Look what I found!

I took the boys to my mom's house today for a March Break visit...on my way to the car, I found this in front of our living room window...

...and these... 

 ...so I took a little detour, and checked out the peach tree...

 ...and these tulips coming up in the currant patch...

 ...and the first of my herbs - chives.

I don't ever ever remember things starting this early in March.  Hopefully nothing drastic happens now.  My mom has rhubarb peeking up in her garden, but I went to check mine, and sadly...nothing in site.  What is coming up in your garden?

P.S.  The squirrels planted those crocus bulbs.  Wasn't that kind of them?

Weekend crafting

Edited to say:  There is a new giveaway at the end of this post.

If any of you are following the stash bash at Crunchy Catholic Momma you may have seen these felted dryer balls.  I am always looking for a way to reduce our energy consumption, so I thought I would give them a go...The problem...I did not have that much wool yarn I was willing to sacrifice.  I do however, have plenty of wool fleece.  So I made the centers from the fleece and wrapped the outside with the wool.

 A ball of fleece...

 ...rolled up as tight as I could manage...

 ...and wrapped with yarn...

 ...until I ran out of yarn...

This is what they looked like after one run through the washer and one through the dryer.  I forgot to time the dryer to see if the load was any faster than usual...to be determined next laundry day.

Here is the funny thing...the grey/green and the beige/pink in the picture above...that was my attempt at buying colour a few years back.  It was a very determined attempt to buy "not beige" and "not grey".  I love colour, but for some reason I seem physically incapable of actually buying it and bringing it home.  I am working on it.

And, and update on my felted eggs.  The project was put on hold for a while because I was angry with it.  The cat kept running away with the eggs and shredding them...no matter where I hid them.  But I finally got to it this weekend.

 One set almost done...

 ...second set needing the blanket stitch...

 ...the hands down favourite...everybody loves this one in my house.

 ...ta-la...wouldn't this be cute in a play kitchen?  I'll have to save that idea.

So with the projects here, and a few others I have been working on, I have used up half of my stash of fleece...going from two large bins, down to one. 

And, for those of you who are interested...here is a sampling from my summer (a few years back, now) of dyeing wool with things from my yard...

From left to right:  white - just washed and brushed...no dye; technicolour yellow - goldenrod flowers with tin; that strange nameless colour - dandelion and then sage with copper;  pale yellow (really pretty actually) - is either goldenrod flowers and leaves with tin, or yarrow with alum (sorry, but on my colour swatch board they are very similar); second row: pinky/beige - peppermint with alum; pink - red rose petals, strawberries, and raspberries with alum ( the same thing with tin gives a strange grey); purple - alum with blueberries; and black - peppermint with iron.  Most of these were tried out searching for green. 

Didn't find it!  

This is how I kept track...little swatches with a tag underneath.  Clearly some have fallen off.  That's OK, they were probably beige.  I have a lot of beige in the test bin.

Have any of you ever made green with a common plant?  Please comment if you can help me out.

I'll be linking up with Crunchy Catholic Momma for stash bash, Wisdom Begins in Wonder for Fiber Arts Friday.

I think I will share after all...

Still a few days to enter the Give-Away, here in case you have missed it.



Tomorrow is Friday...Friday is the day I enjoy browsing the blogs that post to Natural Suburbia for Creative Friday and the ones that post to Wisdom Begins in Wonder for Fiber Arts Friday.  When I have something interesting (to me) going on...I join in and post as well.

And this week, I was not going to bore you all with my sad sad attempts at learning to spin (yarn, not pottery) and then I realized that is exactly what I posted about on my Monday post of keeping it real.  So here we go...my attempt at spinning this week.

This is 1 ply right now.  Still lumpy and bumpy, but I have learned a few things.

I have learned that I would much rather spin with roving that is long and skinny and wound into a kind of a ball than with roving that is a few colours layered onto each other in a kind of a flat slab.

I have learned that a lot of those coil areas come out when I take the yarn off the watcha-ma-callit that it gets wound onto while spinning (you know, like a bobbin) because I only have one of them and I have to wind the yarn off each time.  

I have learned that I better go back and get that library book that showed me how to spin in the first place and learn the proper names for the parts rather than watchamacallits and "slabs" of roving.  Ha ha ha...I entertain myself at least.

I learned that even though I am still learning this new skill, and quite frankly, it's gonna take me a while...that I really enjoy the process itself and it is so quiet and soothing.  No clackity clack of my ancient sewing machine. Just a whooz whooz whooz kind of noise that is kind of mesmerizing.

So here is what I have so far...2 sad sad balls and one not so bad ball now that it is off the spool/bobbin/watchamadooly (I know that I know the name...I just have forgotten it tonight, my apologies).
The test for next week will be to spin these together and see what happens...I am excited.

