Accidentally Matching Socks

I rarely (if ever) plan to make a pair of sox where the hand dyed pattern would line up. Imagine my surprise when I saw that these were doing it themselves. This is not even sock yarn. I bought it somewhere back in the day and decided since it was superwash that it would quickly knit up and I was right. I used Swish Superwash for the heels and toes since I often wear just my socks at home and they will wear better with the heavier yarns.

January has been a productive month for my knits. Now that all the yarn that was in the potting shed has arrived back into the house and my new closet, I can see what I have and plan projects accordingly. And of course this means I don't need to buy any yarn since I can decide what to make based on what I have. But...

Yesterday I read on Ravelry.com that a new yarn shop has opened across the street from my fave shopping spots...Lowe's and Hobby Lobby (and the liquor store). O my.

And I made the decision today to delete my Facebook account. It says everyone will miss me. I doubt it. I am right here.

Learning New Stuff

Taking a break from closet moving (really it is done, except for all the stuff piled in the living room waiting to find a new home in the garage) I made a cuppa, put my feet up and started reading my fave blogs. On both Emily's and Judy Perez's sites knitting with cables was the subject. Judy had a link to knitting cables without the extra needle. I followed the link to this video. Wow I totally get it! Immediately I tried it on the sox I was knitting and it works just great. I learned something new and felt my tea time was doubly rewarding. ( I knit and surf at the same time...idle hands and all that).

Then browsing around Facebook I found my old pal and knitting teacher Gretl who taught me to make socks. Eternally. Grateful. To. Gretl. She has a big project page on Ravelry.com and I had to visit that site too. One link led to another and finally to a site which had a tutorial on How to weave in ends while knitting. I have NEEDED to learn this for YEARS. Now I know how.

Speaking of Facebook, I am suddenly on that site now too. Accidentally, but it is interesting what you can find there. First thing that happened was I got tagged with the meme "25 things about me." O dear. The instructions say to tag 25 more people. Again O dear. I answered my initial request privately and the quit. I guess I am not a team player.

One more thing. Dave also cleared out a clothes closet adjacent to my new big storage closet and handed me the reins for that too. I am overflowing with space now. Here's a slideshow which includes a shot of the nice shelf he put up over the dryer. It's so nice to have a man around the house.

Closet Nirvana

It took most of three days to rearrange our closets. Dave wanted a closet in his room upstairs, but it was full to overflowing with my sewing and painting crap. I said NO, and then reconsidered when he suggested I could have the huge main closet downstairs. Hmmm. I thought. Hmm again. Adding another shelf in there would make it GREAT for all my junk. And I wouldn't have to stoop over to find something in that upstairs closet. Yes. We closed the deal. Dave did most of the moving of my stuff, due to my bad knee, but now it's done and we are both sooooo happy.

Doesn't his closet look nice and neat?

Most of my fabric, yarn and mailing stuff is now visible and accessible. I have a dedicated step stool permanently assigned to this closet. I say most of my fabric and yarn... there are still a few more boxes in the garage and potting shed. We won't even discuss the garage stored quilts and picture frames. Eeek.

I hesitate to declare that we have finally found the permanent arrangement of bedrooms and closets, but it looks to be a perfect setup. It has taken us this long to make these choices because we have never lived like this in all the 30 years of our marriage. And the house is quirky in its layout, so we had to figure that out to make the most of it. Add to that the downsizing, which we keep re-doing.

And is it really downsizing when we have two extra buildings with huge amounts of storage space for all this stuff? I can't answer that.

Anyway now I am ready to make the damn living room drapes and after that return to painting again. I will try and do a quilting thing or two a week, but it will be paintings for a while, until garden time arrives.

Moving In

We haven't seen the bluebirds at all since they first visited our place. But now the birdhouse has begun to change. Today I noticed that a large wad of pine needles and such is wedged into the opening. And the fluff and stuff in that metal cage next to the house is reduced quite a bit.

Somebody is definitely redecorating, besides us I mean.

