Two by two

This arch was practically buried under our wisteria when the tree trimmers got here. I moved it across our yard from near the sidewalk, closer to the house. 

Then, I dug up and replanted two rose bushes that were struggling, underneath that wisteria. The climbing rose on the right reaches just past the curve of the arch. It looks a little feeble compared to it's partner on the left, which wasn't supposed to be a climber at all. Just look at those canes!

Here's the finished whatchamacallit (see previous post).  Look closely. The two loops are connected like links of a chain. 

I had enough Rowan Felted Tweed Aran yarn left for two hats. For the one on the left, I played with color and patterning. For the striped one on the right, I was over it. I didn't feel like designing with bits of yarn, so I used Helix knitting. It's like each yarn makes an upward spiral at the same time as the others. I just kept going until I ran out!

My grandchild, who's already learning to be a monster and tromp around the house, requires appropriate gear. So, I knitted and felted a pair of Bigfoot/Yeti slippers. The pattern is an e-book, Cryptozoology, from Knit Picks. 

Latest Inventory

Wow! It's been four months since I last inventoried my projects. This is not a bad showing!

For this adorable sweater, I followed a pattern from a Sandra magazine dated 2/92.

Little sweaters are so much fun. Don't miss a peek at the buttons!

This triangle-shaped shawl is knit up from my handspun. The lace design is only done on one of the shorter edges. The pattern is "Closer to the Edge" and the fiber is Redfish silk/camel.

Here is another, smaller, knit shawl from my handspun. The fiber is Redfish, silk/yak. 

I swore off socks, but this yarn was in my stash. These socks are knit from the toe up. I taught myself a different technique for the heel, called "short row". It's easy to knit and fits well, too.

And I went back to kindergarten, patterning. Think A B C A B C A... I learned that if I start both socks at color "C", for example, the striping will match! These were made with Berrocco Sox, self-striping yarn!

Somebody liked the hat I made with what was left!!

What to do with leftover sock yarn? These were a variegated and a yellow pair. Now, they're headed (hahaha!) for my drawer of unclaimed items.

I don't often repeat a pattern, but I had more of my very first handspun left and this sheep pillow is so cute! How could I not?

I've made this doggy pattern before, too. 

I found the pattern, 'Mr. Crabby', in a book called Crocheted Softies by Stacey Trock. 'Siegfried, the monkey' is another pattern from Edward's Menagerie. 

Currently, I'm knitting a garment, 'Fyvie', from Rowan Knitting and Crochet Magazine Number 68. The photo on the left was taken just before I ripped out about 40 rows. (That's 224 stitches per row.) The one on the right is Take Two. I can see the difference, and it mattered to me.

I decided to play with my new to me, antique Singer sewing machine. A few months ago, I drove all the way over the hill to a Not big box fabric store to buy cloth for a denim skirt. I took this picture during a break between cutting and tantrum-ing. The cloth was sun damaged and crooked (the warp and weft weren't square). 

What does one do when they're alone (I didn't think I could ask the nurses), without a swift and ball-winder and the yarn hasn't been skeined, yet? Knees!

Here's my current spinning Zen. This is another Redfish fiber from my stash, silk/baby camel.

Someone posted that she was selling 19 pounds of yarn at less than half price. I couldn't talk me out of it. 

Now, Julia and I are making some towels. We will probably continue to make towels for the forseeable future!

Each time I've used Sophie's full width and the drawloom, some of the edge threads repeatedly get stuck in the up position. On the left side of the picture, you can see the vertical threads all scrunched together. I spoke with Joanne Hall. She recommended I move them to the other side of the bars before my next project. 

Here's the same problem from a different view. Do you see the vertical black threads pushed up against the right side of the wooden bar? It took a couple of hours, but I got them moved to it's other side without taking everything totally apart.

And while we're at it, do you see black and white, left-leaning threads at the bottom of the picture? Just behind them are pastel threads tied to white ones. The pastels are the new warp, the white ones were the warp from my previous project. I tied 550 knots to make that happen. Believe it or not (hehe), that was a time saver!

And now, Sophie and I are much happier! We'll be using her full-width to make some more baby blankets! 

Drawer

Is it still de-stashing if it's no longer fiber? Happily, I didn't need to buy any yarn to make these. And now, there's less fiber in my closet stash and on the yarn tree. My drawer of finished objects is getting full, though. Ummm. A different kind of stash?

This cute sweater is a 4T. I made it because I had the yarn, a pattern and some time. Drawer.

With some amazing help from Ravelry (typed messages and suggestions and one woman in PA actually spent over an hour on the videophone with me), I was able to learn how to adjust my drawloom properly. I completed the following baby blankets in record time! The designs I found on Pinterest. I've tweaked all of them, some more than others. None of them had the designer's names attached.

