Cthulhu GEEKSOAP™ copyright to Lesley Karpiuk
It has been a busy crafting weekend!
First of all, I’m excited to report that I’ve applied to be considered for space at a booth at the Bloomington Handmade Market coming up in early April. The deadline to enter is Friday the 26th, and then I’ll find out whether or not I’ve been accepted and have a table by March 5. I’m totally excited – if accepted, I’ll be sharing a table with my cousin’s girlfriend, Christine, and we’ll be selling our wares to the public in just over a month from now. Not a lot of time, but I’m determined to be ready! So what am I going to sell?
Star Wars GEEKSOAP™
I’ve decided that this is the perfect opportunity to start an idea of mine I’ve been wanting to put together for awhile. Well, since at least last May. GEEKSOAP™! I’ve finally figured it all out and this weekend I slaved over soapmaking supplies and cranked out two dozen bars of a couple different geeky soap varieties that have been floating around in my head. Introducing my GEEKSOAP™ line, which so far includes
- Cthulhu (these are my faves, and so cute! They fit with my Cthulhu toques and Sock-thulhu plushies so well)
- World of Warcraft
- Star Wars
- Star Trek
- Batman
- Indiana University (appealing to the IU crowd at the craft show)
Warcraft For the Horde GEEKSOAP™
and has plans to include PacMan, Thundercats, and a few other geeky and awesome ideas still rolling around in my brain faster than I can make the soap. Check out the entire GEEKSOAP™ line over on my portfolio, which will be updated as new designs are created. All of my GEEKSOAP™ varieties will be available on Etsy as well. I’m currently making soap to have as stock to sell at the craft show in April, but I can easily sell it and/or make more for Etsy sales, too. It’ll help me see what is popular and what I need to make plenty of in time for the show.
Batman GEEKSOAP™
Along with the soap I plan to knit up some simple cotton washcloths to have available for purchase. The application for the Bloomington Handmade Market requires either a business website or five photos of your work to help them consider you for space, and so it was another good opportunity to get my craft portfolio site up and running smoothly (something I’ve been meaning to do for months now) to showcase all of the crafty things I do. Most notably are the Cthulhu toques, Sock-thulhus, and my GEEKSOAP™ line. Thanks to my fantastically amazing husband, the portfolio site is up and running and I sent the link along with my application.
Introducing… ThePinkToque.com! The Pink Toque is my online portfolio to show off knitting, crochet, plush, and soap creations I’ve made over the years. Along with being a portfolio, the site then directs people here to the craft blog and to my Etsy shop for more Pink Toque goodness. Let me know what you think! Even if for some reason I’m not accepted for space at the Bloomington Handmade Market, it was at the very least a good way to get me and my handmade business whipped into shape a little bit, don’t you think?
Stay tuned for more photos and more GEEKSOAP™ – have a great week! :)
photo copyright to Lesley Karpiuk
So we’re finally settled (mostly) back home in Indiana. The move from Calgary, AB Canada to Indiana was a long one, but well worth the drive. It was quite an adventure with Lucas and the two boys — three long days of long hours in the car. You’d think anyone would go crazy being cooped up in a vehicle for such a duration, but I tackled my very first sweater on the trip and completed a set of baby mittens, too!
My future nephew is due in October, so I’ve been on a bit of a baby knitting kick lately. I’ve made bibs, spit up rags, toques, and now mittens and a baby sweater. The mittens were super simple and super quick and I love the result. A friend of ours suggested that they were mittens for Vulcans based on the way I posed with them, haha. Live long and prosper… warmly! The mitten pattern I chose was [Ravelry link] this one, “Baby Mittens” by Sassystitches.
Live long and prosper... warmly!
