Author: TwinkieChan

JapanLA is celebrating it’s 10th Anniversary with a fun party and art show! Mark your calendars for Saturday, June 11, 6pm-10pm! They are celebrating with a Super Kawaii Food Art Show and party! They will have a bunch of super cute food related items in store for the party too! AND A CHURRO BAR TRUCK!!!!!!!!! I really want to go, but I’m not sure I can make it. We’ll see…! But if you’re in the area, you should definitely check it out. I will have a crocheted bento box series there. Here’s a sneak peek of one of them! I’m so obsessed with hot dog octopus bento right now that I cannot even function. More pics soon!

When someone asks if they can send you a roller skating unicorn pin … YOU SAY YES. These amazing pins are by one of my faves, Ugly Baby. You might know her more for her shower art, which I have in my bathroom, but she has some other fun stuff in her shop like these guys! She sent me two pins – one for me, and one for a friend. But I sorta took them both… and used them as collar pins! If you want to pick up one of your own,  hit up Ugly Baby on Etsy! p.s. this dress if from Kee Boutique, and I don’t know if I got big or it got small, but now I can no longer zip it all the way up without feeling like a tightly stuffed gingham sausage.

I have a super cute new giveaway for you guys! One of the things I really like about this giveaway is the possibility that you will pass the prize onto someone else for a special occasion. Momiji dolls are message dolls. Not only are they colorful and adorable and come in all different designs and personalities, but they also have little slots on the bottom for a small slip of paper that you can write a special message on. Give a cute Momiji doll as a birthday present, anniversary present, thank-you present, wedding present, or just an everyday hey-I-like-you present. Each doll is packaged in a sturdy capsule box with his/her name and likes. Momiji also often works with other designers around the world to bring you special collaborations and limited editions. To be honest, I was really sad to miss out on the 2008 Yota Sampasneethumrong collab. I mean, really, I LOVE THESE SO MUCH. Actually, I blogged about them in 2012! Momiji sent me some cute dolls to show you guys. Here’s what the dolls look like when they arrive. From left to right, I got Snug Bug, BFF Dina, Thank You (I think we kinda look alike, don’t you?), and BFF Liona. #myfaceforscale Here’s a video of me unboxing them for the first time: TWO lucky winners will be able to select one core Momiji doll of their own (does not include limited edition and doll must be in stock at winners’ local hub). Simply use the Rafflecopter widget below for all your ways to enter. I’m also running a separate giveaway for one more doll on Instagram. Giveaway is open worldwide and will run until Wednesday, June 1st at midnight PDT. Winner must be 18 or over and must also respond to my email within 24 hours or I will choose a new winner. Winner will be chosen randomly via Rafflecopter/Random.org. Please make sure that twinkie@twinkiechan.com will get through your spam filters. While Momiji will pay for shipping your prize, you are responsible for any possible customs or duty charges. No purchase necessary. Void where prohibited. No giveaway accounts please! A giveaway account is a social media account that you use only to post about giveaways. Good luck! a Rafflecopter giveaway

Okay, so, I don’t know if you remember my post about the loaf kitties, but I mentioned that my buddy Candace showed me a shop called Tokyo Otaku Mode, and we have been linking cute stuff to each other since! I am now a TOM affiliate, so while this post is not sponsored, I do get a small percentage of the sale if you buy anything from the store with one of the links on my blog. ALSO, they gave me a 10% off code for you guys: TwinkieTOM. It only lasts until the end of May! I think if you sign up using this link, we both get a $5 credit to shop, too [[edit: actually it looks like it’s not $5 but $10 worth of TOM points instead. I’m sorry I misunderstood!!]]. Phew. That’s a lot of info! Now let’s take a look at some of my current favorites! For plushies, I am loving all of these dudes: Peropero Sparkles Plush Mascots, Bananya Pencil Case, Tsuchineko Chabushi Plush, Rainbow Pockets Teddy Bears In J-Fashion, I put these on my wishlist: Donut Socks, Swankiss Cherry Motif Top, Flapper Cat Tail Fur Bag, Honey Salon Bunny Ballet Flats There’s also a big Figures and Dolls section, but to be honest, I’m not a big collector of those, nor do I know a lot of the characters, so I can’t really select a favorites list from that particular part of the shop. But I hope you have a look at the TOM website and take advantage of the $5 off coupon from my sign-up link as well as the 10% coupon at checkout with the code TwinkieTOM!

