Tag Archives: wool

December 9, 2015 · 1:00 AM

Ending the fling

After digging through the woolens recently and finding the sweater to de-turtle, I also came across an old pair of gloves I’ve had for more than twenty years.

I can’t remember where I got them, or if they were a gift…

They could have come from a shop that also sold crystals and incense. They could have come from a festival with a South American flute band playing nearby. They could have come off of a table in an urban sidewalk market.

I think I had them in college. I might have had them earlier.

My only clear memory of them was when I wore them frequently in a hospital when I was selling my body for science to pay off student loans. The techs would poke and prod and then wheel me to other wings and other floors through freezing corridors, and by the time I arrived to be further poked and prodded, my veins would have shriveled and buried themselves deep into my bones. So the gloves helped keep my blood circulating and earned me the nickname “muppet hands” with the staff.

They’re at least partly wool, but likely not all. They’re hand knit but in a loose-ish gauge, the ends weren’t woven in, and the knots were poorly done and poking through. They aren’t as warm as they look unless my hands are also in my pockets or I’m wearing glove liners because the wind goes right through them. But worst of all, they’re floppy – a quick flip of the hand and they go flying – rude gestures aren’t as effective with the comedy of flinging tendencies.

But I haven’t gotten rid of them, though they’ve spent more time in the charity box than not.

Every autumn I think I need gloves and mittens and pledge to knit some. But every year I discover that I still have several pairs of insulated leather ones from my days of wearing professional-ish attire, a few random pairs old or quirky, and ones appropriate for frosty outdoor activities. But I always blank for a moment when I’m running out the door to do something errand-like, and my fingerless mitts (of which I have many) just won’t cut it and I don’t care if anything is coordinated or looks particularly decent.

Growing up, our family had semi-communal boxes of hats and gloves/mittens. Of course everyone claimed favorites, but if you needed something in a pinch, you could just grab something from the box and be on your way (unless you had to search for the second half of a pair). I’ve been thinking we need this sort of arrangement even though we’re just two, but it comes in handy for guests too. These gloves would be perfect for such a box – large enough to fit nearly anyone, and not so precious or specific that if they’re lost, it’s not a loss to be mourned.

But the flop and fling wasn’t going to work for anyone, so I got out some charcoal worsted, picked up about half the stitches, and knit some k1, p1 cuffs. I also poked in all of the knots and ends (though I’m sure they won’t stay in for long) and gave the pair a nice long bath.

And now they’re functional, albeit with a baggy lower palm, but their fling is finally over.

I have another pair of mittens that have a similar issue, but I think I’ll try sewing some elastic in those…

I’m also thinking we need a couple more loose-fitting, but warm hats for the box too…

Necking

I like a GIANT squishy cowl neck.

I like scarves wound round and round and round my neck.

But I hate turtlenecks.

Even though they pop back in and out of style, I generally view them as always out – and smelling of elementary schools in the 70s and overly religious Midwestern mothers who dress decades beyond their age. But mostly I don’t like the feeling of my neck being oh-so-slightly constricted.

I’ve de-turtled a few necks over the years.

(This one also got de-epauleted and de-shoulder padded, and de-gold buttoned – then I sewed the epaulets into the fake pocket to make a whimsical detail of sorts.)

Very often, there is a convenient seam running up the side of the neck that merely needs to be unzipped or picked and voila! A constricting turtle becomes a floppy…

manta ray? collar.

I’ve been going through my bins of thrifted sweaters to see what should be cut up into mittens and such, unraveled, or mended enough to wear…

And I found this horribly weird pinkish, orchid? one that fits really well and lies on the “professionally” appropriate side of the fine line that it skates with comfortably slouchy – partly because it’s actually a decent length on me and many thrifted cashmeres fall a bit too short.

