Little red Christmas Sweater

Christmas eve and still knitting.

I was inspired by a workshop I took at the Knitting Retreat last November at Bedford Springs Resort. Kathy Zimmerman had us knit three lace edges for scarves and shawls. We started with the lace edge and went from there. This is the bell ruffle knitted in reverse on the edge of a little sweater. I am knitting it out of worsted weight washable merino, #8 ndls. It is for a one year old little girl.

The sweater is knit top down without reading pattern, just making it up as I knit, the beginning is similar to a sweater I knit several years ago as a store sample. I had to rip it back a couple times but I enjoyed the knitting. I like how this ruffle edge looks. Thank you Kathy for the inspiration. We talked about the possibility of knitting this on an edge in reverse and I was happy to find that it was not hard to figure it out by just knitting backwards. I decreased the purls to two between the bells to get the bells to stand out more in the last row before casting off.

Now I need to pick up and finish the sleeves. I am considering a few bells on the sleeves edges. What do you think? Email me if you want to help me decide. I have to stop knitting and wrap gifts for tomorrow morning so I will not work on this again till Sunday.


Have a great holiday!

May everything you knit and give as a gift this season find a home with someone that appreciates your efforts and enjoys wearing lovely hand knitted things.

Nancy

Hats at the Pottery Dome

My hand knit hats are at The Pottery Dome just 2 miles West of the Grove City Outlets. Hours: Tuesday - Saturday 10 - 5 and Sunday 1 - 5 phone 724-748-5001 www.PotteryDome.com
This is a wonderful gallery with beautiful handmade pottery and glass by talented local craftsman. I will have my handspun knitted items displayed there thru the winter. This is a great opportunity for me to get my stuff out were folks can find it. I have been making and selling hand knit hats and handspun yarn for over 20 years in the Mercer - Grove City community and I know some folks will be happy to know that they can still purchase these items from me. I still love making them and am grateful to Lois Hamilton for letting me put them out at the Pottery Dome.

Knitting another Tie Shawl

I started another Danish style Tie Shawl over the Holidays. It is a perfect project to carry along to knit in the car. This one is on #9 needles, the yarn is a soft rose pink, Merino Frappe from Crystal Palace. I cast on 12 sts and knit 10 rows then picked up 5 on each edge to begin the shawl. This shawl has a wider panel down the middle (12 sts. ) with a cable chain running down the center panel. My previous versions had only 4-6 stitches in the center. This is my 6th tie shawl and it is for me to wear over the Holidays. The #9 needles will knit up quickly. This pattern will work with any size needle or weight of yarn. My first version was knit on a size 2 needles with fingering weight yarn. It is still my favorite. The key to the pattern is to increase 6 stitches every other row to create the wide round shape that will wrap around your body. There are two increases on each edge and two in the center one on each side of a center panel. I love knitting this shape of shawl. My next tie shawl might be knit with lace weight yarn and mostly seed stitch with perhaps a lace border. I have a lot of lace weight kid mohair yarn in my stash that is waiting to be knit. I will wait till after Christmas to knit it. I like to plan my next projects while I am finishing the one I am knitting. The possibilities are endless. Making the right choices takes time and l lot of planning. Some project will remain in the planning stage for months before I find the right yarn and stitch pattern to proceed.

I love knitting and wearing this type of shawl. It is perfect for keeping the chill off my shoulders around the house. Once the shawl is tied on it feel like a vest and is very comfortable to wear in the kitchen and doing chores around the house. I can see why it was popular with working women a hundred years ago. You will see ladies wearing these shawls in kitchens and in the market place in old period movies like Weathering Heights and Jane Austin films.


Below is the sample version of the Traditional Tie Shawl I knit for my workshop at Knitters Fantasy in OHIO last April. It fits perfectly on this doll. I will knit a couple more of these for Teddy Bears. This would make a nice gift for a little friend.


Well Thanksgiving is over and I have a lot knitting to finish for the Holiday Gift Season. I finished three pair of socks and have a forth pair with both socks on circular needles knit past the heels so they will be done soon.

