The Great Stashdown

I have 20 different yarns in my stash right now.

I know, some of you are reacting with "Bah!  That's nothing!  I have 247 yarns with plans to acquire more!"  Really.  Some of the stashes from Ravelry members are insane.

However, my compulsive need to Actually Have a Plan for each item in my stash is resulting in some anxiety, I'm fondly referring to as The Great Stashdown.  I want to use up a bunch of this stuff before buying more.  So, I sorted the yarn by quantity, and the ones that have enough for a sweater got pulled out into a special display.  It's like my own teeny tiny yarn store.  :-)

Here's my tiny yarn display tucked into the corner of my sewing/crafting area.

I've got enough for 8 adult size sweaters, and 1 smaller one for my daughter.

All those blue tags are my sons doing.  Looks like a yarn store, feels like a yarn store, so it should be priced like a yarn store.  Makes perfect sense when you're 7.

Interestingly, the one yarn I dislike the most is the one he priced highest.
Good!  I don't want to "buy" that one again anyway!

The FREE black yarn is a delicious bamboo blend.
Clearly his pricing system is skewed.

So I asked my son, "Do I have to pay you money to use my own yarn stash?"  He said, "Of course!  But you don't have to give me Real Money.  Or I'll just give it back to you later."

That's my boy.

It's a Bird! It's a Plane! It's a retro tablecloth refashioned into purse!

Browsing through Goodwill last week, I found this lovely, lovely 1960's era tablecloth in a golden yellow.

Best $1.69 I've spent in a long time.  It's got a wonderful thick texture to it, and it just begged to be something more than a tablecloth.

So it was up-cycled into a vintage-inspired bag designed by the lovely Long Ladies at Marie-Madeline Studio.  If you're not familiar with their designs, check them out.  They create patterns for wonderful skirts, dresses and accessories, and they use delicious color combinations.  Very inspiring stuff indeed.  This particular bag is called the Laraine.  

I followed the pattern exactly with the exception of one small additional zippered pocket tucked into the back lining.  Without it the band-aids and Tylenol and chapstick roll around everywhere and nobody wants that.  :-)  Oh, and I divided the other pocket panel into 3 pockets, instead of the 2 the pattern called for.  It fit my iPhone and sunglasses better that way.  

Show and tell time.

Roomy interior

3 open pockets on one side; small zipper pocket on the other.

My Mother made one too.  Hers is out of airplane seat fabric she found at an aircraft supply store.
It's practically indestructible. 

It holds an amazing amount of crap, despite it's deceptively small size.

Which reminds me of something...

The Silent Treatment

People are starting to ask where I've been.

Awww...I've missed you too.   No, it wasn't something you did or said.  And you don't deserve the silent treatment.  The truth is I just haven't felt particularly chatty.

(insert collective gasp sountrack here)

Yeah I know.  Husband is enjoying it I bet.

Anyway, in lieu of my typical gab-a-thon, today I'll present a Wordless Wednesday.  a.k.a a bombardment of photos from what I've been filling the silence with.

Girly Wallet

Learning Shirring

24-Hour Quilt

Mmmmmm....Homemade Donuts

Reading Nook for Daughter

Ginny Weasley Cardigan that she wears in the Harry Potter movies.  No pattern.  Made it up.

Flower Pincushion

Felted Wool thing-a-ma-bob (was supposed to be the front of a  Bermuda Bag; might actually be a trivet)

Sweater out of my head.  Really wish I'd written the pattern down.

Zipper pouch made from an upholstery scrap

Super Secret Fortress for Son

Cuddly sweater for son.  Didn't write that pattern down either.  I never learn.

News Flash

Darling daughter finished her Very First Hat Ever!

It's wonderful!   True, I have to say that because I'm her mother.

But this time it's not a lie.   :-) 

Going for Gold

In conjunction with the 2012 Olympics, the good people on Ravelry have set up the Ravellinic Games.  (Ravelry is an on-line hang out for knitters and crocheters.  It's awesome.  You should join.  But only if you make stuff with yarn.  Otherwise it would just be creepy and stalkerish.)

I choose to enter the WIP Wrestling event.  WIP stands for Work In Progress and I definitely have a lot of those.  Some eventually become UFO's (Un-Finished Objects), but I couldn't let that happen to my Realta.  It's too beautiful to sit half-completed in a box.