We are moving closets, putting up hanging shelves and redistributing collections of things. Once again I am having to face reality. I haven't used the super heavy down comforters, thicker winter sweaters, coats for dreadfully cold weather, all sorts of pillows, dishes, baking pans, etc. So lots of this stuff is either going to Goodwill (where I may have gotten it in the first place) or being stored in the garage. The garage is filling up fast.

I uncovered another sweatshirt to add to my collection. Now I have five. This is my favorite thing to wear. Most of mine have pockets and a hood, for walking to the mailbox in the rain. Our simpler life results in a simpler wardrobe. Choices are reduced to long sleeved t-shirts or short-sleeved t-shirts. Two pairs of jeans, both black. Easy.

PS. Frontline on PBS is doing a program on Parkinson's Disease. Since Dave has this we thought you might watch and learn what is being done to fight this. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/parkinsons/

Fabric Dyeing 101 with Melody Johnson

If you have ever wanted to try your hand at dyeing fabric, or have tried it before and want to know more, then plan to join Melody for a free and informative talk about dyeing cottons and silks.

Melody has been the co-owner (with Laura Wasilowski) of Artfabrik Hand Dyed Fabrics and Threads since 1990. Her experience in dyeing all kinds of cottons and silks as well as embroidery threads and yarns makes her well-versed in the techniques required to produce colors from subtle to saturated. Melody will show examples of fabrics dyed in her own original patterns and textures and will explain the process to achieve these gorgeous results.

This informal lecture will whet your whistle for the workshop in May.

Level: Beginner to Advanced—Two days—No sewing machine required
We will be using Procion MX Fiber Reactive Dyes, the most dependable, lightfast and washfast dyes in the industry. Day One: Participants will learn the basic techniques to dye solids, crackle, sueded textures and gradations using low water immersion. Day Two: Participants will learn how to use dyes in direct applications to produce blended shades, water color effects, pleating for texture and sunbaking, if the weather cooperates!

Supply list for this class:
Kit fee includes, dye and chemicals, 6 yards of prepared for dyeing cotton fabric.

$40 per student
Participants responsible for -
Old clothes, comfortable shoes, and an apron and RUBBER GLOVES.
24 small lidded disposable plastic containers, such as Gladware.
Bucket and dishpan (or two dishpans)

Plastic spoons
50 gallon garbage bags for second day
old newspapers

Twisting Square Tam

This was made for my Mad for Purples/Blues/Greens friend and the pink was just an interloper.

The tam or beret was knit from the point down and I gathered (a nice word for scrounged) every bit of the favored colored yarns and had just enough to make this rich in texture as well as color.

To make the square spiral, divide the stitches evenly and K1P1 in the last stitch on each needle at the end of every row.

OK there is a bit more pink than necessary here, but the yarn did that, I couldn't help it.

The inside, before I cut the ball off, so I could make sure it fit nicely. This is the part that comes closest to the face, so it must be pretty too. The rounds are alternating smooth stockinette and reverse, with a few rounds of garter tossed in for variety. This makes it very stretchy and roomy for longer hair types. Mostly all wools, superwash, and merino silk blend for the tip top and ribbing. Nothing itchy here.

I love all colors close together but analogous colors make for a more sophisticated scheme.

Easy, Crafty and Colorful

I have been saving this project for a day when I had nothing to blog. This is the day. I painted and stamped these boxes in preblogging days and have been using them non-stop ever since. The boxes themselves came from Michael's and the paint is just cheapo craft paint. However
what makes them so fun are the stamps I got from Sherrill Kahn's website, Impressmenow.
Her books are some of my very faves and her stamps come unmounted so that you can just cut them apart and use immediately.

I painted the boxes with foam brushes, in all the colors of the rainbow. The ink used for the stamping is the same paint, either brushed onto the stamp with the foam brush (which works the best) or squirted onto a piece of smooth sponge and used like a stamp pad.

