Celebrating those who stand up and stay engaged.
Thank you Bob, Bill and Cobie.
Pigma Micron pen on Arches cold press paper, with Prussian blue, burnt sienna, transparent orange, new gamboge and Dr Ph Martin bleed proof white.
HAPPY FATHER’S DAY
Author: Laura Kate
One of six children, I was raised by a busy mom, who instilled in me a love of fabric. Though I learned to sew and knit at a young age, it was the arrival of my first grandchild that pushed me into action. A long-time knitter, I am now ready to explore all things fiber.
Finished Object Friday – Fair Warning
” When I am an Old Woman, I shall wear purple with a red hat – which doesn’t go, and doesn’t suit me “ – Jenny Joseph
I don’t know if this is the sort of hat that the poet had in mind. But perhaps if she had lived in the 21st century, in a cold climate, and was 3 and 1/2 years old, she might have chosen it.
Despite my playful suggestion about an old woman, this hat is indeed meant for Laura Lu. In my determination to use stash yarn, I came to the conclusion that red would work perfectly fine with purple yarn and a purple sweater.
The pattern, which includes a picot edging and very deep ear flaps, is Cameron’s Cap by Sarah Peasley.
https://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/camerons-cap
The designer offers this pattern in four different sizes. I chose the child size, but it is ample enough to fit the child well into teen-hood.
The yarn is Wool of the Andes superwash, by Knitpicks.
Tell me, would you be bold enough to wear this color combination?
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WIP Wednesday: Shell Lake Quilt
For the past two weeks I have been laboring slowly but surely over this quilt. The first week was spent sewing blocks together and sandwiching the quilt. Because I plan to do the quilting in sections, I assembled the quilt in three pieces.
I dithered about for what seemed like forever to come up with a quilting plan. Many hours were spent viewing various classes on Craftsy. Christa Watson’ class “The Quilters Path” is one that gave me some guidance.
https://www.craftsy.com/product/the-quilters-path-plan-it-stitch-it-quilt-it-dvd-streaming/
By Monday, I had come up with a plan.
I started with the Around the world block. First I worked stitch-in-the-ditch every three inches to stabilize the section. Next came the free motion pattern. All of those straight lines needed to be softened and quilted down.
I worked gentle curves across the straight lines.
What remained to be quilted in this block were two large sections of background fabric, including the part with the whirligig. Christa’s all-over motif of loops with random flowers and leaves came to the rescue.
Here is a photograph of the completed sections of an adjoining block.
This is very pleasing to my eye. Having now completely quilted one of the three pieces, I feel that I will likely finish the other two by week end. Then I can move on to final assembly, binding and the Big Reveal!
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Finished Object: Child Cardigan
My week-end has been crazy busy, so this post of a finish is coming out today. I bound off the second pocket on the Lavanda little girl sweater on Friday.
https://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/lavanda
One of the things I like most about this pattern is that when you finish knitting, there’s no sewing up to do – only weaving in ends and sewing on buttons.
Here’s how it looks before washing and blocking.
Despite the fact that I had found my gauge before starting to knit, the finished sweater looks very narrow. Will it in fact block out several inches wider?
Well yes, Yes it did.
A fun feature of the after-thought pockets is the one-inch seed stitch border. It is made by knitting up from held stitches before knitting the interior of the pocket.
This gives a finished look and little extra depth to the pocket. Those rainbow-swirl wood buttons came from an Etsy vendor in the British Isle. They were surprisingly affordable. She must have been reducing her inventory.
https://www.etsy.com/shop/Craftingforjoy?ref=simple-shop-header-name&listing_id=1036971016
Sadly, I did not have enough yarn to knit the attached hood. The sweet seed-stitch collar is a minor consolation. To complete the outfit, I’ll work my purple yarn left-overs into a warm, wooly hat – one with ear flaps.
I can hardly wait for the moment I will give this to Lu. (sigh) I’m afraid that it’s going to be a long summer for me.
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Re-entry
Last Wednesday, the husband and I returned from a very long journey. Over 13 days we drove over 3,000 miles, traveling through nine states. The climax of the trip was three days spent in Ohio, assisting my five siblings in sorting the parents’ household good in preparation for distribution and sale. It’s hard to describe the physical and emotional energy exhausted during that effort, so I won’t try. I wish I could show you a lot of great photographs from the trip, but I didn’t manage to get any worth sharing.
Back here in Oklahoma, it took me a few days to settle back into my normal life. The last few were spent working on hand embroidery of the Shell Lake quilt blocks. It was a good choice for my re-entry, because I could do it slowly while listening to podcasts and drinking lots of coffee. I think that I am done, but not sure. To give me some perspective on my work, I have photographed and posted each block. Let me know if you think the woven sections have enough stitches.
CENTER BLOCK
FOREST BLOCK
FIRE BLOCK
LAKE BLOCK
SKY BLOCK
On another topic, I have brought home a few UFO projects from my mother’s stash that I promised various people that I would finish. My plan is to post about each one as I work through them. If you’re not a fan of sewing and quilting, don’t jump ship yet. I will be continuing to explore watercolor painting, drawing and knitting in the coming months.
Daily Fiber 