Thursday Tab- Pert and Pretty Round Robin- Original Outfits

Back in 2000, I was part of a paper doll Round Robin, where we were each to design outfits for dolls from Merrill's Pert and Pretty paper doll set. The original set is fantastic (I have the Shackman reprint- I've done some searching, and it appears that the reprint is no longer for sale), with nine dolls, all fancy-schmancy showgirls.

I don't remember exactly how the robin was supposed to work, and like many robins, it fizzled before it got very far. I think we uploaded our outfits online, rather than mailing them to each other, but I'm not sure. I have four of the dolls in my file, and outfits for three of them, so obviously, I never finished my portion either. But I thought you'd like to see them anyway. The dolls are from Merrill's Pert and Pretty set, the pages of outfits are my own designs (all done on the computer). I must have decided to do every-day clothes for the girls, rather than Show Costumes.

Enjoy!

P.S. you can see the original cover, all of the dolls and some of the outfits here. Click *newer* for more pages

Leftover Hat Recipe, and some wonderful knits

 Here's the latest leftover yarn hat. Not very manly, is it? Pretty? Yes. Masculine? No. This is yarn I bought at the '09 Sock Summit, and used as Road Knitting to make socks on the way to the Michigan Fiber Festival last summer (and which were gifted to my niece). I love how the stripes are working out (it's not officially a self-striping yarn).

Elizabeth asked in the comments, for the basic recipe for these leftover hats. It's easy peasy:  Approx 34gr fingering weight sock yarn, 16" size 2.75mm circ and DPNs (or whatever needles will give you 8sts=1"). CO 140 sts, join (without twisting). Work 6 or so rnds of K2P2 ribbing and then K until the hat measures 5" (more or less, depending on who is the recipient). Decrease every other rnd as follows: Rnd 1: *K 12, K 2 tog*, rep around, Rnd 2: K, Rnd 3: *K 11, K 2 tog*, rep around, Rnd 4: K. Continue, working one less st before the decreases on the Odd Rnds, until you K2 tog around. Cut yarn, weave the tail through the remaining loops, tighten and tie off. Weave the ends in, wash and block. This makes a snug beanie. If you use slightly heavier yarn and 3mm or 3.25mm needles, you'll get a looser hat. If you want a smaller hat, CO 10 or 20 fewer sts. As I said, easy peasy.

 Robin knitted these gorgeous Macaroni Socks (from The Big Book of Socks). She adapted the pattern a bit because the yarn she used was finer than what is called for in the pattern (yay for adaptation!). She said that she hasn't even gotten to try them on because her 12 year old daughter has appropriated them (yay for daughters who love handknit socks!). Thanks for sharing!

Susan took my Nordic Christmas Stocking class at NCFF last September, and made this wonderful stocking! It turned out beautifully! It happens that I'm teaching that class at the Winter Retreat in Asheville next weekend, too.

Next weekend? Yikes, I'd better finish getting ready.

Restocking the BT'oKT

Somewhere along the line, I thought I had an extra week before I headed out to Asheville for the Winter Retreat. Imagine my surprise when I actually looked at the calendar and counted those little boxes... It's a good thing that I got all of my workshop materials mailed last week.

One of the things I did notice in December, as I chose hats from the Big Tub 'O Knitted Things, is that I'm obviously not drawn to masculine or neutral colorways. Only one or two of the three thousand hats that I knit last year even came marginally close to being Man Colors (and yes, I know, there's no such thing... but a great many men still do not want to wear pink. It is what it is). So one of my jobs this year is to stock the Tub with some Manly Hats.

 This one comes close. It's all made from teeny little balls of leftover yarns- I used up an entire baggie of them. Woohoo!

I'm pretty sure this one doesn't qualify, but boy is it pretty. It's from some Twisted Fiber Arts bamboo yarn (I don't remember the colorway, but it doesn't matter, EVERY Twisted Fiber Arts colorway is beautiful), and I'm thrilled there was enough to knit a whole hat with the single yarn (and not just because there were no ends to tie in).

The hat I'm working on now is all Neon Pink, Yellow, and Green, so... nope... not Manly, but it's awfully pretty too. But if maybe one out of every five hats or so is sort of neutral, I should have enough for my guys come next Christmas.

