Author: TwinkieChan

(This post contains affiliate links.) The crochet classes that I filmed a few months ago are going to start rolling out this year. I filmed for a Creativebug.com series called Critter of the Month! Every month, a knit or crochet designer like Megan Kreiner, Fancy Tiger, myself, (and more!), will teach you how to make a super cute new friend! January is starting up with this adorable knitted polar bear by Megan Kreiner. If you haven’t heard of Creativebug before, it’s an amazing website full of art and craft classes taught by all your favorite instructors, which you can have access to for $4.95 a month. As an added bonus, I’ve discovered that everyone who works there is super nice and fun and creative, so I’m pretty much in love with the whole shebang. I’ll keep you posted on which critter is going up next….!

So I wrote a blog entry on the night of the 30th that I later thought was too much of a bummer. I have my moments when I like to be super honest on my blog, because, we’re all real people going through actual real things, and I think it’s good to talk about that sometimes, too, and not just post crochet things or cute stuff I want to buy. I’d seen something that made me sad, and I just got to thinking about the whole year and the new year and sort of threw it all up over my WordPress. But I didn’t post it. I think maybe I just wrote it for me, and that’s ok, too. 2015 was kind of a weird year. I was single for the first time in a million years. My best friend moved in with me. I wrote a book. I thought about changing careers. Half the time I thought I was really brave in 2015, and half the time I thought I was in hiding. Hiding in my book especially, and making it my #1 excuse to not do anything else. I have to remind myself to be proud of the stuff that I accomplished, and not berate myself for the stuff I feel like I have yet to. I hope that in 2016 I can be brave. That I can be open to new things and be okay with change. Fear is such a weird thing. Okay, this is gonna sound really lame, and I am not an inspo-graphic person, but this quote from “After Earth” always struck a chord with me: I wrote a resume for the first time in 20 years. I sent it somewhere. We’ll see if anything happens. I took some out-of-character leaps to find my lobster (did you ever watch Friends?!), and we’ll see if anything happens there, too. I don’t like making New Years Resolutions, cuz I mostly feel like they can be empty promises and kind of pointless, but I just always hope that I’m doing things that bring me joy and that hopefully also bring joy to the people around me. So let’s do that. P.S. Here’s a silly photo so that this blog entry isn’t too heavy. I found a picture of a poodle and thought: I WANT TO BE THAT POODLE. So I made myself some hair danglies and called it a success. If you follow me on Instagram, you’ve already seen it, but if you don’t follow me there, here’s all my poodle glory. Thank you for following me on my adventures. It means a lot to me, and I hope you all are healthy and happy :).

In the spirit of Christmas Eve, I’m posting my crochet pattern for my Christmas Pickles! I really wanted to do a YouTube video for these, but I just don’t have time to do it before Christmas. Like, I could shoot it and everything, but the editing process takes forever! If you guys still want a video after the holidays, I’ll add one! There are a few different versions of the significance of the Christmas Pickle. Feel free to Wiki it. It appears people think the tradition came from Germany, but it really might be a mid-Western thing. The first child who finds the pickle in the tree on Christmas morning gets an extra present. OR, the first person to unpack the pickle while decorating the tree gets an extra present. OR, while we were in Seattle, someone told one more possibility, which I don’t remember. Pretty much: make up whatever you want, and create your own traditions! I’m not a super-fast crocheter (I don’t like to feel like I’m in a rush … I like to enjoy the process!) and I can finish a pickle in 30-45 minutes.  I like using this sparkly green worsted weight yarn, but you can use whatever green yarn you like. The pickle is basically just a log with a curve in it. We create this curve by putting shorter stitches in one section of the pickle. The bumps are created by randomly swapping out a single crochet with a triple crochet. It’s really easy! I think they look funny with eyes, but that is also entirely up to you. Let’s get started!

