I found these little glass Totoro in a San Diego shop. It was a chance meeting and I had to to go back and clean out the store's stash. I try to talk myself into being sensible when it comes to Totoro. I mean...there are people starving, and is it really dignified for someone my age to collect Totoro? Luckily blogless Kathy gave me the push I needed and the little group came home with me. Here they are posing with some cell phone charms in the 99 cents oak leaf/acorn thingy I picked up at Savers the other day. They are all quite tolerant with the filter experiment "vignette white".
I frogged my stash busting scarf to make a blue bunny. Again I tried experimenting with a larger head, but it made for larger front legs, too, and resulted in a very masculine bunny. I don't know if I'll keep the nose and whiskers or not. The Crystal Palace Country silk has been in my stash for many many years. I think some of it has found it home!! I fell off my yarn diet and got some kid merino for more bunnies. I'm not sure if stuffing counts, let's say not. Anyone know of a place to get cheap wool stuffing that doesn't charge and arm and leg to ship to Hawaii? I ordered Brown sheep mill ends from The Sheep Shed to try out. I can practice spinning on it, too!
The spinning is going a little faster. I'm going for the thinner yarn, now. I adore my spindle from the Isle of Wight:) I'm lusting for the "bog oak" spindle. Fascinating stuff, bog oak. All my pumpkin yarn has been spun up and knit into carrots. I updated the pattern on the side bar to include the formula for enlarging them. I'm looking for a project for my purpley/blue "art yarn".
Being a knitter who likes quick fast projects, I really want to spin fat yarn. The down side is that the roving disappears pretty quickly. So I'm attempting to spin thinner singles and even tried plying some of the green.
Then of course I have to figure out what to make out of the fugly yarn. Since I had so much of the NZ Corriedale in the pumpkin, purchased from Mielke Farms, I could only come up with pumpkins and carrots. The quirky, coily green made perfect tops. The lighter carrots are handspun purchased on Etsy from smallestfriend. Rabbits are happy! I'm going to have a lot of carrots.
The plover are back marking the changing of the season. Next week is September already. And as someone on FB mentioned, soon it will be Christmas. Yikes!
The gray hair didn't wait long after my decision to stop coloring to pop out. I woke up dreaming I had a huge skunk stripe and also alopecia areata! My hair was so short I couldn't even comb it over!
Kim has been challenging me to inventory my Totoros. The sorry fact is that I don't have space large enough or lens with a wide enough angle for a group photo. Instead I have decided to post every Tuesday give or take 1/2 a day while I count.
The first entry and most recent Totoro is Beaverslide, stuffed with wool and some left over corn stuffing. The pattern has evolved over time and every Totoro is different.
Unlike real pets, kids or even plants, Totoro makes no demands, takes no care, is always on time, and never gets sick or throws up on your couch.
I'm going to spin at least 10 minutes every day on my drop spindle until I get it. My lovely BFL has arrived from Jen and I'm planning another lesson with Opal in September.
I went to see Eat, Pray Love over the weekend. I only read the Eat part of the actual book. There were some words of wisdom, and Julia Roberts was great, but the movie was only so so imo. Really how many times does a Javier Bardem actually walk in to a woman's life?
Pattern: Knitted Bunny, by Jackie Erickson-Schweitzer. Yarn: Cotton/Angora from a thrift store sweater, Madil Kid Seta in oyster. Following Nanea's and blogless Sandy's idea, I held two strands of the sweater yarn and one strand of the Kid Seta together. The little extra fuzz really helped to dress up the rather drab yarn. Needles: size 6
After making the first bunny I knit a couple extra rows for the head portion for a larger head. I used two cables from the yellow Charted Knitting Design: A Third Treasury of Knitting Patterns by Barbara G. Walker. The larger head idea was stymied by the fact that I sewed the bunny up backward and did not notice until I passed the point of no return. Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that I decided to let my gray hair grow out and the gray matter of my brain is seeping out.
I also sewed the legs together by putting the right sides together, then turning them right side out, and I like the way the feet came out better.
He is stuffed with some matted roving and bits of left over quilt batting. I made the smaller stand up ears this time and like the way they turned out.
My Bernina has forgotten how to sew backwards and my camera battery doesn't hold a charge very long anymore. I've gotten a lot of use out of both of them, but still do not look forward to having to fork out money to get them fixed. It's lonely without them when they are in the shop and not working, sigh. Somehow weeding just isn't as much fun, imo.