What are you doin'?

Now I want them to get married and pop out a dozen adorable, brown-haired, surprisingly-musical babies.

Side note: I've always thought that Joseph Gordon Levitt would be the perfect Odd Thomas.

Happy New Year's Eve All!

Thursday Tab- Around the Clock with Peg and Dot

This wonderful book was published in 1943 by Whitman. The scans were shared by a friend who reassembled the partially cut book over photocopies of uncut pages. I love this snapshot of a turbulent time.

An object lesson

In all of my books, and in all of my classes, and in all of my class handouts, I stress choosing highly contrasting colors for Fair Isle. In order to make sure that your yarns have enough contrast to make the colorwork worthwhile, I suggest scanning your yarns and then turning the scan into b/w in order to check the contrast.  Like so.

See? You can easily tell the difference between the light and dark colors.

 And therefore, there were no nasty surprises when the items were knit.

You'd think I'd remember that, given that it's my own advice, right? Advice, I might add, that I was paid to write, and am paid to teach.

 You might also think that I would take these yarns, which look highly contrasting to the naked eye, and scan them before casting on, right?

If I had done that, I might have noticed that there was really very little contrast between those colors.

 And I would have had plenty of warning

for this...

I should have listened to myself. Sigh.

(and yes, I will take these examples of What Not To Do to all of my classes. It'll be an excellent object lesson).

An NaCl Kind of Holiday

So, did you survive?
We had a wonderful, noisy, busy, delicious, love/laughter/family filled Christmas Eve.

 It's not that we like banishing the kids to a different table, it's just that our antique dining room table has no leaves, and can only sit six (maybe eight if we squeeze real tight). So the grownups sat at The Big Table. The centerpiece is a pewter Santa that The Hub smuggled back from Cannon Beach one year after I'd admired it there. He managed to keep it a secret not only on the trip home, but for the months between then and Christmas. It's been our Holiday Centerpiece ever since.

The girls' table was right next to ours (at least they weren't relegated to the basement). Everyone got an ornament, and I love getting out the Christmas Dishes.

The girls were wildly excited, and they absolutely loved their Totem Spindles from Halla, and their American Girl Doll Boots. And for a year in which I had absolutely no gift expectations (we're going to SoCal late in January, that's enough), we made out like bandits.

 The hub got this upside down, inside out, insulated beer glass. It works.

 My youngest sister made me a bracelet and earrings using pennies from 1952, though why she thought that year had anything to do with my year of birth is beyond me. Really, it's just a lovely bracelet featuring a random year. I'm not that old... heh...

 Sorry about the fuzzy pic- but this is a light-up wine stopper. Honest, it pulsates and glows red. I love it!

Several gifts came by mail, and as they arrived, I just put them in their Amazon boxes under the tree, so it wasn't until Christmas morning, after I'd opened the Quick Knits book (edited by my own editor at Taunton) which was a gift from a good friend, that I remembered that I actually ordered the Metal Clay Jewelry book myself. Merry Christmas to me!

Another sister gave me these gorgeous earrings. I can wear wire and dangle and hoop earrings now, and I'm enjoying every bit of the bling.

My friend Jane sent me these wonderful knitting socks. Are you jealous?

And, oh the sodium chloride. The Trader Joe's salt grinders are fantastic (the chili & garlic smoked sea salt is wonderful on leftover turkey). I used gift money to order the Lidded Salt Bowl from The Meadow, in Portland, OR, which is my absolute favorite salt store. Okay, it's the only salt store I know of, but it would be my favorite even if they were on every street corner. The bowl is carved from solid Himalayan Rock Salt, with a lid that fits perfectly. It weighs about 4lbs and it'll be perfect for serving cherry tomato halves, or as a salt cellar, or as a dish for unsalted butter. The two little bottles in front are specialty salts- one made from Oregon Pacific seawater, and the other from Alaskan waters. The Oregon salt is mild and crunchy, the Alaskan salt is wonderfully strong. Who knew that I would end up being a salt connoisseur?

But the best gift of all was the personal calendar that Matt and Cassy made for us. Every month has a picture of our family and friends, many from the wedding in July. Eyes were a little teary, I can tell you.

 And look! I'm a Calendar Girl!