Author: missouristar

 
The cuteness quotient has been pretty high around here lately.  First off, I've been sewing doll clothes and it doesn't get much cuter than that.  I made p.j.'s for Mei-Mei's doll and she had to try them on immediately:

I also made this summer outfit (modeled on my doll):

And this cute little dress:

Unfortunately, I ignored the advice on the last pattern to measure my doll first and found out that she's a little chubster.  The dress is pretty tight and doesn't quite meet in the back.  Live and learn.

I also found this simple pattern while browsing a yarn store in Friday Harbor last week.  I forgot the name of the store, but it's right on Spring Street and is quite nice.  The pattern is amazingly simple – just five garter stitch rectangles.  The pattern instructs you to knit them separately and sew them together.  However, I modified it since I have an aversion to sewing up!  I left the shoulder stitches live and did a three needle bind off, then picked up the sleeve stitches at the shoulder and knit down. That left only the underarm seam to sew.  The pattern goes by the imaginative name of "Encore Worsted 1528", but you can also check under Baby Kimono in Ravelry.

Cute, no?  This will be donated to the charity my sister volunteers for – Eastside Baby Corner down in the Seattle area.  I have a whole bag of Encore to do more.  First I'm making the child sized version for Isobel:

This is known by the even more clever name of "Encore Worsted 1440".   Of course, one for Mei-Mei will follow.

It's amazing that I've even had time to knit.  My calendar has been bursting at the seams lately.  Now that the crush is over, I hope I've come to my senses and stopped overscheduling myself.  But not all of the scheduling was necessarily bad.  I leave you with this last bit of cuteness overload – Mei-Mei in her first ballet lesson:

I didn't know it was possible to have so much pink in one room!

 
Last Wednesday we took Mei-Mei to the American Girl Doll Place for her birthday.  Originally we had planned for Grandpa and Nana to take her, but since Abby wanted to go too, we let Grandpa off the hook.  In all honesty, we figured he'd spend the entire time looking at his watch and thinking, "Are we done yet?"  Since Wednesday was Isobel's first day of school, the timing seemed right for Mei-Mei to have a day of her own.  Abby and I had done a scouting of the AG store previously and picked out the doll we were going to steer Mei-Mei to.   She is still too young for the regular Amercian Girl dolls, so we picked out a pretty brown haired Bitty Twin for her.  We showed it to her on the computer so she would be prepared.  However, showing us her true little opinionated self, she did not want a brown haired doll – she wanted one with yellow hair.

We knew that she would be excited when we got to the store, but she exceeded all our expectations.  When we walked in she started exclaiming, "My doll store!  My doll store!"  Of course everyone in the store stopped and smiled.  I thought we might spend some time looking at all the different dolls, but Mei-Mei would have none of that!  She wanted to find, "My doll – the one with the yellow pigtails."  So we took her over to the Bitty Baby section and she saw her doll.

We found a saleslady who went to the back and brought out her doll and (surprise!) one for Nana too!!  Mei-Mei walked up to the checkout counter with her big box of dolls and stars in her eyes.  After we paid, the saleslady asked if we wanted her to take Mei-Mei's doll out of the box.  Of course, we said yes.  This reaction sparked a collective, "Awwwww!" throughout the store.

I had to wipe a few tears away as Mei-Mei hugged and kissed her new baby.  We then went to the cafe where her new doll was given her own little chair and place setting.  

All the way home Mei-Mei talked to her doll and made her dance and kissed her.  When we got home we had our picture taken together with our dolls.

I'm not sure how successful sewing for Mei-Mei's new dolly will be.  I made a couple of little outfits for her (seen modeled on my doll).

When she came over yesterday she wanted to see the outfits on her doll, but almost immediately asked for her original outfit to be put back on.  Good thing I have my doll to sew for – and to knit.  I've started a Spring Dress:

If Mei-Mei shows any interest, I'll give it to her for her doll.  We did manage to get Grandpa involved at least a little, although we had to sneak this photo.

Lest you think Isobel was ignored, Grandpa made her a treasure map and she got to dig for buried treasure in our yard – complete with pirate hat!

The total haul was $9.00 in change, which the girls will split and put in their piggy banks.

On a more somber tone, I can't let the day pass without remembering 9/11.  There has been a lot of backlash because of all the constant media coverage during the past week.  But I don't think we should let the media's trivialization of the event cause us to forget what was truly a terrible event for the entire country – not just New York, Pennsyvlania or Washington, D.C.  It affected all of us. However, I think my pastor's words are really relevant here, so I will leave you with his quote:

"As we gather here today, let us do so in celebration and fellowship in our Lord Jesus Christ.  He is the one who has died that we might live and be free from sin and its death.  If fear of death causes us only to mourn and cower in our sadness, fear will have won.  But thanks be to God in Christ Jesus we need not be afraid.  Let us then live as free people in the Lord and take every opportunity to rejoice together."  

