Nursery

Today our kitchen sink is a plant nursery.  The aloe plant was in dire need of splitting up so I now have three babies and a momma plant.  One of my orchid cactus' was trying to leave this mortal earth so I threw caution to the wind and stuck some springs into some fresh soil and will hope for the best. 

The cactus used to do really well in a north-facing window when we lived at the house, but we only have east windows here and they are struggling to acclimatize. 

Last one (at least for now)

Aren't you glad this series is over, at least for now?  I can see y'all yawning from here (don't try to hide it, because I can see you!!). 

Anyway, this one is also from the 'Purseenalities - 20 Great Knitted and Felted Bags' book by Eva Wiechmann and is called the Vintage Bubble Bag.  I'd like to make this one again!

There, tomorrow we return to my regular mumblings and drivel. 

Don't all cheer at once,

might deafen me.

# 4

This one is much larger than I had hoped for, so I think I will end up keeping it for a new knitting bag.  It's far too large to be useable as a purse or even an everyday tote.  Having said that, I do like the colour combination I came up with and I think I will be repeating that on another bag in the future. 

The pattern is the 'Go Green Shopping Bag' by Kristi Holaas and for the life of me I can't remember where I got it.  I think it was a free download from Ravelry.  My apologies to Kristi for my lack of memory!

Bag # 3

This one is from the pattern 'B-4 Bag' designed by Trish Bloom and is available HERE.  I made a couple of minor changes on this one, but basically stuck to the original pattern.  For some reason my handles turned out much 'skinnier' than the pattern shows. 

Bag # 2

This one is the 'Americana Tote' (with some revision by me) taken from the book 'Pursenalities - 20 Great Knitted and Felted Bags' by Eva Wiechmann.  It was fun to make and I know I will do this pattern again at some point. 

I also have the 'Crocheted Pursenalities - 20 Great Felted Bags' book by the same author but have yet to play with any of those patterns. 

If you're interested in the books here are the specs on the knitting book:  ISBN 1-56477-565-8, published by Martingale & Company, c2004.  The crochet book:  ISBN 978-1-56477-750-8, also published by Martingale, c2007. 

As promised....

Today I will begin a short series of posts (which may, or may not, be interrupted with other things as I go along) showing you what I've been spending my evenings doing over the past while.  These knitted (and felted) bags are destined to be gifts - most probably for Christmas.

Here is bag # 1, which is probably my favourite colour combination of the ones I've done to date...

The pattern is the 'Southwest Style Bag' from a Patons booklet called 'Fabulous Felting'.  I made a few changes, namely by replacing some of the bobbles with beads - I found doing bobbles to be difficult with arthritic fingers. 

Sanity day

Yesterday we took what we call a 'sanity day' and got in the car and went where it took us.  We ended up in Parry Sound, but on the way we lucked out and found an absolutely beautiful water wall in a small town called Bala.  Needless to say we took lots of pictures!

 Above is where the water first began to drop from the top level.  The sound and fury of the water was incredible. Below you can see under the bridge through to the upper level.

 The picture above was taken facing downstream with the main highway bridge above.  We then crossed the bridge and got the photo below, which was the final level before reaching the lower lake. 

Bala is a very small town but their main claim to fame is for the Cranberry Festival they host in the fall.  We're hoping we'll be able to go back then.   All in all, a beautiful day!