The trouble with photographing Etsy shop items...

...is that I don't always have a good model. For something like the quilts, I can rope in Mom or the backyard playground. But for baby headbands, I can't use either, so I use a TV tray. It works, but it's not as good for showing how the headband can be worn. I'd borrow a kid from church of my cousin's kids, but either they're too old or too far away. (Sara would probably gladly lend me her baby for a while...But I don't want to travel across the state and into another one for a five minute photograph session. It doesn't quite make sense.) So I'll keep using the TV tray until I find a baby the right age to borrow (and a parent willing to lend the kid).

the playground modeling the Creatures and Critters quilt

Mom modeling the raggedy flower quilt

the TV tray modeling the pink baby headband

Sewing, Knitting, Arane, and Rabbits

I finished Megan's quilt a while ago. It didn't take long to do, which is good because I finished it about five days before the shower.

Also, during the first lawn-mowing of the year, that little bunny hid in our garage. He ran in there when Dad opened the door. (Another one was hiding in a corner next to the house.) The rabbit stayed there for about five hours and was soooooo scared. His nose wasn't even moving for a while. (I'm glad he hid because splattered bunny isn't at all pleasant.)

I also translated today two sentences from Greek into English without looking up anything.

And Arane is learning about colors and things like that. (Lizzie does it by making piles of things in the same color. Like a pile of yellow stuff or a pile of orange stuff.) She (Arane; Lizzie's too big to play this) also plays with her baby doll and treats it like Lizzie and Justin treat Arane. (Like tucking her in and holding her.)

And Dad's quilt from last Christmas is almost done. I just need to put on the binding. (He did get it at Christmas, but it wasn't nearly finished.)

Here are the first two blocks of this quilt-a-long.

That one on the left took FOREVER. There was a ton of wailing and gnashing of teeth. But now I don't like the fabrics anymore. It's too busy. So I'm going to keep these, but find different fabric.

And I made a shawl in time for 80-degree weather. (Mom's holding it up.) Aunt Susan gave me the yarn and I made up the pattern. It's reaaaaally big and warm.

Also, I finally have all of the fabric for Lizzie's quilt. It's going to be a tumbler quilt in mostly-brown and some blue. All that I need now before starting is the template (from here).

(I also got these two packs of fabric while ordering the template. Because I'm tired of doing flowers and butterflies and pinkness in quilts. Sometimes I need a dump truck and kites and stuff like that. And those are the first precut fabric I've ever gotten other than individual fat-quarters. Which doesn't really count because they weren't in a bundle.) 

Knitting

There's no way I'll get all these knitting projects done. I'll try, but it'll fail. Who can knit a scarf and two hats before Christmas?

But, Mom and Dad are knitting things for Uncle Peter and Aunt Dawn. They're trying a new pattern:

Cast on an un-even amount of stitches (they used 27).
Knit a row.
Now do a ribbing stitch: Knit one stitch, purl one stitch, knit one stitch, purl one stich to the end of the row.
Knit a row.
Now do the ribbing stitch again: Knit one stich, purl one stich, knit one stich, purl one stich to the end of the row.
Repeat until you're almost out of yarn (keep enough to bind off on).
Bind off.

It's really easy. Even Mom can do it, and she hasn't been knitting very long.

Ruth, your scarf is going to come along on the Christmas trip to Missury--er--Missouri, I mean. It'll get finished....Sometime. Don't worry!

Writing, Knitting, and A Truly Amazing Book

First, I want to post this link. http://www.wingsoffireseries.blogspot.com/ My freind, Ruth, made that blog about a book series that she and another freind (Nina) are writing. Nina didn't know about it, but likes the idea. Please follow that blog!!

I've been writing pretty much anything lately. Not much journaling, but a lot of editing. I really should work on my bits in the sci-fi, finish planning my NaNo novel, and finish editing my book for a contest. And I'm only awake for 10 hours each day! It's almost IMPOSSIBLE to knit, do school, do that much writing, and accualy talk to people in ten hours. At least, for me it's hard.

I went to a writing confrence on Tuesday at the library. I LOVED IT!!!! The lady was really nice and really knew what she was saying. Even better, she was talking about publishing, which was just plain awsome.

I'm almost finished knitting my sweater. I'm working on the sleeves. I've finished Chris's scarf, started on Uncle Mike's hat (he likes hunting, so it's basil green and he can where it when hunting), need to start on Ruth's scarf, and finish Lizzie's scarf.

(A yell-out to Ruth: Mom and I are going to get the yarn for the scarf today. I'll start knitting soon! And hopefully get it to you before Christmas.)

Sewing, knitting, writing.

(Finaly managed to remember to make a post about crafts.)

Mom and I are making a quilt for my bed. It's just going to be made out of 6" squares (I wanted to do one foot squares, but Mom said it'd look to big for a twin bed), sewn together with 1/4" seam allowence. We're using an old matress pad (from the bunkbed) for the batting and a old sheet for the back. And bits of cloth left over. We're being misers, but the quilt will probebly be MUCH cheaper than a store bought one, and will last longer. When it's finished, my old one (a purple, green, blue, yellow, and white thing) is going into me hopechest along with the big quilt that used to go on the bottom bunk of the bunk bed of the same colors.

Mom's (so far) made one winter skirt this year. She's been making me skirts, since the ones in the store are so SKIMPY! Finding a modest dress is annoying, too, so mabye I can make a 40's one. You can't get much more modest then that, even though there was cloth shortages then (all on account of the Germans, too).

I'm knitting three scarves right now. One for my cousin Chris, my cousin Matt, and (by request) one for Lizzie, who has already got one. She even bought the yarn! Oh, and one for myself. I don't have a scarf right now.

I'm going to knitt a hat for Matt's wife (Megan), a hat for Dad, a hat for Uncle Mike, and a hat for Brian (another cousin).

Mom is also getting something, but I won't tell what it is since she reads the posts before they're posted.

I'm making a pair of legwarmers for my cousin Kelsey. She's a dancer, too, and so legwarms made sense. She wanted SOMETHING and scarves and hats can get kinda boring after a while.

I got a knitting book with something like 63 easy patterns. One of the patterns is socks WITHOUT heels, so those look easy enough to knitt.

This is a good post on a blog that Dad and Mom read. http://www.geneveith.com/recognizing-bad-writing/_3338/comment-page-1/#comment-68232