It hardly matters if you are neat with the underpainting, as the stamping will make the final result look 'artistic' if you know my meaning. I also used some nicer gold metallic paint, on a piece of sponge to highlight areas.

Boxes like these are great for small things that have no other home. Old love letters, bills you are avoiding, yarn leftovers, and single socks looking for a mate, etc.

We spent the whole dang day yesterday in bed snoozing and watching HGTV. At our age, one day of work, and one day of recuperation seems to be our habit.

Some Assembly Required

At last the new bed is assembled and it is the center piece in my design fantasy for Dave's new bedroom, upstairs in the guest room. How many rooms has he slept in? All of them. This was where he started out when we first moved in and now he's back.

It tooks us several weeks to gird our loins to put this bed together. We waited until the weather warmed up, in case we had enough energy left to remove the old bed to the garage. We didn't. Maybe we will today.

The ceilings are much lower in these upstairs rooms so we had to saw two inches off the uprights in order to clear the ceiling. It worked! This IKEA bed is very sturdy, no wiggling at all. It is yellow painted pine and happened to match an existing bedspread and pillow set. LUCKY.

That hanging paper lantern is temporary. It is lime green like the walls.

The new red chest that was in the dining area is perfect here. I never did put anything in the drawers, so I didn't have to switch it out any contents. And I just stuck those paintings up because there were already nails in the wall. They will be replaced with something more appropriate, later.

I surprised Dave with his own laptop, and I gave him a table just like mine, since I had two. The white chair and ottoman are for watching tv and reading and the black chair has a new home too.

This worked out so nicely and last night we also set up the dvd player in my room and watched a movie there for the first time. Very cozy.

Now we are going to empty the big back room and start figuring out what to do there. Thank heavens for Craig's List.

Knit Club Premiere

Handy Caddy

I attended the first meeting of the Stone Light Knitters Club yesterday and it was FANTASTIC. Like a shot in the arm for midwinter-itis. I was afraid the bad weather might restrain some from attending but I forgot that off-the-mountain-temps are higher and the snow was non-existent. Our snow is disappearing quickly and it will reach the 50's today. Yes!

Nine of us showed up and immediately the audio was turned up to eleven. Clicking needles, laughing and oohs and ahhs at the knit projects made us all kinda giddy. Or maybe I came in that way from the giant coffee I got at the BP?

Anyway it was a hoot. Two of the gals were former Chicagoans and several of us are also quilters which is good too. The gal I was next to, Dianne with two N's lives in the town just down the mountain from me, where I shop, so there's that good news. And her husband has a mini-railroad on their property that grown-ups can ride which made Dave excited to know more.

I couldn't help myself (I am totally insufferable, doncha know) and had to do a mini demo on mitered squares and the corkscrew. But the real star of the show was my Handy Caddy which held all my knitting stuff. Everyone wanted one. I was the same way when I saw it for the first time.

I also met Sidonna, a fiber artist who gave me info on the Mountain Arts Guild.

Big happy sigh...

Corkscrew Toque (that's Canadian)

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I am on a hat-making binge. I have enough socks, altho some are starting to get a bit thin in the heel or toe, so I may revert to socks in the near future. But for now, I am partial to hats, knit in the round and with the idea of using up scraps or leftovers stash yarn. This yarn was a disappointment, dye-wise, but I love the yarn itself. Opal 6-ply with the Hundertwasser label.

I bought it when I was teaching in St. Moritz in 2007, made the socks while I was there and since it is a skein of 467 yards (!!) I had lots of yardage left.

I was hoping to do an all mitered squares hat, but the coloration didn't play up the design well, so I switched to simpler faster stitch patterns. A row of miters, followed by 3 rows of purl and then three rows of knit with popcorns every five or six stitches, and then more purl. After that double seed stitch. Even that looks like a mush-mosh-mess.

I decreased to finish and then left with an uneven three stitches (?) I decided to add a corkscrew.

