They're comin' straight FOR us!!!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Took the opportunity today to alarm my neighbors by taking things out into the yard and photographing them! These are my Tom Turkeys :) The one on the left is actually a candy dish and belonged to my Grandpa Maynerd. I sure do miss him. It was until recently filled with candy corn, but some people-shaped turkeys ate it! The one at the right I bought years ago at an antique shop and had been my only centerpiece. The grand one in the center I bought just this last week at the antique mall. As soon as I saw him, I knew I couldn't leave without him! Enjoy the day and travel safely! I now have HEAT! My furnace was inspected yesterday and when I woke up to shower and dress for work...there was no heat! I must have gotten ready in RECORD TIME! But the maintainance man was good enough to fix it the night before Thanksgiving while I was at work. Charlie Brown Thanksgiving Special anyone? :)

If you see a sign that says "Peep Show"...

...it doesn't mean they're letting you look at Christmas presents early... Well not in this case. I'm not actually SHOWING the presents, just a few of the building blocks. I have been busy working on Christmas presents and therefore don't want to spoil them! ;) But here a few little things I was playing with this morning. That is my well worn TV tray that is probably older than I am and I'm working with some lovely little confetti sized buttons! I love how random they are! It was another blustery cold day today and I STILL haven't turned on the furnace yet. I was watching the newer PBS BBC version of Dr. Zhivago and sipping tea with my slippers and sweater on as I stitched these. I work tonight and have Thanksgiving off. I plan to stitch some more in the morning and watch the Charlie Brown Thanksgiving Special before going to bed! :)

WIP - Toni Jacket

Last week I pulled a muscle in my back at work, a first for me, and I've been spending a lot of time between my bed and my recliner chair. I've gotten very cosy with my ice packs and heating pad, as well as ibuprofen, narcotics, and muscle relaxers. The one good thing that came out of this injury is I got a lot of knitting done. I knit an entire purse whilst lying flat on my back (I'll show it to you once I figure out how to line it) and I finished the other front panel of my Toni Jacket after I was able to be up in my chair. Here they are being blocked on my living room floor. Now I just have 2 sleeves to complete and I can already begin sewing the front panels to the back panel at the shoulder seams because the sleeves are sewn in last. I am SO excited to be nearing the end of this project! :)

Sweat Shop!

Well maybe not really. I did finish off three fallish/earth tone scrubs tonight though. I have had these cut out and draped over my couch for WEEKS now and I was frankly sick of looking at them. The green ones were finished 2 or so weeks ago but I just hadn't bothered to take a picture of them. My sewing machine had been naughty back in the spring so I never finished the shamrock one in time for St. Patrick's Day and the rest of these are random seasonal ones. The green floral one on the bottom of the pile is for my friend Brenda, but the rest are for me. I also have SEVEN more on deck/in the works including a couple for my friend Melissa. I made pretty good time on them tonight though. I do so enjoy wearing seasonal scrubs to work though because somehow they put me in a good mood :) Two of the scrubs that are in my fabric lineup are Halloween and/or Fall themed, so they will have number one priority on my next night off!

i like socks

One last pair of socks to send off. This is a lovely 100% wool yarn I found at Jo-Ann's. It has a lovely homespun look to it and would also make cozy mittens. Since it is quite lofty, I think they would wear out quick-ish though, so they would be best for bed socks. I needed a fourth ball to finish off this pair, and while I was in Jo-Ann's yesterday, I found ANOTHER wool line and bought 9 (!!!) balls in 3 different colorways! They will knit up quickly which is good because next month is Socktober after all! Last year I think I only finished one pair during the month so hopefully I'll be more productive! I had to stand on my head to take a picture of my feet, and since they were knit for feet bigger than mine, my feet look like Sasquatch!

Brrrrrrrrrrrrr!

