Halloween Treats

I am still in the cookie baking mode...don't know if I will ever be out of it because it is too much fun and the people around me, including myself, are eating them up.  I also made Symphony Brownies last night.  For anyone who does not know about Symphony Brownies, they are worth knowing about.  Also very simple.  Just make your favorite brownie mix batter (not the kind with extra syrup or caramel or chips, just a plain old brownie mix).  Put half of it in the baking pan, take one Hershey's Symphony Bar, break it in pieces and layer on top of batter.  Put rest of brownie mix on top and bake according to instructions on box.  YUM!  I usually keep a few mixes and candy bars on hand.  They're perfect for any occasion. 

My friend Cathy came over a few nights to decorate with me.  She and I are both night owls and it's fun to have a friend that I can call at 10 or 11 pm and say "Do you want to come over and work on a project with me?"  We have a kind of understanding about using cell phones past a certain hour so as not to disturb sleeping husbands.   Fortunately she lives down the block so it's not a long late night trip.

I have started back in my knitting projects as well and just posted a new pattern on Ravelry and Etsy.  Like lots of others knitters I'm into hand warmers in a big way.  They are such a nice snuggly personal gift and they don't take hours and hours to knit.  I knit my first pairs in two new yarns that I hadn't tried before.  Wisdom Yarn's "Poems" reminds me of the beautiful Noro self-striping colors but is much softer.  At only $6 a skein you can make a set for only $12.  I also tried Universal Yarn's "Classic Shades."  I saw it laying on the counter at The Gourmet Yarn Company and had to have some.  When I found out it was 30% wool and 70% acrylic the yarn snob in me waivered for a moment but the color "Sapphires" was so pretty and it felt so cushy I went ahead and bought it.  I swear it would be hard for Clara Parkes herself to tell that there is synthetic in there.  It even has a nice fuzzy halo like the real thing.  And at $7 for 100 grams (enough for both handwarmers and some to spare) it's a bargain basement price for something that looks and feels like a hand-painted luxury yarn. 

Here's the handwarmers made in Poems.  I kind of like the mixey/matchey way they are different from one another but if you wanted them to match a little better you could just pay attention to start each one in the same place on the skein.  You have to buy two skeins anyway.  After I finished my right hand, instead of going on to the next skein, I started the left hand with the end of the first skein and, so, my mixey/matchey result. 

Here are the warmers made from Classic Shades:

Classic Shades repeats the dye pattern twice in each skein so it is easy to make the warmers match up.  And there is even a little left over for a teeny project like a doll hat or cell phone cover.

I posted the "Cabled Hand Warmer Pattern" on both Ravelry and Etsy this weekend although I am having a little trouble getting the picture up on Ravelry.  I did post them both as projects though sp you can see more pictures on the project pages.

Well, I'm off to finish a hat and sweater set out of Ella Rae's wonderful washable wool that I started for my new little grand-nephew last June.  Our weather is just now getting cool so I thought I better get it to him before he is too big for it.  I made a size 12 mths but his mom said he's growing like a weed so hopefully he'll get at least a few months out of it.  I'll post pics this week. 

Happy Knitting, Josey

Ella's Cookie Basket with Hat and Ballerina Booties

Hi Knitters,

A dear friend became a grandmother for the first time last week to a sweet little baby girl named Ella.  My friend, a sewer and quilter, helped Ella's momma decorate her nursery in pink and white toile and pale celery green.  The sweet little nursery looks like a page out of a magazine. 

While working on the wedding cookie favors for Hannah's wedding I found a wonderful book at my local bakery supply shop.  Cookie Swap is chock full of the most informative, artistic, and clever recipes and instructions for cooking making that I have ever read.  And instructions for making pink toile cookies!

Julia Usher is an artist.  When I saw her pink and white toile beaded cookies I knew that I would be making them for Ella sometime after the wedding.  In the back of her book Julia gives a detailed list of all the sources she uses for supplies and clear instructions on all her techniques, including how to use "wafer paper" to decorate cookies.  Wafer paper is made of potato starch.  It's a little thicker and softer than regular paper and can be used in a printer with inkjet cartridges of food dye.  I ordered the already-printed toile papers from fancyflours.com and they were no disappointment.   The pink toile came as a set with a blue toile sheet so I made some in the blue too. 

The daughter of our next door neighbor got married just a few weeks before Hannah and she was back in town to visit her mom and dad.  We've known her since she was a little girl and were so happy that she dropped in to say hi.  I knew from her wedding registry that she was decorating her first kitchen in blue and white and yellow so I sent the blue toile cookies home with her and she seemed pleased.  Perfect timing.  I love when things happen like that.

I had never decorated cookies with wafer paper before but thanks to Julia's tips it went pretty well for my first go-round.  I can't wait to order some of Fancy Flours Christmas-themed papers.  They carry green and red toile and even plaids and I am already picturing a pretty holiday cookie tray.

