Caturday and Continents

Here's Eve, rocking a faux-hawk. She's hardcore.


I think Pippin has a crush on one of the neighborhood strays. He spends a lot of time looking out the window and meowing. The other day he carried one of his toys over to the front door, dropped it, and looked out and meowed for a while--I think he was giving the outside kitty a present! Or trying to, anyway.

George still likes to be up high, and she's discovered that the top of my wardrobe makes an excellent perch.


In other news, I got the name and address of my Sock Roulette victim! It's very exciting. My sock is going to a whole different continent. At first, I thought I hadn't been to that continent, but then I had a thought, worked a little Google-Fu, and discovered that I have! That brings my list of visited continents up to 4, counting North America. (Hint: Mom and David, you probably have to add a new one to your lists, too, unless you research family vacations more thoroughly than I do.) I plan to pick up a few small, fun things to include in my package, and then my sock will go winging its way across the ocean! I also need to send some yarn to Mom, and a whole mess of things to Alaska. But first I must stop and pick up some packing materials. And I can't wait to see the sock that I get!

I hope everyone has a great weekend!

A Cautionary Tale

Yesterday I got my shiny new lace blocking wires, so I decided to, you know, work on some lace, so I'll eventually have something to block. I tried to work on my Creatures of the Reef shawl, but I just wasn't feeling it, so I decided to switch to the Seascape thing-a-ma-bob I started ages ago.



I went over to the storage ottoman I could have sworn I put it in... but it wasn't there. Okay, I thought, I'll try the closet. I'm sure it's in there. Nope, no Seascape thingy. I went back to the ottoman and this time fully emptied it--still no Seascape. I rifled through half a dozen Rubbermaid totes that contain at least some yarn or knitting--but it wasn't there, either. I looked back through the closet to make sure I hadn't missed it, but it still wasn't there.

I was getting seriously frustrated. So I went into my bedroom and pawed through a scary little area I like to call "where random crap goes to die." It wasn't there, either--but right next to Scary Area, there was my granny stand-up project bag thing, and inside that--was Seascape! Hooray!

And then I remembered that it got shoved in there and hidden in the bedroom during the mad cleaning spree before my Chinese New Year dinner.

The moral of the story is: Don't clean. It's bad for your blood pressure.

Caturday, and a Request

Pippin really loves the Super Scratcher.

George has discovered that she can walk on the top of a window frame with the help of a curtain rod.

And if you look really closely, you can see that Eve is cuddling a frog finger-puppet that makes up one half of a set of dpn holders.


Now, for my request. I'm planning to submit several designs to The AntiCraft, and if they should be accepted I would prefer it if potential employers didn't find them when googling me pre-interview. So I need a pen name. I'm drawing a complete blank. Any thoughts? Suggestions? Anything at all?

Quickly

I have finally added my Knitting Scouts badges to my blog.----->

Look how accomplished I am!

The People Have Spoken

And they have requested photos of fabric. It wasn't that I was disinclined to post photos yesterday, I just didn't have any on hand--but I thought I had better take advantage of the urge to post despite the lack of photos.

Here is the fabric I'm using.

The colors are a little off; the green is more lime, and the blue is more teal. I really like it.

And here is the pattern I'm making.

I'm making View A, the short-sleeved version shown here in a yellow and white striped fabric. (Question for the ages: Is it yellow fabric with white stripes, or white fabric with yellow stripes? The world may never know.) I considered making the long-sleeved version, but then I decided that my fabric didn't work for that. It's a short-sleeved fabric. I'm glad I made that decision, because when I was cutting out the last piece, here's what I saw.

There was no way to fix this without making one of my skirt panels upside down. I'm not entirely sure it would have mattered, but with my luck, if I had cut it out upside down it would have been glaringly obvious. So what's a girl to do about this? Well, probably make the skirt about two inches shorter. In the end I just cut out the piece and decided to figure it out later. Last night I was very sleepy and had a nasty headache, and I just didn't want to deal with it, especially after the other mistake I made.

What other mistake? Well, when I was cutting out the bodice back, I lined it up according to what I thought was the grain line on the pattern piece. It was not. I failed to notice that I should have lined the pattern up with the fold in the fabric, thereby cutting just one piece that folded in the middle. I now have two pieces, oriented sideways to the rest of the pieces. I'm not too worried about the sideways part; I figure that the back of the bodice can be sideways and it won't matter, not like one skirt panel out of four being upside down. I'm slightly concerned about the fact that I'll have to sew a seam up the middle, which will eat up some width. My plan for dealing with this is to make a very narrow seam, like 1/4 inch, if I can manage it. I think I can probably make that up in the side seams, and not have too much of a problem. Ta-da!