I had kind of a whirlwind weekend while in Pasadena for Vogue Knitting Live. I will blog about it! But first… our monthly giveaway!!! Thanks to my lovely blog sponsors for the wonderful prizes. ONE LUCKY WINNER WILL RECEIVE:

I’m teaching a crochet class this Thursday night, 5pm – 7pm, at ImagiKnit in San Francisco! There’s still time to sign up. We’ll be making mini donuts from my book that you can turn into fridge magnets, pins, hair clips, key chains, bag charms, whatever you like! I’m also bringing a slightly different mini donut pattern if you want more circular donuts (rather than the oval ones that I prefer!). This is a good class for intermediate beginners. Things will go more smoothly if you are already familiar with how to hold a crochet hook, how to chain, and how to single crochet. I can teach you about working in the round, increasing, and decreasing! The class is a promotional price of $25 and you can sign up with ImagiKnit by calling 415-621-6642. See you then!

Oh my gosh, I had more fun wearing this outfit than I thought I would! This adorable suspender skirt was sent to me by Unique Vintage for my Style Society posts. It is navy blue with white polka hearts. I know this would look so super cute with a great blouse, but I am somewhat lacking in the cute blouse department. The good news is that a cute t-shirt works just as well! I paired my Jitterbug Suspender Skirt with a Hello Kitty x Johnny Cupcakes shirt from a few years back plus some saddle shoes from Amazon that I just picked up for a Halloween costume one year. I still want to buy a higher quality pair at some point. The suspenders attach with white buttons and are also adjustable. There is a zipper in the back with a hook closure. I love the way this skirt nips your waist in. As a lady with short legs, I always kind of avoided skirts of this length. Somehow I feel like this is working, though!  When I was putting together this outfit in my head, I felt like I was conjuring a schoolgirl or someone about to meet a friend at a bookstore or library. As it turns out, I was just meeting myself. I guess that’s okay, too. Suspender Skirt: c/o Unique Vintage, Shirt: Johnny Cupcakes (no longer available), Necklace: YouMakeMe Design, Shoes: Amazon, Purse: Kling via ModCloth

OKAY, I know it’s only like the day before Mother’s Day, but I posted a YouTube video for a Mother’s Day project anyway. You know how it goes with me … I’m a terrible planner when it comes to videos and holidays, and you can always use a bunch of older projects for this year’s present, and then you can use this one for future presents! 😛 I need to shoot better photos of the scarf and of me wearing it! But anyway, as I explain in the video, I have a store-bought scarf that I wear all the time and that is getting kind of old-looking, so I wanted to make myself a new one. I figured, you might want to make one, too. There are a lot of patterns and tutorials out there for chain link scarves already, so this isn’t a new-new idea, and I don’t even know if there is some cool tip or trick I’m missing out on. It’s just something I made for myself in real life. If anything, it’s just inspiration to start digging around in your stash and putting together yarns you might not have normally put together! In my scarf, I have some Madeline Tosh, Lion Brand, Knit Collage, and handspun from Etsy. The other fun thing (for me) about the video is that I lit my hands with my new OttLite (that you can win, too!). You’ll notice that the light changes throughout the tutorial portion of the video, because I kept changing the light settings around. I like whatever setting I had it on for the very last tutorial shot! I think that was the cool temp at full blast. Anyway, I hope you have a wonderful weekend, whatever it is that you’re doing! <3