Today was lesson two in spinning on Opal's Majacraft Suzie Pro. She gave me some nice Superwash BFL to practice on. Thanks, Opal! I studied some books and some you tubes. This time I tried drafting with my right hand since I'm so very right-handed and that's how I draft when I drop spindle.
I forget to keep drafting toward the orifice and hold on to the fiber too tightly resulting in the yarn not feeding in and winding on the bobbin. I do get some funky corkscrews which Opal refers to as "art" yarn. She tells me it's nice...liar, lol.
One thing I found to be true is that she does indeed have a very manly looking cat named Sammy. I saw him twice and he gave me a look. I'm not going to pass judgement on the cat, though.
I'm on a mission to use up the bits of blue and gray yarn in stash. Some of the balls are pretty small and bulky weight so I'm just making them up as I go. They seem to have gotten a bit rounder around the tummy and their ears are getting bigger. I'll soon run out of roving to stuff them with. Shipping to Hawaii seems unfairly high at times. I may resort to polyfil, sigh.
Opal gave me a spinning lesson today on her Majacraft Suzie Pro. I tried this once before at the Wisconsin Sheep and Wool on a Babe. Um, let's just say I don't get it yet, lol. Opal was working on a fantastic necklace for her mom. Her cats were all in hiding. Maybe they are imaginary cats?
Pattern: Mimouna's Totoro (Norwegian) Needles: size 4 Yarn: 100% hand spun Romney wool, dyed iwth indigo plant dye by Kathie Rayfield, Athol, ID. Tummy knit in cream Beaverslide worsted.
I used Google translate to get the gist of the pattern. A cover is placed in the bottom and knit in. My lid was too big so Totoro became rather bell-like and his tummy was a little too large. I stopped at 60 stitches for the tummy. It's a very nice pattern and I may have to try it again.
For the most part, I've managed to stay on the yarn diet. Sock yarn of course doesn't count and I allowed the yarn for a charity project. Two projects helped reduce the stash of organic cotton left over from other projects.
Pattern: Little Bee Capelette by Yumiko Sakurai Yarn: Pakucho and Bernat Organic cotton, worsted weight Needles: Size 6 and 8 Mods: none I have not seen the only baby in our family for awhile since she is in Minnesota. I hope it is wearable.
Netbook Sock
Yarn: Pakucho cotton Needles: 16 in size 8 circular Pattern: CO 66 stitches. Join to knit in the round. Place a marker. K1P1 ribbing for 8 rows. (I used two colors since I had a scrap to use up) Row 1: k12, P2, k5, p2, knit to end. Cable row: K12, P2, place 3 stitches on cable needle, hold in front, K2 from left needle and knit 3 off cable needle. Repeat row 1 5 times, then knit a cable row. Continue until 10 cables are made. Repeat row 1, 2 times. Turn inside out. Do a 3 needle bind-off. Sew in ends.
My netbook is 9x7 inches. The sock is 9x10 inches.
I'm on Maui this week for a conference. It's pretty darn nice here! Molokini and Molokai are just out the corridor window.
My yahoo mail account was hacked. I can't really tell who all got spammed as some were blocked by servers. I'm sorry if any of you got the spam from me. Yahoo advised me to scan for spy ware and viruses, and I found none on my system. They also advised me to change all my passwords. Always good advice but I've neglected to do this for some time now. So now it's done.
My niece recently used her debit card online for a donation, and had a couple thousands of dollars charged to her account from some place in another state. This hits very close to home.
My son showed me how to set a master password for my Browser, Firefox. So I'm doing that, too. A wake up call indeed.
The doll patches were paper-pieced quite awhile back, like maybe more then a decade! I added some fabric to make the patch square and to complete the 9 patch. With the borders it's a 46 inch square so far. The attic window is the fast patch method (cheater method).
I know a quilt is not a quilt until it's quilted and I'm determined I will not wait another decade to do it while I contemplate backing and quilting method.
I got a little surprise today out in the patio. This orchid bloom is quite tiny, about one inch in diameter, and actually a bunch of blooms that have the appearance of one big flower. The plant was in survival mode growing in some moss which got moved to a pile of gravel in a cement pot. Lucky for me many varieties of orchid can survive without much attention.
