vegan leather journal

Finished this vegan leather journal this morning:

It's filled with sketch book paper, so it could be a sketch book as well. My favorite part is the button! It really is a vintage button, I'm not just saying that (I feel like a lot of people use "vintage" or "retro" to describe just about anything), it's from a box of buttons I found at a relative's house that probably hasn't even been opened for the past 40 years, so yes, definitely vintage.

The green thread with the flowery button makes me think of spring - which is nice since it's 17 degrees out.

pamphlet stitch notebooks

I just posted these little books to my etsy:

They're simple little pamphlet stitch journals with images from old books on the covers. I love these things. Everyone I show them to loves these things. But I don't think anyone who sees this photo is going to love them. These pictures just don't do them justice, and I'm not quite sure how to fix it. Photographing objects to make them look awesome really isn't my thing. Some people can do a great job, and it also helps if you have a really dynamic object; these are basically sheets of gray paper, and, although cute, are not that visually stimulating in 2-D. I'll try re-photographing again tomorrow when it's supposed to be sunnier out - although I did take these photos in natural light, perhaps more natural light would help? But still, I'm not sure how I can make these look like a must-click-on item when people are flipping through the pages and pages of journals on etsy.... Thoughts? Suggestions? Random comments?

Mara

Last week I finished the lovely pattern Mara (rav link). Used 500 yds of KnitPicks Telemark in "Northern Green" that I had in the stash. Nice pattern - easy but looks good. I'm not usually one for knitting shawls, I don't really have the patience for hundreds of stitches per row, so I don't expect to knit another project like this anytime soon. But I am glad to have that yarn out of my stash and turned into something pretty :)

It's been a bit cloudy and rainy here for the past few days (or months), and all attempts to photo this on a model have failed miserably.... but I think you get the jist.

Oh, Dinner

Over the past few years I’ve actually started cooking. And enjoying it. This is something I never ever thought I’d do, because through high school I was more or less a cooking disaster. Yet out of necessity I started to cook. For over a year all I attempted was stir fry (key to a damn good stir fry: salt, pepper, insane amounts of garlic, more insane amounts of olive oil, and be sure to add some sort of beans into the mix. Mmm). Recently I’ve moved on to bigger and better things.

Last night’s dinner:

Cajun Style Baked Sweet Potatoes

Wow! So good! I've made these before. Super easy, and sweet potatoes are super good for you. Can't go wrong.

Moroccan Chickpea Soup

This is the first time I tried this one, and it turned out really well (not as well as this picture looks, as this is the photo from the website. My own picture of this soup looked entirely unappetizing. I am not a food stylist.) I added some barley too, because barley is on of my favorite things.

This is not complicated! I promise! I don’t do complicated food. So try it!

Hello!

Hi all, and welcome to my new blog. As you may know, my last blog turned into a complete failure as I haven’t touched it for over a year. BUT, I thought that I’d try again, as I often think about things that I should blog about. Maybe I’ll be a bit more disciplined about this. Once a week, perhaps?

It’s crazy windy here today. I keep checking the weather to see if there’s a tornado watch posted because I keep thinking the apartment is going to blow away. So maybe I’m being paranoid….But really, I’m in an apartment, if there is a tornado where am I going to go? Apartments don’t have basements.

Blogs are weird, it’s like talking to yourself. In front of people. Weird.

In knitting news:

For Christmas I knitted everyone in the world (or maybe just in my life) a cowl. This means I have zero stash left (or zero stash left of nice yarn). So I pulled out of the closet this old thing that has been neglected for over a year now (much like the old blog).

My intention was to frog it, but I tried it on before I did and it’s actually kind of cute. So I’m finishing it and we’ll see what happens. I think it might end up to be a bit too tight around the bust, so hopefully something will happen there once I block it. If not then it really will be frogged.