Such Sweet Hands

I found the crochet roll stashed in the cube where I’ve been keeping all the yarn a wrangled up for granny square diversions. *Phew* Remind me to tell the story of the time I lost my entire needle and hook stash and how it was returned to me sometime. . . .

Meanwhile, I just learned that Amy Swenson’s new book is out. My little coin purse project “Assembly Required” is a part of the line up, which also includes a sweet toddler jacket by another Amy we know.

The Assembly Required project was the muse for all this button and doodad fun.

It’s 5:30 in th morning. I couldn’t sleep so after an hour or so of actual sleep and a few hours of laying in bed and staring at the cat I decided to get up and see what would happen next. Having committed to starting my day soooooo many hours earlier than I usually do (I am much more familiar with this time of day as a time to go to sleep not wake up) I decide to pick up a croche hook for the first time in days and actually work on a fun project. I can’t find my crochet hook roll. . . this is turning into early morning house cleaning. I’ve been out of bed less than an hour and I’ve already straightened two rooms. The search process has also included laying on the floor and looking at every angle and nook and cranny the little roll might have run away too. Little roll, where have you gone? I’ve heard of not putting all my eggs in one basket, but now I may change that to “don’t put all your hooks in one roll”.

While I’m chatting at all of ya so early in the morning, I might as well say a formal “Hello”. I’ve noticed quite the increase in visitors in the last month. I’d love to know who you are, please say Hi!

Making a simple useful cloth is one of my favorite things to make in my personal crochet time. I wish to cover my friends and loved ones in blankets and sweaters and toys made by hand, but I simply don’t have the time. I can give anyone I think might enjoy it a pretty little square of handmade cloth to use as a washcloth or a hot pad for holding a hot bowl of soup. Something small and simple to let someone know I want to contribute something comforting, useful, and pretty to her life. . .

I use mine for holding tea mugs and bowls of soup. A good friend recently told me she uses one (the purple one in this photo, to be exact) as a washcloth when she bathes her daughter. She says it’s soft and sturdy and everything you need for a baby’s bath. I feel humbled that this sweet little cloth is an integral part of her daughter’s bath time.

It feels good to sit down and make something so useful and simple. They’re easy to whip up too! I like to bundle the cloth with something else, a package of tea, a fancy soap, etc. You don’t even need gift wrap, just a string or ribbon to tie it up with.

I often use Blue Sky Alpaca Cottons (Dyed or Organic) and Crystal Palace Cotton Chenille. Anything that can stand up to washing and repeated use, as well as creates a nice, useful fabric. If you’re making a washcloth I suggest working with cotton, I bet hemp might be nice for an exfoliating cloth. The texture is part of what makes this useful cloth as sweet as it is useful. Bobbles, stitch patterns full of mixed stitches, anything that creates a crunchy, yummy texture will work. With just a smidge of planning you can pull double duty trying out new stitch patterns and making a useful cloth.

You never know whose daily ritual (be it bath time or tea time) your cloth could become a part of.

I have found the secret, how to transform a simple crocheted sphere ( what will it be or be a part of in the end? will it be part of an amigurumi creature? will one of the cats steal it? there’s just no knowing!) into something as sweet to the fingers as a bonbon of the finest decadent kind is to the mouth? Oh, it simple…

Here sits a humble sphere composed of single crochet stitches, stuffed with ends and stray bits of leftover Koigu from the Larger Than Life Bag. Some yarns are simply too nice and I can’t discard even the shortest strands that are too short to use. Until now I never thought to use these little leftover delicasies as stuffing. I suppose the strands of yarn make for a heavier stuffing. The weight combines with the squish of the plush yarn to make for a little crocheted ball with a bit more substance. I’m not tossing out the bag of fiber-fill in the closet, but now I want to play with other treasured fancy things as stuffing. . . .

