This post is from my blogging buddies who love yarn as I have some yummy yarn colors to share!

Before you panic for me, after reading all my recent “unfinished project audit related posts”, I just wanted to remind you that the audit only focused on sewing projects. As I mainly work on knitting and crochet projects while I am in the car riding as a passenger (see post What’s On the “Design Carpet”) or occasionally when watching television in the evening in the living room, I don’t stress about them as “unfinished projects”. Also I have the attitude on nearly all knitting/crochet projects: “I’ll finish it whenever I finish it, it is busywork”.

Yes I am not that serious knitter or crocheter, but I do love it.

And as far as knitting, I mainly knit hats, and some of you know – I’ve only knitted the same one hat pattern (since like 2013 or so)!

But a wonderful friend sent me a “get well” surprise a couple weeks ago, as I recover from my broken ankle and subsequent surgery (see post A Little Bit of Magic from the Universe? ) that contained a kit to knit a hat with a DIFFERENT PATTERN!

(Look of terror and panic…no I am okay now, ha!)

So I’ve opened the kit and looked inside, checked out the requirements (I needed to pick up a couple circular knitting needle sizes I did not have as well as a different size of double pointed needles that I did not have) and here is everything to get the hat going:

And talk about “yarn porn”, look at this delicious collection of 21 yarn “mini hanks” (what a cute name for these little bits of yarn yumminess):

Mmmmm mmm mmm! I’ve seen these little hanks (or perhaps “baby skeins”) of yarn in other knitters blog posts and I was envious. Well now I have my own set – ha!

So I guess I need to start casting on the stitches and make the hat. Wow does it have a lot of color changes! Wish me luck (panic and terror starting to set in again…).

The good thing is the pattern is easy to follow, I’ll just have to get comfortable with the 20 yarn changes after I cast on the dark gray color which is the base.

I do have a super sweet project bag to keep everything in: the same friend years ago made me this awesome project bag:

She brilliantly figured out how to make it from an image she saw on Pinterest!

Oh while I was pulling everything out on the coffee table in the living room, Mike the Miniature Schnauzer was being cute while nesting in his “natural habitat”: a crochet blanket and a quilt. So I’ll close this posts with some images of my sweet Mike captured in “the wild” 😉

He looked up at me as he knows the sound of the iPhone camera shutter clicking!

A Crafter's Life, Adventures in Paper Piecing, Independent bookstores, Knit and Crochet Away!

The Horizontal Diaries, January 30, 2023

January 30, 2023January 30, 2023 tierneycreates: a fusion of textiles and smiles

Sharing some updates and I am continuing to use “The Horizontal Diaries” as a blog post title (like I did in the recent posts The Horizontal Diaries and The Horizontal Diaries, Continued) because it semi describes my current reality.

I am doing much better as I recover from my left broken ankle and subsequent surgery to repair it (I got “screwed” and “plated”!) and all the swelling has gone down from my foot and lower leg as I behaved and spent a lot of time horizontal! My swelling went down so much (foot/leg returned to normal) that my splint/cast has gotten sort of loose. Good thing I have an appointment with the surgeon tomorrow – looking forward to finding out what comes next…and when will I be ready to compete in the Olympic Gymnastic Trials?!??

I’ve been knitting non stop (just like you suggested @mariss/fabrications) and I am nearly done with the replacement hat for the one I lost during my trip to Ireland in October 2022. I am at the point of decreasing the stitches for the top of hat (soon it will be time for my favorite part of hat knitting – the double pointed needles). I think I will get it done today – yay!

Perhaps with the leftover yarn, that I harvested from the matching scarf I never wore, I can make a second hat…or perhaps a small (quite small) scarf – ha!

I mentioned in the previous “Horizontal Diaries” post that I was working on an irritating English Paper Piecing (EPP) Project. It’s the one I’ve been working on for years (feels like I’ve been working on it for decades). Here’s what inspired the project – the first issue of Quiltfolk magazine:

I need to make 99 hexie rosettes (each rosette is composed of 7 EPP hexies), and I am happy to report I now have 75 done (I’m going to actually “do math” now and report that I only have 24 more hexies to make)! I’ve been working on the rosettes while horizontal, they are a fabulous (if not tedious) hand sewing project:

I’ve made more in the past week than I’ve made in the past 6 months! 24 more and I can start to think about the fabrics to set the blocks in – each rosette is appliquéd to a square of fabric (but I will probably use my sewing machine to do that so it isn’t actually DECADES before I finish the quilt – ha!)

