Mishmash

What's been going on.....
We had another Gem Faire the weekend after the County Fair. I knew I wanted to find some silver crimp beads and found those. I also thought about adding some beads the Ishbel that is languishing in my project basket and found some pretty red ones that may still be used with it. Rachel met me there and I showed her where I found my red 6/0 beads and then she tempted me with the $1 strands of swaroski beads. I restrained myself and only bought a couple strands. Lots of lovely things to tempt, but unless I had a specific project in mind, I didn't want to spend the money. I wished afterward that I had picked up more than two of the little glass hearts, they were .25 each.  He's local so I'm sure he'll be at the next one. There's another Gem Faire in November and I may definitely have more ideas then.

There was a Spinning Bee at The Knitting Bee where an idea was hatched out further with help from friends. I'm going to tease you with that and there may be an explanation later. ;-)  After the Spinning Bee a group of us went to Goodwill to try to find sweaters to re-purpose. There was some success, but I didn't come home with a sweater. Instead I came home with some cream brocade, a wood tray and a salad bowl set - all that I can use with our SCA adventures. There's enough fabric for a dress and only $4.99, the tray was $3.99 and the set was also $3.99 (large bowl, three smaller ones and the fork/spoon). The fabric will be dyed, I'm thinking of a nice burgundy color.

Items taken to the Washington Country Fair were also entered in the Oregon State Fair, except the yarns. They have different handspun yarn rules, that I might try to compete in for next year, but not this year. Not sure if we'll actually get down for the Fair. I might have to wait until September 9th when I pick up my items to find out how they did.

I finally finished the Pre-Literate Socks that I was making for Brandon. This weekend is Shire's Defender's Tourney.  We're going down for the weekend since its at Willamette Mission State Park.  He'll try out the socks with his boots at the event. I have a snood (thumbnail in the sidebar) started that I'm going to bust a stitch to get done so I can use for the weekend.  Here's the socks:

Leeloo turned six months old and a couple days later had her spay surgery. I've spent this week trying to keep her from running around and overexerting herself per the vet's orders. She was on board for this idea the first couple of days but the last few she thinks I'm a terrible person for not letting her run and play the way she wants to. Her spay was done a few weeks earlier than I had planned because she had three baby canine teeth that hadn't fallen out and weren't acting loose. One was coming inside towards the palate and would affect her bite so why there was a push to get it out before it started to fully touch the top. The night before her surgery she was really mouthy and must have been when she lost one of her baby canines because when I picked her up they had only removed two. She now weighs six pounds. 

At spinning I took advantage of the Grange's long table to cut out another surcote from the the one that Brandon had cut out for me out of muslin. The cream muslin will need to be dyed tonight, but I have it sewn except for the hem. I'll sew up the second surcote tonight after deciding if I do the center gores. I have chocolate zucchini bread made up from garden zucchini that we'll take along. Brandon will be making up some of the family recipe of beans for the Friday night potluck. I'm trying to figure out a way to reheat stuffed pasta shells or if its too much of a hassle. My fall back idea is to take chicken curry. I get lunch with the family on Saturday. My stepmother turns 70 and my brother-in-law turns 40 this month so there's a family get together in Salem. I'll just leave the event for a couple of hours to participate. We'll do oatmeal for one breakfast and I think I'll try to get some blueberry (fresh from our garden) scones to take too.

ETA: If you like babies, check out this blog where the mom has been posing her baby while she naps.