It’s been over a week since my last post, so I figured I’d better write something.

Not much to report. I went to the doctor last Monday and she put me on some medications. I’m still trying to adjust. So, I’ve been very tired and low energy.

No crafting has happened in the past week. Though, I’ve been hanging out on Ravelry and looking at pretty patterns that I’d like to try.

Okay kids, that’s all I have for now. Have a good night!

This past week has been spent quietly passing the time watching TV, for the most part. I’ve been watching an extinct show called “Brothers & Sisters”. I really like it and I’m glad that it’s being streamed on Netflix.

The reason why I haven’t been doing much is that I think I’m coming down with a bug. My cube-mate at work has been sick for a couple of weeks; but she hasn’t stayed away from the office… I may have caught her cooties. I’m just tired and feeling yucky…

However, I have done a very small amount of crafting… Something I haven’t shown you any pictures of… Tatting!

Tatting projects are built with a series of rings and chains. They are created either using a shuttle or a needle.

When tatting, one is creating half-hitch knots, often with picots thrown in. Picots serve two purposes: decoration and joining. When you are joining two parts together (such as the two rings at each end of a chain) you need a way to put them together. A picot allows this to happen.

Thread is used with a long needle. The thread sizes range from something almost as small as sewing thread, on up to yarn. The higher the number, the thinner the thread. Needles also range in size. And like knitting and crochet, you need to use the proper size needle for the thread that you’re using. In this bookmark project, I used size 20 or 30 thread. I’m not sure which needle size I used; but it is the second from the largest in my set.

Tatting is an old art. My great-grandmother used to tat lace. She even made a tablecloth! The skill managed to skip a couple of generations and I decided to pick it up. The only difference is that I’m unable to use a shuttle. So, I’ve learned to tat using a needle.

I’m afraid that I don’t have any pictures of the finished bookmark to show you… I realized that I didn’t give myself enough needle thread to use, so I only got halfway finished. There is a way to attach more thread, but I didn’t feel like messing with it. Ah well, maybe next time!

Goats!

I wanted to show you some pictures of my boys’ coats. As usual, Frank was uncooperative.

Here you see Frank:

Not a very good picture… But, of him, they never are. At least you can see his coloring. He has a lovely reddish-brown wool.

And here is Ray:

He doesn’t have to be tricked into looking toward the camera.

See the wooden thing Ray is standing behind? That’s their manger… The naughty boys have got into the habit of knocking it over. We picked it up and tied it to the fence. Hopefully it won’t be so easy to knock over… Well, not until they chew through the rope, anyway.

And afghans!

As I’ve been promising you, some shots of the work in progress… This is the afghan that I’ve been working on for quite a while (and have not worked on in quite a while). It is based on the pattern for the African Flower potholders that I made a while back.

The pattern is the same as the potholders (minus a couple of rows) but the yarn is not.

I’m using Hobby Lobby’s “I Love This Yarn” in the colors Pink and Brown. Yes, that’s their names.

It’s an acrylic yarn; but it’s super soft! It isn’t “squeaky” like some acrylic yarn can be. Plus, you can’t really beat acrylic for clean, bright coloring and color-fastness. It’s also very durable. And for people who are allergic to many natural fibers, it means itch-free warmth. I think it’s going to make a comfy afghan.

The first photo doesn’t quite show all of the hexagons, but almost. All that I have done, up to this point, has taken a few yards less than one skein of each color. I now have five skeins of each color left… No, I’m not going to make it THAT big. As it is, it nearly covers my legs. I’m not sure how big I’m going to make it, but I intend to use it on the couch. So, probably no bigger than a large throw blanket.

This has been a bit time consuming; it takes me about 45 minutes to do one hex. I’m using the join-as-you-go method of putting them together. Yay! No sewing! I’m doing them in groups of three: three hexes that start with brown all put together, and three hexes that start with pink all put together. And I’m trying to avoid large runs of one type of hex… Easier said than done…

Well, that’s all for today! We need to go get feed for the horse and pigs. Stay warm!

How ’bout I give you the moon, instead???

Both photos taken with my Canon dSLR, cropped in Photoshop and I used the plugin virtualPhotographer to tweak the colors. Piece o’ cake!

I see that it has been a week since I last posted… I figured I’d better get with it!

It has been a looooong week, despite being a short week. I had Monday off from work; but man, I don’t feel it at all! Our workload has been much larger than expected. TGIF!

On the homefront, we had a quiet New Years. I stayed up just long enough after midnight to text my only child on the West Coast an enthusiastic “HAPPY NEW YEAR!” and then I dragged myself to bed. The other two (one in Florida and one in Maine) I sent a text at 9:00. I’m sure glad none of them are in Hawaii or Alaska!

I’ve done no crafts in the last… However long it’s been… Feels like weeks… No crochet, no knitting, no tatting, no spinning, no dyeing… Nothing. Too tired. Maybe I’ll get around to doing something this weekend…

On New Year’s Day I managed to take a couple of photographs of sparkly snow. The camera didn’t quite capture what I saw, but they’re okay. Click on the pictures to make them bigger, so you can see the colors:

I just love it when the snow looks like thousands of tiny diamonds, glittering in the sun…

The snow had been melting off, all week. And then we got some today. Maybe I’ll be able to get some more pictures!