New FO!

My new scarf is finished!

Project: December is for Stephanie
Yarn: Handspun Merino in Riverstone colorway
Needles: Size 8
Started: Jan. 14, 2009
Completed: Jan. 20, 2009

This was a super easy, fun project. Unfortunately, these pics don't do the yarn justice. I could not get a better pic of it while I was inside and it's too bloomin' cold to go outside to take a better one.



In it's previous life, it looked like this:It's much easier to see the true colors of the yarn in this shot.

Inauguration Observations

A couple of things I'd like to mention about today's presidential inauguration:

I thought the bobbling of the Presidential Oath by the Chief Justice and the President was delightful. The Chief Justice reversed the order of some of the words of the oath and it briefly threw off Obama's response. I'm delighted because it shows that they're both human and can make mistakes like the rest of us.

During the ceremony though, I was less than delighted by Aretha Franklin's rendition of My Country Tis of Thee. While I enjoy Aretha singing Soul music, I found her version of the song to be the equal of a tooth needing a root canal. Jarringly yelled, not reverently sung.

Three presidents ago, I attended the Inauguration of George W. Bush Sr. I was honored to be able to participate by marching in the Inaugural Parade with the Auburn University Marching Band. While it was an honor to be there, it was absolutely miserable. The temps were freezing and I was crying by the end of the 5 mile parade. I feel both happiness and sympathy for the poor kids who will be doing this again today. I'm very glad to be watching the events from home while snuggled in my armchair in my nice toasty house knitting something that I wish I had had during that parade approximately 20 years ago:


A nice wool scarf. Back then I was just wishing I could get some booze. My how times age us, huh?

So Guilty

What kind of a Mom forgets to go into her son's school and take cupcakes to celebrate his birthday?

Um, that would be me. Here I was at home, enjoying the peace and quiet of having no children at home, knitting away in front of a movie. I didn't even think about the fact that I was supposed to be hosting a little shindig at his school. I clean forgot about it.

Oops.

I've felt guilty about it all day. Not that he really cares, thankfully. He knew he had cupcakes at home waiting for him anyway. I'm such a lousy mom.

But I'm making great progress on a new knitting project, does that make up for it?

Mission Organization: Episode Three

I have a monumental (to me) announcement to make: I can now park in the garage! Yippee!

I know, not really exciting and has nothing to do with yarn or fiber. But I can't tell you how nice it is to be able to get into the car and not worry that my buns are going to get hypothermia and chip off. Definitely a reason to celebrate.

The drawback? I now have 5 or 6 large boxes to be emptied in the playroom. Can't win them all, huh?

I promise to get back to all things fiber-y tomorrow. I'm off to go celebrate with some silk spinning!

Mission Organization: Episode Two

First, a small disclaimer: In the last episode, I might have made a Freudian oops. I might have said "when my husband was living here" in reference to the bedroom. The correct thing to have said would have been, "when my husband was working here in the bedroom/office ." Like I said, oops. I thought the slip was quite funny. Hubby wasn't quite as amused though...


Anyway, the new play room is finished!

It's a really huge room, taking up a third of the upstairs floor of our house. There is one piece of grown up furniture, but it works since they like to dress up and look at themselves in the mirror.

I broke the room up into areas:

Game area for the Eldest:

On the opposite side of the room, is a reading area with green netting over it that they can close in like tent and opposite that is the train table:



Ikea was a great help with organization in this room. Notice the new stair step storage above and here on the wall is more storage for the few stuffed animals we have. Also, below that are the obligatory race tracks for Hot Wheels cars:


And don't forget the Little People area:


What I haven't shown you:

The closet: filled with games and legos and prize possessions of the Eldest. This will have a lock on it to keep the Youngest out of it.

The bedroom: is a work in progress, but is going great so far. Both of their beds and chests of drawers fit perfectly. I still need to decorate the Eldest's side to his liking, but so far, everyone is happy with the changes.