Last weekend my friends and I went to the Pacific West Quilt Show in Tacoma.  What an inspiring trip!  There were so many stunning quilts.  Unfortunately, although I took a lot of pictures, I can't show them to you because of very express copyright laws.  So you'll have to take my word for it.  One of the things my friends and I discussed was that for many of the quilts, especially the prize winners, the makers most likely were very single minded.  In all probability they did not divide their time amongst many interests like we do!  I believe I have the ability to actually get into a juried show like this – after all, I've done it twice at the AQS show in Paducah.  But lately it just seems as if I'm all over the map on my hobbies!

I did get inspired by this quilt in the merchant mall:

I've always loved hand applique and one of my quilts that was juried into AQS was an applique quilt.  However, I've been frustrated at doing some of the more complicated designs.  This particular designer was doing demos of her technique and I was so impressed that I snapped up her DVD, some tools and a pattern.  Although I'm not quite ready to tackle her complicated pattern yet, I came home and started over on a simpler design that I had been working on:

I am so much more pleased with the quality of my workmanship using her techniques.  Yesterday I spent a large portion of the day making the little narrow bias stems, but believe I now have enough for the whole quilt.  Next up is to cut out a squillion little leaves.

Not that knitting is taking a back seat.  I've been working on my cabled cardigan, but it is slow going.  The body is done all in one piece up to the armholes and the honeycomb pattern is kicking my butt!  On the pattern rows, every single stitch is cabled and by the end of the row, my hands are aching.  I have one more repeat to go and then I can get to the more fun cables!

btw – before any of you comment that my cables are crossed the wrong way – they are not.  I double checked to be sure after taking this picture.  It's just an optical illusion caused by the shadows in the photo.  It did give me pause for a moment when I saw it!

I do have one FO – I finished my sister's Hedera socks.  They have already been gifted and worn.

And just to prove I am all over the map, I have started not one, but three! new pairs of socks.  In my defense (?) they all serve different purposes.  The first pair are simple rib socks for car knitting, the second are Funny Valentine socks for the new Solid Socks group I joined on Ravlery (seems to be a nice drama-free group), and the third, Twisted Flower, are in my quest to knit up every sock in Cookie A.'s Knit Sock Love book.  All three socks are out of Cascade Heritage, which is becoming my standard "go-to" sock yarn.

And just to add to the "all over the map" thing, I am becoming obsessed with making doll clothes.  So far this is my only accomplishment:

We are taking Mei-Mei to the American Girl Doll store for her birthday to get her a Bitty Twin.  I have a feeling Nana may come home with one too – after all, I do need a fit model, right?  I don't want to make too many little clothes until I know they fit.  I never sewed doll clothes as a child, so I feel as if I'm having another chance at childhood.  Possibly the fact that I'm applying for Social Security has something to do with that!

I'll leave you with my last "all over the map" accomplishment.  This page was one of the top picks of the month at Scrapper's Guide.  I was SO honored!

Hope everyone has a wonderful holiday weekend.  My niece is coming up from Seattle and then we're going down to Snohomish for a holiday brunch with the family.  Our weather is looking to be absolutely glorious for our last few weeks of summer.

 

I think I may be hyperventilating!

 

Yes, she is doing exactly what it looks like she's doing.  I really love that girl!

We finally seem to be getting a little summer here in the Pacific Northwest.  While the rest of the nation has been sweltering, we've been a lot cooler than normal.  Believe me, I am not complaining! With no air conditioning we prefer things on the cool side.  But when summer does come to Whidbey Island, it is spectacular – temps in the mid 70's, plenty of blue skies and an occasional cool offshore breeze.  Heaven!

It's gotten warm enough that our tomatoes have really taken off:

We have lots of little green tomatoes and I'm hoping by September we'll actually have some red ones.  The plant in the middle is an heirloom variety given me by a friend.  It produces little orange cherry tomatoes that are so sweet, they taste like candy.  

The weather has been cool enough that even knitting on a worsted weight sweater has been possible.  I finished the first sleeve on the Kerry Cardigan.  

This is proving to be a fun knit.  It has enough cabling to be interesting, but not so much that you can't watch TV while you knit.  I thought I had finished all the pieces to hubby's Cambridge Cardigan, but when I got ready to block, I realized that the second sleeve was two inches shorter than the first!  I had forgotten that I had lengthened it, and in my usual disorganized pattern, had not taken notes.  So I had to rip back and reknit part of it.  The knitting is done now and I will start sewing it together soon.  Promise.