The baby sweater was the big project that took most of my time on the trip. I chose the very simple 5 Hour Baby Boy Sweater by Jesse’s Branch Charity Crafts. [Ravelry link]. I love the great little garter ridges on the yoke area and the matching garter trim on the jacket body and sleeves. I’ve never knitted a sweater before, so it was probably a good thing that I chose a baby-sized sweater to familiarize myself with the process. I knit starting with the yoke and went back and forth, increasing in a regular pattern, doing the cute little garter ridges until it was time for the sleeves. It got a bit complicated for me at this point because I had a lot of separating to do. Thank goodness for having a full interchangeable Knit Picks set, because I used extra short lengths of cables to hold stitches while I worked the sleeves. I think I would’ve rather knitted the sleeves in the round via magic loop now that I’ve gone through this pattern once, but I was worried about trying to modify an unfamiliar pattern on my first try. I should also admit that the “5 hour” of the 5 Hour Baby Boy Sweater actually took me more like 12 hours, but I chalk that up to my inexperience in knitting sweaters and the fact I was trying to spread the project out over a long car ride and taking my time. And, well, I’m also a pretty slow knitter! I blocked the sweater after we arrived and I think after adding the little car button as a finishing touch, that it turned out really well.
Speaking of little car buttons, I picked up a small pack of them and used them on my Modern Cabled Baby Bibs, too. Don’t the buttons add an adorable little boyish charm?
photo copyright to Lesley Karpiuk
I recently had a few more people purchase my Crochet Cthulhu Toques so I barely had time to get settled in Indiana before I was busy crocheting away to complete the orders. While I’m job searching, it sure felt good to have orders to fill! Cross your fingers that something comes along soon… I’m starting to get antsy! :)
Tags: baby, Cthulhu
Our moving sale on Saturday
So my writing has been a bit scarce lately but there have been some craftings going on in the background. First of all, the reason for being so busy lately is because Lucas, the boys (Oliver and Winston), and I are packing up and moving back to Indiana to be near family. I didn’t get the job that I went home and interviewed for last weekend, BUT there will be other job opportunities and I can’t very well take them or be available for them when I’m 2k miles away in Canada. I sure am going to miss Calgary; I love the Canadian Rockies and I love just about everything about this beautiful country I’ve called home for the past three years. However, I also love my family and want to be near them as my brother starts his family (my first nephew is due in October!) and as Lucas and I eventually start our own family. I wish I could somehow have all of the great stuff about Canada and my family in Indiana all at the same time in the same place, but alas… something’s gotta give.
working on a bib
So we’re moving back to the U.S. on Sunday, July 26. Over the weekend we had a huge yard sale to get rid of just about everything we own; we’re taking the minimalist approach for the move. We’re going to be pulling a 4′x8′ trailer and that’s it, so if it doesn’t fit in a box that fits into the trailer, it’s not going with us. Oliver has done the cross country trip before; he moved from Indiana to Canada with me three years ago. This will be a first for little Winston. While we sat out front for the yard sale Saturday I finished knitting the second Modern Cabled Baby Bib pattern by Andrea Pomerantz. They turned out lovely! They are 95% finished; the knitting and blocking is complete but I haven’t had the time yet to pick out some super cute baby boy buttons to use. I figure I’ll find some when we get settled back in Indiana.
superwash BFL fingering weight wool dyed by Lesleyluu
A few weeks ago, user Lesleyluu on Ravelry had a contest to create a new yarn colorway. I suggested “Lesley” (as it’s my name, too, and we spell it the same!) and offered up my three favorite colors together: pink, mint green, and browns. Kind like spumoni ice cream from The Old Spaghetti Factory. Yum! The colors turned out soft and ice-creamy, and absolutely dreamy. I didn’t win the first prize, but Lesleyluu did choose my colorway to make as a runner up, and I was then able to purchase “Lesley” from her Etsy Shop. Yay! It arrived in the mail earlier this week and I was so ecstatic. It’s a gorgeous superwash fingering weight BFL wool, and my head is swimming with all of the knitting project possibilities for this lovely yarn. Be sure to check out her other fabulous colorways on Etsy. And tell her “The other Lesley” sent you!
