Christmas crafts

Gotta start early, to try to figure out what to make for Christmas presents. These are my attempt at jelly roll soaps. They're red & white and peppermint scented!

My favorite season

My favorite time is upon us. I like the fall. I like the leaves, the cider, making fires in the fireplace, snuggling up to watch tv... This is also the time of the year that I seem to get back into making things as we're not so busy doing other things. Something about lower temperatures just make my fingers itch to knit!

Dugan ate all our slippers last winter, so I had to make more. I made a pair for me, Brad and Dina. We'll have to do our best to keep them out of Dugan reach. He's not very destructive usually, but if he comes accross dirty socks or underwear (yes, eeew, dirty underwear) then he just chews it to oblivion. Clean socks he could care less about.

So here's this year's crop of slippers (with Dugan looking on - it's really not possible to do anything without him on top of you):

Meanwhile, Brad & Dina have found a good joint hobby:

long time, no blog

Yikes, it's been awhile.

I've been busy with the typical summer stuff... yard work, enjoying the sunshine, visiting family. And signing up to host a foreign exchange student for the 2008-2009 calendar year. I'm not quite sure what we were smoking at the time, but we have a big house with rooms just begging to be used, so we thought we'd give it a try. Our student will be coming from Germany and will arrive on August 15th, just in time for the Hanson family reunion, the poor thing. I really don't know what to do with a 17 year old teenager, but I guess we'll find out. Everybody keeps saying - just treat them like any other member of the family. But, besides me and Brad, our only family members are the dog and two cats. I don't think she would appreciate being crated while we're out of the house. But, on the other hand, I think she does come house-trained, so that's a bonus.

In the meantime, I decided to tackle the upstairs bathroom. The wallpaper was a HIDEOUS metallic gold & pink pattern. Upon removing the wallpaper, I discovered that they had applied it directly to the drywall without any paint or primer. So I spent a day stripping wallpaper, pulling off bits of drywall and sanding, then another day priming the walls, then another day filling the holes and getting the walls smoothed out. Hopefully tonight I can sand the mud and apply another coat of primer. From there I hope to be able to just fill the small stuff missed the first time and be ready to paint. We'll see. I had taken pictures to post, but now I can't find them. Sorry. They weren't very attractive pictures - just ugly wallpaper and scarred walls.

Jacob, my oldest nephew and godson, turns 4 on Sunday! Time goes so fast. I'm trying to finish up the quilt I've been making for his "big boy bed" for two years. I'm not sure it'll be done in time for his party on Saturday, but I'll give it a try. For now, Jacob's very happy with his "Cars" comforter, so I can't imaging that he'll want to switch that out for a stinky home-made quilt for a little while. But, when he grows up a little more, it will be ready for him.

These are the blocks that i'll put together into the facing of the quilt. The red in the upper left-hand corner of the picture is the cordurroy that i'll use for the border and backing (here's to hoping there's enough of it to go around!)

A very brave/stupid momma rabbit gave birth to 4 little bunnies in our back yard. Unfortunately, only 2 have survived this far. I think Dugan gives the little ones a heart attack. He is obsessed with them and always wants to watch them. I didn't get a very clear picture, but they're very very cute!

The stash comes, the stash goes

I've been stuck in the house this last week due to being on call for work. While at first it seemed limiting, it now is kinda nice. It's a treat to not have lots of stuff scheduled for the weekend. Since I can't really go far, I've taken the time to relax a little and just knit. Last night I sat on the back patio, enjoyed the wonderful weather, watched the pets frolick, listened to A Prairie Home Companion and knit for a couple hours. The only thing that would have made it better was if I could have had a glass - or three - of wine. But since I'm on call and could get paged into issues at any time, it's better if I don't.



I've been adding to my yarn stash lately, there have been some great sales on yarn (which doesn't usually go on sale). I'm going to have to knit from the stash now for awhile as I've definitely blown my yarn budget. But I think I might be good for at least a little bit now! (Ruth - I got you some cotton yarn. You have your choice of the hand painted 100% cotton yarn or the slate grey 75 cotton/25 silk yarn. I have 5-6 skeins of each, let me know what you might want)

I picked up 4 new sock yarns, my two favorite are these: The blue-ish/purple-ish yarn is for a pair of socks I'm making for a coworker who has been particularly helpful lately (see completed socks below). The yellow/green/blue/purple is for a pair of socks for Brad that I still need to make.

Here's the purple yarn knit up into a pair of socks, and a pair of mittens that I recently finished. It's amazing how nicely the machine works with higher quality yarn. It makes such a difference.

There was some beautiful hand-painted yarn at just a rediculously good price. Here's a sample skein,it's already almost done being made into a swirl hat. It's so beautiful that I practically had to rip it out of the hands of the yarn store owner who had a really hard time letting it go. It knits like buttah.

This is the sweater I started a few weeks ago using Brown Sheep's cotton tweed. It's 60 cotton/40 wool. It's a common pattern that I've knit up lots of times, but this time I'm trying something different. I didn't put in a neckline opening because I'm going to cut up the middle front and put in a zipper. Yes, I know, cutting knitting sounds kinda counter-intuitive. But I've been reading up on it and think I can do it. I will, of course, be making a test swatch first and cutting that first. A little nerve-wracking, but it's time to try something new! Plus, knitting in the round and then cutting it into a cardigan or cutting in a neckline is a good way to be able to knit in the round as long as possible. I really don't like to purl.




The next project is one for the hope chest. Eventually, it will be a christening gown. I'm just working on the skirt for now since I don't really have a pattern for this. Once I get the length right, I'll decrease a bunch for the bodice and then put some arms on. Shouldn't be too difficult. I'll be trimming it in a silver/grey yarn at the bottom, a band between the bodice and skirt, and maybe even the neckline. Just something to take away from all the white. This one may take me awhile to finish - not because the pattern is difficult (which it isn't) but because I have to figure out what I want it to look like. I looked EVERYWHERE for a christening gown pattern with no luck, so I'll have to see what I can come up with on my own. It's my first attempt at knitting without a published pattern.





Here's also a closeup of the pattern, it's quite nice. Perhaps I should have used some finer yarn, but I'm pretty happy with it.



And, lastly, seriously - how handsome is this puppy? He's been full of energy lately and has been very well behaved considering that I've been a little busy lately and he hasn't gotten as much playtime as he might like.

Coming soon...

I've been tied to the house this week due to being on call for work, so I have lots of new stuff to post, but it's too late to do it tonight and my brain just hurts from work. So watch for lots of projects here soon.

(mittens, socks, sweater, swirl hat, lace project)

No Mittens

Oh, yeah, I was going to make a set of mittens...except it didn't quite work out. I bent a few of the ribbing needles (and they're not cheap!) and broke the yarn at least once. I'll have to go back to square one on that project.

Diapers!

Happy Mother's Day! Brad and I had a very nice day with Mom. She came over and we had Cheesecake Factory for dinner (yummie!) and then she helped me make a diaper prototype. I can't believe how unbelievably SWEET it is. I'll do some testing to see how much water it holds and how well it stays dry on the outside, and then pass it along to my friend Janel to have her use it on her newborn, Wolfi, and give me feedback. It took me most of the day to cut out a bunch and make one, but I think it will get quicker as I go. The worst of it was trying to figure out what the directions were talking about....