I made a little (okay little in the face of the events of the world, huge in our household) fumble last week. I got all uppity with our phone company and bid them adieu without considering/knowing that this was going to mean that our dsl provider could no longer provide us service via the same circuit-ma-jingey once the phone company had yanked the thinga-ma-jingey. Thus, our fair apartment with two home offices has been without a reliable connection for over a week. I’m borrowing wireless from a neighbor right now…

I had no idea how mucked up things can get with dsl service. We will have our own DSL again in a week or so, oh well.

A week without internet access has been nice though. I got a lot of work done and even watched less teevee too. Weird huh?

I’m getting a late start on putting together the “Larger than Life Bag” crochet along. Thanks for your patience and keep a heads up for it in the coming days!

Remember the Doughnut Day a few months back? The tamest of the doughnuts and a lace bangle I made are now available in the new issue of Crochet Today for your own doughnut bracelet making pleasure….

These babies are kinda silly, but silly is fun and life needs more of both. Padding your bangles with some crochet takes away that incessant clanging noise and removes any fear that broad arm gestures might land a sturdy bangle in the face of a loved one. Well, if it does land in the face of a loved one via flying off or manic arm gesturing-thwapping in face while armed with said bangle the blow will be cushioned…

I was unaware of the fire until we stepped out for an errand. Before that I had merely noticed the pink cast to the light and thought about the dust storms of my Lubbock childhood. Thanks to dust storms, a pink lit day is sort of just right for spring out there. I didn’t bother to wonder why it was pink here though. Luckily we were headed to see a condo and I brought my camera along. I snapped a ton of photos as we happened to drive in the general direction of the fire.

This is the intersection of Olympic and Western. Other folks got pictures from much closer, but I love that this humble Burbank grass fire made itself seen all the way to Koreatown.

I’ve mentioned before that Tiger Lily (sometimes I spell it Lilly, just because it looks silly) is camera shy.  She’s simply shy about most things.  But she trusts me.  She’ll sleep curled up close to me at night, she follows me around the apartment sometimes, when she’s bored she’ll come get me to play with her, she’s developed a pesky but adorable habit of “begging” for table scraps without begging, and she’s simply the sweetest little thing.  Of course this sweetness is multiplied many times because she trusts me more than anyone else and only trusts two people at all.

The girl enjoys an afternoon sun nap.  Note, she’s not totally crashed out. She’s aware of the clicking camera, at any moment she may spring into action and dive behind her couch.  Yeah, she has her own couch….  that’s another story.

Wednesday, March 28 was a rather poopy day.

When working on several projects for various entities, one sometimes finds herself standing in the middle of several almost finished tasks and no idea how to prioritize which to finish up and send on it’s way first. (At least I do, because I have a rather dysfunctional relationship with my to do lists.) I was at the crux of one of these “to do list quandaries” when everyone I have outstanding work with emailed or called at once to see if this or that could make it’s way to him or her that day. My brain short circuited and I became paralyzed in my to do list. As soon as I’d start to concentrate on one thing, another popped up and I was literally jumping from thing to thing in a pretty manic way. I was some poor little wonky mixed up crochet robot in need of reprogramming…

A friend asked on IM how I was doing and I responded that it felt like knives were dropping from the sky. ….um, I guess that made sense. I was pretty stressed out. I really felt like I was juggling hot potatoes, but hey, “knives falling from the sky” works too. My dear friend in a moment of clarity with a heart of silliness responded, “combat them with the power of scrubbing bubbles!” That made me giggle. I sent off emails begging for more information, begging for time, wondering if everyone really needed things right away. I noticed I was very stinky on top of being helpless to choose one task to prioritize until I heard back from anyone. So I took a bath.

This is the view from my bathtub. This corner of my apartment always looks neat. Cool shadows, purple tile, it looks clean and calm enough I can ignore the cat litter box sitting directly to the left of this area.

Hiding in the bathtub did make me feel better. My brain seems to calm itself when all I have to look at is old tile and bubbles. As I got out of the tub I remembered the advice from hours earlier and laughed out loud. With a clearer head I chose something on the to do list that involved holding yarn in my hands (when missing other info to prioritize your work, reach for the yarn right?) I had indeed fought the falling knives with the power of bubbles and it worked!