But even after the turtlectomey, I’m debating about tossing it into the to dye pile, but I run the risk of loosing the good length… and though I think I hate the color, I think I can wear it without looking ill, and it goes well enough with browns or greys…

(I’d probably dye it yellow to turn it orange, or go the burgundy or brown route…)

Turtles are also often the easiest part of a sweater to frog since they’re often knitted in rib stitch and don’t felt/full as much as the body. I’ve had several moth-eaten thrifts that were too holey or felted to frog as a whole, but still gave up good bits of usable yarn from frogged necks and cuffs.

Or merely extracted, they make good headbands or hat brims…

And once in awhile, a decent cowl will get detached too – most often from my own sweaters that have generally ceased to function as intended.

And it can remain cowly, just no longer attached to a body…

This was actually a favorite sweater of mine for about 10 years, so I’m happy to save part of it now that it is done being part of my wardrobe due to damage and too tight sleeves that always annoyed me but now are entirely unacceptable after the home reno and summer of gardening (big guns don’t play well with sheer skinny mohair). And I’ll attempt to frog the rest even though I swore off frogging mohair – if it works, I might knit more rounds onto the cowl to make it GIANT.

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Filed under collecting, dyeing, knitting, recycling, sewing, thrifting

Tagged as cashmere sweaters, frogging, green, knitting, mohair, orchid, re-fashion, re-use, sewing, thrift store sweaters, thrifting, thriftscore, turtleneck sweaters, turtlenecks, unraveling, wool

October 21, 2015 · 3:00 AM

Vested, or not my b[v]est

Once again I got to contemplating my frumpy vest.*

I thought I fixed it enough to be happy enough wearing it at the time of that last post. I had added more length, replaced the buttons, and I thought I re-knit the shoulder edging with fewer stitches or smaller needles, but I’m guessing I just gave it a good block. But after unpacking it from summer storage (from a few summers ago, actually) it had reverted back to its stupidly pointy shoulders.

This is not acceptable.

It would be almost okay if the vest was wide and boxy and I wore it open to just hang there and flop around, but I figured something so rustic should be more fitted to take down the frump factor a bit.

Only now it seemed a bit too fitted in other parts too – the buttons at the bust gaped a bit.

So once I again, I set out to modify it.

I had so little yarn left after making it the first time around, I was hesitant to just frog the whole thing and start over again. I’m still not crazy about vests, but this was the perfect amount of handspun yarn for one. The yarn matches my bike too, but there is too much of it that even if I pimped out the seat and handle bars and other things I’d still have an even more awkward amount left over. And I don’t want pillows or bags out of it, and it’s too rough for next to skin wear, so hats and scarves are out…

So I tried yet again to make it work.

I ripped out the garter armhole edging, opened up the side seams and added a little triangle at the pit for more bust ease, and reknit the armhole with an applied icord.

That worked out to be the perfect solution – much better fit with no pointy stuff on the shoulders.

And I discovered I can wear it over my orange hoodie if I’m invited to march in the garish parade.

But if I wear it open as more of an outerwear thing, it should have a pocket. I won’t go into the rationalization except I think of fitted things having a degree of implied misery, and open things comfort and convenience and of course, that means having a “snot pocket” – someplace big enough to store a hankie for my ever dripping nose once it falls below 70 degrees.

I think I have just enough yarn leftover for that…

*The color is most accurate in the old post – the thing is a bit more subdued and overall burgundy-ish in real life.

Things with wings…

No, this isn’t about sewing menstrual pads…

I like autumn, but mourn the disappearance of my favorite winged summer things like crickets and cicadas and especially katydids and dragonflies and bats and butterflies and even the giant random things that show up on the window screens…

I’m still unpacking things from the basement boxes – I’m sure I’ll be continuing to do that into the new year…

And I found my old monarch butterfly Halloween costume.

My mother made it out of out black felt and oil paint, and I wore it with a black leotard, black tights, and black ballet shoes (after I quit ballet classes the first time). And I had a black velvet headband with black pipe cleaner antennae bent into curlicues that would flop down and poke me in the eye.

