Happy Birthday Mom!!!

Just Passion Flowers

Blooming in my garden now . . . .

A Party About to Happen

The Practice Party

Wool Felts

My name is Dena. I am a knitter.

Over the years I have knit many things for my family. And when I knit them socks out of a washable yarn, I tell the recipient that they can throw them in the washer and drier and they do. And if I knit the socks out of a wool that is not super wash, I tell them to wash the item by hand and they do. (As a mother/wife who wished to foster independence, all of my children learned to do laundry - only their own - at a very early age. Two years old is NOT too young for a child to be doing their own laundry.)

The same with sweaters, they wash the ones that can be washed and don't wash the ones that will felt. We have felted items deliberately when those items were knit with the intention of later felting/fulling them but we have never accidentally felted an item - well, until now. And the accidentally is still debatable.

Among the items I have made for my family are afghans, blankets, and the like. Since my family consisted of small boys and big boys who get such things filthy, these items have always been out of washable yarns.

The afghan pictured above was MINE. Only mine. Just mine. And it was made out of a very nice wool. Fred had it in the car for those times when we needed a blanket for warmth. But the dogs had gotten it dirty. So he washed it. In hot water and dried it in the drier. It is very small now. When I saw it tonight, the first thing I noticed - from 20 feet away - was that it had been felted. Before I saw the small size and felt the fabric.

Fred still doesn't believe that it has shrunk and changed. It couldn't have. He washed it just like all the other blankets that I have knitted or crocheted.

I cried.

No Longer Unemployed

Miss you Maddie

Bloomed Again for my birthday

Blooming Water Plant - End of July

Teresa planted plant
It bloomed
My huisband is waiting

Hey Dena!!!!

Happy Birthday!

White House Yarn

Remember our trip to White House Yarn Shop in Ontario, Oregon? Remember those bumps of fiber we got? Well, here is mine! I spun each bump seperately and pretty fine. Then I had to decide which order to ply them in - was going to start with the red end on one but the other had green in it and that would have been too Christmassy (is that a word?) so I put both red ends together. It made a lovely gradiated yarn that starts with red and works it's way to blue (because spool ended up much longer than the other so it's blue on blue at the end). I can't wait to knit this because it's going to have huge sections of color gradually changing from one section to the next and it's going to be gorgeous! I got about 330 yards of yarn and it's probably going to be a light fingering when I've washed it and set the twist (haven't done that yet - too excited about how it looked). What you are seeing in this pic is both sides of the hank, it doesn't really have two red sections.

Totoro and a Soot Sprite

Made this for a swap on Ravelry - both girls are mad that I didn't make more. This is totoro from the movie My Neighbor Totoro (and several other Ghibli movies) and a soot sprite from the movie Spirited Away (and several other Ghibli movies). He's so cute that I was sorry to send him off in a box. I might make another for me!

1/11/11 If you have just found this page through google, please check the following two entries:
Preparing for Knitalong
Beginning of Knitalong

Fibery Stuff and a Few Flowers

First up - Knitting. Here we have the mostly done, second February Lady Sweater. This is the one that I was so Unproductive on in the car on the ride to & from Atlanta. The yoke got done and undone several times while I was out there. As you can see, I've been much more productive since I got home. This is the first time I've actually gotten to try it on the intended recipient, and I'm a little disappointed. I think it's a little too big and I think the garter stitch goes too low (much lower than on mine) but the recipient likes it and that's what counts - because I really don't want to knit it again.

And on the tatting front - much has been happening. I cannot show you most of what I have done yet, but here are a couple of things. First we have a flower and a butterfly and then a flower with a butterfly on it (tatted together) that Miss S made. She seems to really like tatting and picked it up quickly under Miss M's tutelage. Second we have a long piece of edging that I made that will become something, someday - maybe a choker for a girl?

And spinning - I finished the alpaca - pics & stats later because I forgot. This is the two little bumps of fiber I bought in the shop (White House?) we visited in Oregon. I finished spinning the second one last night so I'm going to let them sit on the spool a couple of days and then ply them together. And some new fiber I got for 25% off at Corgi Hill Farm because it was on sale cheap and I wanted to try spinning something from a batt before I undertook the dog hair batts. I started spinning this last night too and it is quite nice to spin - has just a touch of sparkle in it.

And last, a random assortment of flower pics. First, the minuta waterlily. This is a tiny little thing - the pot it's in is a 4" pot that annuals come in and it's in the pondlet which is just a shallow tub on the patio. The flower is about an inch or a little more across but smells good and is pretty and this plant blooms like a fool. That little thing floating near it is a piece of duckweed - and if you look under the water you can see a couple of bright green circles? Those are the leaves of the seedling minutas coming up in the pot.

Then we have the passion flower Lady Margaret - the picture makes it look a little more purple and a little less red than it really is in real life. It's a great bloomer - almost always has buds or flowers or both. And last of all, the Star Hibiscus which is laying on the ground like a vine or trailing plant. It was about 10' tall and I moved it and when I did, it decided to lay down on the ground and it refused to get back up. But it did send up all kinds of side branches and right now they all have buds all over them. It's later blooming this year, but that's probably because of all the new growth it decided to put out or maybe because it's farther back in the shade.

Random Pics

No knitting, stitching, tatting, spinning or other fiber activities in today's post. I'll get back with that tomorrow - cuz I've been busy and have good stuff to show. For today, however, we do have a lovely selection of random pics that are fun.

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First, meet Joe Cool - the coolest dog in town! She loves the beach and the sun, but she don't see so well on her best day!





Next, meet Calvin & Hobbes. These two are definitely not the brightest bulbs in the box. They end up in this predicament just about every morning. They are stuck in the trash dumpster and because the sides are high and straight up and slick, they cannot get out. So they sit here, chirruping and tweeting and trilling until either enough trash builds up that they can get out or some kind human puts a long branch in so they can climb out.



A lovely sailboat gliding along on the very calm seas of August. Kids in the foreground having a great time in the water cuz the water was cool and the air/sun was HOT!











An armadillo on the back patio - they are also not gonna win any awards for smarts. Walked right up to one and it jumped ten inches over into the leaf mulch and burried it's head so I couldn't see it. Kinda reminded me of Robin!
















Girls on the way to the beach - surprised the camera shy one and got a couple of full face shots!

A skink sunning himself on the front patio - right under the bike so that's the spokes of the wheel in shadow.

And my White Star Hibiscus bloomed for me - pretty but needs the red one next to it. Going to have to start some cuttings.

What is a little dog to do when there are no children to toss that tennis ball? Where did all the children go?

Well, no kids are coming. Nobody loves me, nobody likes me, nobody will throw my ball!

Did you know that you can play solitaire with the waves? They will take the ball and move it so you can chase it. Nice waves.

And this was here to greet us when we got home - pretty passion flower 'Temptation'.