2012 Art Journal Project

Here are the two page spreads I have done for the month of January from my personal year long art journal project. I also have done some single pages for the month, but thought I would just share two of my favourites thus far.

To those that know me, YES, I am using all those bits and bobs that have been gathering dust all the while. Except for certain print outs, I am using the enormous collection of found objects, ephemera and such to create the pages for this project.

29 May - Maybe

Maybe:

It's Sunday and I forgot to post yesterday.

I had fun with Rebecca and Mary Beth at Territory Days in Old Colorado City, instead.

I got my picture taken with a Buffalo Bill Cody re-enactor.

I used some of my gift certificate from Mary Lou at Green Valley Weavers.

I bought a Polish Pottery spoon from Ginger Pokrant at the celebration.

I went to church this morning and looked at the gardens for the first time in weeks. Wowser!

I cast on for a Zig-Zag Pullover sweater in two shades of LBY Fishermen's Wool (brown and natural) and one of Paton's Classic Wool in Leaf Green today as I am at a stand still on the Water's Edge sweater due to lack of blue spots, as yet, on the very last skein of my custom dyed yarn that I need for it.

The month is nearly over and I might almost be back in the habit of writing to my blog again.

#103 of 365 - Isn't it Ironic

I finally upgraded to a digi camera about 6 or 7 years ago. Such a deal, it even came with a printer. I was really happy with it, but for the fact I couldn't get extra photo cards for it. I mean to say, no matter how many I tried or the different brands of cards I tried, none of them could be read by my camera. Even Target gave me my money back on an electronic (which is normally against their policy, read the fine print) as the employee in the electronics department couldn't get one to read either. So for years, I muddled along with one card and downloading every picture I took as soon as possible. Then I mentioned my plight to our Rebecca (who apparently is officially old now). She say to me, she says, I have a few cards from Jack's old camera, want to try them? So we trade off and lo and behold 2 out of 3 WORK! Happy, happy, joy, joy!

Then my camera died.

#101 of 365 - Watch Tower or A Day Spent Rallying Around the Town.

The first thing we did this morning was to head south to pick up Rebecca and the BOM pattern for guild. Then far out to the east of town for the guild meeting. Met our Cheryl's lovely mother, Violet whilst there. Then after, a quick trip back to Rebecca's for some packages she needed to mail. Then we headed back to the west and downtown Colorado Springs for a sushi lunch at Yoo Mae and then a wander along Cascade heading north to look at the sculptures all along the streets as we went. We saw 34 thousand plus Helios, a snowman with rocks in it's head, giant metal koosh balls scattered across a lawn next to the giant Spanish dancers on the lawn by the Money Museum.

Also there were stone plinths, metal and glass figures, stone carvings, bronze sculptures and Patrick Dougherty's woven wood sculpture on the Colorado College campus.

During the wander, we saw bulbs about to spring into bloom, checked out an herb garden behind the McAllister House and found out that I qualify as a senior citizen at the Money Museum. Le sigh... I showed Rebecca the climbing roses we, the Grace Gardeners planted yesterday along the ugly chain link fence on the south side of the church. Then it was back down Tejon to Poor Richard's Book Emporium to meet up with Erin again. We also noodled through the goodies in the front part of the store. Rebecca and I felt up some kewl journals, no, really we did. We talked yarn with one of the clerks after she admired my Summer with Ishbel. I also saw the coolest pair of half chaps that would so work as part of a Steampunk outfit.

We walked east back to the parking garage which is over the bus depot. Which is when we got a closer look at the Watch Tower, which I am looking through in the above photo. There were black Suburbans and dark sunglasses abounding when we got there. The exit to the depot was blocked off by a bus and there were ARMED TSA agents littering the sidewalks. We still don't know what was up with that. Erin could only say, Mother, you would leave a baggie of bay leaves on the front seat of the car, hah, hah, hah...


In the end, Rebecca and I had a loverly day of art for art's sake...and by the way, Rebecca, I was right, it was a hawthorn.

Erin and I hit the Sunflower and saw a red fox just chillin' on a neighbor's lawn on the way there. Spooked the USPS guy right out...