After the cookies are iced and very dry (overnight) you simply cut the wafer paper using the same cookie cutter that you used for the cookies.  Since I iced inside the edge I traced on the inside of the cutter with a pencil and then cut just inside the line.  Using a sponge craft brush coat the backside of the paper with light corn syrup and press on top of the icing -- Presto! 

The paper edge stuck out over the edge of the icing a little and I found that if I dipped my finger in water and ran it gently around the edge of the icing the paper relaxed and covered the edge perfectly.  You have to be careful though because with too much water the paper disintegrates.

Another idea out of Cookie Swap that I tried for the frst time was using stencils to monogram my cookies.  When I have monogrammed cookies before I assumed it was just a very steady-handed talented decorator behind them.  Julia enlightens us and gives s source for nice quality culinary stencils.  It was a little challenging to get the frosting consistence just right so that the stencil didn't bleed but for my first try I think they came out okay.   Cookie Swap gives several sources but I ended up buying them from Designer Stencils.  They arrived in two days.  The instructions included some other great ideas for the culinary stencils including monogramming home-baked bread and rolls with crushed herbs -- Can you imagine?  Very Martha Stewart.

Of course I had to include something knitted to go along with the cookie basket so I made this hat and pair of ballerina booties.  They knit up in one evening in Berocco "Weekend."  It's a cotton/acylic blend that feels and looks just like 100% cotton and costs only $6.00/skein.  For the booties I used a Zoe Mellor pattern from Fifty Baby Bootees to Knit and changed the button strap to little ties.

Finished basket ready to go.

My next cookie venture is going to be Halloween cookies.  Whooooooooo.  I'll keep you posted.

Happy Knitting, Josey

I'm finally back! Wedding Crafts

Hi knitting and crafting friends,

Pardon my long absence.  Our daughter became engaged to a wonderful young man this past New Year's Eve and by early springtime wedding plans were ramping up.  All of my knitting and crafting quickly became wedding related.  There are so many creative ideas and such an abundance of inspiration out there.  Thanks to Martha Stewart whose website has endless ideas, mywedding.com, weddingwire.com, etc., etc.  I could have kept going and going.  And I pretty much did until right up to the day.  Both my daughter and her fiance (now husband) are creative individuals and appreciate all things hand-made so that made it extra fun to have such an appreciative bride and groom. 

Now that all the celebration is over and our daily life has returned to its normal pace I am only sorry that we don't have another daughter to marry!  I have not begun to exhaust my ideas for wedding crafts so I can only hope that Hannah's close friends will let me contribute to their future weddings.

I can't catch you up on all the knitting/sewing/baking/printing etc. in one blog but here is a sampling of some of the items that issued from my craft room this year:

Tote Bags in the wedding colors for the bridesmaids (and  a white-and-creamy-colored one for the bride):

Socks for the groom, father of the bride, and father of the groom (My sister-in-law volunteered to knit two pair -- a lifesaver!  She is KnittingMaryB on Ravelry:

Bridal accessories:

Cookies: (This was very fun!  Lots of trial and error but once I got the frosting consistency right I had a great time).  A good friend helped me bag and tie every last cookie.  Thank you Cathy for being a night owl like me!

More cookies for bridemaids luncheon:

Tags for cookies (the stamp is from Tickled Pink Paper Ink on Etsy).  The kids loved it.  I used the stamp for cards on the welcome bags for out-of-towners too:

Welcome bags with homemade ginger snaps and trail mix:

I wish I had a cute wedding picture of the bride and groom to share with you but the pictures aren't back yet and we're just now starting to get a few of the candid shots from friends and family.  Here's a cute one of the bride with her bridesmaids at her bridemaid luncheon:

I'll post details later.  Meanwhile, I have finished a few non-wedding projects which will be posted on Ravelry in a day or too.

Happy Knitting,  Josey

Bali Bag and Boy Scout Quilts

Hi Knitters,

While visiting my family members in Michigan I went to a quilt shop with my sister, the quilter.  She took up quilting a number of years ago and the way I feel about knitting is the way she feels about quilting.  And I really get it!  She frequents a very special well-stocked shop called The Quilter's Garden in Fenton, Michigan.  With so many samples laying around and hanging on the walls you can't help but want to make something.  The owner, Carolyn, doesn't just have quilts in her shop.  She has lots of smaller projects for those who are just starting out-- totes, purses, clothing, baby supplies, wall pieces, etc.  Carolyn is well-known for her own designs and she has a gift for pulling fabrics in colors that make your finished project pop.  My sister has this gift as well and over the years she has made many special quilts for all the young family members.  Each of her 8 grandchildren have their first baby quilts that she made and one of her recently finished projects is two quilts made in the fabrics specially designed for the Boy Scouts.  The two grandsons holding their quilts are well on their way to becoming Eagle Scouts and we are really proud of them. 

