Month: February 2007

Marguerite reminded me that it’s the weekend and time to post. I know a lot of you post every day – how do you do it? Even if I had the time, I just don’t have that much to talk about. I’d bore you to tears! Not too much exciting going on here. After about a week of mild weather, it turned cold and we even had a smattering of snow on our yard yesterday. The daffodils are up and starting to bloom – I hope they don’t get their little heads bitten off!

This is what I spent today doing:

Some members of our quilt guild met today to work on community quilts. These go to various organizations around town such as the cancer care unit, foster kids, CADA, etc. I finished this quilt top today. I didn’t do all of the hearts, only four of them, made the alternate nine patches and put it all together. I think some kid will really appreciate this bright and cheery quilt! Unfortunately, our church where we were working forgot to tell us that the furnace is broken and we just about froze to death. But we soldiered on! My fingerless mitts came in handy and were borrowed by at least one other quilter.

Most evenings after work I’ve been knitting on Forest Path – now on Tier 6:

I think any questions about construction have been answered (hopefully correctly) and now it’s down to just knitting, knitting and more knitting. Since there’s no way I’ll get this done by September, I will have to put it aside at some time for some baby quilting and knitting, but I’ll still keep it in the picture. We now have an official due date – September 18th. I’ve already got my leave papers in. I’m taking three weeks off so with any luck we can be there when the baby’s born. Now we just have to get the baby on board to arrive on schedule!

Another busy week – back to work, school and other activities. I’ve gotten a lot done, but haven’t even kept up on my blog reading, much less posting. However, I do have some progress to show. First off – Forest Path. I am now on Tier 4!

I definitely have the hang of it, but that doesn’t mean frogging hasn’t been necessary! I have to remember whether I’m on an odd or even tier and pay attention to whether I pick stitches up from the front or the back and whether the first stitch is slipped as if to knit or purl. I think I made a mistake in picking up way back, but I am not, repeat NOT going back that far. I have to admit to being just a tad nervous looking at this. I am an experienced lace knitter and I know that unblocked lace looks like crap. But this looks more like crap than usual. I think it’s because of all the zigging and zagging. But I am undeterred and pressing on!

I’ve also been sewing quite a bit as well. I’ll have an Izzy dress to show by next week. I also am in charge of a Mystery Quilt project for my Round Robin group. This is a very talented group of ladies that I got together about 10 years ago. There are five of us, with three of us from the original group and others that have come and gone. Over the years we’ve done mini workshops, round robin quilts and worked on quilts for each other. We decided to do a mystery quilt as something new we haven’t tried before. I found the Fly Away Home quilt pattern and decided it would be a great small project. I think I can safely show this since to my knowledge, none of the group reads my blog:

Of course, if any of them do, the mystery has been ruined. I think I may do some tweaking with this too and add some embroidery in the white squares.

Ummm – and where is school in all this? It’s a good thing this is a one class, low stress semester. I’ve spent so much time sewing and knitting that I’ve been neglecting my school work just a little. So, I will need to buckle down this week and work on a couple of essays. So far, I’ve done well, with all but one of my essays earning a perfect score. Wouldn’t you know, though, that one essay really bugs me, even though I was only 2 points off! Just a month and a half to go and then I will be FREE, FREE, FREE for the summer! After that, only three classes and a seminar to go. I am SO ready to be done!

Whew – what an expensive week! First it was emergency dental work because of a cracked molar. Usually I get all my dental work done for free at my office. But both the docs are pediatrics and don’t do adult crowns, so I had to go next door to what one of our teen-aged patients refers to as a “real” dentist. I have the temp on now and it feels a lot better. Then, the day after, our water heater died! Actually, we had kind of been expecting this and, to tell the truth, were not all that disappointed. We’ve been wanting to switch from electric to gas and this was just the incentive we needed. Fortunately we were able to get it done the next day so were without hot water only about 24 hours. Enough to reinforce that we really, really enjoy it!! And also fortunately we had a reserve fund for just such occasions, but now it is low and will need to be replenished. So, if I wasn’t on a yarn diet before, I certainly am now. Thank goodness I still have a gift certificate to the Kirkland yarn shop given to me by my parents for Christmas so I’ll be able to get at least one yarn fix this year.