The garage: Also a work in progress. As I get more stuff moved to the playroom, I get closer to getting my car back in it. Yeah!

Mission: Organization (The Shea Episodes)

Episode 1!


Do you know the show, Mission: Organization? You know, the one where they go into a home and reorganize it for them. Most of these homes are worse than messy, they're scary messy. The kind of scary where you would be afraid to enter the rooms cause you might not be able to find your way out again.

I'm dealing with a couple of situations like that in my home.

I don't normally make New Year's resolutions, but this year? Yep, I want a more organized house.

I come from a background of depression era style hoarders. My grandparents had an excuse, they lived through the depression and lived on a farm where any little thing could suddenly become very useful again.

My parents were taught by these same people not to get rid of anything, you never know how useful something might be.

So, guess where that has got me? I never, ever get rid of a crafty type item. And it's been a darn good thing too. I'm constantly needing that stuff for school projects and cross-over craft projects. The hubby is just as bad with tools and guy stuff.

Oh, and don't forget, we've got two kids and a billion toys (I'm not kidding) to contend with.

So here's how I'm starting to tackle everything.

1. Mostly complete: Master bedroom - Used to be a combined office/bedroom when the hubby was living at home. I forced the hubby to use a much smaller desk that was given to us and to get rid of all the crap that was visible. We moved a small wardrobe from the Youngest's room to our room and hid all the office crap in there. I now have most of my bedroom back and where I'm not ashamed for guests to see it.

2. Boy's bedroom: Currently the boys are sleeping in separate rooms. We are moving both of their beds to the smaller bedroom and they will now share that space. My goal is to eventually get bunk or twin beds in there, but they can live cramped for now.

3. Playroom: The Largest of the two bedrooms is now going to become a playroom. All items that belong to anyone under the age of 37 will go in here. I'd like to have my downstairs mostly toy free as well and all toys currently down will now go up. The room is huge and will hold all children's junk nicely. The Eldest's favorite stuff, his clothes and everything that is tiny will go into the closet in there and we will put a latch on the closet to prevent the Youngest getting into it. By the time he can reach the latch, it won't really matter what he gets into in there anyway.

4. Garage: Would be nice to use it for what it's supposed to be used for and not as a storage unit. A year or so ago we thought we were going to move and began boxing up toys and other things. All of that will move to the playroom as well, even if it continues to live in boxes.

5. Dining room/my office/craft room: I hung a curtain in one of the doorways so that I can close it if company comes over. That way I can at least hide what ever I may be working on.

I'd show you pics of everything, but it's way too embarrassing.

I'm desperate to have a nice house again (a pipe dream with small children, but still.) If I can't have nice, I'll settle for a tiny bit more organized.

I'm currently going through each room as I get to it and I'm separating things into 5 piles: donate, trash, sell, attic or find a damn place for it. There's a couple of children's consignment sales coming up and I really want to get rid of some toys. We have enough for five families. Especially since I was on a children's consignment committee for so long. I got all the best stuff first and went overboard. Time for some of it to go.

It's going to be a while going through every room, but I'll get there. Wish me luck!

I shouldn't have

But I did!

I finished the merino today during the Youngest's naptime. My shoulder seems fine right now, we'll see if I aggravated it later tonight.

I'm just tickled with how this yarn turned out. I was a little worried since my second bobbin of singles didn't turn out quite as even, but not to worry, turned out great anyway.

3 Ply Yarn
Fiber(s): Merino (purchased from Cloverleaf Farms) & Rayon
Colorway: Riverstone
Yardage: Approximately 226 yards


I was feeling inspired, so I went out into the garage and dug through my craft bin and came up with some gold rayon thread that had been languishing for quite some time. While it sucked for sewing use, it was superb for spinning. It's incredibly soft, so it didn't take away from the softness of the merino and it gives the yarn a nice touch of glitz.

It's off to be blocked now and then it's destined to become a lovely scarf. I'll give more details on the scarf later.

