Merry Christmas

From my family to yours.


May you get your dishes done, may you get one really good sewing gift even if you have to buy it yourself, may you be wise enough to know that not all families are perfect, and not holidays like a dream, but have someone in your life who makes you realize it might all be true after all.


My sweater was appreciated, my socks a hit, and the grow bags fit.


Here is little Heidi on her way to bed in her's:

And to all a good night.

Now on to sewing and flypaper thoughts

• Only 1.37 of a sock to get knitted and I am done.
• Would some good knitter tell me how to fix my ssk? My k2tog are neat, my ssks are loose and looked like some pigeon knit them.
• Last week we got a call from Costco to throw out that Tabouleh.  
• You know that rare impulse purchase because I am knitting too much to cook.
• Recalled for Listeria.
• My son and I ate two tubs.
• Not fair in a house where we grow our own organic Kale.
• Looked at each other for signs for three days and then forgot about it.
• Kale makes you strong. Body and teeth.
• I have thrown out my rash inducing retinol and am now washing my face in baby oatmeal cereal.
• In my mind there is a direct line between these events.
• DIY.
• Skin's great.
• Kale helps.
• I am renting my tablecloths and napkins this year.
• Thank you Auntie Nancy for the idea.
• I think I ordered a big package of red bra strap elastic and fasteners last night when I was sleepy.
• Not sure, I was trying to ssk at the time.
• There is sure a lot of sewing for self backing up over here.
• Thank you McCalls for the Spring patterns.
• Nicer than usual.
• Going to cook for two days now.
• I am doing the recipes that say "fast and easy" spouse is doing things that say "complicated and involve ingredients we have never had in this house before."
• Sent me out of celeriac root and I came back with Japanese Daikon. 
• This is a large radish.
• It does not look like celeriac root. 
• It is however a root.
• Apparently this is not close enough.
• Now we are going to have Vietnamese sandwiches on Boxing Day.
• Calls for Daikon.
• Since these things are not made in a crock pot I will not be involved.

In closing here are some shots of what my spouse brought to my knitting location for dinner last night. From a recipe from this family friend. Going to miss that man when he goes back to Tennessee. 

At least I have the dogs and the crock pot. And a whole lot of red elastic.

New year's thoughts sort of

Every year I order a Moleskin diary. They have the days of the week on one side and a lined notebook page on the other.


This is really useful in meetings when people say things and you can grab your diary and look serious and responsible while you write things like "Spring wardrobe gaps: replace black skirt, make three new fun tops from knits."


My fingers must have slipped when I Amazoned this year (I have maintained my festive season mall boycott) and what arrived was a mini version of what I usually order.


One the left is my current diary and on the right 2012:

 I was a bit annoyed with myself until I realized this was A Sign.


You see recently I have been having some conversations with a variety of people that have reminded me there needs to be a statute of limitations on some of the stuff that gets passed on from year to year.


Every life and every family has some of this.


How many generations should anyone pass on what happened in the war?
How many nights should anyone lie awake thinking of an old betrayal?
How many years should anyone resent the sibling who was always presented as prettier/smarter/more successful?
How many decades should anyone discuss that someone could have should have married better, done more with their education, never left that job?
How long until that mistake has been forgotten?


This made me realize that the common family activity to explain people by recapping the above in fact functions primarily to just keep it all alive - to write it into next year's diary before the year has already begun.


What if the diary was smaller and there wasn't any room to do this?

Sleep sack pattern

I have just finished two sleep sacks for the little girls for Christmas. I was totally appalled that my daughter was spending $60 for Growbags for the kids to sleep in.


Babies these days don't sleep with blankets or bumper pads or stuffed toys in their beds - all those things we used to load up the cribs with. In fact even as they get bigger they still sleep in these sleeping bag units. Miss Scarlett had a sleepover here last night and she was cruising around in her's for hours this morning, having perfected walking in a bag.


I have had a good look at the expensive store-bought ones and looked at the patterns in the books which typical for many kids patterns seemed to me to be too wide in the neck and the chest.


