Happy Spring!

On Saturday, my furnace decided to stop working. A few hundred dollars and a new gas valve later, it's working again. At least I didn't have to replace the whole thing. I'm sure that's not too far in the future, though. In the meantime, Emma had to go to extreme measures to keep warm for a few hours.


"I'll suffer this, because he's warm."

After that excitement, I had the urge to dye some yarn. No, the two things really have nothing to do with each other. I dug some yarn out of my stash, along with the Easter egg dyes and went to work. The first attempt was a giant FAIL. It was acrylic yarn and wouldn't take any dye.


Notice the little pieces in front are the same color as the "finished" product.

The second try was more successful.


That's not the exact yarn I started with on the right, but it's about the same color.

I mixed a whole bunch of egg dye colors, originally going for brown. I didn't like the result, so I grabbed some Kool-Aid out of the cupboard and added it in to try for something more red. Some of the yarn didn't get the Kool-Aid and stayed the brownish of the original. This picture shows the variation in the colors. I think I like it, but I'm still deciding.


What do you think?

I've been working on a stealth project for a swap on Ravelry, but since I haven't sent it, I'm not going to post it just yet.

I can post a picture of the Koigu socks I've been working on, though.


The legs are a bit longer than normal. Hope I don't run out of yarn.

They're almost done. I'm hoping to finish them by the end of the month, when I plan to start a new pair of mystery socks for a knit-along. Then there will be a shawl knit along starting April 15.

Since yesterday was the first day of spring, some of us got together to start new spring projects. The only guideline was that the pattern should have "spring" in the name. Mine doesn't look like much, because I initially had issues reading the pattern and had to tink back a bit. I have to do an inch of this ribbing before I start the main pattern.


Spring Fern Socks in KnitPicks Stroll sock yarn, in the Springtime Tonal colorway.

I got the kitties a present today.


"Hey Max, come check this out!"

I'd been thinking of getting something like this for a while, and this one was on sale at PetsMart. I think they like it.


"Mmmm, comfy. Thanks, Mama!"

A long, strange weekend.

If you don't live in northeast Ohio, you might not know just how weird our weather has been the last couple of weeks. The week before last, it was close to 50 degrees most of the week. Then we got a winter storm that Sunday night. This past Friday, I had a foot-high snowdrift in my driveway. I opted to work from home instead of driving in to work. This was the view from my lap most of the day:


"Thanks for keeping my lap here today, Mama."

Last night, we had massive thunderstorms and I woke up to a soggy basement. Not cool. I burned a personal day to mop and set up fans to dry stuff out. It's mostly dry now and nothing was damaged. I learned several years ago to put anything in the basement on plastic shelves and/or in plastic bins.

But the weekend wasn't all bad. On Friday I got a call from a local TV station saying I'd won 4 tickets to opening night of Shrek the Musical at Playhouse Square! They had a Shrek trivia contest last week and I mostly entered for the fun of taking the quiz. It was a very nice surprise to win, though.

I signed up last week for my first ever knitting retreat. A couple of my friends from my Thursday night knitting group said they were going and the woman who wrote one of my favorite sock books is teaching there. It sounded like a lot of fun, so I decided to go for it. As it stands now, I'll probably be rooming with someone I don't know, but that's okay. I usually don't spend a lot of time in the room when I go to crafting retreats anyway.

I'm using that book to knit my Christmas socks. I think I'm done with the increases and will start the foot next. They are only about a row or two off of being identical. Pretty good for me, since the first two pairs of self-patterning/striping socks were definitely fraternal twins.

Women's Basic Toe-up Socks, in shiny Christmas yarn

On Saturday, I cleaned up the snow that my plow guy left in my driveway (not very happy about that, but at least it wasn't the whole driveway), then I went to the farm to knit. I did enough rounds to finish the next pattern repeat on these:


Sinuosity sock pattern, Destination Yarn in Sea colorway

These have been snoozing for quite a while and I'm happy to be working on them again. I think I'm doing better with the cables now than a year ago when I started them.

