Stitcher's Wallet SAL

Joanie, Sue, Debby and I started our SAL for the Stitcher's Wallet from the March issue of The Gift of Stitching on Friday. This is a photo of my progress. I ordered the fabric from Stitches and Spice in Australia and I love, love, love it. It's quite thick and a pleasure to work with. I am also really liking the Flower Thread floss. It is a single strand product and really gives nice coverage on this 32ct. fabric. I can definitely see myself using this fiber in the future! I am trying to limit my stitching on this piece to Friday's as I have a lot of other projects going on but I think it's going to be tough to resit!

Weekend Work

With some really nice spring weather this weekend, I turned off the heat and opened up all my windows and started some major spring cleaning. I was so motivated on Saturday that I finally sat down and cut out and sewed some panels to hide the storage underneath my butcherblock countertop. This "island" is on wheels and sits next to my stove.



As my house is 87 years old this year, the kitchen is a bit of an awkward space. The previous owners made this rolling island to add much needed counter space.

I used the same fabric that I bought at Walmart last summer that I made kitchen curtains out of. I still have a lot left and I'm planning to sew matching seat covers for the two chairs that I use to eat in the kitchen. This hides the clutter of my "liquor cabinet" and dog stuff that I store under the counter top. I'm pretty pleased with the end result of a weekend's work.

As you can see from this photo taken when I first looked at my house, Casa Pearl has come a long way!

Birthday Exchange Received

I heard over the weekend that my friend Kathy received the birthday exchange package I sent her so it's now safe to share photos. Kathy is a fantastic stitcher and finisher so I was really concerned about my finishing coming out presentable. In typical fashion, I made one slight goof that I didn't realize until the very end. It's not that big of a deal but I meant to have the scissors attach on the side opposite of where they ended up! Oh well, Kathy was happy with the end result and I sent her some Blue Moon STR sock yarn and a cool pattern so I'm sure she'll be another sockaholic before too long! LOL

I have one more exchange that should have reached it's recipient but she was out of town this weekend. I'm hoping I will be notified she got it and then I'll share it.

I hope you had a good weekend - we had a fabulous spring weather weekend and today it was supposed to be in the 80s!! Definitely a fluke for Maine in April but I'll take it. I was very productive over the weekend and put Jemima to work but for some reason I can get my camera to upload the photos I took. I hope to figure that out and I'll share my results tomorrow!

Thanks for the kind comments!

Thanks everyone for your nice comments about my sock. I'm really pleased with the fit and have already started the second sock. I really hope the second one goes faster than the first one!

With all the sock knitting I've been doing lately (seems that's all I'm knitting these days) I was thinking I would really like to have a needle holder for my dpns. I've seen a lot of really fabulous ones in various online knitting shops but I really don't want to shell out that kind of money. So I'm going to make my own using this pattern from the first Stitch n Bitch book and this Amy Butler fabric I bought two years ago for this very pattern. However, I think I'm going to modify it to fit my dpns and then sew one for my straight needles later on. There is some math involved in reducing the pattern so this may take awhile! LOL Stay tuned!

Sweet Sock Success

I persisted!

Bad Knitting Mojo

There's been some bad knitting mojo going around lately resulting in some finishes that didn't turn out quite as planned and some reverse knitting. Last night the bad knitting mojo turned up at my house when I decided that after almost two cable repeats it was safe to try on my sock and see how it was fitting with the cabling. Well guess what? I couldn't get it over my heel because the instep was too tightly knit. Mind you the pattern calls for knitting it on 0 or 00 or even 000 dpns. I knit mine using 1s which is what I got guage with. Major angst ensued as I sat and contemplated all I had accomplished..... and what it meant.

So on my lunch hour today, this sock on the left has become this sock on the right. I ripped back to just before the start of the first cable. I tried it on when I got home and I can now slide it on completely. I have been considering putting it aside and casting on something new but I've decided to hang in there and start the leg again with #2s. But first I'm going to put in a lifeline in case I need to go up another needle size. Ugh, all that time lost. At this rate these socks will never be done!

I sure hope the bad knitting mojo moves on to someone else's house. Although I really don't wish it on anyone personally. By the way, the snow plow just went by. :0(

Hello Spring??? Hello? Hello?

They are forecasting 4-8 more inches of snow starting tomorrow into Friday and more again on Sunday. Today it was probably close to 50 and the pup and I were able to take a walk with me wearing just a sweatshirt. Go figure. So much for spring in Maine. I knew we would pay when it was in the 50s in December.

