Livin' La Needle Loca

Finally! That one took longer than I wanted. I finished the seaming and gave it a little steam block yesterday. The Specs: Completed: 6/29/08 Debbie Bliss pattern from "Essential Baby" Yarn: Crystal Palace Merino 5, Print and solid Needles: US 2 and US 3 circulars It doesn't have any ties yet because I can't find any ribbon for the ties that matches the edging...but I'm not going to worry about that right now! I really want to get back to sock knitting and spinning! I did get some spinning in on Saturday, I finished the second bobbin the Mermaid Falkland top from Yarn Wench . I'm letting it rest a couple of days before I ply it. I'll post a picture of the finished yarn after it's plied. I also spun a bit of the Merino-silk roving that I started last Tour de Fleece. I'd really like to finish that during this year's Tour. Someone asked me the other day just how many apricots we had on the tree. Well, here's a shot of the tree as it looked ...

...can you believe it?! Since my knitting mojo is still AWOL, today's Eye Candy Friday is from the spinning part of my world. Here are two candidates for Tour de Fleece. This is Father Ailnoth's Sin from The Sanguine Gryphon. It is 65% Merino and 35% Silk (yummy!). And this is Chocolate Covered Raspberries from Creatively Dyed. It is Seawool. And another view...love the colors in this one! Up this weekend: spinning and maybe I'll look for my knitting mojo. I would love to finish the Crossover Top and get that out of my hair! I also have to get serious about making my list of what's I'm taking on vacation...we leave the 10th and that's coming up fast! Have a good one!

...I seem to have misplaced it, along with the rest my crafts mojo. I tried working on a knitting project last night and just couldn't get into it. My knitting WIPs are: the finish work for the Crossover Top, the reworking of the doggie sweater, and a pair of socks. I have no new pictures of any of them. I have a couple of baby quilts in the queue, but I really want to get my machine tuned up before I start another one. Anyway, quilts are more weekend projects than weeknight projects. I need larger time chunks to make good progress. And goodness knows, I've got tons of needlework WIPs, but they don't appeal to me either... The only thing that is mildly appealing is spinning. In fact, I signed up for the next Tour de Fleece . Maybe I should take this time to choose what I want to spin and which projects will go with me on vacation—July 10th is coming up fast! So this won't be a picture-less post, ripe Blenheim apricots (yum!):

...the baby quilt is done and delivered to the parents-to-be! Here is "Tickled Pink" It went together much quicker than I expected. I realized on Saturday morning that if I pushed, I could get in done. I took the pictures at 2pm; the baby shower was at 3:30pm...cut it a little close, but it's done! The shower was at a tea room, where we were served some lovely tea sandwiches and desserts. It was very nice to finally meet the mom-to-be and her family. She received lots of cute (and PINK!) things. Sunday was pretty much a wash for me. I ended up without a car until the afternoon, so my plans had to be rearranged. I spent my time quietly, just reading and recovering from Saturday. My shoulders were a little sore from the machine quilting, but it was well worth it seeing how much she loved the quilt. I spent a little time in the garden, just looking around (and stealing a few almost ripe apricots!). There were new flowers ( corncockles) blooming in our herb circle: I love...

...but this time by quilting. So for today's Eye Candy Friday, you get two quilt blocks from the baby quilt I'm making. I'm calling the quilt "Tickled Pink." Here's the assembled cow block: And one of the other blocks: I need to fix the wonky right side of the ducky block. I sewed that at 11pm last night...I probably should have stopped before then! The other four blocks should go together quickly and then I can add the borders. The quilt won't get done for the baby shower tomorrow, but I can at least show her the top! Up this weekend: quilting, some spinning, and maybe back to knitting!

...playing with my new MacBook! We decided to use our Tax Stimulus check to get me a new laptop. I wanted one of the Intel based ones so I can run some of my Windows applications at home (so maybe I can start working at home one day a week...). It arrived yesterday and I've been playing with it ever since. No knitting, no quilting. All Mac, all the time! LOL! Needless to say, not a lot of progress is happening at the moment. But Monday night I did finish cutting out the pieces for the baby quilt. Here's an idea of how the different fabrics will be used: There are 6 squares in this quilt: one with the cow you see above, two have a pink cat in the center, one with a blue dog, and two have a yellow duck. The quilt has two borders: a narrow pink one and one with a flower print that's wider. It will be a cute quilt when it's finished. That's all I have...back to work!

...the weekend goes so quickly! Friday was an odd day. A huge smoke cloud moved in and made everything hazy. When I got home around 7:30pm, this is what it looked like: The sun was actually much redder than this, but the picture gives you an idea of what it looked like. Very strange. I did make it to WWKIP at Purlescence finally around 2:30pm on Saturday. There were 5 or 6 of us outside; I think there were a few inside, but I didn't go in...I just knitted and chatted with the other people there. I worked on the sleeves for the Crossover Top, trying hard to finish them. We took the Husband's parents out to dinner that night for a combination Father's Day and Birthday celebration. We went to Original Joe's in downtown San Jose. Boy, was it busy down there! I hardly recognize that area of town anymore. It's so different from when I went to San Jose State eons ago. Sunday, I started a new baby quilt and quickly got bogged down. I bought a kit and it was not clear which ...

...I'm getting very impatient for our apricots to be ready. Here's a closeup of one that's almost there: The plum tree is doing well and also has fruit that is nearly ripe: The squirrels are also impatient—they have already invaded the apricot tree. Let's hope that the tree rats leave us some good ones! I seem to be experiencing some knitting ennui. I'm frustrated that the doggie sweater is not right and I had to rip out the sleeves for the Crossover Top because I misinterpreted one of the instructions. The sleeves are back on track, but I am seriously tired of stockinette! Either it's time for another pair of socks or I should go quilt something! Up this weekend: I'm hoping to participate in WWKIP tomorrow. However, I have someone coming to look at my quilts and talk about a project she wants to do. I'm not sure whether we'll be done in time for me to get over to Purlescence . I hope so because I had to miss it last year. Other than that, I need ...

...I couldn't sleep last night so I'm not firing on all cylinders right now. Still working away on the sleeves for the Crossover Top. However, the doggie sweater is at a stand-still. I tried it on the dog yesterday and confirmed that there were fit problems. The neck is just too snug and the shoulder area is slightly off. The shoulder area can be easily fixed, but the ribbing on the neck needs to be pulled out. I've put this project in a time-out while I consider whether to fix it or just frog it and start again. Since I have no WIP to show you, I'll share another "old" project. Here's a qult that I made for our bed in 2003. (This is a merged picture, so it's not quite true to form. This thing was so huge I didn't have very many places I could hang it to get a proper picture.) This was the first [almost] king size quilt I made and the first with so many angles (ugh). It is machine-quilted and is still being used on our bed. The title comes from ou...

...there is never enough time in a weekend to do all of the things I'd like to do. As planned, I worked on the Crossover Top and the doggie sweater. The top is turning out very cute: I finished knitting the right front. I joined the fronts to the back at the shoulders. I am now knitting the sleeves (both at once). When they're done, I'll attach the sleeves, sew up the sides, and add the edging. The yarn has a lot more lavender and mint green that the pictures show, but the sweater is looking a bit feminine. Now the doggie sweater is proving a bit challenging, mostly because I don't have a suitable fitting model available. (Although Sombra is pretty close to the recipient's size, her majesty will not be caught dead wearing something intended for a mere dog...) I think the neck is too small and the shoulders are too wide for Papi. I'm thinking about pulling out part of the neck ribbing to make it looser around the neck. Hmmm, guess he'll have to try it on befo...

...can you? This year is flying! We're a month away from vacation and I need to start planning my yarn crawl strategy for Seattle. Today's eye candy is brought to you by the letter "G." I know, I know...this is turning into a garden blog again. What can I say? The Husband is an excellent gardener and the plants just beg for pictures. On Wednesday, I took pictures of the squash blossoms, but they didn't turn out right (too much sun). This morning when I went out to try again, the blossoms were almost all dead. Instead, you get a baby squash picture. Our hydrangea is blooming again. The flowers are in various stages...like this one that is still in progress: This bloom can't decide what color to be, pink or lavender: And because we haven't had a silly cat picture in a while, here's Tica: Note that she has three of her feet showing in the picture. Yeah, she's an odd one... Up this weekend: knitting the Crossover top. I have finished the back and le...

...and no new WIP to show you. I'm working away on the Crossover Top, but there's not a lot of progress since Monday. Yesterday, I was sidelined by a migraine so everything was slow going. At least my migraines are not completely debilitating like some other people's migraines. I just get an aura that lasts between 20 and 40 minutes, followed by a throbbing headache and an upset stomach. As long as I don't move my body in odd directions (no yoga or Pilates) and I don't eat or drink anything that will really make me sick (carbonated water = good; alcohol or milk = bad), I get over it in about 24 hours. I'm fine now, but yesterday...ay! I am itching to start the new socks from the Rockin' Sock Club and I'm having a hard time resisting. However, I found the cutest dog sweater pattern and I think I'll start it instead. The owner of the gym has a cute black and white Pomeranian named Papi. Papi loves to wear sweaters and this one (Dogosaurus Rex from ...

Here's the recap...it was a busy month! Finished: 5/5 Iris Baby Cardigan (knitting) 5/16 Feather and Fan Baby Sweater (knitting) 5/25 Second Iris Baby Cardigan (knitting 5/25 Copperhead 2 yarn (spinning) Worked on: UFOs were ignored this month! Started: 5/5 Feather and Fan Baby Sweater 5/17 Spinning Mermaid Falkland top from Yarn Wench 5/18 Second Iris Cardigan (knitting) 5/22 Spinning Plumthorn (Wesleyan) from Pigeonroof Studios 5/28 Crossover top by Debbie Bliss (knitting) Frogged/On Hiatus: Black leg warmers in Caron Simply Soft yarn (knitting): Waiting for cold weather Works In Progress (did not work on): Saartje's Bootees (knitting) Foxglove baby socks (knitting Montego Bay wrap in Walking on the Wild Tide yarn, using Montego Bay scarf pattern from Interweave Knits Summer issue (knitting) Spinning 4 oz of Angora Cottage 70% Merino and 30% Silk roving in purple Spinning 2 Chasing Rainbows rovings together in the Heather colorway: one Merino-Bombyx (2 oz) and one Merino w...

...working on another deliverable. I'll post my May recap later when I have a little breathing room. So I knit a little: and spun a little: That and housework pretty much sums up my weekend!