A coworker left and upon her departure we exchanged gifts. I'll miss her--she's off to Africa to do some charity work for the next year. She found a lovely scarf and beaded felt flower pin for me.
And a set of lovely tea cups. 
I completed the entrelac section in my diamond tote and am back to working rows. The stripe pattern from the top repeats and then the base is knit. It seemed to balloon up in the entrelac section--I'm very happy to be bringing it back to manageable size with the knit rows.
I've shown two of these before but this photo is better. Here are the three Japanese pastries I made from kits sent to me by my niece. They're now hanging on my office file cabinet.
On our way back from the Midwest Fiber and Folk Art Fair on Friday, we stopped at Village Needleworks in Westmont. I picked up this painted canvas keyfob and stitched it Friday night and Saturday morning. Mostly it's floss but I found a sparkly blue mystery fiber to add to the floss for the water. It will be a Christmas gift.
It was gray outside but everyone was still smiling, anticipating the fun inside. We smiled all day!
There was music both inside and outside--this is where we had lunch. Yummy Polish food. 
I found some treasures--handdyed rainbow fabric...
A tote bag and program came with the entrance fee (or a t-shirt if you preferred).
I got some needles to move my lotus hat from the dpns and rubberbands to circulars that were the right size and length. I brought my project along in it's little tote and made the swap while sitting in the large rest area. I've now completed two of the three lace repeats for the main part of the hat.
I found purse handles on sale. I realized I'll have leftover yarn from my felted diamond tote. These are short, purse handles that will work nicely for the smaller felted bags I like to make and use.
I'm already anticipating next year's fair!
I assembled the finishing materials this weekend, trimmed the fabric to size, pressed the pocket, trimmed the flannel, found a button for the closure (the rest of the materials were part of the kit) and pinned the insides together.
At Tuesday's long series of doctor appointments with hubby I basted the outer edge of the lining (to secure a layer of thin batting and the pocket), stitched a division in the pocket, stitched the flannel into place and pinned it for the final stitching. In the evening, I cut the silk threads for the edging cord to size. I still need to twist the cord, make the button loop, sew the front to the back and sew on the edging cord and the button. But it's the home stretch!
Here's the progress on my felted diamond tote bag. It's about half-way there. I'm trying to knit one entrelac square per night.
While I was cleaning I found a small (knit and felted entrelac) bag with two skeins of yarn, some needles and a hat pattern. The pattern is the Lotus Hat by Third Base Line. I sat down and swatched (what cleaning?--there's knitting to do!), figured out which yarn would work, and cast on for the hat. I knit two rows to get it going.
Not knitting, here, but crochet is close (at least in my way of thinking--string into fabric). I went hunting for acrylic yarn leftovers--the Legal Loopers are at it again. This is a small group of crocheters from my office. Previously we did afghan squares for charity. This time we plan to make a whole afghan for Warm Up America. So I began crocheting my first 7" wide square. It will be 9" long which should be 12 rows. I have four rows (and 3") done here. The yarn is Lion Brand, Homespun I think.
And, last, more clearing up. I have (had) a whole bunch of t-shirts from concerts (mostly Johnny Clegg and Kodo) that I liked--but don't wear any more. (I realized a while back I rarely wear t-shirts with pictures on them.) So I decided to make an afghan. I used a rotary cutter to cut rectangles with the pretty t-shirt designs centered in them (fronts and some backs, too). Later on I will measure them and pick a "standard rectangle size" and then add fabrics to make them all the same size and make up a quilt.
Last weekend I ran a conference at work. Some years I do many, this year just one, which is a nice break. I've learned I can't do any serious work while the conference is going on--I can pop up to my office and check e-mail and perhaps fill out some forms by hand, but that's it. Mostly I'm running hither and yon with conference things, with odd stretches just sitting and waiting for the next break.
Several months ago I signed up for the DMC Mentor program. A couple of us who teach at the YMCA did, thinking we could use the promised kits for teaching there. I had forgotten about it when this arrived in my mailbox. A shiny folder with a really cool pin (which would not photograph at all).
And stuffed full of goodies. Four ladybug kits that will be good for our kids at the Y to do next fall when we start up again. Plus a folder with several more advanced designs to use. It's quite a nice set of materials and makes me feel professional--business cards and all!
Crazy Quilt Exhibition
My order arrived with the threads for the main project that is part of the EGA ICC in Crewel. I added them to the threads I'd pulled from my stash. I'm using the teacher's recommended colors after reviewing the colors that were in use in the 17th Century and that could be dyed from the available natural dyes. I didn't see where I could improve on Judy Jeroy's choices (which surprised me--I'm always changing things like this). Follow the link above to see the design--again, I'm using the recommended design. I cut my ground fabric for the project and plan to transfer the design when I get a chance and a quiet length of time to concentrate on it.
I stitched to previous designs by this designer (Loraine's of Capri), but this one gave me fits. (You can see the others here.) I do, however, see improvement in my stitching since last December. Part of my problem with this project was that I did not like the dark fabric showing through in areas using lighter threads. I decided I was okay with the yellow but not in the pink and I ended up stitching pink felt to the ground before stitching over it. I'm much happier. I accomplished a lot last weekend completing the purple flowers, some stems and leaves.
