Still Knitting

After finishing the two scarfs with the Celtic pattern for Christmas presents I am back to knitting washcloths. I tried a new pattern and after some problems it is going quite easy now. The problem was that the pattern is written for the US knitting technique, I use a completely different one. Once I realized that I found a much simpler way of doing "yarn forward". :) Here is what they look like:

Christmas Cards 2007

Today I made 33 Christmas cards. :) The only materials I bought for them this year was the blue fabric with the Holy Family print and some plain cards and envelopes when they were 50% off. I had a bit of a problem with the craft glue, the stick did not stick so I had to re-glue a batch of cards, the liquid glue oozed, that's why there are extra stars on some of my cards.

Back to Sewing

I joined Apron Swap and this is what I made for my partner. I have never sewn an apron before and I hope she likes it and forgives the imperfections. The pattern is from The Paisley Pincushion and it was quite easy to follow. I am going to make one for myself too.

Sunrise

Monday

I am happy to report that my first ever sourdough bread turned out very well. I followed the instructions on this site and the result is very tasty.


I am beginning to ask myself why I have all these cookbooks when I mostly turn to the internet for recipes and inspiration these days. ;) Anyway, if I would have known that baking bread is really that easy I would have done it much sooner. My newly replenished sourdough starter is happily bubbling away, waiting to be turned into more yummy bread next week - I am going to try whole wheat flour this time.
I made a milk jug cover out of a doily by sewing some beads to the edge. It is much prettier than the cheesecloth I usually put over whatever I have fermenting at the moment.

Today I will start my gingerbeer plant and - hopefully - taste my new ginger ale, I changed the recipe a bit and I am curious to see how that turned out.
My roses are still blooming and every so often I cut one and put it in a vase on the mantle, they smell heavenly.

Handmade Gifts

Dawn over at By Sun and Candlelight is hosting the "Loveliness of Handmade Gifts" this week and since I just love handmade gifts I have to participate. :) I love giving and receiving handmade gifts whether they are practical or just fun. One of my goals for 2007 was to give handmade gifts as much as possible (some people are hard to make things for) and I think I did good so far. Here are some of the gifts I am making for Christmas, I can't tell whom they are for because most of the recipients might be reading this.
So, here we go.
One of my knitted dishcloths and the little tin will be filled with homemade ginger cookies (the recipient likes ginger):

A knitted washcloth and handmade soap:

Knitted scarves - the black one has the same pattern as the white one it just does not show up in the picture:

This is going to be a key-hole scarf for a friend, not quite finished yet ;):


I also bought a bunch of make-your-own-photo-calendars and plan to add pictures of Miss Kitty:


And this is the fabric I will be using for my Christmas cards this year:

Kitchen Experiments and a Baking Mishap

I have been playing around in the kitchen recently, trying new things. I made homemade cream cheese and I am very pleased with the result. I used store bought yogurt because I have not yet dared to try making my own. I followed Melanie's instructions and got a very nice and creamy cream cheese - move over Philadelphia! ;)


My other experiment turned out well too. I made homemade Ginger Ale following the instructions on this site. It is a bit too sweet for my taste but it can be watered down. My next batch I make with less sugar. I am also going to start a Ginger Beer Plant.


I also had a little mishap when baking Del's birthday cake. The recipe calls for 1 1/3 cups of water and just as I poured the last of the water into the batter I realized that I had measured out 2 1/3 cups of water. Oops! I did not want to waste all the ingredients that were already in the bowl so I just mixed it all well and poured it into a large pan and baked it. I expected it to turn out a bit pudding-like but it ended up as a moist and slightly springy cake.

Halloween

We had quite a few trick-or-treaters and almost ran out of candy. My luminaries worked out well, I used brown paper lunch bags from the dollar store and leftover sand from a repair project, instead of votive candles I used tea lights because I still have a big bag of them.

And this is poor Miss Kitty on the other side of the French doors wondering what she did to be locked out of the living room (she forgave us ;) ).

Taking it Easy

When I got up this morning it was freezing cold and dark. I had not slept well and felt stiff and tired so I decided to take it easy today and just sit on the sofa, watch old movies and knit. Once the sun came up I decided to wash and hang a load of laundry. Then I washed dishes and while doing so I noticed two bananas in the fruit bowl that were getting very ripe. So I decided to bake some banana muffins.


