F.O.s (Finished Objects)

I have been a bad blogger!  January really kicked my butt.  We went back to school on January 3, and it was the end of the semester and final exams.  Because I teach English, and my courses focus on literature and composition, all of my students had end of unit essays they were working on and turning in, plus all of my final exams have an essay component as well.  That meant over the course of three weekends and two work weeks I had to grade 300 essays, plus teach, plus enter grades and get report cards completed by the end of January.  Whew!  It was all I did and I was plenty sick of it when I got to the end of the month.

I have been taking pictures when I can, and I have few things to show you.  Over Christmas break I started a new project: fingerless mittens.  When I drive I listen to audiobooks on my iPod, and because iPods and iPhones have touch screens you have to take off your mittens or gloves to get them to work.  I got sick of taking off my gloves every time I wanted to play or pause my audiobook, so I decided to knit some fingerless mitts.  I found some gorgeous yarn from one of my favorite yarn brands, Manos del Uruguay, which means Hands of Uruguay in Spanish.  Manos del Uruguay "is a non profit organization which assembles over 400 artisans in cooperatives scattered throughout the countryside of Uruguay.  The aim of the organization is to bring economic and social opportunities to rural women."  I first used Manos yarn on Tiny Dancer's legwarmers and loved the feel and the way it knit.  That yarn was a cotton blend.  For this project I chose a beautiful multi-colored Merino wool.

You can see the first mitten, in progress, perched atop one of my favorite Christmas gifts.  My mom gave me this handmade pottery knitting bowl (I guess that's what you would call it...)  It is so awesome - you put the yarn you are working with in the bowl and then feed it out through the opening.  You set the bowl next to you and then it just smoothly feeds out through the opening as you knit, instead of rolling off the couch.  Plus, it is a nice was to contain a small project and looks fairly decorative sitting on the table next to my couch.

Here are some close up shots of the yarn and the bowl.  I just love the way this looks together.

And here is a picture of one of the finished mittens, my first F.O. of the new year!

The fingerless mittens are my January Finished Object.  Then, in February, in knit a matching hat. 

This hat is called the Sweetie Pie Hat and I got the pattern from my favorite knitting, crocheting & sewing blog, The Purl Bee.  The hat was so easy to knit and I loved making the baby cable.  I liked the pattern so much and I love my new fingerless mittens so much, I am thinking of combining the two and making a pair of fingerless mitts with the baby cable pattern.  Stay tuned!

Here is a pic of one of my other cute knitting-related Christmas gifts from my mom.  It is a tape measure.  Isn't it cute?

Here is my new yarn for my next project.  I am hoping to have another F.O. in February.

This is a yummy angora/wool blend yarn called Lush by Classic Elite Yarns. 

I can't wait to get started.  I have a pretty busy Sunday.  I have to take Tiny Dancer to the mall to go jeans shopping with her competition tap team (They are wearing sparkly corset-style tops and matching jeans for their costumes.) and I have to go in to work to make lesson plans for tomorrow.  Our entire English department is going to an all-day writing conference.  I hope that it is good & we learn some new ideas.  I hate being gone from my students, but it is worth it if I come back with some new teaching ideas.  Perhaps tonight, after a bit of grading, I will be able to get started.

Hello!

Hello! I have been wanting to start a blog for over a year now but kept putting it off for one reason or another.  I planned to start it January 1st of 2010 - something about starting a new blog on the first day of a new year appealed to me. I even took pictures of what I was doing that day to chronicle the event.  But then I didn't do it... and knowing how way leads on to way... I found myself at the beginning of another new year and still no blog.  I thought about doing it again on January 1st of 2011, but again - something got in the way. (Probably college football, knitting, and my intense desire to stay on the couch all day under a blanket, doing very little, and not thinking about going back to work on Monday.)  So now it is the weekend AFTER the first of the new year.  I have been back to work for a week, have a terrible cold, tons of papers to grade (I am a high school English teacher) and suddenly decided that I would not put off the blog creation any longer.  So, here I am.  My hopes for this blog are the following:
* it will inspire me to write more
* it will be a place to showcase the things I love to do in the very little free time I have: knitting, sewing, reading, and cooking
* it will be a place where I can record the funny things that happen around me that at the time I think I will never forget, but I most certainly have forgotten by now

I need to be realistic about my blogging.  It will probably happen only on the weekends during the school year.  I think my fear of not posting regularly enough was one of the things that kept me from starting. But now that I have noticed that many of my favorite bloggers have gaps and take breaks once in awhile, I am over that fear. So here goes... I am excited, a little nervous, and looking forward to a new project in a new year.

Here is what I was working on last year on New Year's Day 2010.  This is one of the last strips of knitting that was rolled into a flower, felted, and then sewn onto a purse that had also been felted.  This project took a lot longer than I anticipated.  For one, when you knit something to be felted it has to be MUCH bigger than the finished project turns out to be.  And second, these roses (24 in all) were more knitting than I thought.  Overall, I was happy with the way the purse turned out.  I felted it, sewed on all of the roses, attached some cute plastic handles, and lined it with fabric from Anna Maria Horner.  I would post a picture, but after I started using it this holiday season, some of the roses started to pull off the purse and so it needs a little first aid before I can show it to the world.

This is what I was reading last New Year's Day 2010.  I read the first four of the Harry Potter series out loud to my son beginning when he was five years old. (He is 16 now!)  After that, he could read himself and I stopped reading the series.  A year ago, I decided to finish and I read the fifth and sixth books. This Christmas break from school I read the seventh in the series at my daughter's urging. (She is now 13 years old.)  I was a little nervous to read it, because I didn't know how the series was going to end and I was afraid I would be disappointed.  J.K. Rowling did not disappoint and I loved it.  Someday I will have to read the whole series over again - perhaps when I am retired and sailing around the Caribbean.  Sigh.

Besides having a terrible cold, it is a beautiful winter day.  It snowed all night last night, and we woke up to a fresh blanket of snow and the sun just hitting the tops of the trees to the west.  Here is the view out my kitchen window of my backyard.  I am obsessed with the birds, and I have been extrememly disappointed that there have been so few over the past few weeks. (The snow melted over New Year's, and I guess they could find food elsewhere.)  Today, with its fresh blanket of snow, cold temperatures (it was 8 degrees when I got up, and is now up to only 16 at nearly noon and with bright sunlight) they are back! These little things make me so happy.

The view out my kitchen window.

The birds are back!

Well, I think that is enough for my first post.  I am so excited to finally be blogging, I don't want to stop!  I hope you enjoy a lovely Saturday.  Maybe later I will be feeling well enough to go out cross-country skiing.  Fingers crossed.