Category Archives: Sewing

Animals and Nature, Family, Sewing

Hey there, Chickadee

Posted on by Jean

One of my favorite things about being around my grandparents is being surrounded by nature. 

My grandfather built their house up on a little mountain in the White Mountain area of New Hampshire.  I love getting up at the crack of dawn with them, wrapping up in a blanket, cup of coffee in hand, and going out on the deck to watch the woods wake up.

It’s so perfect to see a family of deer or foxes run across their land and listen to the birds.   My grandparents can tell you each kind of bird we hear.  They’ve always had lots of birdhouses and I remember my grandfather always at war with the squirrels trying to figure out a way that he could keep them out of the bird food.  Ever since I was a really little girl I’ve loved Chickadees.  I would actually start crying if the other birds looked like they weren’t letting the poor little Chickadees in the bird feeder. When my grandparents see Chickadees they think of me (there are a LOT of them in NH) .  I love that.  It’s sweet and makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside.   Gram’s 81st birthday is on Saturday.  My gift is late because I just found a great book (Backyard Bird Quilts) and knew exactly what I had to make her.  The book just arrived on Tuesday so I dug into my fat quarter stash and spent yesterday afternoon working on this:

I took a little artistic liberty with the colors (that and it was really hard to see since it’s so dark here in the afternoons) but I think it’s pretty dern cute.   

And because I’m feeling so nostalgic lately, here’s a picture of Gram when she was about three or four years old just outside of Boston.

After the whole Mayflower discovery that I wrote about in the last post, I went to the library and got the book “Mayflower” by Nathaniel Philbrick.  I’m into the second chapter and really enjoying it.   I had no idea that they lived in Holland for about twelve years first.  It popped up a couple of times during the research but I couldn’t figure it out.

And finally, we are so close to Dan coming home that I swear the air is electric.  I can’t remember the last time I was this excited about something.  One week from right this very moment, if all goes as planned, we will be on the Autobahn and less than an hour from being home.   YeeeHAW!

Family, Knitting, Sewing

2 + 2 Still Equals 2

Posted on by Jean

I finished the two socks on two circs.  (I don’t normally block my socks but for photo purposes I used the instructions for the sock blockers online by bending coat hangers. The website I found the directions on is gone now.

yarn:  Regia 6-fadig Country Color / color #4758

So here’s my opinion about this method.  This is just my opinion.  It may be great for you.  I wasn’t crazy about the 2 on 2 method.  I don’t know if it’s because I’ve been using dpns so long but I just never got to a point where I was totally comfortable with it.  The one major pro was being finished with both socks at the same time.  I can achieve this by knitting a little of each on dpns though.  The circulars just always seemed to be in my way.   Made it seem faster but I’m sure that’s just in my head.

I really tried not to cheat but after several attempts to do the heels, I did put them on dpns until I got to straight knitting again.  I doubt I’ll ever knit socks this way again.  I originally thought that I’d do at least one more pair to see if it grows on me, but really, I didn’t enjoy it so what’s the point?

And remember this whole mess so that I could knit until I ran out of yarn equally?  What a waste of time. It was all for nothing.  Look how much I had left of each ball.  If I’d knit until I ran out of yarn I’d have thigh-high stockings which would be fine if I was going for the school-girl look but if I were, it wouldn’t be in this pattern. 🙂

So, what took me so long?  I’ve been working on a couple of other things.  One of them I can’t really show you yet, but here’s a hint:

Hardy Stock

After my last post I pulled all my old genealogy files out and joined Ancestry.com.  Wow.  It’s amazing how much the internet helps in the research.  From right here at my desk, I found more in a weekend than I found in all the days and days that I spent in the National Archives and Library of Congress when I lived in the D.C. area.

I’ve mainly been working from my grandmother back.  I got stumped in 1880 because the line I was researching came from Nova Scotia (Campbell and Fraser) during that year and I’ll have to order vital records to get more information.  The 1890 Census records were destroyed by a fire and it’s really bogging up my research.

Since I couldn’t go any further along that line I started looking up another line. I was amazed to find that my tenth great-grandparents are John Alden and Priscilla Mullins who came over on the Mayflower and founded Duxbury, Mass.  I called my Gram to tell her and her reply was, “I could have saved you a lot of work and told you that”.  This is the price I pay for not getting to live around my family in New Hampshire very much. 

