Back-Blogging: Camp Socks

It occurs to me that I have been neglecting the blog yet again. I have several projects to share, and even a few photos to accompany them. So here goes.

 A cross-country plane trip is a good time to get some knitting finished. No trouble with the sock needles. These are the Sara Elin Socks by Vicki Bird that I started during the Lots of Socks KAL back in February. I finished the first sock, but not during the challenge time; then the second sock sat for a long time. It's a lace sock on size 0 needles, that's why.

 But they are quite pretty, even with the occasional hiccup in the lace. Glad they are done though. Finished them at the hotel after arrival in Virginia, before leaving for camp. Tertia and I had a wonderful time on Friday before leaving for camp, touring D.C. Here are some pictures from that:

 At the Metro station learning a different kind of public transit than she is used to. She thinks the name "Foggy Bottom" for a Metro station is hilarious!

 We went to the National Archives, where no photography is allowed inside, but we admired the patriotic flower beds outside! Seeing the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution was exciting for her. I loved the Magna Carta and would have stayed longer, but we wanted to check out the National Portrait Gallery (and American Art Museum).

 Crossing Constitution was the only real shot we had of the Capitol, so I took this while crossing. We looked at all the presidents' portraits in order, and she read the dates and is working on memorizing a few details on each one. Maybe we can convince her that memorizing facts about the presidents is better than Harry Potter trivia?

 This is in honor of Eisenhower Elementary School.

 This is in honor of Thomas Jefferson Middle School.

This one is just because she shares two names with the subject, and read it as we passed by. Her feet were getting tired by then, and when her feet get tired, we need to quit and go back to the hotel.

 This is The Puritan by Augustus St. Gaudens. I've been doing enough genealogy lately to have come across a lot of Puritan Great Migration ancestors, so why not? It's cool.

So, after that interlude of art and history...

These are the socks I started after the Sara Elin socks were finished. Thankfully on size 1 needles, and a simple pattern so the knitting went faster. It's Patons Kroy sock yarn, the first time I've tried it, and the pattern is Non-Euclidian by Sarah Jordan, another pattern I bought during the KAL in February. This is the second pair I've made from that pattern. I'm calling them Camp Socks because I worked on them over the two camps I attended this summer. They will probably be a Christmas gift...shh! I may want to buy more Patons Kroy sock yarn, because I liked this. It's a little heavier gauge than most sock yarns, and unfortunately lower yardage per skein, but a better price point. So that's the news on the sock knitting front. Next time: quilting.

The Joy of Finishing

So, I have progress in both knitting and quilting to report this week. Of all the things I have blogged about, the knitting and quilting have always been constants, and since I am still struggling with blogging regularly, it is easiest for me to push myself to blog when I have progress or even a finish to report. So, I started a new, impulsive summer knitting project this week. It is Gemini, from Knitty summer 2012 issue, and I am trying it with some reclaimed cotton yarn from an unraveled thrift store sweater. But my conscience nagged me as I knit, because Mint Chocolate was lacking only the buttonhole band and some buttons, and it had been started 5 1/2 years ago.

Also, full disclosure on my abundance of UFOs -- on the right is On Your Toes, a Green Mountain Spinnery pattern I started about 8 years ago (?) with some handspun Shetland wool. And on the right is Rosalind, also long in hibernation. Rosalind doesn't need too much more, On Your Toes needs quite a bit.

Well, I stayed up late and banged out that buttonhole band. It was just a little math, and looking up how to do one-row buttonholes. The next morning I sewed on all the buttons, which were salvaged from my favorite red Nordic sweater I bought at Goodwill, after it wore out at the sleeves many years ago.

 I even practiced my selfie-taking skills a bit. They are better than they used to be. Mint Chocolate, finished at last.

So after I blocked it, I also washed three other of my colorwork cardigans in the Kookaburra woolwash. And then I ordered some more Kookaburra because it's been too long and basically all my woolens need washing. Amazon delivered it the NEXT DAY, which is kind of insane but impressive.

So last week I blogged about returning to the Megaquilter to work on Celtic Solstice, which had been basically waiting 1/3 done since the end of 2017. This was the 2013 mystery quilt. I got to the bottom border and had to refresh my memory about how the quilting goes. It was a good thing I had taken a picture over a year ago of the border quilting, which is a wave pattern.

That was this morning when I finished the bottom border.