On Sunday, I spent a lot of time in my sewing room, but don't have anything to show for it, except a cleaner sewing room. I cleaned stuff out, and reorganized what I have in there. I had lots of help, of course.


Emma, you're snoozing with "kittens"


"Mama, I think I feel a pea under here"

Today, after I mopped the basement and took a nap to make up for the sleep I missed due to the thunderstorms, I stitched out the label for Big Blue. I had typed it up in my embroidery software Saturday night.


Yeah, it was well-aged fabric....

Now I just have to finish stitching it down and get the binding finished before my guild's quilt show at the beginning of April.

In other news, Blue likes to put his favorite toys in his bed.


Yes, two of his favorite toys are pink fuzzy things, what of it?
And yes, I think I need to wash that bed cover again.

Talk to the hand

I FINALLY finished my socks-turned-mitts!




That's the Karira sock pattern done with Destination Yarn in the Tuscany, Italy colorway. I posted my mods to convert the pattern from sock to mitts here (Ravelry link). I got this cool hand mannequin (handequin?) at the craft store to help show off my mitt. Without "Thing", you'd just get pictures like this:


Backs


Palms

They look better on Thing, don't they? And this shows how far I had done as a sock, and how much I had to rip back.



It was painful to rip it all back but I'm much happier with them as mitts than I was with them as socks. This way I can see all the work I did on them. And as a bonus, I have enough yarn to make a pair of (probably short) socks with contrasting heels and toes. Yay!

After I finished the mitts, I started some new socks (sorry for the crappy picture):


Toe up, two at a time, on two circular needles with sparkly Christmas yarn

It's a self-patterning yarn in red, white and green with a gold metallic strand running through it. I'm hoping they'll be nearly identical when they're done. It'll be fun to see how that goes.

I've been having lots of fun with the kitties lately. Did you know cats can have high blood pressure? They can, and Ripley does.


Look at that tiny little BP cuff!
"Mama, I can't believe you're going to post this picture."

She's on blood pressure medicine and it seems to be working. I had to get the prescription filled at my local CVS. They asked if I had insurance for it, and they didn't even look at me funny when I told them it was for my cat. Makes me wonder how often that happens.

Over the weekend, I was trying to do the hand stitching on Big Blue. The crabby girls had a different idea.


"This is pretty comfy. We approve."

I had to change the water in my aquarium, too. I left the linen cabinet door open so I could grab more towels when I needed them.


"Max was right, it's cozy in here!"

Quilt Camp, special edition

Those of you who've been reading this blog for a while know that I usually go to the NEORQC Getaway in February. Unfortunately, this year the Getaway was canceled, so we went to quilt camp instead.

The trip started with some shopping:



My friend Beth and I stopped at the Fabric Peddler quilt shop in Wadsworth on the way to camp. If you recall, I've had a skunk in my yard for the last couple of years. So when I saw a sample bag made with skunk fabric, I had to have it. The bag wasn't for sale, so I had to buy the pattern and fabric. The other fabrics just jumped in my bag. I have no idea how that happened.

We stayed in a different building than we're usually in. The sleeping rooms are a little smaller, but bonus of this building is that we didn't have to go outside for meals. When it's February in Ohio, that is a very big bonus.

I love quilt camp. Three days of sewing with my friends:



Another view:


Note overflowing snack table

Friday night I put the binding on.....


Big Blue!!

I got it back from the quilter on Tuesday and I achieved my goal of getting the binding on the front of the quilt this weekend. As a bonus I was able to sleep under it. I just have to make a label and get the binding stitched to the back before the quilt show in April.

The rest of the weekend I spend working on these little beauties:



The pink and black one on the left isn't done. I have to applique the pieces in the center and corners. The one next to it has 49 pieces in it. I sewed a total of 181 pieces on my Dear Jane blocks this weekend. I was a very productive, if I do say so myself.

Before I left, I had some help with my packing.


"I'll hold this down for you, Mama!"

The thrill of victory....

It's taken me 17 days, and it's about a month later than I needed it, but I finally finished something this year.