#99 of 365 - Big Shawl to Be

So, yesterday I frogged a shawl that wasn't growing to my satisfaction. It was a simple triangle in Stocking Stitch, made be increasing at the beginning and end of every row, but I could see that it would be dragging the floor before it was a wide as I wanted it to be. I had been more and more getting to the point of decision, press on or frog. Frogging won, sigh! No pictures of what it looked like as I neglected that part. Oh well.

After my daily perusal of the blogs I read on a regular basis, I discovered the Mini Weaver's shawl on my friend, Judy's most recent blog post. I cast on for the new one yesterday. Here was the beginning of it as of last night.



Here I am as of today.

It's all scraps and skeins of these two yarns with some mystery yarns thrown in. The two yarns are Reynold's Lopi and Brown Sheep's LambSpun. They are blending together quite nicely. The weight and the shape of this shawl will make me very happy next winter.

This is a replacement big warm shawl for me, as Erin is taking the fringed triangle shawl (which is currently living with Rebecca) with her when she moves to England. It was made from the remainders of some Manos from projects of my dear departed Mum and therefore is sort of a family heirloom now.

#78 of 365 - Two More Join the Pile

I finished another 198 yards of Heaven yesterday. This one is in a lovely variegated light green hand spun I got in the most recent Saint Patrick's Day swamp.

I also finished, FINALLY, my Citron, such as it is. I had a hard time with the instructions on this on. So this is my take on it. It hasn't been blocked yet but it's size it is more like a scarf than a shoulder cover. I also made the last ruffle really, really ruffled.



Again, it sucks getting old. Rebecca had trouble with the 198 and I had trouble with the Citron. I guess either we are tripping down Old Timers Lane together or some knitting instructions could be better written.

#76 of 365 - We Was Pretty in Pink

Today I went to Rebecca's house to felt the comet bag I have been making for her. She has a top loader and I don't. Top loader are supposedly better for felting knitted items. Besides, I was letting her washer fill up with the lint, not mine, LOL... Actually, we put the item in a zippered pillow slip for the felting process. It surely contain a great quantity of the fluff inherent in the process, I must say. Here's a photo of me, seaming the bag prior to washing it. Hopefully Rebecca will read this and get a photo of the bag which is now pinned down to her carpet and drying.

As a general rule, knitted wool tends to reduce by 30 plus percent in length and about 10 plus percent in width. We got the 30 percent but not the 10, so Rebecca is going to cut off a section and make a clutch from the remainder as she wants a messenger bag not an over-night bag. Most of my felted experiments are by guess and by golly, but so far there has been only one fail in the felting department and that was a piece that just never felted to it's own company specifications.

Whilst we waited for the washer to do it's thing, Rebecca gave me a gift of her musical talent. Basically, my own private concert, how kewl is that?

Bleah, I have cropped this photo twice, but it still didn't take, so you get to see a corner of the shawl that Rebecca is borrowing from me. It's a basic bottom up triangle in garter stitch on large needles, done in 4-5 colourways of Manos de Uraguay yarn that was left over from some of my Mum's projects. It's post over on Facebook in the Garden of the Gods Album, if you want to see it and the one that Rebecca was wearing for that photo as well.

In reference to the title, again great minds think alike as both of us had pink on today.

#64 of 365 - I Sat in A Garden Today

I would really wish that I had the space to garden this way. This is a raised bed with salad and herbs and gnomes, even. This is the garden I liked the most of all the display ones, it was done by Hardings. We got mixed flower seeds from them as well. Then there was the white bison from BBI.

Rebecca found her home on the road and we also found the tub we will be using in our old age... The last picture is Erin blanching at the price of the cookware we watched being demoed. Yikes!

#50 of 365 - Then and Now

I got this far yesterday. Along the way, I discovered that my stitch count was way off. So I FROGGED IT (rip it, rip it)! Sigh! I also thought I should, maybe, be using a bigger needle size as well. This is the pattern from Knitty.It is called Citron.

I am doing it as an orange slice as oppose to a lime slice which is the colour of the original shawlette. I am, therefore, calling this one, Orange Zest. Again, my thanks to Rebecca for de-stashing the oranges I will be using to make this little shawlette.

Now, I am at this point on the bigger needles and I like the way that is working out. I have just gotten to the section that was giving me fits yesterday, we shall see what we shall see. More shall be revealed, as I am so fond of saying...

