Author: TwinkieChan

It’s the 15th of the month, so it’s time to launch a new blog sponsor giveaway! Thanks so much to my generous sponsors for offering us these wonderful goodies! We are starting 2015 with a huge bang and 12 prizes! ONE lucky winner will receive:

We’re so lucky to have another giveaway with Blippo.com, your one-stop shop for super cute stationery, phone accessories, jewelry, candy, magazines, and other fun stuff from Japan and Korea! One lucky winner will receive: A Purple Neko Plush Charm A Rilakkuma Rice Cracker Set which come with 4 packets of crackers. …. and a Fluffy Pastel Purse! You have until Wednesday, January 28th to enter! Please use the Rafflecopter widget below. This giveaway is open worldwide. Good luck! <3 (p.s. That’s some other Blippo stuff that they sent me, so you can see some more of their fun goodies!) a Rafflecopter giveaway

I just posted a new video tutorial for an old-ish pattern here on my blog: the heart garland that was featured before in Crochet Today magazine! It’s a cool tutorial for beginners, because we go through several different stitches like tr, htr, dc, hdc, and sc!  

Sooooo I FINALLY was able to finish crocheting baby Groots for my giveaway winners from a few months ago. I am super sorry it took me FOREVERRRRRRR. Renegade Craft Fair and then the holidays really made my crocheting schedule crazy! So thanks so much for your patience Kristina, Katgumi, Lexi, Deanna, and Karen! Your baby Groots are boxed up and on the way! Remember, if you’d like to crochet a baby Groot of your own, my free pattern is here!

Okay, I’m not a super hippie-dippie touchy-feely spiritual kinda lady, BUT, my best friend is, and sometimes, you read each other’s tarot cards all night and learn about Metatron cubes, and sometimes, you write letters to the Universe. We decided to take a moment to write down small letters to the Universe on pieces of paper. Manda said to write down our hopes, dreams, and wishes. I ended up writing a lot of promises to myself, with most of my short letters beginning with, “I will….” Initially, we had planned to do all of this outside on a hike, but we woke up too late to go on a hike, so we ended up performing our ritual in Manda’s apartment at night, with all the windows open, jackets zipped up, blankets on laps, occasionally fanning any smoke toward the windows. I know this was not the smartest idea, but it happened, and everything was fine! …except for the part where the smoke felt REALLY BURNY ON OUR EYEBALLZ. Otherwise, VERY SPIRITUAL. AND STUFF. I hope you are all able to execute your hopes, dreams and wishes this year! <3 (p.s.) How was your NYE? I don’t think I will write a lot about it…. in order to protect the guilty … but we went to our favorite divey club for 80s night, and the evening was no less than epic.

Do you love checking out other people’s creative spaces? ROOM TO CREATE is a brand new print magazine FILLED with colorful photos of crafty studios AND tutorials (including mine!). Learn lots of organizational tips and get inspired for 2015!!! I believe it can be found where most magazines are sold, such as Barnes and Noble! My craft space is currently a huge mess, so telling you guys about this magazine is definitely making me want to pick this place up …. 😛 I don’t currently have links or social media info for Room to Create (I just realized that and just emailed about it), but when I find out, I will let you know!

A few weeks ago, my friend Interro Bang came over to my house for some holiday crafting. She brought over 8 million pounds of goodies and drinks! We decided to make some cheezy holiday tree ornaments together. We also thought it might be funny to make a silly video tutorial… and I know it’s totally too late to make ornaments for Christmas, but, I could ALWAYS use more Christmas, so here is our crazy video anyway!!! I hope you all are having a great holiday season so far! P.S. If you have any requests for Valentine’s Day projects or videos, please let me know. I’ll try to plan ahead!

Sorry for the radio-silence on my blog and on YouTube and basically all my social media. I am still crocheting until the wee hours to overnight people’s Christmas orders that I thought I could handle, but I got a bit overwhelmed.  I am also feeling super spent in all ways that a human can feel spent due to various and sundry life-happenings, but all we can do is forge on. Speaking of human, I got this Murray Christmas baseball tee from LookHuman.com, cuz one of my Instagram friends had one, and I had to copy her! I will be going hobo-casual on Christmas Day.

