Barton's Quest for Shade

Barton and I have been busy crafting together for the past week or so. He needed something to put in his cubicle to help block out the overabundance of overhead fluorescent lighting, and came up with the idea for a shade. He constructed the frame out of wooden dowel pieces and a small block of wood, and I helped him cut and sew fabric pieces that I then hand-sewed in place around the frame. I'll have to get a picture of it, because it turned out very well.

We also got to work on making some roman shades for Barton's living room. They are constructed out of a dark blue fabric with a small diamond print, and are lined with white. We did the majority of the work over the weekend, but I still have to finish sewing the rings across the back of each shade by hand. I should finish those tonight, and then we can hang them. He's already mounted the block above both window that the shades will attach to, as well as the rings that guide the string to pull the shades up and down. I'll post a picture when we're finished. Especially with his Charleston art hanging beside them, I think they're going to look fantastic!

Yarn Quiz

haha, ok this was just cute. I took this quiz from Potter Craft called "What Fiber Are You?" It's a silly little 5 question quiz, but I liked the button. For some reason, I keep thinking Monty Python 0=)

Thoughts on Texture

As anyone who has met my squeaky girl knows, Oreo is very particular about what she touches. She will weave paths throughout my house that enable her to step on as little carpet as possible (rather amazing, considering my only un-carpeted rooms are the kitchen and bathrooms). She's also picky about where she'll sleep. She can be the sweetest lap cat ever if you're wearing a pair of jeans, but if you have on some cozy cotton pajama pants, she won't leave a paw on you. There are certain blankets and throws that she seems to love, and others that she won't touch.

This got me thinking about stuff I make for the cats. When I joined the SCRC volunteer team, I offered to knit some "meezer mats" that would be sent to the foster cats in the program. I found some patterns on Lion Brand's website, and stocked up on soft and fairly expensive yarns to craft them with. When I look at it now, though, I can't see Squeaker sleeping on the super plushy velvet spun, and while she might do ok with the wool-ease, I can't see her liking the microspun. I found some nicely colored Red Heart super saver yarn at Wally today, and decided to give it a try. It' s definitely rougher on the fingers as it's worked (I'm crocheting with it at the moment), but maybe that's the key for maximum kitty enjoyment. I'm dedicating this first one to Oreo to see how she likes it. If she approves, I'll get some more supplies to crochet up some meezer mats to donate to SCRC. If she doesn't, I'll likely give this one to the SCRC and try to please my little girl some other way.

As a point of interest, I don't think my little man cares. Drake would probably sleep on any of the yarns mentioned above, although it could potentially depend on the season.

Knit and Wax Poetic

I found this poetry contest through Ravelry the other night, and I figured it couldn't hurt to give it a try. The rules are:

This series will consist of free verse with a few quirky restraints to make
things interesting. The guidelines are as follows:

1. The lines do not have to rhyme.
2. There are only ten lines.
3. Line one must contain only 1 word (a noun or gerund). Please avoid using a word that someone else has already used.
4. Lines 2 through 5 must contain 3, 5, 7 and 10 words, respectively.
5. Lines 6 through 10 must contain 10, 8, 6, 4 and 2 words, respectively.
6. A sentence may be split across two or three lines, but not four or more.
7. Punctuation is optional.
8. The number of syllables per line is irrelevant.
9. Contractions count as one word.
10. When you post, please click on the checkbox beside "Series One" in the
    category menu on the right of the "Write Post" screen.

Mild curiosity in the prompt (and an extended visit to the Toyota service department yesterday) led to the following poems that I felt good enough about to share (the rest...eh). I used to really enjoy creative writing, but poetry was never my strongest work. It's fun to do, though =)

On cats and yarn
Waiting
can be hard
but my moment will come
She’s fully absorbed… focused on her work
Her fingers deftly maneuver needles and yarn. She pauses only
to untwist an errant strand, dancing freely from its skein
I’m poised to strike; my victory is near
She doesn’t notice my watchful gaze
My wait is over
I pounce

Craft
Craft
I eagerly anticipate
Putting together a new project
Beginning with pattern and the perfect yarn
natural acrylic color weight simplicity I weigh my options
I find planning almost as fun as the project itself
Journeying store to store, the pieces come together
Supplies collected, I can finally begin
In contentment I craft
My creation

A Pouch of Firsts

I started knitting a pouch a week or so ago, and I've really enjoyed working on it. It's been something of a challenge, because it's knitted in the round using double pointed needles...something I had yet to do before. It also required a 3 needle bind off (again, a new skill), and felting. I've never felted before, but I have several projects lined up in my queue that require it. I thought this would be a relatively quick project to learn by, since it's fairly small. I finished knitting up the body of the pouch today on my lunch break, and I bound off as soon as I got home. I think I'll give felting a try sometime tonight. I researched it a bit after lunch...for this project, I think I'm going to do it in the kitchen sink. It's so small, it seems silly to stick it in the washing machine. This is the pouch pre-felting...approximately 6"x7". Wish me luck =)

Pint-sized Scarf

I finished my Harry Potter themed house colors scarf bookmark tonight. I actually think it's kinda cute. It served it's purpose in giving me a small project that I could practice my new (practically non-existent) crocheting skills, and it was small, so it only took me a couple of days to finish. I think I'll practice some new patterns with the remaining yarn, though.

Learning to Frog

From about.com:

Frog
Definition:

If you make a mistake in your knitting and don't notice it for several rows, the best course of action for fixing it is to remove the work from the needle and simply rip out the rows you have completed since you made the mistake.

This process is known as frogging because you have to just "rip it" and move on.

It's not much fun to have to frog your projects, but you'll be glad you did rather than leaving in a mistake you could have fixed.

Yeah, I messed up. Quite badly, actually. I know I'm knitting holes on purpose with this Branching Out scarf, but I made a really big hole *sigh* As it's in a lacy-part, I really have no idea how to "rip until I get to a mistake-free" row. Picking up stitches is something I've not really done a lot of, and this is beyond my novice-level skills. So at some point this weekend, I'm going to rip it all out and start over. On the plus side, at least now I can start with a freshly wound ball of yarn that I can pull from the center.