I’m super excited that OttLite contacted me and offered to send me a new desk lamp to review AND giveaway! This is the LED Desk Lamp with Color Changing Tunnel and USB. I have an older model that was gifted to me years ago, but this new one has some really neat bells and whistles! I’d actually been using an old ugly black desk lamp from Target on my craft table. Back when my craft room was in my spare bedroom, and the walls were yellow, it was really hard for me to get enough light on my work to see true colors. I would complain that I couldn’t tell my yellow pompoms from my light green pompoms! Sorry ahead of time that these aren’t the most amazing and beautifully styled photos. My work table is pretty boring, but I wanted to show you where I’m actually using my light in real life. This is where I pack and ship orders, and also where I glue pompoms to stuff, hot glue things to other things, sew beads to hair pieces… all my non-crochet work. My OttLite makes an amazing difference, and I wouldn’t just say that! Since it’s LED, it’s energy efficient and will last a long time. At first I was a bit afraid that the lamp’s modern look would feel really strange in my space. When it arrived, I was like, this looks like an alien out of Prometheus. You know, the baby one that bashes in that one guy’s space helmet. But I think that the white color helps it feel more comfy, and now I love it. Actually, I kinda wanna glue tiny plastic figurines to the top of it, but we’ll see what happens. The neck of the lamp is really bendy. You can bend it forward and also bend it side to side. I also used it to light my hands in the YouTube tutorial I’m about to upload. BUT HERE’S THE REALLY NEAT PART. On the left side of the base is the power button and a button that says “M.” The M button controls the temperature of the light, so you can have really cool light, or a warmer light, or a mix of both. SO RAD. On the right side of the base are some arrow buttons. These control the strength of the light. There are 4 different strength settings. And that rainbow strip in the center? That controls the color-changing tunnel!!! IT’S CRAFTY PARTY TIME. You can slide your finger along the rainbow strip to choose one color of light, or, if you hold down the green power button, the colors will start to automatically cycle. (I have no idea why all my photos captured the purple cycle…!) There’s also a USB port in the back that I didn’t get a photo of but you can charge up your phone while you work and listen to some tunes! I made a dinky video to show you all of this in action. The giveaway winner will receive the […]

AHHH I forgot to tell you guys that I was book of the week  at Cut Out + Keep! Click on over to check out a Q&A with me! You can also enter here to win a copy of my book. You have until May 9. Good luck!

One of my readers requested that I post links to stuff that I find inspiring, and I just Tweeted about an Instagram feed I really like, so this felt like a good time for a lil blog post! The Happy Mail – Instagram The Happy Mail is a company out of the UK that delivers cute boxes of candy and baked goods to you. They seem to have a “more is more” philosophy to decorating which is way up my alley, plus their IG feed is just so cute and colorful! SaoZen Plush – Instagram Super cute plush artist! When photos from her feed pop up on my IG, I just feel filled with light! Macy Daisy – Instagram I love her style and her shop! I have bought a few pieces of clothing and jewelry from her, and they feel so thoughtful, beautiful, and so authentically her. Momiji – Instagram Until very recently, I had no idea how cute the Momiji Instagram feed is! I will be working with Momiji soon on a fun giveaway for you guys, and their IG feed is just plain adorable! Momiji dolls have an opening so that you can hide hand-written messages, dreams, and wishes in them! Naoshi Sunae– Instagram Anyone who has been in my house has seen Naoshi’s work. SHE PAINTS WITH SAND. It is so amazing, and I totally want to be one of the girls in her art. I have the print in the upper left corner, but I haven’t bought a frame for it yet. When I was in LA a few years ago for the Sweet Streets show, I bought an original sand painting. I don’t normally splurge a lot on original artwork, but I could not say no to myself! I hope you had fun taking a little peek into what I find inspiring on Instagram. Have a fun and/or relaxing weekend! I’ll be prepping for my trunk show at Imagiknit on Monday and MAYBE seeing Naoshi in person at Renegade Craft Fair! (Renegade added a 3rd show this year in SF, and this weekend is the first one!)

I just received my order of custom bookplates, so for those of you who bought my book already but would like a signature, you can purchase one of these bookplates and let me know what you’d like written on it, and then I ship it to you for you to stick in your book! I’m also still offering signed books in my shop as well :). Don’t forget I have a book signing here in San Francisco on Monday, May 2nd, at Imagiknit, 4pm-7pm. Details are here!