To try and cheer myself up that spring is actually going to come, I dug out this little Lizzie Kate freebie I stitched last year. I had finished it up to the point of hand sewing the opening closed and then it got stalled. Last night I sewed up the opening and made the tassles and tonight I sewed them on the pillow. It's quite cute and I will put it somewhere prominent in the hopes it will ward off more snow.

Tonight I had some sad news in my inbox - my local scrapbook store is going out of business. The woman who owns it is going to have to declare bankruptcy and may even lose her home. In the email she wrote that it was her dream to own the store but it just wasn't profitable in the year and half that she was the owner. So sad to see someone's dream come to an end. She is of course selling off her merchandise but it seems so awful to take advantage of someone else's misfortune. I have mixed emotions about going in to buy anything even though it might lessen her debt load.

Sock Update

I've been slowly but surely working along on my Blue Moon Sock Club sock. I've finally gotten to the cabling part on the leg and here is my progress so far. When I was in New Hampshire last weekend, I bought Cables Untangled which I found very helpful. The author uses a DPN for her cables and I am doing that as well. I think having a larger needle to work with for my first time doing cables is helpful although it does make it a bit awkward to manage all those DPNs! This book has some really nice projects in it that I plan to try. And she did a great job including drawings of how the needles and stitches look as well as a very good glossary and instructions for reading the different kinds of cable patterns. A bit pricey but worth the money.

Here is a not very great close up of the cables. My camera doesn't have a zoom lens but the color is pretty true in the photos as I caught the last bit of sunshine after getting home and walking the dog.

Hope you had a great Monday!

Happy Easter!

Although looking out the window and being outside today, I'm not convinced it's April. After waking up to 10 inches of snow on Thursday morning, the ground is still pretty covered with snow and it's cold. It was probably in the low to mid thirties today but the wind gave it a wind chill in the 20s. Lovely weather for wearing Easter finery - not!

I stayed in Maine as I was just down at my sister's last weekend. I am glad I didn't make the trip as it was a very productive weekend from a finishing and exchange point. I can't show you pictures yet but I completed the finishing on my April birthday exchange gift and my color exchange piece. I tried to take my time with the finishing - lots of hand sewing and gluing. Despite that I did make a rather large and silly error which I will point out when I know the projects have been received. They are all wrapped and packaged up and ready to go to the post office tomorrow. I'm happy dancing because those are the last exchange gifts I need to think about until November which means stitching time for me! Hopefully that will translate into some finished UFOs and some new starts too!

I also managed to complete one round of cabling on my STR Inside Out sock but didn't get photos in the daylight so I will try to do that tomorrow to show you my progress.

Hope you and yours had a wonderful Easter holiday!

Saturday Stitch In and Sunday UFO Progress

Saturday I went to a stitch in at my friend Nancy's in Massachusetts. We hadn't seen each other since CATS in September so it was really nice to be able to visit. She had quite the full house - 5 other stitchers besides me and it was nice to get together with a large group and see what everyone is working on. I was finally able to give Nancy her birthday gift from December and she gave me this fabulous framed piece as my Christmas gift. I absolutely love it and it will go next to another stitched gift she made me.

While at Nancy's I was able to finish the stitching on an exchange gift - Yippee and then I got out my CHS Dainty House Wren and got some progress made on that. I also focused on this piece Sunday as it was UFO Sunday with my yahoo group. I'm really happy with the progress and I expect to be able to finish the stitching on this by the end of the month. Maybe even the finishing too!

I was also able to finish the heel of my sock but forgot to take a photo. Next up is the cabling on the leg but I will talk about that tomorrow. Hope you had a great Monday!

Time to Start Thinking About Summer

These are the two tank projects I'm eager to get started on. The one on the left is from last summer's Interweave Knits issue and the one on the right is from the color issue of Knit.1. If my tank turns out well, I would really like to sew a skirt using the pattern shown. I'm doing the Interweave Knits tank in the Bamboo yarn called for and for the other I bought some Lion Brand cotton yarn.

Today's mail also brought the Spring/Summer issue of Vogue Knitting. I just quickly paged through it but I can't say as there were a lot of projects that jumped out at me as "must knits". Somehow I just can't see myself walking into work (or anywhere in my town) in the dress on the cover even though I think it's a pretty combination of lace knitting. What do you think?

I drove down to my sister's tonight because I'm going to Nancy's tomorrow for a stitch in and I'm really looking forward to seeing her. It's been waaaay to long. I brought my camera so hopefully I will remember to actually use it! And I hope to get down to Ewe'll Love It to get my cable needles and possibly this book.

