Valerean

For my first project of October I finished a Trade Winds Lap Blanket which I donated to charity. I came up with a mini sugarfree cheesecake recipe that has a sugarfree oreo cookie crust. I crocheted two more pumpkins for fall. I made some diamond art paintings as hand-eye coordination and grip therapy. I made a primitive stuffed cat from a quilt piece I picked up cheap at an antique mall. I crocheted another pumpkin in a yarn that is perfect for Halloween. I made a winter hat while trying a new colorway in one of my favorite yarns. I crocheted a little ghost coaster while testing a free Halloween pattern. I turned three skeins of yarn into hexes while testing them out. I made a shawl while testing a jumbo skein of yarn I got in a surprise box. I crocheted another Trade Winds blanket for myself in a different colorway that is not my usual thing, and loved the results. Finally I made a Halloween-themed box journal that I can use year-roun...

Happy Halloween!

The mixed lot of yarn and fabric I recently bought at the online auction just arrived; let's see if I got my money's worth out of this one. At first it looked like there were eleven skeins and balls of yarn. Four of the Caron One Pound ($13 to $17 retail) are unused, as is the Lion Brand Pound of Love ($14.00 retail) and one of the Red Heart Super Savers ($5.49 retail). I'd say the pile is worth $53.00 resale. There were also vintage runners, doilies, cord work, fabric, two skeins of cording and two more balls of yarn. Conservatively speaking the linens are worth $50.00 resale, and the extra yarn and cording is $12.00, so $62.00 here. The original owner paid $2.72 for the fabric remnant -- way back in 1999. Heck, it lasted this long -- let's add that in. :) The bag of fabric turned out to be Japanese, and this exact pack retails new for $18.99 on Amazon. Adding up all the estimated, the total resale value of this lot is $136.71. I paid $10.99 f...

I was about twenty pages into The Night Ends with Fire by K.X. Song when I realized the novel was a knockoff. If you're a fan of Disney, the story of Mulan is probably very familiar: girl protects her family by pretending to be a boy and joining the army. This book is about the same character, but her motivations are all dark and negative, and nothing you could really call heroic. She's not protecting her family, she's abandoning them to her drug addict dad to avoid a marriage to a cruel man he arranged. This Mulan is angry and greedy and all about herself, which is fine. That's pretty much the modern lifestory these days. The writing is quite deft, and the pacing is consistent. The author has the skills to write well, and does. I just kept getting sidelined by the knockoff aspects. The main character is not sympathetic or even likeable, and since I am a female who served in the military I should have at least identified with her. Instead I wished she'd...

While I'm brooding on my vintage linen project, I decided to turn this basket of vintage fabric that I used to make the September tote for my calendar project into a small quilt. Back in September I cut half of the fabric into strips, so I pieced the leftovers into blocks. Here's the quilt top arrangement. Stay tuned to see how I make the backing out of the rest of the scrap.

One weekend this month we spent the day in St. Augustine puttering around, getting rained on and admiring houses. To stroll with us, check out my album of photos here .