Just call me the bag lady!

I've spent the last 3 days at the sewing machine making bags for my Mom to bring back to NY with her. The shop she helps out at is going to be at a fiber festival in September (and the owner said she would sell my bags and handspun yarn!) and a few people at the shop have expressed interest in buying the box bags I've been making. A few even placed "special orders"!

So here they are, in all their glory:

The lone bag to the right is actually fairly large. I had a couple of really long zippers and decided to see what would happen if I used the entire fat quarter (well, 1 for the outside and 1 for the lining). It would make a great shoe bag for traveling and would hold 4 or 5 (possibly more, I haven't actually tried it yet) skeins of yarn.

I learned quite a bit during all of this sewing, and have a pretty good system down for making multiples of the same thing. For example, I learned that I despise using the zipper foot for sewing on zippers. I am physically unable to sew in a straight line while using the zipper foot. I also realized after making 10 bags, that I could just use the regular presser foot and it made top stitching the zipper about a million times easier. I'm sure there is some cardinal rule of sewing forbidding the use of a regular presser foot while sewing on zippers, but I'm going to ignore that rule for now.

I have a huge amount of respect for people who have time to sew things for their home and kids or for an etsy shop and do all of this while raising kids, cooking, and cleaning. I didn't do a shred of housework for 3 days, though I did manage to cook dinner each night and scrounge up lunch each day. It's tiring being this crafty!

Here's a few more pictures of the finished bags:

The drawstring bags need some tweaking, I think. I lined them because I like the sturdiness it gives them, but all the fabric at the top it makes it harder to cinch it closed. I'm thinking a new design of some sort is in order.

I haven't done a single stitch of knitting since we got home Sunday night. But, now that the bags are done I can refocus on knitting. I really want to finish up my Mom's Tea Leaves cardigan and get started on the sweater for Seth's Dad. And, holiday knitting really needs to be started. Yikes.

My parents arrive tomorrow, but I'll try and update while they are here!

Love,
liz

Blueberries!

Last Friday Seth and I went down the road to a local blueberry nursery (blueberry patch? blueberry grove?) to pick some blueberries for jelly and smoothies. We ended up picking 16 pounds of blueberries which took me several days to wash and freeze (you can only fit so many cooling racks of blueberries in the freezer at a time, you know?!).  Since well before blueberry season started Seth has been asking for "Blueberry Buckle".  So....Friday night while Seth was at work I found a blueberry buckle recipe and whipped one up. It was super easy, and came out pretty well (according to Seth, anyways). I didn't get around to taking a picture until yesterday...

I also made some blueberry jelly with the recipe from the Sure-Gel box...I ended up with 6 small jars:

I also have a bit of knitting and spinning to share. I finally finished up a pair of socks that I started at the beginning of the month. Hand knit socks are wonderfully comfortable, but I have second sock syndrome.   I love knitting the first sock, but then I have a hard time motivating myself to start and finish the second. I think I need to learn the "2 socks at a time" method. Anyways.....here they are in all their glory:

Pattern: Chicklets Sock by Anne Hanson 

Yarn: Socks that Rock Medium weight by Blue Moon Fiber Arts

Modifications: None. But if I were to knit these again, I would make the leg part smaller, but keep the foot circumference the same size for a better fit on the leg. 

This is a great sock pattern that is easily memorized and has just enough texture without being over the top (the yarn does a fine job with that!). 

Please don't look too closely at the "cankles" I have going on....

This picture shows the texture of the pattern pretty well:

I also finished spinning up some merino today. It's the thinest yarn I've spun yet, it ended up as about 300 yards of fingering weight:

(check out my huge daisies!) 

Seth and I are flying back East tomorrow to attend a wedding in Vermont (yay!)....our friends Elizabeth and Ben are getting hitched! We're taking a little trip up to Maine before the wedding to see some friends and of course stop at Purl Diva yarn shop (what's a visit to Maine without stopping?!)! I'm sure I'll have lots to post about when we return next week! 

Love,

liz 

Glad You're Alive!

Before I tell you about our weekend at Da Vinci Days....

1. Wow! You're moving back to New England! Now you can knit lots of warm things to wear during winter! I'm actually going to be home in October....we'll have to plan something!

2. Creepy about your wallet. ugh. Sorry you had to deal with that.

3. The birthday dress for baby Charlotte is ADORABLE!!!! Even as she grows too tall to wear it as a dress, she could wear it as a super cute shirt.

4. Love the vest you are going to make! It's actually similar to the one I made (Kristen Kapur's designs are lovely and really well written). I highly recommend checking out this post on Purl Diva's blog about organizing all the charts. I did something similar and it was really helpful to have until I had the pattern memorized. Also check out this post, also by Purl Diva.

