Mixed stuff and blessings.

The other day, after sorting some things in my room, I realized that I had forgotten a small thing that I meant to knit for fall.  And that small thing was a sweater for my sweet little Emmett.  It is supposed to match the Gramps sweater knit for owen earlier this year.

It is just too cute to not do this. I have lots of yarn left too so  Tuesday evening, off I went, zipping along.  

Yesterday evening I had this but I also had finished a bunch of other work inlcuding my recent nemesis, the laundry, and at the end of the day, I chose fixing my bed over writing the blog.  It was well worth it.

The house took most of my energy today but I still managed to turn that proto sweater into this

between tasks and naps.  I hope to do even better tomorrow.

One of the chores I did today was kitchen laundry.  I thought it was time to go through and take out what really was no longer even a good rag for cleaning (painting clothes from the kitchen drawer.  Yes I have that).  It came to me that I need a few more decent dish cloths.  The last dishcloths I did were three in 2020 from a weaving project and before that, some I knit in 2019.  It is time for a few new ones.  

I also pulled out some new tea towels.  I love the old fashined kind, the flour sack sort.  I loathe small towels that seem to be standard.  I bought some from Mary Maxim in spring and it is past time to put them to use.  I reserved two to embroider and put the the other five in the drawer.  I may yet take one more to play with, but I have a day or two till I have to take it out.  

I have a bit of a deadline for all these little shores to be done.  My Carter is coming for an over night stay with me just after Thanksgiving. He has never done this before and we planned it for summer, but summer didn't turn out that way.  Next summer will though but we decided not to wait and I am so happy. I love you to the moon and back Carter.

Set A or Set B

This is going to be quick.  It is just one of those days where I need to lie down and sleep.  I think it is the weather as much of anything.  My joints haven't been hurting for a couple of weeks but today, full owwie, full creaking and full, let's not go too far without hanging on something for dear life.  Not a great day.  Lots going on otherwise.

I started playing with these on the weekend.  Set A or Set B

set A

set B

I am pretty certain that somehwere in the mists of time, I had already decided but it was all together in the bags.  It never hurts to do a check before starting.I voted for the set with better contrast in the greyed out photo, Set A and just look at what is going on.

Isn't that something?  It is the very beginning of something wonderful, otherwise known as the Agate Cove sweater.

Happy

For a long time now, I have been using three of Ikea's mighty Bosnas stools/ottomans/storage cubes as my WIP storage.  They are getting quite stained and ugly looking.  And no, the stains do not wash out.  But for storage, they have been perfect.

But they didn't do everything.  As I was working on the blanket o'rama last year, I got myself a folding tv table to help with the knitting but also to colour on and to set puzzles on and for a dozen other wee things I could use one for. My living room was a wee bit crowded and disorganized and all of that needed to be moved aside to use my Cubii.  I tried a few things to solve my terrible looking footstools, but wasn't happy with the result. They still stored things okay, but the Bosnas couldn't be the wider ottoman that I wanted. I tried changing how some pices of furniture sat to see if it made things better.  But it became an irritant to always have to fold the table and tuck it under the loveseat.

I knew what I needed for resolution.  My brother has this really cool lift top coffee table, but his had a normal coffee table under it with shallow drawers and no real storage of the sort I was looking for.  I could not find what I was looking for, not even in the thousands of dollars range far outside of my price range.

I did occasioanlly find it as an ottoman, but the cost was always far more than I could spend.  And then one day, up on a side bar of something or other a wee Rona ad with exactly the thing at a price that I would pay and with shipping to my door included.

This all was going on as I was starting the big clean after summer and the timing couldn't have been better.  In fact, it advanced the big clean because I could finally deal with some other things because I  would have at least two bins available for other storage.

Lifts just perfectly too, and I love that it is just the touch of a hand to put it all away.  The biggest bonus is that it fit everything from all three WIP bins so I actually gained another bin!  Keith wanted a stool for putting his feet up for watching F1 with me.  I was happy to oblige.  Everything that was almost done or being worked on fit in the storage now, even the sock bags have a home.  

