Then we pondered what we could do for a tail.  AHA!  says I. I had some brown cotton yarn and some brown fun fur yarn in my stash,                               

and there was still a good supply of pipe cleaners in the drawer.  One tail coming up!  Quick and easy.  Personally I think it looks more like a lion tail rather than a dog! But I suppose it could be sortakinda considered a type of poodle tail, too, depending on how you look at it.   Ah well!  At least she'll have a tail.   lol 

When Missyboo got home from school and saw her tail, she was quite pleased with it!  Whew!!!!

After it was all done, I was trying to figure out how to attach it to Missyboo's backside.  I had left a fairly long tail on it when done, and her school belt is a braided one, so.......I used the leftover tail and sewed it to the belt between the braids.  It seems to be ok that way.  She wore it around the house for the rest of the night!  :D 

It will be fun to watch her and the others singing tonite all dressed up.  That reminds me, I have to go back to the party store to get grease paint for her face!!!!!  Eesh, better get going!  Talk to you later!  :D

The sorting hat says that I belong in Hufflepuff!

Said Hufflepuff, "I'll teach the lot, and treat them just the same."

Hufflepuff students are friendly, fair-minded, modest, and hard-working. A well-known member was Cedric Diggory, who represented Hogwarts in the most recent Triwizard Tournament.

Take the most scientific Harry Potter Quiz ever created.

Get Sorted Now!

I was reading thru some of my emails and found this posted.  I find it absolutely amazing that it can be done, and so beautifully too!  Check it out.   You'll need to go a click or two into the site before choosing the word "WORK" to see more pictures of her projects.  Amazing!  Here's a teaser picture.  Just don't say I didn't tell you so!

She crochets over objects.  Talk about your freeform!  lol  Actually, to me it looks more like Irish Crochet without the use of traditional motifs.  Either way, it looks good to me!

There are lots more pictures on her site to see and "wow" over.

Have a good night, talk to you soon.  : )

It's been a while since I've had time to sit at the computer for a bit.  Missyboo is a Brownie, and I had the good fortune to be "Cookie Mom" for the troop this year.  This was the week for all monies to be collected and deposited from the girls, have cookie booth sales, and get all orders logged into the Girl Scout cookie system.  On top of my work hours changing (and not for the better!)  Most of my computer time has been spent this past couple of weeks on cookie emails!  Too bad they weren't edible.  But then, I guess it's a good thing they weren't.  I might not have been able to get out the chair!!!  lol

Anyway, I turned in three more chemo hats for my local guild club's collection last Sunday.  There were 118 new hats collected!  I'm guessing that should put us around the 500 mark since January.  We had a visitor late in the meeting who came to learn how to make chemo hats.  She's going thru it herself, and wanted to make hats for herself and others too.  She was told to go thru the hats gathered at the meeting that day and pick one out for herself.  And let me tell you, there were some absolutely gorgeous hats made!!!!  It ended up she picked one of the three I had turned in!  I was so amazed that she did that, considering how many pretty hats were in the bag!  To me, mine were just there, and I drooled over the other ones.  Is it that way for everyone else too?  lol  At least this time I got some pictures of the hats I turned in.  I kept forgetting to take my camera with me, or to take pictures of the other hats I had made.  One of the women at the meeting was nice enough to take these pictures and send them home for me to add to my collection.  Now let's see if I can get that picture posted here!

I made these using Lion Brand CottonEase, and I was pleasantly surprised that I was able to make 4 adult sized hats out of just one skein each of these three colors.  I plan on submitting a picture and pattern for the fourth hat I made to the Crochet Liberation Front group that started on Ravelry as they are in the process of putting a few of their own crochet pattern books together to be published.

So who knows, I've sold one pattern, now maybe I'll get one pattern published!  Now wouldn't that be cool?!  ;-D

I'm still plugging away on my mystery top that's a mix of knit and crochet.  The upper portion is now done.  I had to take both the left and right sides apart and frog them twice since I know so much about knitting.  They were a bit on the big side.  The front portion of the arm hole area just barely covered to the middle of the breast.  That's a bit too "open" for me!  Rip-it, Rip-it.  Downsizing in progress.  LOL  But it's good to go now!  Just need to finish up on the lower portion, add a sleeve or two, and viola, one done top.  Hopefully it will be done in time for the CGOA conference in July!

