NPM: Harry Potter Knitted Sweater

So it's Monday and that means its time for a new project! I have been working on this Harry Potter American Girl sweater project for a LONG time. It's something I started a while ago and put down, I picked it back up last week and FINALLY finished it!! The pattern is from Liberty Jane, and while I love their items (affordable, easy to read patterns, who wouldn't!), this one was a bit of a disappointment for me! I followed the pattern exactly, but was upset that everything ended up being way to big :( The worst part is that I didn't even add in the extra stitches like they suggest to make the sleeves "wider". Not to mention that they want you to add in extra colors on the neckline after you have cast off... not an easy task for any knitter! I ended up crocheting mine because it looked more even and professional. As such I have decided to write my own pattern for a snugger fitting sweater based off of what I learned with this sweater. If you would like I can share that pattern here once it has been written (it may take a while, I'm slow with my patterns sometimes!!) I am also working on a matching crochet Harry Potter style skirt like the ladies wear in the Harry Potter movies! I will post that when it's done as well :D


Anyway, here is my very first ever sweater :D

This is my lovely "Mia" doll who I got on craigslist... she is a bit of a mess, but I love her anyway :P Someone cut her braid, so I have been working on fixing her "bangs" to look flat and cute, so far it looks a million times better... thinking of posting befores and afters tomorrow!

Mia is a Gryffindor as you can tell by the red and gold details in her sweater!

Mia's wand is handmade by me, if you would like your own doll size wand (or a full size wand for yourself!) you can find them on my etsy shop here

Hope you liked the pictures :) as usual comments are welcomed!!
Until tomorrow!
~Megan~

Harriet the Hamster

So last Friday I introduced you all to Hank the Traveling Hamster, well it was such a hit, and James and I had so much fun thinking of places to take Hank that I decided to make my own hamster to bring around when I'm not with James and Hank. I introduced Harriet the other day on the blog, but today she wants to tell you a little about herself!!!

Hi everyone! Welcome to my home! It's small but perfect for me, plus it's purple, one of my most favorite colors!!

Here is Megan and James' fish Cheese (named after the Fosters home for Imaginary Friends character) sometimes I get to feed him, he used to be yellow, but with lots of love and good food he changed color and turned blue!! Here he is watching me watch him :P

I love to take pictures, I am a bit of a photography nerd, I get that from Megan, she takes a TON of pictures all the time, I'm taking some of the rain here!

I love horses!! Hey look it's the tiny horse from Megan's earlier blog! She is so pretty, look at that wonderful mane! Maybe I should grow my hair out....

*sniff sniff* what is this thing!?!

I like watching DIY Network and HGTV, it gives me ideas on how to improve my little home!

Yay I just got my letter to Hogwarts! :D

Om nom nom, cinnamon poptarts

Here I am posing with my friend Cooper, he likes my turquoise bow!

So now that you know a little about Harriet, I'll be posting some of her stories soon! She and Hank have a lot planned! Thanks for reading :D

~Megan and Harriet~

RTT: Music

Everyone has a favorite song, and it's likely to change as you get older but certain songs speak to you more so than others. I for instance love songs that have a story to them, growing up my dad used to have a lot of MeatLoaf playing in the house, and I could sing all of "I would do anything for love; but I won't do that" as well as ALL of his other songs. Harry Chaplin is another one of those story telling artists, "Cats in the Cradle", even "30,000 pounds of Bananas".
My mom taught me to love good music behind the lyrics. My mom is a dance teacher, and she has been my teacher for over 20 years, and with her I learned to love rhythm and a solid beat.

Stick with me, here's the point to my rambling:
So when the two come together (that is amazing lyrics and a great beat) I tend to love the song and play it on repeat until everyone is annoyed to hear the song. As such I tend to analyze the lyrics. I figured for my random thought thursday I would share some of the lyrics that I still stop and think about whenever I hear them because they can mean SO many things:

Ok I have to put this one on here. As it is one of my favorite songs, but has a few strange lines:

Give me a second I 
I need to get my story straight 
My friends are in the bathroom 
Getting higher than the Empire State 
My lover she's waiting for me 
Just across the bar 
My seats been taken by some sunglasses 
Asking 'bout a scar 

Ok, so... I'm sure you've all heard it, I'm sure you all have your own thoughts, but whenever I hear the highlighted part I always thought it sounded like the guy in the song was coming back from the bathroom to see his girl sitting with some creep who was wearing sunglasses (I always thought he was probably really drunk and the light was bothering him... yeah these are the things I think lol) who was talking to her about some scar he has, you know the whole "see I got this when my motorcycle flipped, but the good news is I was able to save that family of puppies" you know some far fetched made up story. It wasn't until the other day that it came on in the car that my brother said "this is such a horrible song, don't you realize what he's saying" evidently lots of people think the girl is being interviewed by a cop (the sunglasses) and he's asking her about a scar that her boyfriend, the singer, gave to her. I sat there and listened and, horrors, it could be perceived that way as well!! Yet, to me the song is about loosing innocence, the night is young, 'we can burn brighter than the sun'... I don't know about you, but to me it always sounded like the boyfriend was being a douche, and now he doesn't know how to make it up to the girl he loves, the girl he thinks he's going to lose because he can't apologize the right way... Maybe I'm naive in this thought, but I like it better than the other option :P

I love Viva La Vida by Coldplay and I love the discussions people have about the lyrics... The whole thing could be analyzed but here's just a snippit:

It was the wicked and wild windBlew down the doors to let me inShattered windows and the sound of drumsPeople couldn't believe what I'd become
Revolutionaries waitFor my head on a silver plateJust a puppet on a lonely stringOh who would ever want to be king?