Anyway, as you can imagine I’ve been pretty busy lately. Tragedy has also struck my family and with the move and all of the tying up of loose ends here in Canada before we move back to the states, time has been short for projects. However, at the end of a long packing day I’ve found time to sneak in an hour or two of knitting. I’ve got some more burp cloths to make my sister-in-law for my future nephew in the Bernat handicrafter cotton color, “Hot Green.” Seriously, Hot Green? Have you ever heard of a more hideous (and perfect for baby spit up) color name? I can’t wait to make some appropriate spit up cloths from it! And you can be sure with 4 days of driving across the country in the car with my boys I’ll have plenty of little projects to work on and share once I’m back in the good ol’ Hoosier state. :) I’ll do my best to keep up on Twitter during our moving and cross-country knitting adventures, but don’t panic if it takes me another week or two before I can update here properly again ;) Take care!
Tags: family, moving, yard sale, yarn
Recycled Wallpaper QP by pinktoque
I’m baaaaaaack! Hopefully you liked the Recycled Wallpaper mini pack freebie given away yesterday :) Today as promised I’ve got the coordinating quick page to give away, too! It’s 3600 x 3600 pixels (12″ x 12″) and 300 dpi. It uses a little from the Recycled Wallpaper pack and then I added some other random stuff as I went. It’s a little pink, but pink is a very good color :)
Download the Recycled Wallpaper QP here!
Don’t forget that unless otherwise specified, my digital scrapbooking elements are for personal use only. Be sure to check out the TOU included and let me know if you have any questions. I hope to make some more new stuff in the near future, as time allows. Right now I’m back home in Indiana for a brief period this weekend in order to interview with the school district I taught at before I moved up to Canada. Cross your fingers! If I get a job offer, Lucas and I will pack up the boys and we’ll be on our way.
And of course, finding out last minute (Wednesday) that I was going to need to take a plane to Indy the next day (Thursday), one of the most important aspects of the packing wasn’t which outfit I was going to wear for the interview, or my teaching portfolio… but what knit projects I wanted to take with me for the flight! Haha. Ok so I’m probably exaggerating a lot (It took a long time for me to decide on an outfit, and I spent several hours touching up my portfolio), but it was a very important part of the packing. I had to figure out the patterns I wanted to take and wind some yarn for those projects into cakes to pack in my carry on. I’m going to be working on Danido Crafty’s Bebeh Earflaps Hat and the Modern Cabled Baby Bib by Andrea Pomerantz. I’ll let you know how it goes! :)
Have a great weekend, and wish me luck!
Tags: baby, interview, teaching
Posted by Lesley on Mar 22, 2009 in
crochet,
family,
immigration,
indiana,
plushies 
It was a busy weekend, and yet somehow I managed to sneak in three whole crochet projects. Crazy, I know. It’s the official start of spring break for me, and my mom and grandma are coming to visit later in the week. Between getting organized, cleaning and getting some things around the house done we’ve been meaning to complete, I am amazed that I was able to get so many extracurricular crafting done this weekend, too. Woohoo!
First on the list is a crochet sackboy from Little Big Planet. I stumbled upon this pattern and felt up to the challenge. I have a friend who loves the game and so I decided to whip one up to send his way. It’s off to the Netherlands tomorrow! He turned out okay — I added the little yellow ribbon for flair — but I felt the zipper part was a bit messy. It was my first go at jointing limbs on a crochet stuffie, too. All in all I think he turned out pretty cute and I’m sure he’ll be well received when he arrives.
