Wee Wonderfuls

Britannica's Pre-School Library

$3 each at the library book sale but I couldn't resist. So many amazing illustrators... Joe Kaufman, J.P. Miller, Dagmar Wilson, June Goldsborough, Trina Schart and Art Seiden!

Here's the first one, "Adventures with Color".

x x x x x x x

After my success with the Blackbird Designs pattern I thought it'd be fun to try to come up with my own little something. That's why you didn't hear from me for a week! Here she is, after many false starts, my little egg collecting girl. I looked to these gals for inspiration. I've got ideas for butter, apples and wool next but first I'm sitting with this gal and trying to decide if she's right.

Here's what I've learned about cross stitch so far. To get me started on my first cross stitch project I googled and found this wonderful post on Yarn tree's blog...Learn how to Cross Stitch in 5 minutes. I love succinct info like this. So much more helpful than the stack of library books I checked out. A few more things I learned while trying to design this... the linen you get at the needlework shop is amazing. It took me a very long morning of driving around to a bunch of needlework shops until I discovered the perfect shop right under my nose, Tomorrow's Heirlooms. That's where I got the linen and Crescent Colours thread I used for the pins and needles design. For egg girl I tried some linen I had on hand and it didn't work out so well. I had a problem with my design being elongated. Also my stitches were confused and I couldn't keep them nice and neat. I think the weave wasn't even enough. And I tried 3 strands of floss instead of 2 and it was a mess. Obviously wrong amount of thread for the size. I'm still trying to figure out the sizes. So then I bought DMC 28 ct linen at Joanns and it worked out well. It's very even and stiff, easy to work with, but I was wishing there were more colors at the store. I love cross stitch on darker backgrounds but I'm working on a little bird design for my mom on black and it is hard going at night, working on that dark background.

So that's what I know about xstitch so far. I have a lot to learn. If you have any bits of wisdom or great needlework shops or sites I'd love to hear!

moving it inside

We're in the process of wrapping up the 2009 garden. I'm bringing a few pretty things inside. We're mulching and trying to make our decisions for next year. I'm disappointed the books say we can't cut back perennials until the first frost. Some things are so shabby and I'm so tired of watching them decay. I think our garden was sort of a bust this year. Weird weather and no time and some really bad impulse decisions lead to a garden that seemed to have no rhyme or reason. We definitely erred on the side of too much variety and are trying to pare it down for next year. So hard though to yank out plants that didn't make it or that just aren't working for us. All that money spent. It's painful. We try to find other spots for things but we have a small yard and only a few spots that get good sun so our choices are limited.

The vegetable garden fared about as well as the flower garden. Some hits (tomatos, green beans, basil, lettuces) and lots of misses (zucchini, cantelope, tomatillos, peppers). We don't get as much sun as we need I think and also the non-raised bed needed more than crossed fingers. Our zucchini actually did well but was eaten by rabbits as soon as it grew.

So going forward, all cool colors. Different shades of greens and purples. Things that are getting axed: coneflowers (too sloppy), phlox (too tall), pinks (too neon and too shabby), golden tansy (too big). Things that will be added in the spring: more dragon's blood stonecrop, more artemisia (to replace the ones I killed by cutting them back too far), japanese anemones for pretty late summer blooms. We bought some more evergreen shrubs to do that whole bones for the garden thing and although I was resisting it I have to say it looks much better. Funny because we started out here 2 years ago in our first house with our new yard thinking we wanted modern, simple, just a few flowers, lots of green and then somehow we went garden gone wild. It's the lure of the nurseries, all those beautiful flowers, they're impossible to resist. I think we've learned our lessons. I have high hopes for Spring.

tuesday yarn

I'm addicted to cross stitch. I can't wait to start another. I tried to design one myself but I can't find my tiny square graph paper. So instead I'm knitting. Knitting with the most soft, amazingly perfect yarn. It's really worth it with yarn, isn't it, to get the good stuff. I'm knitting very slowly so I can enjoy every minute of it.

Blackbird Designs' "Small Token"

bend it!

I've been waiting waiting waiting for Amy Karol's new book to come out and it's finally here! Bend the Rules with Fabric!

I long ago determined that Amy knows everything. And at least once a day I wish I had Amy sitting in my craft room so I could ask her my many annoying questions... should I do it like this? how does that work? why in the heck won't this turn out? Now I have her right here, in my hands, showing me all the coolio arty craft stuff I've always wanted to do. Fun cool stamping ideas, dying fabric, how to use that iron-on transfer stuff, how she does that free motion drawing with thread thing... actually I want to do every single thing in here. I guess she wrote this book just for me! Thanks Amy! Oh, alright, for all of us. But I'll bet you have so many a-ha moments you'll feel she wrote it just for you too.

