Crafty Heiffer

Didn't I tell you they were cute? And how 'bout these:
I think I'm falling in love with my embroidery machine again. Not that I'm abandoning the knitting. But the cool thing about the machine is that I can just kind of sit and monitor it, change the thread colors when it tells me to, and while its doing its magic thing, I can knit! I had the most fun this past weekend doing just that. And my mom cam over Sunday afternoon and I helped her with the bedskirt we're re-working for the Tot's 'big girl' bed. And did I tell you about the 1/4" hemmer? I forgot how much fun that little gadget is! All you have to do is feed the fabric through the presser foot and it neatly curls it under and stitches it down to make a very tidy 1/4 inch seam. I can't believe I forgot about that.

I didn't pick up a starving Tot today after school. But I did get a worn out one. I signed her out at 5:05 and she was asleep by 5:10. Husband thinks this might be a problem. He's crazy. Do not listen to the crazy man. A nap after a long day is every adult's fantasy. The Tot did turn into a bottomless pit as soon as we got home though. I heard a rumor that this type of behavior has been known to last through to the college years. Please tell me it was a rumor. 15 more years of that? Holy cow! And she's so small.

You Are My Sunshine

Don't get me wrong, I am most grateful for the rain we've been getting the past few days. A little sunshine would be helpful if I'm going to have any pictures to post this week though. I have some machine embroidery to show off. I got me a new pattern disk and I love it! Farm animals, of course. And barns. How quaint, huh? Oh, and did I mention the sheep? And the goat? And the jack-ass? I can see that one coming in handy on some Husband boxers or something.

Anyway, I did some cute little dish towels for a gift basket. I think they look nice.

So today was the Tot's first FULL day of school. I really, really like this school. You know how she napped after the first day? She slept ALL THE WAY HOME today. 45 MINUTES!!! And, she went to bed at 8:00. Woo Hoo! Okay, the sleeping isn't the only thing I like about her school, but it is a huge mark in the positive column. But I am curious, did God pre-program all young children to respond the same way after a few hours away from their parents? "I'm hungry!" Not "I'm so happy to see you!" or "How was your day?". Okay, so sometimes I do get "I'm so happy to see you!" closely followed by "I'm hungry!". But GEEZ!!! You'd think she's starving to death all the time. I can hardly imagine what it will be like when she gets some size to her and can open the fridge by herself. Good grief! She ate half a ham and cheese sandwich when she got in the truck (before the nap) and started eating again as soon as we got in the house. (there was a short break in the eating during bathtime too, but it didn't even last long enough to get her dressed again before she was back at the table) The metabolism of the very young is amazing, isn't it?

How Was It?

I'd say the first day of school went well. What do you think?

Any day that we get a nap is a very good day.

Picture Perfect Weekend

A little machine embroidery: I didn't photo the whole thing since it wouldn't have shown up very well. This is a hooded baby towel with the little guy's name on it. These are super-easy to put together and they turn out really cute. (and they don't have to fit, and there's no pesky guage to worry over)

Then there's the yarn that I dyed a week or so ago and just got around to re-skeining: Very Christmas-y. Not my intention. Still, it might make some cute felted mittens, maybe fingerless-glovey things. If I can find a pattern that's easy enough I might try it. Then there's this other yarn that is still in balls:

Felted slippers? I'd prefer to do felted clogs, but I'll have to see what I can find. And if I find a good easy pattern, my new Shrinky Dink stitch markers could come in handy:

I know, I don't get good detail with my camera. The tiny ones on the right will be stitch markers-I ran out of jump rings. And the fishy ones on the left are charms for a bracelet thee Tot picked out for her Gran. And the ones in the middle are little tags for the Tot's school gear. I've got some more with her name on them, but she's been playing with them and they are missing right now. I really like the Peter Rabbit one.