Don’t forget that you have 2 more days to get 15% off in the Yummy You! shop with code POLAREXPRESS! Dec. 18 is our cut-off for shipping Christmas orders in the U.S., so if you need some last-minute prezzies, go git it!

Hi! It’s the 16th of the month, so it’s time to launch a new blog sponsor giveaway! (Sorry it wasn’t on the 15th this month …. it has been so crazy here since I’ve been working hard on your holiday orders!) Thanks so much to my generous sponsors for offering us these wonderful goodies! ONE lucky winner will receive:

My buddy Salena let me know that I was nominated for a Flamie aka Flaming Hook of Justice Awards aka The Crochet Awards. Check out all your favorite crochet people and have fun voting!   p.s. I also updated my Etsy shop with some on-sale ready-to-ship scarves and other fun items like animal donuts and Christmas Pickles! The last day to order within the U.S. for Christmas delivery is the 18th!

Thanks so much to Simply Crochet for sharing my yarn stash/craft room in Issue 16, which is on sale now!

You know you’ve seen them, and you know you wanted one, and here’s the best one! One of my wonderful crochet elves Emy has her own Etsy shop, My Auntie Em Made It or Rosemary’s Baby MEK, and she has a great version of the Katniss-inspired shrug! I asked if she could make me one in PINK, and I totally am in love with this Katniss-In-Candyland confection! It has an amazing fit (no weird droopy spots, which I feel I’ve seen in some versions of this) and is really cozy without making me break out into a sweater-sweat. I also really like that incorporates both knit and crochet. (Sorry about the weird/bad photoshop on the shirt I’m wearing underneath… there was part of an image of a girl kneeling, and it just looked kinda bad out of context…!) For you yarn-lovers, this yarn is Biggo from KnitPicks. It’s 50% superwash merino and 50% nylon. Super soft and lofty! (Although it looks like this pink is now discontinued, boo!)

Friends in LA, you should swing by iam8bit to check out their handmade ornaments show! It opens this Thursday, December 4th, 7pm – 10pm. I sent in 3 different kinds of ornaments, and judging from the names on this flyer, I am sure there is going to be TONS of cool stuff! If you go, you have to take lots of photos and send them to me!

I’m in the December issue of Craftseller Magazine in the UK as Blogger of the Month! Craftseller encourages you to make and sell your handmade crafts, so there’s advice and lots of fun projects inside to make and sell, not only in the magazine, but on the website, too. I have a Q&A and also a free pattern for ya! Actually the free pattern is up on on their website, so I’ll go ahead and link you to it. {{Edit: Unfortunately, Craftseller Magazine no longer exists, so I posted this pattern for free on my blog here.}} It’s for a little custard cream sandwich cookie to with your tea or coffee. I had them at my table at Renegade, and a lot of people had a cute nostalgia for these little guys! Enjoy!!!

I fell in love with an Australian brand called Eat Me Do! I heard about it because Kailey from Mermaidens blogged about the Aussie shop Lady Petrova, and Lady Petrova then hosted an Eat Me Do pop-up, and THEN, I entered Eat Me Do’s Instagram giveaway, and thennnnnn, I TOTALLY WON THIS STRAWBERRY FLUFF JUMPER!!! HELLOOOOOO!!! I got to chatting with the designer, Lara Ivachev, via email, and we are going to have a fun clothing/crochet trade!! I love meeting neat new people! By the way, that’s Bunny’s bed I’m sitting on!!! I wanted to give her a cute space in the bedroom, and as it turns out, it’s a pretty cute space for humans, too! It’s been fairly gloomy and rainy here, so it was nice to wear something cheery and fun for a little bit! *** Jumper: EatMeDo, Skirt: F21, Socks: the Lolita shop in Little Tokyo in L.A. that I can’t recall the name of. Also that big painting in the back is by my talented pal Shannie Shea.

Our Yummy You! sale is still going on! 20% off our entire shop with code BLACKFRIDAY until Monday at midnight!

