When I first begin to design a new pattern, I start with a simple sketch.

The simpler, the better. The sketch helps me break my ideas down into simple shapes, and it also helps me organize and plan colors. The sketch is not really meant to be seen by anyone or show off my fancy drawing skills. It is simply the tool I use in the designing process.

After the sketch, I go and buy yarn, and then start to crochet. Sometimes, there’s a lot of trial and error. Always, there’s a lot of taking apart of things and starting over. While this particular design wasn’t overly complicated, for some reason it just took me a lot longer than I’d planned! I was happy to re-visit the tea cup pattern again, though. Now that I have it written down, you will probably see some tea cup scarves available in my shop very soon! Until then, check out the finished Tea Party scarf!

I didn’t get a chance to take a picture of me wearing the scarf, because I was literally still sewing it together minutes before the Express Mail deadline, and I had to get it out to a special somebody before Christmas! Plus, I hadn’t really slept in days. Nobody wants to see that! 😛

If you’ve been following my blog since last year or before, you’ll already know that I bought a pink Christmas tree. I didn’t have much opportunity this year to hunt for or make more decorations, so it pretty much looked the same! 😛 This year I added two cute stockings to my mantle, and on Christmas day, I crocheted a third!

p.s. I used this pattern to make my stocking, and I just added some stripes and bobble stitches! RedHeart.com actually has a couple crochet stocking patterns!

(click for larger)

I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas! We had way too much food! We also had a turducken for the first time, and I’ll make a separate post for all the food! I didn’t get the chance to decorate the house as much as I wanted :(, but hopefully next year I’ll have more time to make the house a Christmas wonderland. I did accomplish two small Christmas goals though: bake cookies using the cookie press, and crochet my own stocking (I’ll put a photo of that in my Christmas tree post).

Here’s a quick snap of my outfit! Dress by I’m Your Present, Necklace by Onch Movement, Cardigan from Target, teddy bear slippers from Hong Kong, giant ribbon bow in hair from Target! I wore my slippers all day. It was pretty awesome. Here’s a close up of the necklace. It’s super soft! You can just pet them all day.

Merry Christmas, everyone!

Tonight I had dinner with my Dad, brother, and SIL (my mom is still in Hong Kong), and then we opened family presents!

Then I came home and baked cookies til 4am! I used a cookie press for the first time, and I’m ADDICTED! How excited am I to make my own CHEESE CRACKERS?!!! AHHHH!!! I linked you to the exact brand and model I used. Apparently it’s like the cheapest of the cheap, and I just picked it up at Michael’s while I was buying yarn, but I thought it was super easy to use, and the recipe that comes on the box is pretty good! I just added a little extra sugar and a little extra extract, since I’d read that some people found the recipe too bland. I made pink vanilla heart cookies and green pepermint tree cookies. I wanted to make ginger cookies and chocolate cookies, but I started baking at like 2am and didn’t feel like mixing up another batch! 😛

Later today, my fam and Hairy’s parents are coming over to our house for Christmas dinner. I just put up the tree last night hehehe. More pics after tomorrow!!!

Here are a few photos and a little video from when Hairy and I were at Disneyland in November.

I think the highlight was finding out why we should never go on the Tea Cups again. Just kidding. I guess the highlight was getting to go on Star Tours for the first time since it was re-vamped. We even rode it twice! We went to the Wookie planet and also the planet that Jar Jar Binks lived on. There were hardly any lines for any of the rides that day! Luckies!!