It was my best costume (much better than my gladiator made of a pillowcase tunic and tinfoil over a plastic baseball helmet and cardboard shield) and I’m glad I kept it – the wings, that is, the rest is thankfully long gone.

But I’m conflicted about keeping another winged thing…

It’s an Iceland sweater from Rowan 42.

I bought the magazine because of it, even though it scared me with all of its cables and lace – I knew it would be a large commitment for me. Then a friend whipped one up and told me that it was actually quite easy and she thought I’d like it for the coziness factor.

So feeling more confident about the whole thing, I cranked it out relatively fast for me over the first winter when N took a job out of state and I had plenty of time to concentrate and a large public library’s worth of nature program DVDs.

But when I finished, I didn’t love it on me…

Because of the goddamn wings.

But that’s the whole point of it right?

But they catch on or in door handles, hand rails, car doors, house doors, desk drawers; and dip themselves into soups, coffees, cereals, dish soap suds, the compost bowl; and drag themselves through eraser crumbs, dryer lint, almond butter on a slice of toast; and scatter my notes to self…

And if that weren’t irritating enough, it sits on me funny – lists downward from side to side, or hitches up into its own muffin top.

I even had the perfect vintage buttons (and the perfect amount, which is entirely rare) in my stash to complete it…

The yarn I used, Lamb’s Pride Bulky, has drape, but it’s dense – I should have gone up a needle size or two or used something lighter, and I made the waist ribbing less bulky than the pattern, but those are the least of its faults…

But I’ve only worn it… twice?

So do I frog, or do I find someone in need of warmth who does not mind being a winged creature?

Or do I hang onto it as a testament that I once knitted a giant warm garment during a cold time?

I love the leaf pattern though – if I frog, I might just have enough yarn along with a few leftover skeins to make a nice throw blanket in the pattern…

2 Comments

Filed under collecting, knitting

Tagged as autumn, brown, dragonfly, fall, halloween costumes, horsefly, iceland sweater, knitting, lamb's pride, monarch butterflies, rowan pattern, to frog or not to frog, winged creatures, wings, wool, yarn

September 23, 2015 · 1:59 AM

Beat it, beetles!

All wool aficionados know to fear the moth.

But do you also fear the Carpet Beetle?

When we first moved into the house, though I cleaned it well, the cracks in the floorboards and between the window woodwork still harbored who knows what. The bedroom was about halfway down the lists of rooms to tackle, so a few months went by with it being clean, but not the deep-clean blasting that comes with major home improvement. I innocently left a wicker laundry basket on the floor and tossed in my favorite (and expensive) merino wool underwear. Since I only do full loads of laundry, the laundry basket remained undisturbed but slowly filling until a week or so later when hanging all the freshly laundered things up to dry, I found serious, nauseating damage.

I thought the new-to-us washing machine tore them up, but that was impossible because it doesn’t have an agitator.

I thought a mouse chewed them up so I set out my sick but humane and effective electrocuting trap, but didn’t catch anyone.

Then I realized I’d seen a few dead beetle bodies on the windowsills when we first moved in…

…beetles that turned out to be of the dermestid variety – yep, corpse as well as all kinds of protein eaters, apparently very common in the area. (I haven’t encountered them before so perhaps the colder winters and higher elevation of my old city kept them at bay? Or else I was just lucky, or maybe they prefer semi-rural to urban areas…). So preventing them and their evil wool/fur/hair/silk massacres is similar to keeping out and dealing with moths – after cleaning the hell outta the place and sanding and re-finishing all the window woodwork and floors (and all the vacuuming that entails) and partially dismantling and thoroughly cleaning the radiators and painting all the walls and ceilings I thought I’d kicked any beetle left in the house to the curb, and I’m pretty sure I did then but…

A knitting project I haven’t touched since the spring threw my cavalier attitude out the window.