So I thought it’d be fun to see if any of you are my long, long…… long lost cousins.  At the end of this post you’ll find my family history to the Aldens and Mullins.  As you can guess, most of them were born, lived and died in Duxbury. Edith Chick Hodgdon was my great great grandmother and her mother, Christiana Soule Chick, was the first to move away… all the way to Watertown, Ma. (a whopping 40 miles away).  This photo is Edith with her sister, Elizabeth. My Gram believes Edith is on the right.  I can totally see Gram and my aunts in both of these women so who knows. Edith’s mother-in-law was Georgianna B. Allan Hodgdon (the great granddaughter of both Col. John Allan and Col. John Crane that I wrote about in my last post).

Family, Friends, Sewing

A Good Time Was Had By All

Posted on by Jean

The boys and I had a great Thanksgiving in Garmisch.  Three years ago we hiked half way up Kramer Mountain with our long-time friends to find snow and have hot chocolate at the St. Martin Hutte half way up:

We did it again this year:

I’d say the kids have grown a little, wouldn’t you?  Good thing because Joe was not riding on my shoulders most of the way like he did on Dan’s three years ago.  These pictures were taken in the exact same spot.  It was almost 60 degrees when the boys and I left Garmisch yesterday.  Not good for the skiing tourism.

Here’s a view from St. Martin Hutte where we had a nice cold beer (soda for the kids) and pretzels fresh out of the oven:

Meanwhile, Dan was having a fantastic Thanksgiving of his own.  Country Music star, Aaron Tippin, surprised them at Bagram with a concert.

We have about ten Saturdays until he comes home!  I can do that standing on my head.

Last Tuesday night the Spouse’s Club had a “Make it, Bake it & Take it night to raise funds for the club.  Everyone baked or made something (most brought gift baskets of some sort) to be auctioned off.  Here’s the large tote bag that was my contribution:

Both fabrics came from a German thrift store.   I’m positive the yellow is quite old.  Love it.  I found the flower tutorial at Wisecraft.  The pattern for the bag is from this book:

Cooking, Sewing

String

Posted on by Jean

The last few people that I’ve taught to knit or sew have called the yarn and the thread “string”.  Drove me nuts.    I haven’t been posting lately because I haven’t had any knitting to show.  It is a knitting blog after all.   I don’t know what it is.  I went through this once before and it lasted about two years.  I have been sewing like crazy though.  Then yesterday I was thinking (I know.  Scary.) in the end isn’t all just string? Then I started thinking again (must be something in the coffee).  I think most knitters like anything made of fiber.  I know I do.  And besides…  It’s my blog and I’ll sew if I want to.   Just think of the thread as really thin yarn. 

So until I get that knitting feeling back….  Here’s what I did yesterday:

I made a crayon bag for a three-year old’s birthday.  The inside is lined with the bandanna fabric.  I saw a pattern for the bag at Connecting Threads but didn’t have time to wait (the party is today) so I winged it.  Pretty easy. 

His dad works in Dan’s office and they are moving back to the States this week.  I thought it’d be perfect for the plane.  A Tonka Truck wouldn’t have been good since they are all packed out and ready to fly.  If I didn’t think Preston would get upset when I walked back out with it, I’d bring one in as a joke.

I did another happy little girl bag and accessories for Pam’s daughter (Amy Butler’s In Town Bag): 

Her birthday party is tomorrow and I can not wait for her to see it.  It’s very similar to the one I made before.  Madison, the five-year old that I made the last one for saw this one and was not happy about it.  I assured her they were a little different and she seemed okay with that. The little zippered bag and tissue case were made with scraps so that I didn’t have to cut into a new fat quarter.  The zipper bag is lined with the white flowered fabric on the sides of the purse and the tissue pouch is lined with the orange lining in the purse.  Usually a little of the tissue pouch lining shows up on the opening edges but the piece of fabric was a hair too short.  I used a pattern for the zippered pouch from this book:

Pam and I are doing Thanksgiving Dinner for the kids tonight. On Wednesday we are all headed to Garmisch for the Holiday Weekend.   Another family that we were stationed with here in Germany before are meeting us down there.  Can’t wait.  I hope there’s snow on the mountains because, not that I’m complaining, it’s been REALLY warm here for this time of year.  I planted bulbs in baskets to give out in February… I think I’ll be giving them out for Christmas instead.

So Happy Thanksgiving to all! 

Here’s my recipe for Sweet Potato Casserole.  It’s always a favorite and really low in fat (not).

Sewing

Ladies and Gents… we have a winner

Posted on by Jean

Well.   I certainly didn’t think anyone would get it already.   Lisa must have scoured the internet for every photo of every stadium in the world.  She was the only one who got it right.   A pound of the lovely lavender will be winging it’s way across the Atlantic to her this week.

