Finished a new pattern for fingerless mitts. They are going to be gifted to my Pastor's wife. I am going to have it up for test knitting for a little while before making it available to the public. We went to my grandsons Soccer game yesterday. His team won again! It is so cute to see the little four year old playing soccer. You can't even see their legs in the little uniforms!

For a four year old he is really focused on where he is supposed to put the ball and has made several goals.
We do have fun watching him.
Have a great day!!
God Bless you!!
Mary

Chestnuts

Chestnuts roasting on an open fire... La La la la


Our Chestnut trees are really over producing this year! We are also feeding the local deer. because there are deer tracks under one of the trees. You can see where they were stomping the hulls off of the nuts. I had to look online to find some recipes to try out. My husband roasted some in the oven and he said they were great! Of course he did it while I was gone and ate them all! :) I want to figure out how to make Chestnut Flour with some of them. Chestnut flour pancakes are great. We pick up nuts off the ground one day. Then you look and the next day there are just as many as you picked up the day before. These pictures are just from one picking!

On the knitting scene: I am knitting some fingerless gloves for my Pastor's wife. I am designing them as I go. I will be putting the pattern up in Ravelry soon. They will have a lacy leaf pattern on the back of the hand. I have seen that there is not very many lace mitts patterns out there. So I may just have to design a few more of them.
Have a great day!!
God Bless You!!
Mary

I know I haven't posted in a while. Been busy knitting. trying to get the Sports Car scarf done. Fixing up grammatical errors on the Corn on the Cob pattern, which is available in Ravelry for two months free. Then it will go up for sale. Starting some fingerless mitts for my granddaughter Valarie. Trying to think of other things to make for Christmas gifts. Lots going on in my head.
Also the tomatoes are ripe in the garden. The squash and cucumbers are done. Dead vines all around. It has been really dry here lately. We got a little rain yesterday. It seems the rains come and they just rain all around us and we don't get it.
I need to get out there and do some weeding. Maybe today sometime....... :)
Have a great day!!
God Bless You!!
Mary

I finished the Watch Cap Lite. I named it this because it is made with a lighter yarn and can be used in the warmer climates in the winter. I made it for my nephew Lance, who lives in Texas.
Yesterday my granddaughter wanted something made for her kitten. She found yarn with a kitten on the band so she figured this yarn was for kitty things. So I made a little square blankie for her. She sure comes up with ways to help me burn up my stash.
I also started the Sports Car Scarf for my nephew Lance. The yarn that I am using on it is Patton's Silk Bamboo. It sure is soft and nice and drapes well.
Another Item that I got finished are bunny slippers for my Grandson. This month has been quite productive. I still need to get some of my patterns together. I have a couple of people to test knit my Sea Dreams socks. I haven't had any takers on the Corn on the Cob socks yet. It may be a deterrent by the fact that they are done on the purl side instead for the knit side.
I'm baking a cake for my Son in Law today for his Birthday. The timer is going off so I have to go for now.
Have a great day!!
God Bless you!!
Mary

I finished two more projects today. Another Elephant. This one for my Grandson. I made it with some Chenille that I had in my stash. It was horrible when it came to sewing the ears and feet on. The Chenille kept stripping out then not wanting to go through the material. It made quite a mess and was very Frustrating. But I finally got it done.

The other project is Sluggie. He is inspired by my granddaughter. She wanted a slug. So I improvised a pattern. Knitted it up and she stuffed it. Then I closed it up. She was going to give it to her brother but then she liked it so much that she now wants to share it with him instead of just giving it to him. I will be making up the pattern and posting it in Ravelry tomorrow.
I am working on anoher pair of bunny slippers for my Grandson now. these will be his Birthday gifts. I will have them made well ahead of time and put them in my gifts drawer. Since his Birthday is in December, it will make the Holiday knitting go faster without doing Birthday knitting then too.

Have a great day!!
God Bless you!!
Mary

I finished two more projects for my granddaughter's birthday on the 19th.
Slippers and elephant. I used some of the loads of stash yarn that I have. Now I am working on another Elephant for my Grandson. It will be red like the red elephant on Max and Ruby cartoon.
Have a great day!!
God Bless you!!
Mary

I finished the Sea Dreams Socks. Now I need to finish getting the pattern together. I used a lot of leftover yarns in these socks. They were fun to develop. My granddaughter brought me back a starfish from Florida so I used it in the picture too!

I am now working on my Watch Cap Lite and the Sport's Car Scarf.

Have a great day!!
God Bless you!!
Mary

I am almost done with my Sea Dreams Socks. I have two other patterns in mind already. One is the Scarf for my Nephew and the other is the Hat he wants me to make him. I think on the scarf I will do a sort of Chevron lace in the middle with a small cable down each side and eyelets on the outside edge. I am still trying to decide how far apart to put the Chevrons so that they look more manly, and not too lacy.
I am still waiting on the yarn for the scarf to come in. What I ordered for the hat has already arrived.