Luckily, it seemed to have only hit one yarn cake seen at the top of the post and not the project itself, but I really dogged a bullet because I did everything wrong: I left the project and yarn exposed in a loosely woven basket on a table a few inches beside a window with several flowering shrubs just beneath it outside, I occasionally put said basket on the floor underneath the window when it was in the way, I never plunked the whole thing in another kind of enclosure, plastic bag, etc., while it sat for months, I never tossed in a lavender sachet or anything odoriferous for masking purposes, and most importantly, I didn’t check on it.

(And ahem, note to dumbass self: naturally dyed yarn often fades when you put it in direct sunlight… this is supposed to be yellow-green, but the exposed section lost its green and the best of the yellow.)

So I shouldn’t have been surprised to find the damage when I finally picked up the project again in September. But I am lucky this time – the damage is minimal and even the faded cake was mostly okay after a few yards, though I’m going to have to be very careful with the final sweater which I’m not too happy about – the lovely woad-dyed blue is very colorfast but this other stuff I’m adding in as stripes sucks… And the rest of my projects and stash are fine – unlike this WIP, I keep everything else in at least one, if not more, tightly sealed containers.

Treating for carpet beetles is the same for moths – clean the hell out of the area – then empty and wash out the filter and dust chamber of the vacuum immediately. Take anything suspected of being infested outside and shake it well – undo and re-skein it loosely, then seal up in plastic bags and freeze for a couple of weeks. Let thaw for a week and refreeze (this freeze/thaw cycle kills moth eggs and might be a bit more than necessary for carpet beetles – I think one freeze might be enough, but overkill won’t hurt anything). Then wash it all especially if moths were your munchers – moths are very messy with their webbing and copious poop, but beetles generally make clean breaks and sometimes leave bits of body behind.

(And I always leave thrifted woolens in the trunk of a hot car or outside in freezing temps for a bit before I can wash them immediately).

One of the few things that we didn’t have to fix on our house was the windows – all had been replaced in 2007. They aren’t the top-of-the-line by any means, but they aren’t the worst either (yes, there are “better” and worse vinyl options) so it was one of the few home improvement things I was happy to not have to worry about immediately. But the screens are only for half of the window. When we replaced the windows in our old house, we got the full screens (and also put in window boxes which made it nearly impossible to water them or use air conditioners while still having the top part screened to prevents bats in the bedroom – yes, I know about this from experience). And though the half screens better accommodate our new need for air conditioners, they have a maddening gap where they don’t quite meet up with the window that lets in both flying and crawling things which I hadn’t realized…

…plugging or sealing up this gap will now be a project at the top of my list… or else full-sized screen shopping?

Oh, and never use mothballs and pesticides – those do more damage than the crawly/flying fucks themselves – prevent them and then you don’t have to deal with them.

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Filed under home, knitting

Tagged as carpet beetles, damage to wool, dermestid beetles, fading natural dye, pesticide-free, pests, protect your wool, wool

September 16, 2015 · 1:00 AM

Ghosts in the garden, sheep at the fair

Last week saw a day over 100 degrees Fahrenheit here… And it hadn’t rained in nearly a month.

The lawn, which is mostly weeds, was mostly dead, the rain barrels were empty, the well getting low, and my seedling hopes for some fall crops were scorched and disintegrated…

Except for a bit of greens and radishes we managed to save with a pack of very cheap, unused sheer big Swedish store curtains that worked as excellent covers. I love it when having something too late to return and not yet dropped off at the thrift store pays off well – a nice satisfaction and justification for my mild hording habit…

They still catch my eye at dusk – something phantasmagorical hugging the ground as the bats begin to fly about, but hopefully we’ll still be eating our own fresh things until the frost or just a bit after. The tomatoes are soldiering on despite some still lingering pests and diseases, and it’s finally the time for some of the ugliest but tastiest heirlooms.