Plus the two WIP bins that are not in the living room are storing fabric from old duvet covers I am not using any more and bits of pieces of other pretty fabrics.  They will all be sewn into bags for sweater storage (I am so done with the giant ziplocs where the zip part has not been adhered to the side of the bag correctly).  I may even make bags for project storage.  But first clothing sewing.  I need that so much more.

Just felt like sharing my ottoman love.  Perfect.  

Weekends

I am retired but weekends are still very important to me.  The two days bookend days of work still, only it is work of my choosing.  Weekends remain specail days.  

This last weekend was for finishing.  This weekend, I finished Marcu's wee gloves.

I managed to make only one big mistake.  I meant them to be the same but I have the colours reversed on the fingers of the second glove.  It's just not a big thing so I am calling them perfection.

And today, I finished Olga's fingerless gloves.  

As you can see, it looks very different that the sample you saw in the other post.  I was starting them as two strands of the Adma and Eve in s twisted stitch rib.  the farther I got on them, the more I felt I was doing a disservice to the pretty yarn. I may make a pair of them for me for sleep, but for Olga with her long slender hands versus my punky short stubbies?  She deserved sweeter gloves.   I pulled it all back and changed it to a lovely little pattern called Susie Rogers Reading Mitts.

The reading mitts are a fingerless mitten and all I changed was the addition of fingerlets on top.  I tried finishing the edges on top of the fingerlets in the picot bind off, but that made too much fabric between fingers.  It looked fussy, so I pulled back and just did a double garter ridges and then cast off.  It looks great.

So that is one family done.  I just have a wee sweater for Emmett to do.  I had planned this in the spring and here we are fall, and it is almost late but the Gramps cardigan is fast to knit up and fun too. 

At the same time as starting Emmett's I will start one of my own.  I think the quoddy blue regal will be first done, and follow it with the gorgeous DK from Mid Knit Cravings in their Pesto colurway.  I am still not certain what pattern I want for it.  It such wonderful yarn!

Andyway, off to bed for me with a busy day looming.  I may not have everything I wanted in life, but  life is good and that is plenty of riches for me.

Day 732 of Household Reorganization

I am on day 732 of household reorganization.  It's down to brass tacks though.  Almost everything is in it's new location and surprisingly, there still is room on the shelves for the myriad of little things that seem to accompany me through life.  Down to brass tacks now.  I am sorting through all the various boxes putting like with like.  Sometimes it means combining two sets of materials, sometimes it means dividing.  Either way, when I am done, it is better, tidier and neater and that pleases my soul. 

I still have dvds to put away and music boxes to put back on shelves, but that will be the last act.  It is where I started this whole process, so it seems right to bookend it with it. The kitchen is still a disaster though. That is weekend work for two.  I can only get the low stuff clean.

I did some knitting today.  I have the first fingerlet complete on Marcus' fingerless gloves.  It was not without incident though.  I was almost done the palm, when I noticed a dropped stitch back on the first colour row.  It was so many rows down that there was nothing for it but to pull it back and redo.  

When I drop a stitch, I usually pick up and work it up but I find if it is more than two or three rows, particularly on something small like kids mittens or gloves, that the 'new' stitches are just uncomfortably tight.  I would much rather reknit than have that kind of tension glitch.  So drop back, I did.  It looks fine and will take very little time to finsh up tomorrow.

With the days getting shorter and the sky getting dark before 8 p.m., I had the pleasure of watching some combining happening in the field just over the ball diamonds and across the road.  It was a cheery canola field that I hope is giving the farmer a good return.  Watching the combine go back and forth, meeting the truck brought back some happy memories of long nights keeping the coffee hot, and making sure there was bread or cake for late night eats.  Or popcorn for the guy in the truck on occasion.  And once the eats were picked up, back to my good book, because in those days, TV was finished for the night about 1 a.m. and there was sure to be more coffee required before they called it a day, on those perfect nights.

