My Newest Pattern!

Meet Rachel's Mantle.

I have been knitting with an absolutely wonderful yarn! It is 100% Alpaca yarn from Jacob's Reward Farm.

Cindy raises alpacas and sheep on her farm and has some of the fiber processed into yarn and some into spinning fiber. We collaborated on this design, using her yarn and my design.

The neckwarmer is knitted in one piece and the dainty edging is worked while you knit. So, when you bind off your knitting is done. You only have to add the buttons

and block it.

You can purchase the pattern from Cindy at JacobsReward in Ravelry or from her blog link . Send her a message at either place and she will be happy to help you out.

I just love this little edging, it will appear in another project of mine someday. :)

Finished Projects

The cold front came. We did receive 3/4 of an inch of rain. That was nice. Yesterday morning was cool and this morning it is cool, also. But, it should heat up to 95 or so. As my daughter reminds me, it is better than 105 F. :)

I have been knitting for me, as well as, trying to get some patterns done. Here is the Emma Bag

FINISHED! I have the lining in it. I put some plastic needlepoint canvas in the bottom, to give it a stiffer bottom.
Then I ironed interfacing onto the lining fabric. I added 5 pockets inside. I put some on each narrow end and then 2 larger pockets on one side. Usually, I put the pocket all around and then I cannot get to the bottom of the bag. So, I thought I would try it a little different this time. One pocket is very narrow, it is for pens. You know how your pen always disappears to the bottom of your bag? Well, hopefully I have solved that one. Oh, yeah, I know, I have to remember to put the pen in the pocket. LOL!

I started the slouch hat or beret, early this past spring. I wanted a pretty wool hat to walk in. I get up in the early morning hours and go outside to walk. At that time, in the winter, it is cold enough for a wool hat! Especially, when the wind is blowing, which is most of the winter. I just love this hat! Not only is it blue, my favorite color, but it is made from my
handspun yarn. The pattern is called Woolly Wormhead's Meret. I found it on Ravelry.

You know how hot and dry it is in Texas when......

you come out of a restaurant and see a bird, under your car, not just for shade, but drinking the water that is dripping from your car's air conditioner! LOL! Yep, that happened to us last Sunday. We went to lunch and when we came out of the restaurant, there was a bird, doing just that under our car.

I haven't blogged in quite a while, well I guess about a week or so. So, to catch up on the business here, I thought I would tell you of some of the things I have been doing in one post.

Last Thursday, I went with our daughter and her 2 daughters to NRH2O. This is a giant water park. We had a very fun time and rode many water slides, went in the wave pool, the beach front pool and lazy river.

Then when that was over the granddaughters came home with me and spent the night. We did arts and craft projects, they spun yarn and the younger of the two, had a knitting lesson. On Friday, we also made ice cream. When mom arrived, they didn't want to leave. LOL!

The picture above is of the two bobbins the girls used. N, the oldest at 9, spun a great striping yarn using yellow, blue and pink. C, 6 years old, spun pink(her favorite color). After they left, Gramma(me), plied the yarns to balance them. Then I washed them and here is the finished product. Art yarn! I love it, they are gorgeous.

I have been writing patterns again this week. One for a handwarmer that is almost finished. The neckwarmer that I am writing for Jacob's Reward farm is 99% done. I know Cindy will be glad to get that pattern. You will be able to get it from her and it is made with her yarn. A wonderful Alpaca yarn, grown and spun in the USA! Pictures of the neckwarmer pattern will follow in another post.

The pool temp was 84 this morning. The outside high is to be 101F in Dallas. But, they tell us a "cold" front is moving in. Dropping the highs to the low 90's. Why is that a COLD front????

Shawls, Etsy and a video

I have been busy knitting shawls lately. They are fun, because you don't have to worry about your knitting gauge and if they will fit. Shawls can be a one size fits all item. I wanted to try some with crocheted trims, after knitting the main portion of the shawl. Here is my first one.

This one did come out longer than I thought it would be, but it will wrap around and be nice and warm come winter or even fall, if you live up north. By what I hear, they are still waiting for summer in the northeast portion of the USA! Having been from New York, I still have family there. My mom and brother have told me that they really haven't had much summer.

New to TerrificCreations on etsy are my kits! I am going to sell kits for my shawl patterns. So far, I have a kit with black yarn and a kit with navy yarn. The kit includes enough yarn for one shawl and the customer will be able to choose the pattern.

I wanted to share a video with you from youtube, but the author has it protected out there. It is for binding off your knitting. Maybe some of you have already done this, but I haven't and I thought it looked like a pretty good idea. Here is the link.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=efRaicXpT_8

New Bridge Over Lake Lewisville

Well, I was up early today. With great hopes of getting to walk a new toll bridge. It was bound to be a wonderful day and fun time. Our oldest daughter, Rebekah, was going to join me. She is usually a jogger and had conceded to walk the walk with me and not do the run. I was totally grateful for that!
The run was due to start at 8:30 am and the walk about 10am. Well, as it was closer to leaving time, thunder and lightening started to roll in. I turned on the news and saw that the first set of 500 joggers/runners had started. The other groups, had been told to leave and come back at 10am. Rebekah was here promptly at 8:45 and off we went. The bridge is only about 3 miles from my house. We arrived and saw lots of people milling around. The rain had stopped and we figured let's go. So, we walked about 1/2 mile to the start of the bridge and found out that the race had pretty much been cancelled. The walk was still on. So, we milled around waiting. Then we heard more thunder off in the distance. The announcement came, that we would be able to walk to the middle of the bridge and then turn around and come back. OK, we thought that would be great. We could see the bridge and the view of the lake. That's OK. Well, then the sky opened and more rain started to fall. Where were the umbrellas? In the car. Yep, we had left them there, because we had thought the rain had passed. We decided we would leave. It was after 10am, runners were back, walkers were arriving and it was raining. People were leaving. There was no word about if we would ever get to walk across the bridge, so we went back to the car.

Yes, the 1.5 mile bridge is a toll bridge. The flashing sign in the second picture was flashing something about walking at your own risk. :) Not sure if that had to do with the whole day or because of the rainstorm. But, they weren't letting anyone on the bridge. This was as far as we got.

I wanted to get a picture of the police vehicle(3rd picture). I had never seen this particular one before. I am guessing they use it along the shoreline of the lake.

Through the center of the volunteers(4th picture), we could see where the bridge was going, and where we wanted to be...........

The morning ended up nice, anyway. We walked back to the car, got soaked, and went to Sonic for breakfast. Sonic is a drive-in restaurant, popular in TX. You order through a little microphone at your car and they bring out your food. We figured we were safe, since we were sitting, drenched, in the car and we were not fit for a regular restaurant.

It was a fun time, just being with Rebekah, but we were disappointed not to do our walk.