Polka Dot Cottage

My work is available here for another two weeks!

I'm here at Do Ewe Knit today! Come say hello! Buy yarn! Shop colorful crochet hooks and things! 🩷💜

Hi! 👋🏻 I’ve redesigned the shop to be sleeker and simpler to navigate. Also, free shipping for qualifying orders! Plus, a new product for polymer clay enthusiasts, and new ways to shop in person this season!

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Shop update! Free Shipping! New Product! ⋆ Polka Dot Cottage I've redesigned the shop to be sleeker and simpler to navigate. Also, free shipping for qualifying orders! Plus, a new product for polymer clay enthusiasts, and new ways to shop in person this season!

Classic Lisa Clarke:
I few weeks ago, I sewed a navy blue polka dot dress. I thought, this would look nice with red sandals. I also started knitting a taupe sweater to wear with it (I'm about an inch and a half in on that project). So far so good.
Yesterday, I decided I need earrings to go with this outfit. So I custom mixed the perfect navy blue, and found red, white, and taupe that were fine right out of the package. I made a kaleidoscopic design, working so fast I that I got tripped up in a few places and ended up with something I'm not sure I like. I played around with the scraps to make some simple stripes and some messy stripes. Now I have SIX pairs of earrings to wear with this outfit. None of them are screaming "pick me!" They all feel like a bit too much, and I'm getting the urge to go back to the table and just make some solid navy blue stud earrings and be done with it.
The dumbest part of all this is that I may never wear the dress, sandals, and sweater together at the same time anyway for various boring reasons I won't get into, so it probably wasn't necessary to try to get all of those colors into a single design anyway.
All of this? Not at all surprising to anyone who knows and loves me, lol.
If you need me, I'll be at the clay table exploring my stud earring options 😁

I haven't done much with clay lately, because my work space needed a clean. Finally did that yesterday morning, and then spent literally the rest of the day making a bunch of stuff for ME 😁

Little barrettes, because they seem to be the only thing right now that is stopping me from shaving all of this annoying hair off of my head; a new drilling tool, because the three sizes I made 20 years ago weren't quite sufficient; and a pair of earrings which turned into three pairs 😁.

DM me if you'd like one of the two extra pairs. $30 each, and I'll pay shipping, to thank you for keeping me from having to photograph and list these on my website 😁

My thoughts on seeing The Innocence Mission in concert on Friday: https://www.lisaclarke.net/2025/05/25/the-innocence-mission-in-ardmore-pa/

In OCNJ with the family for a few days 💕
Enjoying relaxing with my feet up. (And also punishing my feet by walking 5x my usual amount of daily steps, lol)

How about something frivolous and lovely? How about a little sewing show-and-tell? I put my me-made sheath pattern to work again, and made a shirt, and a dress. The dress has pockets! Come see.

Treating myself to pockets, part one ⋆ Polka Dot Cottage I put my self-made sheath pattern to work again, and made a shirt, and a dress. The dress has pockets! Come see.

Pre pandemic, I didn't work from home. At the time, being stuck in a cold office building, I came up with a bunch of ways to try and make my desk-away-from-home into a space I didn't mind spending 8 hours per day in. These are some of the things I did:

8 Ways to Make Your Cubicle Less Awful ⋆ Polka Dot Cottage Office spaces can be so bland and soul-sucking, but there are ways to make your cubicle less awful. Check out these 8 (and 1 bonus) things you can do!

It was about this time of year that I took one of my favorite pullover sweater patterns and completely replaced the yoke with a different design (though it looks like I took until October to blog about it 🙃). Here's how I did it:
https://www.lisaclarke.net/2017/10/25/how-to-replace-the-yoke-in-the-porthole-pullover/

Sweater Yoke Tutorial: How to Replace one with Another ⋆ Polka Dot Cottage Completely substituting one patterned yoke for another in a top-down round-yoke pullover results in a fresh-looking sweater with a familiar fit. Here's how.

This is a bit of a niche idea, but how about a cozy for a Google Nest Mini speaker that you are no longer using for its original "smart" purposes?
https://www.lisaclarke.net/2019/03/19/crocheted-google-home-mini-cozy/

Crocheted Google Home Mini Cozy ⋆ Polka Dot Cottage A crocheted Google Home Mini cozy may muffle the sound, interfere with the microphone, and make it impossible to see the LEDs. Let's make one anyway!