Frog & Begin Again?

After finishing the tea cozy for my friend, I am sort of itching to do some more crocheting. I always get that feeling when the weather turns colder, too. So I'm thinking about frogging my Day to Night poncho which I started last year, frogged, restarted and *still* can't get to look right, and have finally abandoned. I've seen quite a few people on Ravelry who have made this poncho & theirs looks awesome, but I am just not happy with how mine looks.

I love the yarn-- especially the color scheme, and I really want to make something out of it, so now I'm thinking about crocheting the Kimono Jacket from my Homespun 7 Crochet Patterns for the Family booklet. It looks easy enough and I can *always* use another warm wrap for wearing at work-- I'm always so cold there!

So many projects in mind.... so little time...

Quilt Block Mosaic Box

My most recent mosaic lidded box is finished and has been listed in my ArtFire shop!

Funky Metallic Quilt Block Mosaic Box

I ended up making more tiles after my WIP post, because I wanted to get the pattern just right. I'm so pleased with how it turned out-- its like a quilt with a funky metallic twist. I started experimenting with adding glass tiles to my mosaics as well and I like the texture combination of stamped polymer & smooth glass. What do you think? Is the glass an interesting addition/texture to the design?

Cozy Complete

Remember this little project I started... about a year ago? *blush* It's finally done!

Rosy Cosy pattern by Megan Mills

I gave it to my friend at work today and she was absolutely thrilled with it. I've been apologizing to her profusely for the past 2 weeks for not getting it done before-- we lost touch after the spring project season this year and didn't run into each other again until this latest project at work. She's such a dear, she just laughed and said, "Don't worry about it, I don't really follow a linear timeline in my life anyways!" Still, I feel like such a heel.

This turned out to be such a cute tea cozy, I may have to make one for myself. The pattern was not hard to crochet, but my one critique is that the wording of the pattern sometimes made it very difficult to determine exactly what I was supposed to be doing. Also, there weren't any "summaries" of each row so that you would know if you had the right amount of stitches. If I did something wrong, I wouldn't find out until the next row because things weren't coming out right.

But now that I've made it once, I think it would be much easier the second time around. And, as a bonus, I learned how to do a new stitch-- the reverse single crochet, or crab stitch. This one has had me stumped for years because I'm a leftie. So the instructions for a reverse sc sounded just like doing what I do for a sc, because I crochet backwards. So I had figure out how to reverse the reverse sc. I finally found this incredibly helpful video for lefties, watched it a time or two, then followed along. The stitch came out just the way it was supposed to!

I love opportunities to expand my creative experience. This project was a great one.

Feline Friday: King of the Mountain

Moose loves to be King of the Bed; just give him room to sprawl and he'll be chillaxin' in no time...

But let him discover a big ol' pile of freshly washed bedding just waiting to be folded...

... and he turns into an dozing, furry King of the Mountain in 5 seconds flat.

WIP Wednesday

Sometimes I get working on a project that starts out great and then... goes nowhere. Its frustrating, but it happens.

For instance I got these fabulous rubber stamps, all different sizes of quilt blocks. Perfect for making mosaic tiles, and I made a whole bunch of them. But then my enthusiasm waned when I couldn't seem to arrange the tiles on my box lid in any way that made me happy. So I've been waiting for inspiration... for quite some time now.

The other afternoon I started playing around with the tiles again. And added some glass tiles along with the polymer clay ones. *Bing!* Suddenly every piece started to fall into place. Finally, I knew what I wanted to do. Above is the progress I've made. I need to make a couple more tiles to switch out, but I'm really pleased so far. I love it when inspiration strikes.

Remembering Gram on Samhain

Every year for Samhain I create a special ancestor altar to honor all of my beloved dead, but this year I did something a little different. This year I created an altar honoring just one specific relative-- my Gram, who died last June.

Gram was the last grandparent I had, all my other grandparents died when I was still in my teens. Although I grieved for her at the time of her death, the trip back to Iowa for her funeral seemed almost unreal. I wondered if the reality of losing her would hit me harder at Samhain, when I remember my beloved dead, and it has. And so, to say a final goodbye, I created a very personal altar in her honor.


