Such a mess

Every fall you'll find a lot of debris in my house.  Show season leaves me little time to keep my house tidy.  The only reason it's in as good a shape as it's in is because I hosted my quilt group in September.

As I finish a hat or bag the leftover yarn is tossed aside.  It's truly amazing how the remainders of skeins of yarn grow in piles of orphaned fiber.  When I'm preparing for a show I frenetically pull skeins of yarn from my stash, auditioning them for various projects and casting them aside when they don't make the grade.  Then, once my shows are done for the year, I delve back into my stash and straighten everything out.

This year my room was torn up as usual but especially since I took the two workshops at the Ann Arbor Fiber Expo.  Today was the day to make things right.  I'm offering up photos of the befores today and once completed tomorrow, I will give you the afters.

Even my computer desk is a mess.  So many patterns and other stuff take up space -- can't even write a note to myself.

This was a busy day reorganizing every thing in my craft room.  As usual, it consumed way more time than I had allocated for the project.  I did not go to rug hooking group (too much time, gasoline, mileage, and time -- I think I said that already).

I always feel so productive when I get all of my scraps wound into nice tight balls, and put everything in its place.  I'm not quite done but I'll finish tomorrow for sure and post pics of the new and improved craft room.

Sunny Friday

I went in to the office today expecting to take a half day.  I planned to finish my duties in the morning and head home to get some cleaning done in my craft room.  My tasks were done in plenty of time so I got to start my weekend a bit early.  The sun was shining brightly and it was so nice that I forgot my jacket at work.

I got on the highway and headed east toward my house.  Up ahead of me I saw something so odd I had to catch up to it to be sure I saw what I thought I saw.  Strangely enough, it was an airplane wing being hauled by semi truck with probably the largest trailer bed I've ever seen.  I bet you've never seen an airplane wing going down the highway!

I stopped at Macy's to pay my bill and went home to knit for a bit before I planned to start my clean up project.  Kevin came home and persuaded me (ok, it wasn't that hard) to go across the street with him to our widow neighbor Jessica's house to help her rake her leaves.  Jessica is 86 and moves around well enough but I know she has bad knees and I worry about her.  It took us less than an hour to clean up her backyard but it would have easily taken her a day or two.

By the time that was completed I had lost interest in cleaning my craft room and continued knitting instead.  I finished the second of two camo mitts and started on a new pair of the sterling silver glitz mitts.  Once it got to be too dark I switched to a Republic hat and cast on using another skein from Stonehedge Fiber Mills, in a rich chocolate brown shade.  Pics coming tomorrow.

I'm waffling over whether to drive out to Brighton tomorrow for rug hooking group.  I need to get hooking on Holly & Mike's rug and that's the motivation I need.  Otherwise I'll probably putz around, maybe clean up my craft room.  Or not.  That's it...I'm going to Brighton tomorrow.  In the afternoon I'll probably head over to Right off the Sheep for an all day knit-a-thon.  Ann's raising money for Lighthouse of Northern Oakland County.  They supply all sorts of things for down and out people, something our area has a plethora of right now.

For now I'm going to gather up my rug hooking supplies so I'm ready to go in the morning.  The bag is buried under piles of yarn.  So much yarn, so little time.

H1N1 Strikes

I'm heading off to quilt guild shortly and I know I won't have time to post later.

My daughter Holly was diagnosed with the H1N1 flu last week.  She's on the mend but felt soooo darn bad last week.  She said in her classroom of 9 students, 5 are out with the flu and several others should be staying home.  I told her to ask her doctor if it would help her to get the H1N1 vaccine, now that she's had a bout with that flu.  I don't know if there's any advantage but it's definitely worth checking out.  Maybe some of you know the answer?

Gotta run -- time to grab a quick bite to eat, get gas for the T&C and pick up Sue for guild.

Guild Wrap Up and more...

Last night's knitting guild meeting was so much fun and such a busy night.  Here is my table full of trunk show items ~~ 

 I brought several sweaters, including my Einstein, and various hats, scarves, and mittens.  I even brought one of the needle felting coasters left over from my team builder activity at work.