We've had a bit of fall weather here! Yippeeeeee! :) The last two nights have seen actual FROST! I am overjoyed of course because this is the time of year that I get to start wearing all the cold weather accessories I knit! I finished a Calorimetry headband a few months back but only last night finally wove the ends in and sewed on a button. This was knit from some of my own hand spun soy silk yarn that I bought as a roving off of eBay. I have a lot left over and eventually would like to knit a pair of gloves out of it. That will be a challenge as I've never yet knit GLOVES. This headband/scarf is ideal for me because I walk to work and wear my hair in a similar rat nest arrangement, so I hate to wear a hat for my commute. I usually wear a scarf as well, but it doesn't quite cover my ears. I am terrible during the summer because I DRIVE (with our heat I am disgusting and sweaty by the time I arrive) whereas in the winter I LOVE the walk. An added plus in winter? By the time everyone has their cars warmed UP, I am usually IN BED! :)

This week I also finished a second pair of socks for my friend in Iraq. These are no frills hunting socks knit from a worsted weight machine-washable 100% wool (Cascade 220). I must say they are quite cozy. I have mixed feelings about the Cascade 220 though. It IS an affordable 100% wool yarn, lots of colors available, machine washable, all those good things, etc. I don't know how it will pill down the line, but I just think it could be a bit softer. However, I DO know these will be worn with hunting boots so maybe the toughness will be a plus in the long run. In any case, it was nice to knit up a pair of these again.

Happy Labor Day!

My hometown held it's 60th annual town doings for Labor Day this year. I went home and spent a nice weekend with just my parents and my sister. This is the first time in several years that I've not had to work ON the day or that night, so it was nice to be at home. All the flags were out on main street and it is such a hometown celebration. It is always neat to drive uptown because there is so much activity and EVERYONE is home! :)

I also made a lot of progress on my sweater. I have almost finished the right front panel. In this picture I have just put in the pocket lining and have the pocket stitches on a holder for later. Of course I FORGOT the back panel at my parents' house, but I'm in no danger of finishing the rest of it anytime soon! I am so pleased with the way it is knitting up! This will give me courage to start my Shetland sweater, dreaded steeks and all, when this one is finished! I'm getting excited because I want to WEAR it this year!

HAPPY LABOR DAY!

We had more fun with puff pastry this weekend! The wonderful thing about puff pastry dough is once it is made, you can freeze it up to 3 months (as IF it will last uneaten for that long!) and just take it out, cut off what you need, and store the rest. In this case I made Jambons. Mom and I ate these at little grocery/delis in Ireland 2 years in a row, but we never saw them in England or Scotland. We would stop off at the Spar store first thing every morning to see if we could get any because they went fast! Some mornings we'd luck out, and some mornings we wouldn't! I even took a picture of one on our second trip to the Aran Islands because I wanted to remember them and try to make them at home!

This is the closest I have gotten to replicating them. They are puff pastry squares with a bacon/cream cheese/sour cream/Parmesan cheese filling. You are literally holding a small stroke in your hand when you eat them! They are SO scrummy though! Flaky and rich! Num num! I'm getting a warm fuzzy feeling just thinking about them!

And if this doesn't make you want to try your hand at home made puff pastry, I don't know what will!

I also made a lemon posset as a birthday dessert for Dad. I had to look up what a 'posset' was. I thought maybe it was a colloquial term much like fool or flummery, but it is technically a milk punch or drink (eggnog for example is in this family). This dessert is in fact set with unflavored gelatin and the recipe called for gelatin leaves. I have a few period cookbooks that I've picked up in my travels or found online and I've read about gelatin leaves before, but I'd never used them. I have searched for them in grocery stores on every single trip to Europe but I've never found them until this year! We stopped at a huge Tesco store in Thirsk where I also got garam masala and yellow lentils for the Indian cooking I want to fool around with! Going to grocery stores overseas is one of my absolute FAVORITE things to do! I look at EVERYTHING!

It wasn't a horribly complicated recipe though. It calls for 4 (!!!!!) cups of cream that you reduce by a third on the stove, allow it to cool and add your softened and dissolved gelatin leaves, add some lemon juice and sugar whipped into ANOTHER cup of cream, and then allow it to set. The recipe said it would serve 6 when in fact it would serve at least 12! It is so rich that you can't eat much! I also made a sauce from some frozen mixed berries--just cooked them to death and strained/sweetened the sauce. The gelatin package said that 2 leaves were the equivalent of 1 teaspoon of powdered gelatin and I just read somewhere the other day that you could use leaf gelatin for window panes in a gingerbread house! I was amazed at how sturdy they were though! For some reason I thought they'd be very fragile and brittle.