 And the right side. Then I took it off the frame and remounted it so one side was ready to have the border quilted. When I took my training lesson on the Megaquilter, the lady said to do this with borders. You can just let the weight of the quilt hang over the front rail to keep a basic tension on the area to be quilted.

 How it looked from the side before quilting...

and from the front of the machine. I tucked the extra quilt under and up again over the batting rail to keep it out of the way while still holding tension. If necessary I put a heavy notebook in the middle, in the "pocket" formed by the folded quilt. Believe it or not, this helps!

So I have finished quilting Celtic Solstice. I am still having some trouble with the machine, but I think it is because the hard rubber rails on the carriage have abraded in certain spots, and maybe also because it needs me to use different thread. I can tell it's the rails by visual examination, and because the bumpiness I feel in quilting happens when I am quilting north-westerly or north-easterly. I think I can fix the rails on the carriage, cutting down the short rails that I have never used from the original set-up. I will need to disassemble the set-up and take the machine off separately from the stitch-regulator to do that, and I can maybe sew on the binding while I have it off to test whether the machine itself needs a tuneup. This is a lot of tech talk to say, I need to hold myself accountable to actually do that! It's a bit scary for me. But I am on a bit of a high from having actually finished a project, and maybe I can channel that. I have so many more tops to machine quilt!

So in summary, I have finished two long-standing UFOs in June so far. They are just NOT the ones chosen randomly from my list.

World Down Syndrome Day, and Lots of Socks

So, World Down Syndrome Day, 3-21, was Thursday, and so was the meeting of Young Life Capernaum. I've been taking Tertia there in recent months, and she really enjoys it. It was Disney Day for the theme, so naturally she dressed as Belle. They had a "dance or dare" contest and of course she chose dance! Improvising moves to "Try Everything" from Zootopia, I think she was a hit! Even when her tiara needed adjusting.

 The Lots of Socks knitalong hosted by Lisa K. Ross is over and drawings for prizes will be held next week. I finished a total of 10 socks, including this one of Flower Shock by Anna Friberg. This is the first time I've ever purchased a pattern (or anything for that matter) in Swedish Kronor. It's a lovely lace pattern that is more fun for me to knit than most lace, and I'm excited to make the other sock soon. I used a mystery yarn from my friend Joyce and color segments from two different half-balls of Chroma. The heel is an afterthought, which is the first time I think I've ever done one. You knit with provisional yarn, and then you go back and knit with your regular yarn, and then you have to put pick up stitches and knit them from both sides of the provisional yarn, then decrease the heel, then Kitchener it together.

This is what it looked like after picking up the stitches on both sides. Kind of cool!

 Grellow Love by Clare Devine. I'm calling mine "Grumpkin." It uses a "fleegle" heel, which is pretty similar to my standard toe-up gusset heel, but in a contrast color. I've already started the gusset on the second, so this will be a pair soon, hopefully next week.

 These are my single socks that still need a mate.

 And these are the socks I wore on Thursday; Lots of Socks and Non-Euclidian.

All told, the Lots of Socks knitalong raised more than $18,000 for Down Syndrome International, which will help support people with Down syndrome in various countries of the developing world.

The plum tree is quite happy for the arrival of spring.

I am quite happy too; we have daffodils, forsythia, Daphne and camellias blooming now.

Speaking of spring; I was surprised that we had the Equinox and then a full moon in the sky, but this Sunday is not Easter. (Because my mother taught me, Easter is the first Sunday after the first full moon of spring). Steve figured it out for me with some googling: the exact moment of the full moon was actually a little before the exact moment of the vernal Equinox. So although I was quite prepared to channel Bede and complain about the improper observation of Easter, I bow to the astronomers who have these pesky technical details all figured out. Unlike me... I still have a difficult time with editing my photos for the blog; probably one of the reasons I haven't been blogging as much.

Speaking of the blog, I reverted to my original dandelions blowing in the wind theme. I never quite enjoyed the clean-cut blues I have had. Maybe that will spur me on to blog more. And yes, today is Randomday, so by my own blog rules, I can blog about whatever I want. Since I was blogging about a specific subject today, I'll save most randomness for a future date.

New Year, New Goals

So it's 2019, and 2018 wasn't my best year for either blogging or crafting. I did finish several pairs of socks and a few other knitting projects, but no quilts during that time. The coming of Thanksgiving and the mystery quilt with Bonnie K. Hunter served as a welcome kick-start to get back into both sewing and blogging. But it also was a kick in the pants to me to organize my scraps and long-neglected projects, both of which were in a shocking state.

