Christmas Pillow Tops Have Begun

I have decided that this year, everyone will get knitted pillow tops, with homemade pillows made from cotton prints that will be able to be either stuffed into the pillow tops, or left out.  This will provide two looks for one pillow.  The pillow tops will have the first initial for each person.  I will vary the look of the pillows by using different stitch patterns for the borders and different color schemes.  I will need to make twenty pillows, so I want to vary the look for my own benefit of not being bored doing the same thing over and over again.  I finished the first pillow top just as my pattern called for.  However, I feel it is bigger than I would like the pillows to be, so I am down sizing the rest.  I finished Portia's first, so she will have a bigger pillow than everyone else, but that is okay.  I'm not going to make twenty-one pillows just so hers will be the same size. I have started the second pillow for Ellis, and it is more than half finished.  I am doing a lot of math trying to get this first down sized pillow with the right stitch count to accomplish what I want the pillow to look like, and to be able to still use the alphabet charts that came with the original pattern.  I don't want to go into changing the letters.  The work has already been done, so I don't see any advantage to changing that.  Here is the first pillow top.  I will work on the actual pillows at a later time when I feel like doing some machine sewing.  I need to finish the top of each pillow before I can do the pillow to be sure it will fit in the top.

For now, I used my couch pillow, which was just the same size as Portia's pillow top.

This shows how the back of the pillow laps over in the middle so the pillow can be put in and out of the top.

I used a seed stitch for the border of this pillow top and I only used the alternate color for the letter.  I am doing a basket stitch for Ellis."  I also plan to use a cable stitch, garter, and berry stitch.  I'm not sure if I will try anything else.  I will have to see as I go along. I am doing Ellis' back and front center in the main color, and I am using the alternate color on the front for the borders and for the letter.   I will complete one family at a time, so I am nearly half done with the first family.

I will also need to do some other projects.  I just found out that our new baby will be a girl, so I want to get some things started for her.  She is due in August, so I will have to think about what to make for a summer baby.  She will be our first summer baby.  Hurray! Finally a baby born near my birthday.  Almost everyone else are spring, or very early summer (June) babies, except for Ellis, who was a fall baby in October.

Hockey Pucks With a Twist

I never know what might be asked of me, but I am always willing to give things a try.  The gym teacher at the school where Joey and Lexi go asked me yesterday for some ideas about how to make hockey pucks.  He was looking in a catalog for equipment and said that they were so expensive for such a little item.  Since he wanted twenty of them, he felt it was way too much.  He said he had made some in the past with cardboard and duct tape.  He asked if I had any felt that could be used for the bottom of the puck.  I came home and started in.  It took eight cardboard circles stacked on top of each other to get the thickness of a puck.  I cut out 160 of those babies, and ended up with a big blister on the knuckle of my little finger and some very sore fingers. The rest was easy.  I made another circle out of felt that was slightly larger than the cardboard circles.  I scored the edge of the felt so that it would wrap down around the stack of cardboard circles. I hot glue gunned the circles all together and to the felt and around the turned down edges of the felt.  I used masking tape to tape the edges of the felt in place around the circles and then used duct tape to cover over the top of the puck.  Last, I took a strip of duct tape and went around the edge of the puck again.  The felt made a nice edge for sliding across the floor and the duct tape held everything in place.  Here is the final outcome.  I don't think I will ever be asked to make a living by making these things, but for the preschool and kindergarten kids, they will do.

They sort of look like muffins, but I wouldn't want to try eating them.  They will be much better used by batting them around with a hockey stick.

What will be asked of me next?  I never know, but I love having challenges given to me.  Hope I get some more.

Warming Up America

Finally...the afghan I started over a year ago for an organization called, "Warming Up America," is complete.  I became aware of the project from my daughter-in-law, Kim, who brought me a flyer  explaining how to become involved in the organization.  She said she thought I might be interested.  I went online to find out more.  I liked the idea that they presented.  Some years ago, a group of ladies started making afghans for needy neighbors.  Eventually, they expanded into doing this.  They ask people to knit 7 x 9 blocks and send them in to be joined with other blocks to complete afghans.  Or, a completed afghan can be sent.  At first, I was going to just do a few blocks and send them off, but then I decided that I would like to complete a full afghan myself.  I was afraid my blocks would not fit with other people's, so I wanted to give it a try.  I have made so many afghans myself that I did not think it would be any big deal.  However, since a full sized afghan that they were expecting takes 49 blocks.  That is a lot of blocks to make, but I didn't expect that it would take me so long.  Of course, I didn't spend the whole time working on just that afghan.  I had all those Christmas projects to finish in between.  I only worked on the afghan when I wasn't working on Christmas projects.  Since Christmas, I have worked only on the afghan as far as knitting is concerned. The afghan consists of seven different patterns and fourteen different colors.  I wanted to use up some of my unused yarn from other projects.  That meant that I couldn't have the same number of blocks done by each color.  Some have two, some three, and some four blocks of a color.  I also wanted to be sure that none of the patterns had two of the same color.  When I assembled the blocks, I wanted to also be sure that I never repeated a color in any row or column.  I decided to keep each column with the same pattern  and each row with one of each of the patterns.  I had more dark colors than light ones, so I was not able to distribute the dark and light as well as I had hoped to do and still keep no colors repeated in the rows and columns.  It was a juggle, but I finally came up with something that I feel works, not as well as hoped for, but still okay.  Here is the final project.

I have never tied the corners of the blocks before, but I didn't like the way the color I used for joining the blocks together showed through on the front.  I used the light brown color for the seams, but chose the white for the border and the joint ties.

I mentioned this project to the ladies at church.  I offered to teach knitting to any of them that would be interested, or just have anyone who wanted to join us in making enough blocks to complete a smaller afghan.  Either a lap or baby afghan are also accepted.  I figure that we could easily do that if each lady made one block. I think that the basket weave stitch would be a good one to use.  It uses both of the basic stitches of knitting, the knit and the purl stitch.  I think the plain stockinette stitch of using the knit stitch on the front side and the purl on the back, which is the traditional look of knitting, is too stretchy for afghans. The basket weave alternates the use of the knit and purl stitches on the front and back.  This gives texture to the look and outcome of the knitting.  It will also allow the new knitters to practice the two stitches of which all patterns are made.

Mr. Whaler Competition

Remember the graduation robes converted to boxer robes that I said I had made?  I even showed them with a model, but now I have pictures of the actual young men that they were made for wearing the robes in the competition.  They were used in the opening scene when they ran onto the stage to the theme song of "Rocky." The robes were then discarded and not used again.  My fame to glory lasted about two minutes, tops.  At least, I was recognized in both the program and at the end of the performance.  It wasn't much of a deal to make them, so I'm happy they were able to use them for what they had wanted, with no cost involved.

A Cat In The Hat, Make That Two

Today was a celebration of Dr. Seuss at the schools. I was a guest reader in my daughter's classroom and in my granddaughter, Lexi's, classroom.  I had to take my grandson, Joey, so I made costumes of The Cat In The Hat for both of us.  I also made some white chocolate green eggs and ham to give to the kids in the classes. Here is what we looked like.

Try to use your imagination to make this look like ham.  The egg was pretty good, using a green M&M for the yolk and a white chocolate melt for the egg white.  Very easy to make.  It took longer to make the little box from an index card.