I found homes for two of my kittens. I placed posters with pictures in several stores around Mercer and Grove City. We still have three kittens that need a home. One black female and two grey males. The kittens were born on Sept.3 and are ready to go. Please if you know anyone that would like a free kitten please call me. my cell: 724-877-1082 The kittens are litter trained and very sweet and loving. They purr all the time. I wish I could keep them but 4 inside cats is really two more than I should have. I hope I can find a home for these little guys I would hate to have to put them back outside with the strays for the winter. The kittens are confined to my bathroom for the time being. I posted pictures on my previous post. I will email pictures if you want to see more. my email: spinningotter@gmail.com I will even deliver them to your home if its within 20 miles of Mercer.

5 Kittens looking for a home

I have 5 lovely kittens that need a home before winter. I cannot keep them I have way too many to care for. I have cared for them and played with them every day so they will make someone a loving pet. call my cell: 724-877-1082 or 724-662-0271

Knittreat at Bedford Springs Nov.5-8 2009

I am still unpacking from the Knittreat at Bedford Springs Resort. Above is the hall outside of the classroom where I taught spinning.
This is a view of one of the cozy areas in the lobby where knitters gathered to knit after dinner.

What a wonderful experience. Great food, an elegant environment, beautiful weather and four days of spinning and knitting with inspiring teachers. I had a wonderful time. Below is a view of knitting friends in the lobby from the stairs above. I wish I had more pictures of the exterior of the beautiful historic hotel.

Knitting and gardening

This is a detail of a scarf patten I am designing for a friend to make kits for selling her alpaca yarn.

I am still out here. I have not posted in awhile. I completed two pair of socks, two scarves, 10 hats, Three felted cat beds, a shawl and several skeins of handspun yarn in the past couple months. I did a program for the Butler spinners and weavers last wednesday, Friday I met with my knitting group and yesterday I met with knitting and weaving friends at Munnell Run Farm for our Mercer Guild meeting. So why have I not taken the time to post pictures of my work? I keep meaning to do it but the time just flies by.

October has been cooler than normal and the cool rainy days do not inspire me to go outside and finish up cleaning up my garden to get ready for winter. I am still picking a cup of red raspberries every day. We may have a frost tonight. A frost may stop the raspberries if it is severe. The raspberries can handle a light frost. I have several house plants that will need to come inside tonight. I just looked at the weather forcast and there will be only one day without rain with partial sun and a high of 50 in the next 10 days. This is discouraging. I need more good sunny days in the 60s to get outside and work in my garden.

Chautauqua-Lecture-RobertTherman

Garden Club Picnic at DJ's

Last night the Mercer Garden Club had their summer picnic in DJ's Garden. We had a heavy rain storm that quit just before the picnic. The air was fresh smelling and the flowers were beautiful. The temp cooled down and the sun came thru briefly. It was an enchanted evening in a beautiful garden with friends and way toooo much excellent food. I am glad I was there to be in the moment. I love being out in a garden after a rain. This was a perfect evening and everyone seemed to enjoy being there.

Mercer Spinners and Weavers Guild August 8 2009

Yesterday our Buy, Sell, Swap or Trade Meeting turned out to be a huge success. We only had 5 members of our guild show up but we had lots and lots of folks come from other Knitting and Weaving groups. We had a full house. It was so exciting to see so many people. There was a group of knitters that work together in Grove City. There were a couple car loads of knitters from the Cranberry Knitters Group. A Weavers Group from Erie, Edinboro and Greenville stopped by to visit. There were knitters from Mercer, Sharon and Hermitage that used to shop at Otter Creek. There was a couple folks that Judy met at a recent show where she was spinning. I wish I had counted or taken some pictures but I was too busy talking to think about it. We probably had 40 to 50 people come.

There was wonderful food for the pot luck picnic lunch. I really enjoyed meeting new fiber arts folks and making new friends. Several folks join our club. Everyone had a great time sharing good food and there was lots of laughter. I hope we see some of these folks again. If you were there and happen to read this. Thank you for coming. Please come again. Email me and I will send you our next guild newsletter.

