Another Day--

It's another beautiful day on the Florida sea shore!  Good Morning to us!  We peek outside our tenth floor condo to be greeted by bright sunrise--and we are ready for another full day of fun activities! 

The morning sun hits building #2 and we have clear skies after some foggy dreary days.  But, who cares?  We're inside enjoying 2012 Spin-in............

We head downstairs to the ballroom and find it empty--of participants.  It's a chance for us to catch a quick snapshot of all the wheels void of treadling.

Wow!  so many empty chairs and but empty bobbins.

Vendors have lovely rovings to sell.

What great colors and fibers to spin!

It's so hard to choose which one to begin with.

During the day we had a parade of shawls......................................

Here they come--all different colors and fibers--some handspun, some not.

Some woven, some knitted, some crocheted--all very creative patterns.

Some take years to complete while others are instant creations!

colorful gamp--woven, not handspun though--but, not problem with us.  It's a definite show piece.

First handspun woven into wonderful wrap.

Shawlettes, shawls, cowls, neck wear of any size is welcome in the parade.

Proud owners of lovelies--what a great bunch of folks!  Looking forward to 2013......................

Shawls, Fibers and Yarns!

Here we go--second day of spin-in!  Let's take a walk through some of the shawls, fibers being spun and yarns!

And for the next photo--don't ask!!

Shawl We Dance!



The time has arrived!  We are nestled in our conference center and glad to be here.  Even though the weather hasn't been cooperative, we are inside and all is well!

This is the view from out tenth floor condo--we have a gulf view if you look hard.  But, this morning the fog covered most of the view.

The ballroom is empty except for chairs as the vendors move in their wares.

A new vendor, Colorful String Theory, with new baby in tow--nothing keeps these gals away from the event.

Okay, we are getting there!

Here are two other vendors sitting up--Gale's Art and Funny Face.

What's in all those bags?



The door prize tickets are ready and waiting for participants to arrive........................stay tuned.

A Walk on the Beach

It is our annual trip to the seaside.  The weather is perfect.  The sky is blue.  The water reflects with slight ripples as the waves crash on shore.

So, we take a walk on the beach--our feet crunch over the white sands as our foot prints are left for only a matter of seconds.

It is calm and peaceful.  The sounds of the ocean is music to your ears.

Life is good!

Ah, the creatures that wash ashore are colorful and interesting.

A small matter of replenishing the sea.

And the grains of sand move on.............................as our walk on the beach.

Cleaning closets and storage units are a good thing!  There are all sorts of treasures just waiting to be discovered.  Well, actually, these 'treasures' were stored many moons ago and somehow, the old brain just forgot about them.  You know the saying--"out of sight, out of mind"!  Yeah, that's what happens.

This was just a plain white scarf--bought on a trip to China and it languished away out of sight for a long time.  Then when it was time to search for another item, lo and behold, this little  bundle appeared--all neatly tied and ready to be dyed.  Even forgot what the search was looking for in the first place once we discovered this bundle.

Also buried deep in the drawer was this assortment of dyes--most likely bought at quilt festival after seeing a demo--nothing like impulse buying!  At least, the dyes weren't all dried up and unusable. 

Nice colors for silk--instant dyes too!  So, we took the little silk bundle and wet it with the dyes.  A little tad here, a little dap there and we have this.......................

Doesn't look like much to speak of in this state, but once it was open up completely.........

The design appeared!  Whoa, looks like a kaleidoscope!  and it makes us look like a real artist.

Up close and personal--a real winner in any book and so easy.  Now, to find the other silk scarves--where are they?  Must be in another storage bin.

And on the needles--another Stephen West treat from his latest venture--a shawl of the month club.  This is January's pattern--Arroway.  The black is malabrigo yarn and the multi color is koigu--both yarns were in the stash basket.  And easy to find!

The glasses are modeling the mystery sock pattern--way cool pattern!  The heel is turned and the instep is complete; just waiting on step #4.  Heading off to check out the other storage bins for more treasures.............................see you later.

And We're OFF!!

And we are charging around the back bend and coming on strong...................oh, wait that's a horse race, not the race to finish up some UFO's.  But, we are out of the gate and running. 

Why is it we never start working on a project until the date is right upon us??  It's Valentine Day soon--very soon!  So, cutting hearts from freezer paper............

Ironing those hearts onto red & pink fabric to make this delightful wall hanging.

A bouquet of hearts-- Pattern in the latest issue of McCall's Quilting Magazine. 

We are in RED mode and continuing some redwork stitchery.  We have three more to stitch just like this one. 

And we finished knitting this shawl from Stephen West Designs.  This is one of the five patterns that Stephen is offering through his shawl club via Ravelry.  We opted for the PDF version, thinking we could use up some of our stash.  This yarn was handspun.  The pattern doesn't show up very well with this yarn so there might be another one in our future using different yarns.

And Oh My Gosh!  Just couldn't resist this funky chicken from Fat Cat Patterns! Just love these chicks!  This is Sindy's 2012 BOM--this is going to be fun.  Luckily, we are using stash fabrics.  Well, we completely forgot about finishing an UFO before beginning another UFO..........

Maybe, this will count for ticking off the UFO list--Miss Birdie Stitches.  We are putting on the borders and readying for quilting.  Was so much fun to do these each month!

What do you do with mohair locks, felting needles and a silk scarf? 

You felt the locks to the ends of the scarf to make an interesting fringe!  More scarves in our future??  It's a good possibility!!  This was quick and simple--just had to find the felting needles and that we did at Joann Fabrics --used 50% off coupon. 
Back to the studio to wrap up a couple more UFO's......................