Magic Squares!

Last week my mom taught me and Meg a new knitting pattern.

It makes squares as if by magic.

They are knit all in a line with two decreases which magically turns it into squares.

You pick up stitches to start a new square so the squares don't have to be stitched together at the end.

This technique can be found in a pamphlet called The Rambling Rows Afghan, designed by Carol Anderson and Pat Penney, published by Cottage Creations.

I'm making only the large and small squares right now--a long term project. :-) 

First Socks

My very first pair of socks.

I feel like I have about 50 thumbs getting this started.

The yarn is a Deborah Norville brand.

I am liking the turquoise. :-)

Wee Kokeshi

Meg led a workshop on painting little kokeshi.

This is mine.

I made a few different sized ones a couple of years ago.

I forgot how much fun it is--tho I needed my glasses this time.

Maple Tree Camp 2011

Camp has begun again!

Every summer the girls and I try to get together a little camp for each other.

To us this means lots of art projects, a field trip or two and lots of fun. 

We began this year with a little drawing and sketching.

We decorated our sketchbooks with stickers made from Allsorts downloads, here and here.

Thank You Jenny! :-)

Sunny Drive

Our sunny drive included picking up Em from a 4H camp overnight.

We left her looking a tad nervous,

picked her up and she was hanging off the upper bunk exchanging emails with her bunkmates.

Passed a horse farm with young colts prancing. 

Visited a Hopewell Indian Mound.

(alongside a more modern cemetery)

It was a glorious sunny day!! :-)

Camp Mail

Camp mail to be delivered.

The girls and I have been inspired  for many years by the mail that was delivered in Tasha Tudor's household.

She called it the Sparrow Post and the letters were very, very small.

There is a picture of these wee letters in the book "Tasha Tudor's Heirloom Crafts" on page 143.

Indian Doll is Done!!

Here is the final doll.

I fiddled with the carpet thread hair and cut all those fringes.

I wet the fringe with water, twisted and pulled so it would dry all wonky.

I really liked working with the chamois leather which I picked up in the auto section at a big box store.

It is normally used to dry cars off when hand washing and drying.

WIP---Indian Doll

Here are the small moccasins that I've made. The beading is tricky...really small and wiggley.

I made pretend teeth out of Fimo clay to decorate the dress.

Here they are without the staining and glossy coating that I've since added.

They are a little creepy. (but that makes me smile)

Indian Toy Doll

The girls and I have started our annual summer camp activities. This years theme is Native Americans of Ohio. We hope to visit the mound builder's sites, such as Serpent Mound and a few others. Meg and I have started making Indian dolls of chamois and Em has made a beaded leather pouch.

The three books that I am using for the doll project are "Native American Indian Toy Dolls" by Katie Newton, "Dolls & Toys of Native America" by Don & Debra McQuiston, "Rag Dolls and How to Make Them" edited by Dorothea Hall. I mixed patterns for the doll from the Rag Doll book and there is plenty of inspiration in the two Indian doll books for faces, dress decoration and so forth.

My Pot is Painted!!!

We picked up our painted pots and here is mine!! Love, love the bright colors and of course DOTS....just right for a few little paintbrushes on my desk. All three of our projects can be seen on Cookie's blog.

Painting Pottery!!

This was a grand exit for our camp. We went to a paint your own pottery place and had a ball! Em chose a little cat and Meg a huge octopus--took her forever to paint it, but it was such fun. Here are the girls in action.

Organza ribbon bracelets

The girls and I made these bracelets this morning with organza ribbon and beads. Each has a charm on the end so that the closure stays underneath the wrist when it's worn. The darn things kept rotating to show the lobster-claw closure--how pretty. :-) The girls went on to make necklaces as well.

Camp Mail

Last nights mail was the result of our message in a bottle project. It was fun thinking of mini items to go into the bottles. I wrote a mini paper, rolled it up and created a tiny plastic sleeve for it. We added beads, confetti, charms, and small stickers to the contents and decorated the outside surfaces. The "mailman" got to stamp each letter with a postmark and deliver it to each mailbox.

Camp flag

I forgot to show you the camp flag. I made it out of felt the first year of camp. We tried to make t-shirts with the logo the second year but the decal washed out. Camp wasn't as busy today. We bicycled over to a park and played and sketched for awhile and then headed home for lunch. I made some mail this afternoon and Em worked on her book. Meg took pictures and added to her blog.

Post office and mail bag--we're ready....

I'm exhausted.....been getting ready for camp all day and it is hot, hot, hot here. (not that I'm suffering too much--our air conditioning is working-thank goodness) We are all set for tomorrow.....we have some camp stamps printed and a post box painted---here is a picture of it---it's an old bread box done up by Megan. (the post office sign is done by Emily) We also got kits together for the projects we are doing and I picked up a few more beads--for a bracelet project--at the craft store on my trip to the grocery.

This is the felt Mail Bag that I stitched up over the past few days. It is regular felt-single thickness-except the strap and top flap which I doubled up. Here is a close-up of the embroidered stuff. I free-handed the stitching because the pen I have for transfers is blue ink---not very useful here. :-)

Camp Stamps

Here are the stamps that I put together on the computer for our camp post. My daughter made a template on PowerPoint and I had fun filling in each little box with clipart from Microsoft Office clips, adding backgrounds, words, etc. to make it look like postage stamps . A listing for my older daughter's blog is listed on the side here. She also made a sheet of stamps for camp and has posted it. My youngest is looking forward to her chance with the template this coming week.

Maple Tree Camp

The girls and I are getting ready for camp next week. We have had a family camp for 4 years. Just the girls and I doing camp activities and field trips. It is hard to believe that we have done it for this long, but I'm pretty sure.....

This year we are having an art camp. We are setting up a postal system so we can make faux stamps and send letters to one another during camp. We are each making a zine, Em's is a blank book that looks exactly like a Little Golden book--princesses. Mine will have to do with miniatures. Iwant to make a pretend catalog of toys for Brownies-Palmer Cox. We are going to make grosgrain ribbon bracelets. In all we have about 20 some activities, about 4 a day--some as simple as going to the playground.

One year we had a theme of fairies-a favorite and last year we did museums, which culminated in an opening of our own museum with it's own catalog. This was a lot of fun and took our minds off of living in a 2 bedroom apt. in transition from active-duty military to retirement and finding a new job. In the picture above you can see the computer boxes we used for tables. We were on cots and air mattresses, w/ lawn chairs and plastic dressers. Seems like it should have been fun but in the end a bit harrowing.

Today, I am putting together a felt mailbag and putting together blank journals for the week.