So I went on Etsy where the young mother sewers hang out and found this pattern, which looked to my eye to be very similar to the ones you buy. I have been picking up some of my crafty type patterns on Etsy recently and am pretty happy with the results.


Here are my two versions - prototypes for my daughter to evaluate and for me to do a better job next time. The outside is flannel and the inside a coordinating fleece which of course I realized was going to stick in the zipper teeth - so my top-stitching is a bit erratic.

The only changes I made to the design were to add a little topstitched square at the bottom of the zipper ( you put the separating zipper in upside down) - a detail I saw in the commercial ones.


I also rolled the body back so I could sew as much as possible of the lining to the zipper by machine, sort of a bagging technique, rather than rely totally on topstitching from the right side to catch the lining on the wrong side next to the zipper teeth, as was suggested by the pattern.


This sewer has been around the block enough times to know that was not going to work without angst, so I attached the lining and then did my anarchist topstitching to finish more for decorative effect and to stitch down some of that fleece fluff away from the zipper.


My list is shrinking. Only a bit of knitting and some organizational work.


I have been pondering how to fit in a large crowd to sit down for dinner on Christmas Day and yesterday I had the bright idea that because my living room is bigger than my dining room I could switch the furniture for just a few days.


I have suggested this to my returned spouse.


He has just gone off for a nap now.


Nothing like the holidays.

On the festive home stretch

First of all here are some shots of my daughter's playgroup at her house where I did an impromptu how to turn the heel on a Christmas stocking lesson. 


They may have me back to do "how to hem pants rather than take them to the tailor's." I can't believe young mothers are taking pants to someone to do this. My daughter knows to bring that stuff over to my place:

My daughter has a nice house they are slowly fixing up. They bought it from a man who was recently a widower. He was determined to have his house go to a young family much against his realtor's horror so he practically gave it away, and I mean gave it away.


It is an interesting place. The former owner was a bag man for a political party and there is a full bank-sized safe in the basement. His wife was a great entertainer and the kitchen has two ovens and even a built-in indoor BBQ with a chimney up through the kitchen ceiling.


The house also has come with a ghost. As far as we can figure the lady who spent her life hosting there was not quite ready to leave. As a result the toys are moved around in the night and the cushions on the chairs rearranged and straightened up at military angles. It's not a bad vibe and we figure that when she has it all out of her system she will move on. It must be hard to let a place go you spent your whole life maintaining.


Back in this world my Christmas production is on the home stretch. Four pairs of socks, one housecoat, one knitted cardigan, three pairs of pajamas, and two baby sleep sacs by tonight if I get moving.


Then I am just going to do some back-up knitting. My husband comes in at noon today from Tennessee and this place will move from Santa's workshop into Santa's test kitchen.


All of this virtuous sewing for others, which I do because the homemade gifts go over better than the store bought with adult children (or they are too diplomatic to say otherwise when I tell them I nearly killed myself getting this all done on Christmas morning), has  my own desire to sew for myself  boiling along inside.


To satiate this need I have been happily ordering patterns, specifically the independents for a change, and have some Pamela's patterns, more Style Arc, Brensan and Jalie's on standby on the runway.


I have also signed up for the French Jacket online class on PatternReview. 


Yes, I know I have the books and a fair idea what is involved but after finding out what a difference a good teacher made to my bra-fitting I decided it would be a treat for myself to be taught. So far in the warm-stage the commentary and notes have already been very helpful.


I had some difficulty finding fabric though until I contacted Fabricmart and will wait till I go to NYC in January to source the trim.


I am looking forward to all of this.

Thank you and details

First of all I want to thank my commenters on the last couple of posts. 


The knitting advice has been so useful, helpful, and interesting. (Rebecca I am intrigued by your cardigan recipe, what do you mean join at the sides? Do you mean you knit the whole thing as one piece?) And thank you too Karen for the lead on that sock yarn, I have some on its way.


It means a lot to me when folks go to the trouble to comment on something I have written and to help me out. 


Since last we spoke I have that sweater done and it's downstairs drying from blocking. I have decided it was a smarty pants pattern - just because you know a technique doesn't mean you have to put it in everywhere - all those dozens and dozens of short rows were unnecessary I decided - reminded me a bit of those wearable art jackets that used to be around that had every known decorative technique on them.