On the Gardening front. My garden is producing an abundance of Zucchini and Cucumbers. My tomato plants look great despite the rainy weather. They have green tomatoes on them. It will still be a while before I get some ripe ones. My Butternut Squash is trying to take over the whole garden. They are growing in the tomato cages with the tomatoes. They took over the beans and they are trying to take over the eggplants too. I saw that there are little squashes coming on them. One of my Tomato plants had a horn worm on it. He is squished now. If it becomes much of a problem I will take my little bottle of Diatomacious Earth and sprinkle it on the plants. It usually takes good care of it and doesn't have a poisoning affect on us like other non-organic bug killers. I will have to go out and get a good picture of my garden when it isn't raining so much.

Have a great day!!
God Bless you!!
Mary

Hi!!
I finished my corn on the cob socks. Now I need to Doctor up the pattern so I can put it up for sale.

I also have a picture of some sock blockers that my husband is cutting out. We have a web page that we are trying to set up to sell them and other items. Hopefully it will grow into a nice business for us. If so then we can really reject the recession!! I have also started my sea dreams socks. There will be a lot of surprises on them when I get to the legs. I'm hoping they will be a great pattern.

Have a great day!!
God Bless You!!
Mary

Well my Nephew inherited his grandpa's little red sports car. And he asked me to knit him a scarf to wear with it. Well he lives in Texas so it is hot. Does anyone know where to find a scarf pattern that is really light weight and guy friendly. Even a lace that is guy friendly? I may have to create one and write the pattern. I was thinking of using a light weight Bamboo silk yarn for it. Something slick feeling. If you have any suggestions then let me know. Thanks!!
Have a great day!!
God Bless You!!
Mary

Here is a picture of my completed Cable Leaf socks. They are so comfortable to wear. I love the feel of them. The yarn came from Colorful Yarns (online).
I cast on a new pair of socks that I am designing. They are called Sea Dreams Socks. They will be a Stranded Fair Isle type of socks. It will probably be my second pattern that I plan on putting up for sale. I just have to figure out how to do all that online. I will have to get my Tech Son to help me with it.
Have a great day!!
God Bless You!!
Mary

Socks

I am working on a new pattern for socks. Called Corn on the Cob Socks. I hope to make this my first for sale pattern. Then I plan on designing one called Sea Dreams Socks. It will be a stranded color work sock. I finished the Cable leaf socks and have my pattern up in Ravelry for free.
Have a great day!!
God Bless You!!
Mary

New Pattern

I am working on writing a new sock pattern. It is called Cable Leaf Socks. I will post it in Ravelry when I get them done. I may have to knit another pair in a different yarn so that you can see the pattern better.


It looks like a little cable with a leaf in it. I also made some baby booties with the pattern. The booties started out as a swatch for the socks but they became baby booties thus another new pattern. You can see the pattern a lot better on the booties.
They were donated to the pregnancy center here in town. They are always needing baby booties.

If you knit or Crochet and don't belong to Ravelry, You should join. It is so handy to put your projects in there and look back and see what yarn you used and where you got it from. You can see what yarns worked well for others and what ones did not. You can also get thousabnds of patterns for free. All of my patterns so far are free. I am thinking of charging a little for a new pattern that I am developing. I have just a few of my patterns listed here on the sidebar, but there are more in Ravelry.
Have a great day!!
God Bless You!!
Mary

Puppy Dog Chase

We had a bit of a scare today. I took my basset hound next door to be watched while we go on our trip. Well I looked out back where there is 5 empty acres then some woods. I saw a basset hound that looked like mine out by the woods. My son grabbed her rope and went to go get her. The dog ran from him so he went after it. Then out there by the woods came out a coyote and it went to chasing the dog. So the dog ran away faster. At this point we realized that it was not our dog. Ours is an older dog and it would have run out of steam by that time. So we went next door to ask if Rosie was still there and there she was in the neighbors house just relaxing.. Funny after you think about it. The dog we were chasing went down the road to it's home. My son said the coyote backed off after the dog barked at it and it found that the dog was a little too big to mess with.
I think we have quite a few of the coyotes out there. I heard them the other night howling, and I could hear about 4 of them. One even sounded like it was really close to my house.

Have a great day!!
God Bless you!!
Mary

I made this hat for a Christmas present for someone. I don't know who yet. My grandchildren were happy to be my models.

I have started two pair of socks, that I am designing. One is called Corn on the cob socks and the other one is Cable Leaf Socks.
I will have pictures later of the progress. We are getting ready to go on a trip to Ohio for a week. I don't know if I will have access to the net during that time since we will be at a state park.

I finally got my garden in today. I planted Tomatoes, Eggplants, Summer and Winter Squash, Green beans and Swiss Chard. My lettuce was big enough to cut the other day. It was nice to have fresh lettuce.
Have a great day!!
God Bless You!!
Mary

I have a couple of things done. The Afghan is done and donated to Hope Circle. As in the past there was no one there so I just left it. I guess I am just the anonymous donor. I also got one of the pairs of Purlwise Plain socks done. I am almost done with the second pair. I used fingerling weight leftover's from stash yarn. I have no idea what the yarn is. Some is acrylic and others are super wash wool. For some reason the scrap socks feel better on my feet.