And a close-up:



This Christmas tree skirt has been sewn and basted, waiting to be quilted for at least 2 years. Probably more like 3 or 4. Want to know how long it took me to quilt it? About 4 hours, plus another couple of hours to bind it. I'm pretty sure I could have found 6 hours in 3 or 4 years to finish it. No, I don't have an explanation for it, either. Oh well, it's done now.

I had lots of help while I was quilting it.


"Mama, stop moving my quilt around!"


"And if you don't stop, I'll get you with my laser eyes!"

...and the agony of defeat.

As you know, I've been waffling about the Karira socks. I thought I'd finish them and see if they fit me. If they didn't fit me, I was going to see if they fit someone else and if that didn't work out I was going to get some nice sock blockers and hang them on the wall.

But then I was working on them last night and I decided I just couldn't finish them if I wasn't going to be able to wear them. So I took them off the needles, soaked them and put them on sock blockers to dry. I tried them on and have decided that they are just not going to work as socks. The yarn is too pretty to just hang on the wall, so I'm thinking that I'll rip them back to before the linen stitch heels (that took forever to knit) and make fingerless mitts out of them.


I think they'll look pretty good as mitts

I haven't had the nerve to actually rip them back yet. Maybe later this week.

This doesn't have anything to do with anything, but have you ever cut into a pepper and found a little one inside?


Pretty cool, huh?

And in cat news there's been quite a bit of male bonding and brotherly love going on here.


"This is a pretty cool basket Mama left out for us"


Hanging out on the chair


"I love you, little brother"

Got Egg Nog?

Christmas is over and you might have a bit of leftover egg nog in your fridge. If you've had your fill of drinking it, you could use the leftovers for cookies.



You can find the recipe here. I opted to not use the icing, but added 1 cup of Craisins to the dough. They're nice and soft, and the egg nog isn't overwhelming, so if you're not really a fan of it, don't worry.

In keeping with the food theme, I made a pot of chicken soup the other day from leftover chicken and broth that was in the freezer.


No shortage of chicken here, folks.

I promised to share the knitting in this post, so I'll start with the finished objects, since they're more interesting.

First up, my Noro striped scarf. This is not new to anyone who reads knitting blogs, but I really enjoyed making it. I used two different colorways of Noro Silk Garden yarn and followed the instructions here.



I only cast on 31 stitches, since I prefer a narrower scarf, and I only used one skein of one color, and a little more than a skein of the second color so it's not terribly long. But I'm not one of those double-it-up-and-pull-it-through people, so it's fine.

The next two were made from kits I got at Studio Knit in Medina, OH.


Adorable little Santa hat - needs stuffing or something, I think


Isn't this the cutest thing EVER?

They were pretty quick knits. The hat I started and finished in one evening. The snowman took a little longer, since it was more involved. I did the accessories one evening and the body another. I liked these so much I bought some yarn to make more of them.

I'm still slogging away on the Karira socks.


They're a little farther along than this now.

They are taking forever. Probably because they are linen stitch and charted lace that I can't really memorize. And I've been knitting those other projects and sewing a couple dozen fiddly grocery bags.

Plus, my heart isn't really in them anymore. Once I got the heel turned, I tried them on and I could barely get them over my ankles. One of my friends is a designer and she said her latest pattern was pretty tight as she was knitting it, but it stretched a bit when she washed and blocked them. I have hope that I'll actually be able to wear these when I'm done. If not, I'll either find someone very sock-worthy to give them to, or get some pretty sock blockers and hang them on the wall as art. The yarn is gorgeous and they're my first lace socks. I can't bring myself to rip them back and I would never start them over, at least not as written. If I did, I'd do 1x1 ribbing on the back panel, I think. I like the way the linen stitch looks (it's on the back of the heel), but I'm not a fan of knitting it.

I also started a new project.


