Spoonflower Contest of the Week

Have you all been voting in the Spoonflower contest of the week?

This week the theme is "camouflage" Here is my entry. It is called Butterfly Battle.


And here are all of my votes for this week.


Go over to vote and while you are there look at all the adorable fabrics that are for sale. SO FUN!

I Heart Spoonflower

You all know about Spoonflower, I'm sure.  But did you know that they hold weekly contests.  I just love seeing what this community of designers comes up with each week.  Sometimes I even enter.  (In fact, look for me next week, the theme is "desert" and I do know a little something about the beauty of the desert.

I didn't enter this week's contest, but I thought some of the entries were very interesting.  This week's challenge was "paper collage."  The fabric had to start out as a paper collage and then be scanned in to create the fabric.

It was interesting to me that some of them just looked like more digitally created fabrics.  All of my designs, to date, are digitally created.  I have no problems w/ that, just would have liked to see some more creativity around the medium.

Here are the ones that I loved this week.  You will notice that I really was drawn, particularly to ones that are layered and have that lovely semi transparency you can get with tissue paper.  So pretty.



If you are interested in seeing my novice designs, you can check them out here.  And you will notice that no, I do not sell my designs, but you will find many incredible designers that do here.

I Heart Bags

I'm not sure what I did with things before "green" bags became popular. I think I probably have 10 or so of those big IKEA bags. I use them constantly, and not just for my groceries. They have become indispensable to me.

So, like the good little crafter that I am, I figured I should make a few.

This is what I came up with.



It's a large bag, with a circle bottom and a wide and long sling-like strap.



Vintage fabric, I made my own coordinating bias tape (I now have a reason to HEART my iron,) and either canvas or stiff interfacing on the bottom for extra strength.



AND it's reversible!

I made three of these, one for my grandmother, one for my sister, and this one was for my friend Sarah.

There will be more!

Tragedy

It is a sad sad sad day


When a hand knit baby sweater accidentally gets thrown in with the wash.

and FELTS!!!

And then, if that weren't bad enough, the Duke picks it up and mocks me about it. He wouldn't even let me take a picture of him pretending to cry over the mini felted sweater. (You will just have to create a mental picture.) He has no knitting empathy.

The only silver lining is that I have enough of this same yarn to knit the same sweater again if I want, and, it was only going to fit for another month or so. I will just have to knit a bigger one.


In other news, I have been doing a little bit of quilting. I saw this fabric at Esther's and I HAD to make Little Sir (our little owlet) a quilt out of it. I have the square pieced together. The sashing and the back will be out of the green dots and the binding out of the brown stripes, cut on the bias.

Don't worry, I'm not picking up a new hobby. I have no intention of even quilting it. As soon as I have the sashing sewn on it will go in the mail to The Queen and she is going to take it to her local quilting shop to have it quilted.

But really, isn't it adorable? It helps to make me feel a bit better about the sad felted sweater.

We've Been Thinking

Here's what I've been thinking about:


A new blanket for Little Sir.


What other fabric than knit socks, hats, and mittens on one side,


and the print of knit stst on the other.

Perfect for a Yarnnation baby.

Other knitterly things going through my head. . .


hmmm. . .


hmmmm. . .

HMMMMMMMMM!

Little Sir has been thinking too. . .


I think I'll be a Greek God when I grow up.


I'm strong, not to mention devastatingly handsome.


Logan will be my faithful attendant. It will work out perfectly!


Yes, yes, I defiantly think I will be a Greek God.

This is what happens when a baby spits up all over himself, leaving him soaking wet, is only about 20 min from bath time, and the closest thing to wrap him up in happens to be a Moby Wrap. Oh yes, a silly mother also helps the situation.

Royal Preparations. . .

So, the Queen is multi-talented. In addition to her knitting she also quilts. Upon arrival in Yarnnation,as is tradition when royal family members visit one another, she presented the Duke with a gift for the royal little alien.



My heavens, is it legal for things to be this cute? For those of you who know our royal pup, Maggie, yes that fabric holds a very good likeness of her. Any little alien, boy or girl, will be pleased as punch to be cuddled up in such cuteness. This is the quilt that I have snuggled up with for naps a few times in the last couple of weeks.



WE LOVE THE QUEEN! LONG LIVE THE QUEEN!

We also did a little fabric shopping at our favorite fabric store, Ester's.
(And I heard for a little bird there that they might be launching an e-commerce site soon!)



Here is the other fabric I picked out for the alien. A little bit vintage and fun. (This went home with the queen to make it's transformation into a quilt. I am NOT picking up another hobby- at least not right now.)