And our tiny and woefully inadequate parsley plants attracted some munchers I don’t mind. I’m pretty sure they’re Eastern Black Swallowtail caterpillars, which are quite common around here, but slightly odd since I saw a kaleidoscope of Tiger Swallowtails in the yard this summer instead. I was tempted to mess with mother nature and bring them in to save them from hungry birds and watch them transform, but I don’t know what they do at this time of year – turn quickly, or sleep it out over the winter? I’d hate for someone to hatch in the basement in January and die, so I left them be and they ate every last bit of our parsley and took off (or got chomped). I’d hoped that they would do their pupating thing close by so I could watch and also make sure we don’t mow or turn them under, but they didn’t leave a forwarding address…

So with all of this scorching weather, the last thing on my mind was that it is officially wool festival season around these parts – I had no idea on that 100+ day that in less than a week, I’d be trying not to buy much of anything soft and lovely and watching wooly things on parade… but luckily I saw (and paid attention to) one of those low roadside signs (typically advertising cheap king mattress sets, or sadly fighting against a proposed pipeline) for the Garden State Sheep Breeders festival just in time.

The day was overcast and becoming cool – the same seasonally-appropriate weather as the festival in years past. I bought just a tiny bit of roving, though there were more than a few tiny things I’d have liked to buy, especially since I most enjoy meeting the beast (or at least seeing a picture) whom I’ll be spinning or knitting. I get more than a bit turned off at the overtly religious [sheep] breeders though – I don’t want to give someone money who might then use it to support someone or something I don’t. But I guess I prefer being an informed consumer rather than an ignorant one, so jesus fish and bible quotes on your sheep signs are an effective deterrent – I get that whole shepherd reference, but it’s so damn tiresome…

I spent more time watching the sheepdog demonstrations this year, and missed out on the lamb barbecue sandwich because I ran out of cash – always feel a little funny eating those around their living comrades and kin though…

These last few days have bright and cool, following a few inches of delicious rain – nothing like the inferno last week. I am once again awakened before dawn by the neighs and purrs of screech owls from the finally opened windows.

But I don’t want to jinx it – the air conditioners will stay in place for at least another month…

3 Comments

Filed under collecting, gardening, home, knitting

Tagged as caterpillars, changing seasons, dusk, Eastern Black Swallowtail, fall, gardens, hot weather, jacob sheep, New Jersey Sheep Breeders, NJ wool festival, organic gardening, sheep dog, wool, wool festivals

September 9, 2015 · 6:00 AM

Bite this three times

I finished my Trilobite hat.

I haven’t left the fence I’m on about it though – I still think the top portion is a bit small, and it’s definitely a hair-smasher – but I will have to wait for winter to see if howling winds will still reach my ears through the doubled brim, and if more frequent wear will relax the superwash yarn a bit more (it’s a lovely variegated teal, despite what these pics might show, from the now defunct Schaefer Yarn Co.).

I have enough coldish weather hats, so in order for this to continue to survive as-is, it must work as a freezing weather hat.

Before finishing the brim, I soaked the top part to see if a good block would loosen it up – I had the perfect hat-shaped bowl to use so I didn’t have to take it off the needles – and then a ridiculously hot afternoon dried the whole shebang in a few hours, so I was able to resume knitting that night – and the soak relaxed it a bit, but not quite as much as I’d hoped…

But the thing that most bothers me about the hat is that the trilobites don’t look like my trilobites. I could ramble on about idyllic afternoons of my childhood spent scouring the creek behind our house for fossils, but not today.

But the ultimate fossil-hunting prize was a triolobite – most often rolly-polly stand alone little guys.

They’ve got this smug lippy carp-like expression going on, and their backs have three wide stripy bands – or you know, lobes – what they’re named for after all…

I tried to figure out the order of these vs. the clearly different order for which the pattern was written, but I got frustrated, then distracted…

But if I do end up re-knitting it for a better fit, I’ll make the center lobe much fatter somehow to look more like my guys.

(Taking picture of one’s own head when too lazy to get out the tripod or too impatient to wait until others return home, results in an increase of time wasted due to editing out 10x more image failures more often than not…

And when will I figure out the camera settings, or the editing, to render accurate color…?)

