Another Outfit for La!

I finished this last night:



She's planning to wear it to my cousin's college graduation next weekend. La was inspired by an episode of Caillou where he wore a suit that was shorts and a vest and wanted to have dressy clothes that looked like that. My mom made my sister and I suits when we were about La's age, a jacket, pants and a skirt. Mine was dark green velour and my sister's was navy blue. We each got to pick out our buttons - I went with shiny white with a gold eagle and gold trim. Becky picked yellow that was reminiscient of honeycomb.

I wanted to find a similar pattern, and it took some doing, but this did the job.

The vest is a little wonky - I sewed it when I was coming down with a cold. But the shorts came out perfectly (I was feeling better by then). The buttons are ones that La picked out a long time ago during a trip to the fabric store.

I'm pleased to report that I sewed them on mostly right side up. They are somewhat askew, though. I had my design consultant come over and space out the buttons for me, but they strayed somewhat from the original plan. And I didn't make the button holes quite big enough.

Here's a look at what's left in the work area after I tidied up a little.


I think I need to get working on the Monkey's quilt top next. Needed to cut more strips before I could really get going on it again. I still haven't figured out what to put on the back of the feedsack quilt, but at least all of the choices are washed now. I bought myself a shorts/capri pattern and want to get going on that too.

The bathroom should be painted this weekend. We may or may not like the color. And after that, the light fixture and towel bars. Then it'll be mostly done. Pictures when there's something new to see. :^)

Has it been a week already?

Well, here's what I've been up to.

1. I finished the mittens for La. She wore them to school as soon as they were washed. Highs in the 80's.

They were made from this heirloom yarn. The price tag says $1.09. Neisners. (Which was apparently a chain of variety stores in the northeast, bought by Ames in 1978.) There's not much of the green left and there's only about 1 1/2 skeins of the blue. What has La asked for? A coordinating scarf. How can you not love that?


2. Magic 28 Socks. Norma's recipe. The left ones are K1C2 creme brulee from Melissa from a long time ago. I still love that yarn. Like butter. The blue are secretly turquoise. Cascade 220 and orange Lamb's Pride. The blue ones are bona fide Magic 28 socks. The green are "fudge it 30" because I couldn't wait for the recipe and I had a genuine 4 year old next to me. I am pleased to report that the official Magic 28 sock fits La perfectly. Even better than the one I put together on my own. These two pairs are destined to go the Afghans for Afghans Mother's Day campaign. La almost staked a claim on the blue/orange pair. In my head that pair has been nick-named the "fins-fans socks".

I've also been doing some sewing. Hopefully I'll have a FO to show off by the end of the week. When I unearth my sewing machine.

Patons SWS

Here's what I made with my 2 skeins of Patons SWS in Natural Geranium (in reverse order).

1. A roll-brim hat. Size 9 needles, 64 stitches. Approximately 4-6 year old sized. For the Dulaan basket.



2. Voodoo wrist warmers for myself. Well approximately voodoo. Size 9 needles, 30 stitches in 3x2 rib. Modeled by the remote control.


I have to say that I like the yarn. I'm sort of sick of this particular color scheme, but I like the yarn. It's soft. It's sort of squishy, so it doesn't have the same body/ability to hold it's own weight as a generic wool, but it's soft enough to use for a scarf, I think. And I like the color sequences. From what I've read about it, it felts like the dickens and it's pretty easy to end up with something way smaller than expected. So, swatch.

Here's what else I've been up to:


The varigated green spirals in a way that I totally could not have planned. You have to love remainders in a time like this. I also love that it still managed to kind of work on the decreases. I've got a pair of mittens that coordinate in the works - they only need thumbs. It's to replace this set, that I knit last summer on the cruise.

Renovation Watch 2007

The bathroom is now functional! Here's what happened this week.

First: With Grout! We marked where stuff should hang up with blue painter's tape.





Then: With the rest of the plumbing! Now the bathroom is fully functional from a technical standpoint. La took the first bath that night. Notice no shower curtain rod, so the monkey still used the other shower.






Finally: With holes drilled into the tile (and the shower curtain!)



Today was shopping for the bathroom: bath mats, paint (we ended up with a lighter blue. La picked it, and I concured because I kind of thought the match-matchy blue was a little too Smurfy.), and the start of a storage piece for between the sink and toilet. After we paint then we'll hang up the towel bars and move the rest of the way in.

Look Knitting!

I've been doing procrastination projects. Short turn-around, immediate gratification.

My current WIP:
1. DH's sweater (at 10 1/2" for the body. Boring stockinette. Might photograph soon cause it's pretty.)

2. Brown socks for DH. (Frogged recently. Went up a needle size have about 4 rounds done now.)

3. Shetland Triangle (slow going. Each repeat is going to take a bigger and bigger time commitment. Looks like boiled fanny right now anyway.)

Recently completed:



L: Caron Simply soft. Size 9 needles. 80 or 81 stitches (definitely grown-up sized). Swirling decreases at the top (Similar to ChicKnits Beanie). Currently in the charity pile.