Warm Thoughts from Decorator Throws to Knit

This is knitting up a lot faster than the socks, and I like how it's striping. The yarn I'm using comes in 50g balls, and I'm holding it double, so it's been entertaining trying to keep the pattern repeats more or less together. I have lots of little bits and balls of various colors lying around. I'll probably make cat toys with them later. My only concern is that it isn't superwash wool, so I'm going to have to be very careful when I wash it.

I've been on vacation the last two weeks, so Emma has spent quite a bit of time on my lap. In fact, she's here now. Who cares if there's a laptop there, she just squeezes her way in. The other day, I was laying on the couch and she was using me as a kitty bed. This doesn't look comfortable at all, but it must have been, since she stayed that way for quite a while.


"Yes, my head and back feet are going different directions. What of it?"

Oh, and Happy New Year, everyone! A lot of my friends had a pretty rough 2010, and I'm hoping that 2011 is kinder to them.

Update Number One

Okay, I have about 6 weeks of stuff to catch up on, right? I'm going to start with the non-knitted stuff today, and I'll do the knitted stuff next time.

In the sewing department, it's mostly been about the grocery bags. You might remember that I cut out a boatload of them a while back. Well, I finished the first batch of them, but was a bad blogger and didn't take a picture of them. I gave most of them away to my family at Thanksgiving.

Then I made some more and did get a picture.



Aaaannnnnd a bunch more....


Some of these were done and have been pictured before.

I gave nearly all of these away to friends and John's family for Christmas. I'm definitely taking a break from making grocery bags for a while. I got a bunch more fabric out of my stash, though.

Sometime just after Thanksgiving, I got an unexpected package from St. Martin's Press with this inside.



That would an advance copy of Jonathan Maberry's latest Joe Ledger novel! It doesn't come out till March, but I have a copy now. I read the first two Joe Ledger books (Patient Zero and The Dragon Factory) and really enjoyed them. I went to the website and put my name on a list for a chance to get the book early, and they picked me! I currently have a couple of library books to finish (one of which is overdue), but then I'm looking forward to checking this one out. Thanks, St. Martin's Press!

Earlier this year, I joined a group that meets every Thursday night to knit. I LOVE this group. They are funny, inspirational and occasionally a bad influence on me. I have purchased a lot of yarn this year from and and because of them. But you should see the great stash I have! :) The second weekend of December, we had a Christmas party, with tons of good food and prezzies! Each of us brought food and enough stocking stuffers for everyone else. After we stuffed ourselves with the food, we opened our stockings. This was my contribution:


Tissue holders made with fabric that looks like knitting

We got some really excellent stuff! I didn't take any pictures, but Pam and Andrea both blogged about it. My foot is the one in the solid green sock in the pictures on Pam's blog. It was loads of fun. We had a pajama/Festivus party the night before Christmas Eve, with a Festivus Pole and Airing of Grievances. We skipped the Feats of Strength, but it was a good time. What a great group of people. I haven't known them long, but I love them to pieces.

Santa was very good to me. In keeping with the bag theme I've had going lately, I got some great bags for presents.

First, John gave me this:


A Namaste Newport bag in Hollywood Pink. The little knitted bag was one of my stocking stuffers. It matches well, doesn't it?

Then my friend S. in Massachusetts sent me this one, also pink:



Isn't this great? It's made from a chicken feed bag. S. and her family raise chickens, so I'm sure there's no shortage of these bags at their house. It will be perfect for carrying around my latest project, which I'll show you next time. I'm going to show it to Andrea. It might be something she could sell at the farm once they open the shop.

Yesterday I got together with some other friends for craft day and more food. Two of us knit while the third one sewed. She gave me this.



A little pouch with this inside:


The storage pouch clips to a D-ring inside the bag

How cool is that? J. and S. are going to trade each other for their bags, since S. is part of this group, but now lives in a different state. I've known these friends a lot longer than my new knitting friends, but I love them to pieces, too!

In other news, I was on vacation all of last week and this week. Today I'm catching up on all the Christmas DVDs I didn't get to watch before Christmas. It's going to be really hard going back to work on Tuesday.

The cats have enjoyed my being home during the day, too.


"We love the heated kitty bed."

Next time: Knitting!