Merino!

Since Christmas, I've been itching to spend lots of time with my spinning wheel. I got the wheel out and sorted through my options of what to spin.

1. I could pick up where I left off on the whole oatmeal colored fiber that I'm almost finished with, but it's boring me to tears right now, so that was out.

2. Exotic stuff from SAFF - I've got Camel, two kinds of silk, and llama fluff, but I wanted something with color.

3. 3 lbs of Corriedale that's pining away for me to do something with it. First, I need to figure out what color I'm going to dye it. I don't have a clue what color I want. Then I need a non reactive pot. Since I'm going to be using acid dyes in it, it can't be one of my cook pots and I'm not about to sacrifice the ones I've got. I either need to hit a thrift store or walmart for that. The Corriedale is going to have to wait until I pick a pattern (I think), which will lead me to a color (I hope). I'm also thinking about blending in some of the Tussah silk I have with it. So, big project, that's going to have to sit for a while.

So what to spin? At SAFF I also purchased a lovely merino roving from Cloverleaf farms in the color riverstone. It is absolutely yummy. Soft with gorgeous earthtone colors.

I got 2 oz. spun into singles and they looked like this (although the pic doesn't come close to doing it justice:

Click for the full multi color effect!

This is by far and away the most even spinning that I've done. I mean, just look at it, nary a thick or thin to be seen.

I was feeling very clever, and took a two ply worsted yarn I had and split it in twain. Hah! I said Twain. Anyway, I put one of the plies and a sample of the two ply yarn on an index card. I used this as a control card, spinning some and then every once in a while checking to make sure my singles were the same size as the single on my card. Okay, I admit that I stole the idea from David on Ravelry (Ravelry link), but still, you have to admit it's clever. I have since purchased a control card, but until the other bobbin has been finished being spun, I'll continue to use this card to double check myself.

I was planning on doing more of it once I got back from the folks on Monday, but I seem to have damaged my shoulder. I'm hoping it disappears in a week or so and is not a rotator cuff injury. That would totally suck.

It could possibly have been caused by that bin of baseball cards (that belong to my brother that I was transporting for him) that weighed almost a hundred pounds that I had to lift into that back of the minivan that did it. I wouldn't recommend picking up something that weighs almost as much as you do. Really wouldn't. You would have laughed your a$$ off if you had seen what I had to do to get it in the van.

Who knows how I really did it. I just know that my spinning would aggravate the hell out of it if I tried it. Go ahead, picture me crying here. I really want that merino spun up so I can knit with it now! Not sure what I'll do with it. I'm not going to get a lot of yardage out of the 4 oz., I might just have to purchase more. Now wouldn't that be a shame?

Back on the wagon

It's time to get back on the blogging wagon. I fell off over the holidays, sorry.

I can't tell you how glad I am that the holidays are over. I'm ready to get back to some established routines around the house and to have the children back in school!

I went IKEA on New Year's day with a friend. That store is pure evil. Makes me want to spend money like nobody's business. But, did you know that someone has killed Elmo and Cookie Monster and is selling the furs there? It was shocking, I tell you!


I also found this cute foot cozy pillow that I have got to try and make:


Over the holiday, i also decided to pin some sweater pieces onto Endora so that I could get a better looksy at it:

This is going to be a really cool looking sweater once it gets finished. I'm calling this the 2 year sweater, cause that's how long it looks like it'll be before I get the damn thing finished.

This weekend, I took off and went to my folks house to try and help them move a server and some pc's into their home office. I failed spectacularly at just about everything that I tried to do. I got one server and one pc talking to each other and I got one pc and the internet talking to each other, but for some reason I couldn't get all of the servers, pcs and internet talking together at the same time. not good.

But I did accomplish something this weekend, I made a Golden Snitch for the Eldest:

He's a huge Potter fan now. He's only 8 years old and he's finished all of the Potter books, so I thought he'd enjoy this. We're thinking about attaching it to his ceiling fan to make it fly. We'll see. Might be pretty funny to watch him get whacked in the head with it if we do tie it on there. I guarantee he'll forget it's there and it'll happen.

