Eco-Find: 100ml ECOVER

I just came back from a trip to my favorite drug store DM. One thing I love about DM is that they offer a wide range of products that are cruelty-free, eco-friendly and/or vegan. I especially love that occasionally you can find those products in small sample-like sizes, especially since I love trying out new products but am not willing to buy huge amounts because you never know whether you will like them or not.

Today I came across these 100ml ECOVER bottles. I thought about giving ECOVER a try for a little while already. So I bought the ECOVER Lemon All Purpose Cleaner (on the left) and the ECOVER Pomegranate & Lime Dishwashing Liquid (on the right). 

Even though I don't consider cleaning as one of my most favourite activities (I do what needs to be done) I'm really looking forward to try out those products! 

Does anyone of you have any experience with ECOVER products? Can you maybe recommend any of them? Or would you rather say I should try out a totally different brand? Some DIY ideas? Please let me know in the comments below!

Have a nice weekend!

Yours

Uta

A Survey about the Health Benefits of Crochet

Good evening ladies,

just quickly popping in to tell you that there's a survey about the health benefits of crochet going on over at Felted Button. I just filled it out and it took me about 5 minutes. So if you have 5 minutes to spare, please be so kind and take that survey as well!

Read the 

Blog Post @ Felted Button with more information

Or jump straight to 

The Survey

Yours
Uta

Round Ripples Again

You probably remember the small Round Ripples I made a couple of weeks ago. I just added two more to my collection using the Schachenmayr Bravo Color yarn I bought in May. Unfortunately, the pattern I used is no longer available online so I had to crochet them from memory.

Well, so here are my two Round Ripples:

I now put them on my KALLAX rack together with the red one I made a while back. What do you think?

My craft room / home office looks to sterile from my point of view. There's a lot of white and a little red, that's it. Therefore, I thought I should add some colorful crafty accessories here and there.

Alright ladies, have nice evening - or afternoon or morning or night :)

Yours
Uta

Five Little Snowmen

Yes, I am hooking little snowmen while sitting in the Summer sun :) This year I want to make new ornaments for my Christmas tree and I thought starting on that one early can't hurt.

I used Woll Butt Versailles for this project. That's a 100% acrylic yarn. Recommended hook size is 2,5-3 mm, I used a 3 mm hook. The scarfs are made of blue felt.

Yours

Uta

Mason Jar Lid Cozies

Hi ladies!

As I told you earlier, I visited my friend Kristin a little while ago. Of course I brought some gifts!
Hanneli got a box of dog treats and for Kristin I filled a mason jar with self made Almond Quinoa Granola. In addition I hooked three mason jar lid cozies for her. I think they turned out quite cute. Not too fancy but also not too boring. What do you think?

I hooked these with Schachenmayr Egypto Cotton, a 100% cotton yarn. You might remember that one from my little yarn shopping haul video I posted back in March.
The colors I used are 00111 (nougat), 00122 (yellow), 00171 (dark forest) and 00125 (mandarine). Schachenmayr recommends hook size 2 - 3, I used a 3 mm crochet hook.


Yours
Uta

Pinspired In The Kitchen: Mac & Sweet Potatoe Cheese

Vegan Mac & Cheese was on my list for months now, finally I found a recipe that seemed easy to do and yummy to taste. It did not disappoint, it was fab! Definitely going to make this dish again!

And this is how it turned out:

Yours
Uta

Someone finally got a Smartphone

Yes, after years of negating when asked whether I could be contacted via WhatsApp I finally joined the smartphone crowd. With a cell phone still working (more or less properly) and a Blackberry paid by my employer that I was allowed to use for private calls without paying for them I never really felt the urge to join the 21st century in matters of mobile communication. Well, I finally surrendered and got me a darn smartphone. I don't have a problem with being a bit old school but I sort of felt a bit lost behind lately so I though it would be the time to jump on the WhatsApp wagon. So I bought a Samsung Galaxy S3, cut my SIM card so it fit into the MicroSim slot and turned that thing on. I sort of still feel a bit overwhelmed but that's just a matter of time I assume.