When not running to doctor’s and dentist’s appointments or dealing with plumbers (actually, my husband did most of that), I sewed and sewed. I completed my mother-in-law’s quilt:

This was my first major machine quilting project and I think it’s not half bad. I’m certainly not as accomplished at machine quilting as hand quilting, but I think is acceptable. At least it’s done! I decided to go ahead and give it to her so hubby and I went over today and presented it to her. She was very pleased. She didn’t remember that she had pieced the star, but I assured her that she had and even put a label on the back showing that she pieced it and I quilted it. I think all of the other ladies were quite impressed. It’s now on her bed. But it sure looked nice on my guest room bed, didn’t it?

I received this picture from Abby:

It’s Izzy in her Miss USA dress. Don’t you love that petulant expression? Maybe Mom had just told her that her position as baby of the family is going to be usurped. And the hat! That goes to an outfit I made her last summer. She has absolutely refused to wear any hats I’ve made for her. If you put them on she just rips them off immediately. But Abby said all of sudden she’s been putting them on and wearing them. Hmmm – does she realize her hat doesn’t match her purse? Oh well, if I made one to match she probably would refuse to wear that one. She certainly does have a mind of her own!

In knitting news, I’ve not made any progress on the Forest Path Stole. I picked up Abby’s Debbie Bliss sweater and was enjoying it so much I’ve just kept going. The back is done and I’ve started on the front. No pictures because I’m too lazy to get up out of my recliner and take one. But . . . . I really need to study too. The new sewing machine is providing a definite distraction! So I was good and studied for a couple of hours today.

By George, I think I’ve got it!  I’ve been looking longingly at the Forest Path Stole pattern ever since it came out.  I’ve read the directions and been terribly confused.  I was excited when Debi and Agnes started the Knit-a-Long because I really needed the support!  I actually started a day early because I had a meeting on the 1st.  And it turns out that it is not as difficult as I was making it out to be.  In the infamous words of Nike – you just have to do it!  I sat down and followed the directions and voila:

I am almost finished with the first tier.  As Debi has pointed out, the lace patterns are fairly simple.  I was a little horrified to see that one contained nupps!  If you’ve followed my blog for any time, you know that I have issues with nupps.  However, it turns out that the right needles make all the difference in the world.  I’m using Knit Picks Options needles and the extra pointy tip is just what’s needed to do the P5 tog.  That, and making sure that on the row before, you knit those stitches VERY, VERY loosely.  In fact, far looser than you think is necessary.  I tried to get a close up, but pre-blocking they look a little scrunched.

In sewing news I went up to Bellingham yesterday for my first embroidery class.  Two classes are offered with the machine – embroidery and mastery classes.  The mastery classes teach you all the features of your machine while the embroidery classes are really just for fun – you get to make a project.  I got up early, packed up my machine and assorted sewing notions and drove for an hour to get to the shop.  When I walked in and announced I was there for the embroidery class, I got a blank look – then they told me the class had been cancelled!  I was understandably annoyed.  It appears they hadn’t called me because I wasn’t on the list.  At least three times I had asked my saleslady to put me on the list and she said she couldn’t find it but promised me I was on it!  Apparently organization is not their strong suit.  However, they took pity on me and told me to bring in my machine and they would work with me.  By the time I got set up, three more people had arrived for class!!  So, they put together an impromtu class and I have to admit to being quite pleased with the results:

We used some type of sparkly fiber (I forgot what it’s called) that you lay on your fabric and press, giving a beautiful, irridescent background.  Then she showed us how to trim these and slide them into photo cards that you can get at Walmart.  Cute, eh?  She also gave me instructions for embroidery directly onto paper.  Can’t wait to try that out.

I only have to work one day this week and hope to get a lot done on my mother-in-law’s quilt.  When I get it laid out for basting, I’ll take a picture.  I leave you with this darling email I got from my daughter-in-law.  Could any grandchild be any cuter?

Isobel’s at this stage right now that she thinks the right way to 
hold a book is when the picture’s the right-side-up, i.e. when the 
head is above the feet. Unfortunately there’s this one place in one 
of her Curious George books, George is sitting up in one page and 
standing up-side-down on his hand in the other. She would just sit 
there turning the book around over and over again, trying to get both 
pictures the right-side-up at the same time, which of course will 
never happen. 😀