When I had to make blue string blocks, it forced me to organize my strings. And not just the blue ones.

 I have a 3-drawer plastic unit; it goes beside my sewing chair so I can just reach down. Top shelf is cool colors, middle shelf is warm colors, bottom shelf is neutrals and browns. The above photo was taken when I was almost through sorting the cool colors drawer and dumped out a bunch more.

I thinned it down considerably. I stirred up a LOT of dust and had to take frequent breaks. I threw away strings I disliked or were too small for my purposes, and now my three drawers are reasonably tamed. I also started the process of organizing my other small scraps. All of this was in the week immediately preceding Christmas. I ended up getting my entire sewing area thoroughly vacuumed and the storage area under the Megaquilter much neater. I will probably do other purges and take more pictures to document this in the future, but I took a break from that when Christmas came.

This was Daniel's gift to me, and I got them on the wall for the Last Noel.

I was detoured right around Jan. 1 with a friend's post on Facebook about "Bullet Journals," and I fell into a rabbit hole thinking about ways to apply them to my life. I took a notebook I've had since 2011, a gift from a student, and had been using very sporadically as a quilting and knitting journal. If you look back in my blog, you may see some of the WIP and UFO reports I've made in the past were based on notes I originally made in this book. So far, I have not really caught the desire to write in a bullet journal daily, nor to make it look pretty. I did pick 12 knitting and 12 quilting goals (loosely defined) for this year and entered them down in the notebook. But for now, my "bullet journal" is just experimental and I don't think it would make a good picture at all. However, I will post my year's UFO goals from it here on the blog.

The way it works is I select a random number from 1-12 each month, and that number is the project I work on during that month. Then I will have to report on goals achieved or missed each month, and maybe connect with one of those awesome link-up parties that some bloggers are still doing.

UFO or stash reduction projects (knitting/fiber) randomly chosen each month.

1. spin the light green/silver roving from Sock Summit
2. spin the autumnal Dicentra Designs "Black Bottom Stomp" roving in merino/Tussah
3. start a new pair of socks
4. Manu cardigan
5. Manu cardigan (it's in fingering weight, I figure two months are necessary)
6. Rosalind cardigan
7. Mint Chocolate cardigan
8. spinner's choice (may order fiber if that is what I want to do that month)
9. small gifts for gift stash
10. On Your Toes cardigan (or bail and frog it)
11. start new cardigan from reclaimed yarn stash: boyfriend or favorite color(?)
12. any knitting finish
13. (bonus) design my dream colorwork cardigan 

UFO quilting/sewing projects randomly chosen each month

1. classical tote bag
2. bowling style bag
3. linen blouse
4. machine quilting finish
5. machine quilting finish
6. machine quilting finish
7. machine quilting finish
8. 1996 Piecemaker's top
9. mariner's compass hooked rug
10. rainbow star quilt (applique)
11. frugal patch quilt
12. felted wool blanket
13. (Scrappy trip)
14. (LOTR paper piecing)
15. (Baltimore album quilt)
16. (Extra baby quilts)
17. (Spare block quilt "scrap soup")

Numbers beyond 12 are "bonus" choices that can be substituted for another one if it comes down to getting nothing done, or can be done in addition to a completed month's project.

These UFO's are an extension of my yearly urge to clean up my sewing and crafting area. I am assuming I will be working on one quilt and at least one knitting project of my own volition each month; these are in addition. 

So this month I chose the random number 2: the Dicentra Designs spinning fiber was very easy to find and my spinning wheel was easy to dust off and get going again, while Steve and I watched a few episodes of The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel. 

 It was incredibly fun to get back into spinning. I love these autumnal colors.

 And, believe it or not, the two bobbins of singles plied perfectly; they worked out to exactly the same length! Now to figure out a fun future project to knit with this yarn.

The bowling-style knitting bag is still in pattern pieces on my work counter from more than a year ago, and I will attempt to get to that. I know where all the supplies are.

My current sock project is the Bovary socks, top-down socks so a little out of my comfort zone, in some "Vixen" Hipster Knit sock yarn I bought at Sock Summit in ...2011? I am approaching the toe of the first sock; it has been fun to knit, although kind of slow. I would like to finish both socks by the end of January, so I can join the World Down Syndrome day knitalong. 

My current sewing project is obviously, finishing the Good Fortune quilt top. Hopefully by the end of January as well. Then it will join my 5-7 quilt tops awaiting quilting. I seriously need to get some machine quilting mojo going. But for now I am happy to have my goals lined out.