This is one of those songs that I love to read about online, people talk about how the song is about the bible, the fact that Jesus rose and gathered followers (whom they claim are talked about in earlier lyrics) only to end up being shunned and killed. Others, think it talks about the conquest of countries, specifically King Henry XVI, who committed treason and was eventually beheaded, (see the lines highlighted above ;D) If you want to read some of the most well written arguments about this song click here. 

This is a new favorite of mine

Alright, everything is alright
Since you came along
And before you
I had nowhere to run to
Nothing to hold on to
I came so close to giving it up.
And I wonder if you know
How it feels to let you go?

You say goodbye in the pouring rain
And I break down as you walk away.
Stay, stay.
'Cause all my life I've felt this way
But I could never find the words to say
Stay, stay.

So change your mind
And say you're mine.
Don't leave tonight
Stay.

this song is simply about love, gained and lost. But the real thing I like about this song and it's lyrics, it doesn't say why the person is walking away, or why the other person can't find the right words to tell them to stay... what if they were best friends, and one secretly loves the other, what if it's two people who were once in love, but something changed between them, yet neither really wants to let go. Or did someone pass away and another someone never told them how they really felt?! *sigh* I love this song lol

The best thing about all of these songs that I mention is that their music videos are all exceptionally vague (or strange....) and don't give you any more of a clue as to what these lyrics mean. They leave it up to you to decide for yourself, and that to me, is the real power of a song.

Thanks for reading!! Have a song that you always analyze leave a comment below and tell me about it! Tomorrow is adventures with Harriet don't miss it!! :D

~Megan~

NPM and Etsy Shop GRAND OPENING!!

So it's Monday which mean's its time to talk about my new project! So James and I were talking and I decided that Hank needed a girl hamster, someone who I could take around and snap some awesome pictures with. Which led me to make Harriet:

Harriet is a multi-colored hamster, who is mostly white, with some brown and black patterns on her back, and I can't forget about her stylish turquoise bow!!

Harriet has a bright pink nose, and stitched black eyes and is ready to take on the world!!

Hank and Harriet's adventures will be posted at least once a week here on the blog, so check back often to see what your favorite little hammies are up to! Also we love to hear ideas from you about where Hank and Harriet should go next! Leave a comment below with ideas, who knows you might just see your idea in a future adventure!!

Also in other BIG news, my etsy shop is open and I am eagerly awaiting orders!! :D I only have one item listed right now, my awesome custom Harry Potter wands:

but am working on the descriptions and pictures for the other things I am selling! check it out here: http://www.etsy.com/shop/TheButterfliesAttic

I will post new items here whenever they are listed!!

Also I am now on twitter! Follow me there for all the latest random thoughts and new projects coming up: https://twitter.com/ButterflyAttic

Until next time

~Megan~

Hank the Traveling Hamster!!

This will probably become it's own blog attached to the Butterflies Attic, but for now I thought I would share these pictures/stories here. As you may or may not have read, Hank is a crochet hamster that I made, my boyfriend James really loves this little guy and took him with him to work. I thought it would be cute to post a picture of Hank at James' job, this thought evolved into the idea of taking pictures with Hank ALL over the place!! We wanted to share Hanks first day of pictures, and his story :) 
We loved the idea so much that I made another hamster Harriet that I will be taking around with me. I will be sharing her adventures at another point in time, for now here's Hank :D

Here I am getting ready to go to work :)

Here James and I are all set to begin work! choo choo!!!

James says I'm not allowed to touch this red handle... but it intrigues me

Never mind the handle, I'm gonna operate the whole train!!

When I get to the hotel, first I check the board to see when I have to go to work next...

THEN...

Here I am at my nice hotel room, where I rest after a long day on the road. Isn't my king size bed AWESOME!

Or if I feel like it, you can find me kickin' it by the pool!

Or you can find me in my room working on my knitting, I'm currently making a scarf for the winter!

I am also quite the scholar...

Then it's off to bed 

The next morning I make sure to shave (Harriet doesn't like a scruffy hamster!!)

and I shower, can't get my ears wet!

Then it's a cup of joe, and back to work for me! Thanks for checking out my day!

