Stitchcraft Podcast

Repeat after us: Valentine’s Day is for friends, not lovers! Welcome to one of our favorite holidays, a celebration of appreciation and affection, topped with lots of sugary sweets. We can’t help but think this year is perfect for telling people you’re thinking of them fondly, since it will still be quite a while before we can see each other in person.

Aislinn is drinking A Date with Shirley Manson (recipe partway down this page). Maranda is enjoying Four Roses Bourbon with ginger beer.

Aislinn’s valentines have taken a year to make, but they were worth it! She’s been crocheting them using this pattern with the pinks and reds from the Stitch Together 2019 Advent Calendar and will be making bunting. She recommends against trying to starch knitted things, it just makes weird, almost plasticky-looking flakes all over everything. She is also working on the fantastically Art Deco Hulanicki socks by Rachel Coopey from PPQ Winter 2015 using deep stash Lorna’s Laces Solemate in the Washington Apple colorway. Such a lovely light yellow-green! She is yearning to gather the courage to try making the Libette shirt from PPQ Summer 2014. Maranda recommends for any sewing project: make a muslin first! Make your muslin from less-precious fabric so that you have a chance to learn what you’re trying to do, modify it as needed, and you’ll be much more likely to love the final finished project (not to mention, if you like your muslin, you can wear that, too).

Maranda valentines this year will be mending kits with handmade heart-shaped denim iron-on patches! She bought a full bolt of her favorite adhesive, Heat N Bond, which will last her a long time (and is much more affordable over time than buying it by the sheet). Pellon is another easy-to-find option.

We chatted about a bunch of other stellar things as well, including Ruby Star Society fabric, especially the prints by Rashida Coleman Hale. If you’re looking for ethically made clothing, good options include companies that make clothes from deadstock, fabric that has not been used before but will not be used by the company that had it made. Noctex uses largely deadstock for their clothes, which are wonderfully goth.

Gold stars this week (details of most in this Time article): Aislinn appreciated the design of Jill Biden’s inauguration dress and coat by Gabriela Hearst, decorated with hand-sewn flowers representing all of the states of the USA. Maranda loved the way that Kamala Harris and Michelle Obama highlighted amazing American designers like Kerby Jean-Raymond with their inauguration attire.

Welcome to our accidental annual tradition of “what do I give when I’ve got no money, no time, or neither!” We discuss gift ideas, breaking the cycle of consumerism (and pressure to keep material goods)

Maranda is having a New Belgium Voodoo Ranger Imperial IPA and Aislinn is having a Big Grove Hazepocalypse Survival Kit #2.

For food, we suggest homemade caramels, chocolate truffles (add a pinch of cayenne to make them feel warm when you eat them), and marshmallows. Make them extra cute by packaging in a second-hand cut glass bowl or decorative dish. You can also make seasoning mixes or dry rubs. For drinks, try infusing simple syrup, any alcohol, or vinegar (which make a shrub, which is delightful when mixed with sweetener and carbonated water). For the vinegar, we’d recommend apple cider vinegar, any wine vinegar, or any fruit vinegar. Plain white Heinz vinegar can be too harsh to drink.

For ephemeral gifts that are not edible: try epsom or kosher salt mixed with dried flowers or herbs to make a salt soak. Add any kind of edible oil (coconut, olive, vegetable, anything) to turn it into a salt scrub. Another option is candles, but the essential oils can be expensive to buy enough that makes the odor strong enough. Consider skipping the scents altogether to save money and avoid giving a scent people dislike. As with the edible treats, the second-hand decorative dishes, candleholders, jars or tins can be great. Another edible gift that is more of a daily home item is breath mints. If you’ve got cute fabric scraps at home, a little beeswax and pinking shears will get you homemade beeswax wraps for food! Another nice gift option if you have them at home is plants!

A more holiday-specific item is ornaments, bunting, or garlands made out of paper, fabric, felt, or fleece. Remember: if you’ve got prints that you combine in each piece, it starts to make visual sense even if the prints don’t match when you hold up the fabric in large pieces next to each other. For biodegradable aromatic garlands, try dried slices of citrus fruits, popcorn, and cranberries.

You can recall a memory: Spotify playlists, with a note about what you were doing when you heard it together, or a treat, can bring up the most loving and treasured memories for almost no money but all the love in the world. Music works to share good feelings even with people who are struggling with memory problems and dementia.

You can also pull a real elementary school special and give them a coupon for a skill you have! Can you knit, sew, do carpentry, or cook? Share it with someone who doesn’t have it.

Hello again! Look at us recording in a reasonable period of time. You probably shouldn’t get used to it. Tune in for a one-sided debate about the best coney dog in Detroit, a brief treatise about the UP, and the misnaming of freshwater seas as “Great Lakes.”

