Friday I felt well enough that I wanted to get out of the house, I'd been wanting to go see Coraline in 3-D, so I splurged and took myself to a matinee. Since I almost never go out to see films, when I do, it is pretty special. I'd never seen a 3-D film before, and the effects were enjoyably impressive. I'm thinking I'll probably get the DVD when it is available, for while I was not transported by the actual tale, the technique and all the details kept me wanting to stop and look many a time. I'm pretty picky about my animation, and I definitely felt it was worth seeing, and on the short list of "want-to-own".
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Look at what I found in the front yard herb bed... some of these are going to the swap, and some are for gifts, or private side-swaps, and one is going into the store. I think they look quite tasty
When I initially started working on this swap, my additional self-challenge was to use what I already had; the mushroom stems were made from pieces of an old wool scarf, with the cap overlay made from the bits of felted yarn fringe. When I ran out of fringe, I thought to myself "no problem, I'll go to the yarn store and get some matching yarn to finish the project..."
To find matching yarn proved to be astonishingly difficult, and after trying four local yarn stores, I found a thinner yarn that looked more or less okay. There are myriads of greyish-tan wool yarns out there, all too yellow, or too pink, or too dark, or... I am cursed with a picky eye for color, and the yarns that the store clerks thought looked the same were just not. The thinner yarn is not really amenable to being couched down, but with a little experimentation, I realised that I could do an irregular blanket stitch over the surface of the mushroom cap, and that would give a rather more stylised, but still effective, morel. (I'm thinking about making some for my Etsy shop)
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Several months ago, I took this online test for color differentiation, and found the results to be rather interesting.
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and here is a picture of the springtime that is on the way; a patch of snowdrops in my front yard
As I enjoy handicraft, I find that crafty swaps are hard to resist. The time available is a constraint, of course, but this Handmade Mushroom Swap, hosted by the creative and talented knitsonya, promised both a fun challenge and a delightful result. Who would not like to add a few tiny artist-made mushrooms to decorate their cottage...
I decided to use only materials that I already had, and was inspired by a creamy off-white felted scarf and some scraps of Harris Tweed from a long ago jacket my father wore, to try something different than the usual "cute mushroom with spots". Somehow the materials were saying "make us into a morel". So I did...
This is my second attempt, and at 3 1/2" the mushrooms are a little bigger than I'd hoped, but still well within the swap guidelines. I used some fender washers for the weighted base to keep such top-heavy 'shrooms stable, covered with some additional felted wool, this time from a dark green motheaten lambswool vest recently sent to me for just such crafty purposes by my Mom, (thanks Mom! you are getting one of these for your curio cabinet) 
...for more mushrooms swapping goodness,
check out the flicker group
Friday I felt well enough that I wanted to get out of the house, I'd been wanting to go see Coraline in 3-D, so I splurged and took myself to a matinee. Since I almost never go out to see films, when I do, it is pretty special. I'd never seen a 3-D film before, and the effects were enjoyably impressive. I'm thinking I'll probably get the DVD when it is available, for while I was not transported by the actual tale, the technique and all the details kept me wanting to stop and look many a time. I'm pretty picky about my animation, and I definitely felt it was worth seeing, and on the short list of "want-to-own".