5. I don't like rhubarb. The smell.....ew. We actually had some in our yard and Seth's Mom used it to make strawberry rhubarb pie.

6. Which Ysolda book were you thinking about buying? I have Whimsical Little Knits I and II. They both have great patterns in them. She also has a book coming out in September called Little Red in the City which will be all sweater patterns. You could also just buy individual patterns on ravelry if there are certain ones you want.

7. Weekend Sewing is a good book. It has a lot of cute dresses and kids stuff in it, but I've honestly only made the drawstring bags so far. I'm not brave enough to attempt any garments yet! I think the PJ pants will probably be my first garment, though.

Phew.

Corvallis has a festival every summer called Da Vinci Days, which is a science and art festival. The big event of the weekend is the Grand Kinetic Challenge. Kinetic sculptures are built to ride on roads, climb sand dunes, ride through mud, and float down the river. It's kind of hard to explain....so maybe some pictures will help! :)

Friday the sculptures were judged and the teams had to sing their team song. On Saturday there was a parade of the sculptures along with unicycle riders, electric cars, and solar powered cars. We caught a little bit of the parade while we were biking around town. A few hours after the parade the sculptures take off down the race course, which is mostly on the bike path. Tons of people take off on their bikes to ride along. The sculptures stop at the fairgrounds and have to climb a sand dune before continuing on the race course.

Here's one of the sculptures waiting in line at the sand dune:

Here is the lobster climbing the dune:

Some more sculptures:

This guy has participated in the race for a number of years, and you could tell. He flew right up the sand dune with absolutely no problems.

On Sunday, the sculptures had to ride through a mud bog and then go 2 miles down the Willamette River. I was going to try and catch all of the Sunday festivities, but I ended up skipping the mud portion. It was pretty entertaining to watch the sculptures come down the river, though!

Crazy, huh?!

Well, I have some foodie things to share, but I haven't uploaded the pictures yet. I'll post tomorrow with those :)

Love,
liz :)

I'm Alive

So much to tell you.

First.  I've officially resigned as of September, so I'm going to be making my way east with absolutely no plan outside of
1. find gainful employment
2. maintain health insurance coverage
3. be close to a certain boy i'm quite fond of and of course the family (including the cutest namesake ever)

So, that's terrifying and exciting and every emotion all rolled into one- especially because i'm working on saying my goodbyes to families and campers as they come through the doors.  I'm kind of praying for a miracle.

Second.  Last week my wallet got stolen from my car at work by a camper parent.  There is a special place in hell for people like her.  I'm quite convinced.  She took and used my credit card, debit card and a check totaling close to $1000.  This made for a stressful and ridiculous week of feeling totally violated and seriously inconvenienced by all the paperwork and bologna that accompanies fraud.

Third.  I FINISHED BABY C'S BIRTHDAY DRESS!

It's so cute I can't handle it.  And the little chubs better stay little long enough to wear it.  That's all I'm saying.

I also taught one of my friends, Jenna, how to knit with this pattern:  I'll post pictures when she's finished.

I'm going to get started on my next project as soon as the yarn arrives in the mail.  It's for Drew, another camp friend.  He wants a "new englandy vest" so we chose this one  with a really pretty tweed from Webs.  This is the same pattern as Dad's father's day vest, so I'm hoping to work out the kinks on a smaller version before the summer is out...

We haven't had much time off this second half of the summer (kids left yesterday, volunteers are here today, kids show up tomorrow), so I'm trying to capitalize on my down time by keeping the house relatively clean (my new year's resolution of emptying the dish washer and trying to keep the sink free from dishes is going surprisingly well!).

In cooking news I made a rhubarb fool last week.  Do you like rhubarb?  This is delicious and terribly easy.  You cut up the rhubarb in one inch chunks, stick them in a rimmed baking sheet with a healthy coating of sugar and keep them in a 450 oven for 20-30 minutes.  They turn to mush with syrupy goodness... which of course you mix with homemade whip cream... and call it a day!  I have also put it over ice cream.  Equally delicious :)

This totally isn't my picture, but gives you an idea of how AWESOME it is.

Okay, off again to do orientation.  Please know I love your posts.  They make me smile till I have time to do crafty things again!  

PS.  Ysolda Teague book- worth buying?   Could I borrow the Ishbel pattern?  Also, weekend sewing?  Any good?  I've looked at it a bunch and know that I"m getting grandma's old singer, so we shall see :)

LOVE!!! 

Charlotte 

Rainbow Hat and Mitts

Remember this yarn?

I had just enough to knit up a hat and fingerless mitts. I feel kind of like an 8 year old wearing them, but I think they're fun nonetheless.

