The Miracle of Modern Electronics

Remember when you had a phone, and you had a camera, and they weren't the same thing?


OMG I have become my GRANDMOTHER!!


We had some issues over the weekend with the granddaughter's phone, and DH and she went to the phone store.  A year or so ago I wrote a post about my DH and his analog phone, and how he was forced to get a new phone, and he bought a FLIP PHONE!


So, Miss E has an iPhone, and she always wants the latest and greatest, as all teenagers do.  She was having some problems that could not be solved by anyone in our house, and DH decided he'd take her up to the phone store and ask the experts.


About an hour later, they came back.  She was all smiles!  I said "They fixed it?"  She said "Yes, and Grampa got an iPhone!!!"


Almost immediately DD came over to gloat and give her dad a hard time or maybe see for herself!  Miss E had texted her on the way home.  Really, it was an event worth marking!


So they took some selfies and had a fun time.


Meanwhile I am still trying to figure out how to get the camera in my phone to take a lower size of photo.  My son helped me clear up some annoying issues with my phone on Saturday, but even he said he couldn't find a place to change the photo size.


He did make it possible to get a few more pics off the camera -- here's what's been on the needles and hooks recently:

Knitted Beret, my desk lamp is making
a cooperative model, isn't she?

Crocheted cap with a shell pattern, and
a bow made of leftover taupe yarn.

Doing handcrafts makes my brain quiet after the craziness of phones and cameras and computers.  I feel calm with needles or a crochet hook and a ball or two (or twenty) of soft yarn.  Except when the pattern gets a little complicated, the act of making is usually an enjoyable experience.


I hope it's that way for you too!


Rock on with your making...

Random Thoughts for Friday

Today is Friday so I'm sitting on my two hour plus team call for work, multitasking and not paying the proper amount of attention I guess.  Hopefully since I talked for my three minutes I will be ignored the rest of the call!

I have discovered that if I'm knitting on my lunch period, the lamp on my desk is a good substitute for a hat model.  Necessity is the mother of invention -- so true!  But even though I took a photo, I can't post it because for some odd reason my phone is not communicating with my email, and the picture is a gazillion megabytes large!

Where is the eight year old when you need one?

 

I found an interesting article recently on making to-do lists.  It was in a presentation about artistic journaling which veered off into left brain/right brain concepts and made me think that I'm going down a rabbit hole again... like HERE -- Rabbit hole -- but it made me think about creativity and how it starts.  Or how it gets bogged down in details sometimes.

 

 

Our church guild is making a quilt with a car theme for our retiring pastor.  He's a car guy, and my mind just went to checkered flags and applique right off the bat.  I got the center medallion made, and the other ladies made a BUNCH of black and white checkerboard pieces to go around it.



 

I am now struggling with the next step because this quilt wants to be horizontal, when I wanted it to be vertical!  I made some additional primary color blocked pieces for the top and the bottom, but I was a little stymied by the layout.

 

I asked my friend Suzi to come and look.  We put our two minds to the task and a plan gelled.  I guess my left brain, which enjoys a work plan, was getting in front of my right brain, which works more spontaneously!

 

Hey, here's a new notion I found in a trip to my local quilt shop: 

 

 



I'm a big fan of triangle paper of many types.  The ones from Miss Rosie's are made to work with layer cakes (hence the name) so I bought a couple of packs to use in a project that is fermenting in the right side of my head.

Sew on...

To Finish or Not to Finish... or Not to Start? What's the Question Again?

🔃

You know what that symbol means, right?  Around and around?  Refresh?  Every which way but loose? 

Or maybe running around in circles without getting anywhere!  That's where I feel like I am right now. 

Witness:  DH and I share an email address.  We've never felt it necessary to have separate emails.  He sees what I get and I see what he gets.  He's home during the day so if he's ordering something on line that is a gift for me, he can quickly move the confirmation to his own file, and I can do the same from my smart phone, so we're good.  Until now... until our insurance company won't let us both sign on with the same email so I can't pay my dental premium on line, or sign up for the prescription mail order with the same email!  Ugh.

I think I can set up an alias address but I'll need an eight year old to help me with that.  :-(

Also, my SMART phone has suddenly changed the resolution on my photos, and they're now about a billion times larger than they were a month ago.  I can't seem to find where to fix that.  Again, eight year old...