After I laid out that final piece, the one in the second photo, I remembered where I probably went wrong. I was in love with the fabric, but it was a little short on yardage--I decided that it would be okay because the fabric was a little wider than 45". (Also, laying the back bodice piece out wrong probably contributed. Sometimes Ann=not very smart. This is what comes of cutting out your fabric in two sessions, and doing the second when when your head hurts.)

Anyway, I did go to Hancock last night and buy my thread, and I also picked up some buttons. And I took a look at the batiks they had on hand. They were few, and ugly. I didn't buy any. My local Hancock Fabrics feels more like a quilting/crafting/home decor store than a fabric store--they don't have a great variety of fabrics that aren't fleece or wacky cotton prints. Next time I want fabric I think I'll try JoAnns. I didn't actually do any sewing yesterday. I'll work on that tomorrow, and hopefully Thursday I'll have more fun photos!

Is This a Craft Blog, or What?

I keep meaning to post between Caturdays, and somehow I don't get to it. It's probably because I'm spending all my free time knitting and watching movies from Netflix--but despite that, I have no pictures today.

What have I been knitting? Well, I signed up for Samurai Knitter's Sock Roulette, so I spent 10 days frantically knitting a sock for fear I wouldn't be able to make the deadline. I finished my sock on Friday--whew!

Now that I've finished that commitment, I need to work on some Secret Design Projects for the AntiCraft. I've got a 2/28 deadline for that. Luckily, I've got a good start, so I should be able to handle it.

I've also been working on a hat for Anne. She requested a hat like one that appears briefly on the TV show Bones--it's an earflap hat with a mohawk. She requested the color "green like baby dinosaur," and I found the perfect yarn--but it's acrylic, so it tires my hands out like nobody's business. It's amazing how different it is to knit with yarn that stretches more! Anyway, I'm at the point where I'm ready to start the crown decreases. Hooray! I also need to make her a new fingerless glove. She was devastated to lose one of the pair I gave her for Christmas, but luckily I have enough yarn to replace it. I haven't started that yet--I need to get on it before it gets warm! Anne was afraid I'd be upset, but I'd rather she wore them and lost one than kept them in her house like a museum piece.

I was at Wal-Mart on Saturday and I thought I'd stop by the craft section to see if they had any fun purple yarn that might work for the mohawk on Anne's hat. I didn't see any, but as I was leaving, I walked past the clearance fabric shelves. $2 a yard! I had just been looking at the four dress patterns I bought on sale when I was in Green Bay at Christmas. I have the fabric for one, and I actually started cutting it out this weekend, but I couldn't resist perusing the offerings. I didn't find anything at first, but then I went over to the other side of the display and discovered the $1.50/yard fabrics. I found several there that I liked. One is black with white pinstripes, one is dark grey, one is plum-colored, and the last is light grey with red and yellow pinstripes. They're lovely. I'm really looking forward to making pretty dresses. I'm planning to make a good start tonight on the one I started cutting out over the weekend. I'll need to make a fabric store run to get matching thread, though, and I might have to take a look at the batiks--Hancock sent me an e-mail about their President's Day sale, and batiks are 40% off. They would be perfect for one of my patterns--and I haven't found any fabric for that one yet. (I'm going to avoid the pattern section like the plague, because they are once again on sale, and I don't need any more inspiration.) I blame David for my current sewing obsession. He's making himself a kilt--everyone should stop by and be amazed at my brother's skill and talent.

That about covers it--I've got a couple of other things going, but they've been back-burnered for the month of February. Happy knitting!

Happy Valentine's Caturday!

On this Valentine's Day, I gave the cats a special gift.

A large box.

Eve was the first to claim the box.

The George kicked Eve out, and had a little box time herself.

Pippin wasn't terribly interested in the box itself, but loved the paper that came inside the box.

I hope everyone's Valentine's Day is full of wonderful things. Like boxes.

Super Caturday

I have a special treat for everyone today: movies of kitties! There's no sound, and they're kind of dark--the Eve video, especially--but they're still very cute. Enjoy!