Second this weekend was another gift for a friend; this time a colleague of mine at work. I crocheted a 12 ft tall purple bird. Well, not exactly 12 whole feet tall (try 17 inches), but there’s a bit of an inside joke with this bird. Each morning on the bus run for our school, this other teacher friend of mine puts on kids music for the kiddos. The kids really love this one tape (yes, tape) of songs and refuse to listen to anything else. Let’s just say that after three months, the tape is starting to get a bit annoying. But the songs are cute and it makes the students happy, so who cares, right? My teacher friend shared with me that she really hates this one song on the tape, and it’s a song about a “12ft tall purple bird.” I of course told the students that she looooooooves the song and that it’s her favorite, and so now whenever the song comes on the kids will say, “Oh, isn’t this your favorite song?” to her, and she has to just agree with them. It’s good for a laugh, even though I get the evil eye, haha. So I imagined what the “12ft tall purple bird” from the song would look like, and voila. I cannot wait to gift this to her after spring break.
The last thing I made this weekend was a little tiny Cthulhu! Oh my gosh, isn’t he cute?! I could just eat him up. I made him for Lucas, who found the pattern online awhile back. I of course then found it in the Ravelry database and queued it up. Today I was browsing my queue to find something to make and was reminded of this little guy. He was a quick crochet, and I just loved the way he turned out. I opted for no arms because I’m weird like that, but he does have wings and those oh-so-cute tentacles. If he had a nose, I’d want to rub noses with him. He now sits on top of a stack of blank CDs and DVDs on Lucas’ desk. I think I need to make a pink one for my own desk. TOO cute! It makes me want to make more… and more… and more…
My side-by-side cowl neck sweater is still sitting where it was 2 posts ago. It’s such a time consuming project that I’ve found I really have to be in the mood to do something incredibly repetitious for long periods of time to get anywhere with it. I’ll have plenty of time for that whenever we make the move back home to the states. I don’t know if I’ve mentioned it here on my craft blog yet, but Lucas and I made an announcement over on our personal blog that we’ve decided to move back to Indiana to be near family. Mostly because we’re ready to start a family of our own, and we don’t want to be so far away from them when we do. You can read all about it over on our blog. We go in tomorrow morning to start paperwork, and are crossing our fingers we can be ready to move by the end of the summer. That means 4 days in a UHAUL with my boys and lots of crochet projects to keep me busy ;) Here’s hoping! Take care and have a wonderful week :)
crochet
Tags: Cthulhu, Little Big Planet, sackboy
Posted by Lesley on Sep 7, 2008 in
crafts,
digital scrapbooking,
freebies,
indiana 
I managed to find a little time this weekend to put together a few quick pages for you using my freebie kit for “The Hoosier State.” If you missed parts 1, 2 and 3 of the set be sure to check back a few posts to nab them for yourself! The quick pages are all 3600 x 3600 pixel pngs. To use them, all you have to do is paste them as a new layer like an overlay over top of your photos in your favourite image editing software. It usually lines up best if you open the quick page first, then arrange your photos over the empty spaces, then shuffle the layer(s) that your photo(s) are on underneath the quick page layer. If you have any questions on using them, don’t hesitate to email me. :)
In other news, today is the first official regular season Bears game (versus my hometown team of the Indianapolis Colts!) GOOOOOOOOOOOOO BEARS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Our little family is all prepped for the game and I hope to get another scrapbook page or two together using my “I Love the Chicago Bears” freebie because Winston was an absolute doll and posed wonderfully for me in his little Bears jersey earlier, as you can see.
Download “The Hoosier State” Quick Pages set HERE!
Happy (Football) Sunday and hope you all enjoy the quick pages. :)
scrapbook
Posted by Lesley on Sep 5, 2008 in
crafts,
digital scrapbooking,
freebies,
indiana 
It’s Friday and you know what that means… Freebie Friday! :) Hope everyone has had a great short week — and now on to the final piece of “The Hoosier State” kit, part 3! If you’ve not been following my blog the last few days then you’ve missed out on parts 1 and 2, so be sure to flip back and grab them so you can have all of the Indiana goodness at your fingertips. Part 3 is a bit ‘cornier’ than the previous two pieces and consists of the final two papers, some corn-y notepaper, two more kinds of corn elements, another peony and a wheat inspired mat, a little wordart and wooden elements, a new button and a handful of bows, an acrylic state of Indiana and two more ribbons, with one being of the hand-beaded variety. It’s a beautiful final piece (if I do say so myself) and now your Hoosier state kit is all complete!
