This came down the driveway late Friday afternoon so I thought I would do a re-cap of my "auxiliary" crafting projects since I probably won't be getting around to them for a while. Starting today we will be ripping out a bathroom.
My "auxiliuary" crafts are the ones I get around to once in a while when I get some unexpected free time. The threading of the latest dishtowel is one of those. It's been slow going since I've had some heddle mix ups. First I didn't have the right number of them and then I had some misaligned. Rookie stuff there.
Spiral Chicken is enjoying her new frame more than I have been. I did get some ground under her feet done. The new frame is great. I just wish I had more time and more room for it.
Speaking of new, I bought a very pricey punch needle last week. I am determined to figure out how to do this and I thought a better tool might help. It really does. I'm just playing around with it now. I'll start an actual project with it when we finish up the bathroom remodel. I doubt I'll get much stabbing done until then.
And.....the new needlepoint project is already looking much better than my old one. I can finally see why needlepoint is so popular. It really is pretty mindless when you get the rhythm going. We are tearing out the old shower today and chiseling up the tile so expect a lot of that in future posts. After a day of it, there's little time or energy for anything else.
I've got only three more blocks to finish on The Big Crazy. I've been trying to do two a day.
I'm starting to assemble The Patchwork of the Crosses quilt but I'm far from finishing the hand piecing.
This is what an finished block actually is supposed to look like. There's a lot more that has to be sewn down.
That means I have to make all those pieces first so I'm back to paper piecing. For color placement, I'll have to make a bunch of them before I dare start sewing them down. I've already had a point meeting issue that lead to some serious seam ripping. I don't need anymore surprises.
My downstairs craft table has something new on it.
It's also got this newly stained wood in front of it. We are finally finishing the transition pieces for the new flooring while we are waiting for the delivery of our new shower unit. They called to say it will be here any day now and we haven't done much to get ready for its installation.
We've got a bathroom floor to tear out along with the old shower unit. We have to start with the hole in the ceiling. That's where the leaky pipe is and that has to be fixed first. The plumber is going to do it but we had to tear out some support beams we put up to keep the rotted floor from crashing down into the lower level.
I can't move around much in my room right now but I did get the last of my paper hexie quilt glued down. My poor craft room will be ground zero for construction once again but this time, since we are paying someone else to do the work, it might not be forever.
Plying has begun on the BFL that's on the Ladybug. I'm chain plying it to keep the colors together. I'm pretty sure it will become another pair of Thermal Mitts when it's finished.
Speaking of Thermal Mitts, the thumb is in progress on the one I'm working on now. It would have been finished it I'd just had a few more minutes to work on it but The Mister was in need of assistance with the giant hole we have in the ceiling. More on that tomorrow.
My absolute favorite fluffy project is still the Pi Shawl. I've been carrying it around with me everywhere I go. I even took it for a walk by the water the other day which would be my first knit walking project of the year. I love watching my wonky handspun change color every so often in the sunlight. EZ was right. Pi Shawls are perfect travel knitting. You really can't get more mindless than this.
And....I have to thank Sandflies for finding me another ball of Palette in the discontinued Sunlight colorway. She had a ball in her stash and was willing to give it up along with a bag of Lindor chocolate. Both are much appreciated. Thanks so much! I'm still not sure why KnitPicks would discontinue such a useful color. All of their yellows are so similar now that they almost useless for colorwork. I also have to say that I HATE the new KnitPicks and Connecting Threads websites. I've gotten so frustrated with them that I've gone off to find things elsewhere.
The Mister was having a bad morning trying to figure out the ESPN website to fill out his March Madness brackets for the family group so I didn't want to add to his misery by asking him to help me wind on my latest warp. BIG MISTAKE. I made a horrible mess of it and ended up with a tangled mess. How tangled?
This tangled. My winding went sideways and when I tried to pull it back to fix it the whole thing took on a life of its own.
I was just about to cut it all off and throw it in the trash when The Mister wandered in and decided we should at least try to fix it. It took a lot of clothes pins and tying off while we worked on one color at a time but slowly, very slowly it started to behave.
I'm far from out of the woods but a least it was given one more chance at becoming a dishtowel someday. The blame lies squarely on me. I pushed the limits for width on this little loom and am paying the price I fear. That's what I get for being greedy.
I finished one page of the pattern repeats on Bon Amie's second sleeve. I've got one more to go and then this sleeve will be done.
I'm very happy I made the choice to save the yarn instead of the ball winder. I do love this Static colorway.
Speaking of ball winders, this is the new one. An interesting thing about this ball winder is that Knit Picks wanted $24.99 plus $5.99 shipping for it but Amazon only wanted $22.99 for it with free overnight shipping. It's the exact same ball winder as my other one. I still have that one in the box and they are absolutely the same. It was a no brainer to get this one from Amazon even though I have drastically reduced my Amazon consumption for many reasons with the main one being....Bezos. I'm really sick of these billionaire bros. Why can't they just go and have a nice life and leave the rest of us alone?
My Garden of Joy is growing. It would grown more but I had to rip out and re-do an entire block after I couldn't manage to count to two.
It also had to split the time with Snort Stack. My bottom piggy is growing.
I'm waiting for more paper pieces to show up so I can start to assemble Patchwork of the Crosses but I did make a little progress on Dear Jane. That block turned out to be a nightmare. I tried to applique it and realized it's going to have to be pieced so I had to start over again.
I also got started on Funky Flower. My stitching isn't much better but I am having a lot more fun with it. I'm hoping to see some improvement as I go along but if that doesn't happen I'm just going to embrace the wonkiness.
And....to answer the question from yesterday as to why the raisins, here's why. Soda bread. You can't have corned beef and cabbage without it. Mine is more like a giant scone made with buttermilk and plenty of sugar on top that makes a crunchy crust. I don't eat the corned beef but I do eat a lot of this.
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