Sunburst Granny Blanket: All Done!

I’m finally done. And it’s not even May yet, I might still have a chance to use it this year on a cold evening!

Sunburst Granny Blanket - previous posts

So, in conclusion:
1. I missed slightly on the amount of yarn I needed. I ran out of yarn before the last two circles and had to go get a refill on two colors, probably because I had two yellows and they weren’t distributed evenly across the other colors. I was left with some extra yellow and ran out of the other colors.

2. I missed not so slightly on the amount of white yarn I needed - I ended up using 2 entire extra balls of white yarn.

3. At the end, I decided to finish the blanket with 4 rows of 2 hdc, ch 1 (2 hdc, ch 2, 2 hdc in same space for the corners). I did 2 rows in white, 1 row in yellow, and 1 row in darker yellow. I think it really added a nice touch. But, I had to get two extra balls of yarn for the yellow finish (I didn’t have any left).

4. I didn’t weave in the ends as I went, and ended up working very hard to weave in the ends for 96 squares. If I ever make another granny blanket (I’m definitely taking a break for now), I will definitely weave in as I go. I recommend that strategy for everyone!

Math 101: בדיוק במקום

Home Makeover: in the Kitchen

On these last couple of days I turned my attention to our kitchen. We have a convenient work island in the middle of the kitchen, which naturally turned into a junk pile. We decided, as a family, that junk was not the best use for that surface, and that it could be much nicer and cleaner. We also had these IKEA bar stools, and since I usually sit on them and they hurt my back, I decided that some padding would be nice.

To save time and money, I stopped over at IKEA and picked up some fabric and other home accessories and set out to get all the work done in a couple of hours. Well, not surprisingly, it took a little longer than that (but not much). While I was there, I decided to tackle the junk pile on our bedroom dresser as well, and got some candles and a lucky bamboo, which I hope will help keep the junk away in our entire home (and I like the way it looks and that it doesn’t need to be watered very often). It’s not particularly inspiring, just clean and neat, so I’ll spare you the pictures.

This is our kitchen before:

And here is what it looks like now:

I upholstered the IKEA stools (with IKEA fabric), and used a matching contrast fabric for the table top. Two wine glasses, a wine bottle and a black and white fruit bowl (which will be filled once I get back from the market) completes the soft yet elegant look. I’m very happy with the result. In fact, I’ve been stopping to look and feel proud of my work every time I go in the kitchen…

To complete the decluttering, I moved all of the unused fridge magnets to the side of the fridge, where they don’t show. Then, I wrapped a tin box with the upholstery fabric and glued a magnet on the back, to use for pens. I got the idea here, and I’ve been meaning to do it for a while now. Finally, no more hunting for pens when delivery guys show up!

You can just see our water cooler in the back of the kitchen, so you can see that we really like orange. I can’t get enough of the color (though I try to not go overboard with it).

Last but not least, I made a cover for our Kitchen-Aid out of the same contrast fabric. When I was almost done I decided it was too dark for the corner it was going to be in, and decided to add a bias tape finish made from the orange fabric instead of just hemming it. I’m happy with the result, and I will be sharing a tutorial soon (I’m planning to make one for my in-laws, so I’ll draft a pattern while I’m at it).

Perfect.

365 Project: Day 303

Math 101: חוכמת הגימטריה

365 Project: Day 300-302

Yep. Oops again for day 300.

Day 301:

Day 302:

How to add social media buttons to Blogger

Social media is all the rage for the past few years. And of course, if you’ve been online any time in the past 5 years or so, and definitely if you have a blog - you probably already know that. Bloggers use social media to drive traffic, so we want to push-push-push it in our readers face.

When facebook introduced the “like” button, that was a true revolution: all the reader has to do is click once - and our page is visible to all of the user’s friends. Then came Twitter, Google+ and Pinterest and offered their own button for easy sharing. However, all these buttons caused a serious design issue. They are dynamic (how dare they?). The height and/or width might change according to the button’s settings and how many people shared the page.

There are several different ways to deal with this issue, most of which cause silly gaps between the buttons or require various types of floating vertical areas which contain the social media buttons. I didn’t want to be quite so “in your face”, so I worked on it a little bit and I think I came up with a nice layout which requires a minimum amount of size mismatch, a horizontal layout and no gaps whatsoever. You can take a look at the bottom of this post for an idea of how it’s going to look when you’re done. If you don’t like it, I suggest you stop reading now…

Note and warning: Before you do this, please back up your template. If you don’t know what that means, don’t even try. Wherever there is a yellow highlight, you should replace the values with your own (according to what is needed in that location).

