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My Christmas decorations are up. I feel so festive (and organized). The piece de resistance this year was my new holiday sweater wreath. It helps that it was only $5 at a doorbuster sale at Home Depot this weekend!
Now I'm officially ready for the holidays! Ho! Ho! Ho!
Thanks so much for all your wonderful ideas and suggestions for afghans that might work for my twelve-year-old Secundogeniture. After reading your suggestions, and perusing Ravelry, I found that the afghans I liked most all came from one book - Comfort Knitting & Crochet Afghans by Norah Gaughan, Margery Winter, and the Berroco Design Team so I quickly ordered a copy for myself.
I need to have Secundogeniture look through the suggestions you sent and the patterns in this book to see which he likes best. I'll keep you posted.
I was home in Iowa for the holidays and on Friday we set up the Christmas tree. I loved seeing some of my childhood favorite decorations coming out of my sister's storage. You saw the Three Wise Men made by my grandmother. She was a very creative person. But the next one is a little bit of a surprise.
My Mom made these needlepoint stockings - and she was not otherwise a crafty lady. I'm so glad she made these and that they live on.
These were the last two she made. They're really adorable with a whimsical appeal.
What are your favorite holiday memories in the forms of family holiday crafts?
One of the things I love about putting up the Christmas decorations is finding family treasures from days gone by. This is one of my favorite handmade items from about 40 years ago
My Grandma Grace made these three Wise Men circa 1970. They're showing their age, but are still family favorites. My sister and I look at them and remember the velvet dresses Grandma made for us out of the matching material. Ellen always got pink. in fact, the pink toting king is the only one whose crown got a matching paint job. The other crowns came in blue and green. What color was my dress? Why blue of course. I always got blue. Ellen always got pink. Blue is still one of my favorite colors to this date (after purple). Funny how that works out.
My friend Joanne is making the Palette Fair Isle Cardigan from Knit Picks. She came over today for some knitting and a refresher course in the two handed fair isle technique. I had a copy of The Philosopher's Wool DVD which we watched, and I loaned her, along with some practical ap.
We started with a pattern that alternated colors every other stitch. I'm about to start the 4x4 st square pattern. I laughed at my Knit Picks color palette choice. Doesn't it remind you of a 1970s kitchen?
Anyway, it was fun to do some fair isle knitting again. It's not difficult, just a bit more interesting than plain stockinette. This swatch might turn into some sort of Fair Isle for the American Girl Doll. Hmmmmm. Or maybe not. Maybe a swatch should just be a swatch.
I was so caught in the miniature sweater craze that even as I finished the last sweater of the Snow Day kit I was already mentally planning my next miniature sweater. It's no surprise that I turned to an old friend, one that I have knit time and time again. No, you're not at all surprised to discover that the latest miniature in my series of wee knits is a miniature Wonderful Wallaby.
But it's just not cute enough in that picture. So let me take it a step further and show you that this Wee Wallaby also happens to fit on my Barbie Doll.
Perfect fit!
Here's a shot of the back and hood
A perfect fit - with her hoodie up. Hmmmm. I wonder if the Wallaby craze is going to strike again... this time in miniature fashion.
This morning I worked the first shift at admissions for CraftWestport at Staples High School. It was great fun - but I will admit that meeting and greeting and doing math that early in the morning are hazardous!
Here I am selling a ticket to a customer.
Here's crafter Elizabeth Rubidge with this year's CraftWestport Chair - Dot Baliban in front of The Nut Lady booth.
Here are just a few of the wonderful women of the Westport Young Woman's League who put on this show that raises money for local charities.
CraftWestport 2010
Staples High School
70 North Avenue
Westport, CT 06880
Saturday, November 20th - from 10:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m.
Sunday, November 21st from 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.
Admission Fees
Admission is $9
Seniors are $6
Children are free
Parking is free
So please go now to the CraftWestport and help support our local organizations while having fun shopping. If you get there soon, you might even see Topher Grace. I did. Maybe you will, too.
Another Friday and I've finished yet another sweater. Wow. I'm like lightning!
But as you might have guessed, it's not a human sweater. It's another miniature ornament.
Here's the whole set (minus the vest that I found quite fugly). Five out of Six miniature sweaters is a full set in my book and I'm going to declare this a Finished Object. I will likely knit more miniature sweaters for my holiday wreath... but this first series is done. Now I can move on to other WIPs and UFOs in my queue as I want to finish something so I can cast on some of that new yarn I purchased at Webs. It's oh so tempting!
My knitting friends and I participated in a yarn lover's dream pilgrimage yesterday. It was something we'd been planning for weeks - our road trip to fiber heaven - aka Webs in Northampton, Massachusetts. Eight of us piled into two cars and drove two hours to get to the endless fascination that is Webs. Our first stop in Northampton (after the bathroom, of course) was the most delightful coffee shop aptly named Northampton Coffee. Alex our barista makes a mean latte.
Energized and fully caffeinated (er, I drink decaf), we walked back to Webs and began our shopping.
My goal for this shopping trip was to purchase some Kauni Effekt to make Ruth Sorenson's Knit a Hat
I also picked up some knitting needles, books (Barbara Walker's A Treasury of Knitting Patterns and a Second Treasury of Knitting Patterns) and some Cascade 128 to knit up swatches for a full size blanket for Secundogeniture. Somehow, as we were checking out, some fabulous sock yarn jumped into my basket!
Webs has such a wide selection of yarn, you can see that it deserves the url www.yarn.com.
After we all checked out, we took a group shot in front of some of the yarn before heading next door to Webs Bead Shop followed by lunch at Fitzwilly's and a trip to another LYS - Northampton Wools - where I purchased two skeins of yarn for future Turn-a-Square hats. We got to meet Linda Daniels- who is utterly delightful and has the quintessential knitting store. I only wish I had purchased her titular book - The Northampton Wools Knitting Book
If you're in the Northeast and are looking for an exciting excursion for your knitting group, I can't say enough about our agenda. We were in Northampton for 4 hours which was plenty of time to hit 3 stores and have lunch. Of course, we were in the car for 4 hours - but it was worth every second. Thanks to Joan our fantastically organized knitting friend for making this excursion happen. It was truly a day of good friends, fiber, food and fun. I highly recommend it.
Change is Good
My Conundrum
When I went to Webs last week with my friends, my goal was to buy some Kauni and pick out some yarn to knit a blanket for Secundogeniture. I picked out four skeins of Cascade 128 Chunky (it's so, so soft!) and brought them home to let him pick his favorite. Originally he wanted a black blanket, but I quickly put the kibosh on that! Now that I've selected the yarn, I think I don't actually want to knit my son the Sampler Blanket. So I'm trying to find a blanket that is a solid color and very male. Secundogeniture tends to like more bold lines - so I'm hoping to come up with a blanket that fits both criteria. I already knit BF the blocks blanket - so that's out.
Help! I need some ideas. Please leave a comment with your suggestions about which pattern might work for my little guy (who by the way, isn't so little anymore).
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