Now, I am off to get some proper inspiration from everyone else's blog.  Thanks for putting up with this post.

I see some stash bashing in my future

Before I forget...if you haven't yet entered the Give-Away, go here (if you want, of course).

Now...to the future stash bash..

A few weeks I entered a give-away for this book...and I won! 

Thank you very much to Adrie at Fields and Fire for the generous give-away.  It arrived last night.  

I had read about it on a few blogs and was really quite interested in checking it out.

So, I thought I would share with you the first three projects I plan to make, since it is Three things on Thursday.

 First up will be this little gardening apron...once I saw it I realized I need a gardening apron.

Next up will be this hat, or something very similar.  I think my family will be happy to see a hat replace the bonnet that I wear in the yard (and maybe, once or twice, to the beach).  You see, apparently, my bonnet is embarrassing (to them of course, not to me).

And this little guy caught my eye.  I don't know who I will make him for, but I do believe that I must make him.  He's in the queue anyways.

What are you planning to make?

Yarn along on Tuesday, one day ahead as usual.

First...make sure you don't miss the GIVE-AWAY here.


Second...I realized tonight that I haven't knit a single stitch all week.  Oh, I have plenty on the needles (slippers, penguins, legwarmers, cables...) but I just haven't managed to get to it.  I have pulled out the sewing machine, and rearranged furniture, and made some pottery, but no knitting all week.  I don't remember the last time that happened.

SO, I decided the best thing to do would be to pull out the sweater.  The sweater that has been in a bag since last spring because there is something wrong with the sleeve.  There are at least three mistakes in it and it is both too big and too small.  There is nothing for it but to just rip it out and start again.  Hmmm.  I do believe if I leave it out it just might bother me enough to finally get to it.

No book today...I just went to the library and haven't decided yet what I am going to start with.

I'll be joining Ginny at small things for Yarn along so I am sure I will come away with plenty of inspiration and a good list of books to look for.  I always do!  Incidentally, am I the only one who takes a whole week to get through the Yarn Alongs???  I get there, but it takes me a while.

A Give-away!

It is time for my first ever give-away.  Are you ready?  Go!

I am going to give away one of my handmade necklaces to someone anywhere in the world.  It is an embroidered image of pink lavender (yep, pink lavender...I have some in my garden) on linen blend fabric, mounted to a slice of branch, and strung on a string of pink toned glass beads.  The closure is a button that fits through a loop.

Interested?  I am going to make you work for it - OK?

Here is the deal...I have opened an Etsy shop.  I am just learning.  Most of the feedback has been good, however, someone related to me by blood has told me that it makes them think of an old granny rocking on her porch.  Someone else has told me that a particular item should come off the listings because it brings down the look of the whole shop.  As I said, I am still learning so I am shamelessly soliciting your opinions to see what I should change.  For a chance to win the necklace above, here is what you do:

Go to my etsy shop "AtTheCrossroads".  Come back here and leave a comment with your honest opinion.  Trust me, nothing you say will hurt your chances of winning.  It will be a random draw but I would like a nice big pool of opinions to go forward with.  And heck, while you are there...for a second chance to win, either mark an item as a favourite or come back and leave a second comment telling me what your favourite item is so that I can see what people are looking at.  Oh, please be sure to leave a way I can reach you to tell you if you won.  I will draw the winner next week, shall we say Tuesday, March 13 and will post the winner shortly thereafter.

I thank you all for your help, and good luck

Brown Baggin' It.

I am back with my regularly scheduled programming of "Using What I Have to Make What I Need" this Tuesday.

 I made myself a new lunch bag for work.  And now that my son has seen it, he would like one to replace his lunch cooler.

 Because this (below) is the state my old one was in.

 I don't buy these lunch bags.  This one was free with a backpack that S got one year, so I have been using it.  The boys use nice sturdy small coolers for lunch.  Hard ones.  They have had the same lunch box since kindergarten and they should last all the way through to grade 8 without a problem, except, as I said, now S wants one like this new one instead of his cooler.

I had on hand:  one old linen blend skirt that doesn't fit, some leftover fleece from a Halloween costume from about 3 years ago (ideally I would have used wool, but I didn't have a piece that was big enough), and some leftover water resistant nylon from the year I had to make the boys some raincoats because there was not a single one to be found in town that fit.  Please, feel free to adjust the materials to what you have on hand that will work.

Cut one rectangle from each of the layers:  12" x 26.5".  Layer them linen, then fleece, then nylon.

I serged all around the 4 sides, but a good strong zigzag stitch may work just as well if you don't have a serger.  Sew down a nice seam along the top (one of the long edges) by turning it down about 3/4" and sewing along your serged seam.  Sew the short sides together, 1/4" from the edge (it's where my serger threads ended) to make a tube.

