www.youtube.com/watch?v=4QYOEJ3MRgs

This year I want to teach everyone how to make their own infinity scarf. It’s a popular item to wear during the winter and also highly requested on the HYcrafts channel on youtube.

Before you get started

**understand if you want an INfinity scarf which is basically a loop with a twist at the end… or just a simple loop. For myself, I didn’t want the twist but in my video I ended up with a twist unintentionally haha

FOR NO TWIST - make sure all the ridges of the knit when you cast on are on the same side before you begin to connect the two ends.

FOR TWIST (in conventional infinity scarf or mobius strip) - the ridges dnt have to be on the same side and you’ll definitely get a twist at the end once you connect the two ends.

Hope that helps!

Have an idea of what kind of scarf you will want to make, ask yourself these type of questions…

1. LENGTH: Do i want my scarf to be long, medium, or short?

• The length of the scarf will determine how many times you are able to LOOP the scarf around your neck. If you are trying to make a big chunky muffler (refer to the male’s picture to the top), I made this muffler by making it short (no need to loop) and CHUNKY.
• The length of the scarf will be determined by how many stitches you decide to cast on.
• EXAMPLE: I want to make my scarf very very long where the circumference will be 120 inches. I figure out depending on size of needle and size of yarn (sometimes information is on the tag on the yarn where you bought it from the store how many stitches = 1 inch). HOW MANY STITCHES TO CAST ON?  I have size 6 needles with my yarn which requires 3 stitches = 1 inch. 3 stitches x 120 inches = 360 stitches. HAHA very very long scarf but i can loop it around my neck so many times.

1. SIZE: Chunky or fine?

• CHUNKY - use bigger size needles and chunky chunky heavy weight yarn - super super warm, get ready to sweat! haha it depends where you are
• FINE - use small size needles with appropriate size yarn (usually light weight)

1. COLOR: bright, dark, mixed?
2. TEXTURE: what type of knitting pattern should I do to create texture?
• in the following video, I only show you a scarf following a simple KNIT stitch all the way through for the purpose of making the scarf as fast as possible. There are many different types of patterns to follow that can generate more texture. For example, for ribbing you can do KNIT, KNIT, PURL, PURL for one row. Then for the next rows repeat same pattern.

SUPPLIES

1. Circular Knitting Needles (atleast 36″)
2. Yarn

These are my size US 15 Circular Needles with 40" in between and Chunky Yarn = very chunky scarf

For the purpose of the video, I made a simple scarf with size 6 circular knitting needles 36″.

I used the yarn that will fit the needle. I also used wool from Peru (my advice: start buying yarn from specialty knitting shops… they have the best wool!).

 Instructions

1. Start by casting on. To determine the number of stitches to cast on see instructions under length.
2. Once you are finished casting on, make sure the thick ridge of your stitches are facing the same side in order to avoid making a  Möbius strip. Sometimes people like the idea of the Mobius strip which means that your scarf will end up having a twist.
3. Before you connect the two ends of the knit together, place a stitch marker to help you follow how many rows you have knitted.
4. Connect the two ends by knitting a knit stitch. Continue to knit in whatever pattern you wish. I used a knit stitch throughout
5. Knitting many rows will determine how thick you want your scarf to be. I made mine about 1.5 ft thick but if I wanted to make a thicker scarf, I would keep knitting rows pass this mark.
6. Once you are finished knitting rows, you will start casting off.
7. CAST OFF: Start at the end of the row, and knitting two stitches. THen with the first stitch you made, place your needles underneath it and pull that stitch over the 2nd stitch you made and then release. Continue to follow this pattern until you are finished with the whole row.
8. Once you are finished casting off, you are left with a stitch, carefully remove the needle while holding the hole of the stitch in place. With a crochet hook, take the tail of the yarn and bring it through the hole of the stitch. Weave the remaining yarn into your scarf.

GOOD LUCK!

May the Knitting Force be with you!

