Some Squares

Hello:

I have finished the first row (plus one square not shown) for the Wedding Afghan I am making (ok, the half of the Wedding Afghan, as my daughter, Allifer, is making the other half).

For the Final Round of Quidditch in the Harry Potter Knitting/Crochet House Cup (HPKCHC) this term, we had to craft something with 450 yds in two weeks.  Well, since I need to make 15 squares, and each square is about 100 yds, I decided to make 5 squares and hook them together for my Quidditch submission.

We are making the afghan out of Caron One Pound in Espresso, Beige, and Taupe.  I know, I have already made 2 afghans using these colors, and frankly, after the second one, I was pretty tired of them, but they go together really well, and make a nice neutral afghan that will go in many rooms without clashing (I hope).

I have been putting the squares up here as I finished them, but I haven't shown you the last two that I finished.

I took the Spider Square 

that I designed last year,
put her on a brick wall and gave her

BABIES!!

So much fun to play with and expand on this pattern.

The other square is a bit wonky, I need to work with it a bit more to get it to lie flat (I might have to steam this one ... really that means melt it a bit), but I still love it.  Puzan brought me a photo of some crochet last Sunday, and asked if I could figure out the pattern.  It's a bit tough to see if the stitches are sc or hdc but I made this square using sc.  Anyway, for right now, I'm calling it "Drips."

I didn't ride my bike today, taking one day off, but hoping to get on the bike early tomorrow before I tutor and it gets hot.  Because it has been super hot here.  ugh!

Peace,
f1bercat
shaping the planet with new afghan squares.

Quidditch Cleaning

Hello:

It has been in the 80's F here the last 2 days.  Yes, you read that right.  So insane for the Pacific Northwest. 

The Spring Term has started for HPKCHC, and I am going crazy with busy busy busy.  I am tutoring 2 - 3 hours a day Mon - Thurs, now, so I feel incredibly behind. 

I am getting into the swing of the Spring Term Classes, but I wanted to quickly post about Quidditch.  The first Quidditch game/challenge this term is a great one for me.  It is a "training" exercise, and the prompts ask us to clean up or organize.  So, you can organize Ravelry, as in log in stash, clean out your queue, and so on, but I  wanted to really clean some real life space.  When I am in the craze of finishing, I tend to just sprawl my crafting stuff all over.  I clean up the livingroom where I often work by picking stuff up and just dumping it in the spare  bedroom.  Yes, I am admitting this. 

Then, since I have been sewing, too, and I am too lazy/busy to bring the sewing stuff upstairs/downstairs every time I use it, I have been just storing it in Himes's room while he is away at college.

So, for Quidditch, on Sunday, I cleaned up and organized these spaces:

Thank you, HPKCHC, for pushing me to clean up!

Peace,
f1bercat
shaping the planet with organized space.

Quidditch Food Fight!

Bellevue, WA sunrise

Hello!

Just a quick post.

I left my home in Washington Saturday, September 29th and flew down to Southern California.  I am staying at my brother's house again, for about 2 weeks while his wife is doing some military training.

The internet is very slow here, so posting photos is a bit difficult.

HPKCHC

I managed to turn in one last class for the Harry Potter Knitting Crochet House Cup.  I had finished all of my classes, and well, I just needed to make SOMETHING.  So I hooked a scarf that I had gotten the materials and pattern for while on the 2012 Puget Sound LYS Tour back in May.

This scarf, modeled by my niece, Bella,

was hooked with Shepherd's Wool by Stonehenge Fiber Mill in Raspberry.  I got the yarn and the pattern, X Marks the Spot, at Knot Just Yarn in Burlington, WA.

 It was a super fast hook.  I made it about 20 chains longer, and 1 extra repeat of the pattern.  Then I left off the border, and just sc'd around the scarf.

I turned it in to the History of Magic class.  This class's assignments were all centered around a story from the book The Tales of Beedle the Bard.   Especially, The Fountain of Fair Fortune, which, it seems, was once produced at Hogwarts as a play.  One of the choices was to craft a prop or set piece for the play.  So I turned in this scarf and said that it was a "Creeper" that had come out of a crack in the wall surrounding a magical garden where the fountain was hidden.  The Creeper grabs the 4 main characters, and drags them into the garden.

