Lori's Current Project

I forgot to ask Lori what her work was intended to be. I just enjoyed the stitch pattern. Many people avoid patterns that involve cutting the yarn at the end of each row and then starting on the front right again. They really hate weaving in all the ends. Shelli felt that way about all the ends in her granny baby blanket. For the picture, Lori carefully tucked the ends in.

American Girl Quilt

Lori has come to a group meeting 2 or 3 times now. She comes in from west Virginia. She does really nice work and makes interesting items like this American Girl Quilt. She has nieces who collect the dolls. This is a quilt for a doll's bed. To get the reduced size, Lori made the quilt per the instructions but with size 10 thread. The colors are vibrant and the resulting quilt is spectacular to see. Apparently she has made more than one. Whew!

Getting Ready for Holiday Sales

Everyone is making things for the holiday sales and usually I am asked, "What can I make? or What do we need? But Theresa is going about it in a different way.
Chris asked her to make a skull and crossbones cap for her because we had already seen one Theresa made. Theresa made the first but it didn't quite fit, so she made another. Unfortunately, other people seeing her work on these hats, want hats, too. But now they are requesting other designs, like fish bones.
If she works on these designs when does she make something for the Holiday Sales? By turning her special requests into donations for either Rwanda Knits or VA Pittsburgh Healthcare Systems. Nice going, Theresa!
Theresa is seen here with Chris showing off the skull and crossbones hat and a fishbone hat. By the way, the small skull and crossbones hat has made its way into the Holiday Sales.

Personal Projects

How would you like to wear a hat that came from your own private alpaca? Karen's black hat is from her alpaca, Ebony. The green yarn is from a blend of fibers from alpacas at Highland Alpaca.
Karen decided she needed some nice warm hats for herself this winter and whipped up these two hats. She looks good in this style of hat and what could be warmer or softer than alpaca fiber?

Shelli worked all summer on this darling granny square blanket. The design and colors are so comforting looking. I'm sure her grand nephew will love the blanket. Who wouldn't love getting such a nice present for their baby? The edging is a special finishing touch.

A Mask for Halloween

Theresa loves Halloween and has a houseful of spooky beings to prove it. I think it's the Angel of Death standing behind her. This year her birthday fell on the date of the Halloween party she throws for her interns. I thought it should have something special.
The summer issue of Interweave Crochet introduced Maire Treanor and Clones Irish Crochet Lace. There was a picture of a mask Maire made. So there was my inspiration!
The mask I made doesn't have any Clones knots. There were no details given with Maire's mask; so I was on my own. She apparently used much finer thread than I did with perhaps a smaller hook. My motifs came out larger than hers. The end result was I had no room for a net background. The packing cords were size 10 and the crocheting thread size 20. I varied between a .75 mm hook and a 1.00 hook.
You can see I used a shamrock, several scrolls, a bunch of grapes and grape leaves. There are 2 roses but they are on the sides. I stiffened the mask so it would hold its shape. I'm rather proud of how it turned out but I still have a way to go to perfect my Irish Crochet skills. Even though it's not there, I can make a Clones knot!

More on Felting

One of the usual directions for felting is to put the item to be felted in a pillow case cover.
I personally have never followed that direction. Maybe I should.
When Carol tried her latest felting activity, she put the item in the bag. The first picture shows how much "lint/flutz/crap" came out of the yarn. The second picture shows what came out when the tote finally felted. It actually looks to me like the yarn disintegrated.

So now the questions are: Does this happen with every yarn? or just some yarns? What condition is my new washing machine in now? Anyone out there have any info for us?

Last But Not Least

Maria finished her Special Olympic Scarf just in time for them all to be mailed out. Maria has difficulty with arthritis in her hands and when we were all making our scarves, Maria's doctor told her she needed a little break from knitting.

Maria is back to knitting now but is very careful not to overdo. She made a combo garter stitch and stockinette but felt the edges needed a more finished look. Maria, who barely crochets, put a sc edge down the sides which is difficult for anyone since you really have to go with feel and no real instructions.Then she added a short fringe.
Maria was worried how the scarf would turn out, but it's another great scarf to add to our other 21 scarves that were mailed today.