A New Collar

The second clue for the Gnome Mystery Knit Along was released recently and now the hat is made.

The hat is finished with a cute little leaf (seems to be a theme...).

I finished spinning the sock yarn I made with some raw fleece that I had cleaned, dyed and carded.

I started a pair of toe-up socks. The pattern is Plain Sight by Lisa K. Ross - from the newest issue of Knitty (a free online knitting magazine).

Our little outdoor friend got a new collar this week-

she is trying to back out of her Elizabethan collar

Since she seems to be here to stay we decided to take her to the vet - she has had her shots, been spayed and tattooed. She has adapted really well to being inside and has turned out to be such a nice, easy going cat (if you had told me that two weeks ago I would never have believed you). She loves watching TV - especially hockey, also might be addicted to the iPad, and loves sitting on laps. Our children had hamsters and fish when they were younger but this is our first pet that walks around the house - she is quite entertaining.

bird watching

Renovations are in full swing at our house (as you can see from the photos new floors are going to be put in - hardwood instead of laminate and vinyl flooring). My son made little steps out of the boxes for the cat to look out of the window since she wasn't supposed to jump.

All the best!♥︎

Year in Review

The start of the new year is the right time to look back at the past year and to make plans for the new year.

At the beginning of last year I thought I would try to blog once a week since I hadn't been blogging much (I find that it is a good place for me to keep track of things that I make.) I thought that I would last  a couple of months, hoped I would last one, and I can't believe that I blogged every week for a whole year! Only one week was a prescheduled post because I was going to be out of town. Once again I hope to keep it up this year.

I made a few big projects last year that I am really proud of, two of them involving wool that I was given from a local farmer (they were destined for the composter). I washed, combed, spun and dyed about 5 raw fleeces (some fleeces yielded more than others).

I crocheted a Granny Stripe blanket with two of the fleeces. This was my first major crochet project, and the first wool blanket I have made.

I wove fabric and made a garment with another raw fleece (handspun tunic). I hope to do it again this year.
I also started sewing garments (with commercial fabric) this year which I hope to keep up (I love sewing and don't really need more quilts).

I pieced a couple of quilt tops and lots of quilt blocks, but only finished one quilt this past year. It has to be one of my favourite quilts (the latest one always seems to be).

The biggest change that we had this year is that we bought a farm. Living in a rural setting is wonderful!

There is about 6 months of snow a year where we live, being out here has made us all really enjoy winter. There is so much more for us to do than just going for a walk around the block. It will be interesting to see what the warm weather brings us too.

A more recent thing that has happened is that we seemed to have been adopted by a cat-

She has always been around since we moved here (shy at first), we just assumed she was one of the neighbours (one 1/2 a mile away and the other about 1 mile away, the previous owners never mentioned a cat). Around Christmas we didn't see her for about a week, she was always very thin but came back even thinner. We watched her stalking birds - unsuccessfully (a black cat isn't very camouflaged when her surroundings are all white), plus it  was very cold, so we decided to let her live in the garage (there was a cat/dog flap in the door already, a couple of us are allergic to her otherwise she would probably be in the house).

Even before we fed her and gave her a warm bed she would follow us on walks - she seems better than a dog at staying close. She is still very leery of us, but is free to come and go.

As for my plans for this year, since we downsized our home it has made me reevaluate what I make, although a life time of being a maker is a hard thing to change.
I would like to experiment more with spinning, especially with raw fleece.

I'll finish with a couple of snow pictures (since it seems to change every day).

the snow was amazingly sparkly 

partridge tracks

All the best!!♥︎