Sif

I was recently gifted with a spinning wheel. I named her Sif. Here's the finished paint and varnish job.

The Apron

So I have this apron, and I love it. It's lightweight enough that I don't mind putting it on, big enough to cover most of what gets covered in flour, and flattering enough that it makes me want to get in the kitchen and do some baking. There's just one thing keeping it from being perfect. In fact, it's a pretty big problem.



It's a Christmas apron. This coming from the girl who had her first Christmas tree this year. It was less than a foot tall. It had no ornaments, and the only reason we had that was because of my niece. In fact, we don't have Christmas in my house, we have Giftmas. So how is it that I found myself wearing a Christmas apron in March? I just love the cut.
So the other day when I got that itch to sew, I knew what I was going to make. Do you remember that fabric back in fall that I bought? The stuff that I didn't know what I was going to do with but loved so I had to buy it? I found its purpose in life.



Okay, that picture doesn't do the apron or me justice. Here's a better one.



There, that's better. Less frumpy, certainly.

This was actually a relatively simple pattern to fabricate. And, as a bonus project, I made myself a not-so-white board.

Now, if you have spent more than five minutes in my company you probably know about my possibly unhealthy obsession with dry erase markers. They're brilliant! They write on glass. Think about that for a second. I keep a set of markers in my car in case I need to write anything down while I drive. Going to a new place? I write the directions small on my windshield so that I don't have to fumble with papers. I've also been known to write notes to my friends in dry erase.

So anyways, I was in the shower the other day lamenting the fact that we were wasting my adorable knitting notepad on shopping lists. Then it struck me. I could knit some fabric and put it in a frame, and then I could use that as a whiteboard for my shopping list. But then I gave that some thought and realised that I would be horribly offended if someone wrote over my beautiful knitting. So it shouldn't surprise you to learn what I did with the scraps from my apron.

French Onion Soup

I decided that lunch needed to be good today. I think it will be.

Making my home rich

A forum post today made me think about all of the family treasures I have at my house. I thought that I'd put up some pictures of them.

I have my great grandmother's dining set



Complete with the paint job that was on it when she bought it.



I have the rocking chair that my father put together for my mother to rock me and my brothers in (excuse the mess)



I also have the thread box that my great great grandmother used. The blankets on the back of the horse cover a pincushion.



And finally I have the china that my grandmother purchased for me, along with the toasting glasses from my brother's wedding.

My New WIP Bag

I found this at Michael's yesterday for $1. For the record, the joke is that when you have a great deal of work to undo it's called frogging it, because it goes ribbit ribbit and kind of jumps around in your hands.

Doin it for the Peekture

Knitting

I was out with a friend and her young cousin last week. We were at a bead shop. I was broke, so in order to fend off temptation I started knitting. After a bit, the young cousin came over to me and asked me some questions about my knitting. In the course of the conversation, I realised two things.

1. I like knitting because there is no wrong way of doing it. Like life, there are choices to make. Some are obviously superior to others (placement and number of arms), and some are not (color scheme, stitch pattern). And sometimes, like life, the mistakes you make turn out better than what you had planned. There is no do-it-this-way-or-else in knitting. There is only, do you like it that way?

2. I'm really good at knitting. I do my best to be modest, really, I do. But there are some things that I can acknowledge that I do well, just as there are some things that I know I don't do well. I knit really well. I'm not a great housekeeper. I bake really well. Cooking, not so much. Since I can state the things I'm bad at (ballet, I'm looking at you), I should also be able to talk about the things I'm good at. And I'm good at knitting. Soon I will post pictures of the mittens I'm making for my dad. They're pretty kick ass, I'm not going to lie.