Knitting seems to be taking a back seat to scrapbooking lately.  Hubby was gone for a few days visiting his sister in San Diego.  He comes home today (hooray!).  While he was gone, I did some marathon scrapbooking.  In fact, I think Maggie felt neglected.  I often sit in the corner of the couch while working on my laptop and I looked up to find this collection of toys gathered at my feet:

I think she was trying to tell me that she wanted to play.  So we went outside and threw her ball around for a while.

I've been working both on new pages and redoing some old paper scrapbook pages.  Here's an example of an old paper page reworked digitally:

Before:

And after:

Before (I never even finished this paper page):

And after:

The newest tutorial from Scrapper's Guide was on scrapping your travel photos, so I was finally able to get on pages a record of our trip to Scotland when we first met Abby:

This is just the first page of a four page spread.  And finally, a recent tip from Scrapper's Guide on gradients and blending helped me create this page:

I can't say enough about the tutorials from Scrapper's Guide.  They have really helped me bring my scrapbooking to the next level.  I can honestly say that if I was constrained to using paper, I probably would not have continued the scrapbooking.

Well, off to get showered and dressed.  So excited that hubby is coming home today.  The older we get, the harder it seems to be when we're apart!

 

 

Well – three weeks without posting!  Some of you may have been wondering if I was still out here.  I'm happy to report that I am indeed.  But a combination of very little posting fodder, then having the granddaughters for a week along with Vacation Bible School, out of the town for the weekend, then coming down with the flu!  Enough excuses for you?

As I mentioned, it seems as if I have very little interesting blogging fodder, especially in the knitting department.  I do seem to have a lace blocking block.  Here's the pile of lace that needs attending to:

I actually finished In Dreams way back in mid-May and Tango two weeks ago, but just haven't gotten around to blocking either one of them.  Usually the minute lace comes off my needles I can't wait to get it blocked.  However, in cleaning out my sewing drawers,  I came across two more scarves that need blocking as well.  I think I just need to bite the bullet and have a lace blocking marathon.

The only knitting that has been accomplished lately are Hedera socks from Cookie A's "Knit, Sock, Love". 

These will again be for my sister.  They are almost finished and when done will leave me with only two projects in the knitting stage – the Advent Scarf and Nagano.  Did I mention that I finished the knitting on hubby's Cambridge Cardigan?  That will go in the finishing pile along with Ylva.  I think I'm ready to start something new and believe I have found the project.  The Kerry Cardigan from Patternfish. 

I have some Peruvian Highland wool that's been marinating in my stash for long enough and I think this will be the perfect project. I'm still recuperating from the flu and think I will pamper myself one more day and just sit, watch TV and do the swatching for this.

As I mentioned, we had the granddaughters last week for Vacation Bible School.  Our church did "Kingdom of the Son" and the girls thoroughly enjoyed it.  I was in charge of the 1st through 3rd graders and had (are you ready for this?) 12 boys and 1 girl!  Needless to say, by the time I got home every day I was utterly exhausted.  Isobel fit right in and had a blast.  Mei-Mei wasn't so sure about the whole idea and by the third day decided that she'd rather be with Nana than with her own group.  I wasn't sure how a 3-year-old would fit in with all those rowdy boys, but they actually seemed to enjoy her.  Several of them asked to sit with her and they all made sure she got a turn when it came time for games.  I asked Isobel if she'd also like to transfer to my group, since her group was even larger, but she politely informed me that she wanted to be with her friends!  Definitely a good thing.

We took the girls strawberry picking – we have a farm here that has the best strawberries imaginable!  As you can see, Mei-Mei was more interested in picking dandelions than strawberries.  She only picked four strawberries and ate them all!

Grandpa is always up for a good time and organized a make-your-own pizza night with some very interesting ingredients.  The girls made theirs with pizza sauce, pepperoni, strawberries, apples and cheese:

And, for Marguerite, pictures of our avian visitors.  We have Flickers that visit on a regular basis and saw this adult feeding a baby:

We've also had a return of the quail who have been absent for a couple of years.  Sorry for the fuzzy photos, but these guys are quick!

I have to send my apologies to all of you out in the Midwest and East Coast who are suffering with the heat.  Last week the Seattle Times reported that Seattle's summer could be measured in minutes – 78 to be exact.  The number of minutes the temp has been over 80 this year.  We have had a few nice days since then, but here on Whidbey Island we have yet to break the 80 degree mark and are hard pressed most days to even break 70!  I know that sounds heavenly to many of you who are baking, so I will NOT complain about our lack of summer.  Stay cool out there!

