Spinning and Weaving in Iran

I found a site that has some fascinating picture of women in Iran. Beautiful women in gorgeous clothes. It has women that are young and old living all types of lifestyles. But especially interesting to me was the pictures of the women working with fiber.

Preparing the fiber!

Spinning yarn!

More Spinning!

Weaving!

More Weaving!

The actual site can be seen HERE. I would love to give credit to the owner of the site for their fascinating photos, but I don't read the language this site is written in. Wow, what an amazing group of photos!

knitting dilemma

I gots a dilemma here at Chez Shea. It has to do with the Minimalist Cardigan. As it turns out, it's not so minimalist.

My swatch LIED to me! I was so careful. I swatched. I washed. I laid it flat. I measured. Oh the inhumanity! My sweater is measuring up to be one size up from the one I intended.

If I had been freakin' paying attention though, I would have caught this soon enough where frogging the whole thing would not be as painful.

My dilemma is this: Do I hope for the best and go ahead and block it and hope it will be a smaller size? Or do I frog and begin again?

Sure, I could force it to be smaller as I block it, but we gotta remember that this is done primarily in Moss Stitch which tends to stretch. What are the chances that it would just stretch back out?

But! I was so close to the finish on this. It's a very painful thought, beginning again.

What would you do? Please, I'm begging you, leave a comment and help me out with some advice!

As Katie Scarlett O'Hara said, "I'll think about that tomorrow" or at least after Christmas. Now I have to get to work on my Dad's socks that I promised him. I am aiming to get one pair done, but hope for two. I refuse to stress myself out on this one. If I get two done, great. If not, he gets an IOU on the second.

Obviously I'm not one of those people who line up a million and one projects for Christmas. Nope, not me, no way. I got enough stress just keeping the Christmas ornaments alive each day from the Youngest's efforts to destroy them all one glass ball at a time.

I am my Christmas tree's Champion! I will defend it's, err... balls? it's chastity? Why exactly am I defending it again? oh yeah. children + glass. = bad. right. got it now, thanks.

Cammie says, "If I'm not looking at you, you can't see me hiding under here."

Crochet Cluster Stitch Shoulder Bag

Here's a blast from the past vintage pattern for you. The Crochet Cluster Stitch Shoulder Bag from circa 1975. I was a whole 6 years old when this one was published in an unknown magazine. My mother clipped this out and for some unknown reason has been able to keep up with it all these years. She made it for my kindergarten teacher, who is, hopefully, still alive and still has her bag. Since it was made from acrylic, we're going to assume the bag, at least, is still around. 'kay?

This is too cute not to share. I haven't made it yet, but it's on my to-do list. This would make a really cute Christmas gift and looks really quick and easy. Hope you enjoy it!

Welcome to my World

Welcome to my world. The world where you spend lots of time decorating your house and tree with lots of glass and shiny bits and sundry other fragile, breakable items. Then, you spend the next month and a half or so yelling at the almost two year old who can't seem to keep away from all the pretty lights and ornaments. This is the child who also cannot control his impulses to unwrap the cool paper and neat bows.

I love Christmas and all the bells and whistles that go along with it. So, I must "gird up my loins" (so to speak) and be prepared to have high blood pressure issues and lots of mixed drinks readily available to control said high blood pressure issues.

The first of the high blood pressure issues however, have had nothing to do with the Youngest and everything to do with light strands. I began getting the tree lights out of their respective boxes. I plugged the first one into the wall. Half of the lights came on. Not an all or nothing situation as per usual, but half. Well, damn. I grabbed the next strand and plugged it in. Again, half. This happened not once, not twice, but three damn times! Why me?

Instead of going along every single light to try and puzzle this out, I'm opting for the "go shopping for more damn lights" approach. I have less patience and less time, mainly due to the help of a certain almost two year old.

*****

I had a wonderful time at Thanksgiving and I've decided that if my waistline is to survive, I really need to avoid my Mom's cooking. I gain several pounds every time I go there.


The kids and I went on a walk while we were there and here's a couple of pics from it:

Beautiful!
Chasing big brother