The Creative Colours of June

Here are some pix of the colourful things I've been playing with lately ...

 

Mo the Moose got a makeover ... unfortunately, the sun was shining really bright so you can't see the "PEACE" sign on his left antler and the "FLOWER POWER" sign on his right antler!  He also has bright pink lipstick under that sexy little mustache!  I add a little more "colour" to him every evening ... when I've had enough, I'll give him a clear coat of something to protect him from the weather.

My balcony garden is looking very GREEN.  Yes, that's KALE overflowing it's pot.  And it's very delicious!

 

For some odd reason, my green onions are leaning north ... or maybe trying to lean toward the ground ...

And my pot of potatoes almost need hilling up!

Here's the "nutty" colourful sweater I've got going ... it's worked from the neck down.  I started with white, changed to black and added white "streamers" and "popcorns".  Then yellow and black hound's-tooth pattern.  Then a row of reddish-brown squirrels holding brown "nuts" (popcorns).  Not sure how to transition to ribbing at the bottom ... I'm thinking some red popcorns against the yellow, then back to black and white ribbing?  Suggestions?

I'm contemplating making each sleeve of the above sweater different ... or do you think that would be just too "nutty"?

Here's Miss Boots helping me look at the beginnings of another pair of socks ... very BLUE "Arabesque" by Regia.  It's my "stay sane on the city bus" project for this week.  I can finish a sock in a week just in the time I spend going to and from work on the bus.

I've also been painting Tetley Tea tins ...

Here's a finished one.  Sorry, the pix is a bit over-exposed.  It's flowers and dragonflies on a white background.  Cute for keeping little odds and bobs.

I've also been experimenting with these ...

... cuz they make mighty fine silk scarves!  Seriously!  You just DOODLE on a white silk scarf (but put some protective plastic on your table first) ...

You can doodle on two thicknesses at the same time if you doodle slowly cuz the ink bleeds right through.  (10 mm china silk scarf with hand-rolled hems ... check out www.dharmatrading.com/ )

Once doodled to your satisfaction, spritz gently with rubbing alcohol.  Seriously!  Rubbing alcohol form the drug store in a cheap spray bottle!

If y'all know me at all, y'all know that as soon as I get the hang of some new creative project, I'm out there teaching other people to create it too.  Here's part of a group of senior ladies learning how to doodle on silk ...

 And here's the group modelling their finished scarves!  (It's a great group project cuz folks LEAVE WITH A FINISHED SOMETHING!)  Yes, that's yours truly on the right (the lady with the love handles ...).

 I think my motto for June is MORE COLOUR!  Here's a scarf that I doodled on with the Sharpies ... but I didn't iron it before washing, so my doodles faded out.  Yes, this was on purpose!  (Of course it was!  Uh huh!)  Who needs a washed out pastel silk scarf ... so I doodled some more ... with Shiva PaintStix (check out www.dharmatrading.com/  ... I bought a sampler set of 3 stix)  gold and bronze leaf rubbings in the palest / whitest areas.

 Shiva PaintStix are like oil pastel crayons ... let set for 24 hours then iron to make permanent. This turned out so cool that I'm thinking about adding some glitzy beading to the two ends.  What do you think?

Winter Partridge

So some of my coworkers and friends treated me to a "girls' night out" to celebrate my recent birthday.  I don't "do" birthdays generally, but it seemed a good excuse for a "girls' night out".  On the way to their chosen downtown pub / night spot, I walked past a downtown used book store that I didn't know about!  (YES!  General rejoicing here!  MORE BOOKS!)  As I dawdled to look in their windows ... although it was a quick "dawdle" considering it was minus 16 degrees at the time! ... I noticed this:

 It's a 1960s edition culled from a school library.  When I was growing up, my Dad had a copy of the original 1912 edition of "Rhymes of a Rolling Stone", along with "Ballads of a Cheechako" and "Songs of a Sourdough" ... all by Robert W. Service.  My Dad could also recite nearly every single poem from those three books by heart.  He could also recite a huge selection of William Henry Drummond's poetry ("Leetle Bateese, not much you care how busy you're keeping your poor grandpere ...").  He had a special spot in his heart for poets who wrote about REAL people, places and events.  In fact, he had a special spot in his heart for real people, the folks who had experienced some of life's nitty gritties and never forgotten that fact.  This was one of the poems he recited about that topic:



Reading this on Friday night brought tears to my eyes as I could hear my Dad's amused voice reciting the lines just as clearly as if he were standing right beside me!  I also thought it was an amusing piece of rhyme to find last Friday as Saturday was Municipal Elections Day here.  I wonder if our new mayor will remember her "junior" down-to-earth roots after she's been in office a few months?  Hmmm.