It’s interested to see how my EPP hexie assembly progressed from when I began the project is 2016 (gasp). My first EPP hexies were basted with thread to keep the piecing in place:

Then I learned from a friend that I could baste with fabric glue stick instead which saved a lot of time!

I think I’ve struggled with completing this project because the late “Terry the Quilting Husband” punched out many of the hexies for me as well did a lot of the glue basting of the hexies (he was like a master at it after a while!) for me. I would say he helped me make 60% or more of the hexies for this project. I’ve finished after he passed in December 2018 other projects he started such as The Last Baskets , The Last Quilt and The Ball of Yarn (which eventually became a hat) , but for some reason this one was dragging on.

But 2023 is a YEAR OF FINISHES (I might write a separate post about that later) and this project is on the list to be finished!

To get out of the house the other day, John took me on an errand with him and then took me (and my knee scooter) to the Tattered Cover Bookstore in Littleton, CO (near where his errand was). I love independent bookstores and I had a brief but wonderful wander is this old bookstore in knee scooter!

I wonder if they have a music night where someone plays the piano in the center of the bookstore. If I wasn’t injured and needing to return home to my “horizontalness”, I would have grabbed a stack of books and nestled in one of the chairs. This bookstore has a large collection of both new and used books.

I did pick up two cool new stickers for my older laptop (my newer laptop is fully covered with stickers now) at the Tattered Cover Bookstore:

Well that is this installment of “The Horizontal Diaries”, thanks for reading!

Knit and Crochet Away!, tierneytravels

Another knitted hat complete

November 18, 2022 tierneycreates: a fusion of textiles and smiles

Knitter blogging friends: Prepare to be underwhelmed.

Non-knitter blogging friends: Oh wow look I knitted another hat 😉

I follow several amazing knitters who are busy making complex colorwork knitted hats, socks in their sleep, shawls with fancy lace designs, and tiny Aran cabled sweaters. And I have made ANOTHER simple knitted hat with the same pattern I’ve been using since the early 2010s.

But it’s another hat (option to wear) and its DONE!

Before my trip to Ireland I wanted to have a knitted hat to work on during the trip (a very portable travel project). Here is the hat early in its creation during my train ride from Dublin to Galway:

Since returning from Ireland in October, on subsequent my recent travels (to Omaha, Nebraska, to Fayetteville, Arkansas, and to Atlanta, Georgia) I’ve been working on the hat, especially when on planes:

And last night I finally finished that hat!

Here I am wearing my new hat (which is the same as all my other hats, ha!):

Oh and here is a follow up from my post earlier in the week Cute and Curious Kitty Quilt Trunk Show – I got the quilt that my friend J gave me while I will in Fayetteville, AR, on the wall yesterday.

I am so honored to have one of her mother’s quilts hanging in my home, I put it in the downstairs guest room:

It goes with the beach-y/nautical theme in the rest of the guest room as when you think of Colorado (hint: landlocked state), you definitely think of the ocean – ha!

Her mother hand quilted the quilt and I am amazed at all the work that went into that quilt!

Knit and Crochet Away!

A Hat for Me

February 12, 2022February 12, 2022 tierneycreates: a fusion of textiles and smiles

This post is a quick follow up on the post from November 2021 – The Itty-Bitty Hat and Fun Surprises in the Mail. I knitted a colorful hat which was too small for my head.

I ended up giving this hat to my friend Wendy as a gift and it fit her perfectly (she is very petite and has a petite head).

I still had leftover yarn from this hot mess of yarn (which I did roll into a ball of yarn):

So I decided to try making myself a hat with the yarn again, this time one appropriate for the size of my head and my hair. I finished the hat in January and I’ve been enjoying it!

Now it’s time to use the only hat pattern I know, to knit a hat from my partner John (who has been waiting for a hand knitted hat from me for some time…).

Knit and Crochet Away!

My First Knitted Hat

February 15, 2021February 15, 2021 tierneycreates: a fusion of textiles and smiles

I was looking through my old Google photos this morning looking for some photos for a project I’ve been invited to participate on with a school district (I will share more in a later post).

While browsing my old photos on Google (I no longer use Google, I use Amazon Photos for photo storage) I came across photos from December 2011 of the first hat I knitted!

It was a very big deal for me to learn how to knit a hat. My friend Pam in Central Oregon taught me how to knit a hat. I felt like I was a “knitting bad *ss” because I could now make my own hat!

Here are the images I found from 9+ years ago; and you will see I had braces at the time and I had just started growing my locs.

