Yarn Along

Joining with Ginny at Small Things for today's Yarn Along!

I'm still working on my test knit of Portage from Dandilion Girl Designs.  It's going to be a Christmas gift for my sweet sister and it suits her perfectly.  The deadline is a week from today, so I hope to have finished object photos by then!  I'm just so glad to be finished with all that honeycomb/ribbing and working on garter/stockinette so I can catch up on some Christmas movies & BBC Masterpiece Classics whilst knitting.

I also started a little chicken jumper for my sweet hen Plucky who has a bare butt.  Poor girl is at the bottom of the pecking order and refuses to stand up for herself, so I try to take extra good care of her.  

Not much in the way of reading for me as of late.  Mostly job descriptions and applications.  I do, however, plan to grab a copy of Ann Voskamp's Advent Devotional pronto to read through December.

The gorgeous plum skein in the first photo is next to be cast on.  It's destined to be another Mullspice hat for my dear friend Mary.  Since I never blogged that one, here's a photo of my first version:

I'm pretty sure I'll be giving it to my sis (the model) because, seriously... look at how well it matches those gorgeous brown eyes!? Sigh.  Maybe I'll make one for me someday :)

Dress for a Dreamer

In the midst of recent chaos, we celebrated my (out-of-town) niece's third birthday.   My husband informed me that she is going through a unicorn phase, but that he couldn't find any unicorns in town with the party a mere three days away.  Since a dear woman in my life just gifted me one of her sewing machines (more on that later), I decided to jump in head first with this adorable unicorn fabric found in a neighboring town.  The fabric is from the Far Far Away collection by Heather Ross and the pattern is Geranium Dress by Made by Rae.  This is my first finished sewing project EVER (after a 30 minute crash course in how to sew a quarter inch seam) and as such, I'm very pleased with the results!  Now, don't get me wrong - it's far from perfect, but I think it will be just perfect in the eyes of the little lady wearing it.  Excuse the crumpley photos - I took them before the final pressing and it certainly shows.  YouTube is a wonderful resource and it's where I went to learn everything from pleats to buttonholes to edging stitches.  I've already bought fabric to make the grown up version for myself when Christmas gift making comes to a halt.

Craigslist Find of the Year: Dress Form

My quest to find a dress form began not long after I joined Ravelry back in 2011 when I started seeing so many gorgeous project photos using them.  I had only a few stipulations... she had to be:

1. Affordable
2. Pretty, duh
3. Close to my size
4. NOT adjustable
5. With a wire bottom

Since I started watching, it seems like every dress form I came across was either new/adjustable or wayyy out of my price range.  I was so excited when a quick Craigslist search turned up this one.  I just knew that she had already been sold since the asking price was $65 and it was listed two months ago, but to my surprise she was still available despite a lot of interest.  My husband and I made the nearly-2-hour drive on Sunday afternoon and I snatched this baby up for less than the asking price within 24 hours of finding the listing.  Her measurements are almost identical to mine, so I'm excited to use her for my newly found sewing hobby.   Now I find myself wondering what her story is... was she in a store window or a workshop?  Where was it located?  In what years?  What kind of clothing did she model? How did she end up in that little town called Penhook?  All I know is that the wife of a man from upstate NY bought her for no apparent reason during their time together and she somehow ended up here in VA.  I'm in love.