makin' stuff

Sheesh, it's been a long time since I've done a blog post! I really have been making stuff, I guess I just haven't been making time for blogging!

I finally finished my citron. I used Divine Lace, which is pretty fantastic stuff! The citron however, I don't find quite as fantastic. I find the half circle shape harder to wear than a triangular shawl. I don't like how it won't really scrunch up around my neck. It feels fantastic on, but I'm actually thinking of frogging it and using the yarn for something I like better. It seems silly since I spent weeks knitting it, but it seems even sillier to not wear the thing I made with yarn that I love and frankly was kind of a splurge.

My friend Catherine sent me a link for a purse pattern online and we both thought it'd be a great little spring bag. Last weekend I had 4 days off and I decided to make one! I used some fabric that I picked up at an antique mall (it's not antique fabric, just "vintage"). Because it's drapery weight, I thought it'd be perfect. The only problem is that it's pretty small compared to my Namaste bag that I've been carrying, so its sort of a big leap for me. However, I think it'll be perfect for trips to antique malls or flea markets or places like that where I'm walking for hours and a big bag starts feeling like a sack of potatoes on my shoulder after a while. And it's super cute - I love it!

Over my 4 day weekend, I also warped up my loom and made this rug for the bathroom! I'm not finished with it - I'm going to bind the short edges this weekend. I bought a bunch of cones of bulky weight cotton when the Peaches and Cream place was advertising that they're going out of business. I warped with worsted weight cotton then held three strands of different shades of blues together for the weft. It's still not as thick as I thought it'd be, but I think it'll be ok. I know this picture just makes it look like a placemat, but it's about 24" wide and 36" or so long.

Then a couple weekends back, after seeing this post on tall grass prairie studio, I decided to try my hand at recreating the chevron she did. Because I'm just kind of starting the piecing thing, sometimes I see what people have made and I have to stare at it and figure out how they did it. Then I have to try. I decided to just turn this into a hot pad so it's usable and not sitting alone in my sewing room! it's not exactly like hers, but I think I get the idea and it was a pretty fun way to use scraps!

Huge sale this weekend at JoAnn's!! I'll be heading over soon! I'm going to get some DK weight yarn to make this baby for my niece, and I'd like to recover the benches in my sewing room with some nifty vinyl since Stella, my cat who won't stop peeing on stuff, is living there full time now (and she doesn't pee on anything in there!) Having to take the lint brush to my bench everytime I want to sit down is kind of a drag, so a change needs to be made!

I love parcels!

I don't just love parcels because cool things come in them, it's the box itself that makes me happy - and this one was the best EVER! why? because it had a string tied around it!! It really takes so little to make me happy, but seriously, who does that anymore? I couldn't stop myself from sounding like an idiot in the post office when she brought it out and I said "ooh! it has a string on it! isn't that just how packages ought to be?"

And as per usual for me lately, this box is from Thailand - because I can't stop ordering those little knock off Blythe dolls! This one is blond -although it's nearly apricot in a way. I like it and I'm going to see if I can't do some trimming and washing to make it nicer.

She's a Blybe, but has a CCE style body, which is thinner than any of my others and doesn't turn at the waist. Her hip joints are a little loose and there are some stains on her body, which aren't very noticeable and pretty much what I'd expect for $23!

Oh, other oddities that seem par for the course with these knock off is that sometimes the eyes are a little whacky! for example - the side glancing eyes above are very downward, but the ones below, aren't - I just consider that some extra personality! Again, I didn't pay $150 for a real Blythe, so you take what you get!

Oh, also, you can't tell it from these pictures but her eyelids are blue - not just painted blue, but blue plastic - I can see that her whole eyesocket mech is made of blue plastic. So when I redo her face I'll either work with the blue or paint over it maybe!

And I couldn't resist buying this little outfit for her! I usually make my own clothes, but it was so cute! Ok, next time you see her she'll be all new and beautiful after her mods!

My new old addition

I can't turn down a sewing machine. My favorite uncle told me that he had an old singer in a neat 30's or 40's cabinet that belonged to my grandma and he wondered if I wanted it. I kinda don't have the space, but I know that he needs the space that it was taking up in his house even more, so I said ok and cleared out a spot in my sewing room. Isn't it beautiful?

so simple, so heavy duty - just forward and backward and I think there's a stitch length adjustment. plus, there were neat things in all the drawers

(see how cool and curved the drawers are?) like a button box and a couple incredibly complicated button hole attachments. Unfortunately, it probably hasn't been used in 20 years or more and it needs some tuning up. It was going real slow at first and we oiled up all the spots that looked like oil ports (it actually has spots with little felt wicks where it'll hold oil and dispense it as needed!) and my uncle is super good at working on stuff like that so he knew some stuff to look at and as a result, I now know what a worm gear does! For a while it was working pretty well, but then it started going downhilll again. I think I'm going to take it to someone because I'm betting that all the oil that was there is pretty gunked up after 20 years of sitting idle and our addition of new oil may not be enough to get it going. Fortunately the motor itself works great (we disengaged the clutch and let it run full out - so it's obviously just the moving gears that are bogging it down.) And there are no belts or electronics, of course, so it's just mechanical parts that need to be cleaned up. the cord could also use to be rewired, which I'm sure I could do, but because that's not the only thing involved, I think I'll have to find a hospital for her! I did a search online and found a few around here and some up in Columbus - anybody around here have a recommendation? I'm kind of afraid I won't be able to find someone who knows how to work on these things - just folks who are used to changing out motherboards and electronic cards on new machines!