R: Elann Peruvian Highland (green), KnitPicks Andean wool (grey), size 7 needles, 72 stitches, decreases similar to Knitty's Half-Dome. For the Monkey, who lost his hat, probably at Boy Scout Camp last summer and so he didn't have a nice wool hat to wear on the survival campout in January.

I should have a review of Paton's SWS soon. (preview: I like it).

Also, am planning on making a new hat for DH. These were his choices. I don't think he told me what he liked out of them, cause I'm sure he doesn't really want me to buy yarn to make a Tulane inspired one that he requested.

*I think throwing the wool on the couch and having another look at it is good to do once in a while (a)there's stuff I forgot I had which is kind of sad, really and (b)I never would have thought of cranberry and spring green together and now I really want to make a cranberry hat with spring green stripes.

Finally, a new hat and mittens set for La is on the horizon. From some snazzy heirloom yarn. I think she lost one or the other when we were in Connecticut for Christmas.

Emergency Blankets!

Do you know the ones? Quilted mylar in an impossibly small package hanging in the camping gear section of the store?

We had emergency blankets of a different kind on Sunday. My nephew's blankets got lost! Flannel recieving blankets that I made for his baby shower. Just ordinary cowboy flannel from Joann's. 1 yard cuts. Turn the edges under twice. zig zag stitch. My brother in law nearly made my sister drive back to Orlando to go get them (he's in charge of bedtime). I got an urgent sounding call from my sister asking if I happened to have any more of the fabric. Only small scraps of the brown. None of the purple.

But I did have a couple yards of the trains from another nephew's quilt! I had intended to make pajama pants for the nephews with it. But this is just as good a use as any, right? Had enough for two blankets. And I can make pants out of the trucks flannel that I've got.



Should get there by noon on Tuesday. And the hotel had the orginals and will send them down also. Can't have too many.

Ironing has commenced.

Happy Easter! (Or, if you don't celebrate Easter, Happy Sunday!)

So, the quilt strips have not only been ironed, but sewn together. Now the next question is what to use for the back. Went through the stash and found some choices. I would love to hear your input. Got opinions from DH, La, and the monkey and they each picked a different one. Frankly, there is no particular recipient yet, which DH points out is why this is a hard question. I do know that it's a "girl quilt" but not sure who it's for exactly.



1. Blue and white striped seersucker. Crisp and summery. Neutral. (DH's favorite)

2. Blue shirting. Sort of like oxford cloth, but a little more slippery.

3. Striped seersucker. Somehow this one has kind of a 70's palette and yet the colors work well with the colors on the front.

4. Blue and yellow flowers. From my grandmother's stash. smooth cotton. might be sheeting. (La's favorite).

5. Pink and red flowers. Terrycloth. From my grandmother's stash. Can't tell if this will be soft and snuggly or not.

6a and 6b. Pink with bouquets and pink with castles and horses and carriages. From my grandmother's stash. Neither are quite big enough to be the back on its own, so would be pieced, probably in wide stripes. (the monkey's pick) At least one of these fabrics has a cerain amount of grunginess that either needs to be cut around or washed out.

I would love to hear your opinion.

It's time to iron!

I've picked up the feedsack quilt again.

Friday Night I finished sewing the big block strips and got this:



Last night I finished sewing up the strips of small blocks. I had it spread out on the floor to see how many more needed to be made. Came back to add in the last two and found this:



Finally got Tiger to move and got this:



For a random design, I am pretty orderly. I really tended to put certain colors next to certain colors because I liked it, so I ended up with green and orange in the center, red, blue, yellow, and purple towards the outside. Sort of disappointing, but not completely unexpected.

Also, my seam allowance seemed to vary widely - making the strips vary. It's going to take a little someting to sew the strips all together and not make it look all higgeldy-piggeldy. I also have to wonder if I had bought the pattern this is based on, instead of reinventing the wheel, how it was supposed to go together (and if it would have been easier or more foolproof).

Next step? Iron the strips (I like to go as far as I can before I HAVE to iron), and put the strips together.

The Jaywalkers are Done!

We went to see my sister and her family this weekend. It was a great opportunity for (a)car knitting and (b)to finish her socks (that I started around Labor Day). Embarassingly, I finished at least 2 pairs for me while I knit her two socks. I worked on them on the drive down and during any spare time while we were there. I finished them up less than an hour after we left their house. Isn't that how it always goes?



Here are the specs: Grumperina's Jaywalker. Lorna's Laces Icehouse.

As much as I was plodding through the first sock, the second really was a lot faster. I think it was all user-issues more than anything. I really like how the socks came out.

Modifications: I suspect the sock is shorter than the pattern and I left 19 stitches on each of the sole needles - I was concerned about width across the foot. So, then since I didn't have matching numbers, I just did a generic toe. I think it would have been worth continuing the zig-zags on the top of the toe because by dropping all of the increases and decreases it made for slightly funky fabric. Not quite the look I was trying to achieve, but not worth worrying about.