On our way to fame....

We had such Etsy excitement last night! Zorro's mom saw that our scarf, the Kathmandu, was featured on the front page of Etsy! (Thanks so much to RoseofSharon for including it in your treasury that was picked! I know they attributed the treasury to someone else, but we know who really made it. :)

Here's the screen shot our moms' took to prove it:

Isn't that cool? Now the Kathmandu has over 500 views, and it got 3 new hearts. Hooray! :)

Meow Meow Meow! Look how excited we are!

The Fun of Fulling (Felting)

Our moms are very excited about their new "felted" projects. Technically, these should be called "fulled", because the wool isn't felted until after it has been crocheted into it's full form. (One of the many fun things our moms have learned from EtsyFAST-- the Etsy Fiber Arts Street Team!)

We thought we'd show you how they did it! First, the take yarn that is 100% wool-- for this project, they used 100% merino wool from Patons, because it felts very evenly.

The bag was then crocheted (using half-double crochet, because it is a tighter stitch that isn't too small), but the size was much much larger than how they wanted the finished project! You can get a sense of how big it was here:

It's probably about 16-18 inches by 24-26 inches!

Then, they wash it, with hot hot water and some soap (woolite works, or a simple dishwashing soap like Ivory Liquid), with lots of agitation! Sometimes they do it by hand (rubbing the item in a big pot), or they will do it in the washing machine, but then they have to add some plain white non-terrycloth, non-shedding fabric to help with the agitation. After you scrub it in the hot, soapy water, you rinse it in cold cold water and watch it shrink! When it gets close to the size you want it to be, you shape it and "lay flat to dry". You watch it over a few days, and you can strectch it where you think it needs to be stretched, and rewet it if you want to change the shape a bit, and when it is dry, you have your fulled project!

The final dimensions on this bag were 11 inches x 15 inches. It's currently for sale as a custom order (Warm-colored Woodstock) in our moms' Etsy shop. There is a similar bag in cool colors (the Woodstock) also for sale there.

Newest Geometric Crochet!

Here is Mom's newest Geometric Crochet sculpture! This one was made using a much tighter configuration (rho=2), such that you add a stitch every other stitch. That makes for a very quickly increasing hyperbolic plane. You can compare this one to "Floral Reef" in a previous post.Mom says: "This piece I'm calling "Brain Coral" because the ripples remind me both of coral and of brains. This one is tight enough that you can wear it on your wrist as an interesting cuff or bracelet. Our cats can wear it as a fashionable lion-style collar. :) You can even make it look like a weird monster face!"

This piece is currently for sale in Mom's Etsy shop. Go check it out! :) http://lazycat.etsy.com.

Here's looking at you!

Nemo is looking at you!

He's so happy his moms are home! They are working on making projects again. :) They just finished a custom felted bag, and now they have an order for another hookworm scarf! The hookworm scarf was a special custom order project, and now they need to make another one! The first one was Harry the Hookworm. He went to Florida:

Harry has little teeth, just like a hookworm, and a hook at the end of his tail that can be hooked into his mouth. He is made from 100% merino wool Malabrigo yarn from Uruguay.

The next Hookworm will be named Harvey, in honor of his new owner. More nematode (worm) scarves will be forthcoming, along with other "animate"/"animal" scarves... Mom is thinking of a snake for sure (maybe a Basilisk?), maybe something like a fox? A vote was also put in for a sperm. ;) So, they are off to the yarn store to buy more yarn. We've never been, but they like to go to Busy Hands on Main St in Ann Arbor. They are nice to Crochet-ers! (unlike some other stores that think Knitting is the only worthwhile yarn art.)

So, pictures of Harvey Hookworm will be coming soon, along with pictures of Mom's newest geometric crochet project. You'll probably see them in the Etsy shop too--along with the custom felted bag, which is based off the Woodstock design.

Mom was working on finishing the bag while she was in Tucson, AZ. Here are a couple pictures she took while she was there:

These were taken at the Desert Museum west of Tucson-- looking southwest towards the mountains in Mexico and a close up of some flowers. Mom got a lot of good pictures in Tucson, and some might end up on an ACEO in the store!

Well, we'd love to hear your comments, and our moms would love suggestions on scarf-animals people would like to see, etc. Right now, it's time to snuggle up in bed. 'Night night all!

New Feature

We're just letting you know about a cool new feature on our blog--the EtsyMini! That way, you can peak into our moms' shop on Etsy! It's over on the side bar. :)

Things have been slow here lately... Mom was away in Arizona on a business trip, and we missed her. But she's back now, so that's good. Everything has returned to normal, so we are happy cats! Hopefully that means more blogging, and more posting in Etsy!