I Have Been Remiss in my Posting Duties

It's true. I'm sorry. I've been busy. Reeeeeeally busy, I swear.

So, in no particular order, here's what I've been up to.

1. Taking up the most time of late is my class reunion. I'm making Powerpoint presentation/slideshow/multimedia extravaganza for it, and it's taking up all my computer time these days, not to mention four separate computers to pull it together.

I'm also making up some "interactive decorations" as well. I'm going to put display boards around the hall with things like trivia games, matching games, and nonsense like that.

And finally, I'm collecting questionnaires from my classmates about what's been going on in the last 20 years and I'm reformatting them with my printshop program to make a yearbook of sorts of the event.

Oh, and I'm making the award certificates for the evening as well. It's a lot of work. And I spend all morning, every morning, working on the stuff.

2. I have a two craft fairs sandwiching my reunion. My first is this coming Saturday, so my afternoon time, when I'm done on the computer, is taken with knitting, washing, blocking, finishing, and tagging. Occasionally, I spin a bit. But my ankle still hurts and common sense tells me not to do it. But still, I persist. Only I take more frequent and longer breaks, and I put myself on a spinning time limit.

3. Okay, it's really those two things. But summer is the peak social season and it seems like every weekend and several weeknights are filled with places that one or more of us needs to be. So far there have been three birthday parties, a baby shower, four class meetings and one field trip to the function hall to check things out and shore up the details. Not to mention random cookouts, day trips, and other assorted meetings and the like. I really should make it a point to blog something everyday so that I don't get so behind on things that I can't remember what I've done and therefore have no details for you. It sucks, I know.

4. And Harry Potter came out Saturday. His timing couldn't have been worse. Mr. Poops went to Concord at midnight to pick up my reserved copy. I started reading it before breakfast. I read for an hour before taking a break for brekkies and to go up and see Sister who has been in Phoenix for a week. And dad. He's been making me mitten trees for my craft fair displays. I can't wait to show them off--they're awesome! I promise lots of fair pictures this year!

Anyway, after visiting for a bit, I went back to the house. I read, had lunch, and read straight through the afternoon until I finished the book a bit after 6. I was not disappointed. I was quite satisfied with how things worked out for the most part. Only one part bothered me a bit, but all in all, a good and satisfying read. And now I can get back to work without distractions.

5. How about some pictures? Eye candy for you! First up: yarn porn!

This is what my lovely secret pal Mandy sent me in my first package! A skein of Noro Kureyon with the prettiest colors I've yet seen in a skein of Noro. It's got a taupy-tan color with berry pink, bright pink, lime green to sage green and some gold and yellow, and my description's not doing it justice, but when it's knitted up you'll see how purty it is. And there's a Lantern Moon sheep tape measure. The tape comes out of his butt! And a package of size 5 dpns by Crystal Palace, my absolute favorite bamboo needles. I use size fives all the time...they're my Mitten Needles of choice and needless to say, they go astray from time to time. I'm enjoying my new set immensely! And she also sent two drawing pads and some colored pencils for the girls which they are also enjoying quite a lot, which is why they didn't even stick around long enough for the picture.

Some new spin! This is merino from handpaintedyarn.com. It's really easy to spin--look how skinny I made it! It's a first for me to get yarn this fine. The pencil is there for reference. I'm insanely proud of this! Takes forever to fill a bobbin though.

This one is a bit harder to spin evenly for me, but I like it. It's superwash something or other in Lagoon Blue, which is a lovely bright turquoise. It's smooth and very slippery to work with, but I've got it pretty thin here and the sheen on it is just amazing--silklike, in fact.

I am inordinately proud of these little bags. Sorry the picture is so fuzzy. They're meant to be change purses. I started with the striped teal one on the upper right. Here's what happened: I bought my SP a kit for a wee felted change purse. I took a peek at the directions and immediately thought to myself, "Well, that's the hard way to do that!" (Honestly, they want you to knit the front and back separately, seam the bottom and sides, and then pick up stitches for the top flap? Why would you do that? I knit it in the round from the bottom which was later seamed, and ended with the flap. I think I could make it completely seamless if I started with the flap and did a three needle bind-off at the bottom.)

But I digress. I liked my version so much better that I started playing with the stitch counts and this is what happened. The first one, the teal one, is rectangular. And I felt that their flap was a tad short and the top didn't pull in enough to be covered by the aforementioned inferior flap. So with the coral one, purse number two at the upper left of the photo, I knit it longer so that it would be squarer. And the flap is longer and the top pulls in a bit so that the opening is covered completely by the flap. This one just seemed to lend itself to a long cord so that it could be worn over the shoulder, so I gave it one. I've made two more with this same pattern and I really like it quite a lot.

Which brings me to the three bottom purses. I started to toy with making the bottom of the purse angle in a bit. I did that, knit it straight up to the top and brought the top in a bit like I did on the coral bag, then knit the flap. Well, when I felted it, it was round! And red! Like an apple! So I felted a leaf, and put a wee brown stem loop for carrying, and the button that holds it shut is a ladybug! Love it! And the final one there in the middle is the basic round purse shape but with a felted pink flower with a felted leaf and the middle of the flower is a buttonhole. I consider myself very clever for making these.

Finally for today, just a couple more pair of mittens. The lighting is insufficient in here at the moment. The pair on the right are the ones that were on the needles a few posts back. Well, they're done. And the pair on left is brown with a colorwork band just above the thumbs in a purple that's the color of black raspberry ice cream with some heathered tan as well.

Tomorrow: the strawberry tea cozy and two mini bags. Maybe more. You'll have to wait and see!