Night Out

Chris's band played at Gameworks last night, they opened for another band and it was lots of fun. They were off on a couple of things, but by and large they were pretty good. Plus it was just fun to get out, Sio came, and Garry and Jamie, and Richard and some of his friends and just a lot of people Chris knows. I took some pictues and some video, the video wasn't very good, but the pictures are. The 2nd band was good, too; they were called Misbehavin', they were pretty much a 70's rock cover band. The singer was a girl, and boy could she nail Janis Joplin; she really sounded a lot like her. We stayed til they ended and by the time we got home it was at least 2; that's a really late night for me! Anyway, Sio and I both think we should go out more often; her Chris doesn't like to go so she wants us to go with her.

I made this apron yesterday. I like it so much I might make another one for me. I got a set of curtains at Salvation Army for $4, this is made from one of the panels. It was long enough that I cut the top of the panel off in 3 1/2" strips and used them for the waistband and ties. It only took about and hour, and I still have the other panel and the valance left.

Amish Bars Quilt

I made this Amish Bars wall hanging or baby quilt the other day; it was inspired by an antique Amish quilt.There looks like there is a spot on the maroon stripe but there isn't; it's some sort of crazy reflection. I'm going to machine quilt it; I picked out a few quilting designs and I'm going to make cardboard quilting stencils this afternoon. I'd like to get better at hand quilting, but don't think I'm going to on this project. I do like it a lot though; I'll post pics after I've finished it.

I guess they've discovered 4 billion barrels of oil in North Dakota and Montana ( I think); it's part of the Bakken field which I heard of before. I'm still not clear on the details; I haven't seen much about it. 4 billion barrels only takes us through about 200 days at our current consumption rate anyway; however it seems to extend up into Canada and I haven't heard about any figures there. If it's easily recovorable and there's a lot of it across the border it could buy some time while we are figuring out new ways of doing things. However, I'm thinking it's kind of a non-story at this time because while 4 billion barrels sounds like a lot, it really isn't. We currently consume 20 million barrels of oil a day in the US, even with the higher prices of gas, so until I hear something else I'm not going to get excited about it.

Love This Video!

Here's a great video of Karen Matheson and Fiona Kennedy.

Please Watch This

Excellent French documentary; all about Monsanto and what they don't want us to know.

Projects!

I have been working on several projects. I crocheted some very cute headbands out of yarn left over from other projects; Holly is wearing one. I think they are cute and are really nice take along projects that don't take long. I made this one while I was waiting for mom at one of her physical thereapy appointments. I also crocheted a cute open work hat that Sio has on. It's kind of hard to see in the picture. Then I finished another shawl, this one is crocheted using 2 strands of yarn held together; one is Wool-Ease in Denim Twist, the other is a recycled light blue wool blend yarn. Sio saw it yesterday and said it was a bit plain, so I started adding a fringe last night while I was watching tv after work. My last yarn project is a little cardigan I started from a book called Knitting for the First Time by Vanessa Ann. I finished the back already; I had to increase the width by adding stitches on either side using a cable cast on which was a new skill for me. I started the front right side yesterday; I have a custom order that I'm working on for a trade I'm doing on Etsy, as soon as I finish it I'll get back to the sweater. It's a toddler size 2; I might give it to Sio to send to South America with her hats. It's knit from a cotton/acrylic/wool blend yarn I recycled from a thrift store sweater I got for 99 cents; it was all ribs and cables so there's a TON of yarn.
I have a baby blanket I started quilting, too. I was originally going to make a tablerunner, but I then I thought this would be really nice as a blanket for a baby girl.

Just One More

I know lately there has been no needlework on this blog, it's been music or current affairs.Ok,my next post will be needlework, but I had to post this video of one of my all time favorite bands. When it comes to a Celtic band inspiring traditional craft forms, Capercaillie always does it for me. And while this song is not exactly traditional, it's one of my favorites. Plus, whether she sings in Gaelic or English, Karen Mathieson has one of the greatest voices ever.

Comfort

"My life is open wide,
The more you live the less you will die"

Ok it's more Carbon Leaf, but like I said before, if you're looking for good, folky, solid and sometimes introspective song writing these guys are really good.