[This tutorial covers the code necessary for setting the image for the Pinterest button dynamically, so no need to do both.]

Math 101: בתיאבון, ילדים

365 Project: Day 299 (Home Makeover Day 1)

Over the next few weeks I plan to make some long overdue changes to my house. Today my goal was to move an unused IKEA bookcase from the kids room to my bedroom and reorganize all my fabrics in “mini bolts” on the shelves. So I did.

I saw this idea on Pinterest somewhere. All of her bolts came out the same height and she organized the colors better, but at least I can see all of my fabric and access it now…

If you’re wondering how to do this - it’s super easy. Get some heavy weight cardboard, cut it into a rectangle about 5-7 cm less than the height of your shelf and about 13-15 cm wide. Fold your fabric so it has no rough edges hanging out and it’s just a tiny bit taller than your cardboard, and just fold it around the piece of cardboard. Super easy. The original post I was inspired by had a whole section on how to fold the fabric “just right”, but I’m not that OCD. Just being able to see and access all my fabric is good enough for me.

I made onion soup with crostini for dinner. As I was cutting the challah bread I was going to use, I noticed that the pieces looked just like clouds. I really liked the idea of onion soup with crostini clouds floating in it. Not only were they pretty, they tasted good as well. All in all I’m very happy with today’s work.

365 Project: Day 293-298

I only missed one day this week, but only because I was sure I had taken a picture already…

Day 293:

Day 294:

Day 295 (icky weather):

Day 296:

Day 297:

Day 298 - oops…

365 Project: Day 285-292

It’s getting near the end of the project, and I’ll admit - I have a lot of other things on my mind and I’m getting lazy or forgetting to take pictures more and more often. So be it. Big oops from day 285 to day 287.

Day 288:

Day 289:

Day 290:

Day 291:

Day 292:

Math 101: ילדים שעוזרים בבית

.פוסטורח של הרועי קהת שכותב בס”ד

Math 101: משחק סכום אפס

A Doll House To Go

I made this doll house a while ago with a pattern from one yard wonders. Later, I found the same pattern in a free online tutorial, so - you can enjoy it without buying the book (though I am a fan). Personally, I would modify the pattern not to include so much hand sewing, but otherwise, it’s an excellent idea and the result is really sweet.

I had big plans for the interior - dolls and furniture and more, but I never got around to it, You know how it is… Finally, I decided that the doll house must be put into use one way or another, and started to think about what would be the easiest way for me to make dolls. I decided on finding a cute doll design and printing on fabric. The first part turned out to be much harder than I thought, whereas the second part much easier…

Finally I found this design on Sweet Clip Art, I modified it a little bit because I wanted a little boy and girl, but not holding hands (and I added the smiley face and flower’s to the boy’s shirt and girl’s dress). I chose the colors for the first set (on the left), and then my son decided he wanted a pair as well, so he got to choose the colors for the second pair (on the right). I was a little afraid of printing on fabric, but I found instructions for a simple technique which worked surprisingly well and it worked out fine: All you have to do is cut your fabric a size that your printer accepts, take some cardstock the same size and stick the edge slightly inset from the card’s edge with scotch tape. The edge will slide into the printer easily and the card will provide the necessary stiffness for printing. Easy as pie!

Because the fabric was quite see through, I ironed on some white interfacing to the wrong side of the fabric, and then cut out the doll shapes with a 1.5 cm seam allowance. Then I traced those shapes on a contrasting fabric (don’t forget to put the doll shapes face down…) and cut them out. I sewed them together right sides together, leaving a gap for turning right side out, stuffed them, sewed the gap closed and hey - 4 dolls!

Interestingly enough, my daughter showed no interest in the doll house before it had dolls, or the first doll before it was in the doll house, but together - she loves them!

Math 101: אמנות הויכוח

365 Project: Day 284

365 Project: Day 283

Math 101: אינפלציה לאשכנזים

365 Project: Day 282

365 Project: Day 281

365 Project: Day 280

365 Project: Day 279

365 Project: Day 278

Math 101: אביב הגיע, ניקיון פסח בא