Catch up

I haven't written in awhile, but things have improved and I want to start writing again. I don't know how things will play out in the future, this event could have been a one-time occurrence or it could be the beginning of something that will last a lifetime. Regardless, I have very little control over the situation and will have to come to some peace about that. We have had lots of support and people have written me privately to offer concern and good wishes. We're all okay right now.

My brother came out for 5 days and gave up precious time with his wife - they had left their 2 boys with my parents and had time to study (Mark being in a counseling program, his wife Sheila being in an MD program) and be alone for the first time in years. It was a marvelous visit and it was great to have someone in the house who had skills to interpret what was going on, and just to reconnect after too many years of only speaking on the phone. Mark was enamored of the prolific crop of raspberries and blueberries we had, and so we always had a fresh bowl of hand-picked berries at every meal. I will always think of him when I eat blueberries.

One of the visit highlights was going to visit Mark's old seminary roommate, Spencer Parks and wife Sarah at Menucha Retreat and Conference Center. We found Menucha on the Labyrinth Locater (scroll down to see the labyrinth) and I just had to go with him. We did indeed see the labyrinth, which had just been finished, and I think it's the most magnificent labyrinth I've ever seen. It's made of stone, brick, and tile. The setting overlooking the Columbia River Gorge didn't hurt anything either. Menucha sits high on a hill above the Gorge and the scenery is spectacular.



We got a tour of the grounds and then spent a wonderful afternoon at Spencer and Sarah's home, eating tasty snacks, drinking water with mint and lemon, and just basking in the beauty of our surroundings, not to mention good company. We've discovered we can have family reunions at Menucha and Mark and I have already started plugging the location to the rest of our family. We're hoping to do this in 2010 when my father turns 90.

I do live in a city with lots of labyrinths, but they aren't easy to get to from where I live. Therefore, I downloaded the Labyrinth Shawl from the Evelyn Clark website and bought yarn to complete it. It's just easier to knit one. This is my meditative knitting and I just love the pattern! It's 450+ rows, and each row is charted. It's challenging that way and easy to lose my place. I've had to rip it out once. I have to do this shawl in a very quiet place, which is why it's my meditation knitting.

I'm still working on the Felici stripe sock, though I'm on the heel of the 2nd sock now, and am still working on the Possum Blueberry Hill scarf, the Feather and Fan comfort shawl, and Forest Canopy shawl. Here's a picture of the scarf.



I spent part of today adding sock patterns to my queue in Ravelry. I have a renewed attraction to sock yarns again and sock patterns. I seem to be attracted to the patterns from Finnish sock designers and toe-up patterns (which I haven't learned how to do). I put a few Cookie A patterns in too. All these are dramatic and intricate patterns that would look great in my Wollmeise.

I would love to be able to spend some time in the yard during the daytime! We have some neighbors that live right behind us and we aren't really sure who they are since they change from day to day. However, a few of them love to poke their heads out the window just as we're relaxed and feeling peaceful just to chat. It sort of ruins the peaceful ambiance we crave, so we have to sneak out at night and be very, very quiet! Needless to say, the Ashiyu hasn't gotten a lot of attention this summer.

I joined another coffee swap and need to figure out a small project to knit. I joined the Great American Dog pool at Ravelry and my dog is still in. I don't know how long. The dog is great (Galaxy), but the owner is kind of conceited and full of himself. Should I win, I get 20 dollars of yarn from the other 11 members on my team. I doubt I'll win, but it's been fun and probably the last time I'll do such a thing. I really don't like reality shows!

I've gone on and on. I've been reading, but that will have to be another post. Just wanted everyone who was concerned to know everything is calm right now.

Consumerist update!

Recently two things have been moved to the top of my ever-changing wishlist: a book and a dress. The book is the beloved Lena Corwin's first, Printing by Hand. In the recent slough of hand-printing how-to books, Lena's seems to be the most highly anticipated. It's in stores this week, so you will be able to get your print on in no time (did I just say that?).

The dress is too good a deal to not be mentioned, even on a design-centric blog like ours. The Trixie dress comes from Trashy Diva, one of the best reproduction clothing sellers out there. Recently, other retailers have been blatantly ripping off the Trixie dress, and so Trashy Diva has issued a designer's special, selling the dress for only $34. That's almost $200 cheaper than normal.