A long time ago and far, far away. Ah well. Those days are gone but I am still here.  Memories are as good a way to end day 732 as any.

Bits and Pieces.

Just as I sat down to write this, there was a low rumble and some strong wind and now some light rain falling.  It has been so long since there were any showers here.  Such a wonderful sound.

I had one of those days.  I meant to keep working hard to finish my reorganizing and cleaning  

 but I got waylaid by a really tasty cup of coffee.  And a bit of a nap.  I knew I was tired and didn't have a great sleep last night but sheesh. I did get some of the stuff that was hanging about the living room with no proper place to go, put away but not quite all.  It is starting to look like a decent living room though.  Well lived in to be sure but not quite so hoarderish as it was.

And then it was time to get knitting for my zoom call set up.  I thought about Marcus' fingerless gloves, but with the stripes, it was really too complicated.

I picked socks.  They are the perfect knitting for chatting and for those days when your brain may not be all there.  

Sock one is done of this pair of leftover socks.  It's wonderfully bright and fun to wear in the dark of winter.  It's so long since I knit socks of any sort, that it all felt really fresh and just down home kind of nice.

After my call was done, I wasn't sure what to work on.  I was not in the mood for anything challenging.  Plus I really want to get these family gifts done first before any big sweater knitting happens.  I looked at all sorts of glove and fingelrless mitten designs, but there wasn't anything quite right.  I decided to just go with the glove pattern from Ann Budd's Knitter's Handy Book of Patterns and worked on that for a while.  Stockinette wasn't giving me what I wanted. The yarn was just too fine.  I thought about adding the mohair again, but that would make it too slipperly for driving.  I thought about knitting a lace pattern, but the yarn is so colourful, it would just get lost.  What I really wanted was something more substantial.  I also kept thinking about my own favourite wristwarmers, a pair I made using twisted ribbing.  

So I doubled the yarn and I am doing a simple twisted stitch ribbing.  

  

It will knit up faster and be doubley warm and crisp for those chilly days to come.  Plus, it evens out any colour pooling.  It looks great.  I do have some other yarn for fancier gloves for her sometime, but for on the way to work, these are better.

As quickly as that started, I was done with it.  It will be good knitting the rest of this week, but with all the choices made, I was over the thrill of starting it.

I went to the sock bag to see what else was going on there.  A couple weeks ago, when I was moving some stuff around, I came across another delight from RCY, two skeins of their own yarn, Touchdown in the Saskatchewan Rough Rider Colourway and a skein of the complimentary Hat Trick Semi Solid in the rich Rider green.  I knid of forgot that I had these in my WIP bins.

I had made my mom some Rider Pride socks because she does love her football, and I was trying to make a pair of wristwarmers to match.  I didn't have any luck sorting it out and to date, I don't think the ladies have had any luck finding a designer to give it a go successfully.   Gridiron really is a play on the way this yarn is dyed.  Some things are not meant to be, I guess, but this is such great yarn.   I hate to leave it languish, so I am making a matching pair of gridiron socks for me.  

And that was my day.  A bit of this, a bit of that, and not a whole lot of any one thing.

Isn't it nice?!

There now.  Doesn't that look nice?  I am really pleased with it.  It even looks like the right size for his hands.

Unfortunately, that side doesn't tell the whole story.

Now you see the rest of the story.  Every time I say that, I hear Paul Harvey's voice in my head.  

I left most of the tails long so I could work them in after.  I tried weaving ends in as I went, but the ends have to be on the back of his hand for use and comfort and it just made it all too complicated to do it ongoing.  Weave in I shall.  There are also going to be little holes that need filling where the fingers join.  It just happens and I am prepared for whatever comes.

I am really pleased with the way the finished first glove looks.  The second one is under way, just at the first band of green on the palm. 

I still haven't figured out why a 7 year old needs these but he really wanted some badly. I guess I will find out.

Heads and Hands

Every day it is a little easier making the change to my writing time.  Friday, I had things ready to go when I realized that I didn't have to write till Sunday evening.  So here it is, such as it is.  

