Thursday, February 26, 2009

What I've been working on

Just a small project review today.

First, I got this sweater when a friend of one of the ladies in my spinning guild's mom died. (Did you follow that?) It was all completely done except for some closure. I wanted to put some pretty, vintage-esque buttons on it but for the life of me couldn't figure out why she hadn't put any button holes in. I won't tell you how long it took before it dawned on me...duh, she didn't intend to put in buttons. That nice firm, non-buttonholed front edge is for a ZIPPER.

Anyway, my attempt at using the sewing machine to put it in was more trouble than it's worth. Even with a million pins, the stretch hand-knit bunched and moved around too much for my remedial sewing skills. I'll hand sew it.


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I ordered some luscious Superwash Merino and Tencel in the "Chocolate Covered Cherries" colorway from Susan's Spinning Bunny a few weeks ago. It was supposed to become a moebius scarf for Mom since she liked the first one I made. I wasn't too sure I liked the colors though. So I gave her the first scarf I had done and decided to play with the new colorway.

I'm still not sure I like it. More correctly, I'm not sure if I like all the pink. It's way more pink than I expected.


The two bumps were very different in how the colors changed, too. They may have been dyed at different times. The first one is pictured below had some really nice color transitions and less pink, so I was hopeful. The second and one in the picture above, was less subtle in its color changes and was supremely pink. You can definitely see the difference even with them on the bobbin. I'm still debating on how to ply it. Chain ply? Regular ol' 2 ply? I dunno. We'll see.


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After last weekend at New Haven Gardens, my wheels have been turning over raised beds. I did a little recon work at Home Depot yesterday, and man oh man, are cinder blocks cheap. And easy to work with, and sturdy. So I've been drawing out designs and mulling over how to make them look nice.


I had thought about Hardie Board siding, but I don't know if you can glue it up or not. I could also stain the blocks, but they'd still be pretty flat and ordinary in any color. Right now, I'm thinking about the plywood Dad used in the basement. It has a look of rough-cut boards. That could probably be applied as a facing. What was that stuff called, Dad?

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