Another Good Mail Day

I had two packages waiting for me when I got home tonight. One had these in it: two more pairs of Brittany 5" DPNs I ordered from Patternworks. One pair is for me and the other will be part of a gift that will include at least one skein of the yarn at the left. More yummy Blue Moon Fiber Arts STR lighweight in Thistle and Terra Firma. It will be hard to give one of those skeins away!

Now that I have another full pair of #1 DPNs, I can (theoretically atleast) work on two different pairs of socks at the same time. Now I just need the extra time to fit that in!

Here is a progress pick of my Blue Moon Sock Club sock. I'm itching to start the heel but I need a few more rows of the ribbing to make the fit right. I also need to get some cable needles which won't happen until the weekend when I hope to visit here. I haven't been in this LYS since it moved across Main Street to it's latest location so I'm looking forward to that.

Sounds Like a Stitch A Long

Well, it seems that there are enough of us interested to have an official SAL for the Stitcher's Wallet from the March issue of The Gift of Stitching magazine. Sue, Joanie, Debby and I will all be starting the project once everyone has received their materials. Anyone else want to join us?

I did not get a lot of stitching done over the weekend but I did find out that one of the exchanges I was working on made it to the birthday girl in Germany. This is what I stitched for one of the ladies in my Yahoo group. It's from the February issue of The Gift of Stitching. I was pleased with how it turned out and the recipient seemed to like it.

This weekend I finally fired Jemima up and took her for a test sew. It went so well I got out my border strips for my Turning 20 quilt, sewed them up and then sewed them on! My quilt top is now done. Now I just need to find a large enough flat surface to lay it out and measure it (with the help of a second pair of hands) to figure out how much fabric and batting I need. A friend and work is going to help me with this very soon I hope. I will try to remember to take a picture when it's all spread out.

I also made some progress on my Blue Moon STR sock. I have about an inch to an inch and half left to go on the foot and then I'll be ready to tackle the heel. I'm really happy with the way this is turning out and can't wait to work on it again! And I wound two different yarns into balls for summer tank style tops - one from an issue of Interweave Knits and one from an issue of Knit.1 magazine. I've got to do my gauge swatches but am anxious to get started on something other than a sock!

Sock Progress

This afternoon I took a picture of my very slooooow progress on my Blue Moon STR Sock Club socks. I am hoping to get more time into these next week but with exchange stitching going on, they get the short end of the stick when it comes to time.

The color is not true as the yarn is grey/greenish in real life.

It seemsthat I've persuaded Red to join in on an SAL for the Stitcher's Wallet from the March issue of The Gift of Stitching. We will be waiting until Red gets her supplies but anyone else want to join us?

TGIF!

Mail Call from Australia!

Yesterday my fabrics and accessories arrived for the Stitcher's Wallet project in the March issue of The Gift of Stitching. I ordered it through Stitches and Spice and I'm so glad I did. Naomi sent the linen and muslin to complete the wallet as well as the two little wooden thread winders and some wooden thread rings. I can definitely see myself ordering more of their fabrics as I love the color and feel. I immediately got out the Flower Thread I ordered to see how it looked on the fabric. I am really looking forward to starting this project.

Tonight was my S&B night at the quilt shop. I actually came home without purchasing anything and I made a bit more project on my STR Inside Out sock which I will show you tomorrow and I finished the front of an exchange piece and started on the back. I will not be showing you that until it arrives at it's intended destination next month.

TGIF tomorrow and it's payday!

Knitting Bookaliciousness

Here in New England, we have these stores called Christmast Tree Shops. If you've ever seen their commercials or been inside them, you will know the phrase "Don't you just love a bargain... doot, doot, doot." The "doots" are my version of the singalong part at the end. The stores are filled with just about everything at very low prices and it's impossible to go in with a list and stick to it. There is something about the prices (or the air) in a Christmas Tree shop that is irresistible. I've bought more things in there that I "don't need" than I care to think about.

Well, I was browsing through the Knitpicks website the other day and hit their new books and clearance section and the above picture is what happened (minus the dog!). I bought not one new knitting book but 5 all for $68 with free shipping. My main interest was the No Sheep For You by Amy Singer of Knitty fame but I ended up with Knitted Babes by Claire Garland, Knitting Loves Crochet by Candi Jensen, Knit by Janine Flew and Greetings from Knit Cafe by Suzan Mischer. I just couldn't resist! Many of them were better than 30% off. Hence the segue of "Don't You Just Love a Bargain...doot doot doot!

