October is National Craft-Making Month!

It's been all backstitch, when I can manage anything at all; my household has some cold bug, but we all have slightly different symptoms, and I seem to have the mildest symptoms.

Day 23

[ID: A cross stitch project in progress, showing a gray mouse wearing a turquoise scarf; Holly leaves in dark green thread are stitched at the top and bottom of the mouse. The head, ears, scarf, and right side of the body are outlined in backstitch. End ID]

Day 24

[ID: A cross stitch project in progress, showing a gray mouse wearing a turquoise scarf; Holly leaves in dark green thread are stitched at the top and bottom of the mouse. The head, ears, scarf, right side of the body, tail and abdomen are now outlined in backstitch. End ID]

Same old story... thankfully, I have an orthopedist appointment on Thursday!

Day 20

It was my kids' birthday! I made them nice birthday cards within my limited drawing capabilities, which they liked, but are a bit personal for me to post.

I made them simple, but decadent cupcakes with double buttercream frosting for their birthday dessert; the pic shows the ones that didn't get frosted but got put in the freezer for later.



Day 21

After a somewhat tiring previous day preparing a birthday feast, I opted for starting yet another low-spoon headband (but the last of this skein); I knitted about 54 rows.



Day 22

Day 22 was a bad day painwise; I did manage to finish off the headband I started on day 21, but neglected to take a picture, and now, it's mixed in with all the other headbands.

Day 23

Another not-great day and full of chores to boot. I saved my crafting streak by "finding" (it's been sitting on a chair in my dining room for months) K's dress that needed some mending - some shiny rhinestone cupchain at the neckline had some loose, and I fixed it, and also sewed up a seam elsewhere that had come undone.

Before:


After:


Day 24

I worked on the 2019 Mystery SaL, while trying to master the art of listening to audiobooks. After a bit of time, it seems that I can listen to audiobooks while crafting, as long as the work is not too complicated, because anything complicated makes it hard to listen. Now, I just have to remember to stop the book when crafting gets complicated. At least, the app I'm using has a 15 second rewind.



Day 25

More 2019 Mystery SaL while listening to a few chapters of an audiobook; I think it's getting a little easier.

I think I hate the posting part of this challenge, if I'm being honest...

Day 22

I mostly played catch-up with household stuff, and didn't do any arting or crafting.

Day 23

I put back in the section in the cross stitch that I had to frog on Monday.



Day 24

Hey, some more cross stitch!



Day 25

My local Joann store moved, and had a grand opening sale. I picked up some Halloween-themed beads (like I really needed MORE beads!) and made some Mother/Daughter earrings!



Day 26

A HUGE crafting day today!

I baked and crumb-coated a cake for the birthday party...



And then I started to deal with the costume for K. K had sworn up and down that she'd help, but hasn't wanted to for the past two weeks. I finally got out the material anyway, and she stayed with me for about 10 minutes, before deciding that this was all boring and went back to watch tv. I suppose it's typical for an 8 year old, but I was, and am still, annoyed. I got a long-sleeved shirt from last year to build the costume on, cut a few things on it, ironed on an embellishment, and cut a bunch of yellow strips of material (of which I think I am eventually going to hate dealing with).





Day 27

Unfortunately, F came home sick with a fever from her lesson on Saturday. We waited until the morning to see how she was, and she still had a fever, so we had to postpone the kids' birthday party. That gave me a bit more time to redesign K's costume in my head about a dozen times before deciding that even though the costume looks like a dress in the pictures, I do not have the required skills to make it a dress in reality. So I'm making it a top and skirt. K was pissy when I wanted to do some sizing stuff, and I almost gave up on making this for her. She also wanted to help again and but only stayed about 5 minutes when it became very clear that I wasn't going to let her run the sewing machine by herself. So I finally got the base skirt sewn, except I didn't leave a hole in the casing for elastic, and that's when I knew I needed to stop.