Unfortunately, now he wants me to crochet a specific Pokemon character (Treecko for those "In The Know".) I'd have to make up the pattern and I'm not an accomplished pattern maker, especially in crochet. I might be able to cobble something together, but it's doubtful though.

I'm a dreamer!

I'm a dreamer! (My mom could've told ya that one)

You'd be amazed at how much this fits my personality, well, except for the forgiving and tolerant part anyway. :)

You Are a Dreaming Soul

Your vivid emotions and imagination takes you away from this world So much so that you tend to live in your head most of the time You have great dreams and ambitions that could be the envy of all... But for you, following through with your dreams is a bit difficult You are charming, endearing, and people tend to love you. Forgiving and tolerant, you see the world through rose colored glasses. Underneath it all, you have a ton of passion that you hide from others. Always hopeful, you tend to expect positive outcomes in your life. Souls you are most compatible with: Newborn Soul, Prophet Soul, and Traveler Soul

What Kind of Soul Are You?

Happy Birthday Youngest!

We're celebrating a big milestone today at my place:

Today is the Youngest's 3rd Bday!


Unfortunately, his bday falls at a very poor time of year. Everyone is partied out, or has a party already planned. So, we're having an intimate party this year. He personally requested Scooby Doo cupcakes as his birthday cake this year. Yeah! I like this idea. It's a heck of a lot easier than me having to get out a fancy cake pan and Icing tips and doing a big huge colossally awful tasting cake.


Here's a close up for all you Scooby fans:


He wanted orange colored cream cheese frosting on a marbled cupcake too. Which actually works with the whole Hippy/Psychedelic Scooby color scheme, don't ya think?

Same-Ol', Same-Ol'

I am still slogging away on the Cornelia Hamilton Cabled Pullover. This is taking forever to finish. I have one whole arm complete and part of the yoke.

I took it with me to my Mom's place over the holidays and worked on it when I had time. I'm currently knitting the yoke section that goes over the chest and around both arms and back. It looks like a scarf at the moment, one that curls and drives you nuts because of the curling. See?

It looks much better uncurled:



I was hoping that I could tell you that this section is finished, but, I have one and a half repeats to go on it. Not sure why I'm so slow with cables. I can fly with lace and stockinette and garter, so why not with cables? I'm not using a cable needle, so that's a bit faster than if I was using one. Is it because I'm having to look at my directions so often? If anyone has any tips on going faster with cables, I'd appreciate the advice. Maybe with Christmas over it'll go a little faster. yeah, right.

I'm way tickled about my new camera. I can finally take a decent picture with things that are red. This the first time I've been able to take a pic of this project and have it show up the way it is in real life. By the way, this is a Knit Picks yarn, Wool of the Andes, in the color Iron Ore. Beautiful red.

Santa was good to me!

Santa was very good to me this year. Was he good to you? I got a cool new camera that looks just like this:
But! Over the holidays, while Santa was being good to me, I discovered that my Mother is a truly evil woman.

Over the Thanksgiving holidays, I told her that I wanted her help to make a duct tape dress form. She went through with it and it took us over two hours to make the damn thing with me barely breathing in it and not able to sit down at all and at the end, having to be cut out of it by my hubby cause she couldn't do it herself.

Why was that so evil? Because she had this hidden in her closet just waiting to give it to me for Christmas!A vintage/antique adjustable dress form! Two hours of torture when she could have said she had a headache or a toothache or needed to wash her ping pong balls or some other white lie that would have worked just fine. And yes, just to let you know, she'll be reading this little diatribe and it'll be good for her too.

Oh well, it was still fun to make the dress form out of duct tape. And how cool is this new/old dress form? Took me forever to get it set to my measurements. I haven't done the height just yet, but that's okay, the Youngest likes it set to his height. He's been talking to it since it came home.

