More Tea Towels

I finished another set of tea towels.

This is from another kit from Jane Stafford Textiles - Sassy Brassy Tea Towels, made from organic cottolin (a 60/40 cotton/linen blend). These were for me to learn about log cabin weaving, and it turned out to be much easier than I thought it would be.

The kit made seven towels with plenty of extra yarn. Each towel is different (more details can be found on my Ravelry page).

These are how they looked fresh off the loom - about 7 yards. I still have a small section of fabric leftover, just have to decide what to use it for.

I made a braid on the inkle loom, for loops for the towel.

I don't need loops on the tea towels, I just love weaving them and think it looks neat to have a matching braid.

It just took a couple of hours to make about 40" of braid.

Photos from this week- 

Sunrise this morning.

Ice in the ditch.

Ice on the pond.

You can still see the ice under the water on the pond.

 The pets have been spending more time outside and getting used to one another 

(really the cat tolerates a nose pressing into her constantly).

Going for walks together.

The puppy waiting for her best friend to join her.

Molly watching a pair of geese.

Maggie walking through the water (dripping from her back foot).

She has her anti-predation collar on now there are more birds around.

A pair of geese on the pond.

All the best! Stay well!♥︎

March Monthly Goal Round-Up

I completed my One Monthly Goals for March, hosted by Elm Street Quilts.
They were to weave a set of tea towels-

These ones are made from cotton boucle (from a kit from Jane Stafford Textiles).
To finish knitting a gnome -

A mystery knit called Gnome is Where You Hang Your Hat by Sarah Schira, made from handspun yarn.
And to finish an inkle weaving project -

My first inkle weaving (I'm calling it a belt for now, one day it may become something else).

Last month my goal was to weave fabric for my Mom. Here is what she made with the fabric-

Dining room chair seat cushions,

even a bit leftover to make a little table centre.

Photos from around -

March started like this,

she is watching geese flying by

and is ending with most of the snow melted.

All the best!♥︎

Keep Going

I don't need to be told twice to stay home. I am happy at home. I can always find lots to do (and I have plenty of crafting supplies!). I can't wait to have a place to sew again. The basement renovations are coming along nicely, and I will end up with a wonderful space.

I am making the crafts that I can do last as long as possible.

Weaving tea towels is going well, I am about half way done.

I learned a new type of knitting - twined knitting.

I am knitting a pair of mittens with yarn that I spun specifically for this - it is spun in the opposite direction to my normal spinning. Twined knitting needs yarn spun with a Z twist. This is natural coloured wool from a local farmer, that I processed (the red is a leftover bit of handspun from fleece from the same farm).

inside the mitten

Twined knitting uses both ends of the ball of yarn, alternating every stitch, and the wool is twisted every stitch - there is a lot of time spent untwisting, so it is a slow process. These should be very warm mittens.

This one breaks my heart a little - I took apart a vest that I finished last summer. I didn't wear it - it made me feel like Fred Flintstone. When I was knitting it it seemed to take forever, and it took a long time to take apart - there is so much yarn in it. It is merino that I had dyed, blended and spun - too good to just sit unused.

It is all washed and ready for the next project.

I started some pepper and tomato seeds this week. It might still be -20ºC when we go for walks in the morning, but summer is sure to come!

My family is thrilled that I have been baking more recently.

Today I made some pies - butterscotch, and lemon.

I tried out my new pastry cutter (I have used it to mash bananas before).

It worked really well. I hope it lasts longer than the ones I had before.

It worked well to make egg salad too.

Sunrise photos from this past week  (the colours amaze me) -

Molly has yet to master 'drop it'.

She is learning that the cat is in charge when we go for walks.

All the best!♥︎

More Tea Towels

I put another set of tea towels on the loom.

This is another kit from JST, called Sassy Brassy Log Cabin. I bought a few different weaving kits to learn new weaving techniques (this one is log cabin weaving), and now that we are renovating the basement I am glad to have something to make. Sewing on the dining room table is definitely not like sewing with a proper cabinet, so I won't be able to do too much sewing for a while - I was able to bring the weaving loom upstairs, but the sewing machine cabinet is too big to move.

Photos from around - 

 Both pets are coming for walks again now that it is warmer.

 More snow today.

All the best!♥︎

Woven Tea Towels

I finished weaving, and hemming the 9 towels from the JST kit - Country Renaissance Boucle towels

They were really enjoyable to weave, and because they are woven at 12 picks (threads) per inch, they were very quick to weave. 

All the towels are unique. The kit was very generous - I had lots of boucle cotton leftover.

Here are the towels fresh off the loom - about 9 yards. The towels were woven to 30", plus 2" hems with cotolin in a gold colour (it didn't come in the kit, luckily I had a coordinating colour smooth thread).

I used a piece of #10 crochet cotton to mark the end/beginning of the towels, and stitched a 3-step zig-zag on my sewing machine before cutting the towels apart.

For the loops

I used the inkle loom 

to weave about 30" of a 1/2" wide braid in cotolin. I used a pattern from here (the second one from the top).

 After weaving the towels I finished bobbins, plus odds and ends to use up the last bit of the warp. I ended up with about 10" of fabric,

 and made some little kitchen cloths. They are 2 layers, finished with the serger.

 Photos from around-

interesting clouds

sunset

fresh snow

full moon on the horizon 

Molly has been slowly, over days, carrying this big stick closer to home.

It started out as a large broken branch that we kept breaking bits off for her, this is what's left.

She seems determined to get it home.

Maggie is happy to be climbing trees

Molly seems to want to climb the tree too

today - lots of melting snow

All the best!♥︎