Swiffer cover. Sigh.

Today I am knitting a "Swiffer" cover. Is that the most lame thing ever? Super useful, though. Sigh. The pattern is actually looking very clever for dust attraction. The cobweb catcher would be good too, but my crocheting is weak--I only make square-ish things. I may even sew some doorstopper "snake" thingies this week. Double sigh. Well, it's freezing here!

I have also started the mid-January cable dishcloth. Yes, I know tomorrow is February. It's okay, I have 2 sets of size 7 needles, so I'll finish it fast while February's first pattern is eeked out and then go back for the January snowflake.

I am pleased to present progress on my Brazilian WISP (work in slow progress.) It was in non-progress forever, now it's in pretty-fast progress, so it's an averaged WISP. This pattern I notice is called "Dorothy's Denim," but as I'm not doing it on denim... whatever. The autumn one's official name is "Mary K.'s Chrysanthemum." The leaves on the tallest stalks of this one here are giving me trouble. They were supposed to be buttonhole on each side of that narrow little leaf, but that was looking bumpy, not silky, so I tried buttonhole across the whole leaf. Well, that needed a stem stich border up the open side and, presto, they look like leaves chopped in half. Okay. I am hoping with a little tweaking I can make them look like mostly-folded leaves.

Today Barbie is raiding Ken's closet. Here is his favorite sweater (knit with self-striping sock yarn.) He has a hat to go with this somewhere. He looks pretty hip in the hat, but I guess he's being macho without it in this sub-zero weather.

Was accepted into the Yahoo! Brazilian Embroidery Group today. Had forgotten about that. Okay, no more groups. Dishcloths, Brazilian and TAST (unofficially) online and the cross-stitch thing in real life. I have to remember my job, my husband, my daughter, my house... where I am supposedly hosting a Super Bowl party Sunday... Is there a group for cleaning the house? Yep, and I belong to it. Flylady.

Dishcloth Knit-A-Long

Last night I joined a dishcloth knit-a-long group. When I found it, I laughed out loud. I knitted like 14 dishcloths for Christmas gifts this year! My favorite pattern was this "woven" one. So, watch out friends, the season of the dishcloth has been extended! The group knits 2 a month: one seasonal theme one and one pattern each month.

From Barbie's closet: The Swan Lake tutu, a variation of the Firebird tutu Summer 2006 edition DanceCamp tutu.

Cross Stitch Sampler

I have joined a "Stitch-Along Sampler" group at Village Needlework. I can't come to the Brazilian group on Monday nights, so I found a group on Monday afternoons. They do cross stitch, so I guess I am going to do a cross stitch sampler. It's a really charming alphabet pattern from Heart in Hand. Cross stitch has never particularly appealed to me, becuase it's all little "x"s over and over, right? We'll see. Maybe it's zen. An alphabet sampler does appeal to me because my mother has one framed that was my great-grandmother's. This one I think has already claimed a future spot in my kitchen, unlike most of my projects which remain dismally homeless.

From Barbie's closet: I sent my daughter (the Barbie owner) to go grab something that I had knitted for Barbie and this is what she brought--right off the closest Barbie. I think it was a pattern from barbiebasics where I first explored knits for Barbie. I don't see any free patterns there anymore, but they are for sale. Most are both stylish and simple patterns; a good starting place before moving on to Epstein and/or designing your own patterns. I remember this dress seeming to take forever! I could whip it up so quickly now.

If the dress is not exciting enough for you, Barbie has big news! I am designing her an "Extreme Makeover Home Edition." This is the basic idea. Did I say basic? Well, maybe not, but this will be lots of fun. I have the pattern pieces all mapped out to cut out of plywood (my dad will do that for me) and then I slap it together with some glue and brads. Then I get to decorate it! Curtains, rugs, wall hangings, wallpaper, carpets... !

Barbie's Sterilite Box

Here are several pieces from Barbie's closet.

First, I found the crocheted tote (Epstein) to go with the dress from yesterday. Barbie's clothes are not actually in a closet (gasp) but in a large Sterilite box in my daughter's room, which is chock full of everything Barbie. I have had this tote in prgress for myself in a really thick grey for a year or so. I just don't need more bags, so it has fallen by the wayside, cute as it is.

Here are a few others I dug out today:

A pink and white ski sweater & hat (Epstein); pants to match not shown.

One of my first from Epstein a couple of years ago--the Valentine sweater--which Barbie should be digging out herself soon. This one is starting to show that it has been loved.

My first tutu; still one of my favorites. The carry-along yarn added just the perfect stiffness. It was also knit flat, seamed and fitted with with snaps for really great lines.

And a recent tutu for a friend's daughter. I knit them in the round now, once I figured out they fit over the head fine. It works better for little hands and there are no choking hazards.

Crocheting for Barbie?

There were a few things in Epstein's Crocheting for Barbie book that looked intriguing that couldn't be done by knitting. So last year I taught myself to (gack!) crochet. Here is one example of Barbie's retro crochet couture. I am not a very good crochet-er. I throw the yarn/thread around the hook instead of picking it up (which I could stand to learn in knitting as well) and I pull the yarn up the hook so the stitches do not reflect the size of the tip of the hook, totally messing with gauge. Anyway, a couple of good results.

Back to Work

Back to the dance studio has been all right. I thought I might feel overwhelmed to jump from 0 to 25 hours in "one swell foop" as my MFA advisor used to say. But, it just feels like old times. This week back we had the extra break of measuring all the dancers and the extra fun of introducing the dances they will learn for the end of term concert. I am pleased with the fledgling choreography I have introduced--the dances are developing their own themes and they are not echoing old ideas as far as I can recognize.