While I was at it I thought well, might as well bake some bread.


In between I re-arranged some stuff in the den and the dining room, folded laundry and re-organized a drawer in my dresser.
It is now almost 3 pm and I have not yet sat on the sofa and knit, but I feel a lot better. :)
Tomorrow I will make luminaries to place along the path to our front door for eventual trick-or-treaters. Since we are new to the neighborhood we have no idea if and how many there will be, but we are prepared. :)
I will also try to make ginger beer and cream cheese. I really hope I won't poison someone someday with my kitchen experiments but there are a lot of things I want to try.

Corners of my Home

Our house is by no means yet where I want it to be (it is getting there, but slowly, where did all that stuff come from?), but I managed to at least decorate the mantle a little bit for fall and hang some pictures.
I hung the perpetual calendar from the Schönbrunn Zoo in Vienna above the fireplace

and did a little Fall decorating on one end,

on the other end I put one of the roses from my garden and a glass container with sea shells I collected many moons ago during a trip to Scotland (they have survived several moves),

in the middle I put my two cat tea light holders (I use battery operated teal lights for safety) and my only reference to Halloween (a cat of course).

Washcloths, Soap and Fall Birthdays

I have been knitting a lot of dishcloths/washcloths recently and most of them are for sale in my Etsy shop. Some of them I decided to give as presents to friends and family. They looked so pretty, I decided the only thing missing is some homemade soap. Well, making soap is a bit complicated and at the time I am not equipped for it. But I bought some glycerin soap, purple die and soap molds at the hobby store (I used lavender oil that I already had for scenting) and now I at least have some handmade soaps to got with my washcloths. And I collected some of the pretty maple leaves off the trees in our front yard and made some birthday cards with them.

October Roses

About a week ago I noticed that the rose bush in my garden is in bloom. The previous owners of the house told us that it is a very old bush and that the roses smell heavenly and I agree. :) I cut a few of the heads and dried the petals. I had a pack of baby-shower-favor-bags and used them for the dried petals. They still smell good and make lovely little gifts. Here are pictures of some of the roses, you can see the rest of them here.

Miss Kitty

Miss Kitty gave us quite a scare Friday before last. In the morning she acted weird, agitated and confused, and she was obviously in pain. So we called the vet, packed her up and took her there. They suspected a bladder infection and told me that I had to leave her there because they needed to get an urine sample. That was really hard for me. Del had to go to work, the vet closes at 4.30 pm and I wanted my cat back. What am I doing? I still have a problem with asking people for help, probably because the people I used to know were not very helpful. I remembered our pastor telling me to call his mom whenever I needed a ride and so I did just that. She came and picked me up and we got Miss Kitty back in time. A big THANK YOU to Ms. Penny. :) I would not ask anybody to give a ride to the post office or to the store, but this was a real emergency and I did not feel quite so bad about it. Besides, I am always a total mess when something is wrong with my cat.
Kitty did have a bladder infection - the very first time in 13 years! The vet also told us that fleas are a really bad problem at the moment and that I should treat her. He also gave her a rabies booster shot which is required by state law in NC. And, best of all, I now have to give her medicine 2 times a day. Did I mention that she is not my best friend at the moment? But I am getting really good at it, as soon as she has eaten, I sneak up on her and squirt the medicine into her mouth. :) Afterwards she gets a treat.
She loves to be out in the mudroom by the back door, but I don't like to leave her there by herself because I don't know which way she'll run if somebody comes and opens the screen door. As a compromise I now let her be in the enclosed porch on the side of the house from which she also can watch all kinds of birds and animals, and get plenty of sunshine - provided the sun is shining. :)

Survived the Move!

Well, that is more than can be said about a few of our belongings. Unfortunately the biggest piece that did not survive was the glass top of our dining table. What should have been tempered glass burst into a million pieces when it slipped out of my husband's hands. Oh well, we decided to look for a used wooden table that would match the windsor chairs that were left for us by the previous owners. It will fit much better into the house than our dinette set would have.
I am - for the most part - finished with unpacking and I am now working on getting organized and keeping up with the daily chores.
I have been knitting a lot lately and I am currently working on Christmas and birthday presents. :-) I can't wait to get my sewing machine set up and start making curtains and other stuff for the house.
Miss Kitty is happy in her new house and has even allowed me to put her on a leash and take her into the garden.
Our biggest problem at the moment is that neither one of us is brave enough to go up the rather shaky ladder into the attic (which looks really nice from what I can see from down here). We have to find a solution for that problem soon, I want my dining room to be used as a dining room and not as storage for moving boxes (containing Christmas stuff and Del's train stuff).
Other than that we are doing well, recovering from colds and a bad fall Del took the day before the move, luckily he did not brake any bones, just had a big nasty scrape on his elbow.
BTW, does anyone have a use for lots and lots of slightly used moving boxes? ;)