We’re running the 10K at Panathinaiko Stadium in Athens the first weekend in November.   We will be in Athens for less than 24 hours.  How dumb are we?  We were so focused on being home in time to put the kids to bed on Sunday night that we didn’t even think about going on Friday afternoon and actually relaxing for a bit.  We will probably exert more energy trying to make our early afternoon flight back to Germany than we will during the race.  Poor planning.  Actually there was no planning what-so-ever.  We got excited and jumped in.  We’ll still have a blast and we’re still SO excited.  I’ve been to Greece before but Pam hasn’t.  Our hotel is right in the thick of things and the race course goes right by all the main attractions.   Gives a whole new meaning to a quick trip.

I’ve been sewing again.  We have the Wives’ Club Bazaar this weekend.  It’s a pretty big deal over here.  I’m making bags for the Ways and Means table (money that goes back into the club to help run it).  The Army changed uniforms recently.   So what to do with all those old Battle Dress Uniforms?  Get creative!

Trust me.  WAY cuter in person.  They are lined with the T-shirts that they wore with these uniforms.  I also made up large messenger bags and wine gift bags and little tissue holders.  I’ll share the pictures once I get more done.  I need to get back to the sewing machine.  The bazaar starts on Friday! 

My load will greatly be relieved come November 1st.  Soccer will be over and we’ve decided to put off the Tae Kwon Do until we get back to the States and the boys can join a proper class that isn’t so late in the evening.  That’s FIVE, count ’em, FIVE days a week we’ll get back the afternoons and evenings.  Whew.   Maybe I’ll actually have time to pick up the needles again.

During breakfast I’ve started reading to the boys.  The book we started this morning is Here Lies the Librarian.  They both love it.  This author, Richard Peck, is fantastic.   Daniel read one of his other books in class and I got hooked on him.

Knitting, Sewing

K4, P4 for 40″

Posted on by Jean

What’s better than a little mindless knitting?  A little mindless knitting for a good cause.   Elann’s free pattern for a Chemo Turban.  There’s a civilain family that goes to church with us.   The woman that runs our Playhouse theater moved here years ago.  You may remember Daniel and Joe being in The Pied Piper last year. She was awesome with them.  She met her husband here and had her kids here.  Her parents moved here a few years ago and her mother became the boys’ school nurse.  Her sister, only 40-years old, was diagnosed with breast cancer this summer.  They did a double mastectomy and last Friday she started chemo.  I’m using Elann’s oh-so-soft Esprit leftover from my Hopeful.  I didn’t realize it until just now that it’s kind of serendipity.   Proceeds from the Hopeful pattern went towards breast cancer research.   Here it is so far.  I have about another ten inches to go:

I went with a friend to a German thrift store today.  What fun.  Look what I found!

That, my friends, is a handknit lace table runner.  The cost? About $7.  It’s gorgeous.

I finished another baby gift.  A dog quilt for a baby boy….

Animals and Nature, Sewing, Shetland, Travel

This and That

Posted on by Jean

How about a little of both sewing and knitting today?  Not that I knit anything but I still have lots of knitterly pictures to share from Shetland.  I kind of feel like that person that you go to visit and they pull out all their vacation photos and make you sit there looking at them for hours.  At least here you can just scroll by if you want to and I’d never know it.  🙂

Back to Shetland….What we thought was wool all stuck to the grass was actually a common plant in Scotland called “Cotton Grass”.  We didn’t realize it wasn’t wool until we saw a bookmark with a photo of it.  I took the picture above with full intentions of posting all about the wool everywhere:

There actually was quite a bit of wool all over.  There was quite a bit of something else the sheep left everywhere that Daniel had a very hard time not gagging over. lol  Sheep poop everywhere was not easy on him.  Nothing like ruining a perfectly beautiful photo by talking about poop, huh?  You’re welcome.

Vest outside of the “Croft House” at the Isleburgh Exhibit:

Sheep on Fair Isle near the Bird Observatory:

Everyone is friendly in Shetland.  Shetland Pony saying howdy near Eshaness.

Hap shawls at the Crofthouse Museum:

I did more sewing last night and today.  Joseph’s kindergarten teacher moved away while he was in 1st grade and had a baby last year. I promised a quilt.  You know my motto:  Better late than never.  Perfect timing for the first birthday actually!  I finally finished it today.  Yeah!  The kit came from one of my favorite quilting sources who happens to be in cahoots with one of my favorite knitting sources.  You guessed it… Connecting Threads and Knit Picks.  See… my knitting sort of lead to my quilting.  That counts for something doesn’t it?  The kit was called Daisies, Ducks and Dogs. 

Family, Sewing

Turning Five In Style

Posted on by Jean

Just got an update on Dan’s uncle.   Looks like he’s going to be okay.  He’s breathing on his own and actually joking.  A couple of weeks in the hospital and two months of downtime at home with lots of loving care from his wife and he’ll be almost good as new.  Thank God.  Thank you for all your prayers and well wishes.