Pattern: Twisted Toque from 60 Quick Knits

Modifications: I made the hat quite a bit shorter than the pattern called for. My finished product is about 2 inches shorter than the hat in the pattern. 

For the mitts, I wanted a simple pattern that would show off the stripes. 

Pattern: 75 Yard Malabrigo Fingerless Mitts by Jeanne Stevenson

Modifications: I made the cuff longer than called for in the pattern

Was that enough pictures for you? :) 

Off to go blueberry picking!

Love,

liz

Hand Dyeing!

I successfully (well, it appears successful so far) dyed some Polwarth roving this weekend! I initially planned to take lots of photos during the process, but the rubber gloves and fear of getting dye on my camera sure didn't help the taking of photos. 

My rubber gloves were pretty sexy:

Here's my fiber in it's vinegar bath before dyeing:

And, here are my base dyes (although I only used the blue...):

I used three shades of blue to dye the roving and then wrapped it in a plastic bag and steamed it. 

This is what it looked like when it was finished:

I haven't spun it up yet, but I'll be sure to share when I do! 

I knit up a cute hat from the Polwarth yarn from the last post, but I don't have any pictures yet. It was dark by the time I finished it today, but hopefully tomorrow I'll get a shot. 

In other news, something is chowing down on my garden again. UGH.

Notice how lovely my zucchini plant looks as well as the cauliflower plant to the left:

The cauliflower now has 1/2 of a leaf left. That's it. And the pest that keeps eating the garden also ate one of the huge zucchini leaves and left a wee bit of stem. There are no noticeable holes in the fence. I'm baffled. And frustrated. 

I think that's all the new stuff I have to show off, but I should have more soon!

Love,

liz

Spinning, Spinning, Spinning

Spinning. That's basically all I've been doing since my last post. Why, you ask? Because it has been too gawd-awful hot to do anything but sit inside my house (which resembles a cave during the day) and spin. I've been knitting a few rows here and there, but it's hard to do when the yarn is sticking to your fingers. 

I know, I know. I shouldn't complain about the 4 days of 95+ degree temperatures we've been having. Especially since you deal with it all summer! But after a rainy, cold spring, it was a bit of a shock to my system! 

Well, enough complaining about the heat. Onto the spinning progress!

This is a Merino/Silk/Angora blend that took me a few days to spin up:

The July Wool-a-long breed is Polwarth. I ordered some "Perchance to Knit" roving from The Loopy Ewe and it arrived on Thursday. It was so lovely that as soon as I ripped open the package, I took it over to the spinning wheel and started spinning!

It started off as this:

And it turned into this:

Which eventually turned into this:

I ended up with about 200 yards of worsted weight yarn. I'm thinking of using it for a hat or a pair or mitts. Or possibly ankle socks. 

I've been watching the TV show Bones on Netflix on the Wii while doing all of this spinning, and I thought of you today while I was watching! There was a Patty Griffin  song on during one of the episodes...."Rain", I think. I'm really enjoying Bones....fits right in with my obsession with crime shows. 

I spent a bunch of time today going to the local thrift store, Goodwill, and a few other places collecting the things I need to try hand dyeing fiber and yarn! Since it will be horribly hot again tomorrow, I'm going to try solar dyeing outside instead of boiling things in my kitchen. I'll report back and let you know how it goes!

Well, I'm going to try and get a bit of knitting done before bed! 

Love,

liz 

Goodale Cardigan

I just put the finishing touches on my Goodale Cardigan today, and I'm really pleased with the way it turned out. Plus, it only took a week to knit....can't beat that!

Pattern: Goodale Cardigan by Cecily Glowik MacDonald

Yarn: MadelineTosh Pashmina in colorway Byzantine 

less than 2 skeins

Modifications: Instead of increasing every 8 rows on the body, I increased every 10 rows to make the   body longer. The finished pattern measurements were not long enough in the torso, so this made it a little less than 2 inches longer, which ended up being perfect.

This little sweater is fabulous! You can dress it down:

Or, dress it up:

I picked out some cute pewter buttons, but they might be too heavy for the light fabric. I'll have to wear it a bunch and see what I think.

I've also been spinning quite a bit for the Tour de Fleece on Ravelry. Basically, the idea is to spin a little bit each day that the Tour de France is happening. 

Here's my latest yarn, 200 yards of 100% merino wool:

I've cast on for a pair of Chicklets Socks yesterday, and I'm trying to decide what my next big knitting project will be. 

In other news, my garden is coming around and it looks like I'll at least have some zucchini, radishes, and green beans. And at least 1 tomato. Certainly not the lush garden I had imagined, but I've learned a lot. For example, I learned that I have evil garden-eating animals in my yard that chew through plastic fences and take down tomato plants. 

More spinning pictures to come soon....

Love,

liz