A blog post about...a...blog...post...

Yeah, well, not much going on, really. We had yet more snow on the weekend of April 19th. It's killing all my May flowers! (By the way, that's a shot of the snow the morning of the 20th out my office window at home.)

However, Ben Franklin now has a blog, and yours truly is one of many contributors as the Bead/Jewelry Dept. head and representative. You can see it here: http://benfranklinmonroe.blogspot.com/

(Stay tuned for my post there on the $200 necklace I'm making for under $50! Once the necklace is finished, of course.)

Happy crafting!

(almost) April (snow) Showers

Well, we're so out of touch with things that we completely missed Earth Hour (seen on blogs such as And She Knits, Too and Smoking Hot Needles).

However, we have snow. Lots of snow. This is the Northwest, not the Great White North -- what gives?!

We've been making do with half an inch of snow here and there, and with people not knowing how to drive when it's falling from the sky (it's just fluffy rain, people!) and then I braved the full inch or so of snow, ice and slush down our hill Saturday morning. (We live 800 ft. above sea level, which isn't that big a deal for most of the country, but when the rest of the Puget Sound area is at or below sea level, and 800 ft. is actually high enough to change some cooking/baking directions, and having broken my primary hand in a snow-related car accident 6 years ago, spending 4 months on pain killers that I should have had anti-psychotic chasers for... "Brave" is a pretty good description for going out in that.)

This morning, we woke to several inches...


This is a potted Imperial maple outside the office window that had just started to bud, and then the BBQ on the other side, whose snow has joined with the railing's snow.

I'm thinking some shoveling will be in order, assuming we actually end up going anywhere...

...since the car is certainly blocked in. (While the Honda Insight hybrids are excellent in snow and ice, due to their heavy batteries and narrow tires, the low frame profile rather prohibits getting through snow, as it often high-centers on the snow between tire tracks.) Nope, it's a truck day if we head out to vaulting today.

Also notice the walkway lights, and how one of them is all but buried.

On the bright side, hubby and I will be planning bathtub tiles with brown paper, and I might manage to get some jewelry made. (New porcelain beads came in at work. Check 'em out!)

What? March already?? Since when?

I'm not sure time is flying by so much as getting washed away with the Spring rains. Although there was that 1 hour lost a weekend or 2 ago that some of us are still reeling from.

Since the last post, life has been happening. MIL has safely flown home to the wintry wilds of Ontario, where they have been attacked by snowstorm after snowstorm. (You can read all about them in the blogs from The Yarn Harlot and And She Knits, Too.) I have been unofficially -- yet officially, somehow -- been made bead/jewelry department head and soon-to-be department manager at the Monroe Ben Franklin (an idea which is both exciting and terrifying at the same time).

Best of all, I've been finishing some projects in my dwindling spare time. Aside from web site stuff for clients (which has been taking chunk of time here and there), here are some photos of the more fun-to-share things.

First of all, we have jewelry!

These are some simple chain weaves. The one on the left is a helm chain in gunmetal, silver and copper. (Some also call it a wedding knot, among other things; I'm not sure propriety allows me to share one of my students' names for it after struggling for a couple of hours.) The gold one on the right is the necklace I made for my mother's wedding. (Still waiting for wedding photos, too.)


Here we have one of the simplest pairings I've done so far. This is the product of 4 cheap, stretchy bracelets we received at the store. I cut them apart and restrung them on heavier stretchy cord to make a choker and bracelet. Love these things! Customers love them, too, but we don't seem to have gotten any more in the latest shipment, much to the jealousy of many.


Also since the last post, I had the opportunity to take a class and make this ruffled bracelet. It's all seed beads in greens, ambers and coppers. Somewhat time consuming, but the result is cute, and I just love that button! I swear it's going to end up on costumes.


Here's another chainmail necklace featuring a pendant found in the depths of my manager's office when they were cleaning it out to prepare for expansion. She sent several treasures down and told us to go home with them. Oh, oh, twist my arm. *grin*


This is the piece of which I'm proudest -- the leaf and pearl necklace. I spent the better part of a day on this one, but it's one of my favorites. Freshwater pearls, copper sead beads and a moss agate carved leaf.