So far in 2017 my quilting projects are piling up but not too awful much is actually being finished.  I still have three quilts to do for church.  The retiring pastor will be leaving in May and I'm about half done with the top for that quilt. 

 

The "car" is now surrounded by road, then a band of green.  It's ready for the black and white "checkered flag" that goes next.  I need a few small panels of b&w to fill in the spaces.

 

Then I had a plan for red, yellow and green panels for above and below the car section but the yellow I had was not right.  On Monday I took a little lunch hour jaunt to Patched Works and came home with a better yellow.  Now to get some time in the sewing room!

 

Here are a few pathetic finishes...

 

 

Did I post the picture of Baby Owen wearing the sweater I made?  He's so adorable!  And he does look happy and warm, doesn't he?

The Favorite Strip Quilt was finished by my friend Suzi the Quilter, and returned to the LCQG meeting. I'm counting that as a finish -- one!! One down, I have no idea how many to go.  The problem seems to be, to paraphrase Jerry Seinfeld, I don't care what's on the list now, I'm thinking about what ELSE could be on the list!

I also have in process a quilt for the Little Lambs nursery; progress so far:  Purchase fabric, and think about quilt designs.

For the Teen Ranch donation quilt, fabric has been pulled, design is done, a few flying geese units are done and more are cut out. 

I guess I need a couple of additional projects and a deadline or two!

Easter is coming up in a few weeks.  The other day my daughter said "Let's go out to brunch instead of making all that mess in the kitchen on Easter".  Wow!  I guess she doesn't want her dad to have to wash all those dishes!  That's OK, my favorite thing to make for dinner is reservations.  :-)

Sew on...

On the Needles and On the Sewing Table

I have blogged in the past about the Amazing Goodwill stores in my area.  You never know what you're going to find there.

I was on the hunt for an ironing board for our church guild, and I literally stumbled over this little sewing machine... it's a Brother 14 stitch basic machine with a weight of about 12-14 pounds, the perfect machine for carrying around to retreats and guild meetings.

As you can see, it's missing a few things... like a cord and foot assembly, and the front plastic insert.  It's also missing a bobbin case, but look at the price!!



A bobbin case is around $5 and I paid $19.99 for a chord and foot.  I have presser feet from an embroidery machine I never use as a sewing machine, and once I pick up a carrying case, we're good to go!

On the needles:

Remember the Agnes sweater?  The last picture I took was sans sleeves.  Well, after knitting a bunch more in the evenings and one weekend day, ta da!  It's DONE!  Except for the blocking and the weaving in of the ends, that is.  And I finished it on the last day of winter.



This may be the first adult sized sweater I
actually finished in the same year in which
it was started...

It's a nice dark green called Boreal.
My camera is taking crappy pics.

This green lace patterned sweater has now made it to the current work bag.  I think I should be able to finish two sleeves before summer, right?  Fingers crossed!

The calendar may say it's spring, but this is what my patio looked like a week ago:

 

And this is what is on my sewing table, a sports car medallion for the center of a quilt.  I have to make the road go all the way around, and add a band of grass.  Then some black and white for a checkered flag goes around the border.

My apologies for the long post... that's what happens when I don't get to the computer more than once a week.

Sew on!

Nancy's Notions Sewing Weekend 2017

As of today, Sewing Weekend is exactly 8 weeks and one day away!

My favorites!!  The Midwest Ya-Ya Sisters will be there Thursday evening.  New patterns!  New ideas!  New jokes?  Maybe, maybe not... but they're always fun to watch.

You can ride the yellow buses.  I wonder if Sparky will be back as bus monitor.

 

Hey, I'm just sayin'... 

 

Sew on!

My Yarn Addiction...



In February I completely lost my mind and signed up for a Knit Along (KAL) at a local yarn store.  I got off to a good start at the cast on party, and continued for several days.  The weekend after the party I had made good enough progress that I was at the point of separating the body from the sleeves:

The KAL Agnes sweater a week after
the knit along started.  I love the color.

Putting the sleeve
stitches on waste yarn.