Who would have thunk I would call something made up in Boy Scout fabric gorgeous?  But when I saw the quilts it was a real Wow!  The finished quilts are so beautiful and I think her two grandsons were really surprised and thrilled to receive them for their birthdays earlier this year.  The fabrics are designed by Robert Kaufman and it makes me feel patriotic just looking at them. 

Anyway it was a pleasure to visit Carol's lovely store and to appreciate her love of the craft of quilting in providing her customers with all the inspiration they could ever need as well as all the supplies to see the dream quilts in their minds come into tangible being to be touched, cherished and snuggled in. 

I don't exactly need another project right now and I certainly don't need to take up another hobby since my fingers can't seem to keep up with all the knitting I would like to do, but how could I resist this fun "Bali Bag" tote designed by Two Aunties (see above picture).  There was a sample already made up in the store and it's the perfect size for a knitting project bag or a beach tote or even an everyday purse and it's sturdy enough to load up with even heavy items such as water bottles and books. 

I left with the jelly roll in the picture above.  One jelly roll is just the right size for a medium-size tote.

The tote is made by wrapping 125 feet of cotton covered clothesline (My husband found it at WalMart, Mainstays, a brand recommmended on the internet) with 2 1/2" wide strips of fabric and sewing it down the middle.  Once you have all the clothesline covered you begin sewing the clotheline together with a zig zag stitch going around and around and around and aroooound.  This project eats thread!  Each tote takes at least three large 250 meter spools of thread.  I wound four bobbins for this tote before I started and used all of it.  The pattern has very thorough instructions but I did find it helpful to watch some of the videos posted on Youtube before I started sewing.  There are definitely some helpful tips.

One of the most challenging things is working with a 2 1/2" wide piece of fabric that is over 125 feet long and a clothesline that is just as long.  I found it getting so twisted after a while that I was having to stop frequently to untwist.  The method that I came up with that seems to work the best is to spread the clothesline and fabric out from my sewing machine at one end of the house letting it trail all the way down the hall and over our balcony hanging down in to the family room.  This way it doesn't get all twisted and I don't have to stop every couple of feet or so and untwist.

The cats throughly enjoyed the fabric and clothesline running through the house and had lots of fun chasing the line as I pulled it along.  I just let them have fun with it.  I don't think they could hurt anything since everything gets so tightly sewn together in the end.  Even if they did leave a few claw holes or bite marks they would all get covered up with the zig-zagging.

Here's the finished results of my first Bali Bag.

This one was made with the jelly roll I bought in Michigan.  I found these leather buttons at my local quilt shop.

I ended up using the wrong sides of the buttons.  They looked a little more irregular and hand-crafted on the other side, but I elected not to use the smaller abalone shell buttons that I tried out.

The tote was very thick and sturdy by the time it was all sewn up and I ended up having to use needle nose pliers to pull the threaded needle through as I sewed the bottons on to the tote.  Takes some muscle this project!

The only kind of disappinting thing about my first Bali Bag is that some of my favorite colors in the jelly roll ended up on the bottom of the bag.  For this project I sewed the strips together in the exact order that they came off the jelly roll.  This made for very quick sewing.  Next time I will think a little bit more about the way the colors will distribute as the bag comes together and take the time to rearrange the strips to my liking.

This week I bought some more batiks to make my own jelly rolls at the Savage Quilter in Oklahoma City.  They have two aisles full of batiks that made it easy to pull and it's hard to go wrong with batiks.  The colors are all so gorgeous and random and everything seems to work well together.  I just tried to follow the rules my sister said to follow when picking out fabrics for quilts.  Be sure to have a nice mixture of lights and darks for contrast and at least one or two interesting fabrics that really pop.

We'll see how this one turns out.  I'll keep you posted.

I am still squeezing in some knitting in between my adventures with clothesline.  I'll post more pics later.

Happy Knitting, Josey

New Yarn for Alice Bell's Boyfriend Socks

Hi Knitters,

You may remember a few weeks ago that I was very disappointed with the pair of socks on my needles at the time.  The further along I got the less I liked them.  Here is a great instance of how a wonderful pattern and a wonderful yarn are not necessarily compatible.  I should have been quicker to pull the plug on this one but you know how it is when you have already put several hours in a project.  I guess I thought if I kept at it long enough the poor pairing might magically transform into something more pleasing to the eye.  Wrong!  I finally pulled the socks off my needles and made it one of my missions while in Michigan to find a yarn that would renew my desire to make my first pair of Alice Bell's "Boyfriend Socks."  Here's the yarn that reenergized me.