someday my spring will come

Ok, it has to be like 60 degrees out there today! and I'm not stupid - it's ohio and it will, without a doubt, get super cold again before spring is really here - it's only February after all, but I love it when it gets like this! It's the first taste of spring and it always makes me all excited!

today, before it got too dark, I went out with a shovel and started chopping up this big pile of yard scraps that I've been throwing in the back corner of my yard. I tell myself that they'll "mulch right down" over the winter, but I know I'm lying to myself and that it's just my excuse to be lazy and pile the crap there because I don't feel like dealing with it! Then in the spring and summer, big scary spiders start living the the pile so I can't do what really needs to be done which is hack it all up into smaller bits with a shovel - because obviously the spiders will bite and kill me. So this year, I went out early - while it was still too cold for spiders, and guess what!? it really did compost a bit - it's sort of black and nice! Well, the parts that aren't twigs and dried plants which I was too lazy to do anything with. So I chopped some of them up and spread it around as much as I could - and broke a sweat doing yard work, in February no less! I didn't take a picture because it's just a big wet pile of dirt and yard waste. and speaking of dirt that isn't fit to photograph yet, I started some tomatoes, peppers and flowers in my basement! my gardening co-workers all say "it's too early! it's too early!" but they can suck it because I NEED to do this now. besides, there's no doubt that I'll put them outside too early too - because they'll be big before it's really safe to plant them outside and I'll lie to myself again about the chance of frost probably being past...it's just what I do!

finally big enough!

It occurred to me that I still wanted to add a solid border to my quilt top so I checked the size by flopping it over the bed again and decided that it really was finished!! I added a 6" solid red border to it and now it's slightly wider than the quilt I have on the bed now. I got a very promising lead on someone who'll quilt it for a fantastic price and I'm pretty much thinking that's the way to go. I was sort of dreading trying to do the quilting on a full sized quilt myself. Smaller ones, like baby size, haven't been too bad, but it seems like a real battle to wrestle something this big. One of these days I'll try it, but I think this one might just get sent away!

Process

I feel like I rarely post about knitting anymore and I think it's because when I post projects on Ravelry, most of the people who read this blog, probably already saw it there. A bunch of quilting bloggers started this "process pledge" where they're trying to post more about projects as they're going - not just finished stuff with a blurb about it. I think that's a good one for knitting too - and it's the stuff that I tend to not post on my Ravelry projects page, even though I should. Oh, I'm also going to try to get better about linking blog posts to my projects because I always forget to do that!

So my first process-ish post is about a pair of mittens that I started.

They're the Anatolian mittens from Folk Mittens - which is a great book! I never really realized how many patterns in that book I want to make until I pulled it out recently! I could totally fulfill my 11 in 2011 goal with just that book! I love these mittens because they're colorwork with worsted weight wool - i just think that makes for such a warm mitten! I finished mitten #1 and encountered a problem though - it has a peasant thumb, which means you put in waste yarn then pick them up for the thumb later - really simple, but the problem is that the hand of my mitten just goes on forever - it's probably about 1.5 inches too low on my hand. like the thumb would be at my wrist if I put my fingers to the end of the glove. (can you see the little line of pink waste yarn? not really, huh?)

I think what I'm going to do is kitchner up the opening, matching the pattern as best I can,

then steeking for a thumb hole. i think i'll be able to get the mitten under my sewing maching - that's my plan anyway! i'm wimping out and starting the second mitten before I do that though! I'll keep you posted - and I'll be sure to take one of those horrifying "scissors on knit" pictures that always make me flinch!

I also finished my kaffe fassett sock yarn scarf! yippee! I love it! I used my nifty little fringe winder to do the fringe on the ends,

which I think looks better than wool getting all stuck on itself and not laying nicely!

oh kaffe, what can't you do?

That Kaffe Fassett has color and knows how to use it! Little Knits had some of his sock yarn on sale (that Regia Landscape line that's self striping which I've bee coveting) for 1.99 so I couldn't pass it up and knew that I wanted to weave it! I love weaving self striping stuff where you use it as the warp and weft because it sort of makes a plaid on it's own and makes just plain old weaving, which is all I know how to do, and all I care to do, look really great with no effort at all. The box came today and I warped my loom right away. At first I thought the color repeats were going to be too short for them to do what I wanted, but man was I wrong. I'm loving this!

I got two different colorways and I'm definitely going to have 2 cool new scarves! I also splurged on this little (well, not really little - there's tons of yardage here) skein of silk and cashmere hand dyed laceweight.

It's fantastic and so saturated it's nearly impossible to photograph. The colorway is called plum jelly.