June 2023 Chatter

Hello all. @Char I hope it was okay to open up a new chat for this month. Hope you are having a wonderful family weekend.

In the United States, June is such a transitional month. Schools are ending, seasonal chores must be done and travel plans are being made for summer outings, or for summer jobs. We are switching weather patterns as well. Some of us are getting ready for scorching heat, others are getting ready for flash floods and tornado’s.

Somewhere in all of that business we all find time to craft. What are you planning on working on this year?

I am organizing my crafting goals for the next three months. I have Wips to work on, sewing to get finished, and a crafting area to organized. At the moment it is a very loosely organized list of goals.

Honestly, I will make my list, put a mark by what I think is most important and then relax. That list is there to help me organize my summer…but it is not there to control my summer.

What about you all? Will you make a list? If yes, what is going on your list?
If you aren’t a list maker do you have a crafting goal for this summer?

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I make lists for housework and chores. Crafting I’ll just go with whatever strikes me.

The only thing I can do right
now is can cherries. The tree is loaded. Then I’m exhausted for the rest of the day.

I keep planning to start my new potholders. One of these days I’ll do it. I haven’t got the energy to walk across the house to where I keep my yarn.

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Fresh home canned cherries sounds wonderful. And…exhausting.
Honestly, the only canned cherries I have had is the store bought cherry pie filling.

I am guessing your cherries are more along the lines of canned peaches and not a pie filling…right?

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@hereami it is absolutely perfect that you started one! Thank you :slight_smile:

Generally speaking today is the last day of graduation activities. Nick’s best friends graduate today then dinner after.

Tomorrow starts summer school for the boys (one college one high school). Tomorrow also starts a special summer camp for my high schooler at the university. My husband had to make a summer calendar to keep track of all of the summer activities. We were trying to figure out a time for a vacation and there just is no time between summer school, robotics, training, internships oh my! Our next retreat in Illinois is the last weekend in July. I’ll need a weekend get away by then!

Oh and my youngest brother’s wedding. Can’t forget that one, complete with a quilt to start and finish by then.

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I am doing OliveKnits’ four day KAL again
Lemon spritz
I just got the yarn for it. I chose Fibre co Luma, one of my LYS’s recommended yarns.
Design can be knitted over the “long weekend” of July 4th if you want to be intense. Casting on 6/30

Little plug for my LYS which is listed as a participant: knit whit’s of Baileys Harbor WI

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I’ve stopped making lists, I just get disheartened when I look at them and see all the things I didn’t get around to doing. I know I’m going to do another Pokemon, and something for the mystery CAL, but apart from that I’m going to be working on some stuff for a stall our craft group is having at a Christmas fair - we can take turns manning it and because we have different takes on crafting there will be a big variety of things for sale. My friend Lynn is making knitted fingerless gloves, and so far I’ve made two crochet lace angels, some crochet gift tags and a mini gnome.

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@Lemming13 I love your summer crafting plans. I hope the craft stall is successful.

@Sjuly This summer sweater/shirt looks so pretty. What color will you be making it in? Do you think you will have it done in 4 days?

@Char wow…so busy. Fun busy…but still busy.

We made it out of town for a hike this week. The mountain road we chose was closed up a ways past where we stopped due to snow and road conditions. My lungs got a work out as we went up to over 3500 ft to hike. It was nice to see regrowth occurring since the devastating fire 2 years ago. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caldor_Fire

We found lots of saplings, wildflowers, at least one swallowtail butterfly and… fresh mountain lion tracks. Thankfully…the mountain lion was not interested in us or our lunch.

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They are sourcherries. Generally I add them to greek yogurt.

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So much fun!

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Did something to my foot. No clue what or how. I can barely walk on it. Sometimes it goes away and then it returns. Sigh.

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I am replying to @MBearMakes and @Hellokitten 's discussion in the May thread about kids leaving home.

I got married and moved 1000 miles away from home when I was 18 back in the mid-1990s. My wonderful mother always called me because as poor students, we couldn’t afford the long-distance charges. But my poor dad was stuck with an INSANE phone bill because of it, but he wasn’t about to tell either of us we couldn’t talk to each other. :joy: Fortunately, as soon as I found out I was expecting my first baby I moved back closer to home.