We've named her Endora after the Mom in the old TV show Bewitched. She now reigns supreme in the corner of the dining room/office/craftroom.

Santa Watch 2008

Keep an eye on where Santa is tonight with Norad's Santa Tracker!

I'll be taking the next few days off from the blog for the Holidays.

Merry Christmas Everyone!

Christmas Platter Tutorial - Don't look Mom!

If you have small children and are in need of a "Brownie Point" gift to give the grandparents, here's an easy fun one for you:


1. Get a blank platter or tray - a fairly large rectangle shape.
2. Coat their hands in green paint, then place them on the surface with the base of their hands facing each other and the tips of the fingers spread out.
3. Start at the bottom with the older children's hands. then have the smallest hand print on the top. Good luck with the smaller children, it took a small army to help me get the Youngest's handprints on the plate.
4. Next, fill in the top of the tree with green to fill out your Christmas tree shape. Simple squiggles will do. There's no need for perfection, Go for the Folk Art look.
5. Add garland, ornaments and star. Feel free to change the colors!
6. Then write Merry Christmas across the top and add your year.
7. I added a coat of clear sealant to protect it after it was dry.

Simple and Guaranteed to impress the Grandparents!


See, my brother and I have an unspoken contest every year. the one that can get Mom all choked up and crying (she's very sentimental) over their gift, wins. Guess who's going to win this year? She does love her grandboys! :)

Fleece to Fluff

Sunday was a most productive day. Not Christmas project-wise, but fun-wise.

Right after Thanksgiving, I got a package from a wonderful lady that I met through Ravelry. She was giving away some of her Corriedale fleece. She sent me three pounds!

I finally got around to doing something with it. I was surprised how well it had been skirted. There were no tags (poop) at all, just the normal dirt that a sheep collects in the year between shearings. So, no poop, but lots of dirt.

Here's a pic of some of it:

This time, I decided to use my washing machine to do the cleaning. I didn't want the sink or tub filled with dirty sheep since there were children to bathe and feed, so the washing machine was the best alternative.

Here's how I did it:

I filled the machine with hot water and then turned it off. Then, I added Dawn dish-washing detergent to it. I did not measure the amount, just did two long squirts until the water was tinted a light blue. I prefer Dawn to the commercial fleece cleaners. I like the smell and it gets all of the grease and dirt out quick. Next, I added half of the fleece.

Some of the fleece, I separated it out lock by lock and put them inside lingerie bags to preserve the lock formation. As an experiment, I put some of the fleece in "as is" just to see how it would do.

Here's a pic of it soaking.


At this point, the hubby complained about how the house smelled like a beauty salon. That's better than the barn smell that I expected him to complain about!


I let it soak for 20 minutes, then set the washer to spin cycle and let it do it's thing. I did this step twice. Did I mention that this fleece was dirty? Check out the inside of the machine after the first soak:

Yuck!

I wiped it down after each soak to get rid of the dirt. It came right off, no problem.

On the rinse step, I filled the machine again and then added a couple of teaspoons or so of Odor-ban to the water, mainly to help get rid of the smell of wet sheep. Yes, it's safe for fiber as long as you only use a tiny bit. It's concentrated, so a little goes a long way.

Check out the difference between each step:

Before 1st wash

After the second wash

After the rinse

It turned out so soft and lovely! I didn't see enough of a difference in how everything turned out. Not enough to spend the time separating the locks out in the future. This method did very well.

I'm planning on combing it out and pulling it into roving, then I'm going to dye it up. I haven't a clue as yet what color it will be, but that's a decision that can wait until after Christmas Holidays.

Now I desperately need a drum carder. I really don't want to card three pounds of fluff on my tiny dog slicker brushes. I have got to figure out what I can sell around the house that would bring in enough cash to get one. How's the market on selling husbands? :)

Elf On The Shelf!