My parents’ longtime friend Auntie Mary asked if I could make a cozy for her Kleenex hand towels. This was months ago, but I got really busy writing my book, among other things, and didn’t have much time to spare. I don’t know that I can complete her cozy by Christmas Day when I’m going to see her… but I at least decided to sketch out some colors tonight and thought I’d share that process. Here’s what the hand towel box looks like: It super obviously looks like a house to me. She has some prints in this bathroom that I believe are of flowers (although it’s been so long I can’t really remember now… doh!), and I remember some burgundy and green in her color scheme. I decided to go with sort of an English-cottage-theme with tiny flowers all over. We’ll see how it plays out! (Sorry my sketching skills aren’t great. I pretty much just try to dash these off for shapes and colors and not to impress anyone with my artistic ability!)

Hullooo!!! It’s the last blog sponsor giveaway of 2015! Thanks so much to all my sponsors for offering such fun prizes, and thanks to all my readers for supporting these wonderful artists :). The giveaway is a bit late this month due to it being a SUPER BUSY time of year for all of us shop-owners. I’m extra grateful for the sponsors that were able to kick in this month, as we’re all working hard to ship all of our holiday cheer! Also this giveaway will run a bit longer than a week, until the day after Christmas. ONE lucky winner will receive…

AHH sorry it’s been a million years since I’ve blogged! I went to Seattle with Manda for Urban Craft Uprising, and then 2 days of manic work later, I went to Disneyland with my pal Courtney of Iggy Starpup. Here’s a snap of my promo art on a billboard!! SO COOL RIGHT!??! I didn’t get to see the billboard in person, since we didn’t have time to drive around looking for it, so I’m glad I at least get to see this one snap from the UCU Instagram! Seattle was pretty amazing. I got to see old friends and meet new ones. Manda and I flew in on Friday, picked up our rental car, and went straight to the venue to set up for preview night.   When I travel for shows, I try to keep all my show stuff in 2 suitcases, so my set-up is pretty basic. I didn’t have time to plan out what the table would look like or where everything would go. All I knew is that I would have my trusty risers, my cake stand, a lil Christmas tree, and a checkered cloth. Everything else just sort of fell into place.

I am going crazy getting ready for Urban Craft Uprising in Seattle this weekend! The show is Saturday and Sunday, but if you want to attend the preview night on Friday, you need to buy tickets ASAP! SEE YOU THERE!!!!! xo

I’m so thrilled to work with Kawaii Box again to bring you guys a new giveaway! Kawaii Box is a super cute monthly subscription box filled with 10-12 hand-picked items from Japan and Korea, ranging from plushies to pouches to stationery to pens to candy to nail stickers and so much more. Shipping is free worldwide, and subscriptions start at $17.30/month. This is a great box to share with friends! It’s jam packed with goodies! Manda’s already been eyeing some of my items…. Let’s take a look at the November box!

Remember those lil shrimps I crocheted about a month ago? Now I get to tell you what they are for: Australian brand Eat Me Do’s Hardcore Prawn collection! It already looks so fun, and I am dying to see what Part 2 is! I made all the shrimpies myself, so there is a very limited quantity available. Grab some goodies now before they’re gone! (I’m told they are already very nearly gone anyway!) Here’s me with one up to my ear while I was showing her the size before I shipped them. It was really fun to work on these lil dudes. Do you think you would like to see more tiny crocheted doodads as earrings or pendants from me?

So we went to Target to just pick up some laundry detergent, and we ended up finding ourselves inside this ugly Christmas sweater for two. Someone on my Instagram feed said, “I was stocking these sweaters at my Target store and wondering who would end up in them. Now I know.” If you are looking to stay warm this holiday season, invest in one of these. IT GOT SO HOT IN THERE. ABORT MISSION. Target also has a blue colorway. I didn’t find the Target sweaters online to link you guys, so you’re just gonna have to go in the store and take some funny photos, too! I found a few links for you guys (here and here), but I’ve never bought from these stores and just Googled them. The one at Target was $30something dollars to give you an idea of the price range!

For the last couple of years, Manda and I have always gone to the pumpkin patch together before Halloween. I don’t usually carve mine, and Manda didn’t carve hers this year either. We’re getting ready to decorate the house for Christmas, and I was like, “I was looking into what people do with their pumpkins so they don’t go to waste, but I don’t want to break them down and cut/roast/puree them or whatever.” I’m the only one in my house hold who consumes anything pumpkin-related, and I don’t even consume that much. Manda said she would call the San Francisco Zoo to see if we could donate our pumpkins to them. As it turns out, we could! Manda drove all of our pumpkins to the zoo. The zoo lady said that the little ones could go to the porcupines, and the big ones would become toys for the rhinos. Here’s a Brazilian porcupine with one of our lil pumpkins! So cute! Have you guys ever seen the video of this other porcupine eating a pumpkin!! His happy munchy sounds are the cutest!