Summer Knitting and Natural Dyed Yarn

Every year the Mercer Spinners and Weavers Guild gets together at the end of the summer for a natural dye workshop. It is an exciting day. Everyone brings a pot of some natural dye they have cooked up. Folks bring yarn, roving and loose fibers for spinning. We usually have a variety of pots to choose from. Last year I put rubber bands on skeins of natural undyed wool sock yarn and dipped this yarn into three different pots. The last pot was indigo and that is how I got the blue green spots along with the yellow and orange. The yellow was marigold and the orange jewelweed. If you would like to join us in dyeing this year check out our Guild Newsletter by clicking on the link on the right of this page.

I started another Danish Tie shawl. This is the 4th one. I am using #6 needles and a sock weight yarn that I had dyed at our Natural Dye Workshop August 2008. I really enjoy knitting and wearing these tie shawls. This one will be machine washable and light enough for a summer evening. I will post a picture of it when I finish. I am using a contrasting blue green sock yarn to add narrow stripes. The color matched the blue green indigo spots and I love to use up leftovers so I could not resist using these two yarns together. I don't know how many stripes I will get before I run out of this yarn. I may have to add another yarn to continue the stripes when I run out of this one. I am just going to go with it and see how it turns out.

Below is a picture of booties knit from the sole up. Beginning with tan suede yarn cast on 12 sts and knit a rectangle. Pick up stitches around the rectangle and knit 3 rows switch to the blue bunny hop yarn for the rest of the bootie The baby sweater under the booties was knit from Rowans All Seasons cotton a couple years ago and was used as a sample in my shop. A friend emailed me that her daughter just had a baby boy and I thought this little sweater would make a perfect gift. I made the booties to match. Now I need to locate some buttons before I mail this to Claire in Chicago.

Strawberries, Blueberries & Cherries

Its been a beautiful summer. I solved several problems I had been having in my garden by adding nutrients to my soil in the spring. I just finished picking strawberries and my freezer is filled with plenty for winter smoothies. I am so tired of them that I do not care to see another berry till next June. The berries lasted a whole month. Every day I was able to pick a quart or two. Now my sour cherries are ripe and next will be the blueberries, raspberries and blackberries. I found several ripe blueberries yesterday. So I will having berries for breakfast the rest of the summer. The raspberries will continue till late frost in October. I am still picking and giving lettuce away.

My roses were amazing this year. I have 20 Antique Cottage Garden Varieties.

Knitting continues also. I have one more sock to finish. I am about 1/2 was done with the underskirt of my Sasha Lace skirt. I hope to finish it by Christmas. There is a lot of knitting. With 4 lace pannels it is quite a challenge. I am knitting mine out of Sojabama instead of the Euro Flax Linen. I had the Sojabama left from store inventory. I am not about to go out and buy yarn. I wish I had saved some EuroFlax for this project but I sold all I had when I closed my shop. We have 24 knitters coming to the Friday afternoon knit in at Lake Latonka. Usually there are a dozen folks coming to a meet up.

My Cottage Garden 2009

I am trying to find homes for 6 kittens. Below is a picture on one kitten with Black Magic Woman. We call her Madge. She brought us one Mougie Main Coon Style Kitten about a month ago. This kitten is very shy.

Flowers and strawberries and kittens.

My Favorite Flowers for cut flowers Sweet Williams in my garden June 2009

Growing Lettuce in plastic storage boxes

For the past 7 years I have grown my salad greens in large storage boxes. The picture above is from last August with the mint growing up around the boxes.
The boxes have holes drilled into the bottom and about 4 inches up the side of the box.
I used foam peanuts on the bottom to save on potting soil. I filled the rest of the container with commercial soil for containers. Every year I add a little more compost and soil to the boxes.
One year I was so busy I did not pull out all my lettuce and let it go to seed. In the spring I found that little lettuce plants came up really early in March. All I needed to do was thin them out a bit and I had wonderful greens from May thru August. I let the lettuce seed itself on purpose the last two seasons. Here is a picture I just took o with my I phone. Notice the little red and green lettuce plants. Pictures below are from other years.

Last Summer


May 2008 the Strawberries are blooming.

