DIY

We got the keys to our new city apartment!!!

So exciting...

To celebrate and to make it a bit extra special I made new keychains from leather cord and wood beads I got at the crafts store.

I tried two different diameters of leather - the darker, thinner one is 1.5mm and the other one is 1.8mm.

You need 1x 1.50 meter long piece and 3x 45cm long pieces of leather cord and about a handful wood beads with large enough holes to thread the cord through.

Please follow the step by step picture tutorial if you like to make a leather keychain and let me know if you have any questions.

You can make the chain as long as you wish  - just keep continuing to make the same movement from the middle part but adjust the lengths of the cords then. Mine is about 6cm long + the part with the beads.

Happy Day,

Anette 

P.S Today is Creadienstag

I am really into this extrem thick wool thing lately.

It's fun, because a project is done in a few minutes, looks cool and feels oh so cozy!

For this chunky crochet heart pillow I used un-spun wool called roving.

Since I am located in Germany I ordered my wool from a german supplier but roving is available everywhere online and is usually used for spinnig your own yarn.

I picked this really soft merino roving and a crochet hook size 25mm which I ordered here.

I parted my string of roving in half and rolled it back into a ball - so my yarn size was approximately 12.5mm when I slightly twisted the roving a bit for measuring the thickness.

For one chunky heart you will need about 40 meters (about 650gram) of roving for crocheting the heart and about another 20 meters for stuffing the heart.

You can use the same wool roving for stuffing or some less expensive roving (that's what I did as you can see the white wool on the picture further below) or you can use some polyester filling from the craft store.

Here we go - you crochet in a round and because I usually totally confuse counting crochet in rounds I came up with a really simple tutorial with very little counting :)

Start: Chain 2

Rnd1: work 4 single crochet in 2nd chain from hook

Rnd2 and all following rounds: alternate 1 single crochet in next 2 , 2 single crochet in next... repeat until you can count 24 stitches all around.

Next Rnd: single crochet in each stitch around (you can mark your start point with a piece of ribbon for example so you know when you made it all the way around)

Next Rnd: single crochet in next 6, skip 12, single crochet in last 6

Next Rnd: single crochet in next 12 (each stitch around)

Next Rnd: single crochet in next, skip 1... repeat all the way around

Next Rnd: single crochet in next, skip 1... repeat

Fasten off and weave in ends. 

Second heart bump:

Rnd1: single crochet in next 12 stitches

Rnd2: single crochet in next 12 stitches

Rnd3: single crochet in next, skip 1... repeat all the way around

Stuff your heart with your extra roving or filling material. 

Rnd4: single crochet in next, skip 1... repeat

Fasten off and with the tail end and using just your fingers weave the hole shut between the heart bumps.

I then washed my chunky heart on a 30 degree WOOL-cycle in the washing machine together with a tennis ball. 

Afterwards I let it dry on the heater - turn from time to time.  

Note: It's not like the usual felting in the machine were you choose a warm-cold cycle and your piece felts a lot.

This is a very light felting with the wool cycle just to give the roving a bit more strength and to prevent pilling. 

Happy Valentines Day,

Anette 

Today is Creadienstag

P.S. 

You can find my rosé-gold jewelry line here in my own shop  or my other lines at Etsy and DaWanda

If you like to further connect there is more lebenslustiger on FB, Twitter, Tumblr, Instagram and Pinterest! 

Thanks so much!!!