Wednesday 17 July 2013

My first show, Broken Arts Fest 2013

Hello everyone,

So I mentioned in some previous posts that I was going to be a vendor at a music/arts festival in Oshawa.  It went down last weekend and it was awesome.  The weather was prefect. The music was great and I was able to met some amazing people and sell some of my stuff.

Here are some pictures from the day:

Setting up in the morning 
One of the stages for the bands 


Me and my booth all setup 
 







So I think I learnt a lot from the experience, I wasn't really sure what to expect.  I had never been to this particular event before so I wasn't sure who would be coming and stuff like that.   But I was able to sell enough to get back the price of the space which I think is the most you can ever ask for.   


There might be some things I would change if I were to do it again, like I was pretty close to one of the stages which made it hard to hear what people were saying at times.  So I would do differently for that. 

But over all it was a great day, I was glad that I did it. 

Wednesday 10 July 2013

The Pintester Movement V. 2.0 - Arm Knitting

Helloo,

As the title of the post suggests, this is the second installment of the Pintester Movement  For the people that do not know, its a event done up by the Pintester, Sonja Foust.  Where we take our chances with the weird Pinterest pins that seem a little far fetch and see what happens.  Which is what Sonja does on her blog all the time and it's fantastic.

Last time, I sorta proved that you can transfer weird monster designs on to a mug and porcelain pen it over, and voila, a sharpie mug that actually lasts.

This time I shall be trying arm knitting, which sounds a little weird.  It claims that you can do a scarf in half an hour.  I saw the pin floating around pinterest, but I paid it not mind.  The Pintester herself tried it a few months back.  But it didn't work, but I think it was mostly due to the fact she didn't know how to knit before trying the pin.

So here me trying Arm Knitting.... Wooopyy


I found some yarn in my stash that would be suitable for the job, then I sat down on my floor.  Looking at my yarn I was sorta rethinking this whole thing, it's 30 something degrees out  (Celsius, or it would have been really inappropriate to be wearing shorts and a t-shirt), and working with super warm yarn and I didn't want sweaty arms.  But I was determined to try this thing.     
Pile of yarn?

 Next was the casting on.
Why you tighten your slip knots (heehee) 



I got the slip knot done and on my arm, I watched the video that lady posted on her site on how to cast on, I didn't like it, so I just sorta fumbled and tried to cast on the way I would if I had needles but it was a little weird, defiantly needing getting use to.  But I got it eventually.  


The actually knitting part, wasn't as bad as I expected, you just bring the yarn thought the loop you made and stick it on the other arm.  Makes totally sense, right?


I tried taking a picture of the process for you guys, but that failed, as shown above. So no selfies when you try to knit, remember that kids.


I was able to survive past the first row without to much of a fuss.  Which I was supper happy about, I didn't lose a stitch, with was my biggest worry I had, because everything is kinda loose (that's what she said), and you kinda get lost (she said that too).  



So I just tried to awkwardly keep knitting, it was really hard to keep the tensions even when you where doing it, making the knitting really uneven.   I was doing this I kept think, man  this would be a great fishing net.  Not sure where that idea came from, since the last time I pretended to try fishing I was 8.  But I rolled with it.  


After about twenty minutes I binded off and this is what I got.


Me trying out the "scarf"

After I was done I didn't really know what to do with this awkward pile of knotted yarn I had, so naturally I just threw it on all my pets.



Tell me who wore it better, cat or dog. 


So technically this pin works, you do get a thing that is long enough to be claimed as a scarf.  But its sorta weird looking, and I personally with never wear it.  But tell me what you guys think down below.


So don't forget to check out the original pin here: http://www.simplymaggie.com/arm-knitting-how-to-updated
Check out Sonja's version here: http://pintester.com/2013/04/arm-knitting/
And check out the rest of the Pintester Movement stuff:  http://pintester.com/category/pintester-movement/

Zoe