Crochet Hat

I made another hat. This time it was for a guy at college.

Crochet Striped Hat

Pumpkins

Shelby and I recently gutted some pumpkins. I used the remains to make toasted pumpkin seeds, pumpkin bread, and some pumpkin muffins. I wish there was some left for y'all to try some, but unfortunately it's all gone.

Gutted Pumpkins


Pumpkins Bread and Muffins


Toasted Pumpkin Seeds

Balloon Frankenstein

In an earlier post I told you about a store called Balloon Inspirations were I'm learning to do different balloon scupltures. This time around I learned how to make a Balloon Frankenstein. This scuplture is made of about 109 balloons and stands at about 7 feet tall!

Balloon Frankenstein


Frankenstein Balloon Scuplture

Crocheted Sack Lunch

I Love doing some cute and special for Shelby and I's monthly anniversary. So, with the new food I crochet I decided to create a sack lunch. Included with a special note with 'cheezy' puns it was enough to make her happy.

Crocheted Sack Lunch

Crochet Bacon

Bacon is pretty d*mn good. Enough said.

Crochet Bacon

Crochet Cookie

I've been waiting for a long time to be able to check out this book since I put it on reserve at the library. This amazing book is called Tasty Crochet. The first 'food' I created was the simple cookie. It doesn't taste as good as it looks, but it was still fun to make. While I did enjoy this book it leaves more to be desired. As soon as you make one peice of food you'll ask yourself, "I wonder if they have this?" and multiple times she didn't. Don't let that discourage you though! This isstill a great book for what it does have to offer!

Crochet Cookie

Balloon Dude

One just wasn't enough! I had to make another one. This is truly awesome.

Balloon Dude

Watchmen Cupcakes

After my fail with fondant on a cake I decided to try my luck on cupcakes. They came out great! I used this same recipe for the fondant and Martha's recipe for yellow cupcakes. The fondant's dyed yellow, black frosting for eyes and mouth, and red gel for the blood splatter.

Watchmen Cupcakes

Pirate Balloon Sculpture

Shelby had her birthday a couple weeks ago and I wanted to make something AWESOME! Luckily I've made friends with the owner of the local balloon shop. Dawn owns Balloon Inspirations and takes pride in her work. She is a great person and I appreciate everything she's helped me with. I think Shelby appreciated it too as this picture shows.

Balloon Pirate Girl

Cake FAIL

First off, I love the show Ace of Cakes. I went to visit the Charm City Cakes site and read that, "we require a minimum of $1000 on all of our cakes." I don't know about you, but even though their cakes are AMAZING I need that money for other things. So, I set out to make my own amazing cake. I looked at their flavor list and noticed Peanut Butter and Jelly cake. Never heard of that flavor of cake so I went for a recipe on the internet and found this one. I followed that recipe step by step, popped it in the oven took it out and it looked flat and tasted GROSS! Guess what? The directions didn't tell you to add the sugar! Since Shelby and I made this together I asked if she had more time to try again. She did and we made the recipe again, this time WITH the sugar. It came out great. Now it was time to make fondant which I never done before. I used this recipe which was FUN to make. It came out great, but we didn't roll out enough fondant to cover the cake. It ended up glopping on the cake, so we just added the jelly anyway ready to call it done. Even though it looked terrible I had the best time with Shelby and the cake still tasted Great.


Cake without Sugar



Shelby w/finished Cake




Lesson - Read directions carefully instead of blindly following them. Cakes need sugar! As for everything else... Practice.

Frog and Duck Hat

To suprise my girlfriend I wanted to make hats that we could wear together. We met during the Frog prince so the frog hat is an obvious choice and a duck just seemed cute to make. These are modified versions of this basic hat pattern.

Frog Hat

Duck Hat

Painted Shed

I've learned that I really don't like painting, but when you're told to do something you have to do it. This summer I spent a lot of time painting the shed, jungle gym, and the front porch. Was it fun? no. Was it worth it? Ask the person who wanted it done. She'd say, "yes."

Painted Jungle Gym and Shed

College

You made of noticed the number of posts fall off the map since August. That's because I started my first semester of college. College is alright, but it sure takes time away from you. Now don't think just because I haven't had time to post that I also haven't made anything. I've been crafting more than ever. Posts are here to come, but they will be both old and recent projects. You might ask, "What made this sudden jump in posts?" I looked at the facebook group and noticed the membership started to fall. That upsets me so I hope to bring those members back as well as make many more. Be sure to visit the link below to join ACC on Facebook.



ACC on Facebook

Ami Ninjas

Here's my pattern in all it's glory! Inspired by an Amazon preview of the book Creepy Cute Crochet, a book I really want to get, I decided to give the idea of a ninja a go with the new pattern. I couldn't be happier. This made a great suprize for a few friends of mine, but now it's time to get to work on some Pirates to make the rest of them happy. Stay tuned!