Until next time

~Megan, James and Hank~

Have a place you want to see Hank or Harriet go? Let us know in the comment section below :D

RTT: Organization

So yesterday I was talking with a wonderful woman about crafts when we got to the topic of organization. She, like myself can get buried in crafting clutter, and while my *ahem* workspace (aka bedroom) is still not quite as clean as I would like I spent the better part of the morning organizing my yarn and sewing bins, pattern folders and other knick-knacky things. I thought I would share my pictures with you, and maybe inspire some of you to organize your crafting space (cause lets be honest, we crafty folks tend to have messy crafting spaces!!). 
So without further ado, here we go!

eep my sewing box exploded!! (I didn't think to take a picture of everything shoved in there haphazardly, I apologize :P)

first things first, organize my fabric. I have seen a lot of people organize by color on Pinterest, and I figured that would work for me too. All of my fabric used to just be stacked on top of one another which made it impossible to get anything from the bottom without messing up (and having to re-fold) every other piece of fabric. With the folders I am able to look inside a color folder to see my fabric without having to mess with the others. I recommend using folders that have closed sides like the one in the green box, it keeps everything form falling out, I ran out of these and started color coding my folders with my fabrics as well!!

Here is the finished sewing materials box, much easier to find everything now!! I have used a dowel (3/8 thick I believe!) and run my ribbon threw it so I would be able to keep them all together and able to be pulled out and rested on the top of the box, like it is in the picture. All my heavy weighted fabrics (quilting, and flannel) are folded in the bottom right of the box (they wouldn't work in folders very well!) and I have my fabric bundles and jelly rolls together, easy access for the new quilt I'm going to be making!!

A quick peek inside my knitting box, it's hard to tell in this picture, but all the skeins are stacked so that you can see the color when you open the lid, I wanted to show off some of my other tools that I love, I have my sizing chart, that lets me check if my gauge will be correct based on the weight of the yarn and the needles I am using, clipped to the lid are some highlighters so that they aren't lost in the mess of yarn. I use highlighters for my cross-stitching to mark what I have already done so I don't get lost on big patterns (like the one I'm working on now!) 

The green boxes are from Michaels and I got them on sale! They are super cute and hold a LOT! I stack my crafting books in-between the two boxes so I always can find the pattern or project I want!

The two glass jars are also from Michaels and I use them (and a lot of other ones not in the picture) to hold all of my small items. The left one holds various buttons and a few colorful rubber bands, the one on the right, paper clips, I have others that hold binder clips as well. I also find that DMC/Nicole brand floss holders work really well to hold small items that don't have any other home, like the ones I have in mine :)

This is something new I'm trying, these are all my small McCall, Simplicity and Liberty Jane patterns. I put them in plastic protectors and clipped them into (the only) binder I have empty at the moment. A trip to staples is in order to pick up a much larger binder!!'

All printed patterns and instructions (including the "take me I'm free" project guides from stores) are kept in an accordion folder, and labeled to make sure I can actually find things :P

This is my knitting box, I take this everywhere with me. My great aunt (the one who taught me how to knit when I was 8) gave me this and I love it! The top tray comes out and all the needles are underneath. I keep things like a tape measure, extra yarn, the little red things are quilters thimbles which I use with the really small knitting needles because they tend to rub against my fingers in a terrible way. 

 And lastly my wonderful sewing machine, I got my Singer Promise for Christmas this last year from my boyfriend, it was so sweet, I had mentioned that I always wanted a machine and he picked this one out for me :) I keep it in this awesome bag from Michaels (though it was clearanced out after I bought it... boo) it was meant for scrapbooking but it fit my machine better than any of the actually sewing machine cases! (and it's much prettier!)

So that's it for Random Thought Thursday, tomorrow I'm going to be introducing a new segment with Hank the traveling Hamster (and Harriet my girl version) it going to be kind of like flat stanley but funnier :P Hope you see you then!

~Megan~

Bonus Project: Hank the Hamster

Ok so in a rare Tuesday post I'm going to share a project that I completed that I love. I recently lost my pet hamster Stitch and decided that in his memory my first crochet project would be a small hamster from the "super-super cute crochet" book by Brigitte Read:

the hamster was supposed to be much smaller and I sent a picture of the completed project to my boyfriend James saying that my hamster turned out too fat! (I used the wrong size hook, and added about 4 extra rows, because I was attempting to attach the two pieces incorrectly!!) Well for whatever reason James fell in love with this pudgy little hamster, he named him Hank and insisted keeping him at his house (along with the Hippo "Fred" and Owl "Owlie" that I have also made him). 

(Aren't they just the cutest thing?!)

So when James got called into work today (side note he's a freight train conductor, it's pretty cool!! - and also a volunteer fireman and a member of the National Guard... cause he likes giving me heart attacks when he goes off to work, but I digress back to Hank) he brought Hank with him, which if you ask me is adorable :)


I am going to attempt to make a proper sized hamster next, though James swears that the chubby ones are much cuter :P I would love to know what you think of Hank I'm so excited that I finally figured out crochet, my crafting options have just exploded with possibilities!! 


See you soon
~Megan~
(and Hank)