#48 of 365 - Four Weeks Later, It's This

This is the block I chose for the Block of the Month for March. I am a big fan of Celtic Knotwork and I usually choose it for the block to be turned in in March (for my obvious reason, as it being the month of St. Patrick's Day.

We had a Miz Sheryl back with us after a rather lengthy hiatus. It was grand to see her. rebecca is knitting on a wee pair of Mini-Mochi socks, love the colour of them, for certain.

That's her on the left and our Rebecca on the right.



This is the quilt I won in the In-House Raffle today, shiny. It was made by Anonymous.




Funny old world,isn't it. I got tons of compliments on the Feather and Fan shawlette I was wearing today. The whole thing was an experiment that apparently worked very successfully...

#34 of 365 - How I spent my Morning and Afternoon

First it was SnB at the Knitter's Kove. Val, Suzi, Deborah and others, sat, knitted and chatted. That's Deborah working away on the Lambspun cotton/wool in red and black shadow work for the Skull Illusion blanky she is making for her grandson and then that's Val after she finished buying some loverly Misti Alpaca yarn for a Fair Isle project she has in mind. I worked away on my Lacy Prairie Shawl in brown Fisherman's Wool. I also got another skein of the Andes in brown and amber to match the one that Erin had put in my Christmas Stocking. I also purchased the latest issue of Piecework's Historical Knitting. I always find something to love in this special issue.

Then after, it was watching Rebecca cake yarn with Erin and my winding station. She sure has got a lot of yarn! Like I should talk, LOL. THIS is the Rebecca of the reason I blog a photo a day...

If you don't know already, a winding station consists of a ball winder and a swift. With these two tools you can take a skein of yarn and turn it into a center pull cake of yarn that is so much easier to knit from. Many of you may remember sitting and holding a skein of yarn for your mother or your granny whilst she wound it into a ball to make knitting easier. This allows one person to do the job that normally takes two if you don't have the equipment. Erin and I have it for both general knitting usage and so that Erin can rewind her skeins after she dyes them.




The swift is the umbrella looking thing with the dark pink yarn on it and the ball winder is attached to the table in front of it. The cakes are the flat rounds of colour on the table in front of Rebecca.





Altho, this is not the best picture to see it in, I am wearing my Ishbel that I finished blocking yesterday. I think I am going to wear this little shawlette a lot as I LOVE IT! I knitted it from the Misty Moor colourway from Cherry Tree Hill. I pet it a lot as it's like "buttah". The photo below shows the lace pattern that edges it. Both the Ishbel and the Skull Illusion are from Ysolda Teague, that lovely Scottish knitwear designer we all love so well.

# 29 of 365 - Shawlettes, I Have Many

This is me at SnB at Knitter's Kove last year in my silly little green shawlette that I get SO many compliments on. I think the whole thing cost me about 6.00 to knit as the 3 skeins of the green wool/mohair blend were on clearance at Michael's aeons ago along with the fun fur and ladder yarn that I did the edge in. I own a number of these as they are handy as scarves in the winter as well as shoulder covering in chilly houses. One of them, I even spun the singles, plied the singles and knitted up the resulting yarn. About the only thing I didn't do was dye the yarn myself. Here's a picture of the beginning of the project and my yarn.



These are pictures of Deborah and Rebecca, my friends that I made at the SnB. Deborah was here this morning whilst biding time til she picked up her grandson. She was also wearing a very kewl knitted cowl, which I may have to knit too. The other picture is our Rebecca in one of her infamous Doofy Hats. She's the reason I post a picture a day, so you can blame her as it's all her fault.

#17 of 365 - Mountains above Bailey, CO and Skully Hats

Here's a photo of me on the deck of the Evans Family home where we had the Ren Scots AGM and Fortnight Party last night. A million dollar view doesn't even begin to describe it!



Here's Celton and Meggie Judd in their new Skull Caps and I am wearing Jenna's Hot Pink one, all of them knitted by my dear friend, Rebecca. Thanks, my dear! Our dear Meggie is also playing at being the Pretty Princess with her tiara on as well.

On the Rocks Redux - #5 of 365

Here is the photo that I was wanting to get when I asked Rebecca to meet Erin, Guy, Da and myself at Garden of the Gods. We had so many cameras going, I wasn't sure who had it. Erin's guy, Guy posted it yesterday on Facebook. So here tis.