Anyways, what I initially wanted to blog about is what I made for my new smartphone. The thing is, I totally forgot to add a case or something equivalent to the cart when I ordered my S3. Smartphone in hand I decided this sweet fragile device definitely needs some protection so I quickly put together some layers of felt I had laying around and called it a smartphone cozy:

Yours
Uta

Shopping Haul: Yarn & Crafting Supplies

Hey ladies,

a couple of days ago I told you that we had some extreme weather here in Kassel. Well, seems like my car got hid by some heavy hail stones which caused some small dents. I will stop by the garage on Monday and let the guys have a look at it. Luckily my insurance is going to pay for the repair but the car is not even a year old :(

Thursday evening I found out we had water in our basement. Lucky me, my room was not on the side where the water came in. Furthermore, a small threshold prevented the worst, my stuff did not get wet at all!

Sooooooo, today I stopped by the local yarn and crafting suppliers store and I would like to show you what I bought:

Six sheets of RICO DESIGN scrapbooking paper - they were on sale for 0,49 € each.

The patterns are: 7007.214, 7007.173, 7007.206, 7007.180, 7007.218 and 7007.220

Two RICO DESIGN Paper Poetry Sets - they were on sale for 1,99 € each.
The patterns are: 7090.30.79

Wolle Rödel Häkelgarn (top) - 100% cotton, 50g, 260m, recommended hook size 1.75-2.0. The colors are 1515, 1501 and 1551.
RICO DESIGN essentials cotton lurex (which I already own in light blue) - 97% cotton & 3% lurex, 50g, 170m. The color is 001, white.
And a Wolle Rödel Crochet Hook size 2.


That's it! I wish all of you a great weekend!

Yours

Uta

Are You Knooking Yet?!

So how's everyone doing these days? 

We had some scary thunderstorms last night with hail and heavy rain which kept me awake until almost midnight. In parts of Kassel the power went out, many basements were flooded. The spokesperson from the fire department said in the newspaper this morning that they had been alarmed about 350 times this one night, way too much for such a small city. A major thanks to all the hard working fire fighters, the police officers and all the other rescue teams that took care of us that night and went straight back to work this early AM!

Well, last weekend I visited Kristin in Berlin :) We had such an amazing time! We went on a boat ride, we took Hanneli for walks, we went to amazing restaurants and ate great vegan food, we talked, we laughed, we had fun - and we knooked :)

So I guess not all of you are familiar with knooking, am I right? Well, knooking is quite similar to Tunisian crochet. The hooks look like this - part crochet hook, part needle:

And this is what Kristin and I knooked:

Kristin knooked a smartphone cozy and a small pouch ...

... and I knooked this pouch

Have an awesome day, ladies!

Yours

Uta

Simple Happy Life

Finally, my first post! Yet another one than originally planned. While working in the kitchen a few minutes ago I just got the idea to simply share my evening meal with you :-)

Today a colleague brought me some fresh strawberries out of her mothers garden. That alone you can call yum! But I decided to add some fresh mint from my little window sill garden et voilà: Now you can call it delicious! Maybe I'll add some vanilla soy milk :-)

The simplest things are always the best...

Work In Progress

Just a quick update on what I'm currently working on...

1) A couple of snow man parts waiting to be stuffed and sewn together and I still need to crochet a few more. Those are supposed to become Christmas ornaments.

2) There's nothing like the good old granny square! Not gonna tell you what those are for, you will find out in a few weeks/months :) But what I can tell is that this project requires at least for times the amount of granny squares you can see in this picture.

3) This is my first attempt to hook a sleeping mask. I love the yarn but I think I need to use a smaller hook as the mask is not opaque enough. Already thought about putting some fabric behind the crochet part but I'm not that good in sewing. Furthermore, I'm not 100% happy with the pattern yet. Well, we'll see...

Yours
Uta