Knitting Vacation

Not exactly a vacation...more like a forced separation from my knitting. I have completed a few very worthwhile goals last week. We had a workday at the school the Tot will be starting at later this week. That was fun. No, really, it was. And I got to meet some of the other parents, so I feel alot better about her going off into the wild blue un-known now. I don't expect it to be as difficult for her as it is for me.

So now, on to the non-knitting:
Okay, so maybe not. I'm having some trouble loading my pictures. I'll try again tonight.

Anybody else remember 'Shrinky Dinks'?

Not Dead

But not knitting all that much either. Well, that's not exactly true. I knitted some over the weekend, but I think I need to give my hand a little rest for a day or two. It could be the lace knitting that's making it sore. I hope not since I'm only three inches and not quite a whole pattern repeat into the scarf. It's not a hard pattern, but it does require some attention (and a sticky note to mark which row I'm on doesn't hurt either).

I think I've dyed all the yarn I have available and now I'm considering the roving. I haven't got any pictures of what I dyed last week-I need to re-skein about 7 ounces of it anyway. It was the 'wool blend'. I don't really do any felting- I tried before. But this batch really seemed like it wanted to be felt. I may look online for a good (easy) pattern for some felted slippers or mittens. I was going to put most of my newly dyed yarn on E-bay or Etsy, but I think I'll hold off until I can experiment with the felting again. As if I need more stash yarn. (what I need are some more bins to stash the stash yarn in).

Acryllic?

Yeah, but you can't really fault the fiber choices of the very young. They don't understand any more than husbands do, so I'm cheatin' on the wool this weekend.

This will be a throw pillow for the Tot's new bed. One day. I also did a little dyeing and even though my pictures didn't turn out great, my yarn did.
This is Superwash merino that I got from Stick Chick's Etsy shop. I'll try to find the link and post it on the sidebar. She's got some really nice stuff. And a pretty good selection of undyed yarn too. She also had some roving, but I'm pretty well stocked up on that for now. I dyed a little of the light worsted I got on Ebay, but this picture most definitely isn't true to color. It's really a pretty combination with the blue-green and purple. I re-skeined it after it dried and I liked the color mix alot better. I also ran it through the yardage meter and I think it's enough for a scarf if I decide to keep it (380 yds). I can't wait to see what it looks like knitted up.

It looks kind of brown and tourquoise here, doesn't it? Hmm, I think I like that color combination too.

"More Wool?"

Asks the Husband.

Me: "Yes. Just a little."

Husband: "Why do you need more?"

Me: "I just do."

Me again: "Why do you need another deer head on the wall?"

Husband: "Oh, yeah. "

Actually, he's pretty tolerant of the fuzzy stuff in places it doesn't belong. And he certainly understands about having a hobby that you're obsessed with. That doesn't mean I can't still nag him about the banjo thing.

So this is what I got yesterday:
The two smaller lighter colored skeins in front are a very light fingering weight (almost lace weight) superwash merino. Unbelievably soft. Yum. It is already dyed and hanging in the bathroom right now. I don't know if I'll be able to part with it. The other wool is about a pound of non-superwash mystery wool. Not that soft, but it's not too bad either. It does have a strong odor. Even the Tot said so. It will need a little more washing, but I did dye a little last night, and it takes color very well. I don't particularly like the colors I used, but that's my fault, not the yarn's.

And here is some proof that I have knitted a little this week:

That is my heel-less sleeping sock from the 'Vintage Socks' book. Yep, my heel-less sock has a heel. I just couldn't do it. I think tube socks are an insult to the process of hand-knitting a sock. And that is some KnitPicks sock yarn that I'll be using to make a few Christmas socks with.

Melissa mentioned on her blog about the fuzz-factor of some of the dye-your-own yarns from KnitPicks. I noticed that too, even when I've tried to be extra-special careful about the tempurature and agitation. I haven't had that issue with anything that was superwash, so I guess that's the deal there. Still I love just about ALL of the stuff I've ever got from KnitPicks, and now they have some new dye-your-own stuff that I just HAVE to try! (and they've got super-wash now too)