Next Project Please!

Wow! I've gotten a lot done in the last few months :D Let's recap: 1) contest afghan, 2) family reunion afghan, 3) Ninja Guy10 doll, 4) gift afghan. Neat! I am sort of proud of that. I must say though that the gift afghan turned out way smaller than I thought. The picture seems to be a much bigger afghan. I crochet a little tight, but I've never had gauge problems before. I'm still stumped about that one.

My next item on the list is my tree skirt. It's the 12 Days of Christmas- 6 panels with 2 cross-stitched pictures on each pattern to represent the gifts given on each of the 12 days of Christmas. I've got the panels done and 2 of them are cross-stitched and joined. I've got 4 to go. I'll be starting on it after all the birthday bruhaha is over.

Along with the tree skirt are the tiny, sweet angel ornaments I'm doing for my Girl Scout troop for Christmas. I did a couple of test pieces with sport weight yarn and size 10 thread. I really love the wee little angel I that was the product of the size 10 thread! One of my wonderful neighbors is going to let me use her groovy card making equipment (as well as help me work out a custom design!) for a card to present the angels on.

Oh, and I actually knitted a shawl a couple of years ago and, boy did learn that knitting is not my thing. Anyhoo, it has been languishing in my house ever since completion waiting for the correct home. I happy to announce that the shawl has found a home! As soon as I get a confirmation on the address I'll be shipping it off :)

Happy hooking!

Scarf of two now is through!

Finally! The second scarf is done! I remember now why I dislike doing scraves from end-to-end. I much prefer the side-to-side method. Baby Girl took some pictures for me. The first one I did side-to-side.

This one was about 7 rows and done! Once around for the border and I was finished. Took no time at all. This one however

was only 23 stitches, but man did it linger! I didn't think I was ever going to get that thing done! Hallelujah!!

Both scarves are in Red Heart Baby Sport. It's got that little iridescent thread wrapped around the strand of yarn and looks so pretty. I've started a hat in the same yarn. We'll see if I've got enough yarn left to even make the whole hat :)

Ninja Guy10 Is Done!!!!!!!

It is done! I finally have Ninja Guy10 complete! See:

Ninja Guy10 was actually the first of a set of characters designed and drawn by my oldest (and super talented) son. Ninja Guy10 has an arch nemesis Marvin the Pirate which I made a couple or 3 years ago:

There will be a very cool comic before too much longer, I hope!

I Stink at Gardening :(

So this year, due to Baby Girl's interest in playing in the dirt and dawning interest on my part, I decided to try growin tomatoes this year. I had a couple of big pots that I thought would be the right size. I had been reading how easy tomatoes are for container gardening you see.

Well, that was such a bust! Maybe it was that my first tomato plant was a Cherokee Black (purple?) that maybe is a little more sensitive. Maybe my research was inadequate (as usual for this kind of stuff). Maybe my suspicions have been confirmed that I have a black thumb. Well, okay not that last one since the tomatoes were over at Dad's and he looked after them. I also had a cherry tomato plant (free) from a Girl Scout badge workshop Baby Girl went to. I figured I'd be sick of tomatoes before too much longer. Boy was I wrong. I got 3 tiny, tiny Cherokee Black tomatoes and only 2 cherry tomatoes and the cherry tomatoes just within the past couple of weeks!

Upon pulling up the sad, wilted Cherokee Black plant, Dad discovered that it was severely root bound! "Nuthin' but a big ball of roots! Not a bit of dirt." were the words from Dad. That explains that one. The cherry tomato plant that eventually started growing at an amazing rate, finally has only 2 or 3 tomatoes on it. I think it is suffering from a similar lack of dirt. It has been very disappointing. Unlike previous unsuccessful tries at growing though, I am determined this is a skill I can learn. Hubby knows bunches about gardening (though he won't admit it) so I am determined to pick his brain and make him help me next year!

Baby Girl also planted some pumpkin seeds in little newspaper pots at a day camp program she went to this year. I put them in the ginormous pot I had here at the house and they too started out amazingly. I was so excited! Unfortunately, I found out at the first really long rain that there was no drainage in that pot. So they got waterlogged. Hubby drilled some drainage holes (plastic pot) but it was a couple of days later and I think that was too late. There are still leaves that are a healthy color of green and are not wilted or anything, but the vine has not grown anymore since the waterlogging. No pumpkins either :( 

I am so going to spend the winter months (you know that time that's after Christmas but before Valentine's Day?) reading everything I can get my hands on and aggravating the crap out of my mom (who grew up gardening) and Hubby (ditto) and anyone else I can get to stand still long enough as well as haunting the library (like I need to do more of that). Next year will be different!

As Bob as my witless, I will be a gardner! (I just love the Rugrats!)

Scarf of one, it has begun!

I made my first scarf for the 60 Scarves in 60 Days challenge! It's on Ravelry now, but I remember when it was 30 scarves in 30 days and it was on Dee's blog. This is the ninth year! I can't believe it! I've only been able to participate a couple of years but it is so much fun! The first year I did it, I only got 1 or 2 scarves done and the other year I got 8. I'm going for at least 30 this year! It's the perfect way for me to practice a new stitch pattern or technique or even play with some new yarn :D

Anyhoo, I grabbed a skein of Red Heart Baby that has been hanging out in my stash forever and decided to try a scarf with it. I made a little bitty scarf, maybe toddler sized, but it is very pretty. It's a shell/dc pattern that was pictured on the label fo the Lionbrand Pound of Love that I used for the reunion afghan. I started a filet/sc one last night, but since I'm working from top-to-bottom instead of sid-to-side it's taking longer. I plan on making it longer than the shell one.

I hope to use up a slew of my stash in the process of this challenge. That way I'll be able to cut down on the amount of yarn crawling all over my house and, if I use up enought, maybe be able to shop for some more!

Tarheel Pineapple!

This is it! The family reunion afghan is done! I am very happy with the way it turned out.

I had a little trouble getting going on this one, but it really helped me get back into stitching after the contest afghan rush :)

I'm on to the action figure (no doll) for another one of Gideon's characters. I have one done from a few years ago and I'm looking forward to seeing them together.