I've now gotten one sleeve completely done.  Yes, I did knit the entire body of the sweater, down to the bottom ribbing!!  I apologize for not having a more recent photo.  The light is not good at 10 p.m. in my living room.  That's the time I usually fall asleep with the knitting in my lap.

At least I'm beyond the point where I faltered on the last sweater I started for myself.  That one has NO sleeves even started.

I seem to be able to finish a baby sweater, or a kids sweater just fine.  I think my problem has to do with my yarn addiction.  I can't help thinking about the NEXT project any more than I can help thinking about the next quilt when I'm kitting or sewing. :-(

How can you not when things like this are just waiting for you to get your hands on them??

I got a new delivery last week, some luscious pale pink bulky yarn, 100% wool, and I'm looking forward to getting the green sweater done so I can begin a pink one.

Or maybe it will be a vest.  <sigh>  I'm still thinking.

Knit on...

Spring, Or Not

February in Wisconsin is typically cold, and despite only have 28 days three out of four years, can seem very long.  The holidays are over, it's cold, there is usually snow on the ground, and have I mentioned that it's cold? 

Here's what it says at the web site www.weatherspark.com:

Temperature

The month of February is characterized by rising daily high temperatures, with daily highs increasing from 29°F to 37°F over the course of the month, exceeding 49°F or dropping below 15°F only one day in ten.

Daily High and Low Temperature in February

 

The daily average low (blue) and high (red) temperature with percentile bands (inner band from 25th to 75th percentile, outer band from 10th to 90th percentile).

 

The shortest day is Feb 1 with only 9:56 hours of daylight, but by the end of the month we're having 11:12 hours of daylight.  Of course some of that daylight is cloudy, overcast, and snowy.

 

People in other parts of the country are talking spring.  Buds are coming up in the state of Washington, where my youngest brother lives.  <sigh>  My boss in Charlotte NC told us last Friday that it was 80 degrees and sunny.  <I hate him!> <not really>

 

So what's up with this year??  The actual temperature has been in the forties and ffties, and one day it was 71!  Gasp!!

 

Then this happens:

 

Sat 2/25

Actual Temp

28° /20°

Hist. Avg.

36°/22°

 

and yesterday there was a snowstorm that started at 10:00 a.m. and went through dinnertime. 

 

"Take that," says Mother Nature!  "See what happens to you when you forget where you're living???  Did you think this was, oh, say, Tennessee or Georgia? Ha ha!  I'll show you!!"

 

Today

Mar 2

                  High 36° / Low 16°F                    

Mainly cloudy, a snow shower

 

One local weather forecaster quipped that since it had been warm so recently, it was going to feel just that much colder to be at the normal temperature.

 

Spring or not spring, that is the question.  Honestly, no matter what the groundhog says, in Wisconsin there is always six more weeks of winter!

 

Sew on...

List of Things To DO!

My To-Do list keeps getting longer, and I don't seem to have as much sewing time as I wish I had.

I know, preaching to the choir, right?

I'm reading blogs where people are working on the Splendid Sampler or some other stitch-along and I see new fabrics and fun patterns and I'm so envious...

My list of things to do, in no particular order:

• Finish the car quilt for our re-retiring pastor... I have the center medallion done but I need to do some embroidery and fill-in blocks.  Others are doing the border.
• Start (and eventually finish) a donation top for the church guild.  It's mostly cut out.
• Clean up my sewing room - again.  haha!
• Help Miss A finish up her quilt back to replace Blankie.  She is piecing both sides and the top is done.
  
  
• Start an exercise program.  Ugh.
• Put borders on two donation quilts.
• Bind a quilt that's currently out for quilting (Thanks, Suzi!)
• Finish my knit-along Agnes sweater (five inches or so, and sleeves)

• Finish my green Lady's Sweater from last year (just sleeves now...)
• Knit the second sock for Miss E.
  
  

• Finish wall hanging for church nursery.
• Complete my tax returns.  Double ugh.
• Organize my desk.
• Take my Viking machine in for service.
• Embroider baptismal napkins.
• Embroider crosses on some altar napkin.

I'd better stop there, I'm making myself depressed...

Last week I stopped at the Goodwill and scored several great bargains.  I picked up an ironing board, in super shape with a clean cover and pad on it too, for $9.99.  We can use it with our new Big Board.

