Small accomplishments.

This has been a week for finishing projects.  First, the wee green cardigan for a friend's cleaning lady:

When my friend noticed the lady is pregnant, she offered (through an interpreter, because my friend does not speak Spanish, despite being a native Texan and Dallasite!) to knit something, and the lady asked for a sweater, which my friend does not do.  So my friend offered a blanket and booties.  When I heard this, I thought that I'd knit a sweater, especially to try a pattern.  The teddy bear buttons make it supercute.  The cleaning lady chose the colour because she doesn't know if it is a boy or girl.  They don't know it's coming - the sweater, I mean!

This is the Yoked Cardigan and I may knit an adult size for me.

Next, my current carry-around hat, a simple 3x3 rib in leftover chunky superwash yarns:

I knit the first row when I changed colours, to
smooth out the transitions.  3 rows each.

And the second strip for an afghan, probably a donation to Warm Up, America!

That may not look like a small thing, but there wasn't much left to finish on the second strip.

I started the shawl I am planning to wear in Paris in May:

It's the Tour Eiffel Shawl out of a miniskeins pack from Destination Yarns of their multicoloured "Paris" colourways.  There isn't enough yarn for the full shawl, so I will do as much as I can.  Maybe in Paris I will buy enough yarn for the whole shawl.  The pattern requires attention so it's not something I can carry around, at least not yet.  I'll see once I get past the startup section.

Not so cocky.

I ended up entering four items in the Carolina Fiber Fest competitions, and only one received a ribbon - third place for the Camellia Cardigan.

    

Brown Sheep Sunflower pattern.

   

Above is the bamboo sunhat I crocheted for myself while on the trip last summer.  Handy because it stuffs into a pocket but covers my face and neck well.

Mittens of Knitting Buddha handspun yarn.

  

No feedback on any of the items so I don't know why the others didn't place, or why the cardigan scored so low.  Now I don't know if I'll try entering it into the State Fair in the fall.  I guess I was too used to scooping up ribbons on everything I entered in the Berlin Fair in Connecticut, and last year getting a Second Place ribbon on the item I quickly crocheted to have something to enter.

I looked at most of the other items, although only with eyes.  These I thought interesting:

My Niece #2 and I wandered around to look at everything; she achieved much inspiration but no yarn.  She surprise purchased a t-shirt for me, and I purchased some cute stitch markers for her.  She did some more wandering while I helped to staff the guild table:

Jane at the booth.  Items made by Guild members.

In addition we celebrated my mother's birthday and after the festival closed my parents and I went to the North Carolina Opera's 15th Anniversary Gala.  Today was much quieter overall, just the cinema class and online fiber groups, since we had waves of storms wash through, complete with thunder and tornado warnings.

Mustard Museum Memory

In 2015-2016 I lived in Middleton, Wisconsin for a time.  I enjoyed being there but as often happens in my life, work had other ideas.  One of the things I enjoyed, too briefly, was the National Mustard Museum.

I still have this - he is a much better option than most candidates!

As a mustard lover, I eagerly volunteered to be one of their tasters for the annual championships, held on on this date in 2016.  They asked what we preferred, and because I tolerate hot and spicy well, those were some of the options provided to me:

The samples of HOT PEPPER mustards came with
cups of yoghurt to cool the palate.

Most of the mustards came with water and pretzels to cleanse the palate, except for the HOT pepper ones shown above, and two others:  the dressings arrived with celery sticks and the deli mustard came with small pieces of rye bread and corned beef.  I did not get to sample those, but I did get one bite of leftover rye bread and corned beef.

They also had samples of foods made with mustard, and recipe cards to take home:

Because I am allergic to chocolate I didn't try the brownies, although others said they were surprisingly good.  (Who knew there is chocolate mustard?)  I definitely love the jalapeño deviled eggs.  [As a side note, a friend posted a photo of deviled eggs with the caption: "It's called 'deviled eggs' because the voices whisper & make you eat 25 of them."]

I visited the rest of the museum, and its shop, although it was too crowded for many good pictures.  I ended up with just a bad one:

There are several cabinets displaying mustards from all over
the world - Japan, Sweden, South Africa, New Zealand, etc.

The museum included a number of items of punny decoration:

A peek at spring.

I was finally able to take a proper walk - between weather, travel, and work, I haven't had much time to do so.  I did walk over 14,000 steps more last week than in previous weeks, no surprise given the walking I did at the North Texas Irish Fest!

Spring is starting to appear hereabouts:

Yesterday I took a class to learn how to make fused glass items.  It is in a local gallery and there are many items for sale, and the teacher said that some of their students have graduated to being artists in the gallery.  In this class, after learning how to cut the glass, and the different types of glass to use, we were set free to make our own designs:

My initial setup.  I took a photo before moving the items off the
base glass, because everything has to be cleaned before you can
stick it together for the firing, and I wasn't sure I would remember
the way I envisioned the pieces working together.

These are all the pieces students made, plus one by
a student from a previous class who wanted it fused
further.  You can "tack" which leaves texture, or you
can "full fuse" which melts anything into a smooth
piece.  I chose full fuse for my piece.

The final piece going into the kiln.  My vision is sun and sky;
we'll see how much it resembles this after it is fired.

I will go back in two weeks to pick up my piece, and I probably will sign up for open studio sessions to make more.  The instructor is there on Wednesday evenings and Saturday afternoons for classes or open studio time.  Since my parents don't need quite as much of my time, now that the main part of the books have been cleared (Mom delivered eight or nine cartons of books in German and about Germany to a university programme this week), I can pop out for a session once or twice a month, and still keep Sundays free for my own activities.