The Miniature Post Series: Yeondoo Jung

In an attempt to carry over the Miniature Post theme and actually confirm its existence as a series, I bring to you the work of Yeondoo Jung. Her Dance Hall project involves, in so many words, hundreds of photographs of ballroom dancers cut out and plastered to the gallery wall, set to the music piping through the webpage. The blog world has recently been abuzz with Yeondoo's work, most notably the "Wonderland" project - photographic recreations of children's drawings. This is a personal favorite:

From pot to frying pan

No pictures, but everything looks like shades of gray right now. Things have gotten awful lately and one of my worst fears in regard to child rearing has been realized. I can't say what that is, but our lives are in turmoil right now and will probably not be the same again for some time. My brother is flying in tonight from St. Louis and that lightens my load a great deal, a huge deal!

I don't really have much to report. I did some retail therapy at Loopy Ewe this morning and bought some sweater patterns. I really do mean to graduate to sweaters soon.

Wollmeise is making an appearance at Loopy Ewe next week. I don't care!

I think I'm still learning how to use a drop spindle this Friday, but who knows.

I'm making a Dragon Scale scarf for coworker, Tracey, in possum yarn. She's the only person I know who loves possum yarn and possums. It's a great distraction.

Loopy Ewe Sock Club - July

So, I made it through the 4th of July. To my neighbors' credit, they were pretty civilized this year and waited until evening to make noise. I actually was able to enjoy some of the show from my office window. The animals were mellow (thanks to pharmaceuticals) and my noise-canceling earphones did cancel out the worst of the noise so I was able to transcribe reports without making any life-threatening mistakes.

Lyn helped soothe the pain of having to work yesterday by buying me a strawberry lemonade from Burgerville (they use real strawberries and there are lots of chunky fresh strawberry bits in the lemonade) and barbecuing a recipe from Cooking Light - Schwarmma - made with marinated and barbecued boneless chicken breast pieces, grilled pita bread, tomatoes, lettuce, and a tahini sauce, plus we had an onion, cucumber, tomato, and red pepper salad on the side, as well as corn on the cob. For dessert we had Black Cherry Cake, a frozen dessert from Trader Joe's. Unfortunately, both of us left the table at some point for just a very few seconds, only to have Shane revive from his drugged state and jump up and eat a good portion of the chicken. We were able to save some of it, but we were not happy with him for doing this. We need a taller table.

I went to StitchCraft this morning and visited awhile. I came home with the Gold Hill/Lake Huron yarn for a second Chevron scarf, a skein of Conjoined Creation lace yarn for the Swallowtail Shawl (I'm not sure there's enough)in the Literature Collection called In Cold Blood (yuck -nothing about the colors remind me of blood), and the 4 Seasons Throw book using Manos yarn. I'm not sure which throw I'm going to do first. I like them all.



I came home to the Loopy Ewe July sock club package and was thrilled to find a skein of Dream in Color Smooshy in a Loopy only colorway called Spicy Smooches. I love the red-browns, tans, and greens in this yarn. The pattern is wonderful too and is called Hugs and Chocolate Kisses designed by Debbie O'Neill. It's top down, so I can do this pattern. Other treats were a notebook and Loopy Ewe pen and a little do-dad that I understand is to put inside a hole in croc shoes and it says Born to Knit. I don't have any crocs yet. The picture below only highlights the yarn as another picture I took of everything was too dark to post.



This is the only day off I get this week, so I'm to knit a bit and read. Lyn is painting the kitchen in earthy coffee colors with some no VOC paint we got from Millers Paints. Later on he'll be putting in the cork flooring we got about a year ago. This means living without a stove for a few days, but it's worth it. We also had a French door installed in our breakfast nook to patio area (replacing sliding glass door) and I love the way it frames the garden. Pictures of garden and house work will follow some time this week.

Fourth of July blahs and works in progress

I hate the 4th of July! There, I said it. My neighbors are pleasant enough 358 days of the year, but from the date fireworks go on sale to the day they stop, I don't like them at.all! The drunken party like a mass of 12-year-old boys that extends all day today starts in a few minutes and I'm trying to post something before I need to sedate my dogs and cats and steel myself to the mayhem and noise that will cause us to suffer miserably for the next 12 hours. I also have to work today - the evening shift. I hope no one dies because I can't hear what the doctors are saying. I'm praying for severe thunderstorms from 5 to 11 tonight. I'm listening to Paul Simon's American Tune and Steve Earle's Ashes to Ashes to express my sentiment towards this holiday. I hate the 4th, I tell you; I hate it!