So this was the weekend craft project:

 Comes from a "100 Quilt Blocks" magazine (that usually gives me way too many ideas for possible projects!).  I envisioned place mats ... wintery theme but not necessarily Christmassy.

First bit of leaves
stem
and golden ring.

More leaves
and golden pears.

Some of the little pieces were ironed on
using 'Heat Bond'
and some were temporarily stuck on
using fabric glue stick.
All necessary because Miss Boots
REALLY wanted to rearrange
all those little pieces of fabric!

Here's a partridge on the branch.

And here's the partridge
with beak and berries added.

 The next step is blanket-stitching down all the little pieces along with adding a few touches of embroidery.

After the decorative stitching is done, the partridges will get sandwiched with backing and batting, and then quilted.  I'm doing two sets of four placemats, so this should keep me out of mischief for a couple more weekends.

Madam was quite PUSSED OFF AT ME!!! cuz I wouldn't let her play with all the little pieces of fabrics.  She sat across the room and hissed and spit at me everytime I glanced her way for the longest while, then retired to the rocking chair in a huff!

It snowed all weekend.  When the first week of snow (the picture below was taken last Thursday, I think) is up to the top of my suede boots ...

... I'm thinking it's going to be a very snowy winter ahead!  I brought out the tall boots this morning.

My Easter Weekend

It was pretty lazy.  I decided to treat my 4 days off like a mini (and much needed) vacation, so basically alternated between knitting, napping, reading, napping, playing with the cat, napping some more, etc.  I feel much rejuvenated today!

I accomplished one quick and simple little craft project after noticing this ...

... in my latest "Irish Quilting" magazine.  The Saint Brigid's Cross pictured is quilted fabrics, but I thought to myself:  "Self, why couldn't a Saint Brigid's cross be made with pretty paper?"  (Traditionally, these crosses are made with straw on February 1st, and are believed to protect one's home from fire and evil.)  Since I happened to have some pretty scrapbooking paper on hand ... no, I don't scrapbook, I just happened to come across some scrapbooking paper at 5 cents per sheet ...

... I got busy creating.  First, I tore some strips about 1 inch wide ...

... then folded the outer edges of each strip inward like you would bias strips of fabric ...

... and once I had a bunch of folded strips, started weaving my cross:

Do you remember the Mexican / Latin American "Ojo di Dios" made of colourful yarns wrapped around crossed sticks back in the 60s and 70s?  A Saint Brigid's cross is more or less the same kind of thing.  When I had at least 4 "straws" in every arm, I "tied" each arm together with another strip ...

... then trimmed the arms:

Finally, I glued a small strip of ribbon on the back for a hanger, and VOILA!

Yes, I do realize it is 2011 and not 2087!  Apparently, one is supposed to reset the date after the battery in one's digital camera dies.  Oops!

Saint Brigid's Cross took less than an hour from start to finish, and since I still had 3 more days of long weekend in which to entertain myself, I did a little knitting too.  One of my blogging friends is expecting baby number SIX ... and with 5 boys already, hoping for a daughter.  Since I love baby knitting more than any other kind of knitting (except maybe socks), this sounded like a perfect excuse to start a little girl sweater ...

... using my favourite neck-down method.  The coolest part of baby knitting is the speed ... here I am with the arms divided off already, and only a couple of hours into the project!  It's quite pretty yarn and makes its own pattern as you knit.  Want to see a close up?

Miss Boots was feeling left out ...

First you play with paper, then you play with yarn and you tell me "PAWS OFF!"
When is it Bootsy time already???

... so I had to call it quits for the day and spend some quality time playing "fetch the ping pong ball" with her.  (That would be with the cat swatting and the human fetching the ping ping ball, naturally!)  Despite multiple breaks for cats, naps and meals, this is how far I had knit by last night ...

