A Different Kind of Treasury

Here is my latest Etsy treasury that I curated to accompany my recent song "New Snow."  

"New Snow" is a remake of an older song I composed last year, "First Snow."

Featured Artwork and Artists...
Ice Orchard in Blue
by CountryDreaming

Rose Sparkle
by JulieMagersSoulen

Full Moon
by sylviagrantins

Freeze
by soundslikerain

First Snow
by elgarboart

Winter Waterfall
by robtravisphotography

Hiding From the Owl
by bluedogrose

the village from under apple tree sleeps at the winter time...
by vlad

First Snow
by bartos

Scene Over Pond
by WicksPix

Tribute to Vince Guaraldi Let It Snow
by reniebritenbucher

A Winter's Day ~ Colorado
by SimplyLodge

Christmas Village Wish Upon a Star
by leinerje

Silver White Winter
by klbaileyART

Winter Snow
by firstlightphoto

Winter Twilight
by krystarka

Autumn Spectrum (an Etsy treasury)

The air had a crisp, autumnal quality today, which inspired me to create an autumn treasury on Etsy.  My theme was color, or a spectrum of colors.  As usual, I became way too engaged and spent more time on this than I had planned!  Nonetheless, I am quite pleased with this beautiful collection...

Woodland Cardigan

 My latest crochet project was larger than my usual scarf or bracelet but great fun!  I purchased a pattern for this beautiful cardigan, "The Ermeline Cardigan" from the Etsy shop of the very talented SylvChezPlum .  Of course I always like to add my own twist, but I was able to do so because of the clarity and design of this pattern.  Included in a 23-page e-book with beautiful images and 3 other patterns, this tutorial was worth every penny!  I wanted to add an appliqué to give it a "woodland" theme and I found the most gorgeous appliqué patterns at the Etsy shop of ch1306 .  I used slightly larger needles and yarn to make it usable as a pocket.

photo from ch1306's shop

There are tons of free patterns online for various projects, but I have found over the past few years that in most cases it is worth it to purchase a pattern, usually in the form of an e-book tutorial.  I have quite a few unfinished projects that started out as hopeful sweaters or potential dresses, but after struggling with a pattern that was incomplete or just completely vague, they became spare parts.  Of course, there are many patterns out there that are free and wonderful, but if I want to create something that could be tricky or time-consuming I usually look for reputable sources on Etsy or Ravelry.  There is an art to designing and writing a good pattern and I believe in supporting artists!

photo from SylvChezPlum's shop

SylvChezPlum's tutorial made the entire project enjoyable and I like how she created the layout of the cardigan.  As you can see from the image from her shop (right), her design is more polished.  I tend to add some whimsical elements to my work, mostly to pull the focus toward the slightly absurd and hopefully disguise the fact that my work is often a bit amateur and messy!  She also uses gorgeous, high quality yarn.  As I become more comfortable with this project I will probably move up to better quality yarn.  The kids are already asking for this is in several colors and pretty soon they will both have a brown one just like the one I finished.  Fortunately it is still quite warm so they are not fighting over this one yet!

I added a flower to the end of the hood to disguise a frayed end, made the sleeves flared (just because I love the look), and of course, added that lovely appliqué.  As I was stitching the appliqué to the cardigan, I left the top open to use as a little pocket for various treasures.   I also made the cardigan slightly longer and flared at the bottom.

Needless to say, both SylvChezPlum and ch1306 are on my list of favorite Etsy shops and I will be purchasing more from them.  It's so nice to have finished projects!