 

 

Well, we survived an entire week with the granddaughters!!  Perhaps survival is putting it a little too strongly, because mostly it was a delight.  They are very easy kids.  But the constant activity can be a little draining on two aging grandparents.  I discovered quickly that the key was to keep them busy.  And a perfect activity was winding yarn.  Ivy took to it like a pro:

Isobel was amazed at how much sock yarn we wound:

We made a field trip to Padilla bay where the girls learned a lot about the creatures that hang around an estuary:

And Ivy learned that she could actually sit in a whale vertebrae:

The best part of the day?

Ivy was pretty happy to see Mom and Dad, but Isobel actually got a little weepy when she had to leave.  I had to assure her that they will be back in two weeks to  spend the week again for Vacation Bible School.  That should give me and Grandpa enough time to recover!

I did manage to sneak in a little sewing here and there, but discovered I do not do my best work when I am distracted!  Before the girls came I managed to redo the handles on the tote bag.  As most of you suggested, they were too long and were positioned wrong.  Here's the new and improved bag:

And another one that is up on etsy:

And today I was able to spend the whole blessed day in my sewing room and just posted these on etsy:

Although they look deceptively alike, the upper one is lined with stiff interfacing and a plastic insert in the bottom so it can stand on its own.  It also comes with a matching accessory bag.  The bottom one is softed sided and can actually be folded up if necessary.  I think this line of bags will go over well with the Corgi lovers.

We've actually had a few days here and there that made it up over 70 degrees.  Hearing what's going on in the rest of the country, I am so grateful for our moderate weather.  I don't know if we'll even get any tomatoes this year.  The plants are green and healthy, but woefully short of blossoms. 

Off to enjoy the peace and quiet!  And just to assert my independence, I've left sharp objects and hot coffee just lying around!!

I think all of us in the Pacific Northwest have a case of the blahs.  Once again it is dreary, cloudy and rainy.  We've had a couple of spectacular days – all the way up to 70!  But for the most part we are still struggling to even make 60 on some days.  I try very hard not to complain – I'd much rather have this than extreme heat, but it does wear one down.

I seem to have hit a blah with all of my projects as well.  I spent yesterday and today working on a little tote bag that I thought was going to be just the cutest thing ever!  But when I got done, something about it just didn't thrill me, and I'm not sure what it is. 

What is it?  Is it something as simple as the handles are too far apart?  Too tall/wide, not tall/wide enough?  I'm wanting to make some for my etsy shop and if it doesn't thrill me, it probably won't thrill others either.  Any opinions or advice would be welcome.  What would you like to see in a small knitting/project bag?

I did manage to finish the boring socks!

I'm not sure what I'm doing next, but it will be something with a lot more interest!

Perhaps the blahs are due to changes around the old homestead.  We've had some weeping cherry trees out front since shortly after we bought the house over 25 years ago.  We watched them grow from little saplings to mature trees.  Unfortunately they have reach the end of their lifespan and are starting to die.  In addition, there is some concern about the roots and our drainfield.  So – they had to go. 

Before:

After:

I'm looking forward to getting the area landscaped.  We have a friend who is a Master Gardener and she's going to come over and help us out.  I'm hoping to get something with some color.  The lavender that is in the foreground is coming out as well.  Perhaps some irises – I caught this beauty while walking Maggie down by the beach:

We did have a little bit of excitement this week – my old boss, Dr. Olson,  and his wife surprised us with a visit.  Of course, it was on the day that I decided to clean out the guest room closet and there was junk scattered all over the house and I was wearing my sloppiest clothes and no makeup! 

They certainly didn't seem to mind and we were so happy to see them.  I don't miss my job, but I do miss him.  He is finishing up his orthodontic degree at Loma Linda and then will be looking at where he will practice.  He hasn't ruled out our little town, so we're hoping!  But no, I will not be going back to work for him.

A busy week ahead as we prepare for having the granddaughters starting on Friday.  They will be staying with us for a whole week.  Gotta rest up!!

 

I was the fortunate recipient of a Random Act of Kindness last week!  Hubby had gone to check the mail and came trudging up the driveway with a big box.  "Did you order something?  It's really heavy!"  I told him I hadn't.  The return address label was from Corgi Hill Farms – known for her fabulous fiber.  I hadn't ordered anything from AnnaMarie, and even then her boxes tend to be light as a feather.  Imagine my delight when I opened the box and found this:

72 fat quarters (and a couple of pieces that are probably a half yard or so)!!  AnnaMarie is clearing out her belongings in preparation for a move and thought that I might like to have these for the little cases that I'm making.  They are beyond perfect.  They are all high quality fabric and the prints are just lovely.  I have to admit, this unexpected gift made me cry!

