Grand Fir, R.I.P.

We chose to have guests on January 6th rather than take down the Christmas decorations. Because of this, we missed the usual means of tree pickup and had to improvise.
So while I dismantled the garland and wreath, Jonathan chopped up the tree into tiny bits that would fit into our yard waste bin.

New Year's

Our New Year's Eve is generally quite uneventful. My family does not have any traditions to speak of other than helping out with the youth group event at church. Three years ago, Jonathan honored one of his family traditions by proposing to me. The next year, we celebrated by watching Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and realizing afterwards that we had missed the moment of the changeover. Last year, I had influenza and we did absolutely nothing. No one was sick this year but after all of the fuss and bother of Christmas, it was nice to just relax.
However, we went down and met more family at my in-laws house on New Year's Day.


I also am in the process of receiving the baking torch from Jonathan's grandmother. Creme brulee, anyone? The two new items this year are bullar, a Swedish version of cinnamon and cardamom roll:


and pepparkakor, a spicy, paper thin cookie:


Very tasty!

Epiphany Party

We had my family over on January 6th for a last bit of fun all together before my brother had to head back to the midwest. We had a great and hilarious time playing Pictionary.

Ben and Schatzie did best when it was just the two of them playing. They came from behind to win at the end.

The artist in my dad resulted in some beautiful and detailed drawings.


That doesn't make any sense!


We got it!


Elsa and I had more trouble when playing alone


but we were nearly unbeatable against the other teams.


All play!

Experiments

I celebrated the new year by trying out a couple of crafty ideas that were new or rusty.
This was the first.
During the white elephant gift exchange at work, I picked up some bright cherry red yarn and the obligatory gag gift--an ashtray with Santa and Mrs Claus kissing on it. While I am not yet sure what the fate of the the Clauses will be, the yarn seemed like a perfect opportunity to try out a couple of projects that might be a stretch.

Knitty.com is a fun site with lots of different (some more different than others) patterns at various skill levels. I am a novice knitter so I looked for something that would be fun and quick and minimally frustrating.

Enter my demented elephant finger puppet:

Maybe red was not the best choice. And the trunk placement is a little off. I did, however, discover that I have been doing the knit stitch backwards my entire life and took a halfway decent stab at stockinette stitch.

Next up, knitted coif. We'll see how it looks in red before I decide to wear it.

Here is the second project of the new year.

Knitty and Stitchy

This double point needle case was made for a friend who runs her own crafty business alongside her regular job. Along with needle cases and knitting bags, she hand-dyes sock yarn with entertaining names.
After seeing me work on projects for the last couple of years, she asked for a personalized item.
Once she gave me the corduroy and the funky Asian print lining from ReproDepot, the simplest thing that I could think of (without spending weeks on searching and sketching designs for things like umbrellas and fish) was a sprig of cherry blossoms.
The color scheme:


A few design ideas:


The stitching:

A closer look:


The flowers are in buttonhole stitch, the leaves are fishbone, the buds are nested detached chain and the stems are split stitch. The leaves and twig are two different colors of floss twined together. I'm happy with the blend of the greens but the browns aren't quite close enough in shade even though that does add to the sense of three dimensionality.

View with the lining:


The colors in the stitching are a little less dramatic than those in the lining but that seems appropriate to the subject.

I hope that she likes it!

Update: She did. She has also offered the chance to make a little money by embellishing a few of her knitting bags for sale. It would be great to pay for crafty splurges by selling work! I don't think that this would ever be the level of business that could make up for everything that I would want to do but, as it is easier to justify spending money out of pocket for gift components than personal fun components, I might be able to feel less guilty about the odd purchase for myself.

Handmade Notebook

I have been wanting a visual journal to collect ideas and sketches, work through designs and document progress and completed projects. Ideally, it should be sturdily bound with room for future insertions, a convenient size for carrying that would be still be large enough to lay out designs, have both lined and unlined pages, have a few pockets for scraps and a few fold-out pages for larger layouts. What a list! While I will probably have to settle for a commercially produced sketchbook (which will, of course, work just fine), I had delusions of grandeur while riding the bus home tonight about making my own to fit these specifications.
Some time ago, I came across this tutorial via another great stitching website. This gave me an opportunity to revisit the idea and give it a try.

Materials:
15 sheets of 8 1/2 x 11 25# white paper
2 sheets of 8 1/2 x 11 card stock
1 manila file folder
ruler
sturdy needle
extra strong craft thread
rectangle of fabric to cover folder
lots of craft glue!

I didn't take pictures of the work in progress but here is the result.


This fabric was left over from a quilt that we made for one of my coworkers to celebrate the placement of her soon-to-be adopted sons with her. It is a fairly stiff cotton. I applied the glue a bit unevenly so it turned out wrinkly. Oh well, practice and learn!


The page stitching turned out to be quite sturdy. Despite its obvious imperfections, the book can be used to keep a collection of stitching designs that I don't want to be linked to a particular journal period.

Happy New Year!

to one and all!