I don’t have an empty nest yet, but my oldest moved out about 18 months ago and I am still adjusting to him being gone, :cry: but my youngest is still with me.

Actually, I DO have an empty nest, it just isn’t my nest, it is our Mama Hummingbird’s! On Saturday, my brother saw that there was only 1 baby in the nest, and since it was exactly 21 days since the first egg hatched, he left just when he was supposed to. We got a decent shot of him testing his wings on the camera my brother mounted.


So we just had one hummer nestling left, but Mama was still hanging out in the tree directly in front of the nest and yelling at us.

When I went outside yesterday to check whether our second nestling was still there, there was a bird in the nest, but the moment I stepped all the way out the door, she flew off too! I’m not positive whether the bird I saw was the second nestling taking flight, the first nestling visiting home, or Mama checking out her now-empty nest. But either way, the nest is now empty! I got some pictures of the nest, now that I can get close to it without an angry hummingbird pecking me in the head. But I am a little sad that they are gone and will miss Mama twittering in my face every time I try to use my front door. :cry:



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Has anyone made the 10-stitch Star Blanket? A friend needs one for a play she is doing next school year (she is the theater teacher) and I don’t want to say I can do it if it is more complex than it looks on quick judgment and someone can verify that it actually comes out looking like a star and not a circle or hexagon. I’ve had the pattern for years but never made it.

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I looked at some finished projects and they all look like stars to me. Also though I haven’t done this pattern I find her patterns easy to follow.

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I’ve done a little more research and what she is going to need isn’t a blanket like she thought, but a cape. She is doing the Spongebob Squarepants musical next year and had only looked at one picture of the costume in question. I found some more pictures of the costume in the Broadway version and while I have a basic idea of how to make it, I haven’t found anyone who has actually done a knitted pattern that is similar, so I will have to design it myself. She absolutely must have it by the middle of January, though having it for rehearsals in October would be preferable, so I have plenty of time to work it out. If anyone has any suggestions or patterns you know of that are similar, lay them on me! I do know that the original pattern is crochet, which would be much easier, but I can only do a sloppy single chain in crochet and doubt I can learn it well enough to make this within 6 months. :worried:

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The transition to empty nest was difficult. As a stay at home, homeschooling mom… I lost my career and my kiddos at the same time. All of this eased because a couple still live at home. Which means I see them as they come and go about their busy schedules.

On the bright side I have more time to take those long walks and much more time to craft and plan my crafting.

@Nyssareen I will keep a look out for a knit version. His cape reminds me of an open and modified crochet granny star blanket. I was going to suggest sewing one. However, in Sponge Bob grandma crocheted with ‘love in every stitch’ didn’t she?

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It looks like the pink is done as an after the fact and tacked on…

@hereami - stitch can still mean sewing …
:joy:

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WIP Wednesday


Brioche cowl with sport weight held double.

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This is so pretty.

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Yes, my daughter will still be at home for a few years at least. But I’m glad someone gets it! It doesn’t help that I am kind of a homebody, anyway. I devoutly wish that we had been able to stay near my parents – I sort of wish that we were living in some farming community where everyone just stays around. But, not laying that on my kids, of course. You’re right, I hope to have more time to do the crafty things I love.

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Completely not crafting related… just interesting piece of information in case you need it.
Did you all know you can file an informal FCC complaint?

I did that for the first time ever today. Basically, it is a noise/interference complaint.
For a long stretch of road…from my house south at least a mile there is interference to all radio transmission. Am/fm, satellite, blue-tooth and cell phone usage. You hear what I call electrical sizzling…but there really isn’t a proper word for it.

This interference is constant in my home and down the street a ways. The interference is constant. 24/7 I had to use my cell to call emergency services a while back and they had trouble hearing me in my own drive way.

I don’t live in the country. I am not surrounded by high rise buildings.
Anyway…I put in a FCC informal complaint today. So we will see if anything happens.
Close by this road are: several government cameras along the freeway ramps, several (3-4) cell towers and a huge important government building. There are no radio stations or ham operators in this particular area. The nearest airport is 10 min away.

I will keep you informed. The noise got so overwhelming for me a while back I actually dreamed about it and told the mystery people in my dream…“I’m sorry I don’t speak morse code”. LOL Maybe that’s my hint to learn it.

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