Please mark your calendars if you’re in the Bay Area! I’m going to be at my favorite yarn store Imagiknit, on Monday, May 2nd from 4pm-7pm signing books and throwing a lil trunk show! Come say hi, check out some finished pieces from the book, and maybe even purchase some if you haven’t done your Mother’s Day shopping yet! I’ll have limited numbers of pieces, so be sure to snap them up! I would really love to see you there! Don’t forget to check out the deets at Imagiknit, and here’s the Facebook event if you want to put it in your event calendar over there :).

Wanna call in and chat with me on a podcast? Let’s do it! I’m going to be on the Yarn Thing podcast with Marly Bird on Tuesday morning, April 19, at 10am mountain time, which would be 9am here on the West Coast. We’re going to chat about my new book and gosh knows what else… so tune in and find out and say hi!

Did you finish your taxes? If you did, treat yourself to my April blog sponsor giveaway! If you didn’t, you still got time… get on it … and then enter the giveaway!! Thanks so much to my awesome and generous sponsors. ONE LUCKY WINNER will receive the following:

(Thanks, Unique Vintage, for sponsoring this post!) I had a little adventure! Manda and I went to Dolores Park on a Lemon Drop #CYClemondrop to leave some lemon stress balls out for people to take during tax-time and National Stress Awareness month. Don’t forget you can make some, too! I decided it would be a fun outing to try out the sunny yellow dress that Unique Vintage sent to me as part of the Style Society. This is a longer length of dress than I’m usually used to wearing, but I really liked it because I felt comfortable going out without leggings or tights (I have a thing about my knees!). It has a soft yellow background with white polka dots and some cute navy blue anchors. Also the back has some stretch in it for the perfect fit. Manda took my outfit photos. I’m pretty used to taking them on my own with a tripod, so I felt kind of weird posing in front of someone else, while all these people walked by wondering what we were doing! I need to get more used to this and just not care! The dress was really fun to wear, though, since it’s so swingy and flowy and twirly. Also you can squat down in the grass and string labels to lemons without your butt hanging out! I mentioned on Instagram that I sort of Iron Chef my outfits. I started with the dress and knew I needed a cardigan, and the only cheery one that I had was that pink floral one from Forever 21. Then I grabbed this Fatally Feminine circus cookie necklace to tie in the pink. Since we were adventuring, I put on my trusty boots from UNIF. I feel like normally you’d feel pressured to wear a dainty shoe with a dress like this, but I am a die-hard black boot lover, and I think it worked out ok! I also recently received some fun retro bags from Sun Jellies! I’d been following them on Instagram for some time, and I was so surprised and excited when they offered to send me some to check out! This photo makes the bag look a lot smaller than it actually is, but it carries quite a bit! It was perfect for our lemons, tags, and tools. I’ll show you more photos from our Lemon Drop below the cut! (Also stay tuned for the April giveaway later this afternoon!) Outfit details: Dress – c/o Unique Vintage, Necklace – Fatally Feminine, Boots – UNIF, Bag – c/o Sun Jellies, Cardigan – Forever21? (ages go!)

I’m excited to tell you about the first giveaway happening right now where you can win a copy of my book! ALSO, you can win either a finished honey bear apron OR the yarn and hook needed to make your own. Head on over to SuperCuteKawaii to enter to win!! You have until April 19th, but do it now before you forget ;).

It’s April and that means it’s National Stress Awareness Month! ARE YOU FEELING IT!? I’m teaming up with the Craft Yarn Council again this year to help spread the word about knitting and crocheting being wonderful stress relievers and mentally akin to yoga and meditation. Last year, I created a pattern and video tutorial for a crocheted lemon stress ball, cuz when life gives you lemons… you can make one… and squeeze one!! This year, the CYC is taking the lemons even further… all the way to NYC! The CYC ran a big crochet/knit lemon drive with guilds across the country, and the CYC will drop thousands of these lemon stress balls into the hands of frazzled New Yorkers on one of the most stressful days of the year, Tax Day (which ironically happens to land during National Stress Awareness Month). On Monday, April 18th, people rushing last-minute to the James A. Farley Post Office Building in Manhattan to wait in line to mail their 2015 Tax Returns by the due date and filing deadline will be met with a sunny surprise and important message… knitting and crochet are good for you! I wish I could see this all go down!! If you are in NYC and someone hands you a lemon, YOU GOTTA TELL ME ABOUT IT! We can still participate in the Lemon Drop Takeover locally by knitting or crocheting a lemon, tagging it with an encouraging message (the CYC created a sample tag, here’s the front, and here’s the back), and giving it to someone we know, or leaving it somewhere public for someone to find. Snap a photo and share it on social media with #stitchawaystress to share your Lemon Drop! You can check out other weekly #stitchawaystress challenges by following the Craft Yarn Council on Twitter, Instagram, or Facebook. Also, I’ll be taking over the CYC Instagram next week, April 13th, so you can see what adventures I get up to with my own Lemon Drop! (All photos and graphics courtesy of the CYC!)