And so, last Friday our Ravellinic group, called Team Sparklers, met during the official Olympic Opening Ceremonies, London time.  A mass-cast on ensued for the knitters, and I dug the partially completed Realta out of my bag and tried to remember how to crochet an octagon.

It came back quickly.  :-)

I'm pleased to report that ALL FOURTY-EIGHT (yeah, I said 48) octagons are DONE!  Done, as in the ends are woven in too.  Whoa.  Dude.  That's ambition.

In between each octagon will be a small square with a colored dot in the center.  All 35 of those are started and laid out above.  See anything that needs adjusted?  Every time I walk by I seem to switch something around.  It's supposed to be random but that's hard to do when a color can't be immediately adjacent to itself.

So, to earn a Virtual Gold Medal on Ravelry, I need to finish this beast by Closing Ceremonies.  A lot needs to happen.

1.  Add a black border around the 35 dots, making them squares.
2. Sew all the squares and octagons together.
3. Make 24 triangles for the edges.
4. Sew those on.
5. Add a border.
6. Weave in ends.

Wow.  Even if I don't get it 100% completed and earn a medal, it's still really helped motivate me to make Serious Progress.  

And if I ever, ever say anything about doing a motif-based afghan again, distract me immediately.  Preferably with something chocolate.  Mexican food and margaritas work too.

Copycat.

Back in May, I spent a lovely day with my cousin shopping at the outlet mall.  Cutting right to the chase here: I found the Perfect Dress that day.

Knit (for comfort).
Polyester (easy wash and dry).
ITY (Interlock Twist Yarn fabric, which is nearly impossible to wrinkle).  And most importantly,
cut like it was made custom for me.  

Of course, I bought it.

The sad part is that the store only sold this dress in ONE fabric and ONE color.  What's a girl to do?

Copy it!

Don't go gettin' all impressed.  This was an easy one because it's simple tank style with no sleeves, and it's not super fitted.  In all, the dress only has 4 pattern pieces.  A roll of tracing paper, a sharpie marker, and we were in business.

The black is the store-bought original.

Mine aren't exactly like the original.  I changed the direction of the skirt pattern because I like the stripes better that way. (To be honest, it was a goof. I didn't pay attention to which way the stripes were and I was excited to start the project and just hacked out the pieces and got busy stitching.  Oh well...they're still wearable!)

(also, I just now realized that when I photographed these dresses, the black one is backwards!  Oops. The front has the same detail as the rest.)

Does the second one in line there look familiar?  It should, because this is it's third life.  I bought a set of t-shirt knit sheets a looonng time ago at Target, and made the wrap dress.  And later I used more of those sheets to make a maxi dress.   (I had pink streaks in my hair then...I should do that again!)  Sadly, neither of those dresses exist anymore, because I chopped them up to get enough fabric for the above knit dress.  

I'm glad I did.   This one suits me more.  See how cute!

I wear one of these every day.  Hey - there's nothing wrong with having a uniform!  The top fits just right, and the full skirt hides the bumps and rumples that come with being over 35 and a mother to two.

What about something other than stripes?  Yeah, I went there.

Retro-inspired chevron, Baby.   Polka dots and solids are also in the plans...someday.

Oh!  One more thing!  I was able to make all these knit dresses because the serger is working again.  Dude, really!  IT'S WORKING!  No idea why the sudden change in it's attitude, other than I said Mean and Threatening Words to it.  And I spent significant time shopping online and selecting it's replacement.  It must've noticed.  :-)

Happy Birthday America!

Where we live, the big fireworks display is on July 3.  Why?  Not a clue.  The show was fabulous and we had an amazing view of the action from the roof of my husband's office building.  However, today is actually Independence Day and it's important to celebrate it, even if the Big Show is already over.

So our day began with Freedom Pancakes!

Mix up about 3 cups worth of pancake batter, and split it into thirds.  Color one batch blue and one batch red, then make all the pancakes.  Let them cool a minute, then cut out the shapes with cookie cutters.  Swap out the colors...and voila!  This is fun for any occasion.  Use hearts for Valentines Day, pumpkins for Halloween, dinos on your 3-year-old son's birthday, blah, blah, blah.

My son snarfed his plate of cakes down and declared this the Best Day Ever.  (I don't read too much into that, though.  He uttered the same statement last night during the fireworks show, and last week when we got a free cookie at the grocery, and before that when he found a forgotten gift card stuck in his dresser drawer...he's easy to please.)

At dusk this July 4, we'll be content with our six boxes of sparklers.  :-)