WOW

Wiping out works in progress...I am making great strides on the Puffin Mantle and should finish over the weekend.

The Beaded Beret stopped because I ran out of the beads.  I have new beads and will take out the row and possibly mix the beads.  Must think about this one a bit.

The cotton sweater is coming along.  I am at the mind-numbing stockinette stitch body.  The Debbie Bliss Cotton Denim DK is lovely yarn in pale denim.

The orange project is an entrelac bowl (it was a short phase some years ago) like the one (that needs to be fulled) beside the snowman, one of three that have been in a basket for longer than I can remember.  I have a lace sweater that needs to be frogged and the yarn re-purposed, as well as the vest that needs armbands.    Single patterns are now organized and filed and books are easier to find, as I rearranged them.  Patterns for classes are pulled and ready to use.  Samples are all finished, documentations are turned in, and I can focus on other projects.  Projects include paintings, weaving, spinning, and wet and needle felting.  Making progress is good!

Aranmor sadness

'Rub-a-dub-dub Mother C. went to the tub to get her poor Aranmor a skein

When she got there the tub was bare and so her poor Aranmor had none

...And she was really ticked off!'

Sigh...the life of a knitter is not an easy one.  At least with paint, I can go out and get another tube of the same "dye lot" and be done with it.  Knitting?  NooooooOOOOOoooooo!  I was so careful to check yardage ahead of time and my gauge is spot on to Ms. Starmore's (quite an accomplishment, if I say so myself).  I spent the morning looking online to search nationally and internationally for a few skeins--I need only 1, but am NOT taking chances.  I found a lot of 8, three will be sufficient to finish.  I am checking to make sure the order went in, even though I got an order number.  Overkill, I know, but one must not take chances with discontinued yarn!  The body is finished and I was almost to the saddle on the second sleeve when I stuck my hand in the tub--horrors!--worse than a slasher movie.  Well, at least in my opinion right now.  Until I have the yarn in my hot little hands, I will not rest easy.  That would be a cold, dark dive into the frog pond.  

Daisy Bowl

Enough of that!!  I have an entrelac class tonight.  I hand felted the daisy bowl.  It is very cute, just as I thought it would be.  I will leave the pink/green/white bowl unfelted and then I have two bowls in progress so I can work with the students as they progress.  The Quant pattern is ready and I have to steam the first sample (knit in Noro Kureyon from Kathryn).  I like it better than I did at first.  I knitted it exactly like the pattern.  On the shop sample, I modified the ends to match.  There are lots of modifications on Ravelry, which is handy!

The bronchitis is barely hanging on and annoying.  This week will be week 3 of it and it is time to get better.  It just needs another nudge to get out of my system.  Over-the-counter meds just treat the symptoms, so another visit to Dr. V. is in order.  If I go on Thursday, I can see his therapy dog, Rufus.  I love Rufus and he always makes me feel better.  "Dog pills."

Art in Bloom

The last of winter melted away yesterday with a visit to the MIA.  My friend, Lynne, and I spent the rainy day at the museum taking in the Titian exhibit before it goes away and it was also cool to watch the floral artists set up for the Art in Bloom exhibit all over the museum.  Florists chose works of art as inspiration and arranged flowers to display along side the art.  Lovely colors, textures, and smells!

A nod to Alenander Calder

This is the painting to the left of...

Hortense! 

Renoir is to her right.

This one was so beautiful and captured the light and color of the painting.

Ahhh, Monet...

This was a clever and very Americana interpretation
of Grant Wood's work.

Chagall needed no flowers!

Lynne's friend did this arrangement beside the monkey.

The art teacher at CRHS made her vase and arrangement.

This was one of my favorites--simple and elegant.

The Quant is finished!

I finally got photos of the dreaded headband.  I like the Great Adirondack yarn much better than the Noro for the project.  I used the pattern modification to make both ends the same.  The left sleeve of the Aranmor is almost finished and I started the cuff of the right sleeve.  Light at the end of the tunnel--at last!  The weather is still dreary today, which is fine--I do not have class until later.  I hope the rain stays away during the baseball game, as Jim and some colleagues from work took the train into the city to see the Twins play.

I like the pattern modification to make the ends match

A sleeve and a cuff

I have a lot of catching up to do.  I lost a few days with being miserable.  Bronchitis = ugh!  We received some "medicine" in the mail the other day from Bernd and Angelika--Ritter Sports and Milka chocolate bars, a chocolate bunny, and Milka eggs with little purple spoons for scooping out the cream centers of the eggs!  That will make me feel better really quickly!  Danke!

Spring might just be here...

The water at the Rum River Dam in Anoka was really rushing
now that the snow has melted!

I am afraid to say that too loudly.  As the snow melts in the back yard, I am doing yard patrol.  Not my favorite job, but necessary.  A robin hopped by the back door.  I think it is safe to say SPRING!

I finally edited the felted bowl pattern, and since it has been a week, it is time to try it one more time.  Kathryn is taking a shot at testing it for me.  Aranmor is progressing...meh...I had to frog that darned center section because on row 97 the numbers on either side of the section were off by one...not happy about that.  Such is life and knitting.

Bottom of the bowl marked for the first triangle tier

11.04.11  Wow, it has been some time since I started this post.  As you can see by the photo of Aranmor, the buds on the maple tree are popping out.  

I made another entrelac bowl and took photos of it in progress.  I have two to felt and Kathryn did a great job with the pattern and I just need to re-word the top triangle tier. It will be a perfect pattern for teaching.  

I will call this one "daisy."

My knitting demons have disappeared for now and the second side of Aranmor is just about finished.  I will be very happy to begin the sleeves.  

I like that this photo shows the true color of the yarn.
I really love this pattern!

FO

I finished the entrelac bowl the other day.  Now I am working on another one and going through the rewritten pattern closely as I knit.  The third one will look like a flower and then I will add some embroidery or needle-felting.  We shall see.  This will be the shop sample.  As I knit the current bowl I am taking photographs of the progress.

Entrelac bowl

Boing!

Eevee's paths disappeared.

Spring sprung, and then it SNOWED!  Jim told me to take the Jeep on Wednesday.  I drove my car to the gym.  Bad idea.  I made it to yoga, but did not make it up the driveway when I got home.  I started to shovel, and then decided to start the snowplow.  The shovel worked, not the snowplow.  I got back in the car and tried to back up--nope.  I tried to go forward--nope.  In all my years of driving, I have never been stuck...I was stuck.  A couple of neighbors pushed the car while I revved it and finally got unstuck.  One of the fellows started the snowplow and cleared a path for me to pull into the garage.  I made two loops around the block because I was afraid to stop and get stuck again.  Once I got the car back into the garage, I got ready for work.  It took over 30 minutes to get to work and I was happy to drive the Jeep!

Bowl before felting

I finally have the entrelac bowl finished and it is ready to felt.  I believe I will adapt the pattern and put in better instructions.  The Quant is my next small project and then I can schedule a class for an introduction to entrelac.  Entrelac is not my favorite technique, but now I am happy to have finished the bowl.  Maybe once it is felted I will like it a bit more.  My Baktus scarf is on the second half of the skein.  

Heavy March snowfall.