Here's how: Cable cast on a lot of stitches....I didn't count. More than 50 I think. Then increase 3 (k,p,k) into each stinkin' stitch. Turn and knit the whole thing and then bind off loosely (they always say that) and watch the corkscrew happen! So fun. I am putting two more on this hat before I call it finished.

Today is the first meeting of the knit group at the quilt shop. I am going. I hope the weather doesn't prevent others from venturing out. It has snowed for two days and nights and now we have almost an inch on the ground. Heavens!

Inauguration Day!

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We are watching the inauguration of Barack Obama and Joe Biden today.

We are so jubilant!!

Why is this bed here?

We are about to rearrange furniture again. I was busy all night long imagining room makeovers in my near-sleep. Dave decided to move his bedroom up to the guest room while we are going to be renovating the big back room. Out goes everything, either to the garage or upstairs and then it's decision day for flooring, paint, lighting and rugs. It never ends...until the fat lady sings and I am tuning up as we speak.

Have a great turning over the administration day. I know we will.

The All Day Beret

I wanted to do something with all my Koigu leftovers, and I have many, many balls of short lengths, from frogging other bad ideas. ( Wouldn't it be nice if we could unravel all our mistakes and re-cycle our ideas into something worthwhile?) So I devised this hat, knit from the top down, and incorporating miters and triangles.

I started at 8 am and finally went to bed at 10:30, with it unfinished. It is still on the teeny size 2 circulars. I used 5 size 3 dpns for most of it, especially the squares and triangle-wedgy parts.

The nice part for me is that one makes a section, and then one picks up stitches for the next part so no sewing together is required. But counting stitches is very essential, and as I was figuring this out, I wondered if I would ever be able to duplicate what I had done or explain it or write a pattern. The answer...No.

Bits o' Knits

January is my big social month here in the boonies. I am joining the knitting group at the local quilt shop, aka the local yarn shop and in the summer the same place is the local dye studio. All things I like. I needed a hat to complete my ensemble (see here) so I visited Ravelry and searched through all the hats there. I found this one to be fast and easy, and it was! I was done in two hours. I kid you not. Here's the pattern

This is Noro Kureyon which was more my colors when I started and then it changed to orangerustgreen later on. O well.

And while I was so comfy sitting there in front of the tv watching Russell Crowe in The Insider, I also finished these socks.

Three yarns which are not dyed to stripe, Baby Ull for the heel and toe, Koigu in gold and Sophie's Toes in purple-blue multi.

The weather has finally warmed up and the ice is dripping off the roof like raindrops. Nice day to sit and knit some more.

My Breadmaking Pot

Actually I have two of these, and they don't look nearly as nice and new as this picture from the Circulon website. Mine have teflon inside, which does or doesn't matter when baking bread.

They are kinda heavy but not as heavy as a cast iron pot, which I DID buy for bread baking and didn't like after we used it for popcorn alot. It makes excellent popcorn, but the fact that you don't wash cast iron made the whole thing just a glob of burnt on stickiness.

I also have two of these, in the 8 cup size. I mix the dough in this and let it rise to the top. Then it gets poured (very wet dough) out onto my worksurface and a bit more flour is added to make it into a loaf and then it is set back into a pot or bowl to rise a second time.

The bread recipe-s, which was requested in a comment, is in the sidebar...

A Word or two about Bread

Faithful readers will attest that I have been making bread using the No-Knead method for some time. It is easy, if slow, and makes a great rustic loaf. Recently, like three days ago when I lost all my Helpful Stuff links, I had to go back and find the recipe and video and repost them in the sidebar. While on that quest I discovered another article by Mark Bittman which referred to a Faster No-Knead recipe. I was intrigued.

The original recipe called for preheating the cooking pot in the 500° oven til it is piping hot BEFORE placing the bread dough in it. I never really liked that part, because one has to be careful not to burn oneself on the very hot pot as one puts in the dough, plus my smoke alarm is way sensitive and it goes off whenever I open my oven door.