In addition to the yarn diet, I'm trying to not buy sugar. This isn't saying much as I had a big stash. I'm out of granulated and brown sugar, but still have powdered sugar and the brown sugar crystals, not to mention the honey, maple syrup and maple sugar.
I found the oatmeal sugar cookie recipe surfing. Adding oatmeal just seemed to be "healthier", lol. It also made it a bit harder to cut out. I think next time I will grind the oatmeal a bit. The great thing about this recipe is that there is no creaming of butter and sugar, or chilling of dough. It was quite easy to roll out. I substituted 1 1/4 cup powdered sugar for the granulated sugar.
I used my handy dandy RM Make Your Own Cookie Cutter Kit to make the Totoro cutters, starting with Jennifer's tutorial on how to create a coloring book style image from a photo.
I like baking but I'm no Martha when it comes to decorating. I still they came out cute with the simplistic chocolate chip eyes and sugar crystal tummies.
Wouldn't you know it. While I was baking these, the docs office called and said I'm due for blood work. I could swear those kind of things were for patients, not for doctors. Do I just bite the bullet and go in tomorrow? Or do I procrastinate some more? In my case it's true, doctors make the worst patients.
I can tell it's almost summer as the pikake and gardenias are blooming like crazy.
The plover are all gone, but the Fairy tern are coming up the river. They are beautiful acrobatic fliers. They lay one egg without building a nest. Although they are sea birds and eat the little fish that have hatched along the shore, they still fly up our valley to raise the chick in the trees.
The litchi tree across the stream had a lot of fruit. None of it was picked so the fruit eating birds have had their fill.
My mom has been trained by a lovely red cardinal couple to feed them shelled sunflower seeds on command. They chirp and whistle and she comes a-running. It's pretty funny, really. When I daddy watch, they chirp at me too, and darn if I'm not trained now, too! (Kiko, the cat, is sure interested in them too!)
I finally finished a couple knits!
Pattern: One Row Scarf, by the Yarn Harlot Yarn: Debbie Bliss Cashmerino Aran, in a nice cranberry red (the photo does not do the colorway justice) Needles: size 9 Mods: I cast on 36 stitches, including two for the end stitches. Comments: 4 skeins ended up being 64 inches long and 5.5 inches wide, unblocked. The yarn is a real please to knit with and feels very plush against the skin. I've read it is quite fragile, but it held up well while knitting. This one is for the Red Scarf Project. I'm a little concerned that it is not an easy care fabric. I love the color!
Pattern: Topsy Turvey doll Bernat has another version of it. Mods: I was thinking about a project for Ponyo. She has two forms, a goldfish and a little girl. I ended up not having enough yarn so Sonja was born. I used some of Opal's hand spun left over from a project and I really like the color of her hair. She's sitting on one of this years 3 pineapples.
The summer project of weeding the patio and transplanting the pot-bound plants has stalled about 3/4 of the way through. The weather dried up making the weeds hard to get out. Then, I was sidetracked by the aphids attacking my Rangpur lime and bay laurel. I love the Rangpur lime I grew up with. It made the best tabbouleh, imo. The nursery I got it from grows the lime for rook stock and I've nursed the plant along in a pot. It finally got planted in the yard but it still hasn't taking off. It's fighting for root room with the privet, grass and Asparagus densiflorus One thing I've discovered, is that staring at the tree twice a day does not make it grow faster. I will have to ask Totoro to help!
The last of my card play days with blogless Melody was all about cupcakes. She brought her Sizzix cupcake die.
Melody will be returning to Camano Island until November, so no more card buddy. It was so much fun having a partner in crime!
In the meantime, I am organizing the sewing room in hopes of getting my sewing mojo back. If anyone sees my sewing mojo, please send it back. The fabric stash is waiting!!!
Yes, I have the acorn cakelet pan. It's lovely to have friends and family who have fed my acorn obsession with acorn gifts including the Pan.
These little cakelets are Hawaiian style cornbread. The cornbread I grew up with was either the Jiffy kind or a sweeter, Bisquick, variety, like the recipe from the first volume of the Honpa Hongwanji Hawaii Betsuin cookbook. Unlike the cornbread served with beans I discovered in Kentucky, the cornbread is sweet and cake-like, and makes wonderful muffins served for breakfast with jam and more butter.