I gathered all the photos I had of her and chose my favorites. Photos of her as an infant, a toddler, a teen, a young married woman, a grandmother. For an altar cloth, I used the quilt with embroidered panels that she made for me when I went away to college. I also included a couple of framed cross stitch pieces she made for me to decorate my home with after I was married.


The dress is one of her calico house dresses from the around 1950's. I found it in the attic back when I was in college and used to wear it myself-- with white lace tights, Madonna-style. I can still remember Gram shaking her head and saying, "Why you want to wear that old, ugly thing is beyond me." My Gram was a lady who always had a linen handkerchief in her pocketbook or tucked up her sleeve, so I included one of her monogrammed hankies and another with a lace edge on her altar, too.

Gram used to have a little sun room in her house that had window shelves full of African violets. I got my love of African violets from Gram and so of course her altar had to have a couple of those lovely, blooming plants. I put each one in a milk-glass pot just like she always had them. After her funeral, I brought home half a dozen milk-glass pots from her sun room.

The baby-doll was a gift from Gram and Grampie when I was just a little girl. Gram and my Great-Aunt Phyllis made and entire wardrobe for her-- embroidered nightgowns and rompers and dresses-- even a little wool coat and hood. The bible is Grampie's, which always sat on one of the end tables in their living room.

The cookie jar is part of the set of cannisters I have in my kitchen that used to be in Gram's. The cookie cutters are ones from Gram's kitchen too, and I remember lots and lots of sugar cookies that were made with those cookie cutters.

The only items on the altar not tied directly to Gram are the tarot cards I picked-- Death (end of a cycle), The Sun (joy), the 6 of cups (nostalgia), 10 of cups (family celebration) and 10 of pentacles (family traditions).

Creating this altar brought up a lot of emotions and brought back lots of memories. It has been a bittersweet experience. And, in remembering Gram the best way I know how, a healing one.

May the blessings of Samahin be upon you.

Wishcasting Wednesday: Treats

Each week, Jamie Ridler Studios hosts Wishcasting Wednesday.

You can be a maker of magic and a tender of wishes. It’s easy. Answer the wish prompt on your blog and leave a direct link HERE. Support wishes by visiting other participants, leaving a comment saying “As (insert name) wishes for her/himself, so I wish for her/him also.” It’s that simple. There is great power in wishing together.

This week's prompt asks:

WHAT TREAT DO YOU WISH FOR?

At the risk of sounding superficial and frivolous... a treat I've always wanted is a professional manicure. Yes, really.

I've struggled with biting my nails my whole life. When my nerves kick in or my fingers feel dry and rough, I can chew my nails and the skin around them until they are mangled and bleeding without even realizing it. When I was younger, I tried putting bitter stuff on my nails, sitting on my hands, wearing gloves... As a child I frequently heard, "Get your fingers out of your mouth." I was always embarrassed and ashamed to be caught chewing my fingernails, yet I couldn't seem to help it.

This is about as good as they ever get.

The older I get, the better I've been about leaving them alone, yet its still a struggle. My nails are soft and weak and tear easily; my cuticles tend to be dry and hard and ragged. I don't want long and glamorous nails-- in fact, I prefer to keep them short since they're not very strong, and long nails get in the way when working with clay, leaving little crescent moons everywhere on my creations.

But I really crave short, even, neat fingernails. I try my best to manicure them myself, but I would love the treat of several professional manicures in a row, including paraffin waxes to smooth away my rough cuticles. I've always admired and envied anyone with nice, neat, buffed fingernails. I don't want anything fancy, I just want fingernails that look well-cared for. After all the abuse I've put mine through, it would be lovely to have nice looking hands for a change.

What treat do you wish for?

A Sad Goodbye

This week the sad news filtered through our pagan community that Lake Wellington, a long time location for three different yearly pagan retreats-- as well as a very popular primitive mountain campground, is closing.