Plans and Goals for 2007 - revisited

Before we start the next stage of our big adventure (moving into our own house - yeah!) I thought I go and check on how I have been doing with my goals for this year.

Personal Goals for 2007:

• Learn to drive.
• Nope, did not happen
  

• Find a church and attend regularly.
• Done. Became official members and really enjoy our new church family.
  

• Let go of what hurt me in the past and live the new life I came here for.
• Made really good progress on that one.
  

• Grow spiritually, continue on my journey to become a Christian.
• Getting there, meeting people who are much further along the way was a big help.
  

• Write a letter to my parents at the end of every month, complete with photos (whether they are interested in what we do or not).
• Did that and I am still doing it.
  

• Keep a journal (on paper).
• Did that until I hurt my right thumb and I am still having problems with hand writing.
  

• Find a balance between computer time and "real" time. ;)
• Not perfect yet, but getting better.
  

• Refresh my Spanish skills.
• No, that fell by the wayside.
  

• Read the Bible in one year.
• Not quite.
  

• Read at least one book per month.
• Did not do that. Too much else going on.
  

• Lose more weight.
• Not as much as I was hoping for, but it is still coming off. We put more weight (pardon the pun) on eating healthy than actively losing weight.
  

• Exercise regularly.
• Did good on that one before Summer got too hot, will pick it up again soon.
  

Crafty Goals for 2007:

• Finish my Women of the Bible Quilt (top at least), which means also staying with the study. I got behind a little but I am catching up now.
• Got behind on that one, will move it to next year.
  

• Work on my other sampler quilts: Civil War Diary Quilt, Sylvia's Bridal Sampler, Dear Jane
• I gave up on Sylvia's Bridal Sampler (due do something the author of the books said on her mailing list), made some progress on the Dear Jane quilt, none on the CWDQ
  

• Finish one UFO (unfinished object - as opposed to WIP - work in progress, stuff I actually work on, whereas UFOs are usually laying around in all states of incompletion) per month.
• Finished only two before other things came along.
  

• Make all my cards.
• I did that.
  

• Give hand-made gifts only (as much as possible)
• Did that one too.
  

• Finish all BOMs I started in 2006 (I am currently debating if I allow myself to start the new Debbie Mumm BOM).
• Did not start the new Debbie Mumm BOM but did not finish the other ones either.

Not all bad I'd say, considering that I did a lot more knitting and crocheting than sewing and I am quite pleased with the progress I made in my personal goals.

Yard Sale

Our church held a big yard sale on Saturday and it was a wonderful and perfectly timed chance for us to get rid of some stuff before we move. They day started out humid, dark and foggy but later it became sunny and breezy. We did really well at the sale. Our main goal was getting rid of things, not making money, that was just a nice added extra. :) I decided to offer the rest of the Nascar stuff, that was not stolen in the break-in for sale and donate the money to the Victory Junction Gang Camp. I sold almost everything and made $67,-. :)
We sold almost all of the other stuff as well and even gave away two boxes of stuff for free. The only things that did not sell was my coffee mugs. I only sold one with a picture of two cats on it (the people who bought it, have cats that look just like the ones on mug) and a set of 4 mugs from the 70s with big red numbers on them.
It was fun to watch the different types of buyers, the yard sale pros who come early and bring a bag of change, the people who hope to find a gold watch for a dollar and those who come late and hope for price reductions. I quite enjoyed haggling and making deals with some people.
The fee for the table and the money from the bake sale and breakfast and lunch goes to our youth group to help with expenses for a trip to a conference in Florida.
All in all it was a very enjoyable day, even though I ended up with a sunburn on my nose, top of my head and arms. :) (I also knitted two dishcloths during the sale).
And I was a really good girl, I only spent $2,-! I bought a cute quilt block pin and a thermos jug for serving coffee to our helpers for the move on Saturday.