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1. Fabric. My fabric of choice was Linen. I recommend linen or cotton for your first time.
2. Sewing Machine (recommended) | Needle & Thread? This can be done by hand sewing but I do not advise it for your first time and will be extremely tedious and long and your shirt may come out more delicate than you would want it to be.
3. Cutting Board
4. Rotary Cutter
5. Pattern Paper
6. Patterns for shirt (if you have them, You can also make them yourself. Here is a guide using your favorite T-Shirt as a Template – click here)

Instructions

1. Using a template of your favorite shirt, fold the body of shirt lengthwise (hotdog style). Place on tracing/pattern paper to create a pattern of your favorite shirt. Tracing the front of the shirt will be the pattern for the Front part. Tracing the back of the shirt will be the pattern for the back part. You should have two patterns, one for the back and front. Including sleeves, you will have 4 pieces to sew together. You can also trace out the sleeves… check out my picture in how this should look like:
   

   My Pattern Paper for the front side of shirt

   

   Pattern is cut out of fabric

Pattern for Sleeves, this is how it should look like

 

Pattern for shirt. FROM BACK LEFT: Front Pattern, Back Pattern, and sleeve (make 2)

 

3.  Once fabric is cut out, begin by placing the right side of the shirt together. Overlock the front and back pieces together at the left shoulder. Secure area by placing tape or using needles. Sew these pieces together on the left shoulder on the wrong side of the fabric. Use a zizag stitch.

Once front and back pieces are sewn on left shoulder, Roll-Hem stitch around the neck hole, using a decorative stitch.

4. Roll-Hem stitch around the neck hole, using a decorative stitch.

5. With right sides together, overlock the front and back pieces together at the right shoulder.

6. With the right sides together, overlock the sleeves to the armholes.

Sew Sleeve to the armhole. Let the curvature follow the armhole curvature. It should bend and form a sleeve shape once finished.

 

THis is the top view of me placing my sleeve pattern into the armholes. The Shirt is fully opened up.

View of Sleeve attached to armhole from Right Side of fabric

7. Roll-Hem stitch the sleeve opening using a decorative thread.

Roll The Hem and then stitch

Stitched Roll Hem, DO this on sleeve openings, head and body openings.

8. With Right Sides together, overlock the front and back pieces together at the left side from the bottom opening up to the sleeve opening.

9. Overlock around the bottom opening or roll hem stitch like I did.

10. With right sides together, overlock or zizag front and back together at the left side from the bottom up to the sleeve opening.

Finished!

*Try cleaning up your garment by trimming rough edges, loose thread, etc. I added some buttons to make it more my style.

finished product!

I added some embellishments but only a few. I realized if I had to sum up my style it is mostly simple, classy, boho with a little glamour. I love Chanel especially the nautical look that came out during that time. I love Baseball. I added the two together and got this hahaha

Inspiration Board: nautical, chanel, baseball, linen stripes

Some classy Buttons I wanted to place on shirt

Ready to go out and about

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Lately, I have been obsessed with Zakka Life & Design. I have always loved this aesthetic but making things for the Home hasn’t been this compelling till I actually started.

These past few months, I have been collecting items for my home as well as making many different things like dinnerware, kitchenware, bedding etc.

This past month, I hosted a dinner party with my friend Cindy. These are some pictures from the dinner setup.

Dinner Setup

Here is my Setup for dinner! I don’t have much money so I had to improvise a bit. A lot of my items here are very affordable.

Dinner plates were from Ikea.

Goblets/wine glasses are from Target.

Candle holders are actually containers for Kitchen Spices that I used and they are from Ikea.

The Vase is a used PREGO sauce bottle.

The gold bracket used for a platform for the candle was given to me by Roommate, it’s a bracelet.

Placemats & coasters are by ME.

COASTERS

Coaster, Bracelet, & Candle

Creating Coaster: sewed two square pieces together. One denim like cotton piece along with a yellow striped cotton piece. This has lace accent.

Great way to use left over scraps

I LOVE TEA!! and Tea Sets! and Making Tea Set Accents!

This tea set is made by Zakka Artist Shinzi Katoh

Placemats!

Owl Print Placemat

I used this Owl Print to sew a Placemat. I thought this would be the perfect pattern to compliment the orange linen placemats that I sewed first.

This is organic orange linen. I love Linen. Linen fabric is beautiful for home decor. I love it’s lightness and fresh feel. I used lace to accent the placemat.

Placemats together

Sunflowers are a wonderful centerpiece to brighten up the table!

Here are more pictures from the dinner party and Zakka Style incorporated.

Piyo Piyo

Steamed Egg on my Printed Run

Piyo Piyo Figurines. Photo Credit: Cindy Lin

Muscato D'Asti is My favorite Dessert Wine

Dinner Party Accessories

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Turtle poses with Hello Kitty Pillow

Close up!