Next Friday, June 24, I'm going with World Embroideries to the Midwest Fiber and Folk Art Fair. Once there, we'll meet with my sister and sister-in-law for a day of fiber goodness. I've never been there, but friends have and it sounds wonderful. Fibers, music, animals, and shopping. They also offer a robust schedule of classes.
If you're a member of the Embroiderer's Guild of America and belong to a chapter in the Great Lakes Region, the region has just posted the list of Group Correspondence Courses it is sponsoring for 2012. You can find it here. If you're not in the GLR, check with your region to see if they have a similar program. It's great fun.
The catalpa tree is in full glorious bloom. I actually took this photo a couple of years ago--it's hard to get the light right to take a good photo of the white orchid-like blooms against the dark leaves.
Here's the bit-by-bit progress on the knit entrelac bag to be felted. The white is the set up for the entrelac row. (The bag is upside down, begun at the top, moving toward the bottom.)
And here's where I am on the London quilt. Working on it intensely was what irritated my hand so and I've set it aside for now. It changes as you stitch the hexagons and remove the papers. I'm thinking about transferring the pattern to muslin and stitching the hexagons to the muslin to provide a bit more stability (right now the pattern is on newsprint). I ripped out quite a few of the smaller hexagons--once I linked them up to the larger ones, the smaller ones shifted and were not following the river pattern. I find taking photos of works in progress helps with the designing--especially if I desaturate them and view the image in black and white.
This series closes on June 26--if you can, it's well worth a visit:
Here is the pocket sampler all stretched and nice. It does make a huge difference (and it stayed that nice, even when I undid the lacing and removed it from the frame). Check out the crumpled photo from last week here. The band sampler below will be included in the package along with the notebook of materials I've gathered and a letter. 
I have a long way to go, even while my samplers are under review and I can't add to them... I've decided I want to do a sampler of leaf stitches, perhaps on plain oval () leaves, using some of the older books I have. I need to work on my paper. I've gotten a list of threads I don't have for the final sampler. I need to order them and I can get going on that--trace the design and begin working in some areas. I've already taken two EGA Group Correspondence Courses with Judy Jeroy so I feel fairly competent and confident.
Like much of the world this spring, our weather has been extreme. We've been very lucky that most of the bad storms so far have gone around our little neighborhood but it's been scary!
I've been struggling to get back to my morning walks ever since my hip bone cracked in October. Not pain, I'm fine. Just the weather. And me being a weather wimp... And, well, lazy. The sidewalks were icy for seemingly forever this winter. This spring it's often been rainy in the early mornings. Now it's hot--and very humid. Even quite early. When I left for work on Tuesday it was already 81F (and I skipped the walking--it's no fun going to work all sweaty and hot)! That said, when I feel I can, I do go for a morning walk.
And on occasion I bring the camera. I took these flower photos on the morning of June 4 in our yard. It was already quite hot and the flowers are fading quickly in the heat. But they're lovely while blooming. Our neighbor's yards are also boasting some lovely displays.
Doesn't this look just scrumptious? (it was) Later that day we drove up to my sister's for a family gathering. We indulged in some nostalgia, looking at old Super8 movies our dad took in the 70s. Oh, my! The benefit was we could do it sitting in their cool, dim basement. Our sister-in-law brought a lovely bag of asparagus, some of which is pictured above. I made a sauce for pasta with some fresh chicken breast, onions, a bit of fresh garlic, homemade chicken stock reduced for the sauce, and a ton of asparagus. We feasted! I topped mine with Parmesan and black pepper. Yum! Thanks, Nancy! It was wonderful.
So, I scrounged about a bit in the stash and came up with materials and made up the tassel angels this weekend. The halos and wings are glittery felt. The bodies are perle cotton, wool yarn, ribbon, metallic threads and some silk threads.
A friend is graduating at the end of this week so I made her a bright beaded bracelet. It's posing on top of the start of my knit to felt tote. My hands are still painful so I'm pretty much limiting how much I work on it but I still am seeing a bit of progress each day--it's on size 11 needles so even one row shows. And it's an easy project to pick it up and knit one row and not be lost when picking it up next time.
Here's a close up of the bracelet.
And last night I finished the first sampler pocket. It needs (desperately) to be damp stretched--the instructions provide very specific instructions for this so I'll tackle that this weekend. I think between the two I've covered the required blanket and long-and-short stitches.
I'd love to be able to get this into the mail next week.
I spent a lot of time stitching this weekend, with not a lot to show. I worked on my paper-pieced quilt but did a bit of ripping as I try to sort out how the large hexagons will fit in with the smaller ones. When the papers are removed it changes things but they can't be removed until stabilized (either pieced all around with other pieces or stitched to some backing or other). So nothing to show there... It also did in my hand. Holding the pieces in place to whip them together made my left hand very sore and inflamed and I'm frustrated.
It's a kit from Knitpicks that's been hanging about for a few years waiting for me to get to it. knitted then felted. I figure if I do a row or two a night, it'll get done and my hands won't scream. Plus, it's pretty mindless.