On Friday I showed you the loveliness that is Olga's variation on a Huj Tub.   Today, I can show you the completed version of it's silky hazy beauty.  

End to end, it is 25 inches of glory.  Plenty of length the have it over your head to keep you warm and still have a good thick soft pile around the back of your neck.  The first Huj Tub, made for me, was a bit short because I ran out of the mohair silk I was using, but this one, I had lots.  I only need about 400 m of the multi coloured mohair silk and I have plenty remaining to do what I wanted with it in the first place.

I decided that next up would be Marcus' fingerless mittens.  There are very few designs with finger bits for Marcus size listed on Ravelry.  I wouldn't buy yet another pattern anyway, not for him.  He's just a kid.  Colour is his thing.   I am just using a basic glove pattern from Ann Budd's Knitter's Handy Book of Patterns  and snipping the tips, if you will.  

I didn't have to go too far for yarn either.  As I was putting things into the new sewing room/guest room, I came across a box of yarn to be put away on the next Big Dig.  I used it for some bed socks around New Years.  

It is really the perfect yarn for these gloves.  It's a good sturdy wool.  It is easy care.  It is sturdy (personally torture tested.) Plus I had just the right number of colours, Five,  so I could make the finger and thumb each a different colour.

The only change I made to the basic glove was to make the cuff longer and to knit a few rows plain before starting the thumb gusset.  

I should have been finished glove one today but right about where I was supposed to start the fingerlets, I realized I had way too many stitches.  I was screwing up the gusset something fierce, so back to the base I went and started over from just a few rows after the cuff.  Still I am pleased with where I am on the project and can't wait to get these done so I can work on the much more elegant ones for Olga!  

Back to ordering the rooms tomorrow.  The sewing/guest room is almost done.  There are just tubs with my sewing fabrics in them, to go into the closet and the drawer unit to drive over to set by the sewing table.  It is looking good, far better than I hoped.  We shall see if this is a better way to use the space. 

Once some boxes cluttering the corners of the living room are put on to their new shef space, my giant task will be at an end and all my personal rooms will have been deep cleaned for fall and I will be ready to knit.  

Or I will be as soon as  kitchen is done.  Ewww.

Change is hard.

The changing of the work is going fine.  Really well in fact.  However, the blogging in the

Evening, not so much.  I took photos.  I put them up ready to blog around them.  I went to my computer in my room aaaaaaaaand

Yeah.  I couldn't get to it till I moved a few things and if I moved them, it meant the computer needed to move too.  So I did that and promptly forgot about writing.  

Today is a other day.  I shall try again.

I did knit a couple hours yesterday.  I keep working on this because she will want to use it very soon.

I really love this.  I cannot say that enough.  The only other thing I am looking for is a fingerless glove pattern to match.  

Momma will get a pair.  Marcus will get a pair.  But that will be next week.  

Bahahaha

I sat here thinking of stuff I wanted to do before bedtime last night, but not once did I think of blog writing. And, since in every other way, the plan worked, I shan't be writing the blog this morning either.  

The coffee target was well met.  The work target was well met. I napped and still managed to do a few hours of knitting.  It was a good day.

But I forgot about the blog.  Not so bad, all things considered.

Trying something different.

I am going to switch up the time of day that I have been writing my blog.  It has gone from morning to evening to midday and all the way around several times in the past years.  I think I started switching it in response to what life was handing out, but it seemed to keep my writing fresh too.  Right now it is a bit about keeping my thinking fresh, but part of it is the situation and how time seems to go by so fast, even as it creeps oh so very slowly.

I have been writing morning for a long time, but it can take whole morning some days.  And then evenings, which have been a struggle for me for a good many years, are too long and I retreat to my bedroom just to do something different.  That means that my biggest work gets done in the afternoon and that just is not my best time of day. I take naps when I am tired and if it is a really good nap, well the whole day is gone before I accomplish anything at all.  It does okay for knitting, but not for more detailed work like sewing.  Also, if you only start in an afternoon, it takes two days to sew even a simple garment.  My eyes are fresher in the morning and can see so much better that these days, the difference matters.  

