Grace and Bunnies

A couple of FB acquaintances are bunny people.  One raises Angora bunnies and has been posting many pictures of these fuzzy bunnies.  Some look like fluffy bedroom slippers and have so much fur it obscures their faces and tail.  So I got the bug to knit bunnies.

Pattern:  Heartstrings Fiber Arts Knitted Bunny from a square.
by Jackie E-s
Yarn:  re-purposed Baby Alpaca grand.  I also used some polyester medium eyelash yard as I acquired a whole bagful at the last trade show.  What was I thinking?  For the fluffy one I used the baby alpaca and the eyelash yarn held together. 
Needles:  size 8 for the larger bunny and size 5 for the smaller one.  I used the cabled braid from one of Walker's books.

I've also got a new friend, Grace.

 

She is a Golding all the way from Vermont.  1.4oz, Birdseye maple with walnut shaft.  She spins well.  

My Ewa Beach Cotton on the e-spinner is plugging along.  I had some tension issues but seem to have figured this out.  I just have to relax and let the wheel have it's way.  

BTW, I used the shoe bag pattern from the last post to use up some Amy Butler stash (Amy Butler, Coreopsis in Peach, August Fields Fabric) for my Mixer beaters and made a a matching cover for the mixer.  It's such a happy print.  

The Hawaii International Film Festival is on.  My first film will be a documentary about the animators at Studio Ghibli in Japan, including Hayao Miyazaki, the creator of Totoro, The Kingdom of Dreams and Madness.  The others are samurai pictures or have Asano Tadanobu in them. 

 

Travel Shoe Bags, and A Giro of Another Color

Loved this video and had almost all the ingredients!  Serger, grommets and a ton of fabric to destash.   The only thing missing were shoe laces and Payless had a 20% off entire store sale going on.  Lucky me.  Using shoelaces was brilliant as they are already finished. I used 36 inch ones for both sizes of the bag since I couldn't find any 27 inch ones. 

I tried to get fancy with some embroidery but I don't quite have the hang of it on my Janome.  The only mod I made was to round the open bottom corners using a CD as a template, to make it easier to serge around.  Also my "safety" 4 stitch serge did not look too good so I re-enforced the seam with a straight stitch on the sewing machine.  These are quite and easy and fun to personalize. 

I used a stopper knot to tie the shoelaces together.

Add.  I forgot to post about another FO
A Giro of Another Color.

My second one.
Pattern:  Giro, by Inês Sousa from Primavera Book
Yarn:  Koromo, by Noro
Needles:  Size 8
The pattern calls for fingering.  Koromo is aran weight and quite rustic I may add.  I used almost all of 3 balls.  I used a croched hook for the picot bind out.  The curved neck edge blocked to 62 inches.  I feels very warm, but it is pretty warm and sunny here today.   The Noro stripes behaved quite nicely.  The colorway was difficult to photograph.  The yellow and mauve actually pop out quite a bit more then in the picture. Love this pattern. 

Soft Almond Cookies

Being lactose intolerant I once thought it would be wonderful to make may own almond milk and bought some almond flour.  I found it was not to my liking so the flour sat waiting for the right recipe.  I thought about macaroons, but they sound like way too much work.  After I bought the giant bag of lemons I found the right recipe for both.  Soft Almond Cookies.

Blogless Muffy Multitasker took her second cooking class in Italy and told be about amaretti.  Those are still a possibility as I have a little flour left.   It uses only egg whites, and the Soft Almond Cookies use the whole egg. 

I changed the shape since I put too much egg in and the dough was very moist and I wanted to use my cookie scoop.  They are very moist inside and very lemony.  I will make these again. 

"Might Oaks from little acorns Grow"

Apparently from from the middle of the 19th century. It appeared in A. B. Johnson's The Philosophical Emperor a Political Experiment, 1841  (http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/247100.html)

There be hat knitting and red scarf knitting and I'm hoping a Patch or two will happen.  I have a pile of fabric calling me from the sewing room too.