Slogging Away

I decided that my Brunswick cardigan was turning out too long, and in addition the button band was pulling the front of the sweater out longer than the back. So I took some scissors to it and picked back up the stitches (wow, does it take a while to pick out and pick up those stitches at this gauge in a bottom-up sweater!) and restarted the ribbing. As I am skipping the 1 x1 ribbed button band edge on this re-knit version of the bottom ribbing and it's not pulling the front out so long, so I think it will be an improvement.



And spinning yarn at school the other week went wonderfully, with most kids getting the hang of it amazingly well in under an hour! A couple of kids took their drop spindles along to the playground to keep working. So. Cute. And here is the leftover wool, made into some quick felted balls.



I've also been organizing knitting supplies (wow, how did I end up with seven #6 circular needles? I have a ton of needles! ) And I frogged eight projects, including an almost complete shawl and four barely started hats that I was never going to complete. Feels good to not have a bunch of projects laying around that I don't intend to complete!

All that remains are three (almost complete) blue sweaters and a blue shawl that I am currently working on.

La Mariposa

Today we made felted butterfly wings from Living Crafts magazine. I managed to bend and snap several of my felting needles on the first try. Um...oh, yeah, I was supposed to put the foam under the wings, not felt with the towel underneath.

In the end this limited the exactitude of my felting, producing crude shapes rather than the fine detail my (almost) 6 year old was seeking. My 4 year old was pleased with the heavy and uneven coverage method of decorating. I only lost my patience twice, mostly because I stabbed myself and was pretty freaked out by the felting needle with kids in the room. The kids loved squishing around soapy wool with bubble wrap.

I finished off the felting in the washing machine, which dislodged a few decorations. A little drying and some ribbon ties and I'll call it complete. Somewhat successful, though if I attempted it again I would do more of the needle felting alone and then just invite the kids to do the decorating.