The last thing I crafted before September ended was something for Quidditch.  The 2nd Quidditch challenge is a Food Fight!  The idea is to craft food, or something that has anything to do with food, then virtually (on a thread in the group) throw it at someone in another house.

I had promised my sister, K, a wine cozy.  When I visited her in Houston last July, I had brought her a Teapot Cozy, but she didn't have a teapot!  So, I told her I would make her a wine cozy.  The Quidditch challenge was the perfect push to get this gift finished.

I used It's My Party: Wine Cozy pattern by Donna Hulka.  It only took a few hours to finish it.  I  brought it with me to Bella's basketball game, (her team won)

and finished it before heading out to the Holy Family Cathedral Fiesta

When I got back after the Fiesta, I posted on the Group, and virtually shook up a bottle of Butter Beer, then sprayed Sentstarr of Slytherin, my partner in the Interhouse Unity Challenge in September.

Not the best photo, but I was trying to just Get It Done and turn it in.  It is my first time crocheting with beads.

I also managed to finish my Better than French Vanilla Socks, except for the final Kitchenering of the toes, then did that when I woke up today, and WIP'ed the First!  by turning in a finished WIP for detention on the first day of the new month.

I have cast on a new pair of socks in purple yarn for SKA, SolidSocks, and my OWL, as well as the Mobius Cowl for my son, Pookie.  Photos of both to follow.

O!  also, in a short where in the world is f1bercat, I walked around the block this morning, which was not that easy as the temperature went over 100 F.

Stay safe and well.
Yours,
f1bercat
shaping the world with a bunch of new class assignments

The band, Cheap Date, performs at the Fiesta

Tea Cozy Quidditch

I was just about to head upstairs to bed, when I realized that I hadn't posted today.

This month I participated in the Spring Quidditch Challenge in the Harry Potter Knitting & Crochet House Cup (HPKCHC) Group on Ravelry.  There are lots of regular classes each month, more about that in a later post, but I guess as well, there is Quidditch!

This term (Spring2012), Quidditch started with mini-socks knitting/crochet.  The second part was a "House Colors" scarf competition.  I did not participate in either of those, but the 3rd challenge was a Tea Cozy Race.  Each House had a team, hopefully made up of people spread over the various years, so there were new as well as seasoned veterans.  The exception to this was the NQFY (Not Quite First Year) group, which had our own team.  We were not really in the competition for points, but just for fun.  There were 2 tea cozy patterns chosen, one knit one crochet, and they were named about 1 week before the race began.  The challenge was to make the cozy, and embellish it.

I was in California at my nephew's wedding in the days leading up to the challenge, which started on July 2 at midnight (or July 1?  well, 12:00 am July 2).  I had just returned home that afternoon from the airport, and was super tired.  I actually tried to take a short nap, so I could start my cozy at midnight.

I decided to make the crochet cozy as I am a super slow knitter.  I worked on the cozy for about 1 1/2 hours, then just had to go to bed.  Of course, Team NQFY is not really in the competition, so I wasn't letting anyone down by getting some sleep.  Still, I got up at 7 am the next morning (July 2), and immediately got to work.  It only took me about 30 more minutes to finish the cozy, but the embellishments took quite a bit longer.

I hooked the cozy in some Sugar N Cream cream colored cotton yarn, and made rose colored roses (I know they look a bit violet here, sorry) and light green leaves for the embellishments.  The roses ended up being a bit big, but I still love how it all came together.

I don't actually own a teapot (I know! heresy), so I had to pose mine on an upsidedown bowl.

I think I will give mine to my sister, S, who lived in Ireland for a while and DOES own a teapot.

Here is a link to a fabulous slide show of all of the creative cozies made.  Way more creative than mine.

It was really fun.  This is one of the many reasons I love Ravelry.  I made something I have been thinking about, but not really finding the energy to research and start.  The HPKCHC pushed me to try a new project.

Stay safe and well.

yours,
f1bercat
shaping the planet with some ginormous roses