Once upon a time, a dear friend of mine, Carol Aebersold, wrote a book. That book has now, after several year of very hard work on her part promoting it, hit the big time. I'm so proud of her and her daughter Chanda!I've been very remiss in not plugging her book to you before now. It's called Elf on the Shelf and you can find it just about everywhere now. Go check out their website, Elfontheshelf.com.


Several years ago, before the book came out, we took a trip to NY with Carol and her hubby and she told us about the elf tradition then and how they had always done this for their three children.

The elf shows up the day after Thanksgiving and finds a spot to sit and watch how the kids behave. At the end of the day, he/she reports back to Santa. On the following day, the elf finds a different spot to sit. This continues until Christmas day when it goes back to the North Pole until the next Thanksgiving comes around.

Well, I've been doing this since that trip to NY. I found an antique elf to use at first and then switched to the new one when the book came out. It's so much fun! The kids have a fantastic time hunting for it every morning and can get quite obsessive (and competitive) about it.

It also promotes better behavior and that's always a plus in my book!

So, if you can go to Carol's website and check it out. You can also order the book from Amazon and other sites.

Jaunty Cap #3

I've been laid low by a cold that was ever so sweetly given to my by The Youngest. Seriously, I feel like I've been hit my a Mack truck. This is not good for my Christmas Crafting.

My last two projects are the Nativity Set and the hat for my friend.

I've finished the hat (seen here modeled by Folgers):


This is the third Jaunty Cap that I've made. I absolutely love this pattern and I think this one turned out very masculine. It's blocking as I write on the same Folgers container.

I finished a bunch of the nativity set last night and I've only the animals to do now. This is a huge project that takes a while to complete. There are a lot of pieces and each piece is very detailed, so it will take me another couple of days to complete.

Let's hope I get over this cold really quick. All I want to do is go to bed and sleep.

Mission Complete! (Almost)

I have almost completed the Find It Game projects! Hooray! Christmas here I come!

Here's how they look:

Click on any of the pics for more detail!

This should have been a relatively easy, simple and enjoyable project. The keys words there are "should have been" for those of you watching on television. It's an easy pattern, great concept, few supplies needed, so why the "should have been"?

First, my sewing machine desperately needs a tuneup.

Second, the tension somehow got off and the sewing thread kept getting caught in the bobbin doohickey thingy and would stick and then the project would be pinned to the machine by both thread and needle.

Third, I had to replace the bulb on my sewing machine and that seemed to require a Rocket Science Degree from Princeton or wherever you get one of those degrees.

Anyway, that's enough numbers, let's talk about the project.


Here's some tips for making this project a little easier on the next person to make this:

1. If you decide (like I did) to enlarge the size of the pattern, do so by more than one inch on all the numbers. Obviously, I did not do well in geometry in school. By adding that one inch to all the numbers, it somehow threw off the ratios and I ended up having to cut some of the pieces down to make the puzzle all fit. In summation, math are hard and I shouldn't be doing it.

2. Add interfacing to your fabric pieces to add more durability to your project.

3. Ironing tip - I turned the steam off to put the interfacing on and I also put a paper towel in between the iron and fabric. I can't tell you how many times in the past that I have used interfacing and an iron and had all sorts of sticky gunk left on the iron from it. The paper towel prevented all that gunk getting on the iron.

4. Instead of rice, I used the one pound bags of pony/crafting beads that you get from any craft store. This added more color and makes it a bit more complicated to find all the lovely stuff you've put in the bag.


5. Buttons! Buttons make great things to put in it. I picked up these little packs of colorful buttons at Michael's that had themes to them - Wizardry, Rescue Vehicles, Zoo, Vacation, Safari, Dress Up, etc. Makes gathering some of the little stuff easier and if a child is into a particular subject, you can get a bunch of stuff for less money this way.