Randomday

 Every morning I go out to feed Smudge (the black cat, who stays outside). He is always eager and sometimes comes a foot or so into the house, though he knows he isn't allowed to stay. Then I take his food and water out and he u-turns and goes right for it, and Muffball follows me out onto the porch. Sometimes there is a very brief acknowledgement of the other's existence, then Muffball sniffs around the porch and patio before being persuaded to return to being an inside cat.

 I am finally cutting up this old t-shirt for rug yarn, but it was hard. Those are Daniel and Peter with me in the picture, and it was one of my better Father's Day presents if I do say so.

 More yarn came in the mail for me, from Knit Picks. I wanted yarn for a few specific projects and ended up with enough that the shipping was free. Sometimes it works that way.

While casting on a new project, I took stock of this hibernating Rosalind sweater. That bit on the needles that was 2" is now more than 9", half as big as it needs to be (the right front, similar to the left front on the right). It was hibernating for at least 3 years. I don't know why I do that. But I keep swearing I will change.

It was cool today, so I went to Salmon Creek park to pick blackberries. I met a couple walking their dog on the way in. "You're optimistic, that's a pretty big bucket," the guy said. "Well, I won't know what the picking's like until I get there," I said. This is 5 quarts (in a 2 gallon bucket) and represents a little over an hour of picking.

 I've been busy keeping the dehydrator filled with plums and plum leather.

 This is the original reason for my yarn order: Quarta is a huge fan of Hamilton and I heard about the Hamilknit Hat on the Knitmore Girls podcast - because yes! I now have an iphone and have figured out how to listen to podcasts, and it's cool! She picked out Honey for the lettering and stars and Hawk for the background, in KnitPicks Gloss. Casting on with a crocheted provisional cast on, and joining "being careful not to twist" for knitting in the round was the work of one evening. It always looks so awkward, and I used two size ones because I hadn't yet bought my 16" size twos.

 Yesterday I knit the inner band, which is in the negative color configuration to the rest of the hat, and I used a chart with more than just "Hamilton" four times, but with Angelica, Eliza, and Peggy Work! Which apparently increases the coolness factor, if you are a 15-year-old Hamilton fan.

With 1 quart of the blackberries, and some pears, nectarines and plums I made this pie for tomorrow. Next week I will concentrate on making preserves from the plums and maybe more blackberries.

Last night we watched Into the Storm, the excellent 2009 biopic of Churchill during WW2. A month or two ago we watched the related picture, the Gathering Storm. They have completely different casts but are both well worth looking up if you have Amazon Prime. I particularly enjoyed Brendan Gleeson's portrayal of Churchill in Into the Storm, and its suitably heroic portrayal of Britain during the War. It was just right.

I am going to watch something and knit. I will probably not cast on something new, but the temptation is almost always there.

Randomday - Playing Catch-up

Yikes, that was a long blog hiatus. Summer is hot, life is busy, the blog goes begging. Sorry about that.

 I did not document the 4th of July here... but it was good.

 I finished a few knitting projects... this T-yarn rug for Charissa's wedding on size 15 needles...

 ... and these Stashbuster Spirals socks for a Christmas gift on size 0 needles.

This is one of the three new pairs of socks I have cast on, but the only one I've photographed so far. And I have placed an order for more yarn with KnitPicks. I should really do a stash report, but that would require me to do math. And I have plans to cast on a bunch of things besides socks. Most recently I have decided to try the Hamilknit hat for Quarta.

Here is the (about) 70-year-old Hydrangea bush in our front yard. Did you know you can root new Hydrangeas from cuttings in water?

This is how you do it. It doesn't always work, but if you keep a green leafy stem in water for long enough, it often sends out roots. And then you can plant it in a pot, and then you can set the pot in the ground over the winter, and then you can plant the whole plant the next spring. We now have a yearling start that's in its own place, and a potted cutting that is doing well (pictured above before I potted it), and a new cutting that is just starting to grow roots.

This photo was taken a month ago... the yearling plant has two blooms now. They are pink because there probably needs to be more acidic material added to the soil. But I am proud of being able to grow these. Our landscaping, along with everything else in our house, is aging and some of it is at a stage where it needs to be replaced. Maybe this little plant will be around for another 50+ years!

It is bizarre that it is August already. I need to get started with all the back-to-school shopping, and paperwork for Tertia, and doctor's appointments that have been put off.

I will call a halt to Randomday for today and determine to pick up the blogging of the incredible fleeting summer soon.