I don’t blog nearly enough about all the cool crocheting happening out in the world, but I had to show you these amazing puppets that someone sent me on Facebook along with a wonderful note. Emily is an art teacher and drama director at the Heritage School District in Homer / Broadlands IL. Her drama club performed Little Shop of Horrors last weekend (and I’m so sorry I didn’t get this blog post up before then!). When she first decided to take on this project, the only thing that went through her brain was EVERYTHING MUST BE CROCHETED! So, all summer she crocheted and completed two of the puppets. The final puppet had to big enough for the actors to go through and get eaten! Not only did they crochet the plant puppets, but also vines, mini plant puppets for each actor, flowers for the flower shop and hundreds of leaves! Here is the big one! It is 5.5 feet tall! Feed me, Seymour! I’m just so impressed at all the work that went into these pieces, and I’m bummed I don’t live close enough to have seen them in action! Maybe if we are lucky, the Heritage Drama Club will make more crochet magic in the future! Thanks, Emily, for sharing your photos with me and for being an inspiration!

I polled you guys on Facebook to see what kind of Thanksgiving-themed crochet tutorial you’d like to see, and I got a lot of votes for a turkey drumstick as well as some form of pumpkin pie. The turkey drumstick would be easy, as the pattern already exists and I wouldn’t have to write anything, but hey, I like a fun(ny) new project and thought maybe you would, too! I decided to turn this little pumpkin pie brooch (or hair clip, for the adventurous) into a hiding place for some sheets of tissue, and the tissue also doubles as the whipped cream dollop for the pie! You know, this will come in super handy at your holiday feast, if someone randomly drops some stuffing on the floor, or if someone has some gravy on their face. YOU COULD BE THE THANKSGIVING HERO. YOU’RE WELCOME. (Pattern also includes the option of stuffing the brooch with Polyfill and not having any tissue come out of it…) There’s also a video tutorial on YouTube for ya.

I’m excited to bring you another KawaiiBox giveaway! KawaiiBox is the cutest monthly subscription box, filled with 10-12 hand-picked items from Japan and Korea for $18.90/month. Use the Rafflecopter widget below for a chance to win next month’s KawaiiBox! Let’s check out what’s in November’s!

I have a new free crochet pattern today for this Gingerbread Christmas Stocking over at Skip To My Lou for their huge Bake Craft Sew & Crochet Along! Don’t forget that Skip To My Lou is also running a giveaway for a $300 gift certificate at Michaels! I also plan to post a video tutorial for this in 2 weeks, so stay tuned!

Don’t forget that I have a free pattern for a Turkey Tissue Box cozy with cute lil veggies and a lettuce dish cloth! I’ll be filming a tutorial for the drumstick and posting it this week! Also for those of us less inclined to crochet any turkey-related accessories, we have our Turkey Hat available for sale over at Yummy You!

Today I’m over at Skip to My Lou as part of the Bake Craft Sew & Crochet Along. I am sharing a wonderful crochet pattern perfect for holiday gift giving. In fact, you won’t want to miss all the handmade gift ideas! I have joined over 100 bloggers to share some amazing homemade gift ideas……..AND I get to be part of an amazing giveaway too. Keep reading… You can enter to win a $300 Michaels gift card. Yes, you can buy yarn until your heart is content! Follow along with us and you can enter to win each day!   Just wait for the rafflecopter to load and get ready …… a Rafflecopter giveaway

Yesterday, I got a fun little surprise in the mail: HAPPY MAIL! It’s the new monthly stationery club from my fave gals Elsie & Emma from A Beautiful Mess (they also recently launched a new shop filled with tons of crafting supplies plus their new craft line, bee tee dubs!). You can tell that I’m kind of really into their mailer! Let’s check out what’s inside! I already started getting the happy feels upon opening my hand-written card! When I was little, I tried to get Manda to be my pen pal, but she never mailed me anything! Granted, she did GIVE me some letters when I saw her, BUT STILL. Anyway, I admit, that I am really bad at the lost art of letter-writing and card-sending. My friend Cuppy is like The Queen of Card-Sending, and I think it’s really lovely, and I wish I had my ish together enough to send some random mail-love to my favorite people. For $15/month, you get a$50 retail value of fun and colorful cards, tags, stickers, labels, notepads, and even a print! The gals put together a little video to show you everything you get. As a person who does not collect cards or stationery or very much paper goods, I’m kind of excited to have this little collection to play with! It’s giving me a push to send someone a surprise. Who would you send a fun card to?