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Carry On


Starting with sewing! The latest issue of Taproot magazine had a great bag pattern in it that I promptly made. I ended up using flannel doubled for the main bag and leftovers from the top I made last summer for the pocket - this meant that I got to learn French seams and sewing a circle into a cylinder on (at one point) 12 layers, which I do not recommend. On the other hand, it did have a confidence building effect, so maybe it was a good idea after all.




The kids loved it, also, so I reprinted the pattern at 60% and made them each their own (out of a single layer of cotton duck, see, I did learn something). I bias taped the edges of theirs rather than fiddle with a rolled hem at the smaller scale but followed the pattern for everything else, and by the time I did the last one my time was down to 45 minutes, including cutting out the fabric (in the interest of full disclosure, I do not use pins for pattern cutting or for sewing, which does tend to speed things along - except when something goes wrong and has to be ripped out). They enjoyed the masked outing to choose their own fabric (they hadn't been in a store since November) and they're all excited to use their "adventure bags" to collect nature finds on walks and trips to the park (and I'm excited to not be the designated pinecone carrier anymore).


My biggest project this month was spring prepping the house - dumping all the kids' clothes onto my bed to see what needed to go and what needed to be replaced, donating the outgrown things and buying new ones (everyone has gone up a shoe size and Juniper went up two), deep cleaning so I could bug spray every interior perimeter, lavender sacheting my drawers of knits (I found a few suspicious holes in some of the hats I pulled out for the kids to wear in the snow last month), and putting ant and mosquito baits outside. Still on the list are replacing the back door (the bottom six inches are completely rotten, which I discovered while ant spraying and does a lot to explain the ant problem we were having in our room) and putting up a new fence, but it was a satisfying start.


Between the sewing and the cleaning, I haven't knit much. I do have one completed project to report: these Understory Mitts (pattern by Larissa Brown, link goes to Ravelry). I made a pair of these a year or two ago and really liked them, and all of my fingerless gloves have gone exploring without me, so I whipped these up... just in time for the weather to turn warm.


Right now, I'm working on another design for Needlehook Fibers, but I've got 1200 yards of yarn to use up and some fairly small needles to do it with so don't expect an update for a month or two.
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