4 Comments

Filed under collecting, knitting

Tagged as fossils, free pattern, hat, knitting, knitty, superwash, teal, trilobite, winter hats, wool

August 26, 2015 · 6:00 AM

Summer craft

We’re unpacking boxes again. Some of mine haven’t been unpacked since a very sudden move in 2008, and a few from my childhood home decades ago that were only opened to toss more things in rather than weed and remove.

I found a whiskey box with a great wad of crafty jewelry that dated c. 1980-1991. It was a time of equal-opportunity counter culture decor for me – vintage hippie beads, new age crystals, punk rock chains and pins, beads representing bleeding-heart worldliness from Africa and South America, and crafty bits from midwestern 4-H camp.

I remember making most of these things in the summertime – embroidery floss taped to my knee while I sat in the hammock or under a tree – or else they were worn more in the summer with their nautical vibe (and my winter clothes tended more goth and grunge and gender-bending…)

I made possibly hundreds of these things and gave away many. This was also before the overpopulation of Jesusfish due to global warming melting out the rightwingedchristiandom crazies, so some of these are patterned with fish just for fishsake…

And I remember trading these beaded safety pins in elementary school – the bead colors meant something, but I’ve since forgotten (and this was before gay rainbows too, but yay for gay rainbows)!

I had a bead loom – up until recently, I think – I think I gave it to one of my siblings before the last few moves…

And I’d like to think I was one of the “cool” camp counselors, evidenced by these gifts from my campers. Plaid Maggot was the secret real name of our two-year award winning (of the camp talent show) jugband whose real name was something gentle and new age and asinine like Lunar Rhythms or Earthstrokes…

(I think another counselor reported me for my non-censoring leatherwork class, but secreting these quickly away and playing dumb actually worked out for all involved that time…)

I feel like I didn’t take full advantage of summertime crafting this year. I most like sitting outside to unravel sweaters or card wool so the sneezy bits fall on the ground rather than the rug.

But I only got in a couple of unwinding sessions so far…

But there are still a few months to go before the nasty white fluffy stuff comes back, right…?

7 Comments

Filed under collecting, recycling, weaving

Tagged as 1980s, beading, beads, camp, cicadas, embroidery floss, friendship bracelets, leatherwork, merino, nostalgia, recycled sweater yarn, unraveling, wool

July 8, 2015 · 6:00 AM

Fancy feets

It’s been several months since I had an actual sock on the needles.

I’m working on a simple sock yarn cardigan that was small enough to be travel knitting for a time, but has since outgrown my everyday bag and will probably take me years to finish…

N treated me to a fancy feast in NYC for my birthday last month and I finally began a new sock on the train home. (I went up earlier in the day for a work thing and wisely tucked the yarn into my bag in case there was a gap in the work moments – I don’t normally bring yarn to dinner).

This is my last ball of 6-ply sock yarn and I’m a bit sad about that – I still have plenty of sock yarn in my stash, but hands down, I like the thicker stuff much better (even though I’m not crazy about these colors, but at least green is involved) and I’m still on the longest non-buying spree of my yarn life (except for that stupid neon stuff) that I hope to stretch into next year, or hell, maybe even the following, or the one after that too…

But only a day after I committed those words to the screen, I caved and ordered two more balls (on the cheap, of course).

Balls usually come in pairs, right?

(Well, I guess not in the ball sports, but I’m not much of a sports fan.)

But this really isn’t about stash-building, it’s more like a work-in-progress waiting in the wings, and I know my trusted pattern* works for me, and I gave the other pair I made earlier this year away, so my conscious is clear.