Last Friday and Saturday I took part in our local Relay for Life.  I belong to a group at our church called "Faithfully Fit".  We're a support group for healthy eating and living.  We decided to field a team this year because two of our members have had battles with cancer.  Ann is in remission from breast cancer.  Bebe has been undergoing chemo for ovarian cancer and just a few days before the walk was declared to be in remission!  A huge cause for celebration!  The first lap around the track is done by cancer survivors and is pretty emotional.

That's Bebe in the white cap waving at all her admirers.   A hardy few of us volunteered to stay all night.  I was hoping to get a few hours sleep in our tent, but those hopes were unrealistic!  It was SO cold and there was constant noise.  If you think karaoke is bad in the best of times, try it at 2:00 a.m. when you're cold and exhausted!  Those of us who stayed were pretty unanimous in our decision that we will not stay next year.  We're just too old for this.  Next year we're going to enlist the youth of the church for the night shift.  But our efforts were definitely rewarded.  We raised over $5,000 with our group alone and the total for the entire event was around $200,000!!

In celebraton of my friend's good news, I started a new shawl for her.  After much deliberation and more than a few false starts, I am knitting the Holden Shawlette.   This is a pretty, free pattern from Ravelry that only takes one skein of sock yarn.  However, it does start out with – you guessed it – lots of stockinette stitch.  I just can't seem to get away from that!

I've started a new line for my etsy shop as well.  iPad cases! 

I'm very pleased with these and hope they will be successful.  So far so good – I sold one before I could even put it up in the shop!

We've had a few beautiful days here on Whidbey Island, but it seems as if today we are back to very cool and windy.  However, seeing the heat wave back east I am definitely not complaining.  We do seem to be blessed here.  No risk of tornadoes or hurricanes.  Our location somewhat protects us from tusnamis and we get only the occasional snowstorm. 

I'm off this weekend for more fun and games.  Abby, my sister and I are going to do a winery tour tomorrow and then a girls' lunch out.  Should be fun!

I've always enjoyed Marguerite's Wednesday Wings.  She's so knowledgeable about birds and takes wonderful photos of the birds that visit her feeder and nest in her birdhouses.  I've always been a little jealous at the variety of birds that show up at her house.  However, I'm pleased as punch to report that I have my own Wednesday Wings today!  Yesterday hubby and I were lounging around the house watching a movie after dinner.  All of a sudden the crows started making a horrible racket.  I went outside to see what was going on and found this majestic guy (or gal – it's hard to tell the males and females apart) hanging around a tree in our backyard:

He hung out for about an hour and and half and then went on his merry way.  The crows continued to dive bomb him and occasionally he would snap at them if they got too close.  The crows were really flirting with danger because an eagle will grab another bird right out of the air if they so choose.  This may be one of the nesting pair from across the street, or one of their offspring looking for a place to nest (they had three babies this year).  I have mixed feelings about wanting him to make a home in our yard.  It's a wonderful opportunity to observe bald eagles first hand, but then you become a nature preserve and there are a lot of restrictions on what you can and can't do with your property.

These pictures were taken with our new Nikon CoolPix P500.  We had bought a Nikon D60 a couple of years ago, but it has become obvious it's just too much camera for us.  I had visions of buying new lenses for it and really getting into photography, but that's just not going to happen.  Plus it didn't do video and only had a 3x optical zoom with the lens we had.  The CoolPix has an outstanding 36x optical zoom, is smaller and more lightweight and does everything that we'll ever probably want to do with a camera.  I'm already getting some great other Wednesday Wings shots:

That's about the extent of the excitement chez Missour Star this week.  I currently have three active projects which involve:

(1)  a grey stockinette sleeve

(2) grey stockinette socks

(3) a navy blue stockinette sweater. 

Add in grey, overscast skies and it's really a snooze fest.  I guess I do have the Advent Scarf, but it's just not doing it for me right now.   I have a terrible urge to cast on something new, but nothing's calling to me.  I flirted with the idea of starting the Wedding Ring Shawl, but I don't have the yarn for it.   We just spent a boatload of money on the new camera and new window treatments for the living room, so I can't justify a major yarn outlay right now.  What to do?  This weekend we have company, but maybe next week I'll sit down with Ravelry and do some exploring.  Any suggestions would be welcome!