Does this make you think of sunshine and peaches?

... body complete, one side of the button band sewn on, and with button placement marked.  I'll have to dig through "Stanley the Button Jar" for 6 pretty buttons!

So that was my Easter weekend.  What did y'all do???

Cleaning Cupboards and other Domestic Tasks

Once in awhile, you just gotta get in there and clean them cupboards.  The deciding factor was the jar of honey that lived on the counter beside my kitchen sink for two weeks because there was no room in the cupboard for it.  There was no room in the cupboard for it because the last two empty or almost empty jars of honey were still in the cupboard.  Sometimes it takes a while ... like two weeks ... for the annoyance factor to kick in and motivate me.

Yikes!

I found this ...

... FOUR bags of cornmeal!  Okay, in my own defense, the bag in the front is only used for the bottom of pizza crusts and artisan breads that I bake on my oven stone slab, so really it's only THREE bags of cornmeal.  I am NOT turning into Gramma!

Miss Boots proclaimed her boredom all the while I was cleaning.

Enough of the scrubby-cleany stuff already.
We play now kaythx!

She finally gave up on me and created her own entertainment.

It's a cloth grocery bag ... with a tail!

No, it's a BORED kitty playing hidden monster!

I also tackled the front entrance closet and the hall linen / "everything else that doesn't have an official home" closet. 

No, I did NOT find my Christmas ornament!  Not that I'm admitting in any way that the missing Christmas ornament had anything at all to do with the weekend cupboard/closet cleaning spree!

At the end of it all, I was left with this burning question ...

CAN THESE TWO EMPTY JUICE BOTTLES BE MADE INTO DECORATIVE SNOWMEN???

Your creative suggestions would be greatly appreciated!  Cheers!

Another week crawls to an end

Does that title sound weary?  I am, or rather my brain is.  I've been working on cleaning up and updating my work website.  It wouldn't be too bad, but we have a number of member organizations who each contribute multiple pages to our site.  Not a website-savvy person in the lot.  Yeah ... need I say more?

There's a big forest fire not far from here, and we've been under a bad air quality advisory all week.

This photo was taken about 7 am.  The horizon was pretty much obscured by smoke.  Earlier in the week, it was hard to breathe, especially when hurrying, and my eyes were really irritated.  I think there's been some progress on getting the fire under control now as it doesn't seem so bad.  Considering we have MILES AND MILES of dry pine-beetle killed trees up here, this type of event is no surprise.

My Scarlet Runner Beans are getting ready to run!  And seriously, they are not YELLOW!  The morning sun was shining through them when I took that picture.  They are very green and healthy ... honest!  I put up some cheap wood trellising behind them for them to climb on at one end of my patio.  At the other end of my patio, I put up the same trellising for my Sweet Peas to climb.  However ...

... SOMEBODY keeps eating those little climbing tendrils off the Sweet Peas!  That same somebody also likes to rub her whiskers on the Thyme, and sit with her face buried in the Rosemary just breathing in that delicious smell!  I thought she would be all over the Mint, but considering she has no interest in Catnip, I don't know why I thought that! 

I was going to post some pictures of my knitting ... the green cardigan I started in my bus trip to Kamloops is nearly finished ... but my camera is sitting on my desk at work.  Instead, I'll introduce you to Catarina del Sarto ...

... which I believe roughly translates to "Tailor's Kate", my (not so) witty attempt to play on words.  Catarina is going to become a fashionable little 16th century Venetian lady. I wanted to dabble with some medieval garb OUTSIDE OF my early 15th century medieval British persona ... yes, I'm into medieval recreation ... but didn't want to spend the money or time making me-sized clothing that I probably won't wear.  L wisely suggested clothing a doll (thank you, L!), and I agreed, so now I'm working on some needle lace to fancy up a linen chemise for Catarina.  Can't have the poor lady sitting around in immodest nakedness!  I'm hoping to construct a complete wardrobe for her that will be along the lines of this ...

...  Bacchiacca’s 1540 Portrait of a Woman with a Book of Music which resides in a Los Angeles, California Museum.  Part of the fun and challenge is doing the research in order to construct garments that are as historically accurate as possible.  Will keep you posted!

Have a great weekend, y'all!