Cut one 6.5" square from each of the layers.  Layer them, and serge the edges.  Pin the bottom to the bag, right sides together, like this:

Sew along the bottom of the square, using the serged seam as your guide.

Ideally, I would have put grommets in the top to be able to thread something through to tie it closed, but I didn't have any on hand, so I just used this cording that was in my "bits and pieces" drawer.

This was the hardest part of the whole bag.  The rest was done in minutes.  I even had to use one of those little rubber grippy things made for opening jars to pull the needle through all the layers.  I will probably add grommets when this cord wears out, but let's just see how long it lasts, OK? OK!

And let's hop on over to Frontier Dreams to see what everyone else is "Crafting On" this week, shall we?
I'm also posting on Crafty Moms Share for Sharing Saturdays.

And, just in case you missed it...the Give-away is still open until Tuesday, here.

Felted Eggs

I am trying something new to me:  wet felting over a plastic egg.

 I still have plenty of sheep fleece in my stash.  I thought I would try to make something for the boys for spring.  They are getting a little old for the old "find the plastic eggs" thing, but I wanted to do something, so I am trying out felted eggs.

I wrapped a plastic egg in two layers of carded fleece, drizzled a little dish soap on it, and rubbed it and squeezed it and smooshed it around, alternating hot hot water with cold cold water.

After about 15 minutes, it looked like this...the plastic egg inside is the size of the one on the right.  I plan on doing this same thing in 3 sizes and then cutting an opening to get the egg out.  I will then blanket stitch around the opening, and hopefully they will fit on inside the other, and then I can put a surprise in the smallest one.  I don't know what yet.  I also don't know if they will all be white, or if each layer should be a different colour.

This one egg took a lot more fleece than I thought, so this should make a significant dent in my stash.  I will update as the project goes on...I figure I should be able to make one a day...and then wait for them to dry.  The one I made last night was still wet this morning.

Now I'm off to see what Crunchy Catholic Momma has going on for stash bash fun this week.  Won't you join us?

Yarn along and possibly a stash busting update

This week, I was really hoping to have finished my penguin project.  I really really wanted to finish them in February, as I self-imposed a deadline on myself.

Penguins in various stages of completion...

 I have 6 nearly done, although none have a beak on them yet...

...and I have the parts for two more (and to finish the nearly done ones).  I am currently working on the last two penguin bellies.  I had thought to make 24 of these for an advent calendar for my sister but these 8 took up my entire ball of black yarn.  Who knew?  So, as part of the stash busting challenge...

they sure worked,  but I thought there would be more of them.

I'm putting them away for a little bit, because my sister was right...I do get bored of making the same thing over and over.  I will take a break from them and come back.  

Oh, the pattern is this one by Linda at Natural Suburbia.  

The book is "New Treehouses of the World"  by Pete Nelson.  I picked it up at the library because it looked interesting and the boys and I have spent hours going over this book.  It has amazing pictures of amazing treehouses, like this:

 I thought it was a greenhouse, but it was built for communication with outer space.  I'm not kidding.

This is one of my favourites, because the second floor (the second floor of the treehouse!!!) has 4 beds in it, with lamps and drawers and it just looks fantastic (unfortunately I couldn't seem to get a picture of the picture).  If you ever see this book, check it out.  I promise you will be amazed!  Some have hydro, and running water, and wood burning stoves (in a treehouse!!!)

Anyways, hop on over to small things to join the Yarn Along fun, and check out Creating a Family Home just in case the stash busting update is Wednesday too.

Crafting on...

Twice in a row now, I don't have anything for "Using what I have to make what I need".  I seem to be spinning in circles lately, getting distracted by everything that "needs" to get done "right now".

Having said that, I will join Frontier Dreams for "Keep calm, craft on".

 The Green Man mug I worked on this weekend.

 S really likes it, even though it isn't done yet.

The only thing about using the studio at the college is the amount of time it takes to get something back.  It will be 3 to 4 weeks at least before this one comes home finished.  I am looking forward to it.  I  worked on another mug too, that looks like an eyelet fabric

It is based on this fabric...

Do you see it?  I cut this piece of fabric from a ballet costume I had when I was a child...I have boys, I don't think I will be needing the costume any time soon.  It was a skirt with a pair of bloomers underneath.  I have another piece for my bathroom curtain.  OOOH, does that count as using what I have to make what I need?

And for those of you who join me on Tuesday, there is still a little time to use the discount code for my etsy shop.  15% off purchases excluding shipping until the end of the month for my blog readers as a "grand opening sale".  Use the code GRAND2012.  For those of you who read this daily, I apologize for the broken record...I just wanted to catch those who come weekly.

What are you "crafting on" this week?