Museum Rat

I had a class and a meeting for work last week and finished the class earlier than planned and had a few hours to dink around. Knowing I didn't DARE take a nap for fear of sleeping through my meeting, I decided to head over to the MacNider Museum. It had been a while since I'd been there so I visited my two favorite paintings and found out about an art contest they'll be having. This one is called "The Spinning Wheel" and is an oil painting by John Castigan. It is a very textured painting and I remember seeing it when I was little on field trips to the museum. I can remember being tempted to touch the paint and obviously hundreds of other people have too because now it is framed behind glass! But I just love this painting.



This one is called "The Watcher" by Marvin C0ne. He was an Iowa painter who studied with Grant Wood. I just love how the perspective is off and makes the painting look a little creepy. And the room pictured is painted in one of my favorite shades of blue.

The Kinney Pioneer Museum hosted it's annual Kids' Day event this week. I had the day off, but of course it was sandwiched between two nights that I did have to work so I stayed up and then went out to demonstrate with my wheel. I only stayed for about 2 hours though because I was falling asleep! I worked on a 1/2 pound of this lovely blue Tencel/Merino fiber blend that I've had for a while now. I'm going to make a DK weight yarn out of it for socks or for lace baby hats for any little boys that will be born soon. They had a lot more hands on activities for the kids like rope making, and knot tying--things like that. Another gal from the spinning group had brought her inkle loom and she had the kids help her warp it. A lot of the kids asked, "Can I try?" when they saw me and I wasn't comfortable with them treadling or drafting so I felt kind of bad. I DID bring along my carders and some wool so I let them do that and I had plenty of different kinds of fibers for them to touch and handle. I'll have to think of different things to bring for next year. The end of September will be their last open house day and they will be making apple cider! I am excited about that and I plan on being there!

Toni Jacket Revisited

I can always find all sorts of excuses as to why it is necessary to either take a break from a large project or start new ones. For all knitting there is a season, be it Christmas time, approaching birthdays, pregnancies, kids who are smaller than adults and therefore their stuff knits up quicker, or dorky whims/free patterns found all over the internet (knitted vegetables for example). I bought this kit from Ram Wools and began knitting it on the day my niece was born. Now I'll totally embarrass myself by telling you that this infamous day was almost *ahem* SIX YEARS ago. I have urgently felt the need to pick up those occupied needles and resume work on this jacket because it will be bee-YEW-tiful when it is finished and I want to wear it this season. I have done some marathon knitting over the past 2 days and finished the back panel and pocket linings! Later today when I wake up, I will begin the right front panel. This sweater is bordered by 6 rows of red in plain garter stitch which is knit on size 4 needles while the fair isle portion is knit on size 6. I can't find my size 4 circular needles (no doubt they are occupied somewhere by some other partially worked project!!) and I avoid using my LONG straight needles as much as possible. I was digging thru my needle arsenal earlier and to my utter delight, I found these! They are the same size and I will get to use them for the first time! I bought these at a dollar type store in Germany last year on my trip! I bought 4 pairs in different sizes and these were my ONLY knitting souvenirs from that trip. We had traveled on a group tour and were only in shopping/non-tourist areas during funny hours of the day or on weekends so EVERY single fiber/yarn shop I had on my list was closed by the time we got there. I was happy to come away with these needles though and I'm excited to christen them tomorrow!

Gold Rush Days!

Gold Rush Days were held in Rochester this weekend and we all converged as a family on my sister and her husband's home, including my dear friend Melissa. You never know what you are going to find there, but this year was marred by the RAIN! It rained constantly all day and you just could not be outdoors so it was very crowded to say the least. Melissa and I must be really slow too because we hadn't even gotten through two buildings before the rest of the family was calling on the cell phone ready to go home for the day. Pictured here are some lovely vintage beads cut from old clothes. This same vendor had trims, appliques, laces, etc. which were gorgeous but too expensive for me. These beads are sitting on a charming tea towel that my sister in law picked up for me on a recent trip to Alabama. I just love it and I'm trying to decide if I want to use it as a towel, or sew it into something. Decisions, decisions. The beads will be bead knitted into SOMETHING but I don't yet know what.

These are 2 FABULOUS Pyrex bowls I also picked up! I absolutely LOVE them! The smaller lidded one was $9.50 and the larger one without a lid was $8.50. I also snapped up a very Martha-esque painted wooden handled slotted spoon for $12.50. My mother has a similar spatula at home and I can't believe how STURDY they are even after all these years. These are shown on my newly acquired French dreaming fabric from SupperBuzzy! Now what to do with THAT?!