And now for the knitted items, mostly socks or sock-like.

Finally! A photo of the No Tears-based sock, based on a pattern from Elizabeth Zimmerman. Lots of fun to make and wear.


Here are the gorgeously soft merino wool socks I had so much help with. The only thing is that the turquoise colored the bottom of my foot after the first day of wearing them. Time will tell.


Lastly, the Cortney legwarmers. Cortney is a fun, fantastic 18yo young woman I know from the barn. She is the vaulting team captain, a skilled vaulter and rider, a hard worker, but she has one of the hardest home lives to grow up having. She has become a stellar person despite her home surroundings, so I have a hard time not doing anything to help keep her cheerful and bright (not that she needs much of my help -- she has a deep well of happiness fed by horses, sunshine and her away-from-home surrogate mother, Andrea the barn owner). When she asked for legwarmers in a long list of bright pastels (to go with her new and very-80s tiger print spandex), I went on the hunt and found a closeout ombre from Knit Picks in a nylon-acrylic blend -- easy to wash and should be pretty durable. Not to mention, this is SO SOFT. I am such a Knit Picks fan these days.



Well, that's it from la-la land these days. Is it too late to do New Year's Resolutions to get better about updating the blog?

No end of help

Things have been somewhat hectic lately, to say the least. We're barely managing to get anything done, though Hubby has managed to almost finish replacing our front door. (There are a lot of steps involved, and we often don't know what's needed until we start to do something.

With some furry little help, I managed to finish the first of a pair of socks done in Knit Picks Essential in Peacock Multi...

This has become a very common pose after working days, me in the Love Sac (a giant bean bag, for those of you who haven't heard of them; a.k.a. world's largest cat bed) with Zoe across my chest and Oscar on my lap. By the end of the evening, I'm nearly supine on the floor, and my arms are tired from holding knitting away from the white fur.

In other news, Hubby has also replaced the kitchen sink. Like most of the other pojects in this house, it turned out to be a muh more difficult taks than one would expect. For instance, in this case, the faucets were welded to the sink. Expected? Certainly not. Also, who would expect that Binna could be so useful at holding Hubby down while he struggled with said project?

Binna's first act was actually to climb into the cabinet onto Hubby's chest, look up under the sink to see what he was doing, and while MIL went to grab the camera, decided that perhaps she could better anchor him in a position on his thigh instead.

More jewelry in progress. Finished a couple of pieces today, but still having trouble getting into the mode of reaching for the camera when something gets finished!

Happy V-Day to all!

I realize that not everyone celebrates, but as today marks the 6th anniversary of when my poor husband tried to propose while I was still high on painkillers due to a broken hand the previous month and was trying to figure out the TV remote!


Yeah, his story starts with "She stabbed me, so I married her" and all the supporting stories just get better.


So anyway, I promised some jewelry pics, so here they are! The above necklace was done with some pink stones (and of course, I've forgotten the name of them), silver bugle & seed beeds and silver pendant and findings. It's sort of a collar necklace design, made to contour a natural neck. (Which is why it's a little buckled on one side -- because this unnatural neck has no contours!)

This next set is some chainmail jewelry with crystal dangles. The bracelet is probably big enough to be an anklet for most people, but the earrings are nice and dainty.

The next is my favorite so far. The darker stones and the pendant are amethyst, and the lighter stones are called "purple crazy lace." If I had actually purchased the materials for this necklace, I wouldn't have let it stay on display at the store.

In other news, I finished the knitting on yet another bag to be felted, but not enough time to felt it today, so that will have to wait for another day. I also attempted some transfer paper printouts we bought from Office Depot, but it didn't work for the punchneedle, so I need to find more options for creating transfers that can be duplicated.

Ph, and the funky-chunky wooden necklace I had been wearing to work decided to explode when I took it off last night. Glad that didn't happen in the dark in the truck! (Or at the store, in Safeway, at the barn, or outside anywhere else!)

Guess it's time to restring the sucker after all...

Lots of chocolate wishes to all!

Photo update & Secret Company revealed!