I also love my coffee.  It is the only real reason to get up in the morning, so cup one is early.  I find writing in the morning requires coffee so that is cup two, and after writing, usually about 10:30 a.m., and well, it is 10:30, and that is coffee time.  It is kind of how after lunch, I generally give myself a break for an hour no matter what I am doing, a far off echo from school and long recess.  I need to cut down coffee.  I know that, so changing up some other routines to help make it easy seems like a good idea.  Evening writing of the blog means tea!

Plus, with the kids here all summer, my evening routine has shifted a bit.  I find I can stay awake much later, much later meaning past 9:30, quite easily now and I would hate to lose that more normal routine again.  

So for all the reasons there are, I am going to switch things up and see if I can get more done by writing in the evenings.

So we shall see how it goes.   

Heinous jobs

I am doing a truly horrid job that is not done nearly often enough.  I am cleaning what is effectively my junk drawer.  Only it isn't a junk drawer, it was a junk closet.  

It had all the hallmarks of a junk drawer.  Bits from screwdrivers.  Loose nails and screws.  Parts from picture hanging kits.  Felt pads for chair legs.  A couple random pieces of sandpaper, partly used.  A huge box of old vhs tapes.  And an explosion of screw drivers.  

What is an explosion of screwdrivers you ask?  That is when the kit with every sized screwdriver and every style of bit known to mankind, once given to you as a gift by a gentleman who never returned my screw driver bits, bursts the seams on its bag and takes up an entire shelf in said junk closet.

I have always kept my tools in a sensible toolbox but because I am no longer the only person using it and using the tools, things are never put back in the same way.  The landlord likes having stuff up here at hand when he can't find his stuff in the garage and, slowly, his tools pile in too.  I kept telling him that I needed the closet for linens, but tools and junk just kept piling in.  I stopped caring a couple of years ago.  I just gave up.  

I let the beds stay layered in all the blankets and tossed all the pillows on too. My extra room, was guest room, kids playroom and storage for some of my craft thing too.  And it didn't do any of those jobs well.  Even the blanket layered bed was a bit of a pain when people did stay.  

I am done with that and as I said was reclaiming my space.  I am reorganizing it all just a bit differently than before.  Reclaiming my linen closetwas step one.

It was a heinous job, but it is done.  It will go much faster from here on.  

I Wish

I wish you could see how lovely this piece is.  If only it's colors came through in the photo.  

It is more copper, more peach, more golden than you can even begin to see here.  

I am about half done the cowl now, and I am debating going up one needle size so that the part around the wearer's neck is just a tiniest bit wider and softer draping, so that it hugs her neck even more.  I know that she will love how it feels.  

Seriously, who wouldn't.   Take two of the most delicious yarns, in this case, River City Yarns Adam and Eve and some hand dyed to match Hand Maiden Superkid Silk and knit them holding both strands.  It really is the most delicious bit of decadence.  

If only you could see it in person.

Almost Done.

Well alrighty then.

Among all the bits of chores that I accomplished yesterday and the day before, I also knit and I am thrilled with where it went.  By Wednesday evening, I had both sleeves complete.  That was sort of thrilling in and of itself.   

The next big thing was how do I deal with the front.  She wanted a pullover which I did not find out till after half of the body was knit.  I had several ideas on how to deal with this so I was game and just kept knitting.

My first try looks pretty darn good.  The eagle eyed among you can see where the sewn edges are but once it is blocked and washed and once I even out all the stitches, you won't see that at all.  Thursdays work, odd as it may seem, was getting the seam right.  It  wasn't hard but I had to take care and it was just a tad stressful.  Still it worked out and by supper time, I was picking up stitches for the neck band.  

I was tired so I stopped after a couple rows.  I didn't like the way the centered double decrease in the middle of the front V was looking and I knew I could do better, so as soon as the coffee was on this morning, that is what I was working on.  