All I have left now is a couple of days of sewing to do, more knitting, and my spouse will be home Saturday for two weeks.


Like many women of my generation who got married young and then had children I do not have much experience living alone. Even in my single mother years I was still a mother.


So for me to be on my own while my husband is sent off for work for long periods is an interesting and educational experience for me. A life stage I kind of skipped and am learning how to do now.


I come from a big and interactive family. 


I think I was about 35 before I was ever in a room by myself. 


In my house "being alone" was regarded as a sickness. I remember having a visitor stay with us once and my mother frantically calling us into the kitchen "Somebody get into that living room - he's in there reading the paper and He's Alone, someone go in an talk to him." Silence, in the house I grew up in, was evidence that someone wasn't doing their job.


And working, having a bunch of kids of my own, pretty much has filled up my own silences.


So it's a novelty to learn to be by myself.


I miss my husband and living with an advanced level eccentric and excellent cook. He's fun. But being on my own has been good for me.


I was reminded of this over the weekend as my two sisters-in-law and I took my mother-in-law to show her the apartment we have picked out right near me. This is chapter two of our campaign to move her in from the country where she has still being living since my father-in-law died into the city where we can help her out more. I think she will be really happy to be near family but the process of making a decision about what she herself likes is almost too much for her. She says she still hears his voice in her head telling her what to do, what she likes.


Now women of my generation can hardly imagine that but my own unfinished business is learning how to live when there isn't anyone in the living room I need to go and talk to.


Being so busy with my projects is taking care of this, and of course having two dogs around who are permanent children is good too.


Still, it's interesting and important to be doing this.


Now off to my daughter's mother-baby group.


Someone over there is in tears because she can't figure out how to turn the heel on the Christmas stocking she is knitting for her little baby. I just got the 911. 


Since I am now an expert ripper-outer this sounds like just the job for me.

Late night elf work: Family ban alert

I have spent the last week coming down from term, helping my daughter with the kids, and getting some Christmas stuff worked through.


I just can't stand the stores during the holidays so it's either handmade or shopped online.


I laughed and laughed though when I saw this label on Meg's blog:

I am working on exactly that kind of project now, a sweater for one of my sons.  I am about 10% of the knitter I am as a sewer and I made the mistake of thinking I could actually make this:

I have knit sweaters for the other kids and it was my NYC son's turn.I got it in my head that since the designer was in Brooklyn and young it would be something he would wear. Yes, I know.


Like a lot of young knitter designer patterns it has more emphasis on structural knitting - short row shaping and I cord and fashionable techniques than traditional patterns. What I call mathematical knitting, based on my personal observation that a lot of good knitters are good at math, which I am not.


Getting this thing wrestled to the ground has involved as much ripping out as knitting and hours on Raverly and iTunes watching fast videos made by people who actually know what they are doing.


The sleeves have just about done me in.


Since the whole thing is knit in the round (good thing I hate sewing up knitting - those yarn seams just don't look sturdy enough to the sewer in me) you have to pick up the stitches for the sleeves and knit those on double pointed needles.


In my case this has involved knitting on 5 needles and every time I come to turn a short row (took me the first sleeve to figure that out) I sort of haul the whole unit around and slide half the stitches off one of the needles, put those back on the needle and try again.


Every once in a while I stop and check on things and if you were here next to my Lazy-Boy you would be hearing a lot of  "What the hell?"


I admit those sleeves are going to involve some hole darning to get them to look like sleeves, and the underarms look sort of like Rascal knit them. 


By the way here are some pictures of my assistant elves obviously exhausted by all they have been doing to decorate the house and get things ready:

Matching dog beds I hope you notice.


I should have sleeve two done today and then I will spend some rescue time with a needle and wool and put in the zipper.


The thing is I actually have learned a lot of new techniques making this and if I made another one now it would be fine. 


Maybe I need another label that says- "The next one will be better."


Once this is done I have only some sewing to finish and this morning that looks like a piece of cake then I think I am due to be a Lazy-Boy myself.