I haven't written in awhile because I've been busy and quite frankly, I hate the process of taking pictures, making them halfway presentable, and then saving and posting them on the blog. However, it's not a blog without pictures, so since it's a day of coping with the things I don't like, I'm going to post a few works in progress.

I finished a sock. I'm working on #2, but it's a slow process. The yarn is a Knit Picks Felici sock yarn in colorway called Coastal. It's a mindless sock pattern that doesn't call for any stitch pattern and I'm just letting the stripes stand out. It's fun enough, I can work on it in social settings, and the end product is functional.



A few weeks ago I went to The Black Sheep Gathering in Eugene, Oregon, and the only thing I bought was this RickRack rayon from Interlacements. I got a free feather and fan shawl pattern with the yarn and started making it right away. This one is for me.



I don't know why nothing stood out for me at Black Sheep. I've certainly seen enough from others who bought fiber, yarn, tools, and gadgets that I've been admiring from the festival. I had just bought a spinning wheel, so I guess I just felt I should be frugal. I did buy a fast flyer for my Kromski, so I came away with a cool tool.

I've been spending a bit of time at StitchCraft and Nicholette has started Saturday knitting in the store. We're supposed to sit outside, but it was over 100 last Saturday and we sat indoors. Nicholette assisted me in picking out colors for a Chevron scarf and I eventually chose Lorna's Laces sport-weight merino in Aslan and something Lake. I'm pretty satisfied with the results. I want to do another scarf in Lake Huron and Gold Hill. The Chevron scarf is my new favorite mindless project. I think I have the hang of picking out contrasting colors that work together now and I know I'll be doing this scarf a few times.



I'm also knitting a shawl for someone, but can't post it here yet.

Within the next few weeks, Carol from spinning group is going to teach Betsy, Nicholette and me how to use a Turkish spindle. She's very adept at this and we're looking forward to the lesson. Carol has an amazing story behind her spinning. I'm waiting for her to tell it on her blog and then I'll link to it.

The garden is bearing fruit and vegetables. Lyn just brought me in a handful of ripe raspberries and we've been enjoying blueberries in various forms for the last few days. This week our local CSA, Purple Rain, delivered the best strawberries I've ever tasted and we devoured them straight from the box. Our figs are huge this year.

I hope you all enjoy a safe and happy 4th of July; just because I won't be happy doesn't mean you all shouldn't be. For those of you who secretly suffer, especially those of you who have pets that suffer, you have my sympathies!

The Miniature Post Series: Miniature Felted Animals

I never could have imagined the world I would uncover by typing "Needlefelted Animal" into Etsy's search bar. There is a world of people out there, sitting at home, creating strange fantasy creatures, bubble-bathing squirrels,  and cartoon-like animals (hot pink dinosaur? It's true) out of felted roving yarns. But rather than create a post centered around the peculiar and not entirely aesthetically pleasing felted creatures of the world's retired craftswomen, I've decided to bring to you what good has come of the felting movement (that's right, I'm deeming it a movement). 

The movement's most popular product might be the custom-created felt version of man's best friend. About four out of ten results for felted animals fall under this category, and they sell particularly well for a two-inch-tall object that costs between 95 and 200 dollars. And to tell you the truth, I would probably purchase one if I could logically work it into my budget. It's the less creepy way to eternalize your favorite pet, if you understand what I mean.

{above: Custom Pet Sculpture by KayK9s.}

{above: Bunny by LittleElfsToyshop; Fox by WoolComesAlive.}

Guest Blog by Amelia Hayes

Tips for a D.I.Y. Wedding

When Jason and I decided to get married we started talking about the wedding that same day. Within two months we had a venue booked for the ceremony and reception and we were off and running. Right from the start I knew I wanted to do a lot of things myself. I was making lists of the projects I wanted to complete for our wedding right from the start. I had two motivations for this, first of all I'm frugal and second of all I wanted to show off in my own way. Some people might like to show off with a lavish display but to me that display is only worthwhile if I can say I did a lot of it.

For my wedding I made my dress, the flower girl's dress, decorated the bubble jars, collected eclectic vases for the tables, made the table cards, painted porcelain birds for the centerpieces on each table, helped arrange the table centerpieces, made bridesmaid's gifts and I taught myself calligraphy to write addresses on our save the date cards and invitations. And those are just the things I can remember right now! The list goes on and on. I learned a lot in the process and if you want a DIY wedding I can offer you some advice.