Here is my first success, a most exciting success, screen printing with PhotoEZ, page 60. Screen printed kitty dolls, a very belated batch of thank you gifts. I find manufacturer's instructions are often too detailed and tedious. Having Amy's cut-to-the-chase advice and tips kept me on track where I would normally get overwhelmed and give up.

Bend the Rules with Fabric is really my kind of book, accessible, jump right in, adaptable. I have a long list of projects inspired by the techniques and supplies described in the book. As a person who wants to try everything, but just a little differently from the suggested, it's a perfect book. Nice job Amy! Thanks for writing a book just for me. Now I will be needing that book on knitting kids hats with bulky yarn.. thanks :)

working back to normal

Thanks guys for the sweet comments on Phoebe's jacket! And yes! to all of you who mentioned the plaid. Isn't that great. That and the gold knit are both from Joanns. I think the jacket would have been in the junk pile for sure if it hadn't been for my deep love for that fabric pairing. Another lesson maybe, work with fabric you love.

So my brain is stuck in goo today and I thought maybe I could write a quick post to unclog. I am having the hardest time blogging lately. I know a huge part of it is our new Fall schedule and it's almost complete lack of free alone time for me. Right now both kids are in their drop off activities for 2 hours and instead of being able to cruise through my huge to-do list I'm wandering around the house in a haze feeling like I forgot something.

I joke with my friends that writing the book broke me but I think actually it might have dinged me a little. All that work and all the responsibility is taking longer to recover from than I thought it would. It's tricky business making work out of what you love to do. I really want to just make and stitch and not think about the shop or the photos or writing about it or I don't know what. I feel like everything got so formal and official and I've lost myself or my voice. Or sort of like I forgot what I was doing. I'm just going to push through though. That's what you do when you don't feel yourself, keep acting yourself until it's back on track, right? 

I'm working on this cross stitch at night and I love it. It's so exact and perfect and I don't have to make a single decision, colors, designs, they're all decided. It's like a therapeutic puzzle and I sort of feel like when I have it completed I'll be right as rain.

the little jacket that could

"At least you can blog it" said Tim when I spent 15 minutes detailing all the problems and failures I had making this little jacket for Phoebe. It was supposed to have a zipper and elastic cuffs and be finished so nicely you couldn't tell it was handmade. Instead it's a little uneven, a little shabby, and best seen from a distance. But it's grown on me. Considering I made it without a real pattern and that it's lined with a stretchy jersey knit, oh and that's it's PLAID -- what was I thinking?! -- it came out pretty cute. I tried to adapt a japanese pattern for an unlined, button-down tunic with gathers to make this jacket. Evidently I copied the wrong size and maybe the wrong pieces, so it came out too small to fit around Phoebe. I added a 3" strip along the front edges and now we're in business. I didn't want to deal with buttons and the zipper was out b/c the sides needed to overlap, not meet up, so I sewed on some velcro. And by some I mean a huge long strip along the whole front. ha! I was at the end of my rope, and quite out of my mind, last weekend when I did that. That may be the biggest mistake, although when she's in it, she's in. But if she needs to take it off...rrrriiiiiipppppp. It's quite an event. I'm thinking maybe she wears it for our pumpkin patch outing. I always take 1,000 pictures of that every year. Then it'll be properly documented and I can put it out of its misery in the back of the closet. And chalk it up to lessons learned. First lesson, maybe try sewing with some non-stretchy fabrics. Two, and maybe something solid that doesn't need to be matched up. Third, look for sewing patterns in English!

this year's purple hat

it's this pattern here, with a pom, knit in saphira yarn. I know it's an adult pattern but I think my yarn wasn't as bulky so it seems to have worked out okay. it's sort of a slouchy beret thing on Phoebe instead of a more fitted hat like it's supposed to be. I wish someone would write a knitting pattern book of all hat patterns for kids done in bulky yarns. that's all I ever want to knit.

labor for the weekend

three whole days off, I cannot wait! have a great one!

back to school

man, school really starts out with a bang doesn't it! I am a blur of drop off/pick up, pta, orientation, open house, curriculum night, phonics, ice cream socials, peanut free snacks, soccer drills... and on top of it we've had some amazing cool crisp fall weather which has spurred on some massive cleaning & organization projects at the lang house. my craft room has never been so spotless. even the inside of my sewing machine is cleaned out. I have enticing stacks of new craft supplies on a beautiful clear clutter-free desk just beckoning to me. soon projects! soon! the pta is almost done with me.

a little back to school present from my mom, a pincushion plant. how perfect is that!