Craft-y Bits

I ordered some grab-bags of yarn and thread from Elmore-Pisgah, makers of Peaches & Creme cotton yarn and Grandma's Best crochet thread. The bags had some of the crochet thread, which is pretty awful stuff: it's way too fuzzy. If you stitch with it, there's no stitch definition. I may try unwinding some of the balls to see if they get better further in--they may just be fuzzy on the outside from wear and tear.

There also was some yarn--odd lots of various colors, including five balls of this stuff: a cotton yarn in a discontinued colorway called "Passion" (the colors in the picture). I wasn't impressed with it in the ball. (It's paler than the photo: weathered red, light purple, dusty rose, orange, and light green.)

But I had a pattern for crocheted socks that called for worsted weight yarn. I don't want to make socks in wool that I'll have to handwash to keep them from felting. And socks in acrylic yarn--yech! So I figured I'd try some cotton yarn--and there's enough Passion yarn to make a pair. (And one grab bag contained a solid-color weathered red yarn that goes with the Passion, so I can use it at the heels and toes.) I'm being pleasantly surprised by how the yarn works up. The sock pattern might not be great--the jury's still out on that one--but I like the color combination made up much more than I liked it in the ball. Quite often, my feelings about ombre/variegated yarns and threads go the opposite way. And fat cotton socks should be lovely in cold weather. (They'll fit inside my Crocs, even if they don't fit inside other shoes.)

I'm also working on a doily for a friend: I've done halfway through round 18. It's 21 rounds for the main doily, then 6 rows for the two "wings."

And I got two gorgeous sets of yarn for a coat pattern: TLC Amore's plum for the body of the coat (the solid down the page, not the print near the top) and Lion Brand Homespun in Prairie for the edging. (I can't find a good color swatch of Prairie: it's mostly olive green with bits of brown, red, blue, and plum in it.)

No longer an e-bay virgin...

I won my first auction on eBay.

"Won," of course, is a complete misnomer since I'm paying for the privilege. And I was the only bidder.

Believe it or not, I didn't order it for the dog sweater pattern. (I wanted the teddy bear pattern.) I found a dog sweater pattern on another site. The largest size--"X Large," they called it--is supposed to fit a dog with a girth (i.e., chest measurement) of 24 inches. Well, Jacey's chest measures 26+ inches; Sam's, 30+. I don't hold out much hope of this book having a sweater that will fit either of my dogs. And my dogs have polar-fleece coats that I made years ago. Jacey will inherit Oreo's Winnie-the-Pooh coat.

Oreo in her jammies:




I'm taking it easy on the crocheted greyhound. Work on it is proving to be hard on my hands (I wind up with aching hands the next day), so I'm only working on it a bit at a time. But I have a couple more pictures of a sulking Sam with bits of his "rival":