Today I need to get out and hoe some more in my garden so I can get my plants in. I have only 3 tomato plants in the ground. I like to spread out newspaper under them and poke the tomato cage through it to keep it in place. it helps keep the weeds from growing close to the tomato plant and inside the cage.

Have a great day!!
God Bless You!!
Mary

Ok what do you do with yarn that someone gives to you, where they started making something, but you don't know what.
A friend gave me this yarn that is done in a bunch of Hairpin lace.
I thought for a while then I came up with a granny square hairpin lace afghan to donate to a place that gives blankets and hats to terminally ill patients, to keep them warm. They are called Hope Circle.
I'm using some other yarn that I had in my stash to make the granny squares.

Recently in Ravelry I have added a couple of more patterns to my designs. Some socks and some baby booties. Our group of ladies that meet on Thursday nights are thinking of making baby booties for the Pregnancy Resource Center. One of the ladies said that they were really in need of them.

Have a great day!!
God Bless You!!
Mary

Easter Bunnies

Hi!!
I got the little bunnies done for my grandchildren just the day before Easter. I think they came out cute. I used Stash yarn to make them. I am trying to use up as much of the stash yarn as I can. Most of it is Acrylic that I inherited. I have just one tub full of real Wool, Alpaca, or Possum, sock and lace weight yarn. That tub is getting over full though. I also have some chenille that my Sister in Law sent me. Not sure what I will make out of it. I have heard that Chenille does best in Crochet.
It has been cool and rainy around here. For Easter we had Thunderstorms. I made a roast and we had a nice family get together.
For the garden I still need to plant little seeds in cups to get them started. The only ones I have done are the Tomatoes. The lettuce that I planted a while back in the garden is now up. It will be great to have that nice fresh leaf lettuce. I planted a mixture of leaf lettuces all in the same patch. That way my salad is already mixed.
Have a great day!!
God Bless you!!
Mary

Easter Knitting

I have been doing some Easter knitting for my Grandchildren. Hope I get it all done in time.
We have a couple of bunnys going and an Alligator Scarf. I got the chicks done. The scarf should take just another day of knitting and it will be done too. I intend to make a girl bunny and a boy bunny.

I will need to create a pants pattern for the boy bunny.
I am still working on my Icarus Shawl and my Almond Blossom socks. But they are on the back burner till the Easter knitting is done.
Have a great day!!
God Bless You!!
Mary

Knitting and Spring

I have been busy still knitting. I made some fingerless gloves for my grandchildren. I have a picture of one of them here.

I have started to design another pair of socks. I put them in my bloomin Almond tree to show spring has arrived here in Arkansas.
I don't know what to name the pattern yet. Waiting to see a little more what they are going to look like. For now they look like W's. I am using some leftover yarns in my stash to make these, so the toes and the heels will be a different color than the rest of the socks.
The city is finally getting all the branches picked up from our terrible Ice storm. You can actually drive down the road without worrying that you are going to hit a tree branch. Some branches however are still hanging precariously above the roads. You drive under praying it doesn't come down on top of you. I know that spring and summer will heal most of the damage done.
Have a great day!!
God Bless You!!Mary

I picked up my Log Cabin afghan again and have been knitting on it. I'm trying to use up some acrylic stash that I inherited from my mom. I also finished these Diamond Waffle socks. I put them in the drawer for next Christmas.

I hope to also get to working on my Icarus Shawl too. I need to get it done since I have been having it in hibernation for too long.

Have a great day!!
God Bless You!!
Mary

Ice Storm

Here are some during and after ice storm pictures. We were without electricity for two days. My daughter was without for 12 days. so she and the kids stayed with us. We had kerosene heater and we boiled water for hot chocolate and tea and boiled some eggs and made Ramen noodles for the two days that we didn't have electricity. You never know how much you depend on it till you don't have it for a few days. We had lots of candles and some oil lamps for light. but the best light we had was my grandson's toy camping lantern. It lit up the whole room.



I got some knitting done on my log cabin blanket. Since it was a bit cold the blanket kept me warm too.

Believe it or not it is now something like 68 degrees outside today. What a change in weather.

Have a great day!!
God Bless You!!
Mary

Here are the things I have been working on lately. I am making ornaments for family for next years Christmas. I have decided to make things all year and put them in a drawer till Christmas comes and by the end of the year I should have lots of homemade gifts amde for everyone. I think I will have to put some little name tags on them so I can remember who gets what.

I am starting a pair of socks for my dear husband. They are Diamond Waffle socks. You can find the pattern in Ravelry.

I made a new leaf square where I added a flower in the center. MY pattern has both squares included in it.
I also finished another Pineapple afghan for a girl at Church that is getting married.
So as you see I have been quite busy.

We had Knit night at Barnes and Nobles last night. We had 12 people there, and had a great time. Most were new people and they were glad to have someone to talk to and get advise on projects from. My son is even learning how to knit. Of course he wants to make a Dr. Who scarf. He seems to only knit at Knit night so this scarf may take him all of his life to make. He He,

Have a great day!!
God Bless you!!
Mary