Age's Crochet Pages Update/Overhaul

Been working on some minor layout changes on Crochet Pages. It's sort of a continuity fix, to make the pages more consistent in appearance. I'm also working to remedy the severe lack of photos. Jessy will be helping by making some of the samples that have apparently gone mixing/been given as gifts.

I'm looking forward to getting everything "together" so speak, finally.

Age

In the meantime

I've been waiting for the sun to go down a little so that I can plant the afforementioned little tomato plant and water my teeny backyard and garden. In the meantime however, I've started working on archiving the Age's Crochet Pages newsletter onto the website. As soon as I've gotten everything swapped over from Word documents to HTML (web) format, I will borrow the hubby's thumb drive and upload everything to the site.

No, I do not have any current plans to start up the newsletter again. Sorry. This doesn't mean I'll never consider it, it just means not right now.

Age

Current Projects as of June 1

Currently I am working on a Bender Doll for my friend Dan in exchange for helping us fix some things on our 3rd floor. (pattern can be found here)

Also in the works, and nearly finished is a star quilt afghan (not the one on my website) for a housewarming gift for a couple I know. Their apartment building burned partially a couple months ago and they are currently living in another apartment while theirs is renovated (it only took water damage). I'm hoping to have the afghan done in time to give it to them when they finally get to move back into their original apartment.

I've got lots of things I'm brainstorming sitting and waiting for me to have the time and ambition at Kayuda. (www.kayuda.com) If you've never heard of it, Kayuda is a web-based, nonlinear thinking/planning/writing tool. I think it's great. I brainstorm supplies for my projects there as well as using it to organize my thoughts for the cookbook I'm writing. Lots of people use Kayuda for things like writing and programming and though it's pretty new, it seems to be a big hit.

Oh, I bought a 3rd tomato plant for my garden. I've gotten tired of looking at a completely empty tomato cage on the end of the first row. It's a Bonnie plant, which I've never bought before, but it came in a peat pot and supposedly you just take the wrapper off, tear the bottom off the peat pot and stick the whole thing in the ground. I've planted from peat starter pots in previous years and they work pretty well (ask my husband about the Sunflower Massacre - all the grass died cause it didn't get any sun past the sunflowers), so I have high hopes for this little plant. Of course I had high hopes for about $25 of starter herbs and herb seeds and most of them have since died. Only the basil and the 3 varieties of mint are still doing well.

ah, well.
Thanks for reading,
Age

What is Age's Other Pages?

Hi, all! It occurs to me that at least some of you have noticed that sometimes a lot of time goes by in between my postings of new patterns on Age's Crochet Pages. It also occurs to me that at least some of you might be interested in what I'm doing when I'm not designing free original patterns for your personal use. (If you request permission, I do sometimes grant it, on a case by case basis, for other uses.)

For the most part what I do when I'm not designing free patterns falls into one of the following categories:

• crocheting stuff that I couldn't begin to explain how I made it, from someone else's pattern or something that I can't share the pattern to for one reason or another
  
• working (Framing Manager, Michaels Arts & Crafts #4714)
• fixing up our 100 year old row home
• gardening (flowers out front, veggies in back, herbs in the house)
  
• other arts and crafts (I'm a whiz at Knifty Knitter if you ever need any help.)
• as of right now, blogging
• gaming (RPG's - like Dungeons and Dragons, but we don't actually play that particular one)
  
• not much - we watch a lot of movies and anime

Lately I'm been making a lot of dolls, and I can't seem to find much of anything about anybody crocheting any dolls on the internet. There's lots of amigurumi (funky, miniature, oversimplified dolls crocheted in spiraling rounds) going on, but I haven't found much else. So I thought, if nothing else, I'll at least share what I've been up to.

Thanks for reading,
Age

So, what have I been doing lately?

These are some of my more recent photos. You may find I'm a little erratic about posting news photos, this is because I don't actually own (believe it or not) a digital camera. Which means I have to pest Sarah to bring hers over and then wait for her to send me the pics.

Dave's Birthday Present


For those of you who don't recognize this guy, he is a Traxxian. Specifically, Pinefresh Kitty-Litter. Yes, he has 4 arms, and yes, they are poseable. Traxxians are a playable race from the RPG Orbit. (We're also gamer geeks around here.)

(btw, from left - my husband, Carl; me; our friend Dave)

This particular Traxxian was actually an NPC (non-player character) in our orbit campaign. He was the head engineer on the spaceship we were traveling on - hence the overalls and flannel grease rag in his pocket.

Dave enjoyed playing the character for us and it was a big plot point in our game, so I made this as a birthday present for him back in March. (If you look closely in the background, the partially finished Chthulu is hanging out in a shoe box.)

Baby Booties

The baby's name is Ava Grace. She's the daughter of a friend of a friend, which is silly, but she's also the only baby girl I have access to as a model. The booties are crocheted as one piece, socks attached and are basically a slightly oversized version of the shoes I sometimes use for my dolls.



Chthulu


Chthulu is one of the "Great Elder Gods" who was written about by H. P. Lovecraft, followed by many others. The legend is that Chthulu is a god who preceeded humanity and now is slumbering beneath the ocean. Presumably, one day Chthulu will awaken and rise up from the depths. Probably, he'll eat us. Not because he's evil, more likely just because he can. Or he might not.


This much more cuddly version is a crocheted copy of a plush Chthulu my husband purchased a number of years ago. He has red button eyes and armature wire in his wings to support them and make them poseable.