6. Hand sew the ribbon that holds the card into the inside seam of the bag before you stuff it and sew it back up. Also make sure that you put a warning on the card not to carry it by the ribbon. There's no way that tiny ribbon will be there for long if a kid picks it up by it and runs around with it. That being said, I'm sure that's what my kids will do to it. :)

Obviously, the cards are not attached yet. I need to print them out and get them laminated first. When I do, I will turn that long ribbon into a loop to hold the cards on, so they won't be quite as long as what is in the pictures above.

All in all, this was a fun project and if I ever get my machine tuned up, I'll be making this again! Thanks so much to Angie for setting up the tutorial on the Find It Bag Games!

Disaster!

Remember that hat that I was knitting for a friend? Well, the hubby has now inherited what's left of it due to my stupidity.

I had it finished, but wasn't quite happy with the way the brim was going. So, I couldn't find the end where I had woven it in because of the damned tweed - everything looked like an end. Out came my trusty little baby fingernail clippers that I keep in my knitting bag and I clipped what I thought was the end. Um, it wasn't. Not by a mile.

I ended up with a QUARTER size hole in the front of the hat! I mended it as best I could, and if you don't look very closely, it's fine. In my opinion though, this can no longer be given as a gift. Damn again.

I couldn't get a good pic of where it was fixed, but here it is unblocked and being modeled by the Eldest:



After looking at it, I think I'll make another Jaunty hat instead. I know it's unblocked and not in it's proper shape, but I just don't think I like it quite enough to make another.

Oh, and this time when I make it, I'm going to hold a strand of black yarn in with the gray tweed. The color needs more depth I'm thinking.

Here I am already in a crafting crunch that was going very well, and then this had to happen. Ack!

Partial Hat and Supervising Cat

Evidently this is not the week for daily blogging, but every other day blogging. Sorry 'bout that. The two year old has caused all sorts of crisis this week, up to and including slugging his teacher at school! Not good. He got into a world of trouble, I went into embarrassment and depression and well, there you go.

But! All better now. I hope.

When a friend of mine requested a hat, I'm pretty sure he had no idea he would actually be getting it. I cast on two days ago and here's the results so far:

Oooo, String!

Have you ever noticed that when you try to take a picture of any woolly object, the cat comes out of the woodwork to help? Not the dogs, the cats. Why? What causes this? It's not like they're interested in helping, just supervising.

I tried to get her to smile in this one, but she wasn't having any of that "nonsense".

What can I say? She (along with the hubby) is a scrooge. Did I tell you that I got a whole lecture about how I shouldn't spend money on presents? That I spent too much on the kids and that he didn't want any presents himself 'cause we don't have any money? He does this every year. We've been married twelve years and I have gotten similar speeches every single year. Now wouldn't he be disappointed if Santa didn't bring him anything to unwrap this year!

Like I said, What a Scrooge.

Jewelry

Today was a day for making Christmas presents for both my sons' teachers as well as a little something for my best friend.

I packed the kids off to school and then hunkered down with a whole pile of beads and chains and these are the results:

First (and my favorite) is the BFF's necklace:

Glass Beads on antiqued findings - browns/blacks/bronzes

Second and Third: Bracelets for the Eldest's Teachers:



Fourth and Fifth: Bracelets for the Youngest's teachers. These two ladies actually deserve real gold for what they've had to put up with. But since I can't afford it, this will have to do.





Sorry for the blur in the last two. My camera hates me. But that's okay, it's being replaced on Christmas day. (A little Elf told me.)

State of the WIPs

Now that I've had a nice break knitting little things, it's time to get back to the two large projects on the needles.

First, the Zara Cabled Tunic:

This project is taking an eternity to knit. This pattern is not for the faint of heart. Really, I'm not kidding. There are a quadrillion cables to work through and it becomes quite tedious at time. Oh, and the gauge/pattern issues are not so good either. I'm working on it, albeit slowly. I have finished one whole sleeve:

In order to combat boredom (since for all intents and purposes is the third sleeve I've completed even if it is the only one I haven't frogged) I'm going to work on the Horizontal yoke section next. I'll get back to the other sleeve later when I have the stomach for it.