Here is the finished autumn Brazilian. Never sure what to do with the things I've finished. Framing is hideous expensive. I finally got an vintage dance poster replica matted and transplanted in an old frame for the bathroom this week and that was expensive enough!

Next I will likely finish this piece from a Brazilian class a while ago. It was designed to go across the upper back of a denim shirt, but I don't wear denim shirts. I am a very monochromatic and unembellished dresser. Wearing too much color or pattern freaks me out. Not useful for an embroiderer, knitter, etc. So I don't know what I am going to do with this piece either.

From Barbie's closet today is a summer-squash-multicolor seed stitch sweater and coordinating skirt perfect for warding off the early fall chill.

Barbie's Closet

JDR Brazilian website is back up, so now I can forward you to the designs by dorothy-platt. The nine-patch flowers sampler and the autumn chrysanthemums are her patterns. I don't see the autumn one and its companions on this list, so I'll have to go thru other channels to get the rest. Here it is as far as I can go today. I ran out of Iris thread for the last wheat stalk--aren't they adorable?

Also figured out how to create a link to inaminuteago in case I ever have anything to add to TAST. Hey, remember my back-and-forth buttonhole? Turns out it is actually Cretan stitch. Why aren't they related in the stitch dictionary? And feather stitch is related?! Wow, I'm new to all this, but my block is going like crazy with all kinds of buttonhole and herringbone (and the one running bullion I couldn't resist) so TAST is working for me. I can't decide about the bigger lazy daisy flower. I put it there to balance the big buttonhole fans which turned into 3 bowties. You can see one at the bottom. It does balance it, but it's kind of a sloppy flower. I kind of wanted it to look not-too-perfect, like a doodle, but I don't want it to look just sloppy.

Here's today's peek in Barbie's Closet. Hey--that would have been a better name for this blog: Barbie's Closet. This is a poncho from Nicky Epstein's book. I would have loved to own this myself in about 2nd grade!

Back to work tomorrow. I hope I can keep up my creativity at work with all this creativity flowing at home. I'm going to choose to believe that each will feed the other!

Knitting for Barbie

So, in between my revived mania for Brazilian and my new exploration in crazy quilting, Barbie has had to suffer with a closet that is sooo last season. But here is timeless piece from her wardrobe--a classic cable sweater in surprisingly versatile mustard.

Here now is a good start on my latest Brazilian project. I actually just finished this same one for a friend at Christmas and loved it, so I'm making one for me, too. It is an autumn bouquet design by Dorothy Platt, a local Brazilian guru. There are patterns for the other seasons as well. I have a thing about 4-seasons stuff. I already did her Brazilian trees in 4 seasons, which hangs in the livingroom. And the sampler posted below is her pattern, too. It's kind of hard to scan the dimensional embroidery because I don't want to smash it down and distort the look. These are chrysanthemums made with cast-on stiches. Wait till you see the cutest-ever wheat stalks that come next!

Now my crazy block--not showing up super well either. I have decided to limit myself to the stash of rayon thread I have and a package of multicolored seed beads. This will keep my head from swirling with too many possibilities. I have done a herringbone seam with contrast couching and beads, a buttonhole seam with beads, some buttonhole fans... with beads, and a back and forth (up and down?) buttonhole with contrast woven thru... and beads, and some running bullions... with beads. Can you tell I'm having fun with the beads? I guess this is going to be a pillow top or just a sampler. For any bigger project I would want to have some sort of color schema.

Back to a bit of my job today and the rest will slam me next week, so I hope I've made some inroads here toward keeping some sanity projects like these going.

TAST

I've decided to join Take-a-stitch-Tuesday on the most intriquing site I found on my Brazilian surfing. I have trimmed a ~12" square out of a big odd-shaped piece I made years ago experimenting with stitch and flip and I plan to embellish at least one seam a week with the stitch of the week. I will probably keep it pretty simple because I expect a lot of the stitches will be new to me (unless typical in Brazilian) and because many of the seams are very small and all the fabrics are cotton so I expect simplicity will show well on the square. My shiny rayon thread and maybe few beads will dress it up sufficiently. This is the top and bottom of the block overlapped by the blue trapezoid.

Images for Old Posts

To catch up to myself with images, here is the Paquita tutu for Barbie from this summer. My tutus are my own pattern combined from many Barbie bodices that came before me.

And here is Barbie's most recent knit acquisition, a rolled raglan sweater made as a "Barbie & Me" to match the sweater I made my 4-year-old for Christmas. THAT sweater is the only human-scale sweater I've ever made. I made it out of dishcloth yarn beacuse it was cheap enough to buy a lot even if the sweater didn't turn out and because I figure it will wear well for a child. The Barbie raglan is combination of a couple of sweaters in Knitting for Barbie by Nicky Epstein.

Last, here is my first completely finished Brazilian project from last summer. I've actually completed several more now. I began this particular one when above 4-year-old was only a few months old. I had learned Brazilian on a fishing vacation a couple of years before and re-visited it at a local class. I have now become a minor fanatic.

This is a nine-square sampler that won't quite fit on my scanner.

Old Doodles

These are some very old doodles I found super-cleaning my basement. I want to use them as motifs on something.

Crazy Quilt Needle Case

Whoo-hoo! A picture! I finally discovered that I can SCAN images to post since I don't have a digital camera. Duh. This is my new needle case that I made in 2 days over my extended holiday break. It is my first serious crazy quilt foray albeit on a miniature scale. It is for my Brazilian embroidery needles. I was looking for blogs about Brazilian and mostly found crazy quilters wanting to explore Brazilian. So I became a "Brazilian" exploring crazy quilting!

I made the crazy part using this paper piecing pattern.