They arrived yesterday and I've barely had a chance to page through them but I'm quite content that I'll have lots of future projects - if I ever find the time! I don't know who I would ever knit the dolls for as my nieces are past that age but I just couldn't resist. I've picked up the book so many times and not bought it but I gave in. I'm sure I will find someone to give the dolls to - or maybe I'll just keep them for myself!

PS to Cowboy's former mom - as you can see in the photo, he's doing well. It will be a year next month that he came home with me and while it's been frustrating at times - Jack Russell Terrorist situations - I'm happy and I think he is too. Thanks for stopping by!

Weekend's Work

I didn't get any stitching done this weekend because I spent every free minute working on finishing my baby blanket. Yesterday evening at about 8:00 I finished the last color round and wove in all the ends. Today we had a surprise baby shower at work for the expectant mother but I'm waiting to give her the blanket until her family shower on Sunday. My hands are killing me but I'm pretty proud of the accomplishment! I hope she likes it. The colors in the photo aren't that great but in person I'm really happy with the color combination.

Tonight I will be doing some exchange stitching - finishing the front of one piece and possibly starting on the back. I need to choose something to stitch for a birthday in April and I'm having the hardest time. The recipient is a VERY talented seamstress and stitcher and I think that's what's holding me back. Maybe I will look through my charts again to see if something sings to be stitched.

Hope you had a good Monday!

The Magic of a Glass of Wine

As I'm sure many of you know, a good glass of wine can work wonders in many, many situations. This photo is an example of what a good glass of chardonnay can help a newbie knitter accomplish! Of course ripping out and repeating MANY times was also a part of the equation but I firmly believe the glass of wine I sat down with last night boosted my determination to master the art of a toe up sock. This is my toe and I'm very proud of my accomplishment. So proud in fact I considered going no farther but I do believe I will press on. This is the toe of my first 2007 Socks That Rock Club Club pattern called Inside Out using the Monsoon colorway that came with the kit. It's going to be a very challenging pattern for me as the leg involves real cables - a technique I have not tried before as well. Stay tuned!

There was some cross stitching done prior to the accomplishment of this knitting feat but I can't show it because.... it's an exchange piece!

Happy Wednesday and cheers to a fast moving downward slide to the weekend. I'm off to finish a glass of wine! :-)

Sunday Stitching

I decided that I needed a day to stitch for myself since so much of what I've been working on lately has been for others. Yesterday I picked up my CHS Dainty House wren and put a fair amount of work in it. I also worked a bit on it tonight - it's hard to put down once I get started. I so love the colors in this piece. I worked on the finishing the tree including the leaves and the large bird at the top left as well as some small motifs. I will put this down until next Sunday as I started an exchange piece and I've been working on my friend's baby blanket.

Thanks for all the nice comments about my "other" stitching. I've managed to grow my baby blanket by almost 2 more repeats of the pattern. I have about 1 and a half left to go so I think I can stay on track for finishing it by the 19th. I have to say I'm enjoying the crocheting part. I also plan to start my Monsoon socks this week. The pattern is a toe up process which is new for me and I'm trying to follow the directions. I found some helpful instructions on Knitty but I think I need to practice a bit more before I get it to work properly!

Stitches of a Different Sort

First off, thanks to all who have visited and commented on my blog. I appreciate you stopping by, especially since I've not been blogging much lately. I'm also trying to catch up on my regular reading of blogs but I have so many listed in my favorites that I can't read every one every day! I'm trying a rotation with those so hopefully I will be staying caught up with everything that is going on. One can only hope right?

As promised, here is a picture of the start of my baby blanket that will be a gift for a co-worker. It's her first baby and she's in her early20s so I hope she won't mind a hand made gift. I also plan to get her something from her baby registry but wanted to make something for her as well. I think she will like it. The blanket is being made out of Lion Brand Cotton Ease which I have to say I really like. It's very soft. The colors are Taupe (darker brown/grey), Stone (lighter grey), Lake and Lime. I really like how the color combination is turning out.

The other "stitched" item is a pair of socks for my older sister in Ohio. Her birthday is on the 19th and she requested a pair of socks at Christmas so hopefully she will get a bit of wear out of them before spring arrives for sure. This is some Spunky Eclectic Sport weight yarn I had in my stash. The color is called Mojave - I thought it would be appropriate for my sister as she loves the desert of New Mexico.