Now that I have finally had the intro business lunch with the necessary person and had a bunch of questions answered, I can share all the nifty neato things I've been working on during January!

In addition to working almost-full-time for Ben Franklin in Monroe and still teaching crochet and jewelry classes, I'm also now making handcrafted models for Clover! Clover produces many kinds of tools for crafting such as crochet, needle felting, hairpin lace and punch needle.

So now, after long avoidance (not because of lack of interest, but because it would be yet another "skill"; although really, it seems like a skills that was born from someone's husband or child trying to be helpful and dumping the entire laundry basket, wool sweaters and all, into the washing machine and setting it on Hot water [because you take Hot showers, not cold showers, to get clean, right?] and washing and drying everything together).... Where was I? Oh, right. But don't worry, I know there's a very long history of purposeful felting for very good reasons.

Anyway, after long avoidance, I have now been producing a good nmber of felted bags, as well as a couple of fine crocheted items. Here they are!









I think that's everything.... There is a new hairpin lace shawl currently in progress, and then it's on to some punch needle projects. I'm having the time of my life with all of this!

Jewelry pics to be posted soon, I promise!

What kind of yarn are you?

See? I said I'd be posting pics soon! Yeah, OK, so this is an immitation. But it's a fun little so-called personality test.

Here's what it says about the Angora-type personality...

"Angora – Soft and warm

Angora has a warmth that rivals cashmere and softness that rivals qiviut. Best of all, it comes from cute little bunnies that look for all the world like furry footstools with ears.” –The Knitter’s Book of YarnAngoras are eager to please and are highly sensitive. Flexibility and adaptability are your strengths and sometimes your weakness, as well. You are essentially a warm and feeling person, and little escapes your impressionable mind. You are generous with others and strive for harmony in your relationships. "

If you would like to take the test yourself, it's available here.

Happy crafting!

New Year's Resolutions? Nah, I'll pass, thanks.

We've survived through the holiday season, although we're still dealing withone someone in the house being sick at all times. This has been passing around since Thanksgiving, when Hubby and I caught the sickness from my mother's fiance. Fortunately, we've missed the stomach flu variation, but being sick through my mother's wedding (and trying to do the flowers and some decs for it as well while being the Matron of honor) was really no treat, and the night we arrived in Portland (with 1 day before the wedding), Hubby was congested and feverish again. A few days after arriving at home, MIL is also now sick. Whee! Although we finally convinced the furnce people to come out and fix a squished duct underneath the house, so she is now getting heat in her bedroom and bathroom. Progress made on fixing the previous people's stupid mistakes...

But the wedding was beautiful and meaningful to the people who mattered most -- my mother and her new husband. After 26 years of being a single mother to an only daughter, she has now become mother to several more daughters, a son, and some grandchildren who are old enough to be supplying great-grandchildren at any moment! Not sure that part sunk in, but she was willing to joke about having grandchildren now, not just grandhorses and grandcats.

We also, of course, forgot the camera, so am waiting anxiously for pics from other family members. Will post those once they start arriving.

My New Year's Resolution was going to be to make it through a large amount of the stash. However, something better came along. Near the end of the year, smeone approached me while I was demoing at Ben Franklin and offered the possibility of creating models for a variety of things, including hairpin lace and punchneedle items! Needless to say, much excitement ensued, and I doubt my ear-to-ear grin vanished for the rest of the day.

We haven't actualy managed to get together to discuss a lot of details, but my first project is to provide a couple of felted purses. Guess what? I've been reading all about it, but have no meaningful amount of feltable yarn in the stash to provide anything more than small pouches and clutches!

On the bright side, other needed items include crocheted lace (large amount of crochet thread in the stash) and punchneedle designs (good amount of appropriate linen scraps from past costumes in the stash). Woohoo!

Not sure I can really talk about who these models are for, but once my contact comes back from TNNA, we'll talk about more of those details.

In other news, I've finished a very cute pair of cabled socks based on a Elizabeth Zimmerman pattern from Ravelry, but they're somewhere near the bottom of the laundry bin, so will post pics later. Hmm, I owe you lots of photos now...

Happy crafting in the New Year!