Surprise! For the next 3 months, I’ll be part of Unique Vintage‘s Style Society. (Image plucked from Unique Vintage’s blog!) This means I’ll be showing you guys some cute outfits I’ll put together from pieces from their shop. If you are not familiar with UV, they specialize in retro and vintage clothing. I think I might’ve bought a dress from them years and years ago to attend my former boss’ charity gala, but I guess I didn’t say where I got that from, so it will remain a mystery! I know I’m not generally a vintage/retro gal when it comes to my outfits (I do dabble on occasion), so I think it will be really fun to try incorporating more into my wardrobe! Anyway, I have been really bad about blogging outfits lately because A) crappy phone-cam Instagram photos have replaced outfit blog posts, and Instagram is just easy and fast, with quality not being an issue for me there, but mostly B) I kinda lost my go-to in-house locations for good outfit photos. I used to shoot a lot in my dining room, but now my dining room is my craft room and there’s less room and more clutter. My yard is really ugly, so that’s not so much an option. I was thinking maybe in front of my books where the light is better, but there’s not a lot of space. If someone can recommend a good camera lens to get for small spaces, that would be really rad! I have a Canon T3i. Regardless, contributing to the Style Society will really kick my butt in gear to get my outfit-photo-set-up sorted out. More soon! Also do hit up the UV blog to check out the other Style Society gals. I’m already really enjoying one of their blogs, and actually accidentally ran into her blog today while image-searching Buxom lip gloss swatches :P.

My new crochet class just went live on Creativebug.com as part of the Critter of the Month series! Click on over to check it out! I was really excited to see all of the sloths you crocheted from my February class, so I’m looking forward to seeing all of your new unicorn friends! P.S. In case you were curious, here is the rough sketch I used to write my pattern!

Today is the official publication date for my new book, and I just posted the little book trailer/commercial that Manda and I shot 2 days ago to my YouTube channel! I’m super lucky she has the skills to sew her own outfit! She also helped a lot with the direction and concept and provided the voiceover. I have batted around some other silly video ideas and will probably want to execute those for fun, too. But here’s the first one! Also stay tuned for some book giveaways!

Thanks for participating in my Vogue Knitting Live giveaway! I’m still trying to pin down a winner who will actually be in LA at the time ;). In the meantime, Vogue Knitting Live is giving you a $10 off code for either one of my clases! Just use code TWINKIE during check out.   Here’s the class list. I’m teaching Saturday from 2:00-4:00pm (soup can) and also Sunday from 2:00-4:00pm (donut). Look out for the DONUT and the SOUP CAN!

I didn’t know if I’d have time to post an Easter-themed pattern this year, but I saw a picture of some super cute Easter cake pops and thought, THOSE ARE BALLS. WE CAN CROCHET BALLS. So this pattern is SUPER easy and basic. Think of it more as project inspiration. There are a kabillion ways to customize your own Easter cake pops, so I’m simply providing a road map! As simple as these are, I think they are pretty darn cute! I also updated my YouTube channel since it’s been a million years…! Let’s crochet!  

My new book is starting to ship and is landing in people’s hands!! YAY!! The official pub date is April 1, and I’m still trying to work on a cute little video trailer, but if you have pre-ordered, your book should arrive any day! If you feel inclined to leave a lil Amazon review, that would be super duper amazing, and if you already have done so, I appreciate your support so so much. I can’t wait to start seeing all your fun projects! Use the hashtag #TCAbodeALaMode if you post any finished pieces on social media, so that I can see them!