Today that involved a lot of cleaning and organizing, some vacuuming, un-gunking a drain, and putting out the trash and recycling bins.  So exiting!  I also watched my congregation's Purim Spiel online, and have been working on the hat I am trying to finish so I can enter it at the Carolina Fiber Fest.  Deadline to register something is Tuesday and they have to be delivered Thursday night or Friday morning; it will have to be the former, given my work schedule right now.

As always in March

At the beginning of the week, FitBit gave me another badge, which made me feel a little less like a lump.  I've struggled a couple of days to meet the 10,000 steps challenged, and to move each hour.

At the end of the week, I headed to Dallas:

Once again, as a manager in Performer Products, although if the other manager had been able to attend, I would have shifted to being a swing volunteer and supported many other areas.  I did volunteer for the Fun Run - not as a runner, of course (although they offer a "Zero-K" option for people who just want swag) but handing out packets and personning the bag check.

This year I also received a medal.

So these are photos of the masks I wore during the trip, since mostly I take and post videos that allow my mother and others to experience the event.

I also wore appropriate socks, such as these on Friday for the opening of NTIF:

Fiberuary - Week 4

 

Day 22 - On The Road

My mother had surgery on Friday, and I went to pick her up on Thursday.  That's my current "car scarf", a simple item (sometimes a "car hat") that I can work on while waiting, or taking into a location in case there is a queue.  The one shown is now finished and I have started another.  I didn't notice until looking at the photo later that the house flag is nicely framed above my knitting.

Day 23 - Self Care

I wanted to have a photo of one of my favourite shawls, but didn't take one before going to my parents' house (I stayed through the weekend to help them while my mother recovered) so had to make do.  It's crocheting and knitting and a wee bottle of a really nicely scented hand lotion, which is the "self care" part, especially as the yarn I am knitting is a scratchy wool.

Day 24 - Memories

Top right is an afghan crocheted by the great-grandmother I never knew, and which I repaired many years ago.  It's very heavy, single-crocheted wool in panels with a lacy connecting stitch.  Bottom right is the aran-style blanket my grandmother knitted.  At left is the last gift I made for her, a lap blanket that I gave to my grandmother on her final birthday.

Day 25 - Handmade Gift

Technically, many gifts - I have a friend who loves to knit socks, and for many years she gave me a pair each year.  These are not all the ones she made for me, just the ones I could grab most quickly when I had a few minutes today to take the photo.

Day 26 - Where in the World

Some of my yarny souvenirs from travels - Argentina, Austria, France, Germany.  Possibly others, I would need to check notes from past trips.  I couldn't quickly locate yarn from New Zealand, and I didn't buy any in Thailand (although I did knit a scarf on that trip that I treasure as a memory), and there are some other yarns that became items I did not include.

Day 27 - Sip and Stitch

Too late I realized I should have taken a photo of my knitting with the drink (tonic water) I was sipping on my flight to Dallas.  Sip & Stitch at 37,000-ish feet up!  This was after I landed, and settled in "my" room at the friends' house where I usually stay when visiting.  They stock Diet Dr. Pepper® for me.

Day 28 - Gratitude

Two friends donated lots of yarn of all kinds to the Urchin Street area at North Texas Irish Festival, with the only requirement that none of it returns home.  The ladies in charge were delighted to receive it and to pose for a photo that I posted so my friends (who could not attend this year) could experience their gratitude.

That concludes my Fiberuary for 2025.  Will I do it next year?  Maybe.  It was a nice distraction this year.  But it's also a challenge - I know, that's the idea - to find a subject each day.

Fiberuary - Week 3

 

Day 15 - Cozy Corner

This is Judy's sunroom.  I thought it makes a perfect location for "cozy", with the addition of crocheted (not by me) afghans and a mug of tea, and my knitting.

 

Day 16 - Reading/Watching

I knit while watching the opening of the Maria C. Vallejo Lace Collection, and during class (but no photos), and then knitted and read on my flight home.

Day 17 - Monochromatic

I almost forgot to take a photo, then thought I might have to re-use something and I want these to be unique as much as possible.  As I was trying to find something else I noticed the piece of felted wool I'd purchased at last year's Carolina Fiber Fest, to use for shoe insoles and padding.

Day 18 - Twos Day

Photo shows the in-progress scarf to match a hat I knit last year.  I had two skeins of yarn in different colourways and decided to work them into a set.  First the wedge hat, and the rest for a scarf.  I tried to do a scarf in wedges also, but it was more of a challenge than I felt like managing.  So I changed to this pattern, in which I started with one colour, added the second, and when the first colourway ran out, finished with the second.  Bottom photo shows the finished set, which I didn't complete on Tuesday.

Day 19 - Wear It Wednesday

It was a cold and snowy day, so wearing a thick handknit sweater was perfect.  I've seen baby and toddler sweaters with the leaf pattern at the yoke and wanted one in a grownup size.  When I found one, I was very happy that some well-aged yarn in my stash would work nicely.  Lower photo is a better one of the sweater; in the selfie I am at the storm door but the glare prevents you from seeing the snow.

Day 20 - Fiber Friends

I have many photos of people I met through fiberarts, and groups and events I have attended.  Many are just of two of us; this is of the DFW Fiber Fest board and guest teachers from 2011.

Day 21 - Now & Then

The Sock Yarn mittens that were in one of my first blog posts also appear in the "Favourite Things" photo for Day 13.  One has a moth hole I need to repair.