Here’s a quick snap of a fun custom order I just completed. She wanted crocheted cup cozies to store her corn dog pens in, so we met up downtown so she could give me her glasses!

Happy mid-month! It’s giveaway time, and also time for me to say thank you to all my wonderful sponsors! One lucky winner will receive:

Fully moving into my new craft space – since switching it to my dining room –  has been kind of a process of fits and spurts. One of the last things I needed to do was hang my art, but it never really seemed that pressing and important compared to other things on my to-do list. However, a camera crew is coming through soon, and this prompted me to ask Manda to help me hang everything. I’m not a really good spatial organizer, and also, I don’t really care so much, so I asked Manda because that kinda stuff is really important to her, and I figured her opinion on how to arrange everything would be helpful. We decided to start with my BANANA collection (which is looking kinda puny and sad right now….. I NEED MORE NANNERS). After breaking the ice with the nanners, we started creating other vignettes until they all sort of melded together. These are just quick iPhone photos that I snapped. I know my house is super cluttery, but that’s just sort of the way I am: not a minimalist, and always working on stuff! Manda did all of the hammering and everything, and since there is a table in front of the wall, she did some crazy stretching  and lunging to get all the nails in. That’s what BFFs are for! She was like, “How do normal people hang art!?” And I was like, “I dunno. THEY HIRE SOMEONE.” It’s not perfect, but there is a definitely a good feeling in the room in real life. Once I get everything done in there (need to hang some curtains to hide ugly things like storage and supplies) I will definitely film a room tour for YouTube! I think I want to crochet a cozy for my desktop monitor, too!

If you follow me on Instagram, you know that 2 weeks ago, I filmed some crochet videos with Creativebug in their studio, which conveniently, is also in San Francisco! Creativebug is a how-to/crafty website that is subscription-based. It’s only $4.95/month for access to all the classes on the site. That is pretty nuts, if you ask me! All the videos are high quality, beautifully edited, shot from various angles, and taught by awesome instructors. Hopefully my presence does not lower the bar on that instructor part :P. They pulled items from my craft room to dress the studio. Some of what you see there in the background will be projects in my book :). I don’t think that the projects I wrote and filmed for them are top secret, but they haven’t posted anything to their Instagram yet, so I won’t until they do! My classes will be available in 2016, and I will definitely let you guys know when they start rolling out! I was super nervous about it all before going in. Usually when I film tutorials for YouTube, I’m just by myself. If I say something stupid, I can edit it out (or keep it in). If I have to say something 100 times to make it sound right, nobody cares. If I start a project at noon and can’t finish filming until midnight, no big deal. I can angle and adjust my camera or laptop around a window or light until I feel like I don’t look gross. I am in control of all these things, but when someone else’s camera (or 3 cameras, rather) are on you, and there’s a schedule, it’s kind of a lot of pressure and also hoping you don’t look like a bridge troll! I did have a few moments where my brain stopped communicating with my mouth, and all sorts of random weird things would come out, but the crew was really awesome and patient, and the whole experience was really fun. It was definitely hard work, especially for a night owl and a hermit, but the people at Creativebug made a huge difference. They have an amazing team! One of my infamous stories is that many many years ago, I was asked to appear on HGTV for the show Uncommon Threads. I have always HATED seeing myself on camera, have always felt extremely not-cute because I only have one cute angle, and I said HECK NO!! Everybody was mad at me, but I was steadfast. No. Appearing. On. TV. EVER. At least HGTV asked if I could send some samples for a short segment, so my work got to be on HGTV, just not my face. Doing my stupid vlogs – and now my Youtube tutorials – allowed me feel more comfortable with being in front of a camera and sort of comfortable in front of somebody else’s.  I’ve never felt like I was a natural for videos or even teaching in general, but I tried really hard to get better at it […]

Hope you have a happy Halloween!! Here’s my super quick and dirty “costume.” Years ago, I asked one of my crochet elves Lizi to help crochet me some green elephants to mimic elephant topiaries. I always wanted to do a little Edward Scissorhands-inspired photo with crochet hooks on my fingers, but it was one of those projects that always took a backseat to more important things. I finally took about 20 minutes to snap some iPhone photos and sloppily Photoshop some images together. It’s just for fun. Maybe one day I’ll try to do a better job of it! 😛 I do really really really like topiary, though! I’m actually staying in tonight. I had a really long and tiring week, crocheting on camera, which I’ll tell you guys about next!