Off to the library, jeans buying and Sherlock Holmes. More shall be revealed. Still knitting away on Shawl #1 of 10 Shawls in 2010.

On the Rocks - #4 of 365

This is really going to be a quickie. Spent the whole afternoon at Traffic Court with the kiddo.

This is Rebecca and me at Garden of the Gods here in Colorado Springs. This photograph is of me and Rebecca as we were getting ready to take our shawl "batwing" photo. It is "the" Rebecca from whom I am borrowing the idea of 365 in 365...

I finished the Tangerine Dream Scarf based on Ysolda Teague's Damson. I need to block it but will wait til daylight and slightly warmer temperatures. I am currently working on the Patons Classic shawl of my own design but which is loosely based on Damson now, which is for 10 in 2010.

Photo #2 of #365

A year in photos and again my thanks to Rebecca for letting me take her idea. This photo was taken the day we went to see Where the Wild Things Are, you'll maybe notice I am wearing an animal print sweater. This is 2 of 365, nuff said.

New Years Day - Welcome to MMX

I am borrowing a page from Rebecca who posts a photo everyday and posting a picture for this day... Casting on for the first of my Ravelry Group 10 shawls in 2010 on this day as well.








and from Rabbie Burns, the great Scottish Poet:

Should auld acquaintance be forgot,
and never brought to mind ?
Should auld acquaintance be forgot,
and auld lang syne ?

CHORUS:
For auld lang syne, my jo, for auld lang syne, we’ll tak a cup o’ kindness yet, for auld lang syne.
And surely ye’ll be your pint-stowp !
and surely I’ll be mine !
And we’ll tak a cup o’ kindness yet,
for auld lang syne.
CHORUS
We twa hae run about the braes,
and pu’d the gowans fine ;
But we’ve wander’d mony a weary foot,
sin auld lang syne.
CHORUS
We twa hae paidl’d i' the burn,
frae morning sun till dine ;
But seas between us braid hae roar’d
sin auld lang syne.
CHORUS
And there’s a hand, my trusty fiere !
and gie's a hand o’ thine !
And we’ll tak a right gude-willy waught,
for auld lang syne.
CHORUS

oh, and by the way: Thanks Donnely for reminding me of this.

I will open the back door to let the old year out, and the front door to let the New Year in, give your first visitor of the new year a twist of salt to season life, a piece of bread to stay hunger, a glass of water to stave thirst, and a coin to fend off poverty. A hug to show human warmth, a handshake to show you hold no grudge, and a genuine smile and candle to light up their darkness.

Steampunk Ring Giveaway

My friend Rebecca had this posted on her blog.

Do go and check Catherinette's blog and store. Catherinette's Blog is here. If you are interested in finding jewelry related to steampunk, a great place to start is her Etsy Store.

The Bella Sinclair Award

My friend, Anne over at El Milagro Studio is way too generous with her praise and has kindly gifted me with another award for this blog.

Here is the link to Bella Sinclair who's award this is. Through the Renee Award previously given to me and created by Bella and Ces in honour of their friend, Renee, I have come to know some of these wonderful artistes in Blog World through blogging myself. There is Anne, Tristan, Gypsy, Diana, Kay, Bella, and Ces of course. Not the least is my daughter, Erin and then there is Leah, Frewen and Rebecca.




So, in the spirit, I pass along this award to Erin, Leah, Frewen, Rebecca and Diana. Thanks so much for the inspiration in my life.

It's April 17th & the 1st Annual Blogger's Quilt Festival

This is so kewl. Check out the link here: http://parkcitygirl.blogspot.com and view some wonderful work included in the 1st ever Online Blogger Quilt Festival. The raven postcard pictured here is one of my favorites. It was made for the 200th Anniversary of Edgar Allan Poe's birthday, which is being celebrated this year. I will post a different quilt later on when it's completed. Take a look, as well at "While the Octopus is Away" in an earlier post. It was done from a Bag o sCrap. The theme for that one came about after my daughter got back from seeing the Cirque de Soliel LOVE show in Las Vegas and describing the Octopus' Garden segment.

Rebecca, if you are reading this one, go check out the ParkCityGirl blog and then you should post the Pirate Quilt or else the new neutral one with the brown borders.

In reference to the date in the title of this post, it SNOWED AGAIN today. April is half way over, what's up with that?