Well my computer time for the day is up.  I need to get some pictures taken for Missyboo's science fair project, and put a hem in a couple new pair of work pants before going to bed.  Especially the pants part.  I kinda ripped a hole in my last pair getting into the car to go home on Friday.  I'm just glad it was after work!  It would have been em-bare-assing otherwise!  LOL

Have a good night.  :-)

After a few false starts, I decided to make a top that was a combination of crochet and knit.  But nothing like this one!  Mine is, and will be, a very simple one in comparison.  Only one main color, and maybe another "background" color.  So far, it seems to be coming along really well.  I'm hoping to have it all done in one piece, or I should say in several pieces that are put together as it goes along.  No seaming at all.  It starts at the bottom front waist area and goes up and around to the back waist area, all in one piece.  Then each side is added.

So far there are only two problems with it.  #1: I didn't make the shoulder connector from the front to the back quite long enough.  That's what happens when you're at work, no mirror is around, and neither is anyone else for the time being.  It felt right, bottom front even with bottom back.  When I got home and showed Hubby, the real deal was "laid" out.  I did 20 chains to connect the front shoulder to the back, should have done at least 30.  So instead of the bottom edges stopping just above the natural waist, it will be more of an empire waist.  But I can live with that.  #2: I can't figure out (or remember how I did it before!) to get a part of my crochet trims to intertwine with each other.  I had planned on using this trim to connect the center front and back to the left and right sides of the top.  Like I said, no seaming!  I know that doesn't make much sense right now without seeing a picture, but I'm not taking any until I'm done with the project, so you'll have to wait to see!  lol  And that's all I'm telling you about it, too!

I needed an off-white to compliment this shade of green that was a bit finer weight than the green, so off Missyboo and I went to AC Moore's.  We ran into a couple of ladies from my crochet group there at the check out and laughed about the supplies we each had.  Yarn and more of it!  lol  I only went for some off-white.  But some grape and rose colored chunky followed us to the checkout.  I said ok, you can come home with us.  Visions of sugar plums turned into tops are running thru my head.  Colored cables, raised textures..............can I make the picture come out into my hands?  Only time will tell. I know I won't!  ;-D  (yet)

Have a good night.  : )

I had seen a posting in one of the online groups I belong to concerning a "bin sale" of yarn at the Connecticut Yarn and Wool Co. in Haddam, CT.  You would be able to pick out all your own yarns to fill the bin for $300.  That made me curious to see what kinds were available.  The "bin" was one of those really large-sized Rubbermaid type bins, and if I heard the man right, you kept the bin also!  The store carried lots and lots of wools and all-natural wool blends to choose from. In almost any variegated color you could imagine.  Mostly from a local farm a couple miles away.  All hand dyed.  Along with some cottons, mohair and a limited amount of bamboos.  But, ooooh, the colors on the bamboos!  I think I'm glad I didn't see the bamboos until after I had made my purchase! (I'm still wiping the drool just thinking about them!)

I didn't buy a "bin"ful since the choices to pick from were limited to discontinued colors, changed dye processes, and returns.  There was very little solid colors to choose from, and not enough hanks of closely matched dyes for a full garment.  I would estimate 99% of the choices were the wools.  I have to be careful on that part since Hubby has a wool allergy.  We don't know if it's to the lanolin and other oils, or to the wool itself.  But I did buy some yarn that was a blend of cotton, silk and lambs wool, and some cottons.  I told him I would make a small swatch for him of the blend to wear for awhile in the waistband of his jeans to see if that combination bothered him.  Fingers are crossed it's the lanolin and oils in "adult" wool!

But I think I did get a pretty decent deal.  I came home with 15 new hanks of cottons and wool blends in an assortment of color, yardage from 200 up to 350/hank.  If you made a minimum purchase of $79, you could fill (read stuff!) a small shopping bag to the brim from the "choice" yarns for free.  So my new stash averaged out to about $10/hank counting in my freebies.  I was happy.  I have enough to make a top for Missyboo, and a sweater for Hubby and me.  

Missyboo was in loooooove!  We had found a real honest-to-gosh castle and she was there to see it!  But it's closed for the season.  My niece is coming to stay with us for a while this summer, so we told Missyboo we'd come back when the castle was open for tours.  Everything was all smiles again.  She was quite excited to "discover" a small picnic area that included a stone fire pit and very small enclosed garden box.  Gillete Castle was home to early 20th century (boy does that seem weird to say!!!) actor William Gillette, who was best known for playing Sherlock Holmes on the stage.  It was completed in 1919, and in his will, he insisted that it not fall to "some blithering saphead who has no conception of where he is or with what surrounded."  It became a state park in 1943.  What gorgeous river views!!!!!  We'll be sure to take the camera with us in the summer!