The new FASTER method has the bread doing its second rise in the room temperature cooking pot and going into a cold oven and then being brought up to temp to bake it off.

That's like a whole big step I can avoid.

Why not try it?

So here's the result. Strange shapes yes. But the crust is wonderful and the interior is still fabulous and the taste is exactly the same.

Nice crumb. I should have waited till it was cool to cut this but it was already 11pm when the bread was done baking, and I couldn't stay awake much longer.

The cooking pot is prepared with a little vegetable oil, sprinkling in some Kosher salt and Sesame seeds, the dough goes in and is topped with more salt and seeds and covered with the pot lid. I let the dough rise for several more hours while I watched all my shows and then at 10pm I started the oven with the pots inside already. After an hour which included warming up to the proper temp (450° really, not 500° ) I removed the lids to let the loaves brown, another 15 minutes. Simply wonderful!

My Freemotion Machine Quilting Book is now available for everyone here.
Thanks to my new best friend on earth Melissa.

Brrr...

It's 12° F here and the pond has frozen. I am staying in and wearing a hat.

The goldfinches are flocking to the feeder and we hide behind our paperwhites so they can't see us. Every now and then one flies into the window. Thud. They only do that once.

+++++++

And now a few words about the point of this Free Motion Machine Quilting Book

Machine quilting is easy IF you put some time into it.

Sit a little higher at the machine, use contrasting thread and plain fabric so you can SEE WHAT YOU ARE DOING.

Spend a good three hours doodling with the designs in the book and you will continue to improve. Don't pay attention to the back at first, this will look awful. But after you are more relaxed and have spent the necessary hours the back will look fabulous.

Machine quilting requires an unbalanced thread tension. Looser needle thread and tighter bobbin thread. Don't dink around with the bobbin tension, just loosen the top thread.

A. Little. Bit.

Do the designs in the book, one page at a time, until your stitches look just like the book stitches. These are actual photocopies of the piece of quilting I made. Aim for that size design, stitch length etc. Some of these designs you will never use, but are for practice to achieve the points, straight lines etc.

Keep a few extra quilt sandwiches handy to warm up before you quilt your good quilt. It can't hurt.

Good Luck.

PS. I can't send anything to you unless you email me. I can't reply to the comments if there is no email address. You know who you are. I don't.

This is my machine. Janome 6500. It is good but not magic. You will still have to practice.

Print Parade #6

Print Parade #6

Commercial and hand dyed cottons, machine pieced, machine quilted, hand embroidery.

22.5" square.

This ends the Print Parade series and now I am ready to attend the quilting group this afternoon.

PS. The entire series can be seen on my New Works site.

New Helpful Stuff Links

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While I was trying to do something else, I lost all my sidebar links called Helpful Stuff. I am so mad at myself.

But since this stuff is in the archives, I was able to find many of them again. And luckily some were lost... no loss really. And I added something new, My Free Motion Machine Quilting Design book which is available as a Google Doc. Just click and see.

I know there are lots of spam comments attached to these, which take forever to delete, and then reappear the next day. So do like me, and IGNORE THEM.

Print Parade #5

Print Parade #5

Commercial and hand dyed cottons, machine pieced and quilted.

22 1/4 x 21 1/4"

I would have finished this yesterday, but I had an overwhelming need for a nap. I cleared off the guestbed and crawled in and didn't move for three hours. Three hours! That killed my whole day, but I guess I needed it.

I got up early to work on this (with the help of Mr. Moon shining right at eye level, brighter than ever) but checked my email. My sister Brooke sent me this site: www.playlist.com and I got all distracted. Geesh, it doesn't take much. On this site you can search for just about anything from Yo Yo Ma to Los Zafiros (a Cubano doo-wop grupo from the 50's), make up a playlist and listen to all the tunes you like. Free of course. Addictive. Totally. Or you can find someone else's playlist and save hours of dinkin' around. I did that too. Hours later I finally finished yesterday's quilt.

One more to go, as tomorrow is the quilting group meeting. I must have new stuff to show.