1. Ask for help. My sister makes beautiful origami flowers and she generously agreed to make some for me to use in the wedding. We had origami flowers in the bouquets, the centerpieces, and the boutonnieres. My friend Amanda is an extremely talented floral artist. When she offered to help me with the wedding I immediately asked if she would help me with the flowers. She agreed and the day before the wedding we went to a flower wholesalers market and bought a ton of flowers. We spent almost the entire day arranging flowers with my sister and I'm so grateful that they helped me. Amanda took charge of the bouquets and boutienerres and they were so beautiful. I would never have been able to make them look nearly as beautiful as she did. I did learn a lot about doing centerpieces, though! On our flower arranging day I provided champagne and lots of snacks to show my appreciation for the help.

2. Make lots of lists. Right from the start I was making lists of projects I wanted to do for the wedding and making timetables of when certain steps needed to be completed. I bought a 3 ring binder and I took it with me practically everywhere. In addition to holding all my lists together I had sections for the catering information, the venue information, research information for projects, and so on. If you are going to DIY you can't be lazy. I had projects completed over 6 months in advance of our wedding and I spent countless evenings and weekends working on them. For me it was fun but if that sounds awful to you then you might want to cut down on the number of projects you are going to complete. While I was working I would usually imagine our guests enjoying the things I had made and that made the work fun.

3. Be ready to compromise for your budget. I had lots of ideas that didn't work for budget reasons. I heard about another woman who did a DIY wedding and since she and her fiance collected vintage china they used lots of different styles in their place settings. I thought that was such a great idea! I immediately began looking at thrift stores and on eBay but in the end it was going to be a lot more expensive than renting place settings plus I didn't know where the heck I was going to store it all after the wedding! I decided instead to rent the china and I collected various whimsical vases from thrift stores and eBay and other sources and used those for my centerpieces and in various locations around the venue. The total cost for vases was about $70 and I got over a dozen pieces for that.

4. You are not going to do all the projects you want to do. On my first lists I was going to make all the bridesmaids' dresses and make neckties and pocket squares for my fiance and the groomsmen. I was going to bake cookies and package them nicely for wedding favors. HA! Some things had to get scrapped along the way because in addition to all the projects I was doing there was all the OTHER stuff that has to get done for the wedding plus I had to work and have a life. I was sad to give up some of my great ideas but when I think of everything we did do for the wedding I'm really proud.

5. Things are a lot easier when you fiance is on board. Jason is a very creative person and always bursting with ideas, so he was the best partner I could have imagined in the planning process. I think we split the work pretty evenly and everything he did was done beautifully. He has quite the green thumb, so one of his ideas was to harvest seeds from flowers he had grown and package them for wedding gifts. He collaborated with the printing press about our wedding invitations. I didn't get to see them until they were done because he wanted to surprise me and they were gorgeous. He planned the honeymoon and he and his groomsmen decorated the ceremony area, too. We had a lot of fun planning the wedding together. I think the only difficulties we ran into were because we each had so many ideas about what we wanted to do! If he hadn't been so enthusiastic about everything we did it wouldn't have been fun at all.

6. The library is a wonderful resource. I checked out countless books about every topic relating to weddings and crafts. I taught myself calligraphy from a library book. I got lots of ideas about how to save money and different projects that could be done to make a wedding more special. Before you go to the bookstore, go to the library. I didn't buy a single wedding book.

7. Accept your limits. In the beginning I thought I could make virtually everything myself. From a certain perspective I was right, I could have done it all. But who wants to? You are going to have to let some things go. Don't let it ruin your wedding. Because I was so involved in our wedding there were things that I particularly noticed had not happened the way I had planned. Instead of letting it upset me that these little details weren't perfect I just looked around at our family and friends having a nice time at our wedding and let myself be happy that we were all together on one of the most important days in my life.

 Most of all I feel I accomplished something by working so hard for our wedding. When I think about it I'm extremely proud of what we did and I feel it really reflects the kind of people that we are because we put our hearts and our creativity into our wedding. Whatever you decide to do for your wedding make it a reflection of the two of you and don't feel obligated by traditions unless they are meaningful to you as a couple.

--Amelia Hayes