The print is a depiction of Jack and the Beanstalk. Supper cute!


Here is what the queen picked up. No baby in mind, but whoever he or she is will be lucky! Isn't that print so cute!


I have been working on this,



which will be come this. It's Jamison, which I never thought I would like to knit with, but I do. Out of Jamieson's Simply Sheltland 3, which I never would have guessed I liked so well, and I do.



I tried it on at Churchmouse, and it is going to make a supper cute maternity top, that will easily convert to a non-maternity top.



I've also been working on these (as if knitting were not addictive enough.) The yarn is Lamb's Pride's Cotton Fleece. I like this yarn, but it blocks in a strange way, which may just be that I am not used to blocking cotton. The baby blanket (the only one I plan on knitting for ANY of my kids, they will have to share) will be made of a total of 16 miters, making up four blocks, each 14" by 14" (35cm by 35cm) with a border. It will be a "car seat" blanket. It's good to keep knit blankies small.


OK, that's all for now. . . more to come!

Desperate Duchess and Dashing Doggie

I want to say thank you again for all the comments, suggestions, emails and general love and good vibes that so many of you have sent since I announced my impending alien arrival. I have tried everything that any of you have suggested, and anything that anyone else has suggested. Some of the suggestions worked a little bit. Some of them made me more sick. Some of them concerned my darling Duke (but I did them anyway- desperation is KING.) Please, be patient with me in answering your comments and emails. My energy level is very limited.

Thank you for the encouragement to start selling the onesies out of my etsy shop. I don't think I will any time soon, as my business brain ruins all creativity when it takes over (ie- You CAN NOT spend more than 20 min on a single onesie, or your cost of labor will go above the point where you can cover that cost and still sell the onesie at a reasonable price point.) However, there will be some fun new baby and shower gifts to come out of this new found activity. If you really want one, you may also be able to bribe me with yarn or other fibery goodness to paint one for you. Email me and we'll talk.

Now, if you want to skip my continued whining about how much I hate being pregnant (and really who could blame you,) scroll down to where the pictures start.

The Saga Continues. . .

Yesterday morning I had to open the refrigerator, a task that requires me holding my breath, as there is a smell emanating from within (despite the fact that the Duke has thrown nearly everything away out if- bad or not,) that sends me into dry heaves. The Duke can't smell it- at all, but I can't even be in the room when it is open, and have to evacuate the area for about 2 min. each time the accursed appliance is opened. You can imagine this is a problem for someone who 1. is pregnant and 2. doesn't want to eat anything as it is.
So, yesterday as I was following a dear friend's advise to eat something bland when I felt sick, that for her, the sick feeling was her body's way of telling her she was hungry. Rice Checks were on the menu and after an uneventful meal I summoned the courage to replace the rice milk. I prepared for the event, took a deep breath, opened the door, and somehow instantly ran out of air. As I replaced the rice milk I also inhaled. This sent me immediately into dry heave convulsions. Normally this would only last a couple of seconds, but not this time. They continued as I frantically made my way to the porcelain recepticle (I was in NO SHAPE to be cleaning vomit off the floor.)
Up to this point in my pregnancy I have only thrown up once, brought on by an extremely upsetting conversation (watch for major life change #2 coming soon.) Yesterday was to be my second. I have no idea what it is like to have a seizure, but if I were to imagine it, this is what I would now imagine. Naturally, this can only go on for so long before any body would relent. I lost my Rice Checks. I crawled to my bed and began to alternately wonder why God suddenly decided to hate me, and if my lifelong defence of Eve's decision was warranted.
Now, I know that God doesn't hate me, and I know that Eve did what she did for a noble and great purpose, and I am thankful for both of those things, but my brain had been short circuited to feel nothing but pain, there was no hope.
I have known for several days now that salvation from this malady lie in my medicine cabinet. A friend and my cousin had both told me that Promethazine (Phenergan) was the only thing that made their pregnancies tolerable. I had talked to the Duke (who, for those of you who don't know will be a pharmacist in about a month) and my father (who is also pharmacist,) about taking this *scary music starts here* DRUG! The Duke wanted me to wait until after my first doctor's appointment and my father, who showed no real concern about me taking this drug, thought that I probably should as well, but knew of many women who had taken it during pregnancy and had healthy happy babies. For those of you who are medically minded, it is rated category C for pregnant women.
I wasn't comfortable calling my doctor, as I had all ready done this once and he had told me that he wasn't very comfortable prescribing me something until after he had seen me, but would make an exception just this once. (So I all ready used that card) and I can't really go see him until the 1st of April when my insurance kicks in. Now, all of this would be moot, as it is a prescription drug, except that I HAVE A BOTTLE OF PROMETHAZINE IN MY MEDICINE CABINET. My PCP had prescribed it a couple of years back when I was having nausea brought on by migraines. I didn't need it for long, as I soon afterward quit the job that was causing me to have migraines, thus treating the problem in a more proactive way.
I fought the "temptation" for a few hours longer and finally, at the end of what I consider a very long rope, I looked up the appropriate dose for pregnant women. I took the lowest possible first dose and was in the most profound sleep I have had in weeks within a half an hour. I took the second dose several hours later and, although I was not miraculously better, I finally felt well enough to wash my hair for the first time in 7 days (I have showered once in that period of time, but couldn't bring myself to wash my hair, which is kind of a lot of work.) I normally shower daily or every other day, and I only rarely shower without washing my hair. After a bit of a rest I was also able to leave my house, and run some errands.

