Idle Hands

This week in the garden: May flowers

Oh, the May garden!  It is unbelievably gorgeous.

The vining plants are getting going, so that color is everywhere -- honeysuck climbing on a trellis:

a rose filling a corner with blooms:

and clematis growing in the blueberry bush:

The early spring bulbs are gone, replaced by their showier counterparts: allium and peonies and irises.  The irises remain the kings of the garden in my mind -- majestic and tall.  They have been particularly spectacular this year. My irises seemed unhappy in their previous location, so I spent an exhausting weekend last fall moving them all together into a new, well-draining spot, and I have been rewarded with an extravagant display of colors this year.   

If only the rest of the summer can be as beautiful as this month has been!

Sheep and Wool Festival 2013

My fourth annual trip to the Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival was a little bittersweet without my two yarn-loving companions -- my mom and the award-winning Lisa Marie -- but the festival was so awesome that I was quickly giddy with excitement.  

This ain't my first time at the rodeo, so I headed straight for some favorite spots.  I stopped by the alpaca tent (yes, there is an alpaca tent) for some socks for my brother.  I admired adorable baby patterns at Melissa Jean's stall and swooned over the colors at the Sam Spun stall.  I spent a very long time talking to Jamie Harman, whose yarn I am totally obsessed with, and found myself cooing over a rainbow of soft wool at the appropiately named Carried Away booth:

I made friends with this guy:

and snacked on sheep's milk cheese and honey:

but my biggest discovery was Clare Margaret Artwork.  You know how much I love paper cutting (see Lydia Crook and Famille Summerbelle), so imagine how much I would love an elaborate cut paper sheep. 

via Clare Margaret's etsy shop

Pictures can't do it justice.  The texture was just incredible.

Now I just need to get knitting, so that I can use up my yarn from this year before festival time next year!

True story

I was planning on going in to the office yesterday, but the peonies were just too pretty. 

It didn't seem right to be inside working with all of this calling me outside.  

I may regret this decision Monday, but it won't be long before the beans are growing tall, and I would have missed the miracle of watching them push up through the soil.

I hope you had a beautiful weekend.

This week in the garden: Spring

Impossible not to feel grateful for so much loveliness.

Do you have a favorite spring poem?  Language seems inadequate for the sweetness of this time of year. 

This week in the garden: Ready to burst

It's the return of "This Week in the Garden"!  The daffodils have come and gone, the beans and lettuce are planted, and the dogwood is in bloom. Spring has officially sprung. 

I have been eagerly watching as some of my favorites get ready to bloom.

Everything is ready to burst!  

Math sweatshirt

Sorry for the lengthy absence.  It has been a particularly exhausting couple of weeks, but I'm still here! 

In the midst of a busy week at work, I had a quick trip to Chicago, which also happens to be where my brother lives.  I wanted to take something fun to celebrate his acceptance to grad school for math.  He really loves math, and it makes me so happy to see him do something that he really enjoys. 

I decided to customize a sweatshirt, so I bought a plain blue, super soft one from Target.

Then, I made my template.  I wanted a font that would look like a University sweatshirt: Rockwell Extra Bold was perfect. 

I traced my template onto freezer paper.

Next, I cut out the letters with a very sharp pair of scissors and ironed the freezer paper to the sweatshirt.  This works because the waxy side of the freezer paper bonds to the fabric when ironed, forming a nice, paint-proof seal. 

Last, I painted my design using white fabric paint and peeled off my freezer paper template.  And here's the result!

Simple and easy, but personal and fun.  A happy-making little project.   

Happy Easter!

Spring has sprung, and so have the daffodils.

I am not the only crafty one in this house!  Tonight at Easter dinner, we'll be celebrating Nick's success in the 2013 Washington Post Peeps Contest...because nothing says spring like an eerily realistic peeps diorama. 

Ravelry roundup: My current obsessions

The darling sweater is coming along nicely.  But sometimes you see a pattern that just makes you want to drop everything and start a new project.  Here are a few of my recent favorites:

Cuffed hand warmers by purl soho -- they just look so soft and smushy: 

via purl soho

 

Greta, by Elisa Contolini -- styled like a giant collar, it feels both feminine and strong.

 

via Quince & Co.

Greta headband by Nikki Wagner -- so many pretty Gretas!  I've found that a regular hat only looks nice when my hair is down (a knit cap just doesn't work with a pony tail or bun), but if I go without a hat entirely, I am left with cold ears.  This knit headband is the perfect solution -- pretty, with a vintage feel.  

via Interweave

Abate by Alicia Plummer -- this sweater is so simple and so adorable.  And I love that it would work for a little boy or a little girl. 

via Ravelry

 Happy Knitting! 

 p.s. Want to know more about ravelry roundups?  Find out here.

Whale softie

After the success of the recycled sweater wreath, we started a new policy in our house: no sweater left behind.  If a sweater is worn thin, pilly, stained, shrunk, or otherwise unwearable, it will be given new life through felting.  We just throw old sweaters in with the wash until they've shrunk down to somewhere around half their original size, leaving them wonderfully thick and smooshy.

I was inspired by my growing stash of felt to find a good project, and I realized that I had accumulated lots of cream, gray, and black.  There are a few new babies in my life, and a gray softie might be just the thing for a little baby boy.     

So, there's someone I'd like you to meet.

I bought the pattern from DIYFluffies on etsy, and I am quite pleased with the result, especially with the striped fabric. 

I particularly love the way the different striped pieces come together on the tail. 

The bottom and the eye are the remnants of an old cashmere-blend sweater and are particularly soft -- such a nice mix of textures, and so huggable. 

Also, making a stuffed animal this way is about a million times faster and easier than knitting the whole body.  I am going to have to do a few more of these, I think...

Baby's Book of Names and Faces

My friend Janelle introduced me to this genius idea, courtesy of Pinhole Press: the Baby Names and Faces Book.

I live just over 700 miles from my niece, Evelyn.  As a long-distance Auntie, I do lots of things to try to stay in touch.  But despite visits and gifts, it's hard to stay present in the mind of a two-year-old who doesn't see you that often.  

The book of names and faces is exactly what it sounds like -- a personalized photobook filled with the names and faces of all the people in a child's life.

Kids love it because it's a book filled with people they know.  I love it because it will help Evelyn remember what I look like:) Here's my book, which I created using Shutterfly:

I tried to use pictures that would be fun to talk about -- the sort of thing that will lead to conversations along these lines:

My brother: "Who's that?"

Evelyn: "Auntie Dawn!"

My brother: "What's she doing?"

Evelyn: "Eating an apple!" 

As I was searching through photos, I found more fun pictures than I could use, which led to my favorite part of the book: the last two pages, where I used all the extras in one spot. 

 It's true: so many people do love her. And I love this book.