I was so proud of that hat and myself for actually knitting a hat. Eventually I learned to make hats a bit longer for the shape of my head.

Unfortunately the hat got washed and dried in the dryer (long story but it involved not taking the hat out of my pocket when I put a sweatshirt in the wash…) and it FELTED (frown). So that was the end of this hat which had become a tightly felted child hat in the dryer!

But I’ve made 11+ more hats (actually I’ve lost count) since my first hat, for myself and for family and friends. Yes the same pattern – a rolled brim hat.

In case you are interested in this very basic pattern, I did find a similar pattern online on Ravelry: Basic Roll Brim Beanie.

But warning: DO NOT LAUNDER AND PUT IN THE DRYER your completed creation!

Knit and Crochet Away!

The Hat from the Yarn from the Journey

February 26, 2020June 22, 2022 tierneycreates: a fusion of textiles and smiles

I recently finished another knitted hat with the kind of story behind it like the one I shared in my 11/11/19 post The Ball of Yarn (which eventually became a hat).

This hat is for my sister Rianna, who helped me more than I can ever put into words or thank her for during the most difficult time of my life in December 2018, after my husband suddenly died.

As I shared in the 12/23/18 post Stories from the Road, Part I, after my husband died I flew to the Eastern Coast of the U.S. (on a plane ticket my brother Raoul brought me) and my sister drove me across 4 Eastern states to see family and to attend a celebration of life for my husband with his family in Upstate New York. (My husband and I are originally from the East Coast of the U.S., both growing up in New York)

I was in a shocked daze but hanging out with my sister was a beautiful and bonding distraction. She drove me over 800 miles round-trip and on our way back from Upstate New York we stopped in a quaint town called Tarrytown, New York.

things-to-do-in-tarrytown-ny-and-sleepy-hollow-6 — wildkidswander.com

I knew at the time I needed to leave Central Oregon where I lived the past 14 years with my husband and start a new life somewhere, when I was ready, but moving to Colorado was not a fully formed idea yet. I was considering moving to New York to be closer to my siblings.

So we stopped in Tarrytown and wandered around for several hours as a break from being on the road.

While in Tarrytown we discovered the Flying Fingers Yarn Shop, and while browsing my sister brought a skein of yarn over to me and said: “Would you knit me a hat with this?”.

A little over 14 months later, I’ve finished the hat for my sister with the yarn she selected on the road trip:

I love variegated yarn and I think the pattern created by the variegations in the yarn is yummy!

My sister has curly hair (lots of it), so I made the hat a little bit wider and longer than I normally do. Here are some photos of me modeling the hat for my sister when I texted her images of the finished hat (I wanted to show her I added in extra length to the hat).

A handmade knitted hat is not enough to thank my sister for how much she was there for me during the most difficult time in my life but it is a little token of my appreciation.

When I write posts like this, though I try not to my make blog too “grief-y” these days, it reminds me how much love I have in my life from family and friends.

Postscript

“Snow Anxiety”

I’ve been struggling with anxiety this winter, especially when we have heavy snows in the Denver metropolitan area where I now live.

Likely this is related to the worse winter of my life in early 2019 (after the worse Christmas season in my life when my husband died 12 days before Christmas).

There were constant major snowstorms in Central Oregon in January and February 2019 and I was constantly shoving feet of snow just to get out of my driveway.

Previously, my awesome husband always handled snow shoveling (occasionally I would help and we would “team shovel”) and suddenly after his death, I now had to constantly do it on my own (while sobbing uncontrollably in my grief).

This continued until I finally admitted to close friends my struggles and my wonderful friend Jason once he found out what I was doing, brought his snowblower over and told me no matter what, I was not to shovel snow anymore! He drove across town daily if needed to my house to take care of the snow removal (we had an endless dump of snow daily for a while in Central Oregon in winter 2019)!

I think when heavy snow hit the Denver area in January and February 2020 it brought back those awful grief memories and it manifested itself in “Snow Anxiety”.

No worries, I am working with my healthcare provider on this anxiety issue. Living at 5280+ feet above sea level, in the Rocky Mountains, there is going to be snow. So unless I am planning to move somewhere tropical I need to resolve my “Snow Anxiety” issue.

One thing that is helping with my anxiety is knitting and quilting projects!

This morning over breakfast I was reading an article in a crafting magazine discussing the mental health benefits of handwork and came across the most wonderful quote from Anne Lamott that I will close this post with:

Almost everything will work again if you unplug it for a few minutes, including you. – Anne Lamott

Knit and Crochet Away!