Then I also spied a Brother sewing machine for $9.99.  It doesn't have a cord or a foot pedal, but I have a Brother embroidery machine that converts to a sewing machine that has the same cords.  I never use the foot pedal because I never switch over to the sewing machine, since I have other options, so I'll find that and us it on the new machine.  I may have to buy a power cord but that's all.  The feet and accessories are all interchangeable so score on that one!

Last thing was a wooden folding TV table for $3.  I've seen a small ironing station made with a wooden folding table that this will work for.  My cousins and my aunt have made them, and I'm planning on making one too.  Here's a picture from Pinterest.

I hope your day is going well...  It's starting to feel like spring, which I know is wrong since it's still Wisconsin and it's only February.  I may try to take a walk in the neighborhood this evening.

Sew on...

The Resource Center Scores Again!

This week, like the last several, is flying past me in a blur!  Tuesday after work I stopped at a funeral visitation.  Then I rushed off to my local quilt guild meeting where I am the raffle chairperson.

The main program was our past president was showing her embellished quilts and telling stories about how they came about.  She does love her bling!  She talked about collecting things with an eye toward adding them to her quilts, and what inspires her to add things to her projects.

Last night Miss A came over with a request for a tan skirt for Friday morning for school.  Yeah, not exactly the four dozen cupcakes for my class tomorrow request, but close!

Tan is not a color I ever buy a lot of for garment fabric.  :-(  But we dug around and came up with a few things that might work... for a Paleo Indian costume.

Let me esplain --  as Ricky Ricardo would say! 

Their school does these fair-like presentations where the students prepare a display and often dress up to illustrate what they've learned about a subject.  Last year Miss A did one on Australia, animals you find there, what the cities are named, the desert, etc.  I had been there so she had some Australian money and a stuffed kangaroo.

Now she's doing a unit on Paleo Indians in Wisconsin.  Paleo is a word meaning ancient, according to Miss A.  It's archeologically 10,000 to 1,500 years ago according to Wikipedia.  So somewhere between the Garden of Eden and recorded history I guess!

Paleo Indians photo from the internet.

Hunting the mammoth...

We dug around until I stumbled across a box of clothing I had saved as potential material for doll clothes.  There was a sort of tan, faux suede skirt from when I used to dress up to go to the office, back when women work skirts and dresses regularly.  And heels.  But I digress.

The skirt had an elastic waist, so with the aid of a large safety pin we made it fit her.  In a flash of brilliance I offered to cut off the hem and make some fringe at the bottom.  Score!! 

Her mom had previously donated a couple of tan tee shirts, so we picked the one that matched best, and we may fringe that one tonight if we are so moved.

She also said she needed a piece of gray fabric for a cave roof.  She and her project partner made a cave out of a large cardboard box.  But they ran out of materials before they finished the roof, so we found a piece of dark gray fleece that will work.  We stuffed everything in a large plastic bag for transport to school.

You just never know when that resource center is going to come in handy!

I wish I could have scheduled time off tomorrow afternoon to go see the presentations!  I'll have to rely on Mom's cell phone video viewing later... I'm sure it will be both amusing and amazing.

Sew on...

Where Did The Week GO?

I can't believe I haven't posted this week.  Well, no, actually I can. Life has been pretty crazy lately.

My youngest Grand stayed overnight with me twice this week.  DD has had a busy schedule.  It isn't any trouble, Miss A is very self-directed, but I enjoy the time spent in math homework or reading with the kid, or just chatting!  I'd rather be doing that than laundry or even sewing.  (Gasp!)

Last week I joined a Knit-Along at a local yarn shop, and I've been busy knitting a lovely green sweater while watching pre-recorded programs on TV in the evening.  My stock of Jeopardy recordings is huge, I'm watching the January shows right now.

This is where I separated for the sleeves and body.  I've
knitted another five inches past that now.

At work I was part of a Project Manager training class from Monday through Thursday... I absorbed a lot of technical knowledge and hopefully that will be of benefit to my work life in the future.