I’m excited to have a new free pattern for you! It’s a part of Cut Out & Keep‘s Trick Or Treat Trail, and you can find the pattern here. I based my bright color palette on the wrapper graphic, but obviously you can also use pastel colors to represent the actual candies. When I posted a teaser on Instagram a few weeks ago, I was inundated with comments about how this candy is called something different in different countries. In America, these are called Smarties, in other countries they can be called Rockets or Fizzers. Here’s one website that talks about it, and also a Wikipedia entry. Anyway! Have super fun making your candy scarves! It is a pretty easy project for a beginner and a great way to bust that rainbow stash!

You guys, I’m in love. With kabocha squash. We were at Trader Joe’s the other day. I’d just watched Elysse break down a butternut squash at her house, so I had squash on the mind. I was going to also grab a butternut, but then I saw that TJ had kabocha and I went totally mental. KABOCHA IS DELICIOUS. If you aren’t sure what it is, it’s a Japanese pumpkin. You might find it in your veggie tempura. It’s quite sweet and tastes more like a sweet potato to me and also has kind of a starchy mouthfeel like a potato. I had NEVER cooked one of these before, so it was one big adventure, and I followed this recipe from Nom Nom Paleo. First, preheat your oven to 400 and then wash and dry your squash. I wanted to keep the skin on and eat it, but you can also peel it off if you want. To start cutting up your squash, try to carve off the top and the bottom, kinda like when you take the top off a pumpkin when you carve jack-o-lanterns. This makes slicing through the whole thing a lot easier. The sharpest knife we have is from Daiso… so… you can see what kind of tools I’m working with here. (Daiso is the Japanese dollar store.) I found that using a short stubby knife worked better for removing the top and bottom. Then use a larger knife to slice the squash in half and dig out all the seeds with a spoon. Feels like Halloween! Then keep slicing it up. Like half-inch wide slices. This is the part where I really wanted a grown-up in the house, because, this did not feel like a safe activity for me. When it’s all sliced up, throw the slices in a bowl and toss in 2 TBS of melted coconut oil (or butter) with some salt and pepper. This part feels very moisturizing to the hands. Then lay them all out in a single layer on a cookie sheet covered in foil. Then ya pop em in the oven! My squash fit on two cookie sheets, so I put them both in the oven at the same time, one in the middle rack, and one slightly below that. I had no idea what would happen to the ones on the lower rack. Then you bake them for 15 minutes. Then go in there and flip them all over and leave them in there for 15 more minutes. Then you can take them out! As it turns out, I enjoyed the ones on the bottom rack, because they got even more carmelized, crispy on the outside and mushy on the inside! I am not really sure what I would pair these with to make a proper meal, but they were so terrifically yummy, and surprisingly, even Manda liked them!! She is not known for liking squash or vegetables, so this was a super IDGAF kitchen victory! And I still […]

Here’s a preview of a project I’ve been working on for one of my favorite indie designers. Lil crocheted shrimp! I’m packing them up and sending them on a long journey to Australia. I really can’t wait to see the final product and photos, and to share all of that with you guys!