Aislinn is drinking a Pastorela cocktail made with Centenario añejo tequila, Earl Giles piloncillo syrup and Hey Honey from Backpocket. Maranda is having Grown Up Juice, also from Backpocket. We were both drinking things we had given each other, getting into the holiday spirit early! These were intentional gifts, but we do discuss the Midwestern etiquette of leaving behind the drinks you brought to the party.

Aislinn finished a garter ear flap hat from Purl Soho in Jade Sapphire Relux Lite in 07 gray. Maranda suggests that if you have wool clothes or accessories that are too tight, try wet blocking. The Knithole makes great hats but they are too small for our huge melons, so wet blocking to the rescue!

Aislinn is trying a method of repairing pottery that mimics kintsugi. She used J-B Kwik Weld and plans to cover it with Pebeo Gedeo gilding wax. Maranda threw down the gauntlet about shabby chic gilding everything, and then we went down a rabbit hole of explaining the longstanding feud between Lafayette Coney Island (the only coney worth your time) and American Coney Island (staffed by garbage people who serve garbage food to garbage people). We are, of course, totally unbiased in our love of Lafayette.

Maranda has been working on her Fall 2021 projects for work. She daydreams of the time she can dedicate a room in her home for wrapping gifts, which is her favorite part of gift giving. She is also thinking about using a friend’s CNC system to make some woodcrafts for gifts. As you might expect, we are focusing on makers and local curators, like Basic Goods, to ensure our money goes to people we want to support.

Aislinn’s gold star goes to her cat, Spalding, for managing to use a litter robot in such a way that it actually doesn’t reduce the workload of scooping a litter box. Good job, Spalding. You have managed to cultivate the spite of an animal five times your size.

Maranda’s gold star goes to Wear It Again Wool, a sustainable mitten company from Michigan.

After a months-long hiatus to work on salvaging our country, we’re back! Happy Belated Birthday to Maranda! Apologies for the audio quality issues, we haven’t yet worked out the best recording system.

Maranda is drinking a Moscow mule with Cock and Bull ginger beer. Aislinn is drinking Double Nod from Big Grove Brewery. While expensive, the Yeti coozies work really well. Aislinn’s husband recommends Morning Recovery for preventing hangovers. Never did anything for Aislinn but it might work for you!

Aislinn has been doing a lot of visible mending and finally finished the Edie sweater tee by Michele Wang. She also just finished a heavily-modified version of the Overbury mitts from Pom Pom Quarterly by Lydia Gluck. Maranda finished embroidering a pendulum mat.

Aislinn’s gold star goes to Melbourne-based crochet artist chiliphilly. The newest KFC collab makes us so hungry! Maranda has lots of gold stars this time: the podcast Nice White Parents by the NYT/Serial, musician Tima Likes Music, and Black Forager Alexis Nikole.

Wow, sorry it took so long for us to get this posted. Blame the derecho and all the mess that came with it; the internet hasn’t been too stable since then because random tree branches keep falling in subsequent much smaller storms. At least we haven’t had a second derecho, right?

Links may come later, but at this point, the most important one is probably the link to the EmPower People 2020 site, where you can find free patterns and buy yarn from indie dyers who collaborated on the project.

Happy Pride! We know this is being posted after the end of June, but it was recorded on the last day of Pride month, and really, why should Pride end at all? Join us for a discussion of our favorite summer beers (and rough summer drinking stories), ongoing craft challenges (read: life remains busy with social activism and like, work and stuff), and some TV recs when it’s too hot to be outside.

Aislinn is enjoying a pseudo-perfect Manhattan (wrong ratio, but right taste!) with Cedar Ridge Port Cask Finished Bourbon. Maranda is having the Pryes Brewing Royal Raspberry Sour. If you’re not interested in an alcoholic drink, Aislinn strongly recommends this tiki mocktail: 2 oz grapefruit juice, 1 oz lime juice, and orgeat to taste. Chef’s kiss.

Maranda is enjoying her work, focusing lately on Target’s Pride collection, and carving out daily time for social activism (Black Lives Matter, police defunding, grassroots organizing). Aislinn finished a wrap in WATG Shiny Happy Cotton and repairing Maranda’s Celestarium.

Gold stars this week: Aislinn highly recommends We’re Here on HBO (anyone will enjoy this) and UNHhhh on YouTube/World of Wonder (which is definitely adults-only). Maranda recommends that you pay content creators, particularly if they are Black and indigenous people teaching you with their posts online. If you’re on Instagram, try to find the original content creator and see if they have a Venmo/Cash app handle or linktree link where you can pay them for their work.

Helloo! We’re here again for your entertainment.

This week we toasted with cocktails. Maranda opted for a bourbon strawberry rhubarb lemonade made with Earl Giles pre-mixed cocktail mixer (which can also be enjoyed as a mocktail). Aislinn is considering ordering their piloncillo syrup; if you’ve never had piloncillo, it’s a delicious flavorful Mexican cane sugar that adds so much to coffee, tea, and other beverages. Aislinn toiled through the process of making a version of a whiskey sour, a Sicilian bitter almond sour, and wailed about the messiness of egg whites. Maranda suggested an immersion blender next time, which sounds like it might just work.