It's hard to go wrong with a subtle combination of greys and blueish lavendars.  It's that kind of misty moor combination that I am always drawn to.  I found this skein within a few moments of entering the first shop I visited.  I was a happy camper.  It's amazing how your knitting slows down when you have doubts about the outcome of the finished project and how it speeds up when you feel you've got it right.

Here is my first attempt at the Boyfriend Socks: Not so pretty, right?  The color was too dark for the cables to stand out and the dramatic contrast and pooling of color didn't just look ugly, it masked the intricate design. 

Here is my second pair of Boyfriend Socks with the Cascade Heritage:

Better, don't you think?  The lighting is a little off in my photo but I think that you can tell how much better this yarn pairs with the pattern.  The cables pop and you can appreciate how they travel and intersect one another.

Pretty socks....

Not so pretty socks....

Here are the valuable lessons I learned knitting this project:

1) Dark yarns do not show off cables to their best advantage.

2) If you want to choose a painted or self-patterning yarn for an intricate pattern choose one with subtle color contrast.

3) Quit while you are ahead. Your time is too valuable to invest on something you don't love.   If your knitter's intuition is telling you that a yarn is not working with your pattern, trust yourself.  Cut your losses early, save yourself further time wasted, and head back to the knit shop.

Lesson learned.

Happy Knitting,  Josey

A Brand New Yarn from Schaefer

Hi Knitters,

I had the very fun privilege of knitting with "Chris" before it was introduced at TNNA last week.  I ocaisionally knit samples for Schaefer Yarn Company.  It's pure joy.  Not only do I get a glimpse of what's new as far as their yarns and color concepts but I also get paid in beautiful yarn.  It's a dream job.  The only difficult part is that sometimes it's hard to part with the finished project.  Oh, and it's also a little mind-boggling to choose my payment.  Just go on their website and you'll see what I mean.  Not only does Schaefer have the full range of weights and textures but each yarn comes dyed in an amazing spectrum of colors.  I've spent hours clicking back and forth on the website almost to the point of craziness when it was time to actually commit to a yarn.  Sometimes I think I should just say "Surprise me!"

Here's the Chris that came in my mailbox earler this year.  Oh, the feeling of seeing the postman head up my driveway with a box that I know is full of yarn!  I didn't know the name of this color while I was knitting but saw on the website today that it's called "Julia Morgan." 

Chris is washable wool, 80% wool and 20% nylon.  It feels all natural and has a smooth almost cottony texture that makes it a good year-round kind of fiber.  It knits like a dream, the yarn never split once and glided quickly on my metal needles.  I think the stitch definition is beautiful. 

Here's the finished sweater.  The pattern is Schaefer's  Linen Stitch Jacket . 

The Linen Stitch Jacket was available before in a different gauge but was rewritten specifically for Chris.  For once, it was easy for me to pick my yarn payment because this little jacket is completely charming.  I tried it on before I mailed it off and it felt perfect in every way.  I love the sleeve length that is a little shorter than expected, just enough above your wrist bones to be out of the way and to let bracelets show but long enough to keep your arms warm in the winter or in over-airconditioned places.  The short sleeves and hem make it a good sweater for the warmer months, but I think the pattern would be easy to convert to a tunic length if you wanted more warmth factor or simply like more coverage.  In that case I would probably lengthen the sleeves as well.

The bottom edge of the body and sleeves is knit in the full linen stitch, then the rest in half-linen stitch.  Isn't it pretty?

Blocking was a breeze because the linen stitch holds its shape almost like the garter stitch.  Just a few pins and a very light steaming.  A single crocheted edge around the neckline is a nice detail.

The pattern calls for a hook and eye closure but I had this mustard-color button from Joann's and thought it looked perfect.  Schaefer's resident designer/consultant, Laura Nelkin (loladesigns on Ravelry) liked the button and gave her okay.  Although the sweater would be beautiful either way I think the button adds a nice little pop.  I'll be making my jacket in the Gertrude Ederle color.  I've looked up hundreds of projects on Ravelry made in all of the different colorways and think the Ederle is beautiful. 

I'll be back soon with a couple of posts about knit shops I visited on my recent trip to Michigan.

For all you cat-loving knitters out there I am posting the picture below.  It's our youngest cat, Rufus.  He actively inspects every new yarn or project that comes into the house.   He tries to get his nose in every picture I take.  He is the reason I cannot leave my projects out when I am not working on them and that I cannot place any bowls or baskets of pretty hand-painted skeins of yarn out for their decorative value.  Natural fibers mean one of two things to Rufus--a chew toy or a scratching post.  I absentmindedly left a crocheted Sak purse on my bed a couple weeks ago and found it the next morning on the floor.  Rufus had enjoyed scratching and gnawing it into a soggy tangled mess.  He's lucky he's so darn cute.   

Happy Knitting, Josey