I've already made sacrifices to the project list in order to keep myself on track. The three shawls have been stricken from the list. Instead, I'll be making another pair of mittens, a triangle scarf, and another casserole carrier. Smaller projects = faster knitting and crafting, right?
I've already started the scarf.
This is Three Irish Girls Felicity in Terra Firma. And holy sheep balls, I love this yarn! It's amazingly soft to work with. And the shine from the silk!
That's why I have another ball of it in a different color being knit into a triangle scarf for myself.
I have visions of all of the ladies at my family party having something knit to wear, and I need something for myself, too, right?
I mean, it is a worsted weight yarn. How long could it take?
Faith's mitts are finished except for weaving in the ends. I figured I'd do all of that at the last minute to keep me from giving the gifts early. I'm notoriously bad about that.
I also took some time last week to make a birthday gift for a dear friend, Taylor, who is turning 30. His wife, Caitlin, threw him a surprise party on Halloween. It also just so happens that Caitlin is my friend who works at Flaming Ice Cube, my second favorite yarn shop in the world.
John and I left early enough that I could stop in quickly to purchase a bigger magnetic chart keeper and say hi to Ellie, Caitlin's co-worker and our other friend. I also decided to gift Ellie my skein of TIG yarn that I had planned on using for John's cowl. He had no interest whatsoever in ever wearing one, so that beautiful yarn needed to be given to someone more worthy than my ungrateful spouse. It was pure coincidence that Ellie's birthday is coming up soon.
And lest you think that I would be cruel enough to give one knitter precious yarn and not the other, Caitlin got the matching skein of TIG that I was going to use for a cowl for myself. With everything else going on and my already (alarmingly) large stash, I knew that this poor skein would be lost amongst all of my other planned projects. I have no doubt that it is now with the knitter that will make it into something special and lovely, like it deserves.
Here's my new, super fancy chart keeper.
Look at it! It's so fancy and awesome and it even comes with a pocket and a pen! I love it so much already!
And I not only managed to find my nifty chart keeper, but also the yarn to make Al's fingerless mitts.
She's been bugging me for forever to find some of the HiKoo color changing yarn in blue. I was planning on ordering it from Jimmy Bean's, but Flaming Ice Cube had gotten some in stock since the last time I visited. Yay for supporting my favorite places!
Here's what it looks like normally.
And what it changes into. And it happens so fast!
This yarn is seriously bloody cool.
The plan is to make the body of the mitts out of this red Simplicity from HiKoo.
And add a stranded heart on the top in the Abracadabra.
These also managed to jump into my arms.
How could I say no? And the picture doesn't even do them justice! There's some lovely little spots of the lightest, silvery blue running through it like a stream. I didn't even look at the tag. Just grabbed them and carried them lovingly to the counter, completely and blissfully unaware of the horror that was written on it.
Yes, my friends, I made the mistake of looking at the name of the colorway yesterday. These beautiful, lovely skeins are named... Camo.
*shudder*
A foul name that should only be reserved for the cheap stuff like RHSS! Not for the beautiful merino that is in my hands! Camo invokes images of the local rednecks crashing through the woods, shooting anything that moves.
I refuse to let that be the legacy of this yarn, so I'm sorry, Manos Del Uruguay, I'm renaming these two special skeins. They'll be known as Northern Forest from here on out. Let it invoke images of a beautiful forest filled with all kinds of flora and fauna, a peaceful stream lazily passing through. Much better, yes?
In other crafting news, I, in a surprising turn of events, successfully taught Renee and my new soul sister, Sydney, how to bind their own books and journals. I didn't swear too much, or even try and do it all myself. I shocked even myself.
And we even had useable journals at the end of it!
Here's what we made.
Mine, Renee's, and then Sydney's.
For Sydney's front and end pages, she used two different papers.
She even glued on a pen holder. And see that adorable little sticker in the corner?
Look at those adorable little felt owls! The branch I cut out for her out of handmade paper.
Here's a close up of Renee's cover.
She used some lovely crocheted flowers, which she glued some vintage buttons on to, along with some stickers to make it so absolutely beautiful!
Renee used this beautiful script paper for her end pages.
They also chose to wrap their signatures in different papers. I forgot to get pictures, though.
And lastly, here's mine. Please excuse the atrocious lighting. It was late at night.
The corners I had purchased from JoAnn's in the scrapbooking section. They have a whole assortment of Steampunk/Victorian things right now. Just make sure you take coupons with you! They aren't cheap!
The flowers were in Renee's craft stash and she graciously gifted them to me. They really are absolutely perfect!
I fell in love with this houndstooth paper and knew I had to use it for my endpages. Unfortunately, I didn't make them quite as long as I needed to. Plus, there was a red starburst pattern in the corner of the paper. So in an effort to mask all of that, I cut all of these little advertisements out from a piece of scrapbook paper. The tag at the top was one Renee had tea stained. I added the writing to it.
The back cover features a pocket made out of the same handmade paper, only this time in black. I added a yellow rose I had cut out from a different piece of paper, plus some lace, once again from Renee's immense stash of craft supplies. Seriously, I aspire to have such a large and beautiful collection at my disposal someday!
I've become so enchanted by bookbinding that I went out yesterday and just so happened to bring all of this home with me.
The books of paper actually aren't paper at all! They're all plastic/paper lined fabric! Which is what you need for book cloths. And book cloths are not cheap. Sure, I'm going to have to make smaller books, but 28 book cloths for a fraction of the price is pretty damn good.
Here are just a few examples of what I have to work with now.
This one is a burlap-esque fabric.
As is this one.
But these two feel like linen.
Now, for anyone who does scrapbooking or other paper crafts, you're mentally adding this up, aren't you? And that price is shocking, isn't it?
Well, rest assured, that's not how much I spent.
Would you believe me if I told you that I got all of this for $30?
It's my super power, being able to find deals anywhere. And, like Wil Wheaton's dice rolls, no one believes you until they see it in action.
Still don't believe me? Well, I'll show you another example.
We had to stop in at PetsMart yesterday to get cat and rat food. I stumbled upon their clearance dog clothes and found this adorable shirt for Chloe.
It started at $12, but was on clearance for $4.87. I figured that was worth the cost to make her look adorable.
The shirt rang up at $2.97. Cool!
But then the cashier called a manager over. Apparently, the particular shirt I had picked out was reduced a further 75%. In the end, I paid $.74 for it.
Here's the receipt.
I told you, it's a superpower. And I promise to only use it for good.
And here's a picture of my adorable mutt, wearing her new outfit.
She loves it, I promise.
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