More Shetland pictures to follow. Just didn’t want everyone to think I’d lost all my creativity and would just be showing pictures from our trip forever.

I have a confession to make. I haven’t been knitting much this Summer.  There.  I said it.  I have been sewing though.  I decided that I don’t care how it looks and set up a little sewing corner in my dining room so I could get to sewing and finally put my machine to work.  There’s absolutely no place else in the house with enough light and space to do it.  There’s a huge walk-in closet (unusual in Germany) upstairs but it’s dark and full of wool.  With Dan gone we don’t entertain now, so who cares what it looks like.

Having to pull everything out and put it back again when I feel like sewing something really puts a hamper on my creativity. I have this awesome machine and I use it so little that I have to reinvent the wheel whenever I take it out because I can’t remember how to do the gazillions of cool things it can do.  So when I’m actually sewing, the dining room table is covered but it’s easier to clean up by just putting stuff neatly in this little corner than to haul everything up and down the stairs and I find I’m sewing more now.  Which I like.

A neighbor girl (her dad also works in Dan’s office) is turning five tomorrow.  I have all boys.  It’s a treat when I get to make something for a girl.  I went all out girlie-girl because once-upon-a-time in a far away land I was a very girlie girl and I miss it.  With some inspiration from Autum (Creative Little Daisy) and the Amy Butler “In Town” pattern, this is what I came up with for her gift:

I used the main purse fabric for the pocket on the back side of the little zipper bag (which I used this pattern for).  Yes, I messed up and somehow ended up with the pocket on the back instead of the front.  Worked out though because I also cut it wrong and if I’d put it on the front the pocket would have covered the zipper.  So when I screw up it’s kinda like a double negative. lol.  It erases itself and no one would ever know…. except you.

I bought a handmade tissue pouch at the local fabric store and tore it apart to see how it went together.  There are plenty of tutorials on the web so don’t ask me why I didn’t just go the easy route.  The edging in red was also an accident because I had to use the scraps as I could. Just turned out that way.   I was using a set of fat quarters and didn’t want to cut into another set just to make a little tissue pouch.  Really funny because the fat quarter pack is called Serendipity.  Guess it’s true to it’s name.

I was so excited about it that yesterday I told the birthday girl that I couldn’t wait until she saw what I made for her.  She said, “I hope it’s not a baby present!”  LOL. I assured her that it was very much five-year old style, in fact,  people would probably think she’s six!  She was very happy to hear it.  You’d think she was 36 the way she talks.  It’s hilarious.  The ensemble will go very well with her beautiful red hair.  I also put a little tube of kids hand creme I found in the German apothecary (the tube is the perfect shade of orange) and a tube of cherry flavored lip balm (also German) that matches the red in the bag.  And it’s bad luck to give a wallet without money it it so there’s a $1 bill in the pouch.  I hope to hear squeals of delight this afternoon.

Knitting, Sewing

Wednesdays Are For Spinning

Posted on by Jean

Wednesdays are for spinning for me. That way nothing can interfere with my spinning day….except this Wednesday. I just had too much to catch up on. I’m still not finished and Wednesday is almost over here in Germany. I did get a lot done though and, as you’ll see, I was rewarded handsomely when the German post arrived. We don’t often get mail in our German mail box other than the weekly sale fliers every Friday. We pick up our American mail at the mail room on the Army Post

Besides a trip to the commissary and the usual daily stuff, here’s what I accomplished today:
I had to do some machine embroidery today.

I needed to put a new baby’s name and birthdate on a blanket. He was born August 21st. That shows you how long this has been festering in the back of my mind. Now… it is done. While the machine was out I also had to do a military flag for a retirement gift for the Sergeant Major in Dan’s unit. Now that’s done too. Man does that feel good to say.

Speaking of done… the Vittadini is done! Can you give me an AMEN! That’s another baby that’s been festering in the undone pile for months. It’s done in some German cotton yarn that I bought here at the local yarn shop. I swear it looks like suede up close. It’s the richest deep purple. I love it.

My friend, Mariana, and I are having our own little knit-a-long with the Knitting Pure and Simple Neck-down Jacket. Mariana cast hers on about a month ago. I promised to finish the Vittadini before I could cast mine on. I’m happy to report that last night I cast it on with Berroco Uxbridge Tweed that I bought from Elann about six weeks ago.

And now for the Grand Finale for today: Just to show you that no good deed goes unnoticed (in the knitting world anyway) I received a terrific thank you from Yvette in France: