Livin' La Needle Loca

...such as it is. I have not had time to take many photos, but I do have one from our trip to Mom's: a rainbow on the way home: Up this weekend: It's time to cycle over to baking. Today, I will start the ingredient shopping. The goals for Saturday and Sunday is to bake the fruitcakes and pumpkin bread, and prep the cookie dough that much be refrigerated. It doesn't sound like much, but I'll be in the kitchen all weekend! The advent calendars will go up tomorrow and then it's the mad scramble to get the Christmas decorating done at the same time that I'm baking. Yes, it's Cookie Time!! .

...sorry, no photos this week either.  It was raining too hard for me to go out to the studio and take photos of the current WIPs. I have added another project to the list: a quilt for my mother-in-law. When we visited her at her memory care facility before Thanksgiving, I noticed that her side of the shared room was pretty empty of anything personal. Her roommate has a nice quilt on her bed, so I decided we needed to make one for my MIL. My original thought was an Irish-themed quilt, but I quickly discarded that idea. The quilt examples that I found were either too complicated (Irish-Chain quilt) or too cartoony (leprechauns) for her taste. Given that the quilt might accidentally disappear at the facility, I don't want to invest hours and hours in it, but I do want it to be nice. She really loves the seashore and seashells. In my stash, I found a panel from the Sand and Sea collection by Wilmington Prints and a couple of other fabrics in the line. The panel has large seahors...

...and the Thanksgiving report. The long weekend was pretty busy, so I didn't really have time to post. We woke up Wednesday to rain!! It was so good to smell clean air after 10 days of smokey and hazy days. We went to my Mom's on Wednesday. I baked an apricot cobbler when I got there so I wouldn't have to deal with it on Thanksgiving Day. I helped my sister set the table and helped my mom with whatever she'd let me do. Let me tell you, at 88 she still has a ton of energy! ON Thanksgiving day, we all pitched in to do whatever needed doing. The turkeys (!) were cooked in electric roasters, freeing up the oven for the side dishes. 14 people arrived for dinner. It was yummy and the desserts were fabulous. We all ate too much, but it was all SO good! We came home on Saturday morning. I cooked our turkey and The Daughter joined us for dinner.  I cooked a smaller turkey this year because there were only 3 people. So, fewer leftovers, but that's a good thing! I w...

...blog-and-run post. WIPs Roll Call Worked On: Charred Teal Shawl (knitting) [ Ravelry ] Finished color 5 and started color 6 in Section 3. Shimmering Advancing Point Twill Wrap (weaving)  Playing around with the width of the end product. In the Queue Renaissance Mermaid (cross stitch) Shimmering Advancing Point Twill Wrap (weaving) Works In Progress, Did Not Work On This Week: Baroque Hat (knitting) [ Ravelry ]  Finishing work for some old crewel pictures (sewing)  Look Through My Window quilt for me (quilting) Mother of Dragons shawl (knitting) [ Ravelry ]  St. Charles (needlepoint) Valley of the Heart's Delight sampler design (cross stitch) UFOs/Hibernation: Be My Baby for My Baby (knitting) [ Ravelry ] Bear Paw pottery (needlepoint) Canto de Sirena shawl (knitting) [ Ravelry ] Peacock Majesty by Just Nan (cross stitch) Tucson Twilight (needlepoint)

...and the weekend report. I spent the weekend cleaning up the house and getting things prepped for Thanksgiving. We're having 2 Thanksgivings: one with my mom and one with The Daughter. I'm providing cranberry sauce and dressing/stuffing for both dinners, and a pie or cobbler for my mom's. On my half-day off on Friday, I started spinning a new yarn, Under the Sea [ Ravelry ]. The top is a Stitches West 217 purchase from Huckleberry Knits.  I also spent some time toying with the Advancing Point weaving project, trying to figure out the best way to make the wrap wider. It currently site at 16 inches, which is not wide enough. I'd like it to be at least 20 inches wide. I did the first grocery run on Saturday. After the grocery run, I cooked. Made the cranberry sauce for both meals. It's in the refrigerator, ready to go. Prepped the dressing/stuffing for both meals. I put it into two containers and froze them so they'd hold better. Assembled the dry br...

...we've experienced a week of poor air quality due to the fires north of us. So many people (and animals) have lost their homes, some lost their lives, and many are missing in the #CaliforniaFires. I feel for them all. Here's a photo from last Friday, which was the beginning of our hazy days. OK, now imagine it twice as bad. I haven't seen blue sky in several days. I can't imagine how bad it is in the actual fire area. Ugh! We're looking forward to Thanksgiving at my mom's next week. She lives well out of the smoke area. It will be nice to be able to go outside and breathe fresh air. Up this weekend: Start the prep for Thanksgiving. I'm taking stuffing, cranberry sauce, and a pie to my mom's, as well as having a small Thanksgiving dinner for us on the weekend. The more I can prep and freeze this weekend, the less I have to do during the week! .

...and some finished objects! First up: the secret project. My friend Jane had to have hip replacement surgery. Normally, I'd send her some flowers and maybe a card. However, she asked that I stop sending her flowers as she felt they were too expensive. We try to chat via Facebook Messenger every week. During our chats, we catch up with what's going on with our families, what we're working on, and so on. During one of our more recent chats, she mentioned that the tote bag I made as a birthday present in 2008 was finally wearing out. I decided to send her a care package with a new tote bag after her surgery. This was the secret project that I mentioned in earlier posts. She finally received her package this week, so here's a look at three components I made for the bag. This is the Bohemian Tote Bag:  and the inside: Specs: Started 10/21/18 Finished 11/3/18 Fabrics from the Bohemian Rhapsody collection and Fairy Frost, The outside uses the darker ra...

...such as it is. Maybe it's the time change; maybe it's just fatigue. I could not get any traction on any project this weekend. I looked at the quilt squares, but could not get motivated to do any rearranging. I gave the St. Charles needlepoint a passing glance, but did not pick it up. The same goes for the mermaid - could not get motivated to start her. I picked up the bag containing the latest hat and put it down. I really intended to start winding the warp for the new twill project. I got as far as figuring out how long I needed the warp to be and the path I needed to take on the warping board to achieve that length. Then I got stuck. I realized that my current vision of the project would not be wide enough for me. In the loom it would be 16 inches; after weaving it would be less than that. I wanted something closer to 20 inches after weaving. Hmmm...back to the drawing board, or in this case, iWeaveIt. Ran into another stumbling block there. While having the patter...

...and there are some new plants in the garden. The rosemary plants in our front yard are pretty old and are getting a little woody. The Husband bought some new rosemary plants that are flowering for the backyard. I think the Husband misses seeing chile peppers in the backyard because he bought an ornament pepper plant to have outside our kitchen window. For color, he planted some dianthus, Violas, and chrysanthemums. Up this weekend: No specific plans. I'm going to just go with the flow and see where it takes me! .

...but didn't get very far and obviously didn't finish it. That's what happens when I get too busy with work. The time change is affecting me more this time. The whole waking up at 4 in the morning is getting really old, but it's worse with the time change. It doesn't help that Sombra is not adjusting well either--the meowing for her breakfast at early hours of the morning keeps me from getting back to sleep. I'm hoping that she will adjust soon! Not much happening in the craft-end of things. I've done a little knitting on the Charred Teal Shawl [ Ravelry ], but that's about it. Just can't get motivated. WIPs Roll Call Worked On: Charred Teal Shawl (knitting) [ Ravelry ] Still working on color 5 in Section 3. In the Queue Renaissance Mermaid (cross stitch) Shimmering Advancing Point Twill Wrap (weaving) Works In Progress, Did Not Work On This Week: Baroque Hat (knitting) [ Ravelry ]  Finishing work for some old crewel pictures (se...

...and Election Day in the US. If you are eligible to vote, please do so - your voice is your vote! I did my annual Hallmark Open House visit and purchased the Star Trek USS Enterprise metal ornament that was released in October. I think I'm going to need a bigger tree for these ornaments soon!  I finished the Secret Project! I assembled all the various components and ready to mail. Then I realized that the box I picked up from the Post Office wasn't quite big enough. I made a quick stop at a Post Office on my way to work and got a larger box. I packaged everything in it and printed the postage. All I had to do on my way home was drop the box into the package slot at the same Post Office.  One it is received, I can show you photos of the things I made. There were a couple of components that needed a little thought, so I started spinning another Stitches West purchase while I decided what to do. I started Envy [ Ravelry ], a Merino/Tussah silk/Black Welsh fiber from Homeste...

...one more month until Christmas baking. I better get busy! Finished: 10/6 Love You Punkin (cross stitch) 10/7 Ornament finishing work x 3 (sewing) 10/20 Arizona handspun (spinning) [ Ravelry ] Merino-Bamboo-Silk top (4.0 oz) from Greenwood Fiberarts 282.3 yds, 2-ply; 15 WPI  10/27 CSI Examiner's Gloves (spinning) [ Ravelry ] Merino-Shetland-Silk (4 oz.) from Homestead Hobbyist 161.9 yds. chain-ply; 11 WPI Books: Noturnal Magic, CN Crawford Primeval Magic, CN Crawford  Eternal Magic, CN Crawford   Outlier, Annabel Chase Secrets in Death, JD Robb Bone Driven, Hailey Edwards Caravan Witch, Shannon Mayer The Perfect Husband, Lisa Gardner Love You More, Lisa Gardner Next Year in Havana, Chanel Cleeton Started: 10/5 Arizona handspun (spinning) [ Ravelry ] 10/13 CSI Examiner's Gloves (spinning) [ Ravelry ] 10/21 Secret project Queued Renaissance Mermaid (cross stitch) Shimmering Advancing Point Twill Wrap (weaving) Works In Progress: ...

...finally! Here is Arizona handspun [ Ravelry ]: and the close up: Specs: Arizona handspun Started 10/5/18 Finished 10/20/18 Merino-Bamboo-Silk (4.0 oz) from Greenwood Fiberworks 282.15 yds. 2-ply; 15 WPI This is CSI Examiner's Gloves handspun [ Ravelry ]: and the close up: Specs: CSI Examiner's Gloves handspun Started 10/13/18 Finished 10/27/18 Merino-Shetland-Silk (4.0 oz) from Homestead Hobbyist Up this weekend: Finish the secret project and take some photos. I received the last color that's been on backorder for my next weaving project. Maybe I'll start winding the warp. Let's see how it goes with the secret project. .