Little Crafters

So I stumbled upon this adorable little book at the library (Doodle Stitching by Aimee Ray) while scouring the shelves for ever more knitting pattern books (obsessed much?) and it reminded me of the big bag of embroidery thread I picked up at the thrift store ages ago for a quarter, or some other ridiculously low amount. I said "Wheee!" and checked it out and brought it home, along with the necessary accoutrement of needle work (things like needles, for example) and sat down with the children. I sent them ahead to pave the way to embroidered bliss, brave crafting soldiers that they are, and they triumphed indeed, overcoming pricked fingers and thighs.






Photos of finished works to come! Also, my own attempt at the art.

And now . . .

I'm doing a couple of things.

This is a rather pitiful interpretation of degas, but it might look nice in the bathroom eventually . . .


And I've painted Harry MacLary from Donaldson's Dairy for a certain 3 year old who is a big fan . . .


This TARDIS in my "studio" needs desperately to be finished. Don't worry, it's bigger on the inside, of course.


We'll see if anything ever gets finished in this hectic little life of mine.

Just Some Art. . .

from the past.

Knits amid warring hummingbirds

I knit. Not spectacularly, but I can putter my way through simplistic projects. I'm not picky about fibers or about notions. My current small work of mild wonder, this HipToBeSquare blanket (from ravelry), is cast with synthetic baby soft yarn on my thrift store scavenged aluminum needles, the blue rubbing away on the tips.



Knitting gives me fantastic feelings of warm fuzziness, and not just from petting all that delicious yarn. It feeds my artistically driven need to create, watching lovely patterns emerge from my clumsy old hands. Not that my creations are flawless; far from. But even with the missteps along the way, the beauty of the pattern shows through in the end.



There is also a meditative stillness in the act of knitting that is hard for me to experience in any other way. My mind is an insistent multitask-er, nearly always fretting over bills not yet due and highly unlikely catastrophes on the horizon. As I sit and work at knitting, counting away the stitches and rows, my mind is often able to let go of things. My other creative outlets give me no such relief; they often make me think too much. Knitting provides a much needed release of thought, the dialogue of my mind ceasing, or slowing down to a dull murmur."When walking, walk. When eating, eat." When knitting, knit.