This weekend, Manda and I visited our city dump for the first time. I know a lot of people have done this before, but this was very novel and kind of amazing for us. First up: THE SEAGULLS. Manda kinda freaked out over these seagulls because there were so freaking many of them. I am internationally infamous for getting shat on (Italy, Russia, and here in the U.S.), so my nerves were more about not wanting to exit the car under a cloud of well-fed flying animals. Next up: I didn’t expect to see any art at the dump. There is an artist-in-residence program at the dump here, and I think some of the works were on display. Either that, or, the guys who work at the dump just like pulling out the weird stuff and lining them up on the hill. I didn’t get a good photo of this, cuz there was a guy in a truck giving us the side-eye for ogling and we proceeded to drive forward. Here’s a small shot of the inside area where we dumped our car-full of stuff. We actually had a lot of over-sized cardboard pieces and some large, broken wooden things, and not so much plastic weirdness, but apparently you just chuck it all (except hazardous waste) into this huge pile and then they sort through it later. Manda was a champ and had filled up my car all by herself. What the heck was I doing!? I can’t even remember. We kinda felt weird about taking a selfie at the dump, so, that’s why there is none of that. San Francisco has a zero-waste goal for 2020. I haven’t read many details about it, but visiting the dump was kind of a good kick in the pants for becoming more aware of what we toss or recycle. We’re definitely trying to make better use of our green/compost bin and are looking into buying a charcoal-filtered compost pail for the kitchen, especially since we’re trying to cook more at home.  I don’t have strong hippie-dippie tendencies, but I’m also not into turning the planet into a huge trash heap, which is also why I try to keep the packaging for my Etsy shop pretty basic without many bells and whistles. I still buy new boxes and tissue paper for shipping, though, but I guess we are all sort of working through how to approach this stuff. Baby steps!

Hullooooo!!!!!!!!! It’s giveaway time again!!!! Thank you so much to all my wonderful sponsors!!! One lucky winner will receive:  

I’ll only be vending at one holiday show this season, and it will be in SEATTLE!!! Urban Craft Uprising! December 5&6 at the Seattle Exhibition Hall. I also crocheted some promo art for the show of Seattle’s skyline wearing their winter gear! This will be on a billboard in Seattle, so if you see it, send me pics! I’m kinda in love with these little trees. They are super easy, and I’ll post the pattern here on my blog in a bit. Here is the sketch that I used as a reference. His hat got all weird because I kept changing my mind about the colors! This project really took a lot out of me, but it was super fun to watch it come to life. I really liked making tiny accessories, which is shocking, because generally I hate working small!  The total piece is 36 inches wide and 18 inches tall, bigger than I’d planned, but…. you know… IT HAPPENS. I almost ran out of that light blue yarn and had a heart attack because I was on such a tight deadline. Normally I adhere my crochet paintings to actual canvases, but there wasn’t a canvas that was 36 x 18, so I ended up cutting down some thick foam core. I would NOT recommend this. While the crochet does stick to the paper facing, the paper facing also PEELS RIGHT OFF THE FOAM. Use canvases or wood, when you can! So if you’re in Seattle and are planning to swing by the show, let me know if you want me to bring certain items in particular. My book won’t be out by then, but if I have time, I plan to make this mini-pattern-book with a funny theme that I’ve been wanting to write forever. More on that later!

If you’re looking for a new magazine to tuck into your book bag, might I suggest Caboodle? Caboodle is a super cute, high-quality mag out of the UK.  Inside you’ll find fashion, beauty, art, vintage, how-to’s, recipes, and q&a’s with various artists (like me!). They are just on their 2nd issue now, and it’s gorgeous! Danger: this will not help you if you are trying to be on a shopping hiatus (I sort of am… but am desperately failing…). This is not stopping me, however, from looking up all the designers and shops online. Just for a peek, right? Right! You can purchase a copy here.  I don’t believe it is available digitally at this point, but it’s nice to have some good ol’ paper between your fingers.

I started seeing these cute little blush compacts pop up on my social media, and they are too cute to pass up! My old blush is nearly tapped out, so I decided to check out Love Flush by Too Faced. Like the lazy non-makeup-guru that I am, I didn’t even see any of these in person. I just straight up picked one randomly, googled some swatches, and ordered it from Sephora. This shade is Justify My Love, and I’m actually really happy with it. I thought it might be too light for my skin, but it’s actually kind of perfect. I generally like my blush to be slightly on the cooler side, so I might check out some other shades in person at some point, but I’m super pleased with my blind purchase! (Sorry this is a crappy phone cam pic… Non-Makeup-Guru strikes again!) The other cool thing is that Too Faced is cruelty-free! I’m not sure that this blush is vegan, but they maintain a list of their products that are.