On the needles, the acorn socks are stalling. I think they are looking too large. I love the way the acorns pop out of the pattern.
I felt like knitting a bit of lace and only had one ball of the yarn. The yarn was a lovely knitting experience! I wish had more to make a whole cardigan with.
I won a lovely pink wash cloth and sweet lavender soap from Rachel. Thank you!
How she finds time to have contests and do all that she does is always amazing to me. While I'd be pulling my hair out trying to keep up she manages to maintain an eye-catching blog and an Etsy store, can her own fruits and vegies, keep the diva in style and complete many FO's, all the while keeping her wits and humor about her. Very inspiring!
My Stampin' Up order came in today. I had a 20% off coupon! Yay! I tried out the texture plate on the green portion and my new (second hand) corner punch. I wish there was an acorn texture plate.
My one knitting WIP is a capelet based on a 1993 pattern by Lois Young. I was gifted a skein of Knitpicks Shadow, colorway sunset, ages ago. The pattern is a cardigan knit top down and oversized like in the day, so I thought I would try knitting the yoke and then just keep going until I got a capelet. The yarn is very nice and I wish I had enough to make a cardigan of some sort.
A Texas cousin is in town with his daughter. One should not wait 59 years to meet a first cousin if at all possible. I really enjoyed catching up with another branch of the tree and hearing new stories about players in my life. His mother and my mother were the youngest in the family and their childhood was unconventional and hard.
A job opportunity came up, but I decided I'm much to busy to commit to a regular schedule even though paychecks are very nice. The Landcaster has saved me $20/year by having me turn off my coffee pot after the morning fix. How did I get such a smart kid? I better pull in the belt and go on a paper/punches/Sizzix die diet. Like sock yarn, glue dots and ink pads don't count. (I don't know if that is written, but I'm just saying)
Blogless Melody got me started on the whole stamping, card-making thing by organizing 3 card making sessions, starting with quilted cards for Valentine's Day. Baby sister Rita enabled me further by gifting me some Fiskars scallop and flower punches. Then I "won" two silent auctions for The Bead Gallery's charity auction which was a Sizzix embossing machine and kit and a Stampin' Up coupon for 20% off. Then another blogless friend destashed some lovely paper, punches and brads at prices that I couldn't pass up.
There are so many wonderful tutorials on you tube on how to make paper flowers and pop cards, as well as how to use the Sizzix.
The bottom line is, I needed another hobby like I needed a hole in my head! My yarn, fabric, and bead/wire stashes now have to make room for punches, inks, papers, glue dots and Sizzix attachments!
My mom is threatening to have me star on the hoarding show.
I love making paper flowers! It beats working any day:)
This recipe was given to my mom by Ruth Y. Brown rice krispies are really good. My sister makes her own marshmallows. I think some mini chocolate chips or mini m&ms would be really yummy.
Spread oats and sesame seeds on baking pan. Toast 5-10 minutes in 300-degree oven.
In heavy pot over medium heat, melt marshmallows, butter and peanut butter together until marshmallows are all melted.
Mix rest of fruits, nuts and rice krispies together. Stir in marshmallow mixture. Mix and press into jellyroll pan. Using plastic wrap to press it down, or rolling over the plastic wrap with a rolling pin helps to flatten it out. Cut into squares and wrap each in a small square of waxed paper.
Pattern: Drop stitch pattern from Barbara Walker's book. This pattern has been written up as a scarf on Ravelry by Wohemel. For my version, I CO 40 stitches and included two end stitches. Yarn: Plymouth Baby Alpaca worsted Needles: Size 8
I used 3 balls and ended up with 51 inches, not enough for a red scarf project scarf.
Pattern: Creature Comforts Cardi by Madelinetosh Yarn: Plymouth Jeanee. Needles size 7 and 8 as pattern calls for. Comments: The oak leaf starts with creating 7 stitches in on, and it left a rather large hole. The Jeanee, being cotton and acrylic stretches them out quite a bit. My sister is modeling the cardi which is actually a shrug. I'm not sure why but on me the cardi doesn't sit straight and I'm sure why. I'm not going to count stitches to find out why. Maybe it has something to do with the way I sewed the side seams. I washed it on gentle and threw it in the dryer. Aah, the beauty of easy care yarn.