BBC Report

I heard about this report on the Thom Hartmann show yesterday.What I'd like to know is why the BBC reports on this but I haven't heard about it from our news outlets? Talk about shades of the Great Depression!



Then there's the question of: If this is what's happening in LA where it's relatively warm, where are people going in places where it isn't warm? Here in Chicago, we had an inch of snow yesterday. I know there are people who would say that it's those peoples fault because they let themselves get into loans they couldn't possibly pay for, but I think those who made the loans are more to blame. In their greed to make as much money as they possibly could they were willing to put a lot of peoples well being at risk. This is what happens when there is no one to regulate that greed.

Thom Hartmann is the smartest person I've heard on talk radio; he can be streamed live at Air America radio from 11:00 til 2:00: http://www.airamerica.com/ or here in the Chicago area his show is rerun on WCPT 820 fm at 5:00, although they go off the air before he is over. They also stream at: http://www.wcpt820.com/

I watched the End of Suburbia last night; I hadn't seen it in awhile and since I recently recommended it to someone I thought I'd watch it again myself. With the recent happeneings on the economic front and oil being over $100 a barrel, and (at least in my opinion) not likely to ever go below $100 again, I was kind of watching to see how much of the movie is begining to come true. I can't even begin to list everything. I also was reimpressed with a couple of things, the first being how much of the food we eat is dependent on oil. Our fertilizers and insecticides are oil based, the machines we use to plant and tend and harvest that food run on oil. The plants that process that food are in a good many cases run on electricity that is derived from some sort of fossil fuel, and we get that food to our grocery stores on trucks which run on oil derived diesel. Without a source of oil we are trully a starving planet. Actually there is an excellent photo essay called "What the World Eats" in two parts here:
http://www.time.com/time/photogallery/0,29307,1626519,00.html
and here:
http://www.time.com/time/photogallery/0,29307,1645016,00.html

What's really striking in these pictures is how much of the food is processed. It's remarkable how our food is awash in petroleum products. We cannot sustain life in the numbers that currently populate this planet without fossil fuel. And yet we go right along squandering the most precious resource we have, driving to fucking Wal-Mart to buy stuff made in China in our SUV's. Sometimes I agree with Siobhan that we are the stupidest race on this planet and we deserve to become extinct. However there are some signs that the party is about to end. With it looking like we have already reached worldwide peak oil production and that it will never again be less than $100 a barrel , combined with rising food prices and the burst housing bubble, the outlook for the average American is not rosy. It's pretty apparent we are on the verge of a collapse that may escalate into Biblical proportions rather quickly. Even if we stave off the ramifications of oil depletion for awhile (although I don't know how we can do that) economically we're fucked. The middle class has shrunk to a shadow of what it once was, unemployment is higher (probably much higher) then the reported numbers, every thing is higher priced, and we are in a recession that I think is the beginning of the the Great Depression of the 21st century. In the meantime, the economists and bankers and government officials use fake numbers that don't account for the neccessities of life, like food and fuel, and the real number of the unemployed, to paint a nice picture; but they are increasingly unable to keep up the appearance. In the last month or so 2 financial institutions have failed, and although Bear Stearns was given a bail out, (I don't know all the details on the failed European bank), there's really no way to bail every one out once the domino effect kicks in. And with all the bad loans sliced and diced and repackaged and resold, who the hell even knows who has what. And the fed drops interest rates and prints 2 billion worthless dollars to flood the market place in some kind of crazy sleight of hand manuoever so that maybe we won't notice whats really happening. No it's not a pretty picture at all. And we play it all out against the backdrop of Peak Oil and Climate Change.
And like the hypocrite I am, I still go to my worthless job to sell cheap crap to the stupid soccer moms of suburbia.

