12 Days of Christmas - Day 7 plus other tidbits.....

 Here is Day 7 of the 12 days spin-a-long. Only 5 more days until I see all the packet colorways and then decide just how I want to spin it all. As I follow those spinning the packets daily (on Ravelry) I get antsy wanting to be spinning each day too but I've gotten this far in waiting I can wait a bit longer. I really want to plan out how I spin it this year, hence waiting to start spinning.

 I learned how to make these desk organizers at my local ASG (American Sewing Guild) meeting and ended up making a few as gifts for family and friends. They're addictive, very fun to make and fill with scissors, ruler, pens, pencils and a pocket on the back for a notepad. They could also be used next to the sewing machine with sewing tools, or next to the loom.

And I made a few of these folios for gifts (and for me). They're plenty big for holding a big writing pad, holding knitting patterns, handouts for seminars/workshops, whatever. I want to make myself a few more.

12 Days of Christmas - Day 6

Here is Day 6 of the 12 Days - I'm loving these colors

12 Days of Christmas - Day 5

Oooh, I wonder what direction these colors will go......can't wait to spin it

12 Days of Christmas - Day 4

 Here is Day 4 of the 12 Days spin-a-long. I love how each days colors are a progression in color from the day before.

The second sock of Sam's Christmas sox is finally finished. It's harder to find time to knit on them without him seeing since he's semi-retired and works from home much of the time. So, the one finished sock was in his Christmas stocking - second one still on the needles until yesterday evening. Next up on the needles is a new knit cap for him as I noticed recently he needed another for beach walks.......but I'm not behind on this knitting, it wasn't to be a gift, recently saw the need. 

12 Days of Christmas - Day 3

Here's day 3 of the 12 Days spin-a-long - I'm not sure my plan of waiting to start spinning after I see all 12 packets is going to work - this is killing me.......

12 Days of Christmas - Day 2

Here is day 2 of the 12 Days spin-a-long. It's already killing me to not spin yesterday and today's packets of fibery goodness.........but I'm going to be strong and wait until all 12 days are unveiled to decide how I'm going to spin it.

12 Days of Christmas - Day 1

Today is day 1 of the Inglenook 12 Days of Christmas spin-a-long. Here's what came out of the package. I think this year I'm going to be strong and wait to start spinning after all 12 packets are open in case I want to rearrange colors or do something totally different with the way I spin and ply. It's going to be tough but it's something fun to look forward to.  You can see my earlier post about this spin-along here.

A bit of fun......

Yesterday I spent much of the day at the embroidery machine. All holiday preparations were done except for cooking the Feast of the 7 Fishes for tonight's family meal.......so, I decided to play and get ahead of future holidays a bit.

First I finished up the cross stitch bookmark I had been working on in the evenings - a friend gifted me with the kit. It was supposed to have a tassel on the bottom but I opted not to add it - I like it just he way it is.

I sell a lot of chicken towels, a lot of them - I never realized chickens were so popular until I embroidered the first ones a few years back.  Yes, I know this isn't a chicken, it's a rooster. After stitching more of the 4 chicken designs for my etsy shop I decided they needed a couple roosters so I found a pattern for two of them. They will all be in my etsy shop once photos are edited.

And yes, I'm thinking ahead to Valentine's Day - several different embroidered towels with hearts will be showing up in the shop soon - once again, photo editing needs to be done. This design has a cute vine frame around the heart. There are a couple other Valentine towels that will be showing up soon in the shop along with these.

And not too far off will be St. Patrick's Day - this Celtic trinity heart works for both Valentine's and St Paddy's Day. Editing awaits these pics too, then they'll show up in the shop.  I've got several other Celtic/Shamrock designs awaiting stitching - hopefully will get to those in a week or so......then Easter/Spring will be waiting in the wings for stitching. I'm going to try very hard to be ahead of the game this next year......at least that's the goal at the moment..........

 

A bit from santa's workshop......

 Remember back on Nov 15th I had a bunch of a little felted squares to make into a secret something - well, here those simple somethings are - little wreaths. I felted a super scratchy Woolrich sweater that I wore only once in the past 10 years - cut it up into 1" squares and ran some buttonhole thread through them to make little wreaths. I've already got an idea for another felted ornament along these lines..........need to find another scratchy sweater to sacrifice...........

I sewed up some pattern weights for a dear friend in fabric I knew she'd love. These are basically yo-yo's with batting and 2 heavy washers inside, topped with fun buttons from my button stash. In the near future I'll be making myself a set of these..........which I guess means I should get to doing some sewing so I have a use for them..........