The Ball of Yarn (which eventually became a hat)

November 11, 2019June 22, 2022 tierneycreates: a fusion of textiles and smiles

Did you ever need or want to finish a craft project but the project itself had a great emotional weight?

Such is the case with a ball of variegated turquoise yarn in my yarn stash.

Last year near this time I was on a trip with friends to Santa Fe, New Mexico (see posts Santa Fe in Black and White and Creative Inspiration: Georgia O’Keeffe Museum). Sante Fe has many wonderful shops and we did a little winter hat shopping in the shops for my friend Michele who was looking for the perfect turquoise hat to compliment her turquoise winter coat.

After trying on several hats in several shops that did not work, I offered to knit her a hat using turquoise yarn.

When I returned to my home in Central Oregon, my late husband Terry and I went shopping for the perfect yarn and we found it – variegated turquoise yarn.

Terry was taking a break from making quilts and was just enjoying being my “crafting assistant” so he rolled the skein of yarn into a ball to make my hat knitting easier.

This was one of the last crafting things he worked on before he unexpectedly and suddenly died on 12/13/18.

So I had this ball of yarn, that he had wound into a ball.

I could barely touch it much less even think of knitting that hat.

However, as I’ve discovered during my first year journey of widowhood: crafting and making things are good for your spirit. Sometimes it seems like doing something with my hands is healing to my heart.

I began working on the hat in late Winter 2019 as I prepared for my move to Colorado (see series of posts Colorado Bound) to begin a new life adventure.

But it was difficult to work on and I put it away. Every time I picked up the ball of yarn I could picture Terry sitting on the sofa across from me rolling the ball of yarn, watching a TV show with me, and laughing. Some days I still cannot believe my beautiful life with him suddenly ended.

In early October on an unexpectedly snowy day in Denver, I realized that “Winter is Coming” and if my friend Michele was to have that turquoise hat for this winter, I needed to work on it.

And so I did.

Here is my favorite part of knitting a hat – when you switch to the double pointed needles:

Here is the completed hat:

And here is my lovely friend Michele in her new hat (which I gave her this weekend):

I feel very peaceful after completing the hat. Terry was also a friend of Michele’s and he would be very pleased to see the hat completed. His work rolling the ball of yarn was not wasted!

Postscript

To close out this post, here is another inspirational sign from the collection of signs sprinkled about the restaurant I mentioned in yesterday’s post’s Postscript section:

Creative Inspiration

Creative Inspiration: Autumn in Central Oregon

October 11, 2017October 29, 2018 tierneycreates: a fusion of textiles and smiles

Monday I went on a field trip to the Wintercreek Nursery with my friend Jenny. The Nursery was filled with glorious examples of the beauty of Autumn in Central Oregon.

I thought I would post a couple of those photos as part of my ongoing series of posts on sources of Creative Inspiration. I think these photo compositions could be inspiration for an interesting art quilt. Feel free to use them for inspiration and if you repost the photos, please credit me as the photographer, thanks.

Here is my absolute favorite of the photos I took:

And here is a tiny little house that I think was covering some plumbing that looked like a real house tucked away in forest growth:

Finally here are a couple photos of Autumn at my house in Central Oregon:

We have a lot of reds, yellows, yellow-greens and greens. We do not have the purples of the Autumn in Vermont (when I lived in New York we used to drive to Vermont in the Fall to see the exquisitely beautiful palette of colors) but I think Autumn is an exceptionally lovely time of year with the Fall colors and the backdrop of an impossibly blue Central Oregon Autumn sky!

Thanks for reading my photo essay of Autumn in Central Oregon!

One of the “non-Wordpress” blogs I love to follow is that of a fellow Central Oregon SAQA member, Kristin Shields. On her blog Kristin Shields: Artist & Quiltmaker, she has a visually beautiful post on Fall Color – October Color.

Postscript

I’ve made quite a bit of progress on the table runners I am working on (see recent posts) and will sharing a peek in a future post.

Now that the weather has changed (it has dipped into the 60s and 50s during the day and 20s – 30s at night!) it is time to start making knitted hats again in the evenings while watching TV.

I love to wear my knitted hats (yes I only know one pattern) on brisk Fall and Winter walks!

As I mentioned in the post Not Working On What I am Supposed to be Working On, I love to wear my nearly finished hat around the house with the double pointed needles sticking out of the top, as a tradition right before I finished off the hat.

So here is another silly picture of me with my nearly finished hat!

Terry the Quilting Husband puts up with me weirdness!

Oh and here is the full image of the featured photo – I would like to find fabric in this color:

A Crafter's Life, Knit and Crochet Away!