Easter Blogging with Carbon Leaf

I saw Carbon Leaf at the Metro a few years ago, 2003 I think, when I saw Great Big Sea for the first time, and I have been a fan ever since. They unfortunatly don't get the airplay or acclaim they deserve, although they did win best of something at the American Music Awards about the same time I saw them (my brain is mush and I can't quite remember what). They are a solid, folky, songwriting and singing band if you like that sort of thing; which I do, and some of their lyrics are extrememly introspective and poetic. They also throw in an occasional bluegrass or Irish song, especially if you catch them around St Patty's Day. I've downloaded several live shows, and I look for them from time to time to see if they are coming back this way. So far I haven't been able to catch them again, and a peek at their web page shows they aren't headed this way anytime soon. So in the meantime, I found this wonderful video over at YouTube of them doing One Prarie Outpost at (of all places) a Borders in Olympia, Washington. All I can say is; how come bands of this calibre never play at my Borders?

More Knitting

I found this yarn that Sio left here and knitted a baby hat. I can purl continental now too! This is Hobby Lobby's Yarn Bee Mosaic Twist, and the colors are just perfect for a spring baby. Sio has a friend who's family goes to South America every year to volunteer medical services, and she always knits a bunch of hats for them to take with for the newborns. I'll give her this one too, and maybe I'll make another one for more practice.
I also finished this black shawl crocheted using Lion Suede. I bought the yarn over a year ago and started the shawl, now it's finally finished and I'll list it in my Etsy store. I started another one using a bulky acrylic/wool blend yarn that is recycled from a sweater. I sorted all my cotton yarn today, too; I have a ton of it. I'm not sure what I'm going to do yet. I made a couple of headbands and I might make a few more.

Birthday Blogging

Melissa was here last week which was really nice. We celebrated our birthdays together; Chris had a party at his house and it was a lot of fun. He has a friend who has Rock Band; they set it up and the real highlight of the evening was Siobhan singing the Beastie Boys Sabotage. It was so funny! Melissa has video of it and I want her to send it to me and I'll see if I can post it somehow.Chris invited a few people that I knew, and Sio asked Holly from work. Joan was in Alaska so they didn't ask her.It really was a fun party and I haven't been to a party in a long time. We didn't leave til 2, and with the time change it really was 3, and then we had to get up kind of early yesterday to take Melissa to the airport

Carla and Jimmy had their play on Friday and Saturday night, this is their second weekend. Melissa, who had spent a couple days with a friend in St Louis, met us at the theater early and we went to dinner at a Thai restaurant about a block away. The play was fun, too; Carla and Jimmy and the rest of the actors/actresses who are involved with them are so enthusiastic. I helped with some of the costuming. They were alright as far as costumes go, but kind of uninteresting. But they were perfect for the production and I understand they have to go pretty cheap. There was an opening act called the Puppet Bike which was kind of crazy but still ok.

Melissa helped me figure out how to do the border on my shawl. I didn't do the miter right, it doesn't look too bad, but I'll do better on the next one. I used a plain green yarn that Siobhan left here. I wish I had made it a bit bigger, but I didn't have a long enough circular needle. I'm going to buy a longer one at Hobby Lobby and maybe make another one.

The kids got me a new free motion foot for my machine, a spool rack for my thread, and the Quilters Design Wizard, which is just really cool. There are 200 blocks and 3000 fabrics, plus free downloads for more on the website. I played with it all last night, but the files aren't .jpg's, so I just took pics of the computer screen to show the program. What I really like about it is that you can look for fabrics by color or by type. And the math is almost eliminated; I can figure out what size I want to make it, choose blocks, border and fabrics, and it will come up with yardages and a guide for both rotary cutting and templates. I am going to design and make a baby quilt in the next couple of days for my Etsy store. It works for scrap quilts too.

End of the World

Siobhan and I have been talking about the end of the world because of the Matchbox Twenty song Just See How Far We've Come.
I have to say I much prefer this:

Especially with it being Great Big Sea doing it!

Art Quilt and More Yarn

Well I finished the quilt show quilt and dropped it off the other day. It's ok, but not something I would do again. I really enjoyed the process of dying all the fabrics, but I always do. I layered netting over the top and quilted through all the layers, and then beaded it. The organza swirls show up better than I thought they would. Siobhan is holding it up for me.