Ami Ninjas

Experimenting

As you can see I was hard at work. For a week I worked on trying to make my own customizable pattern after the inspiration I received when viewing the blog at Geek Central Station. Especially the Star Wars figures! It was kinda' fun to experiment with no complete idea of what I was going for. My first time trying felt clothes, and even some playing trying to latch hook hair. After plenty of frustration I had finally settled. I have created my first good looking pattern! Just wait until the next post, AND if you like it make sure to let me know. I'm thinking about making a PDF guide for it. :)

Ami Experiments

Bobba Fett Ami

First off, making your own patterns is TOUGH! That's what I tried to do. With a lot of inspiration taken from the Mighty Mugg characters I wanted to make one of my own. He didn't turn out like I wanted and I'm thinking of making him a lost cause. For now I'll just enjoy what I have and hopefully return to him later. Maybe after watching Star Wars again? :P

Bobba Fett Ami

Ski Masks

I know it's not cold outside and there's fact that it is still summer, but after a friend showed some interest in wanting to learn to crochet, he said a crochet ski mask would be awesome to make. Well, to show him that it could be done I whipped these up from a pattern found here. This is a great project, especially since it's hard to find patterns to suit a guys taste. Might as well go ahead and make a couple yourself, because winter always finds a way to seek up on you.

First to Smile Wins

Just to let you know, I won! :) I know I'm cheesy, but how could you not smile at this cute cross stitch. Made with love and completed with that smile, this was a pleasure to make.

Smiling Frog Cross Stitch

Aluminum Can FAILURE

That's right, it even happens to the best of us. Fortunately it's never a true fail unless you don't learn anything. I've been inspired by aluminum can art and sculptures. It's something Grandpa and I always thought were cool. So, after some major research I finally found a couple sites with great instruction, and one free pattern that I could use. That pattern was fairly easy, and the shark was fun to make, but you HAVE to use the glue that they tell you. First I tried to put him together with Elmer's Ultimate Glue. Before reading the package I tried to put together my shark. Turns out the glue requires moisture and a long drying time that sharky just fell apart and would not allow other glues to adhere. I cut out the pattern and cans again and this time tried my glue lover, hot glue. This seemed to work, until the next day. He fell apart again. Now each day we just tape him up with a new piece falling off each time. So, FOLLOW INSTRUCTIONS! I've learned my lesson, but had a good experience. I'm going to take a long break from can art, but continue to stay excited for my next venture into the craft.

Aluminum Can Shark

Aluminum Can Airplanes-amazing detail

Tesscar Aluminum Craft-wide selection

Shark Instructions

Goomba Shirt

Not to brag, but how awesome is this. I'm proud to present my first time cross stitching on a shirt, and what's cooler than a goomba? I didn't learn about waste fabric until after I finished the project which explains the uneven stitch size. I've since been enlightened. Waste fabric helps stitch on non-evenweave fabric, which allows you to easily make even stitches. Once you finish you just pull out the thread to reveal the finished project. I'll deffinately try this next time, but for now I'll just enjoyed the project I made without that extra help.

Goomba Cross Stitch Shirt

It's Been Too Long

How far has it been since my last post? The answer is TOO LONG! I'm sorry. Don't think I haven't been busy though. College makes things harder than it has to be. Finacial Aid in a pain in the butt. The car broke down and life gets in the way, but I've still kept on crafting. So, without futher ado, let's do some posting!

Space Monsters

Okay this probably isn't considered a 'craft', but it is something I enjoy. A program called Adobe After Effects was used to create this space background. Here is the link to possibly my favorite AE tutorial. This tut comes from my Favorite site created by Andrew Kramer, videocopilot.net.

SPACE Monster

Invasion of the Plush Monsters

I've wanted to sew for a LONG time, but using a sewing machine was something I wanted instruction on using. Well, I waited to long and after trying a few books that left me stumped and confused I finally found a cute and rewarding book that encouraged me to make my first project. Lyle the horned alien, made his way into my finished projects list after following instructions from the book, Invasion of the Plush Monsters. There are plenty of cute monsters in this book for you to get your fix, and I'm most excited to start on the brain eating hats! A deffinite check out from your local library.

Plush Monsters!

Cross Stitch Frog

I love using the "Learn to Cross Stitch" Stamped projects that I purchase at Michaels. So far I've completed my third of there small stamped cross stitch projects. Without futher ado, here is Mr. Frog.

Frog

Amigurumi

If you crochet then I should hope that you've heard of amigurumi. Amigurumi is a japanese word meaning knit or crochet toy. The best book I've found for this is Ana Paula Rimoli's book Amigurumi World. The book is full of cute critters to crochet and she even has a second book that recently came out. Here is my most recent characters made using the book. If you like crochet this is a must buy!