This pillow is for my friend’s new baby sister

for a little newborn… well actually it’s a huge pillow for a new born but it’s actually a pillow that will be used in the parent’s bedroom that will give the mother & baby a barrier.

cute heart button accents

This fabric is made by 100% cotton. I highly recommend if you are ever sewing a pillow made for your bed,  i recommend using 100% Cotton! It’s probably the best fabric to use… others might be too rough like linen (although good quality linen is very soft) but if you like your bed having a fresh and clean feeling, cotton is the best! Also… 100% cotton, I believe is better than 50% cotton because some fibers are more frail than others. Cotton is pretty durable and can stand within many washes in your washer.

I used white cotton fabric with printed Hello Kitty fabric. The Hello Kitty print was perfect for the project!

I used some trimming to make this pillow even more feminine and cutesy.

turtle is so cute

the pillow measures 20 x 52 inches

Sleepy Hello Kitty

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2011 is full of new things! What a great year so far… I should’ve blogged earlier but haven’t had time until now. I wanted to show you all my new business cards that I ordered a while back around FEB. Thanks to a friend that recommended this vendor, I was able to order my business cards from moo.com! They are awesome! I will definitely be using them for future events!

New Hello Yellow Crafts Business Cards

variety of designs

100% made from recycled material

quality is awesome

There are regular sized business cards and then there are THESE mini-cards that I feel are more portable and convenient.

moo mini cards

I love moo!

I have been handing these out and they work so well! If you would like one, let me know

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*insert mortal kombat intro here*

WELL WELL WELL fellow FRIENDSSSS AND helloyellowFANSSS. You think Food Poisoning killed me? WELL IT DIDNT! I am seriously going crazy right now cuz all my pics are loading super slow on etsy so this has been taking sometime to load.

Yesterday, I got food poisoning. Isn’t that wonderful? Right before my store opening—OF COURSE THIS HAPPENS.
LOL. it’s all good.

I’m currently going crazy also because I haven’t eaten and still am working on this, but seriously.. it’s ALL GOOD. I feel like I was delayed but hopefully can get this in on time.

….. AND I AM QUITE DONE, everything is loading quite slow but here take a look!

HOOORAYYY! HERE I PRESENT TO YOU:

HELLOYELLOWCRAFTS ETSY STORE!

Click here to be led to ETSY STORE

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helloyellowcrafts.etsy.com

My collection will feature items that can used for this winter as well for upcoming spring & some items just for valentine’s day!

i’m so excited! I’ve worked on some stuff with my mother who also loves to sew and knit so this is really special to me. Enjoy the teasers!!

There is certainly A LOT MORE to be shown…

Don’t forget, on Sunday Night, Jan 30. 2011, you’ll be available to view all my items @

http://helloyellowcrafts.etsy.com

also if anyone in the Houston Area is FREE THIS WEEK TO MODEL… please let me know!

need models <3

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Reddit Alien Ornament

a handmade ornament of the Reddit Alien that I made for my friend

It was for his Reddit Secret Santa

will look well on a christmas tree…

made out of pure cotton and drew out an outline of the alien and sewed over it.
used embroidery thread to make the smile and eyes.

used leather straps to hold the ornament together. I like the leather/suede straps… it really gives a nice handmade feel.

You can also make christmas ornaments out of fabric by sewing out a simple pattern like a christmas tree or small circles, put some embellishments and BOOM, you got a cool looking tree!

like the one seen here on the cover of COTTOM TIME Nov-DEC issue:

Handmade Christmas Ornaments from Wool

Variety of Holiday Themed handmade ornaments

Handmade cupcake ornaments

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Something I have been obsessed with for the holidays is making bows! ALL KINDS OF BOWS. But so far, i have made many many bows for the hair.

I guess what inspired me to do this was something I came across a while back. I kept on seeing a variety of bows in pictures within fashion magazines and thinking, hmmm I should give that a try.

In particular, I saw this image on YESSTYLE.com and thought that’s a nice looking vintage bow. Also, wouldn’t it look lovely at a christmas party? So I figured some of these bows would look festive. THEN, I started to make festive bows.

Well, I didn’t want to make the bows that can stand out too much. I wanted a more suttle look… not too hard. So some of the bows are not too dramatic. I feel that I should make a dramatic bow next time though. A HUGE BIG BOW NEXT TIME.

Evidently, if you have a lot of left-over fabric from past projects that you didn’t even get to use, this would be an ideal project to start.