I also picked up a new collection of fairy tales called "The Tenggren Tell-It-Again Book" illustrated by Gustaf Tenggren. I absolutely love fairy tales and nursery rhymes and the illustrations seemed familiar, particularly Hansel and Gretel. I wonder if we didn't have one of his books growing up. These were my two favorite pictures from the book. Can you guess why?



And finally what I could not afford: these glorious heddles! I should have taken a business card from these dealers because I've seen them every year that I've been to Nordicfest too. They specialize in Scandinavian pieces. You'd think they'd just held up a museum when in fact they actually sell items to museums. I don't know WHERE they find these pieces, but they are simply devine. None of these heddles were under $500. My other favorites of theirs were some woven pieces, bunad jewelery, boat shuttles, and bridal crowns. Absolutely beautiful!

Just in case...

My friend DeeDee and her mother are big into the local farmers' markets and travel all over selling their produce. They have both been very encouraging when it comes to promoting things I make. I am never organized enough to have any sort of project inventory ready when local craft fairs and the like are in full swing, but I had the idea to whip up a few Avoskas to sell in their stall. An Avoska is a Russian string bag so named because a Soviet comedian once called it such in his routine and the name stuck. Avoska literally means "just in case" in Russian and they're commonly carried in case an opportunity to buy consumer goods arises and you have something to carry it home in. These were knit on US size 15 circular needles with a worsted weight 100% cotton (think dishcloths) yarn in a simple eyelet pattern. They stretch out nicely and will hold a lot. I remember we had a navy blue one growing up and we'd carry our towels and swimming suits to the babysitter's house in it. So far there has been interest in them but no takers. The yarn costs $3 for each bag and they take 2-3 hours to knit. I'm asking $15 for each one which still doesn't make it worth the time and materials, but we'll see. If they don't sell, my girlfriends and sisters and mother will get a new Avoska!

There's just something about whipping eggwhites til glossy...

We had a slumber party at Brenda's house last night. Yes indeed, a slumber party. Melissa and I stayed over and our friends Zak and Summer made an appearance. Brenda made a batch of fabulous barbeque meatballs and twice baked potatoes. DeeDee couldn't make it but we had sweet corn grown by her family. I baked french bread, a tomato tart, and this lemon meringue pie in my favorite Martha Blue antique pie plate. I had a lot of fun playing in the kitchen before the party.

We listened to Sam Cooke half the night and Melissa taught us how to play Train with dominoes. Later we had a few rounds of Idiot during which I layed down some serious smack! Then we had SPA night! We soaked our feet and got them sandal-presentable again, painted our toenails, did exfoliating hand treatments and dead sea salt and clay face masks. I also got a little knitting done. It is always nice to just be together with dear friends! We MUST do this more often! :)

Leftovers

I finished my wrist warmers from the leftovers of my Army Sock Kit using beads I bought in Thirsk, Yorkshire. These were knit with the same size 2 needles I used to knit the socks. I cast on 35 stitches for each one and when finished, there were only about 6 yards of yarn left! So that worked out well! The beads are from a cute little embroidery shop we found on the way to the James Heriot Centre. They are size 5 beads in shades of smoky purple, blue and green and have white stripes on them like African Christmas beads. I can't wait for cooler weather so I can wear them!

Army Socks

I finished these this afternoon! I ended up just making a simple pair of ribbed cuff socks on smaller needles to better use this yarn. They were cast on from the other end of the ball of yarn and worked until I started cannibalizing the original oversized sock. I still have the entire cuff of that sock left over and I think I'll try to get a pair of beaded wrist warmers out of it using the same needles. These will be mailed to a dear friend of mine serving in Iraq, hence they are a bit big on my feet. These felt very soft on my feet! :)

"She really saves her candle nubs."

I remember watching some biography of Queen Elizabeth II and they described her as someone who "really saves her candle nubs," or some such thing. Anyhoo, I am off for just one night and I don't think I have the strength to do any sewing tonight because that will involve taking over the entire kitchen table and surrounding area with the sewing machine and fabric and tools, etc. I work the next three nights and I just finished working the last three so I think I will tidy up a little and just knit tonight. I did get tired of looking at these jars

that I've been saving for candles though. I melted down some pillar candle nubs for the two rounded jars and they are a lovely cinnamon apple spice scent once they all mixed together. I get some lovely 100% beeswax tapers every year at the Civil War re-enactment here in town and I've been saving those runts for a while and melted them down to fill the hexagon jar on the right. I absolutely love beeswax candles! They look and smell like honey when you pour them and cool to a lovely and smooth beige/brown. Whenever you blow out a bees

wax candle, the smell just reminds me of church. The jar on the left is from Windsor Castle and once held organic honey produced on one of Prince Charles' farms. The honey has long since been eaten, but I just loved the jar with the royal crest! It was absolutely crying out to be re-used!