We are fortunate to have an enthusiastic Charity project chairwoman in Judith.  This year she kitted up donated yarn and hat patterns for guild members to knit hats for homeless children in our area.  Unfortunately the need is even greater than it has been in years past.

Here's Judith sporting one of her fabulous hats and all of the wonderful kits that were made up for us ~~

And here's a shot of the door prizes that were up for grabs last night.  12 super prizes that were donated by various guild members.

Last up, I finished the other sterling silver mitt for Eddie this afternoon and started working on another pair for a different customer.  Here's the first one and the second one, barely cast on ~~

 

I'm sure all crafters have had this thought in their lives:  what would happen to ALL of my craft supplies if I died tomorrow?  What would happen to all that yarn, that fabric, those books and patterns?  I came across this article in the Anchorage Daily News and it should make all of us sit down and write out a plan.  In this article's case, the quilter died at her sewing machine -- so incredible.  Read the article:  Alaskan Quilter Story

In my head I know what I want to happen but it does no one any good unless I write it down.

Guild Night

Tonight was such a busy knitting guild night.  Besides running the door prize raffle (12 different prizes tonight) and bringing my $10 brown bag exchange (somewhere around 50 participants), I was also asked to do the member trunk show.  This meant gathering up several items that I've knit over the years, packing them up and lugging them to the meeting.  I took a few pictures from the meeting but they'll have to wait for tomorrow's post.  Partly because I'm tired but mostly because the camera is in the bottom of one of the bags I toted to guild and back.

Much more tomorrow....

Warning Signs

Oh, it's not quite that ominous.  How many times do you have a warning sign that you don't heed?  Everytime I cook something in the broiler the smoke detector goes off.  Of course, that sets the dog off, and I run around the house with a magazine trying to clear the smoke from the various detectors, opening every available window.  Years ago I nearly set the house on fire.  I started a frying pan of meatballs and went across the street to talk to a neighbor.  Big mistake.  When I realized my error I headed back to my house in time to see smoke billowing out of every window and every smoke detector going off, with the dogs barking frantically.  Never repeated that careless error again.

Two weeks ago my tire pressure warning light came on in my T&C.  I got the tires filled back up and went on my merry way.  Then, the light came back on again last week and I thought it was just a sensitive sensor.  Wrong.  Turned out I had a nail in my left rear tire.  Got that fixed for free.  What a pleasant surprise.  Sure beats having a flat tire.  I didn't even know where the spare tire was on a T&C.

Yesterday my 'change oil' sensor went off in the car.  Sure enough, it was time for a change.  I took a half day at work today and took care of that.

Tonight I finished the sleeves on my Hoodie Tunic and started the hood.  I was hoping to have it completed for tomorrow when I'll be presenting a trunk show at the Black Sheep Knitting Guild monthly meeting.  I've gathered several items I've knitted in preparation but will need to scoop up a few felted items to augment my stash.  I also have to run the door prizes and remember to bring my item for our Brown Bag exchange.  So much to remember, I better make a list.

Photo Updates

As promised, here are some photos to go along with my post from last night.

I finished the blue hat this morning along with the first of two fingerless mitts.

Here is a close up of the seed stitch band -- definitely closer in color than the second picture.  Guess that's what I get for taking the picture at 10:30 pm instead of 10:30 am.

I think I mentioned yesterday that this yarn came from Stonehedge Fiber Mill in East Jordan, MI.  It has wool, alpaca, and a bit of mohair -- such a nice fabric when knit up.

The fingerless mitt is a Kraemer Yarn that contains Sterling Silver, albeit 2%, but still quite a unique yarn.  I carried it with Cascade 220 to give it the weight needed for the mitt.

 

Sorry for the blurry shots but I think you can see the glimmer of silver.

And finally, the white/grey hat made from Classic Elite yarn purchased years ago.

I also started working again on my top-down hoodie made with Cascade 128 Tweed.  I'll try to post an updated picture tomorrow.