Don’t forget that this freebie kit is for personal, non-commercial use ONLY, as specified in the TOU included with all of my freebie downloads. Please be sure to read the TOU before using any of the items in the kit, and contact me if you have any questions about it.
Download “The Hoosier State” Part 3 of 3 (final!) HERE.
My ultimate goal is to make a quick page or two for you to give away late this weekend or early next week, but we’ll see what time allows; you know how it goes. I hope everyone has had a wonderful week — enjoy your weekend and “The Hoosier State” and hope to see you back again soon :)
scrapbook
Posted by Lesley on Sep 4, 2008 in
crafts,
digital scrapbooking,
freebies,
indiana 
It’s day 2 of my Hoosier state freebie kit and I’m proud to give away 2 more themed papers and 14 more elements towards the complete set! Today you’ll get a little Indy 500 flavour with a cute road ribbon and wooden cut out car, plus word art, another frame and some more buttons, bows and ribbons. You’ll also snag my cute little gemmed and felt corn paperclip! (which you might recognize from my “Healthy Balance” kit) You’ve almost got the entire Hoosier state set, so be sure to come back tomorrow so you can pick up the final piece for Freebie Friday! :D
Don’t forget that this freebie kit is for personal, non-commercial use ONLY, as specified in the TOU included with all of my freebie downloads. Please be sure to read the TOU before using any of the items in the kit, and contact me if you have any questions about it.
Download “The Hoosier State” Part 2 of 3 HERE!
And like I said yesterday, Indiana is near and dear to my heart and always will be. So if you make any fab layouts with “The Hoosier State”, please let me know so I can show off how awesome you are :) Thanks for stopping in to nab part 2 (oh, are you a first timer here and missed yesterday’s part 1? Click HERE!) and I’m already looking forward to seeing you again tomorrow for part 3. <3
scrapbook
Posted by Lesley on Sep 3, 2008 in
crafts,
digital scrapbooking,
freebies,
indiana 
Happy Wednesday :)
This week I have three days in a row of amazing freebies for you, being kicked off today! And what’s the topic? Well by the title you’ve probably guessed — “The Hoosier State.” Most of you that have followed my blog (or notice the blog design or header) know that I’m a Hoosier girl… originally from Indiana, but now living happily ever after in Canada for over two years. I decided to create a big freebie kit dedicated to where I grew up because I’ll always have a soft spot in my heart for the Hoosier state, even if I don’t technically call it “home” anymore.
I finally finished the kit last night, and together there are 8 papers and 40 different elements in this one including wordart, frames, mats, ribbons, peonies, notepaper, corn (lots of corn!), clips, buttons, bows, and even a few acrylic elements and wooden pieces such as the state flag, the state itself, and some Indy 500 items. All in a colour scheme that reminds me of Indiana. The kit was too big for one zipped file so I decided to break it up into 3 pieces and release all of the parts over the next three days. Each day contains at least two papers and a random handful of the 40 elements. This Friday’s Freebie Friday will be the final piece, and once you download all three, you’ll have the entire kit.
Don’t forget that this freebie kit is for personal, non-commercial use ONLY, as specified in the TOU included with all of my freebie downloads. Please be sure to read the TOU before using any of the items in the kit, and contact me if you have any questions about it.
Download “The Hoosier State” Part 1 of 3 HERE!
I would really love to see what you do with the kit — please send any layouts you make to me and I’d be happy to feature you here and show off your creativity. If I get around to it this week, I may release a quickpage or two. But don’t hold me to it! Be sure to check back tomorrow (and Friday) for parts 2 and 3 to complete the set! I hope you like “The Hoosier State.” Thanks for stopping by :)
scrapbook