I am pretty pleased with it all but for one small thing.  Now that the whole thing is done and laid out flat, the sleeves, which looked marvelous before, seemed a little too short.  I decided to add another set of stripes, one purple and one of the Locura Fluo.  I have just one row of the bright multicolour left and then I will have a good look and see if it looks better balanced than before.  The pair of striped rows adds just over another inch, which should take it right to her elbow, which is what she wanted.  Crossing fingers and toes.

But this little thing, so long in the planning, is finally looking complete.  Almost done.  I like those words.

Taking Stock

I thought I would get a lot of work done yesterday.  I really did but sadly in order to get a lot done, you must do a lot.  On the face of it, that was where I went wrong.  I did not do a lot.  I was so gosh darn tired.  It can only be a response to the summer.  Ah well.  I wouldn't have traded it for anything.

What I did do yesterday was to make a large pot of chicken soup stock.  It was the best chicken stock I have ever made.  Rich and flavourful and just the perfect balance of salty tasty chicken goodness.  Oddly enough, it only made okay soup. with noodles and a bit of chicken meat and a few veggies in the pot, it became oddly bland. I have some tricks up my sleeve for next time that will make it be great soup though. Carmelized onions might well be the trick. I have not given up on my tasty stock yet.

I feel that same little bit dissappointed that I haven't gotten everything done this week that I thought I would, or should.  Cassie's buffalo plaid shirt remians unsewn.  Her sweater is still being knit. Her mom's cowl is still on the needles and while I have given Marcus' fingerless mittens some thought, that is all I have given it.  I used to stop here, at the list of all I had not done.  I used to stop and knash my teeth and berate myself.  

These days, I do better.  Just like not giving up on my chicken stock, these days, when I see a list of things that I have not yet completed, I look at the rest of the story.  I made delcious chicken stock.  My living room is ordered with only a few things needing putting away. The things to put away even have a place to go! I have room in my livingroom for all my dvds.  This is huge for me.  I love my movies and it was getting so the stacks of movies were always in the way.  Plus, there is still lots of room for my music boxes and for Grandpa's beach.  

Big wins all around.  The sweaters and mitts and cowls will come along soon enough as will the shirt. Soon enough, I will be ready to just sit and knit a new warm woollen sweater just for me.

Organization/Disorganization.

Well that was a weekend.  It was ntoa weekend of knitting.  It was a weekend of chores and there are still a few more bugguns to get out of the way before I can do my much desired big dig in my stash.I have finally sorted what I am going to do with Cassie's sweater and am doing the bottom ribbing.  There are still sleeves to knit too so that will come next. 

 

I just love how Locura Fluo looks with these deep almost black purples.  It's just very satisfying.  

I have another healthy week of big chores left if I work at the same pace I did last week so the plan for this week is to get more done.  bahahahaha

Last week a big part of the slowness was trying to figure out why there were certain things that no matter what I did, there did not seem to be room for them and they always ended up, not quite in the way but not out of the way.  I may have resolved some of it as I worked slowly last week but not all of it.  Some of it is, sadly, going to end up forever in the department of  'didn't try that yet, so maybe it will work' school of organization.    

Organization/Disorganization.  Surely I am a master of such things by now?  Perhaps it isn't about getting things a a certain state of being that matters.  Perhaps it is the journey?  

Consequences

A bunch of chores that had been pushed aside by the much more cheerful prospect of playing with my grandkids all summer were completed yesterday, but even better, there was knitting.

The short rows are complete so the only thing to do on this sweater is sleeves which she wanted only a bit longer than elbow length and all the edges.  The edges are a bit of a problem.

When we first started talking about sweaters, we were talking about cardigans with long sleeves with a hole in the cuff for her thumb.  So that is what I was knitting.  As kids do, Cassie changed her mind and said she wanted a short sleeved pullover.

Sleeves are not an issue at all, but changing from a cardigan, where I knit back and forth changes the colours that happen in the stripes.  Colours are not the same on the fronts of the original cardigan. Just sewing a seam and having it look good isn't quite feasible.  