It's definitely looking more like summer here already...the plover and turnstones have flown away to Alaska, the litchee and mango trees are loaded and the shores are full of schools of baby aholehole and such. The whales have also gone. The vog has alternated with trade winds. There is little rain even here in Nuuanu. I may have to start watering some plants.
This is my first project from fabric dyed in Shibori Class. This piece is the itajime technique. The screaming pink Kona cotton was fan folded and clamped, then indigo dyed. This is a synthetic indigo dye.
I kind of suspected this yarn would be more red-orange then is comfortable for me, but it was baby alpaca and I was in the market for red yarn. I have since found out that scarves for the Red Scarf project do not have to be red. Duh. My whole dyeing adventure began with a desire to tone this colorway down...going more toward the rust side. Since I was very happy with my Koigu experiment with Wilton cake dye, I started by dying the yarn red. Well big surprise, lol, it turned red. I imagined that it was toned down and little, but the visiting niece and sister brought me back to reality. It was still screaming red and just a touch less orange. Having only blue left I added just a smidgen to the dye bath, and squirted some around. I was terrified it would all be totally purple or even worse, felted. So I'm stopping here. It still screams a bit but is more to my liking.
My sister is town and baked this thing of beauty. My neighborhood natural food market with the wonderful shredded coconut closed:( so we are trying this other stuff from Down to Earth.
Pattern: Koigu One Mitts by botgirl. Free! Yarn: Koigu, red/orange colorway, over dyed with Wilton's blue food dye. Needles: Size 1 DPNs Mods: none Comments: This is a great, fast easy knit which makes a lovely pair of fingerless mitts for a women.
I took a day trip to Paia, Maui to check on my dad's property with my BIL and niece. While we were walking up Baldwin Ave, a couple of my knitting buddies, blogless Dayna and Barbara, flagged me down. What a small world! They were visiting relatives in upcountry Maui. This is the wonderful Maui Yarn they gave me for my birthday last month. It's is very squishy and soft! The chocolate bar did not last long enough for a picture:) Thanks, ladies!
I love Koigu and when some free Koigu fell in my lap I couldn't say no. Never mind it was peachy pink and peachy red! It has marinated for quite a while in my stash. Another yarn that I bought online for a nice price, was some worsted baby alpaca for the red scarf project. It was much more orange then I hoped. I have been plotting way to tone down the red-orange so decided to try and over-dye it. The Koigu became my practice yarn.
MsKnottyKnits, Zinlizzie and Znitter on Ravelry were all so encouraging and helpful. Thanks! They shared some wonderful links to get me started as well as their experiences.
I liked the Wilton's cake gel idea as it was readily available and non-toxic. My first try with the darker red/peach yard in a pie plate in the microwave oven was a bust. I used too little dye and too little water, so I dug out the crock pot and did all 3 skeins with Wilton's blue.
The lighter peach/pink turned out a very nice shade of blue. The dye did not sneak under the figure eight ties, but the small amount of pink left is fine with me. The darker skein came out definitely purple, with more pink showing through. I only have one skein of this, not enough for a pair of socks.
The alpaca is skein-ed up and ready to dye. I'm not sure what color I'll try. Perhaps black cherry koolaid or the Wilton's in red. Or maybe black and red. From what I read, the resulting colors are somewhat unpredictable.
My niece from Manhattan is visiting and the sun came out for her! The cel phone camera isn't the best but Diamond Head still looks classic:)
Pattern: my own
Yarn: Lamb's Pride Worsted. Bits of eyelash yarn.
Needles: size 4 DPNs
Stuffing: wool roving in natural
Embellishments: wired ribbon leaves, ready-made silk and satin ribbon flowers. Thrifted object for "nest".
Roses: grown by my mom, and what a wonderful fragrance they have!
4/17/2010: Untested pattern available on Ravelry.
Pattern: Strawberries by Pezdiva. Yarn: Knitaly in red, some handspun and Encore in green. Needles: size 4 dpn
What a quick, addicting little knit. I made a total of nine since yesterday for my walking group. I stuffed the strawberries with wool so they can be little pincushions. I know I will make more of these, perhaps adding the leaf by Robin Hill on Ravelry.
Chicken Little Weird, a pincushion, was inspired by a strange stuffed animal I saw in Safeway. He is knit of organic wool by smallest friend on Etsy. I glued him in the basket lined with ribbon leaves.
