superwash tops - i'll be testing the super wash element after they've been spun up!

New Style Coin Purse

I say new, in which i mean different to the other style I've sewn. Its been done before many many times, its not my design and i used this tutorial on Flickr as a base. You can see the zip is in the middle and that the same fabric is used through out but it wasn't too difficult to work out what I wanted to do.

The grey one was my first try. Its wonky, it has untidy edges. and turned out a little smaller than i anticipated! But all in all it worked out great and the blue one is the proof of the pudding. A lot neater and tidier, inside and out - no raw edges showing. And bigger, even though i used the same amount of fabric. Not sure how that happened. Practice i suppose!

Anyways, like i said, not new by any means and they are quicker to whip up than the other style I have done. What do you think?

Old WIPs...

Its been a while since I've actually posted any projects I'm working on. Sorry, this is going to be a big post to make up for all the lost time :o

First up though, in light of my resolution to make TomatoTea more successful this year I have rearranged my bedroom to be more productive.

Uh, no before shot. I didn't think I'd blog about it to be honest! And the second picture is terrible, my room is quite dark, so it's hard to get the exposure right :( But you get the idea.

So on to the projects.

The majority are half made bags; knitted, crocheted and waiting for some lovely linning :) Heres some thumbs from Flickr:

I've also got 'Thermal' on the needles... and the knit picks gloss is staining them XD. Admittedly, I haven't got far with that one but I'm taking it to New Zealand in the hopes of getting it done.

Yes. That's right. DONE.

I just wish I could knit on the plane... I have 16+ hours to kill on the way there and back ;_;

Also, I'm in the middle of crocheting some baskets for my new 'Studio' (can I call it that if I sleep in there? XD). Parcel string is dead hard on the hands though. I need to work out if I'm making the most of the string by crocheting in the round (as shown) or if its more 'economical' to crochet back and forth. I'll get back to you guys on that one at a later date!

I think thats enough of an update for now.

Oh, and Happy New Year :)

WIPs and FOs

Busy busy.

Heres a little look at what i’ve been up to :)

mirrored from tomatotea.net

Bad Blogger

Time to step it up a gear. I am terrible at the moment. I think the lack of posts is to do with my lack of creativity.

However.

There has been a spark at last!

This is all down to Yayster over on deviantArt. She came up with the most brilliant idea of the Twelve Months Of Deviousness and Mays project involved a secret santa type of thing :)
Anyway, it helped me to look outside of my boundaries and create something a little different.

More sparks:

These are my current sneak peeks at some works in progress. I'm thinking of making a 'Sneek Peek WIP' post every week, to help drive me to post at least once a week :)

Oh yeah. I finally have some sort of job! Its only 12 hours at an arts and crafts store at minimum wage, but thats fine by me for now :)
...Still looking for full time work though.
Also looking at some local short courses to do over the summer. This will hopefully build up a nice portfolio.

Enough babbling.