I also got some absurdly teeny 9″ US0 size circulars to try out on the rest of my sock yarn stash – I like knitting and wearing the thicker yarn (though I also like wearing thin wool socks in the warmer months, but commercially-made thinness – an impossible weight for me to knit) so I’m not holding my breath that I’ll fall in love with knitting and wearing the light fingering weight yarn, but I do love a repetitive round and round and round and round and round on circulars, so who knows… But I knit a little tighter on circulars than dpns, so I won’t be too keen if that skews my stitch numbers too much. And not to mention I’ve got big paws and these are sized for child labor or the dainty bird-like lady…

If these don’t work out, the rest of the skinny stash (held double, of course, or maybe triple…) is probably destined to become a throw blanket…

*My favorite/trusty sock is 64 stitches of the light sport-weight yarn on US2 dpns (got a high instep) with provisional cast on from ankle down, a slipped stitch heel flap, reducing 4 stitches on the foot, then picked up and knit ankle up. After one ankle/foot is done, I make the other on another set of dpns. Then I wind the yarn into a center-pull ball if it isn’t already and take turns knitting each cuff up from each end of yarn, so it’s sorta two at a time and no leftover yarn.

And I still haven’t settled on how many stitches I need when dropping down to US1 or US0 needles…

For the sake of keeping notes, I’m thinking the following might work for me:

US2 – 64 sts

US1.5 – 68 sts

US1 – 72 sts

US0 – 80 sts

But 80 stitches is 20% more sock that I usually make, so that doesn’t sound too promising…

3 Comments

Filed under collecting, knitting

Tagged as big hands, circular needles, feet, fingering weight, online supersocke, sock knitting, sock yarn, superwash, wool

March 25, 2015 · 6:00 AM

More things that aren’t what I thought they were or what they started out to be…

I seem to be on an uneasy roll wherein I can no longer trust anything…

Including the season…

Clouds of grackles and redwing blackbirds have been stopping over in the yard, and the hyacinths began to pop up – it’s been grey but warming.

Then more of this – more than I thought was coming (but it didn’t last long).

We’ve been talking about dressing more safely/noticeably when walking on the road to a little trail head nearby and considered buying some of those neon vests construction workers and police officers wear, but then I saw a bag of neon yarn at the big box and thought I could whip up some sort of vest/cowl/bib thing that could be more fabulous than the plastic vest.

Only it turned out to be mesh yarn… So I can make scruffly safety boas instead?

And I ordered what I hoped was the last bit of fabric for curtains for the near future and on impulse added a few yards of a lovely colored plaid flannel to my “cart.” I’d been thinking about making some loose tunic-like shirts in plaid… Only it ended up being this incredibly thick, luscious stuff without the drape of cheapass flannel… What now? PJ bottoms, pillow cases…? Or do I need to sew an actual shirt that fits well and has buttonholes? I don’t feel like paying that much attention to detail now, but this stuff deserves something nice.

I like berets – I have thin hair and berets don’t smash the top front down, so I whipped up a Selbu Modern because it is called a beret. But in the pattern pictures it looks like a floppy hat – whatever those are called – floppy berets? The kind of hat good for dreadlocks or stuffing thick hair? But it looked like some people blocked theirs to look more like a tam sort of beret. But no, even after some intense blocking mine is floppy… it’s fine, I like floppy hats, but I already have enough hair-smashing hats, and still need another that isn’t – especially this time of year.

So I turned to some predictable projects. I picked up this sad little shelf/nightstand/table thing at a thriftstore recently. It had a terrible hack plywood shelf and a crackled paint that may have been intentional, or may have been the result of a fire, or may be evidence of something evil and toxic and brain-robbing. But I love old stuff. And I love that it was $7.00. And I love small light furniture that is still wood and yet it takes little effort to move around.

So I stripped and stripped and stripped (the furniture) and took out the crap shelf, debated about putting in a better one but didn’t, and painted the whole shebang.

I’m still not sure where it’s going to go, and the aqua works in some rooms and not others (I just mixed up some old sample paints) but I’m happy with it – and happy to feel a bit less off-kilter again.

For now, it’s here.

Can you spot the other thing with the Selbu Modern pattern?

Tag Archives: wool

Ending the fling

Necking

Vested, or not my b[v]est

Things with wings…

Beat it, beetles!

Ghosts in the garden, sheep at the fair

Bite this three times

Summer craft

Fancy feets

More things that aren’t what I thought they were or what they started out to be…

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