Year of the Snake 2013

February 10, 2013 Year of the Snake.
Since traditional Chinese holidays like the Moon Festival are based on the Chinese lunisolar calendar, the date on the western (Gregorian) calendar changes from one year to the next. This Chinese new year calendar provides dates and descriptions of significant traditional holidays and festivals in 2013, the Year of the Snake, which begins on February 10, 2013 and ends on January 30, 2014.




For people born this year you will be rich in wisdom and charm, you are romantic and deep thinking and your intuition guides you strongly. Avoid procrastination and your stingy attitude towards money. Keep your sense of humor about life. The Snake would be most content as a teacher, philosopher, writer, psychiatrist and fortune-teller.

Now for the advertisement, whee. If you would like some cute wear for this slithery year check out my CafePress designs. A little baby snake with rattle can be found in green, pink, and blue.
It is always fun to make crafts to celebrate the seasons. 2013 is Year of the Snake. So here are some snake and chinese new years ideas.

To celebrate this year please remember that not all snake are bad and that serve a purpose in life. They keep the rodent population down and are a natural part of the ecosystem. This year is a good time to teach children to be cautious around snakes but not to automatically declare all evil and kill them. Fun snake facts.



Snake amigurmi – I have to admit I love the little amigurumi’s that I see on the internet but so far have been unable to make my own, just don’t have the patience. Here are some cute patterns that are available online.

• Willy Nilly Snake
• Salazar Snake

You can use old fabric pieces to sew into a tube to make your own snake
Using those old plastic Easter Eggs you can make this snake. You can also use an old egg carton.
For interesting food ideas:

• Snake burritos
• Strawberry Snake Cake

Papercraft ideas:
Bouncy Cobra Paper Craft
So have a very happy and safe Year of the Snake, enjoy the fun slithery year.

Geek fest ornaments

While surfing the interwebs I have encountered some really nifty cool homemade geek ornaments out there.  So here are my favorites:



 
1.  Amigurumi Pi ornaments.  I admit to loving amigurumi, I wish I could do it and there are so many cute designs out there.  Any little amigurmi can be an ornament.  These were made by alicia954.

2.  When in doubt go with Dr. Who.  Polymer clay is a great media and you can make your own Tardis, or my favorite, the Dalek.  I have seen many weeping angel tutorials on how to turn Barbie into something terrifying (well at least more terrifying than she already is) to put on top of your tree.  This Dalek was made by headofheather and she has many cute geek ornaments for sale at her Etsy store.

3.  For the science nerd we have these cute periodic table ornaments.  A flat blank ornament, paper mache or wood.  Some white paint, stick on letters, a little santa hat, and you are ready to create your very own ornaments.  These can be found over on Artfire if you wish to purchase instead of making your own.

4.  Pokeman is very popular and I found this round ornament made from sequins for sale on Etsy.  If you are a very patient person you can take any round idea like Angry Birds, the Death Star, or even logos from your favorite game like Zelda or WOW (Alliance or Horde) and create your own.

5. And last but not least using those old circuit boards.  Cut them in cute themed shapes, punch a hole and you are done.  Recycling at its best.  You can the same with the old CD's to decorate or just cut in great shapes. 

 

So have a very happy holiday and let your tree truly show who you are.

Adventures in Amigurumi

I recently discovered the wonderful world of Amigurumi.  There are the cutest little critters out there.  So my plan it to try some of these.  I have watched a few videos on YouTube, one from WireMySoul who had a nice little tutorial on the basic stitches and what they are.  I find I learn better from viewing, I have a book but trying to figure out from just a book drawings can be hard.  Wandering the web there are tons of free patterns out there you can find that are simple and can be used to learn.  Below are a couple of patterns I would like to try.  We shall see how my versions turn out.

Gnome Pattern











Owl Pattern