Black Friday On the Needles

I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving.  My husband and I have so much to be thankful for and we try to discuss that often, not just on Thanksgiving!

Have you seen these cute little solar toys?  I just love them.  I found this turkey while I was in Florida visiting my brother.  His little wings flap and his head bobs-so fun.  They are from a dollar store.  My brother has quite a collection but I have a hard time finding them here in Phoenix.

I have been knitting quite a bit and my fingers are letting me know it is time to take a break.  I am about 1/2 way finished with this cowl/scarf for my niece.  It is a free pattern from Ravelry, Irish Mesh Cowl.  I bought this yarn on line from a destash sale.  It is Herschners sock yarn, Tweed Twilight.  It is soft and thin, I think it will make a great cowl/scarf but I don't think it would be suitable for socks.  I have plenty so I think I will try some fingerless gloves or a hat too.

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Needle Friday 11/22/2013

I'm trying to catch up with my posts.  We returned last night from Florida where we were visiting my brother and his wife.

I crocheted these two spool doilies while I was visiting.  The purple one was for my SIL and the orange one for our friend, Donna.  The pattern is Shelvy's Spool Pin Doily from Bonnie Hunter's website.
I used these bonbons from Lion Brand.  I also got the variegated yarn to try too.  I purchased it all in Florida at Joann's

Here is my finished Coco's Pearls cowl/scarf (free pattern on Ravelry) that I made for my niece.  I used City Tweed yarn from KnitPicks which is a lovely soft yarn.  The photo does not do the yarn or the pattern justice.

I am also working to finish this pair of socks.  This is a Lion Brand Yarn-Sock Ease and so far I am not real pleased with it.  The yarn splits and seems on the thin side.  I was making them for a gift but I will keep them and see how they hold up after a few wearings and washings.  

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Design Wall Monday

I was at a group retreat the weekend before last.  We had such a good time and everyone accomplished so much.  I have been going on retreats with this group for 10 years and I cherish my quilting friends.

This year we have been working on a mystery quilt.  Three of us worked on the last clues at the retreat. This one is mine and the colors are brighter then this photo shows.  This is a large lap size.  There are more borders in the mystery to make the quilt a twin.  I haven't decided if I am going to stop here or make it a twin.  I like the mystery's additional borders so maybe I will expand the quilt-time will tell.

 This bright one is Cheryl's.  She did not intend to make a Christmas quilt but it certainly could be one.  She put smaller borders on it in an attempt to make it less Christmasy.

 This one is Joanne's and the photo does not do it justice.  These are all batiks.  She was short on material to make the last two borders and was going to see if she could get more.  If not, she had enough fabric to piece the last two borders.

I will try to remember to post the finished products and the other members tops when I see them.

I also worked on my UFO from 2005 but I apparently forgot to take pictures.  I will try to work some more on it and get a picture for next Monday's report.

Here are some of the other projects being worked on:

I am lucky to have such talented friends.

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Design Wall Monday

I have been rummaging around in my UFO box for 2 projects to take to Quilt Retreat this coming weekend.  My group is headed out on Thursday for another great weekend!  We are lucky to have a wonderful place to go, Tonto Rim View Lodge.  Ron and Maggie treat us so well and make us feel very comfortable.  We were there last March and we were snowed in for a while-coming from Phoenix, we all enjoyed the change.  

I found this UFO that I had completely forgotten about it.  It was a block of the month from our locally owned Craftmart (like a Ben Franklin).  Unfortunately, they went out of business about 10 years ago.  So, I guess this UFO has aged enough.  There were 6 different blocks and each block had 2 choices, an easy block and a more challenging block.  My friend and I were going to do this together.  She lost interest early on and gave me her blocks.  Actually I think she gave me her kits and I made all the blocks myself.  Since there were variations for each block, I made each variation so it looks like 12 different blocks.  

They are already put together in a staggered arrangement that I copied from a tile floor layout.  Even with the additional plain blocks, the quilt is small.  I have lots of fabric left over so this weekend, I will be adding multiple borders.  I have Judy L's border book all packed and ready to help me complete this quilt top.

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On the needles

I have two projects underway.  More socks-these are pretty pink ones for a friend.  This is Lion Brand Sock-Ease yarn which I haven't used before.  It is soft to use and feels nice.  I'm using my old stand by pattern, Simple Skyp, free on Ravelry.

I am also working on a cowl for my niece, Tara.  Tara lives in Brooklyn and can use some warm outer ware.  She wears lots of black.  This is Knit Picks yarn in City Tweed.  It is a soft yarn in a soft grey with bits of brown and beige woven in. The pattern is CoCo's Pearls by Lovely Little Knits, a pattern on Ravelry.  The pattern is pretty simple but I found it was even easier after I added stitch markers every 20 stitches.  

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