Spring Socks and New Toes for Old Socks

Socks, socks and more socks I love knitting socks. The socks pictured above made out of Tofutsies. I have one sock finished and am working on the second. They were knitted toe up. I became bored with the random pattern of the Tofutsie yarn and started to add a dark blue cotton wool blend yarn that was left from the yarn I was using to repair the toes on my Koigu socks pictured below. I added the dark blue for the heel and two color design and stripes. I am doing a simple rippled stripes on the cuff ( two rows of knit+ three rows purl) with contrasting two yarns for the cuff. I always have a sock in my jacket pocket to work on when I have a free minute. I took my Tofutsie Socks to the dentist on Monday but did not get too much done. It is good to have something along just in case one has to wait for an appointment. I am always ready with a sock to knit on.

I started knitting these Hemp socks a couple years ago when the new Hemp Yarn came into my shop. I started with a garter stitch toe inspired by a Lucy Neatby video that I was playing in the shop. I left the socks partly done with the yarn to sell the hemp yarn as a sock yarn and several folks bought the yarn for socks. I never got around to making my socks. Last winter while going thru my UFOs from the store I came across these socks with the needles still in the yarn. Since I did not want to run out of the hemp yarn I added some left over dark green bamboo and nylon in dark green to the top of my sock. I finished one and was pleased with the results now I just need to get the second one finished I am ready to start adding the contrast dk green color in my second sock and the ball of yarn has gone missing. I hope my cat Bob gives it back soon or I happen to find where he has hidden it soon. I would like to have these sock finished and ready to wear to Knitters Fantasy on April 4. I will be teaching a class on Knitting a Danish Tie Shawl.


I love these old socks knit from soft Merino Koigu Wool Yarn.
The only problem is Koigu Yarn did not have Nylon in the yarn and I have worn out the toes and heels. The heels went first and were patched and replaced. Last winter I replaced one toe and I just finished replacing the other toe. I just cannot see throwing these socks out just because they are old. I have been wearing these for at least 5 years and with new toes I may get another season out of them.

Signs of Spring

The snow drops and crocus are blooming at my house. I took these pictures with my iphone on March 15.
I must remember to plant more snow drops next year. I got this little bunch in a garden club plant exchange last year. What a treat to see them. Simple pleasures are sometimes the best to ones spirits after a long cold winter.


Pictures I took yesterday afternoon. The first day I could be outside working in my garden. It was 53 out side.

Mercer Garden Club Field Trip to Phipps Conservatory Orchid Show

The orchid show at the Phipps this year was beautiful. Many beautiful orchids were blooming in the Phipps Orchid room this year. The special displays for the Orchid Show were outstanding. It was nice to see the glass sculpture that has been added to the Phipps Permanent Collection.

On Saturday two car loads of Mercer Gardeners headed to the city to see the Phipps Conservatory Orchis Show. We left Mercer at 9:00 and arrived at the Phipps at 10:15 . We toured the conservatory and met back at the Phipps Cafe at noon for lunch. To a slide show of pictures I took with my iphone at Phipps you can copy and past this address http://web.mac.com/ottercreek/iWeb/Site/Phipps%20orchid%20Show%20Feb.2009.html into your browser or click the link on the left of this page.
Diana took my picture with my iphone

E. Z. Surprise Baby Sweater

Over the years I have heard so much about Elizabeth Zimmermans Surprise Baby Sweater that I finally got a copy of the CD a couple weeks ago and kit the sweater. I could not understand why this pattern was so popular until I knit it. It is easy but also a challenge since it is knit in one piece from the top down. The way the sleeves go together is trueley unique. You have to knit one to understand.

It took me about three days to knit. I do not know how many hours at least 10. Since I used knit 200gms of yarn. 150 gms of Crystal Bamboozle 3 balls and I made the stripes from one 50g ball of Panda Cotton knit double stranded since it was fingering wt sock yarn. It worked fine. I had verry little yarn left over. less than a yard of each color. Both yarns have stretchie elastic quality. I knit the jacket on #8 needles beginning with 160 stitches. I figure if I add 12 stitches 4 to each section then it would come out bigger.