I sewed this tote for a friend - what a challenge. Both the outside fabric and the lining fabric have a 1/4" foam interfacing quilted to them, plus the lining fabric also has a heavy duty interfacing. The real challenge was working at the machine with all the bulk that didn't want to fold down out of the way. But I did it and I love the tote so much I've got all the supplies sitting in a pile in the sewing room to make myself one.........with sheep on it..........of course........

I have a few other things that have come out of Santa's workshop this year but they haven't been opened by the recipients yet so I can't post about them until after the holiday.

This was not a holiday gift but it recently came out of the pile of UFO's I'm working on - cross-stitched sunny sheep made into a cute little quilted wallhanging. This will be a future gift........unless I decide I can't give it up.

I'm still working on Sam's socks that go in his Christmas stocking this year - they won't be finished - he's around too much for me to get much knitting time on them. So, one goes in the stocking, the other stays on the needles until Christmas Day when I can finish it up out in the open.

A shawlette/scarf came off the needles this week but needs blocking so a photo will come after I get around to that. I love it.

Another small cross-stitch project is in the works - it was a gift, a kit for a bookmark - will share after it's done.

I've pulled out all my samples and references on boundweave as I've got to present a program on it to two different guilds, the first in March, second in April. I need to make a few more samples and hopefully there will be time for two new projects floating around in my little pea brain. My handout from the program I gave on boundweave in 1999 needs updating.....actually it needs to be totally re-done because somehow the file never made it from computer to computer (many computers) over the years.

Right down to the wire...........

Sheesh - where does the time go??? I was right down to the wire on getting out all our holiday cards - finally today the last of them went in the mail - hopefully they'll arrive on the east coast by Christmas........if not they can be called a New Year's card. Anyhow, they aren't really cards at all this year - they're fabric ornaments that have a little tag hanging on them with a sentiment on it....sorry, didn't take a photo with the tag on them.

The I don't want to count it inventory sale.....

Click HERE to get to my roving/fiber etsy shop. Do you need roving to spin? felt? whatever? Then this is a good time to shop.  It's only my shop with roving/fibers/stash yarns that has everything on sale. My other etsy shop with my handmade/handwoven items does not currently have anything on sale but if you'd like to check it out you can do that HERE.



It's that time of year again.......

Such joy arrived in the mail a week ago - Inglenook Fibers 12 Days of Christmas fiber. This is a limited edition and you have to be quick in the Inglenook group on Ravelry to get in on it. But if you missed out this year there is an etsy shop with lots of other fun fibery blends.

Starting Christmas Day I will spin one packet of fiber based on the Santa's Village graphic. I can't wait to see what each packet will bring........and I will not peek ahead. I will try to post them here as they're spun.

So, the big decision between now and the 25th is how do I spin these. Last year I spun them very thin and then plied with a rayon thread.......but then found that my resulting lace weight yarn was too thin for anything I wanted to knit so I then Navajo plied it. The resulting shawl turned out lovely but this year I need to think it out a bit more before starting. A few options are to spin it all on one bobbin and then ply with something else; split each packet into 2 and spin on 2 bobbins and then ply them together in the end; spin and ply each packet on it's own creating mini-skeins. If I keep spinning all on one bobbin or two bobbins as in the first two options then I end up with one skein going from color to color starting with packet 1 to packet 12. But if I spin mini-skeins when I get to a project I can mix up the color order.

And then there's the decision about which wheel? Majacraft or Hansen e-spinner........or I could go the spindle route although I'm sure to fall behind if I do that.  

Decisions, decisions........

MIA

Yes, I've been missing in action - well, maybe not so much action, just trying to tread water and in all honesty I had nothing to share, not much creative going on here. I'm almost ready for the holidays and will be so happy when they are over - yep, that's how I feel this year and I won't apologize for it.

The brochure for the WeGO traveling exhibit is done, I received it via email the other day. This is the front and back of it, the inside has a list of all exhibitors names and awards. Three of us in my local weaving guild entered items for judging and all three of us had our items accepted - kudos to my fellow guild members Lucy & Kathy. That's one of my scarves on the front cover although not the one that won the Complex Weaver's award. On the back cover is a close up pic of the fabric in Lucy's vest. The closest the exhibit will be to us is in May/June around an hour north. I can't wait to see the  exhibit - I think there are something like 66 pieces.

Today I was embroidering some long sleeve t's for a gift and decided to embroider myself one - I love this lotus and am happy I had time to do this today, I've had it sitting aside to do for myself for a while.

In case anyone is interested there is curling Olympic trials on tv on the Olympic channel which on Dish is channel 389. I put it on while embroidering thinking I could listen to it but it bugged the heck out of me just hearing them yell - have figured out it's one of those things I have to actually watch......hope I can steal a little time this week to watch an hour or two although it's looking doubtful. Yes, I am a curling fan........