Maranda’s creative work lately has been focusing on clearing out her denim samples to allow them to live a little! There are so many ways that belongings languishing in our homes can be useful to others, so she’s hoping to bring a little treat to others who would enjoy them. Aislinn has been working on a wrap for a friend with WATG Shiny Happy Cotton in 101 Spots. She continues to work slowly on her granny stripe blanket and mending things.

Gold stars this week went to small businesses: Nooworks, Big Bud Press, Scarf Shop, WAAM Industries, and Revival. Shop small if you can! The money you spend in your community goes a long way to keeping it vibrant, even a few dollars here and there makes a really big difference in aggregate.

Quarantimes call for ongoing support and craft therapy! Listen in as we chat about new ideas and reviving old (or perhaps previously tried but never successful) hobbies. Aislinn tries gardening from seeds, and Maranda gets into rehabbing furniture.

Warm weather calls for a refreshing sour beer! Aislinn is drinking Big Grove (shocking, I know) Queserita, their nod to margaritas via a lovely lime and agave sour for Cinco de Mayo. Maranda is enjoying a Fair State Roselle, a beautiful pink hibiscus kettle sour perfect for warm days.

Aislinn’s crafting has taken a turn for the slightly more focused, and she’s just about done weaving the pattern on her Penny Cardigan. She continues making masks and puttering along on her granny stripe blanket when her brain can handle nothing more complicated. Maranda is repairing old furniture, used clothing, and revamping her interior decorating.

Gold stars this week go to Melissa Maya Pottery for really pretty ceramics and art. Seems like a good time to invest in art featuring birds since so many of us are seeing more birds in our neighborhoods due to the reduced noise and pollution! Maranda’s gold stars went to two crafty friends, Stephanie Stimmler and Ben Klavay, a.k.a. She Chimp (on IG: @lavetaluddite).

We’ll be adding show notes throughout the day, but for now, check out the Saturday Night Dance Party on Facebook Live with DJ Mel! 6-10pm CST.

Aislinn is having a cosmopolitan, which sadly was not as delightful as she had hoped. Maranda teaches us about the world of Bloody Maries (Marys?), and that in Minnesota, a beerback is called a “snit.”

Aislinn walked herself through setting up her mom’s sewing machine and is now making fabric masks for friends, family, and local orgs. Maranda is starting her indoor garden!

Gold stars went to Masterclass (currently a BOGO sale on annual memberships!), Creative Mornings, and people sharing solidarity and support with signs, street art, and public decorations. We really appreciate everyone who is working to keep up our spirits.

If you’ve got $, donate to your local food bank. People really need you to step up right now. Wash your hands, keep your distance, and look out for each other.

…in which we enter the Twilight Zone of prolonged sheltering in place. Please comment here or on our IG about how you are all surviving in this most bizarre of times.

We’re all working at establishing our new routines, and learning to give ourselves grace and mercy while we try to take care of others and ourselves. We wish you all safety and security while we weather this storm. If you have the financial means to support others, please consider supporting your local food pantries, crisis centers, and small businesses. Those with the fewest resources are the hardest hit by this pandemic, and now is the time we all need to pitch in however we can. Even small financial donations can be stretched significantly by non-profits who can purchase tax-free and in bulk; no donation is too small.

Maranda is enjoying a Fulton Brewing Blood Orange Hard Seltzer. Aislinn should have known not to knock the hard seltzers before she tried them!

Aislinn is having the first beer in the Big Grove Coffee Shop Series: Coffee Oatmeal Stout. Contains lactose and delight.

Maranda is working on new routines, parenting her plants, and walking Toobee. Aislinn is doing small invisible mending projects and working up her courage to do some visible patching with her jeans. Aislinn hasn’t yet started making masks because her local small hospital got so many fabric masks when they put out the call, they stopped accepting them! But there are other places that need them, so check you local news or https://www.providence.org/lp/100m-masks to see the latest calls for masks. Maranda also pointed out that there are other sewing projects that can help including headbands with buttons to protect ears from friction when wearing masks for prolonged periods of time.

For a little lightness and sugar in your day, Aislinn gave her gold star to Christina Tosi‘s IGTV Baking Club, which airs daily at 2pm EST. So much fun to watch Tosi, chef and owner of Milk Bar, share her enthusiasm and creativity in making delicious treats. Maranda (and Aislinn, and our mom) is loving DJ Mel’s Saturday night Living Room Dance Party from 6-10pm CST. The music is so fun, and he supports charities each week (links embedded on the website above where you can also find the livestream). Dance, get your wiggles out, and feel connected while keeping our communities safe.