The original news was that it had become too popular and was being closed just for the winter to give the lake and surrounding land a resting period, however... a notice went out a few days ago that everything from the campground and camp store is being sold this weekend-- the rental boats, camp gear, campers, trailers, and personal items from the caretakers who lived at the lake and have been told they must move-- so it seems that the lake will no longer be available to the public as a campground anymore. Rumor has it that it will become developed for housing.


I am torn. Part of me would like to go to the sale for the express purpose of seeing the lake one more time and saying a personal goodbye. And yet, I think it would be too sad to see everything being sold off. Nor do I know that I'd even be allowed to get any closer to the lake than the view from the camp store.


I feel regret now that I did not attend any of the pagan retreats held there this past summer. It was my choice, and at the time it was what I felt was best for me. But I never imagined that I would be giving up my last chance to see the lake.


Although I'm fully aware that its communing with my pagan friends that makes the retreats so meaningful, nevertheless, I will miss this beautiful, magical lake that has been such a big part of my summers over the years.

Feline Friday: Fall Foliage

Before we had our first freeze, the tree in our front yard was turning the most vibrant shade of yellow. A nice backdrop for the kittens in the window, who were watching the chaos in our front yard as we had some construction done on the drive, stoop and walkway.

Kitties watching the workmen...

Kitties watching me watching them watching the workmen...

And so on and so forth...

Afternoon Tarot Study

Got together today with my Ya-Ya Sistahs for lunch and tarot practice and we had a good time, as always.

I brought two decks with me to use; my trusty Robin Wood tarot, which I find easy to read and understand, and my Pearls of Wisdom tarot, the deck I got for my birthday and am totally in love with. I've decided I really want to learn to read with this deck, its so lush and detailed and I think it will be excellent for readings because there is so much symbolism in each card. Most of my fellow readers who see this deck feel its too bright, too detailed and too... well... psychedelic-- but I tend to like highly colorful and detailed decks; I feel I get more out of them when reading because no matter how many times I might draw the same card, I usually see a new symbol or detail which gives me a deeper interpretation of its meaning.


For our first exercise, we each did a practice reading using a spread from the Complete Book of Tarot Spreads. I just recently found this book and I really like it, lots of good exercises and useful spreads. I did a 9 card spread on self-definition, with some interesting cards appearing for my answers. It was quite accurate (the cards always are) but I'd like to take a little more time exploring in depth what came up, I think there's lots of good information for me that I didn't have time to really delve into during our practice time.

Our next exercise came from the same book-- we went through our decks and drew all the cards we disliked or that made us uncomfortable for whatever reason. Then we compared which cards we drew-- and for the majority of the cards, we all chose the same ones-- I.E., we all had The Tower, 3 of Swords, 9 of Swords, 10 of Swords, 5 of Pentacles, etc. So then we each shared what it was about the card we didn't like-- the message, the artwork, etc. Each of us was using a different deck, so it was interesting to compare the similarities or differences in the same cards.


Then we looked at the cards we'd drawn that we didn't have in common and discussed why we'd chosen them. For instance, I was the only one who had the 4 of Pentacles, which in the Robin Wood deck just expresses isolation and misery to me as well as possessiveness and greed.

This whole exercise was really fascinating and generated lots of good discussion. It was also interesting to note that the number of cards I drew depended on my deck. There were more cards in the Robin Wood deck that I disliked/made me uncomfortable than in the Pearls of Wisdom-- almost twice as many!

We had some competitive fun for our last exercise. We used a deck we're all familiar with (Rider-Waite) and threw down each card one by one. The first person to shout out a correct keyword/phrase, won the card. After we'd gone through the whole deck, we counted cards to see who had the most. Darling kicked butt-- she won 45 cards out of 78! I had a total brain cramp, I only won 13 cards. I definitely know what I'll be working on-- my keywords and phrases for each card.

I love tarot study with the Ya-Ya's. We always have such a good time and I always come away feeling like I've learned something. Who says study time has to be boring?