Not working on what I’m supposed to be working on

January 7, 2017August 16, 2020 tierneycreates: a fusion of textiles and smiles

My Intentions

Well here’s what I’m supposed to be working on today:

Reality

Here’s what I’m actually working on today:

It’s so cold and snowy today all I want to do is sit around under a quilt and knit.

I am almost to my favorite part of knitting a hat – switching to the double pointed needles. I love finishing off the top part of a hat – it’s kind of challenging but fun! (Plus I like being silly and walking around the house with my nearly completed hat and double pointed needles sticking out of the top – ha!)

Well back to watching the snow fall outside my front window…

❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️

Postscript

Reminder – Sassy the Highly Opinionated Miniature Schnauzer now has her own blog schnauzersnips.wordpress.com.

You can sign up to follow her blog at schnauzersnips.wordpress.com/blog/

Knit and Crochet Away!, tierneycreates

Knitting!

October 6, 2016June 22, 2022 tierneycreates: a fusion of textiles and smiles

And now for something completely different… – Monty Python’s Flying Circus

Let’s take a break from quilting and sewing and talk about KNITTING!

I have always wanted to learn to knit, I thought it was magical. My grandmother taught me how to crochet and crocheting is cool but there was something more austere and glamorous about knitting, not quite sure how to put it into words. Maybe it was because I did not know how to do it and it seemed so difficult that made it so ethereal…

15 years ago a I learned how to knit but I only learned how to make knitted scarves, I was scared to try anything beyond a scarf. After learning how to knit I became completely enamored with wool yarns. As a crocheter I had made numerous afghans with inexpensive acrylic blend yarns. I could not imagine buying expensive yarn for crocheting.

One of my first exposures to “high-end” yarns was at a yarn shop in British Columbia on a trip to Victoria. When we lived in Seattle, WA, Canada was not that far away and we would frequently go to Vancouver, BC. Every couple of years we would take the ferry from Northern Washington State to Victoria, BC for the weekend.

One trip to Victoria, we stopped at the Beehive Wool Shop. My first time to a yarn speciality shop, I was overwhelmed – so many colors and textures, and yarn options, and patterns, and, and, and (I nearly get short of breath and dizzy just thinking of that first experience).

They were so friendly and welcoming at the Beehive Wool Shop, especially when I told them I was a new knitter. It was as if I had joined a new family – The Knitting Family.

Displayed at the shop I saw the most beautiful scarf – a ribbed knit scarf made with this beautiful burnt orange yarn (I seem to have always had a thing for orange, see my posts Embracing Orange and Orange). I figured this scarf was way too advanced for me – I had only mastered straight knitting and straight purling, no combinations!

The kind and very encouraging shopkeeper at the Beehive Wool Shop told me that I could do it, found me the yarn, then gave me an impromptu lesson on how to create ribbing. She also wrote down the simple pattern for me.

Here is the completed scarf – it is my most favorite scarf of all time (and I made it – yay)!

Having conquered a semi difficult scarf, I set my dreams on someday knitting my own cap/hat.

Then 9 years later, while living in Central Oregon, my friend who is a very experienced knitter, knitted me my first handmade cap! Oh my goodness – I was so in love with this hat that his hat became my “security blanket” (remember when you were young and you had a “bankie” that you took everywhere with you?) and once the weather got slightly cold enough it was time to wear my hat!

Dec 2014 me — Me in my “security blanket”

My love for my hat grew to the point that I had to learn how to make such a hat, even if this sounded scary and beyond my reach. My friend Pam agreed to teach me how to knit a hat and she was very patient (very patient) as I made it through my first hat.

There are no photos to share of my first hat. It was wonderful to make a hat but it was rather small for my head, not sure what I was thinking.

I did not give up, the best thing after learning to do something is to try again, especially on your own, to cement your learning. I have made two more knitted hats since that time (same pattern) and I am currently working on a third. Eventually I would like one in every color of my wardrobe!

2016-10-06_13-57-05_917-2016-10-07t00_39_35-253 — My knitted hat collection (from the top): I made the olive green hat, my friend Pam made the purple variegated one, I made the blue one, the maroon one is in progress.

I may not work on it all the time but my knitting is very special to me. I like to take it on trips or to events where I will just be sitting around. I carry my knitting in a special bag – one that I picked up when I went on a trip with my father (who is no longer with us) to Williamsburg, VA. This bag reminds of the fun day I had, about 18 years ago, wandering around Colonial Williamsburg with my Dad.