None of my previous entries have disappeared, don’t worry. Now they’re just available for reading for those who have verified and approved subscriber accounts. For more day-to-day blog entries, you’ll have to hop over to my other blog to read those. From now on (hopefully), Chelle-Chelle.com will be dedicated towards my writing and crafty endeavors.

Chances are, most of the crafts that will be posted up here will be jewelry (one of my favourite things to do, but also one of the more expensive ones), crochet and knit work (scarves… hats… mittens… more scarves…), maybe some polymer clay work (I have a lot of it, I just never seem to have the time to do it – which is absurd, considering how much time I dedicate to other crafts… and schoolwork) and some paper crafts (watch me not cut in a straight line).

I have a yarn stash, which I share with my sister, and it’s full of acrylics, wools, soy, bamboo, merino and a lot of other fibre goodness. We haven’t gotten into spinning yet (but I’m sure that once we find a nice local source for roving, we’ll be adding to our hobbies). I share my love of knitting and crocheting with my sister, so we’re both really good at enabling the other person when it comes to yarn sales. And by ‘really good’, I mean ‘really bad’.

I first learned how to knit when was I about 8 years old. I wanted a new sweater and instead of my mom taking me to the store to buy one (because my parents were really into hand-me-downs), my mom cast on the appropriate number of stitches onto a set of circulars and taught me how to knit (not purl, just knit). This kept me occupied for a few days. I did about 7-10 rows before I gave up. It was in 100% red wool from a now defunct company. I know this because when I picked up knitting again when I was 16, I used the exact same wool to make a scarf for my mom for Christmas.

After picking up knitting, I picked up crocheting in 2006 (because, well, it seemed natural – plus I found a copy of Stitch n’ Bitch: The Happy Hooker by Debbie Stoller and my local public library). And so, I learned that. And I bought the largest ball of yarn I had ever seen in my life at Walmart for the lowly price of $6. It was Red Heart, in variegated shades of blue and it was 100% acrylic. And with the knowledge of how to do single crochet, how to increase and decrease, I made myself a bag for my first project. Two side pockets, long strap and decent amount of death. I take it fairly frequently as a book bag.

My bead stash is kind of basically my pride and joy. I started making my own jewelry sometime in middle school. Before I really had much money, I would buy one item at a time, once every two weeks, with a 40 or 50% off coupon at Michaels. I started off with a huge amount of plastic beads that I got as a Christmas present one year from my parents – I saw it at the store and absolutely adored it. I think I was about 10. I started off with those. And I found websites on the internet with photos of necklaces and earrings with really nice beads. So from that, I started to buy things, one at a time. I started off with jumprings. Then bought earring hooks. Then bought a package of beads here, a tube of seed beads there. I developed my jewelry supplies very slowly. It took me about a year to stop myself from buying a package at a time and then save up for a bit and I bought my very first set of jewelry pliers, with a 50%-off coupon at Michaels. I was so ridiculously proud of myself. I later ‘discovered’ more bead shops outside of Michaels and, well, now we all know where my money goes to (besides school and yarn, of course). I have like 20 or so boxes to organize the beads, I have a box dedicated for pliers. I have a really nice pair of crimping pliers that I would honestly rescue from my house in the event of a fire (along with, basically, all of my beads, a couple teddy bears and all the nice yarn).

So, now that I have my crafty introduction out of the way… I have a massive to do list in terms of projects. Such as a new pair of mittens. A few dozen amigurumi (since I really need more stuffed animals, honest). And, of course, the scarf that I’m currently working on. It’s currently about 5 feet tall (almost my height) and it’s no where near done. I’ll post progress photos later.