When I first opened my Christmas present to see my hubby had gotten me a GPS system for my car, I wasn't quite sure how to take that.  Was that his "polite" way of telling me to "get lost"?  Did he figure I couldn't find my own way out of the driveway?  Or, were we supposed to get out on the road to "sightsee" more?  (what, with the price of gas these days?!?!?!?) We had never used it until today.  It was pretty cool!  It only gave us directions for one wrong turn the whole trip, and then it immediately took us around the block to get back on track.  Hubby set it up last night so it would be ready to go first thing this morning.  He has the time on the darn thing set wrong.  Now we have to take the battery out and start all over again with the set-up.  Teehee, snicker snicker, and he figured I  would be the one to get lost?!  LOL  I really don't care if the clock reads the right time or not, but I do know it will be plugged in on the way to NH for the conference in July!

All in all, it was a most excellent trip today!  Have a good night.  :-)

On another note, I've had a lot of interested expressed in the hats I was making for my local CGOA chapter's chemo hat drive.  I usually take the projects to work with me, and a lot of people taking a look at them have expressed their interest in buying some of the designs already made up.  I gave some of them the address for this site to take a look at some of the pictures I had of other things, and they've all come back telling me I should start selling thru the site.  I had never thought about it before, but now I'm intrigued.  So for those of you reading this and that already do this kind of thing, please send me an email telling me what you think about your experiences doing it. Just click on the "Contact or Email Me" link in my Navigation side bar.  I'd really like to hear your thoughts and ideas on this subject, both the good and the bad.  Thanks in advance!

Have a good night.  I need to go on another egg hunt to find the missing two Easter eggs from our indoor egg hunt last night.  I'm hoping I find them before the smell finds me!  lol

Priscilla, my sock-knitting teacher wasn't able to make it for this month's meeting, so my socks will have to wait a while longer before they learn to become a "well-heeled" pair.  (pun was intended!  teehee)  I'll see if I can get a picture of them on here.  If I do, don't laugh!  The pattern says to stop about 2" before the end of the heel.  So I did.  I think.  It's kinda hard to tell since I still have the knitting cables running thru them, and every time I bent over to measure, the "darn" things (sorry!) {G} kept heading for my toes!  And if it wasn't that, the looped ends kept rolling over on me!  I think you need 2 pair of hands for knitting and measuring these kind of things!  lol  I used some Lion Brand Magic Stripes sock yarn that I found in my stash, and wouldn't you know it?  I was at AC Moore's the other day, and they don't even carry it anymore!!!  ( how do you show a raspberry in computereeze?  :-p= ?  ) It's pretty neat watching the stripes show up without my planning it!

We had some pretty bad weather here over the weekend.  Especially on Saturday with LOTS of rain and high winds.  By nightfall, the rains had stopped, but the wind hadn't.  Of course, Hubby, Missyboo and I had to go out in the mess.  (whatcha-gonna-do shrug)  When we got home, we found some branches in the driveway really really close to my car.  After taking a quick look around it, the car seemed ok.  The next morning I went out to get my crochet bag from the car.  When I shut the car door, I heard this tinkling kind of sound.  I thought to myself, that's an odd noise for tree bark to make falling down off the roof.  I turned around to look, and it wasn't tree bark at all.  It was my side window.  The vacuum created in the car by shutting the door popped the center of the window right out!  Looked like someone was inside and used their foot sideways to kick out the glass.  So the glass man finally got here today to fix the hole.  It was supposed to be done yesterday, but for whatever reason, they thought I had clear glass instead of tinted.  So I had to wait another day for them to get a tinted window.  And believe you me!  I looked real hard before I sat in the car afterwards to make sure all the glass pieces were out, and I wasn't going to sit in any bird or bat do!  lol

Only one more week to go before registration time for classes at the CGOA conference in NH.  WooHoo!  I have mine planned, or should I say plotted, out already.  Now to see if I can make that happen!  {VBG}  I'll bet a lot of other people are waiting for the same thing!  I have to hurry up and get my projects started that I want to take with me!  Eeek!

Oh, and before I forget, at Sunday's meeting I was telling one of the women about this new jacket designed by Tammy Hildebrand for Caron yarns.  What a beauty!!!!  Lots of rich texture, and a gorgeous plum color!  Yummy.  Check it out here.  Let me know what you think of it!

Have a good night.  :)