I suppose I could use bigger yarn and #10 needles to make a bigger jacket. I could try to felt it after knitting on the bigger needles. So many possibilities and so little time to knit. I took my finished sweater with me to visit Elizabeth for her knitting lesson on Tuesday. She wanted to knit one for her baby brother. We tried the one I made on him and found it to be too small. Francis will be 1 in March. So If I am to help Elizabeth make her sweater we will have to knit it a bit bigger.


I will be teaching the Danish Tie Shawl at Knitters Fantasy in April and I wanted to knit another Shawl before the event also. I should try to focus more. I have so many projects on needles. I should really be working on the shawl instead of this pattern. However this pattern fascinates me so I will start another sweater anyways.

My Third Tie Shawl Finished

I just finished my Noro Silk Garden tie shawl. I cast off my shawl with an applies i-cord edge. I then continued to add the icord ties. I love wearing this type of shawl. It is similar to a vest that crosses across your chest. It provides added warmth. You can move freely while wearing it and it looks good too.
I plan to put the shawl in the fashion show at the Pittsburgh Knit and Crochet Festival. If I get a picture of it on I will post it.

Sunrise on a New Day Jan 20 2009 Yes We Did!

Today is Inauguration Day I have been watching C-Span since 7AM. I took this picture out my front door looking across the street on my neighbors house as the sun rises on a new world.

I am so happy. I was part of the 13 million people in the grass roots movement. I did not do much but when millions of people each help a little it is truly amazing how they can change the world. I am hoping to continue to be part of the grass roots movement to change America. I am not sure what I can do here in Mercer PA. But if each of us changes our lives and helps each other thru these hard times we will change the world.

After all I am an old lady now. I was in high school when President Kennedy first inspired me to become involved in my country. President Kennedy said to Ask not what your country can do for you but what you can do for your country. I was so inspired by Kennedy. I was involved in the civil rights movement and anti war movement. After the Kent students were killed I dropped out of political activity. I lived in the woods for 25 years and had given up on my government. This has been the first time I have been inspired to become involved in politics since the 1960s.

I feel like We Have Overcome! and we have finally taken our country back. Living here in Mercer PA I really had my doubts. We liberals are in the miniority here. Not many people were willing to speak out for Barack Obama. People would come by and steal the Obama campaign signs out of your yard at night. The email war was fierce.

When I started to go to grass roots meetings there would be a hand full of folks and by the week of the election there were hundreds of people coming out to get involved. It was so inspiring to watch folks become involved and to speak out. After years of being polite to our conservative republican friends we were finally standing up and telling everyone how we really feel about our present government. People coming together with hope and working for change. Wow!

The pictures I am seeing on the TV are amazing it is 10:24 AM and I am seeing millions of people waiting in the cold to here Obama take the oath of office. I would love to be there.

National Day of Service

I joined members of the Mercer Garden Club today for lunch.

We are a small service organization dedicated to planting and maintaining the flower beds around our Community Library and Courthouse Square. We do some fundraising to pay for the flowers and mulch.

In the summer we visit each others gardens and go on field trips to tour gardens. We learn from each other and exchange plants and seeds. It is amazing how everyone can pull together and get a big job done. Our next meeting will be about growing African Violets. I will try to remember to post some pictures after the meeting.

There is over a foot of snow outside and it has been bitter cold. Spring will be here in a couple months and the planning has begun. Check out the new widget on the right. There are a few slides of flowers from 2008 and the meeting agenda for our February meeting. I will attempt to keep this information current so members can check this site to see time, place and meeting agenda for future meetings.

We welcome visitors to our meetings and encourage anyone join us in maintaining the gardens in Mercer. In other words if you are walking around the Square and see a weed, feel free to pull it out or dump a gallon or two of water on a wilted pot of flowers. These are your gardens too! Enjoy!

Danish Tie Shawl

It is a very cold snowy winter day outside. A good day for knitting. This is another Danish Tie Shawl inspired by a traditional pattern that was in Spin Off Magazine . The first one I knit on #2 needles. The secon was knit on #9 and this one is on #7. I am knitting with Noro Silk garden. I am about half done and I am on my third ball of yarn.