Edited to Add: I forgot to mention that the wrist pain that this project was causing me has been greatly reduced by finding a new way to hold/tension my yarn. I'll try and demonstrate it soon.

Second, The Thermal Vest:


This has also become tedious. Waffle stitch, even if it is done in dk weight instead of fingering, is still boring. The color is killing me now too. Winter is not the time to work with dark gray. However, the alpaca is so soft! This is coming along fairly well now, thanks to school car pool line knitting. I'll be sitting around on every monday night during my son's basketball practices from now until March, so I'm expecting this project to really take off (although I really shouldn't jinx myself by saying that.)



The good news is that a friend of mine has requested a hat, so before Christmas, that will have to get done. That means, whichever of the two projects above are bugging me most will be put down very soon. I suppose that's good news.

The bad news is that I've got Rogue waiting in the wings, but can't start it until one of these two big projects is finished. sigh.

Booga Bag!

The Booga Bag is complete!

Project: Booga Bag
Needles Used: Size 6 circs.
Yarn: Cascade 220 (black and turquoise), Noro Kureyon (184, 209)

Modifications:

Cast on 50 instead of the 34 recommended. Unknown number of rows completed. Basically I went until the bag looked in proportion.

Used two different types of Noro that compliment each other. Also using some black cascade 220 and some turquoise cascade 220. Used the turquoise for the handles because I only had a tiny bit of Noro left.

Used grommets for the holes where the handles feed through. Please remind me not to use grommets again on the next one of these I make. Grommets and I do not mix well. I think I wasted about 10 grommets on this project. I used the little kit with the plier type tool. I think I would have been better off with a hammer and tap tool. I do think that the grommets give it a classier look though.

Misc:

To give you an idea of the size of the bag, and since I don't have dimensions handy, it's a larger purse size. I stuffed four skeins of yarn and a partial knitted project into this and everything fits perfect. I could probably get a fifth skein into it with no problems.

This is a simple, fun project to do and as long as I stay way from the grommets, I plan on making more of these again later.

Magazines!

Okay so I didn't get the bag finished, but I do have these lovely little magazines that I found over the weekend to show you:

I found these in a Salvation Army Thrift Store and got them for a quarter a piece. It's
Workbasket and Home Arts Magazine. This was the first magazine that targeted crafters. It is so awesome. I can't tell you how thrilled I was/am to find these. I had never heard of this magazine before. The publication ran from 1935 to sometime in the 1990's. The ones that I have ran from 1965 to 1984 and I do not have all of them from those years. The 1970s are predominate in this stack. Which is actually pretty good for a laugh. Check this one out:

Click to Enlarge

Oh Yes, your eyes do not mislead you on this one. That is indeed a very long Granny Square skirt. First, I can't imagine how drafty that would be and Second, what would you do for undergarments? Also, if you absolutely had to have a granny square skirt, wouldn't it be much cuter as a mini-skirt?

Besides the occasional laugh from horrible fashion, these little mags are priceless. They have patterns for knitting, crochet, needlepoint, embroidery, cross stitch, even tatting! They also have recipes and how-tos on plants.

Can you believe the shopping weekend that I had? It's taken me all week to tell you about it.

The other thrift store finds? I scored a lambskin leather skirt (feels like buttah) for $6.99. Sweet huh?

Almost done

So I've finished knitting my booga bag:


It's been felted and is drying now. Hopefully, barring any delays in my life with potty training, I'll be able to show you a finished project tomorrow.

Here's the cute little thing that is not allowing me to accomplish much of anything for the past few days:

Potty Training Cutie

He absolutely insists on taking his blanket and pacifier with him to the potty. I figure that whatever keeps him there is a good thing. Plus, the blanket keeps naked little legs warm!


I promise to be away from kiddie stuff and back on to the knitting stuff as soon as humanly possible. :)