Mrs. Bunting!

This week is the week of our local county fair and they are holding an open textiles show which they have not done in several years. I asked my sister in law to loan me a few of the things I've knit for my nieces to enter in the show. In a way I feel like I'm cheating by entering something I knit some time ago! As a kid, I always remembered the final week leading up to the fair as a frantic time of finishing projects, preparing, selecting and freezing the choicest baked items, and getting the rabbits looking presentable! This was WAY too relaxed! This is the first ever "garment" that I'd knitted (as in NOT a hat or scarf or mitten). It is a corn cob baby bunting that I bought as a kit from the Lion Brand Yarn company and as I recall, I was trying to get it done before she was born! The "corn" is knit in a bobble stitch and the "husk" is stockinette stitch with slipped stitch ridges. The only thing that I lamented at the time and continue to gripe about is the fact that it is designed for and knit with their Micro-Spun 100% acrylic yarn. Those who know me well know that I can't ABIDE acrylic yarn! Whenever I'm FORCED to use it, I'll always say that I knit whatever it was out of plastic!

My mother gave me the Army Sock Knitting Kit from the Red Cross 2 years ago for Christmas and I've finally gotten around to starting work on them. It is a kit that comes in a lovely vintage-esque tin and includes Army green sock weight yarn, a darning needle, a set of 4 double pointed needles sized US 5 and a reproduced copy of a WWII GI sock pattern that civilians would have knit for the cause. This is the only kit that is offered, but there are other vintage WWII patterns posted on the Red Cross website. The proceeds of each kit go to the Red Cross which is great, but I have to say I'm a bit disappointed in the needles. I started knitting the sock as directed with the included needles, but with the weight of the yarn and the girth of the needles, I thought the stitches were too loose, the junctures laddered too easily, and the overall work was just "holey". I started over again with size US 2 dpn's and cast on 68 stitches instead of the 60 and just used my basic sock formula because I was afraid I wouldn't have enough yarn with the increased number of stitches in the gauge (the original sock pattern calls for a 11" cuff!). The yarn is also simply labeled "100% wool" and that is it! No gauge is listed nor are there any washing/care instructions. It is still a neat little history lesson though. Had I been alive during WWII, I certainly would have knit for the troops. The yarn is VERY soft and these will be very warm.

O Pioneers!

Today was the annual pork feed/open house out at the Pioneer Museum here in town. I took along my spinning wheel, my niddy noddy, a few drop spindles, my carders, and some different types of fiber to demonstrate spinning to the public. They were VERY busy which is always nice to see, and there were quite a few kids there too. I visited with a lot of people as they walked through the exhibits and lots of people asked several really good questions. It was nice to talk about the different antique wheels/tools they have there on display because the technology has not changed over the years. I think it was good for the public to see a working wheel vs. an antique/nic nac.

I roped Summer into coming with me to work on her drop spindle and to knit. Melissa was going to come too but she worked last night and needed to catch up on sleep. I told both of them that NEXT year when they are spinning like the wind, THEY will be in charge of running the wheel and I'll just knit on something! Summer and I were sitting in kind of a neat spot across from a Victorian bedroom set-up and opposite this mirror. I thought it would make such a neat photo to take a picture of our reflection but I couldn't get a clear shot sitting where I was. Oh well. I still think it's a neat picture! You can see Summer holding her drop spindle and kind of make out my wheel in front of our knees.

This afternoon I labored to produce this skein of silk yarn. It is a two ply fingering/sport weight I'd guess (I never did see how many yards I got!) and is very shiny and smooth. This is the last of the silk from my mom's Elizabethan stockings I knit for her. I have a sister who keeps threatening to reproduce so I need to have some nice baby fiber on hand for booties and hats, etc.! I have the skein sitting on my brand new acquisition--a yard of FABULOUS babushka fabric! This is one of those fabrics that you almost hate to make anything with because that would involve cutting it up! Perish the thought!