A new bag in town

Hey Robin!
How's the vacay? I have to thank you again for the Ropa Vieja recipe. It's sooooo good and I have to admit lately that meals that spend all-day getting to where they are... are my absolute favorites. Tuesday I made my Mom's Etouffe! THANKS MOM! That was awesome too. I never knew how much butter went into that dish. Eegads, but then again, no wonder. Y'know?

Did I show you the finished blue-felted bag that I recently made? I think I was keeping you appraised of the progress, but since I felted it (mostly successfully) I haven't said much. TADA! It's DONE!

Yesterday dragged out the sewing machine, bits of fabric, magnet clasps and handles (bought specially for this) and sat down to see what I could make!

You know that I am no seamstress, and indeed my machine and I are rarely on speaking terms. But this time we cooperated and managed to kludge-together something that I am actually rather happy with! It's rare for me to find that in a sewing-scenario! I really wanted this to be lined, in order to be more useful, and also to add a pocket or two. A lining would also serve to hide whatever method I choked-out for attaching the handles to the entire structure...

That as a tricky-bit let me tell you. We can't all be Grumperina!

At any rate, some bits of my fave fabric scraps, some grosgrain ribbon that I've had since the early 90's and the aforementioned handles and clasps and VIOLA!

It's that odd-mixture of all my favorite bits and pieces and obviously they don't go-together for just ANYBODY. I have a feeling this is going to be another one of those projects that only-I will love...

Next: I guess I should update my 'on the kneedles' bit and also maybe think about a couple of future projects YAY!

Also: the shawl for the beloved Aunt was well-received. Brought a little tear to my eye, that one.

Later!

You can't felt-out a stickinette-roll...

Hey Robin,
Yay a new FO! Woot! I managed to satisfy my need for a quick-project by making myself a purse/bag/thingy. I'm so excited. It's attempting to dry if I would only just leave it alone... here's some pics with some story. See previous post for last-seen pictures...

So The striping was actually coming along nicely, it was seriously fun mixing up all the teensy-balls of Noro and things-of-questionable-wool-content. I was getting past the handle though and was supposed to make more stripes for 10 rows. I wanted some nice striping there but when I glanced at my mini-stash to see what was left to choose from, I had very few options. Gah! What to do? Use the yarn that had the greatest length and just do one hefty "stripe"? Or go to the lys and get something to make some multiple-stripe-action. Hmm... which do you think I did??

I think you will recognize what I found:
Wait. Can't see it?














Here, try this one...
It's like Paton's (The SWS stuff) knew what I was doing ahead of time and hurried up to make sure this was in the bin where I was looking when I needed something. It's... it's like... EXACTLY the colors of the rest of the bag! Shocking! Ironic, because I have looked at this ball before and not been interested.





So anyway, I used, almost-exclusively, the SWS for the handle... it striped VERY well at this diameter and looked GREAT with the rest of the bag. I knitted up very nicely compared to the last time I used SWS (see earlier posts because I still don't know how to link to another post here...). Anyway, i finished it late at night and didn't feel right trying to felt it in the washing machine while certain other household inhabitants were sleeping ;)

This was the first time I felted something in the washing machine, with the zippered bag, tennis balls and a pair of blue jeans. I was nervous because I have a front-loader and all instructions talk about filling it with the water, THEN adding the soap, THEN adding the "contents". Also no spin etc. So YAY ME! There's a "no spin" option on my machine so I wasn't going to have to camp-out in front of it like it was soapy-TV.... i checked it often... nervously... like looking in the little window was going to ensure that everything worked properly. I'm such a sucker.

Here it is outta the bag and after a bit of semi-blocking-type encouragement!

I should point-out that the expedition to acquire new yarn for the handle that would fill-out more stripes and stuff was totally unnecessary. Why? The top TOTALLY rolled on me and I can't get it back up. So the beautiful SWS is hidden. In a roll. *sigh*






In other news, I have a garden too! Mine isn't as beautiful or prolific as other knitter's, but i got THIS:
For anyone with a background in Art History (myself included) or Ancient History/Archaeology this kind of find speaks volumes on what our made ancestors believe in certain-types-of-gods. Isn't it beautiful? I hate to eat it...










Later!
:D