Tuesday, April 26, 2011

Seeing Purple

I'm noticing a theme... there's a lot of purple turning up in my world lately. Not that I'm complaining. I like purple. It's just that, in general, it's not a color that is typically in my daily life despite the fact that as a teenager I painted my bedroom a deep purple. Maybe that did me in for a (long) while. Maybe now I'm ready to reconcile with purple because I've chosen it for a baby sweater I'm knitting for someone in my office.
This is the back of this baby jacket that is still a work in progress - but I am making progress!
Learning some new things on this one like adding on stitches at the end of a row to shape the sleeves (thank you YouTube).

Surprise purple crocus in the yard that must have been transplanted by squirrels or chipmunks since they are in an odd new place. 

And a purple pansy that I got at the farmer's market last weekend to brighten my kitchen. 
All in all, I can say that I am happily in a purple phase - not haze (yet). 





Wednesday, April 13, 2011

Ziphobia

So maybe I don't have ziphobia, the supposed moniker for a fear of zippers (devices I've often thought were rather marvelous in their engineering), but I have suffered from a fear of putting a zipper in a sewn object dating back to home economics trauma in high school and haven't attempted such a feat since - until yesterday.
Having lost my beloved iPhone on Sunday (a whole other sad story), I bit the bullet and got a new one yesterday morning. Can't say enough about how amazingly wonderful Apple products are. All my fears of the data being gone forever (never mind the fears that it was in someone else's hands) were dispelled a few minutes after plugging my new phone into my laptop. Miraculously every last thing that had been on my old phone, including the screensaver photo from Palm Springs last year, populated the new device. I instantly downloaded the MobileMe app which allows me to locate my phone and to erase, if I choose, all the data on it so I won't be in this position again. Everyone should have this app for peace of mind. Anyway, I digress...
The new phone needed a new home so was my reason to make a little zipper pouch. 
Zippers come in such great colors these days and I had picked up a couple the last time I was at Alewives in anticipation of confronting my ziphobia one of these days. I found a great tutorial here that I had bookmarked a while ago. The tutorial was perfect for a novice. Got the job done but next time, I am going to work on setting the zipper in the top in such a way that it doesn't extend to the edges so the corners aren't angled like this ended up.
I played with the decorative stitch options on my machine for the vine embroidery.
See what I mean about the corners?
I do love the lining though. All in all, I learned a lot. I overcame my ziphobia, even if I do have a ways to go to perfecting zippers, and my new phone has a new home. 
Oh yeah, almost forgot, here was the first pic taken with that new phone of my best friend and trusty sewing companion who often sleeps on the job.



Saturday, April 9, 2011

"Officially Spring"

"It's officially Spring", she said to her friend who was in front of me in line at the farmer's market this morning. The friend gave her a quizzical look and the woman replied, "Well I just feel like today it's really Spring so I'm making it official".  Have to say, I kind of agree with her. There was just something about today that made it feel Springish. Maybe it was all the people out raking their lawns, or, maybe it was the number of folks at the redemption center bringing in a winters worth of bottles, or, maybe it was the increase in the ratio of ground to snow,


or... maybe it was the abundance of green shoots sprouting from the ground.
All of these things together equal the end of winter in the this part of the country.

Wednesday, April 6, 2011

It was raining?

W


e barely noticed. That's how it rolls when two friends get to spend a day in the city and they haven't had uninterrupted time to just catch up in a long while. The rain did deter taking a bunch of photos, or, maybe it was the good conversation that made me forget to pull out the camera. 
Ellen and I took the bus to Boston on Monday with little on the agenda except a couple of yarn stores and a stop at Paper Source (because I had a gift certificate burning a hole in my wallet and LOVE that place). We started out in Cambridge, a stroll down memory lane for Ellen who went to Wellesley and may have dated some guys who went to one of those little colleges in Cambridge.


Then we came back to Boston and went to the coolest uncool store that only a fiber geek could love, Windsor Button. This store looks like it hasn't changed since the seventies - certainly the merchandising style (lack thereof) seems to date back to that era but we didn't carbon date the dust so it's hard to know. None of that really matters though because it's packed to the gills with every notion and doodad a sewer, knitter, crafter could desire. A fun place even if the button selection itself left a lot to be desired.
The next stop: Boylston and Newbury Streets where we hit Anthro and some of the other biggies while dodging raindrops and talking, talking, talking. 
There were angels in the architecture (thank you Paul Simon)
And Earthlings in the bus station.
It was all great.





Sunday, April 3, 2011

Cue the sunshine

Today was one of those days when the promise of Spring seems like it will be kept.
There was a brown hound sunning in the corner out of the wind;

miniature irises a little stooped from Friday's snow but still making an effort;

and signs, hard to see in this pic, that the pond is thawing.