More Hats

Okay, I know these aren't nearly as exciting as the new winter curtains, but Wool Fest is only days away! Here are some more hats for the festival! The stripes seems to be a big hit for the Lock Nest Hat, so this one I added fringe. It's pretty cute! Great for this area, half the people have dreadlocks!

Here's a better pic of my version of the Tentacle Bag. I have been getting great comments on this everywhere I go!! People absolutely love it's kookiness!!

New Winter Curtains

Knitting 3 strands of worsted weight on size 15 needles!! 3 different shades of off-white in a leaf lace pattern I saw in Vogue Knitting. I love the pattern, and I knew it would make killer curtains!

Bone buttons I'm using for detail.

A nice little felted vine for the top...hanging on a nice piece of dark bamboo. I should add flowers or something later.

And so beautiful with the sun shining through! That was my vision!! Success!!

Now I'm working on 5 more panels just like this one!!

New Meditation Mat

This meditation mat is made from a hand felted frame and then filled in with recycled sweater pieces. The original piece was done by Merce with silk inlays as a glass window type piece. She gave me two of them and I had them hanging on my studio walls and sadly I couldn't get them to work for my windows! So I needed to do something cool with them! I love the natural wools she used and I just happened to have sweaters with beautiful natural earthy colors to go with it!

There is a middle layer of recycled sweater too for extra padding and then a nice sturdy material backing. I threw in a few center stitches randomly for a quilted effect! This is awesome for meditation, prayers, and sitting yoga poses and stretches!! The wool will give protection from the cold floor all winter long!

All hand stitched with love!!

Sept. Flare

So Lupus strikes again! This is a good time to give a health update. I made the switch to the Cellcept over a 3 week period, and I've been on the full dose for a couple of weeks now. No more Immuran, but still taking 20mg of Prednisone a day, and 400mg of Plaquenil....with the other various vitamins and what not.

The Cellcept has caused some major depression moments and some very angry mood swings! Like throwing things type mood swings!! But Twilight helped me figure out that this was being caused by the medicine and I've been able to keep mental control of myself and my emotions, so it's okay right now. Cellcept has also caused extreme insomnia, but Big D and I have been playing around with med schedules...and I think we've come up with one that lets me sleep at night. Cellcept has also caused diarrhea and vomiting...but it's way better than being constipated, and again, tweeking the schedule of meds and sleep and eating have cut down on the vomiting! I weighed in at 144 pounds yesterday and I'm excited!! My BMI is back to 23! I have now lost the 20 pounds I gained after first starting Lupus treatment!! Woot woot!!

So the flare....Started Friday Sept. 10th. I started with tired and weakness on Friday. A low grade fever through Saturday, and Sunday I woke up covered in bruises and a bloody nose, and mentral blood pooring out of me even though my period had just ended. D and I argued about going to the hospital, and I won. My take on it was that all they'd do at the hospital is pump me full of fluids and steriods and put me on absolute bed rest. And in my view, it's much more pleasant to do that at home where it's free. So that's what I did. 70mg of Prednisone, and fluids and bed rest for a few days. The bleeding stopped, the fever went away, and I'm feeling good again now.

So wait till you see the next few posts!! In bed, I knit like an insane woman and I got lots done!!!

Maria's

Pics from a trip to my favorite Santa Fe restaurant Maria's. This place has the best New Mexican food, great service and charm charm charm! It also makes the very best Margarita in town for those people fortunate enough to be able to have one!! Big D with our good friend JP outside.

I just love the inside! Wooden floors and adobe walls. Love it!!

The place is filled with cozy little nooks and crannys.

More Hats

I still can't believe the overwhelming positive feedback I've gotten over my Lock Nest Hat, here on the blog, and on facebook, and in person!! So the vote was that I should make some for the Wool Festival this year. Well, it's a bit late in the game to be adding in new ideas...with one month to go...but hell, I love a challenge!!! Here are two more finished! And I have 3 more ready to be felted and enough yarn to knit up two more before show time! I was spending the afternoon with my lovely friend Polli...who is ga ga over the hats, so she graciously modeled them for me!!

It's a little hard to see, but I used a varigated mohair boucle in the stripes of this one. You can see the purple shiny spots. It gave it a yummy texture!!

This one is different because I used an acrylic based yarn in the alternating stripes of pure wool and it had a very cool effect!!

I like the effect of striping with solids and varigated colors.

Because I started and ended with the acrylic yarn, it did the neat little roll at the front and back. This was Polli's favorite one, and since it didn't technically count as pure wool for the festival....I let her have it. It looked just too good on her! I've learned alot in just 3 hats....I have some more ideas I'd like to try.

New Purse? Hat?

This is from one of my favorite books "The Second Treasury of Magical Knitting" by Cat Bordhi, who is heroess to me and many many! It's called the Tentacle Bag. I've been keeping this on my list for a few years now. But time is getting near for the Taos Wool Festival, and I really wanted something new and fun for me to wear. This is a mobius version that has another inside pocket and does a funky twisty thing. I've done alot of moebius knitting in the past, and now I like to save it for objects or gifts when it has a spiritual meaning or purpose, or for a knitting mediation exercise.

So I set out to create my own pattern, inspired completely by my guru Cat Bordhi, for a new funky purse!! I followed the "spirit" of her instructions...not decreasing at regular intervals, and making each tentacle a different size. (this would make Twi crazy, he he he) It differs from Cat's version because it is not a moebius knit and it does not have a second inside pouch.

I apologize for the terrible quality of the next two pics, but they're all I got before it was felted.

Each tentacle, as well as each strap is it's own little pocket to keep pens, lipgloss, and keys in!!

Felting Day!!! I threw it into the washing machine and Tadaa!! I have a new Purse!! I mean Hat!!! Purse? Hat?

I think it suites me!!!