I chain plyed the yarn before I could use it for this weft. This blanket is actually going to our friends' daughter. She and her conductor husband just had a baby! 

There should be a story here. Until someone thinks of one or there's need for the blanket, it's off to the drawer, for now.

I think it's So fun that the bunny has run off the edge!
Hmmm. Maybe I should find someplace other than the drawer, so the bunny doesn't escape. Besides, the drawer is getting FULL!

Finishing

My sister says I've been getting all kinds of things done. She's right. I've been knitting like a fiend. But after the knitting (or whatever), everything tends to sit while I procrastinate over the final step, the finishing.

I wove this rug about three years ago, and we've been getting a lot of use out of it. But the header (the dark navy edge near the fringe) is a cotton that shrank more than the rest of the rug. It was pulling up as if I'd laced a drawstring through the ends.

When I finally figured out why the rug was not laying flat, I decided to try snipping those threads. Voila!

After I'd spun this wool, I Navajo plied it (three ply). I didn't like the way it knitted up, so I had to unspin it. For knitting, it's called a gauge. For weaving, it's called sampling. Either way, if I'd bothered to do this to see how the yarn would behave when knitted up, I wouldn't have ended up knitting three hats and ending up with two. (It's called "frogging". Ripping  out.) Luckily, knitting hats doesn't take much time. Finished!

By the time my LYS closed in the end of January, I'd made some serious inroads into my policy of only buying yarn if I had a project in mind, and a reason for it. I bought Paintbox Knits by Bonnette and Murchland. Then, I purchased the yarn and buttons. This dress is a 2T. I made it just because. Now, I'm building a stash of FOs (as opposed to UFOs---UnFinished Objects).

With the left overs, I made the dress on the left. All of these are 18mos size in Juniper Moon Farm "Neve" (pure Peruvian pima cotton).

And, again with the leftovers, I made this 18 mos size sweater/jacket. All four garments needed to be blocked to be finished.

This sweater sat for about two months before I finally blocked it, along with those baby clothes. I admit to dragging my heels...a lot. But Finally! I'm finished! Of course, now, it'll be too hot to wear the sweater until next winter.

Clean House

This is how I clean my house. If I finish something, a project or a puzzle or a magazine, I can get rid of it. Then, there's one less thing in the "to do" pile!

Years ago, I bought 2 oz of this Friesan Lamb wool in Oregon. I spun it up in just a few hours. I'll probably use it for a dryer ball.

Just last year, I did a spinning and weaving demo for my friend's school. She gifted me with a bag of cotton that they'd grown there. I spent several days picking out all of the plant matter. Doesn't it look squeeze-ably soft?

A five years ago, I cut a warp for a rug, but my math was off. I had twice as many ends as I needed. That warp has been sitting in the "to do" pile. Now, not only have I used up that warp, but two bins of cloth have now been consolidated into one! This pattern is from Handwoven, Summer 1985.

Because I was using up, and actually running out of fabric, you can see where I added some green strips to the blue and light blue to the dark blue. Shocking, I know! By allowing it not to be perfect, I actually learned something! And I'm happy with the results!

With the last of the warp, here's the last of the fabric strips...except the red. There's always more red.

Self soothing to keep calm

With all the goings on going on, I've been self soothing, doing things that make me feel calm.

I finished spinning and plying this 50/50 Silk/Camel blend from Redfish. It is so soft to the touch!

 And the 8oz of fiber I started with is now 800yds of two ply.

After such a long project, it felt good to do a shorter one (and to get something else out of my fiber stash). I spun up 2 oz of Milk fiber, called Casin. I haven't done the math to figure out how many yards it is. 

This pair of socks was from a yarn I picked up at last year's yarn crawl. I taught myself how to do a different kind of heel. It's called a short row heel. I'm definitely going to try it, again!

I'm finally down to just one box of fabric scraps and lengths. Don't ask me how tired I am of these same fabrics. Really. Don't! I went onto Youtube to see how to cut it into continuous strips for weaving.

Right now, I'm using some of it to weave a rug with Sophie. I haven't been completely pleased with my previous rug projects, but practice is how I learn.

When my LYS closed, I picked up a pack of five small skeins of Manos del Uruguay, Fino. It's extrafine merino and silk. I really enjoyed doing the colorwork with this fine yarn.

It was so much fun, that I went ahead and used the other set of colors I'd bought. I ran out of the white with about 10 stitches to go. Can you tell? 

The hat is from a free Ravelry pattern called, "Katie's Kep". Such a lovely crown on this hat!