Javanese Necklace

Meet my little friend - he's from Indonesia. More specifically, he's a handcrafted Javanese glass face pendant/bead made in Java, Indonesia. I made a necklace of him and a whole bunch of his little buddies for my Etsy shop. :-) You can find him here:

http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=19097656

There are some other views of him, but he's a bit difficult to take photograph. Because he's made of glass, I have to be really careful with the flash because the little bit of shine he has tends to give off a glare. I've also learned that it's really hard to photograph red! It could be because I'm not a very good photographer or I can use a new camera (or both) but it's taken me longer to photograph this little dude than it did for all of my bead crochet bracelets. :-) Well, once I start getting some cash flow I may have to invest into better photography equipment so I don't have to spend so much time on it. :-)

Please take a look at my etsy shop! I've updated a bunch of bracelets to show international shipping (now to Canada and the UK) and updated a lot of pictures. I've kept most of the older pictures because they show a little bit of detail that is lost in the newer ones... but you can definitely see the improvement! At least I see it.... :-) :-) But I know that there is way more that I can do to make them better. :-)

I hope everyone has a safe and happy new year and best wishes for 2009. :-)

Take care,
Pinka

Twas the Night Before Christmas

...and all through the house we had wrapping paper everywhere! I waited until the very last day to wrap presents... and thanks to my Bunny for helping get them all in paper. :-) :-) I'm not one of those fancy present wrappers either so it didn't take as long as a person would normally spend on a present. :-)

My parent's are coming over with my son - thankfully they were able to take him for the afternoon so we could get everything picked up and cleaned. :-) :-) I just have to get Bunny's presents in paper and I'll be mostly done! :-) :-) No, really, I'm not done yet! I never get presents mailed on time for Christmas and still need to finish the presents for my best friend and her family and the in-laws.

With my poor Bunny in puffy cheeks from getting her wisdom teeth yanked out yesterday, it's going to be a nice and quiet Christmas for us. I'd feel really bad if I bake a turkey with her not being able to eat it, so we just went a little more crazy on the presents instead. :-) :-) So even if we decided to have turkey we'd only be able to afford turkey sandwiches! :-) :-) :-) My Bunny is worth it though. :-)

So, since I'm on the topic of presents, I do have a little present for all of you. A free pattern! :-) :-) :-) It's called my Scrap Happy Purse that I designed last year. I never did anything with it so I decided to give it to you all. :-) I'd love to see pictures of your finished projects so please remember where you got the pattern from, okay? :-)




Scrap Happy Small Purse
By Veronica “Pinka” Peck

Skill Level: Easy

Finished Size: 8” tall

Gauge: 14 sts/ 8 rows = 4” in dc

Materials:
At least 10 yards of various WW yarns (one color should have at least 40 yards). Will need enough to make base plus at least 16 rows
3 yards of a super bulky yarn that compliments colors
1 CD
G Crochet hook (or size needed to obtain gauge)
Tapestry needle

Base:

Rnd 1: With 40 yard color, ch 4, 11 dc in 4th ch from hook. Join with ss (12 dc)
Rnd 2: Ch 3, dc in same st, (2 dc in each st) around. Ss in 3rd of beg ch. (24 dc)
Rnd 3: Ch 3, 2 dc in next st, (dc in next st, 2 dc in next st) around. Ss in 3rd of beg ch. (36 dc)
Rnd 4: Ch 3, dc in next st, 2 dc in next st, (dc in next 2 st, 2 dc in next st) around. Ss in 3rd of beg ch. (48 dc)

End yarn and weave in ends. Repeat for 2nd side but do not weave in ends.

Joining base to CD:

Using yarn from center, sew center of each base together through the hold in the CD with wrong sides facing the CD. Once the center feels stable, weave in ends.

Using yarn from 2nd base, sc both side of base together and around CD. Join round and change color.

Rnd 5: Dc in each st around. Ss in 3rd of beg ch. (48 dc)

Repeat rnd 5 and change colors at the end of each round to complete 16 dc rounds. If a taller purse is desired, keep repeating rounds but more yarn will be needed. Each round uses approximately 10 yards of ww yarn.

Weave in ends as you go to keep inside clean (and not have to do it all at the end).

Cut three strands of super bulky yarn, each approximately 1 yard each. Holding together thread them through top round either going through ever other dc or every 2 dc. Tie ends together in decorative knot.

Copywrite 2007. For personal use only please.

Please enjoy and if you find something wrong or confusing, please email me! :-) :-) Here is the best email to use: pinka_m@yahoo.com

Happy Holidays!
Pinka
http://pinkap.etsy.com

Twitter

Okay, I feel so useless... I used to consider myself pretty good at different stuff on the computer.... I used to program in my past life! (as well as be an accountant on the side) But now with all of these pages like facebook, twitter, myspace... I can't figure any of them out!

I just joined Twitter (https://twitter.com/home) and I can't figure out how to find, add or have anyone follow me. If I don't have their email then I can't find them. I'm looking for other people that like bead crochet like me... so how do I find them? I started following a few people, but how do I get people to follow me? I just can't figure this stuff out. I think I'm getting too old for this stuff... it's sad that I need to get my 18 year old to fix my cell phone for me because I still haven't figured the darn thing out.

Am I really getting that stupid? I know that I'd rather do the dishes than spend 15 minutes on the computer (well, when the kitchen gets really bad) and sometimes I have no choice because the 4 year old kind of demands that I feed him every once in a while. :-) :-) So, how do I figure this stuff out without making my teenage feel like she wants to choke me for being so dense? Is there anyone out there willing to give me a brief tutorial? :-) :-)

Pinka
pinkap.etsy.com

My Etsy Shop

There! It worked! The button above is going to take you to my shop on Etsy! :-) :-) I've been learning a whole bunch on what it takes to get my shop noticed... and this was one of the things that I wanted to play with. Even though I don't have a 'following' on this blog, it's a good way to figure things out and play. :-)

I have 15 bracelets for sale right now, about 10 more to photo and post and have a necklace in the works. I have one necklace that I'm very tempted to put up for sale but I love it so much that I'm not sure if I should keep it instead. :-)



What made me fall in love with the necklace is the pendant... isn't it beautiful? If I do put it up for sale would someone really want to purchase this for $60? There is no way that I'd sell it for less - there was way too much work in there! It probably took about 3 hours just to string all of the beads - which is in a pattern - then another hour or two to crochet it. The pendant was not cheap, and even though I used up a lot of beads that I had purchased years ago, I know that they were not cheap. This necklace is made with size 11 beads! So it took lots and lots of stitches going around to make this. Hmm, I think I'm talking myself out of that $60 price tag - I think with all that I've put into it that I may be underpricing it. Well, I'll just have to think about it more... unless there is someone out there that is actually reading this and has an opinion. :-) :-)

Take care,
Pinka