Well, it seems as though spring is springing around my corner of the world. Just in the last handful of days, I've noticed several types of trees blooming already...even though it seems quite early to me. The sunsets have taken on their warmer weather look, at least to me. And the temps are certainly leaning towards a warm (and early) spring. Even though we still have 20 days left of winter, I find myself leaning into a spring direction...it's hard not to when nature is showing signs of buds, blooms, and birds singing in the morn. Before winter officially makes an exit until later this year, I wanted to share two of my most recent crafty projects that I got up to this winter.
Right before Christmas, I taught myself how to crochet a traditional Granny Square. I found myself catching on quite fast, as I had practiced different crochet techniques earlier in the autumn, which helped me a ton. I have since become Granny Square obsessed! I absolutely love the look of the traditional square and especially mixing different colors in for each round. I am working on a bigger project of a blanket, and right now I'm about one-fifth of the way done with the first part. However, when our winter storm came in late January, I was inspired to make a Granny Square headband using some random yarn I had in my stash from previous knitting projects. I chose a lovely lilac, blush rose, and a happy daffodil yellow. This was a quick project and an incredibly easy one...but let me tell you, I used that headband so many times during our cold spell. I have a collection of winter beanie-type hats, which I love wearing when my hair is down, but if I'm wearing my hair up, I prefer a hand band. I knitted myself one a few years back, and this crochet one really sparked joy for me.
Another snowbound evening, I found myself rummaging through my stash of fabric scraps. There is quite a lot of fabric that I've had for years, and for one reason or another, much of it just isn't my taste anymore...but no need to waste it. I pulled out a bunch of bits of this and that if I loved the colors, and cut many, many, many strips. I found a wreath frame in my craft cupboard that I've also had for a long time...and so one frigid evening, with a good movie on in the warmth of my cozy living room, I set out attaching all those many fabric strips to the wreath frame. And the result was a very colorful, very scrappy rag wreath. It brings me so much joy every time I look at it.
Those two projects were the perfect one-night crafts for a couple cozy evenings. They were fun and relaxing and enjoyable in every way, cost me zero dollars as I already had the supplies in my stash (and they'd been sitting there for some time already), and I'm still enjoying them. Though the head band is probably tucked away until next winter, unless we get another cold spell. Which I would not be sad about. {{smiles}}
What have you created lately? What are your favorite sorts of creative projects? I've learned over the last while that I always gravitate towards craft projects involving yarn or fabric or embroidery floss or felt...and then my scrappy journaling, too, with lots of stickers and washi tape...what about you?