Ami Cat, Bunny, and Duck

Koopa Troopa Wall Hanging

This Koopa Troopa was another in my experiments with tunisian crochet. He was first intended to become a pillow, but he actually just taught me a great lesson in gauge. The number of rows you have can actually be a longer lenghth than width of stitches across. Never fear though, with this new found knowledge I will persevere and this Koopa Trooper will find his home as a wall hanging. I plan to whipstitch the top to a 1/2 inch below itself and insert a dowell rod to hang him up with and most of all he's still fun to look at.

Koopa Troopa

Koopa Troopa

And so everyone can learn from my mistake, here is a lesson on gauge!

Hang On For New Posts

I apologize for not posting lately. I've been busy making a lot of new things, and finishing some older projects. You'll see some new posts within the week. So, hang in there!

Can Mowing Be Fun?

No, probably not. But you can try to make it fun. After mowing the backyard last week I put the wheels at a lower setting and made a heart design. I can't say I love mowing, but I love this heart.

Tunisian Crochet

I also mentioned, in the first post, a new stitch I learned to help creating 8-bit inspired projects. First off check this out to see what can be created with it!!! Awesome, right?! Okay the stitch is easy to learn and fun to use. There are some pros and cons between it and single crochet that I will try to post later, but for right now look at this site for a tutorial and take a gander at the projects i've made with it.

Lakitu














Link

Balloon Dolphin Hat

I made a dolphin hat out of balloons a couple weeks ago following the tutorial video at balloon-animals.com. I don't know about swimming with the dolphins, but now you can walk with one!

Amigurumi Goomba

This was my first time trying to make my own amigurumi pattern. It also didn't turn out like I wanted it to, but still looks cool!

Daylillies

I've planted these 3 or 4 years ago and they're sprouting once again. Aren't they Pretty? :)

Monty Mole?

Not a craft, but a fun side note. Grandpa came out to till some soil in front of the house for mama and, in doing so, found this guy. Kinda' inspires me to make a Monty Mole project.

Carrying Colors Through

My first post mentioned that I learned a new technique for crocheting. This involves using multiple colors in your work (example here). I used this to stitch up a Goomba and a Super Mushroom from the original Super Mario Brothers. A few problems I found included colors that are being carried through can show through your stitches. It's best not to do this with high contrast colors. For my first time I think they look pretty cool. I'll also give one more plug to spritestitch.com for the inspiration.

Goomba

Super Mushroom

Both

Balloon Shield and Balloon Sword

I started doing balloon animals about four year ago to help entertain the kids at Vacation Bible School. During that time I only knew how to make a sword, dog, and flower. Since then, with the help of a book from a great friend, and online videos I've learned so much more. Check this video out for some easy twisting projects that are still popular with the kids.




If you would like to continue learning before I create more balloon twisting videos then make sure to check out HappyCabbie's youtube channel and my all time favorite balloon-animals.com

Origami Balloons

Okay, so they don't actually float, but they're still fun to throw around. This was the first origami project I think I learned.

Bubble Wrap Painting

This next project was designed for my child development class, but I found out it's fun for kids of ALL ages. :)

The Videos FINALLY Uploaded

Finally! The videos took forever to upload on youtube.com (about 9 hours!). But now they're here in all there glory. Although I thought I had more episodes saved before I left and only now do I realize how cheezy they really are. :P This first video is an intro that Devon Hudson edited together to have a little fun. Enjoy!




Camera Crew-Jan. 2009
Devon Hudson
Austin Duda
Caleb O'leary

Little History for ACC

For those new to Andrew's Craft Corner it's time for a little history. ACC started two years ago in my high school broadcast class. They were looking for new ideas that would spice up the show a bit. With my crafting skills I gave them the perfect idea, but after a five minute episode, trying to explain how to crochet, people were bored to death. The teacher and students wanted to cancel the show, but I figured I would just have to show them something more exciting and put a more upbeat tone into it. My timespan was now supposed to be kept under a minute, but I always went over. Some teachers and students began to enjoy the show except for my broadcast class. They ridiculed the show and the teachers that didn't watch started to turn KHS-TV off. ACC was then abandoned for about a year. That was until the middle of my senior year when people kept asking where the show was. So end of senior year, not caring what people thought, craft corner was brought back as a hit. So, enough history. Let's Start Crafting!

Let's Get Stitching!

Wow, it's been months since I started this blog and I've never made a post! Well, now it's time to change all that. I've been busy the past few days learning a new crochet technique (carrying colors through and using a graph) and a new stitch (tunisian crochet). I've been inspired by an awesome site called spritestich.com and I'm on an old video game stitch craze. Over the next week or two I hope to get this blog up and running, so get your hook out and let's get stitching!

:)