I was able to go to the bank, boring buy long overdue.

I was able to go the Baskin and Robbins and get (and EAT!) a scoop of the only one of the 31 flavors I am permitted- Daiquiri Ice- YUM

I was able to go to the fabric store where I bought these



to make this.



BTW- Princess, if you like this well enough after I'm done, I will make one for you, but I didn't realize until I got there just how much fabric it requires, and the personal accountant balked at two right now (plus I didn't find any fabric I really LOVED for you.)

I also got these for Princess, who fell in love with this fabric line after seeing what JoJo at Stardust Shoes did with them. Thanks to Chef Messy for introducing both of us to this super cute blog.



I was able to go to a baby store and bought my first real baby puchase. It was on sale for "only" $30.00 and the ones that I've admired like this before (with a "big" name attached to them) were over $100.00. It felt so real to be buying something for the alien.



I also have some knitting content to share (oh yes, that reminds me, I also felt well enough to get a little - a very little- knitting done.) Here are a couple of patterns that together make up Dashing Doggie. You will find them, free of charge, on my patterns page.



UPDATE: While I was writing this post I was also eating a green apple. I went upstairs as the Duke's alarm went off, but he didn't get up. I was feeling OK, still a little nausea, but I didn't expect to feel 100%, after all I am pregnant. I got the Duke up and laid back down myself. 10 seconds later I found myself violently puking up my green apple and crackers. I relent! I give up! I surrender. I called my Dr. this morning and said I would come in and pay for the appointment, what ever he wanted, just PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE make it stop! He told me I could take a higher dose of the Promethazine for today, and then called in a prescription for Zophran (aka one of the most expensive drugs on the market- these people know that a vomitous pregnant woman will pay nearly anything for relief, and so I will.) God bless this good man. He understands pregnancy related deperation.

Here's hoping that the sun will come out tomorrow.

A Change of Pace

Thank you so much to all of you for your words of encouragement. You all inspired me to actually DO something about slowing my life down, instead of just talking about it. So, I dropped one of my classes today. It felt good. It felt really good. This, in addition to giving me more time to prevent my house from looking like the place has been tossed, will also give me more time for knitting and spinning, at least this is my hope.

Yesterday, Sarah and I took a little field trip to Bainbridge Island. What were we doing there? Oh not much. . . just picking up all of the new spinning wheels for Hilltop! YIPEEE!

Sarah and I met a little over a year ago at a "mentor fair" for school. She had her knitting with her, (smart girl) and we were eventually also assigned to the same mentor. Sarah is the one who is paving the way for knitters to knit in class. She also told me yesterday that she knits under the table when she is in long meetings at work. I LOVE IT!

In addition to picking up the wheels and various other spinny items, we paid a visit to Churchmouse Yarns and Teas. A very interesting thing happened there, neither of us, both maniac knitters, bought a single thing. We had spinning on our minds, and commercially spun yarn was not answering that sweet hand spun call.

Our other stop, however, was beyond our ability to resist. Esther's Fabrics is a fiber maven's paradise, and if that weren't enough, they were having a SALE. I could not resist, but kept my purchases to a minimum.





These will make a nice little notions pouch for me



And these little lambies. . . their sweet little bleats enamoured me.



I finished a lovely scarf for a friend, it's long and soft and wonderful. The yarn is Elesbeth Lavold's Angora. One ball each of colors, (7) midnight blue, (8) aubergine, (14) lime green, (12) cloudberry.

I realized when I finished it that I have only ever knit myself one short little scarf, a situation that will soon be rectified. The Duchess needs a new scarf for this ridiculous weather Seattle is experiencing.



The Duke is also doing his part to help me slow down. Isn't he the picture of masculinity?