We're mid-stream with our Call Process for a new Pastor at our church.  We had good news, our top choice is coming this weekend for a visit with the congregation, bringing in his wife and youngest child.  That involves a dinner on Saturday evening.  I'm on the clean up crew.  :-)

My friend Suzi the Quilter had a birthday this week.  I hope to have a surprise for her this weekend and wish her many happy returns of the day.

Yesterday I had THREE conference calls or meetings nearly back to back.  I barely had time to go to the rest room between meetings...  those days are so difficult that when I get home after work I just veg out after supper.



AND VICE VERSA!!



At this point I'm saying I am so thankful that my DH does so much at home!  His life contributions give me the ability to do what I do.  As my oldest Grand would say, I Literally Cannot imagine what I would do if he wasn't doing what he does!

I am glad to have a weekend to look forward to... there is no family sewing tonight because my dear Aunt is in Florida with some friends, enjoying the sun and the surf.  Tomorrow I'll enjoy a pot luck supper as only the Lutherans can do them, and on Sunday afternoon I will take a nice long nap on the couch, maybe with my knitting in my lap or maybe with a cat there instead.

Have a good one yourself!

Sew on...

 

 

Wisdom for Friday

I was on a deadly boring conference call listening to people talk about things I didn't understand and had no interest in.  I get to speak for about three minutes at the beginning of the call and then that's it for two hours.

Enter Pinterest.

In no particular order:

The last one goes both ways, finding the right guy works the same.

Happy Friday!

Agnes Knit Along

Never having learned to limit the number of projects on which I am working at one time has sometimes been a blessing and at other times a curse.

I know that some of you know what I mean.

Here's my current list in process, in no particular order...

• Knitting my green lace sweater - I'm down to sleeves only!
• Knitting socks for my oldest granddaughter.  One is done.  The second one is cast on.
• Planning and executing a masculine quilt for a charity request for church
• Layering and quilting a small charity quilt for my LQG
• Planning and executing a portion of a quilt for our vacancy pastor
• Making a chair cushion for my office chair
• Making a cushion for the cat seat in my front window
• Knitting a pair of socks for myself
• Sorting and organizing the church quilt patterns
• Knitting various doll items...
• You get the drift --

So it should be no surprise to anyone that I started a new project!

Enter the Knit Along...

My local yarn shop advertised a simple sweater Knit Along (KAL) starting yesterday.  Lord help me, I didn't NEED another project but then we know need never enters into things when something shiny
and distracting comes along.

I do love this shop!  I appreciate it so much more lately, because one of the two other shops within driving distance of my house closed last year.

 

Cream City Yarn is in Brookfield.  Their yarn is yummy and irresistible.  They can provide you with patterns from Ravelry.com and put them into your library there.  It's wonderful.  So I signed up for Agnes -- the pattern below.  I do not think I'll do pockets, because I don't really need them and I know I don't particularly want focus on that area of my person!  

It was a requirement of the KAL that you purchase your yarn from CCY.  I ordered the recommended Puffin by Quince and Co, in a lovely green called Boreal.

OOOOOUUU, AHHHH!

Coincidentally the sample sweater was in Boreal.   So I know it's going to be luscious. 

The yarn is a bulky weight and we're working on a No. 11 (fairly large) needle.  At the cast-on party, I resisted drinking the wine and eating the snacks and just cast on.  I had too long a cord on my circulars but managed to do a fair imitation of the Magic Loop with what I had in my knitting bag.

After two inches of neck ribbing, I started the body of the sweater and actually had several rows of increasing for the raglan sleeves done when I left after an hour and 45 minutes, so I am hopeful that this one will be actually finished some time soon!  (Wish me luck.)

When I got home I knit a few more rows while watching the news, but I'm thinking I might frog stitch back to the ribbing because I'm not fond of the appearance of the increases I'm using.  Maybe I'm doing something wrong because I'm making holes.  Not good!!

I also didn't remember to take a photo of what I'd done thus far, but since I'm tearing it back, there's time to do that.

Additionally, I could not resist a few other skeins while I was at Cream City.  I did get a free cowl pattern with one of my choices, and I bought some very cool navy/white sock yarn.

With the nine skeins for the sweater, plus the rest of my purchases I think I added a couple thousand yards to my stash.

Just kidding!! Not mine, a random internet photo...

Sorry, I couldn't resist these either...

Knit on...