Cranking Out Some Sweaters

I've been doing a lot of knitting lately making plain raglan sweaters. Why? Because for me they are very easy and relaxing to knit. Miles and miles of stockinette stitch. I also have come to realize that plain pullovers are really what I wear most often in the fall and winter, so I needed to add some to my wardrobe. So here is the black raglan drying. Notice the terrible color quality of this picture.



And here is the green sweater drying. Now take a look to the left - you can see a bit of the black sweater -notice the really nice color quality of the black! What the hell! Why can't I get the black to look that good in the main picture?

Anyway, moving on...



I dug out this old handspun cardigan I started a few years ago and got back into it. I bought this Merino roving from The Fold a few years ago. It is a very soft almost black roving with bits of red and blue in it from Ashland Bay. You should be able to get it from any fiber shop that carries their products. In this picture the color is very accurate.



I still need to spin up the rest of the roving, even though I think I might have enough yarn spun to finish the sweater. And here...the color is way off again.



This is the wool spun up into a two-ply. Again, color is perfect in this shot. Maybe I need to get a book on taking better pictures.

Boomoo the Sloth

I recently received my first fabric order from Spoonflower. If you are not familiar with Spoonflower it is this really cool site where you load your own artwork and have it printed on fabric! It is so much fun and really easy -even those of us that are technically challenged can do it.
I created an account ages ago, but I was a little intimidated by all the other people on the website that are cranking out really wild fabrics, so I spent a long time trying to come up with something suitable to experiment with. Well, lo and behold my 8 yr old son was at the table drawing his current obsession -Boomoo the sloth. I opened up our drawing application on our computer and had him draw Boomoo on there, then I loaded it in the Spoonflower site and ordered a yard of fabric.


The fabric arrived in about 10 days. We are all pretty excited about it even though we didn't do much with color. Now we have to think of something to make with it. Maybe a pillowcase? I will keep you updated.

Awesome studio

We just moved into our new house in the middle of February, and of course it was a nasty, cold, snowy day, but now we are settling in pretty well. There are a lot of special places to hang out like the library, screened in front porch, home theatre room....but my favorite is my awesome new studio. I don't mind bragging about this because if you saw the dungeon I was forced to sew in (for 10 yrs) at the old house, you would agree that I earned this.




It took me a while to get things set up to even this small degree of organization, so I am thrilled to have a nice place with light and no spiders leaping out at me whenever I would pick up a piece of fabric.
My last place was the unfinished basement at our old house which was essentially a dark, dirty, cement box full of huge spiders, crickets, some centipedes, and the occasional mouse.
Needless to say, I didn't get a lot of stuff done there. I would bring my projects upstairs whenever I could, but my sewing machines were down there along with stacks and stacks of bins with all my stash.



Eventually I hope to thin out my stuff and get some cubbyholes on this wall so I can "un-bin" all my yarn and fabric. :)

Blog Do-over

So, I've been reading up on blogs and how to create a better one, which brought to mind this old abandoned blog. Should I start a new one or update this one? I think for the time being I will stay with this one until I get some momentum going. Then probably move to a new one.
I am planning on posting once a week, and will try to post a picture each time. Let me know if anyone is reading this beside my friend at baabins. Ha Ha.

It's about time!

I know - I haven't even looked at my blog since last October. I dropped out of posting way back then because I was starting to work on my family of penguins halloween costumes and just haven't made it back here. So - with the new year starting I am going to try to get back into it. Unfortunately, we only have 2 pictures of us like this - and no side views so you can't see the black part of the costumes very well. They look so much better from the side. Oh well - better than nothing. We had a lot of fun at our friends party, and got lots of comments on the costumes. It was a lot of sewing but well worth the effort. It was also a lot of fabric and other materials - so I would reccommend taking advantage of coupons and sales if you want to try this. I especially liked Zane's grey baby penguin. (that's Dumbo that he is holding).

So, I am trying to make a come back. Happy New Year - a little late, hopefully I'll post again soon.

Ooh beads!

Last Thursday, I was shopping at the JoAnn's fabric store and re-found a very cool bead store on the way home. I had been to Eclectica www.eclecticabeads.com once before years ago, so I decided to stop in again. Wow! I was blown away at the changes. They have expanded the store, have tons of beads, books and just about everything you need for beading. But, the best part is... they now have a studio. You can just walk in, choose a kit, and sit down and make your kit with help from an instructor!
When you buy a kit, you get free instruction if you need it. This is perfect for me, because in the past I have always just bought random beads and materials, not knowing what I was doing, and then I ended up having a bunch of stuff, and no idea how to put it together.
So, now I am all jacked up on a beading high because now I can get help on my schedule! Of course, I walked out of the studio with 3 kits and am planning on going in this week to get help making them. I'll post the pictures.

Finally, I have a free day to blog some more. This morning I went on a picture taking spree around the house, taking pictures of projects I am working on.
While most of these are knitting projects, my main project is my niece’s quilt. I have been working on this little gem on and off (mostly off) for several years now. This quilt was intended as a wedding present for Kerri and SuThanh when they got married FOUR YEARS AGO! Now they have 2 kids! So, needless to say, I really need to get this one done and out of here. It is slow going because I am hand quilting it. Lately, I have been doing a lot – basically forcing myself to work on it every day. It is an Irish chain pattern with a really cool blue/green batik fabric on a white background. The picture doesn’t do it justice. In person, this quilt is really cool. So, anyway that is my number one project.

As for knitting, now that my kids are back in school I got out the polar bear. This is a really fun polar bear rug made with Lion brand Fun Fur and Jiffy yarn. It is from Knit Simple magazine winter 2005 issue. It is fun to knit, and goes pretty fast. It is made by holding 3 strands of fun fur together with 1 strand of Jiffy. It does take a lot of Fun Fur so it is best to watch the JoAnn fabric stores for a sale before buying the yarn. My friend Deanna made two of these for her grandsons, so I got the “wait for a sale” tipoff from her. We both got the Fun Fur when it was $1.00 a skein so that was nice. I did encounter a mistake with the head instructions which is right where I am at now, so I am trying to find the correction on the magazines web site. Deanna fudged the head when she came to the mistake, so if I can't find the correction I'll have to as well. I think I am going to make this one for my son Blais, then I will have to get more yarn and make a different color bear for Zane. I think the hardest part is choosing a color.

Well, not suprisingly, this ate up a lot of time - because I am so technically inept. I finally got the pictures where I wanted them. So I think I'll call it a day. Now I am off to try to figure out how to get the software I don't want off of my Palm, so I can make room for what I do want! And I know it will take me 9 hours to figure it out, but I'll learn something new in the end.