The blue yarn is my latest reclaimed yarn project. There wasn't a label so I'm not sure what it's made of, but it's soft enough that I think it might be a cashmere blend. I think I will save it for a scarf. Melissa wants me to show her how I unravel sweaters while she's here next week, so that means a trip to the resale shop, hooray! I have been spending as much time as I can on the shawl, too. If I can find a border yarn I might finish it over the weekend.

Recycled Knitted Shawl

I am knitting this garter stitch shawl from a silk/cotton blend yarn that I recycled from a thrift store sweater. I don't knit much, but this is coming along pretty quickly. I got the pattern here:
http://mary4169.tripod.com/Stash_Shawl.pdf
I'm not sure what to do about the border yet, if I can find some yarn I like here I'll use it; if not I'll have to hit the thrift store again.

I am almost done with a patchy bag for Etsy; it's all green prints with a celtic knot appliqued on the front. It's my first scrap project of the week.

Dyeing Nylon

I finally got the shrug finished and am posting pics of the sweater before and after it was dyed. I used Procion Lemon Yellow, 1/4 tsp. and then just a tinch of Emerald Green, and I got this pretty apple green. I simmered the sweater for a good 45 mins and then used vinegar to set my dye. It was a nylon/cotton blend. The trim was an acrylic/rayon blend and it didn't take the dye at all. I trimmed it with trim that Sio got at the the thrift shop, so except for the thread, the entire thing is made with recycled materials.
The little nylon slip I dyed with Cushings Rose Pink. You can't see it in the picture but I have added 2 bands of rose print fabrics to the bottom. I need a vintage silk flower to pin to the cleavage. I was going to take off the lace because I knew it wouldn't take the dye, but it looks nice so I'm leaving it on. Later on today I'll take some better pics and then list the shrug on Etsy.
Sio taught me how to knit the continental way last night and I am making a skinny scarf from recycled yarn that was once a tank top. It's kind of a skinny ribbon yarn, red and black. As soon as I finish it I'll post a pic.

Victorian Charm

I don't know, maybe it's because Valentines Day just passed, or maybe it's just because I like the romantic Victorian look, but whatever it was, I was inspired to make both of these projects. The coasters are the latest scrap project and they are pretty; I can see using them at a tea party with pretty pink and white rose china tea cups and tea pot. The cuff was inspired by the little floral earring that I have sewn to the center. It was a clip earring and I broke the back off and sewed it to the cuff. I think it turned out very nice. I still have the other earring and I might use it on a choker. I also dyed one of my slips pink and am going to turn it into a dress today. I have some yellow cotton printed with pink rosebuds that might make a nice band for trim.
I think my next scrap project is going to be to use up all the 4 1/2" squares that were given to me by a friend who used to work at Hancock. I have a huge bag full, I'll bet there's enough for a twin sized bed, maybe even a double. Then I'm going to look for a flannel sheet at the thrift store for a back and sell it or use it as a summer quilt. I have one already, it's perfect when a sheet isn't enough but a regular quilt is too much.

Vintage Clutch

I made this little clutch for Etsy. It's the same pattern as the blue strips one, just the smaller size. I also got the bath mat finished but gave it away to Holly before I had a chance to take a picture. I have some crazy quilt sachets to make up for my third scrap project this week, I might make them tonight.
I went to Salvation Army last night and got 2 shirts to turn into the corset on Threadbanger. Then I got this real cute linen cotton blend skirt that I am going to shorten, add some trim to the bottom ,and an applique.I also got 3 slips for slip dresses, a cotton rose print skirt that I took apart to add to my quilting stash, and this nifty embroidered table runner which will become at least one bag, maybe two. Plus a sugar bowl and a towel so I can try another bath mat. All for $18! I call that pretty smart shopping.
I have started hand quilting the applique blocks at moms in the afternoon. I am sewing them into groups of 4 and then quilting them 4 at a time and the first 4 are almost finished.

This is Pretty Cool!

I stumbled across www.threadbanger.com, and found this really cool video. I can't wait to try it.


There's also a tutorial: http://www.threadbanger.com/post/5655/how-to-make-a-corset