This project uses minimum fabric and minimum sewing. It may not take a lot of thought, but I found myself thinking more than I thought I would be for each bow. I guess it’s part of the designing process. I must admit, that not all these bows are made from things that were already in my “studio.” I actually went toHigh Fashion Fabrics in Houston to pick out trimmings that would go with my theme. STAY TUNE FOR THE HOLIDAY VELVET BOW… where the velvet is made from Switzerland. O_O and is 4.99/yard. PORQUEEE?!!!

Some Vintage Inspired bows…

Off-white-Lace bow with white beaded trimming.

Details of Lace Bow Clip

Black-Lace-Bow

black on white.

Plaid/Pattern inspired Bows…

Festive and can be used at many other occassions

Plaid-bow

Plaid-Bow-on-Tiffany

Lace-on-striped-Wool

Burberry-like-pattern clip with circular Gold jeweled embellishment/buckle

Gold buckle looks awesome...this clip is one of my favorite

Holiday Festive Clips

(intentionally for the holidays)

Green Holiday themed bow with gold print

Red Sequin clip. Very expensive trimming that I never used till now!

and now… FOR MY ALL TIME FAVORITE

THE STEAMPUNK HAIR CLIP

The Steampunk inspired Hair Clip

made out of lace, beads, and "watch parts"

errr… SHOULD I MAKE A TUTORIAL FOR THIS?

ERRR GONNA START MAKING BOWTIES….

SEEE EVEN OBAMA WEARS ‘EM! hahahaha check out my helloyellow

OBAMA bowtie impression

CHECK OUT OBAMA IN HELLOYELLOW BOW TIE LOL

I guess it's his favorite ^_-

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Since it’s winter and was atleast ~30 degrees for thanksgiving, I decided to knit a beanie.

Also since some people have requested a how-to on how to knit a beanie, I made a video!
There is a helloyellowcrafts channel on youtube and you can watch my tutorials there.

WATCH NEW TUTORIAL VIDEO!!!!

www.youtube.com/watch?v=TExqHb7_Di8

Materials

1. Circular Knitting Needles (I used 16 inch, size 15)
2. Yarn (in my case, I used yarn from yarns2ewe from Houston, TX. Merino Wool! It’s worth it. Very good quality and so soft)
3. scissors
4. crochet hook
5. Stitch markers

Instructions

measuring your head . . .

1. Take a measuring tape and measure the size of your head. Figure out how many inches the circumference of your head is. Then, with your knitting needle and yarn, make a small patch by knitting a few stitches (each . Determine how many stitches make up an inch, multiply that number by the inches of your head, then you will know how many stitches to make when you first cast on.

My head is about 20 inches and my stitch turned out to be 2 stitches per inch, therefore, I multiplied 20 x 2 to get 40 stitches for my cast on.

merino wool from yarns2ewe

knitting your beanie

1. Start by casting on the number of stitches you determined to fit your head.
2. Place a stitch marker after you knit your done casting on. This will help you determine how many rows you have fully knitted.
3. knit, knit, purl, purl, till you finish 2-2.5 inches of the beanie rim. To learn knitting stitches I recommend this website: http://www.knittinghelp.com/videos/learn-to-knit

4. Continue to do a simple knit stitch for many many rows after you complete the rim. This will create a long tube structure that should eventually fit your head. I waited till mine was about 7-8 inches long.

5. Place the almost-made beanie onto your head to see if it fits well. Make sure it covers your ear or whatever your preference is.

knit-the-beanie

finishing your beanie

1. Create stitch markers or use stitch markers that you can buy at the store. I made mine by cutting threads of yarn and tying them together.

2. To start decreasing, you will group the stitches. Each group will consist of 8 stitches. This will only occur for the first row of decreases, so first knit 6, and for the last two, knit them together. That is your group of eight. Place the stitch marker after this. Repeat till you finish the row.

3. Each next row will be different, but continue to follow the same pattern except now, you will just keep knitting each stitch until the very last two for each stitch marker. You will actually knit those last two together. Then repeat this whole process.

4. Once you are up to four stitches left on your needles, get a pair of scissors and cut off the working yarn. Use the crochet needle, and hook the working yarn through the stitches.

5. Once that is done, remove the knitting needles.

6. Use the crochet hook to hook in the working yarn from the outside of the beanie to the inside. Weave the remaining working yarn into the beanie.

me and my buddy

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