Cassie and I talked about making it looked like an always buttoned sweater, where the is ribbing and buttons but it is sewn together.  This is my favourite idea.  She didn't really like it.  Then I thought of icord edgings.  I cord isn't quite a strong enough finish for the dark purple.  Maybe a double icord?  Twisted icord, where two layers are twisted just to give it more helft and depth?  

Not sure where this will go yet, but it will get decided today.  

There are more chores on the go today, laundry being of particular importance.  There are sheets from all the beds that have been taken apart, 2 and maybe 3 loads of bath towels (it's a really small machine) and a load of kitchen laundry all needing doing.  When those things are done, I will need a place to put it, which means the big closet over the stairs needs sorting and ordering, which means...

Well, it is a bit like if you give a mouse a cookie.  For every action, there are consequences.

Time for Knitting

This morning I find myself sitting here, with a strong need to dig into my yarn closet.  It would be a good day for it in some ways, but in others less than ideal.  I don't worry too much though about idealor waiting for it though so...

After yesterdays forays into my books, and my embroidery and its inspiration, I think that is what I am looking for.  Since I cannot go to Fabricville (see Tuesday's post) and I have cruised my shelves for inspiration yesterday, I am sort of wondering what to do today for another shot of inspiration in lieu of actually doing something.  

Now that right there is the real probelm.  There are so many things to do and I have time now to start to do some of them but I have no idea which one to do first.  This is complicated by the long, long list of chores I need to do to feel like I have the house under control again.  

I could go on, but honestly, it makes more sense if I just go do.  Sigh,.  I hate that in a day.  Oh well, needs must and there will be time for knitting next week.

To Dream

With all the stuff I did and didn't do this summer, one of the things I have really missed was working on my stitching projects.  And every day, I thought about it too, that simply marvelous volcano and its lava paths, watching my ebullient little boy play and charm me.  He found very early on that the case containing the stitching stuff was a great place to sit while eating his Happy Meals and watching videos.  Everyday, it was right there, in front of me.  And  I let him.  My case is filled with thick lidded cases full of floss.  A squibbly boy can't hurt them.  What energy I had this summer went to my knitting goals for stash dash and the project for Cassie and one for their mum.  But the embroidery was always on my mind.  

I made an order to Mary Maxim for some tea towels, the big, almost square. cotton 'flour sack' kind.  I did it mostly because these tea towels beat anything that you can get anywhere else for drying dishes (I really do need the tea towels) and because they really are perfect for simple playful, silly embroideries.  A row of flowers, a small group of sheep, silly quotes, practise of stitches and borders.  

Next I treated to myself to this.

I ordered a Beginners Guide to Blackwork.  This is not for use on my tea towels.  Blackwork needs an evenweave fabric and in I 'found' some.  Sorting and digging in a drawer for something completely different, I found a long linen table runner that I won't use again. It has a green border matching my curtains from the house on it but it is otherwise in fairly mint condition.  It has onlly been washed a couple times.  The linen is just too nice to waste, so I thought maybe I could take off the green fabric edging and use the linen to do something else, something like Blackwork, It could make a large piece for my living room but I could also use it along with the linen roll Olga brought back from Ukraine for me. This idea just popped into my brain and right now, my stitching vibes are humming!  Part inspiration and part a project to dream on but maybe?  

Last night I dug out my very old copy of Ilse Altherr's Balckwork and Holbein Embroidery.  I have had this forever and a day, but I was never quite ready to work on it and learn this slightly different technique of work.

This book is  a true workbook.  There are motifs to work up, but the author also shows you the pathways to beautiful work.  You see Blackswork, used traditionally to docorate garments and household linens had to look good on both sides.  The 'pathways' in Altherr's book shows you how to do that and how to deal with those times where you can't.  

Who knows where it all takes me?  But here are three different embroidery projects to get you thinking of whatever creative purisuits you love for the winter days coming up.