X-treme knitting...

I got these AMAAAAZING large knitting needles from The Knitting and Stitching show in November, and finally got round to using them in the Christmas holidays. Part of the Knit and Destroy makeover that is happening is changing the yarns I use, and this giant knitting is great for using up my acrylic yarn.

The 4 steps of knitting a stitch as taught to me by my mum...

IN

OVER

THROUGH
OFF
This giant piece of knitting is now beign very useful as a rug in our dining room, for more information on where to get hold of these giant needles and what you can do with them, check out Rachel John's fab website.

Ladyfest is ten!

So the year is 2010, which means it has been ten years since I thought my Hi-Fi had been hit with the millennium bug, when my friends had just got popcorn stuck in it, tens years since I left school and also ten years since the first Ladyfest happened in Olympia.

Now I would love to say I was cool (and rich) enough to have been there, but I wasn't.

I was, however present at the first one in the UK, Ladyfest Scotland, in Glasgow.

This was one of those life- changing/defining/forming/saving moments. Seeing all my favourite bands, hanging out with awesome people and just learning so much. Ladyfest Glasgow will be one of the best times of my life. From the dancing with Allison Wolfe, to the telling Beth Ditto what Weetabix taste like, drinking lots of Irn Bru and even getting called 'it's the fookin Tribe*' in the street

*CH5 program I never watched but Nickie says it was dead good!!

I'd like to thank the folk that went to the first one in Olympia and were so inspired came back to Scotland and made the first UK Ladyfest, to everyone and anyone who has since been involved in any Ladyfest, and especially those who started the very first one.

I have since 2001, opened up the festival in London, sold my wares in Brighton Leeds and Manchester and had an all round awesome time!

The last picture is a selection of hand embroidered, Ladyfest flyer's from around the world that I stiched.

Honorary Craft Idol

This one is given for total craftinitiative, and goes out to...

Kickball Katy

Bass player with Vivian Girls, Kandy, Nickie and I went to see them play on Sunday (awesomesness!). I purchased the last small t-shirt, Kandy got one of the remaining medium, Katy told us they were selling great but they had lots of large ones left and that the folk of the UK are just too small!! We were saying that it doesn't matter if they are too large as we will just take them in, like we do with most band tees, she said she is totally the same but a lot of people wouldn't bother.
Kandy and I saw them again on Friday, where Katy was taking in the larger shirts to sell,they were being pre-ordered, so to speak! She was stitching them up with a needle and dental floss, know that is what I call crafty D.I.Y action.
That's What I call ace!
Here is my t-shirt that I took in, I used the uncool method of a sewing machine, kinda wish I had a hand stitched floss Katy special!!
Polaroid taken by Nickie, thanks!

Craftastic!!!

I forgot about Architectures In Helsinki ( I tend to have a listen when the sun i shining through my windows!) until I saw this on Craftster blog, it's like a well crafty video!

Wilkos craft time part two.

Been down Wilkos again, checking out what crafts they've got going on, found these:We have a how to- origami fortune teller in Sugar Paper #1, only we named it a Cootie Catcher!

I tried to buy you a Hostess cupcake...

...but you're a ruddy vegan (or vegetarian). I tried vegan baking for the third time, a recipe I got off Vegan Village (I tried it out last week, but the cakes were quickly scoffed round Charlotte and Lara's ace pad when playing The Twilight board game). Anyway, you may recall my first attempt was a flop, but my second and third were not, so much so I thought I'd fancy them up, and make them look like Hostess Cupcakes:My cakes sadly don't have that gelatin filled centre, but I reckon I could find an alternative (fluff for veggies?!) but they still taste nice!
Here are some pop culture references to Hostess Cupcakes:

Jigsaw, JIGSAW YOUTH!!

I like jigsaws, in fact I might even say I love them, we had the same 5 or 6 when I was younger, my sister and I used to do the, we each did certain parts of the jigsaw, like I always did the bluebells and she did the foxglove on a certain round floral number!

The other day I got a new tattoo, it was jigsaw themed:

The picture is pretty shoddy, it says Youth, it was inspired by this:

I was also checking out all things crochet tonight, you see I am learning to crochet and determined to make it a craft I can do, look at this hotness:

Then I found this little gem:

I managed to do it in 3minutes 36 seconds, I tell you if I were using my hand and not a mouse, I would have done it in half the time.
I can say for definite that there will be some jigsaw action in Sugar Paper 5!

Sugar Paper...

is now available to buy from other awesome folk that aren't us!
Nude Magazine and Made In The Shade, if you don't want the zine, just go over, check these guys out and show them some love (does that sound like Joss Stone when she made a tit of herself on The Brits?.

one of them lists!!

Another year has passed, another DECADE has passed, it's around this time of year that people make them lists. I know very little about music, and this will probably change next week, but I reckon, in no p[articular order, these are my ten favourite albums of the decade:Total cop out, a best of! Placebo got me into music way back in the mid 90s, they released 4 albums last decade, none of them my favourite,either one of those was released the decade before that, so hence a singles collection.
Everyone wants fast easy songs that you can totally shake your booty to. Bangs rule.

This is not my favourite Kinney album, and tomorrow this could very well be One Beat, but I'm in a poppy mood tonight.

This band restored my faith in music, made me feel well good for liking music made by band formed in that decade, imagine. Bedroom dancing delights!

Three cheers for MCR is what I say, and for me being out and proud with my love of 2nd and 3rd wave EMO, this band probably did save my life.

Listening to Mika Miko makes me feel like a punk, like an original 1977 punk like Enid in Ghost World yeah. Sadly they are no more, shitter.

Because the self titled album was released just a little before last decade and because I saw Le Tigre for the first time on the Feminist Sweepstakes tour (I don't know why, I was being stupid not seeing them earlier, I will now refer to anytime I decline seeing a band with a poor excuse as YummyFurGate) and Holly and I started a stage invasion.

When I was younger I only liked songs that were over in 2 minutes and gave me a stitch dancing to them. I got older. I am more of a cynic, but appreciate such delights as this.

In the late 90s, I'd been listening to girl bands, ones on KRS and labels of that ilk, but I hadn't heard a band like The Gossip. Seeing this band live always makes me smile and gives me a stitch. I think I prefer Movement, but this is what got me.

Another one of those faith restorers. This band gave me so much. They made me excited about music again, made me dance, made me happy, made me money and made me awesome friends. swoon!

Ok, while I go and cry into my tea about YUMMYFURGATE number 2, you go and point out all the albums I should have put, and check out how those last two record covers are made of felt, for realz!!!

OH GOLLY, you make me want to crochet....

Look at these hot crafty golly related Christmas gifts I received:And I have been learning to crochet this weekend, so oh watch out I might be knocking awesome crochet stuff (I wouldn't hold your breath, it's a bit fiddly for me).

How I got a twitchy eye...

So I did quite a bit of crafting for Christmas gifts this year, but one gift in particular took me a while, spending my evening after work cross stitching like a crazed crafter, it took me a couple of weeks to realise this was why my eye was twitching so much.

And yes this very cross stitch was stitched using the pattern in Sugar Paper 4, but be warned, cross stitching on dark winter nights without turning the lamp up is not advised!