My new skirt.

I finished this just in time to wear for Mother's Day. Hopefully I can find a shirt that matches so that I can wear it tomorrow. I drafted the pattern myself following the directions in "Sew What! Skirts". The fabric was found at Thrift Town. I am pleased with how it has turned out.

Easy Ripple Blanket

This was a wonderful stash buster--660 grams! I crocheted this and it will be sent to Afghanistan to keep a small child there warm. I hope that that child's mother feels the care and concern for her child and family.

Dogwood Blossom Shawl Completed!

See? It's done and I am enjoying it! I have it hanging in the living room so that I can look at it. I started this last June and finished it a couple days ago and blocked it yesterday. *sigh*

Easter Stashbusting

So, I have all but eliminated the kitchen cotton in my yarn stash by knitting washcloths. Here is an "Easter"y ballband washcloth. I've also made some melt and pour soaps in egg shells. Sounds like a good idea, right? And they do look cute...However, it is difficult to peel an egg filled with a solid substance. It ended up taking far too long to peel these. I am a stubborn Dutch girl, however, so I prevailed and wound up with 19 soaps. This morning I woke up with a throbbing finger only to find that I had an egg shell sliver jammed under my fingernail. It was nearly as stubborn as me and took some time and blood to remove. But, I wound up with some pretty soaps. Who knows? By next year I may forget what a pain this was and even by induced to try it again!
The other picture is one of two identical little kitchen scrubbers to match the washcloths below. They totally obliterated the blue and yellow variegated yarn! Happy Easter!

Washcloths

Mark's mom has been asking about more washcloths, so I thought I'd do a little stash busting for Easter. I did need to buy one ball, but I think that I can make one more cloth and have it all gone. It'll probably be another yellow one. Each of these has been taking about a day to knit.

More little bits...

I am perfectly delighted with the little baby socks in the top picture! Each sock took one short evening of knitting and used approximately 12 grams of Cascade Fixation (cotton/lycra) yarn. My only disappointment is that I had hoped to use the rest of that yarn up! I still have enough for one more pair of baby socks.

The wristband pictured below the socks took 10 grams of fingering weight cashmere. It's for me. Also a very quick knit to use up some little bits. The pattern is in the Fall 2008 Knit.1 magazine.

More stashbusting fun...

Here are a couple of finished objects from February and early March....

The first item is a neckwarmer made of a full ball of Artful Yarns Reality. The yarn feels yummy and I love the colors. I'm not sure where it will find a home, but it was a quick and satisfying knit and since I recently discovered that I have about 80 single balls of yarn, I need to crank out a project like this every month or so to cut down on my yarn stash.

Secondly, I gave Hailey this wristband for her birthday. You may not be able to see the pocket, but I designed it to be large enough to fit a gift card or library card inside. For her birthday, it indeed contained some coupons--for time out together, time sewing together, a special dessert, Bi-Rite ice cream with her papa, etc. Alas, I still have more of this yarn.