Roses in Winter and a Raspberry cape

I just finished my part of a RRlite. The theme is Roses in Winter. I found a darling dress pattern that would lend itself nicely to the fabric I chose. I had a FQ of babypoo yellow with wonderful clusters of raspberry colored roses on it. It made up very nicely and I'm quite pleased.

Since it's winter the outfit needed either a coat or cape, something to keep Dolly warm so I dug through my stash and found a really yummy piece of raspberry colored wide-wale corduroy. Normally I wouldn't use a wide-wale for a doll-I'm picky about scale to size-but it was just perfect for a cape. the wale would be too large for a coat. I lined it in pale raspberry cotton and trimmed it in a great rose trim that I had in shades of raspberry. It couldn't matched better if I dyed it myself. I finished it off with a little tassel that I made from raspberry DMC floss. the perfect finish.

Vintage crocheted buttons...or....what was I thinking??

So, one of the gals on a list I belong to got us all excited about vintage/antique crocheted buttons. I have always been a button lover. any kind, any shape, any color so I got excited. Bring 'em on! I knew I had downloaded a very old vintage crochet booklet that had crocheted buttons. It took some searching but I found it buried in my files. It's from 1912 and it's Irish Crochet. very intricate and lovely.

Now, I've been a lifelong crocheter (is that really a word?LOL) and I certainly felt up to the challenge. Well, I didn't think it would be a challenge. I just thought it would be some time spent creating very beautiful new vintage crocheted buttons.

What in the great googlymoogly was I thinking?? They're worked with very fine thread and tiny steel crochet hooks. Usually no problem. Thread crochet is my favorite. And then I started. The pattern is made of alot of old stitches like the roll stitch (now called the bullion) and clone knots(sort of a strangely formed bullion). Plus the pattern stitches are off from what we know today. not hard to figure out, but you just need to really concentrate on translating the stitches to todays terms.

It took me 2 hours to do the first one. One simple looking button. It's on the brown button above. It looks great but those roll stitches were near impossible. I took a break and made the cute little pink flower button. It's crocheted on a small (3/8inch) 4-hole shirt button. It's darling. I started another vintage one and this one is even harder. there are 16 wraps in those clone knots that circle the center of the button. those took me almost 2 hours to do just the 8 knots. Whew. I finally took a break and chatted online with a few friends. One friend directed me to some more info on heirloom buttons and I discovered that once upon a time a special hook was made for making bullion stitches. It's design was very specific to make it much easier to crochet these stitches. It figures that the hook is no longer made.....sigh..... There is a brand of hook made now that works just a bit better for these stitches and I just happen to have 3 of them.

I found them and tried them and voila!! It did work a bit better. Maybe now I might actually try to make a few more of those stinkin' buttons. They sure are pretty.....

Ode to a piece of Chocolate

Then there were the Chocolate Covered Cherries.......

.....not just any choco covered cherries, but THE choco covered cherries. oh yes, you know what I'm talking about.........enjoy with me......

.....Deep Dark Chocolate Cover Cherries that have the juice in the center with the cherry-not that yukky thick filling stuff. Ohhhhhhh to make a teeeenytiny nick in the bottom edge and suck the juice out first. Then that next oh so delicate bite to remove the cherry with just the smallest bit of the dark chocolate that comes away with it only to be followed by the last bite of this confection-letting that oh so delectible, deep, bittersweet, dark chocolate slowly and very very delicately melt in your mouth with the hint of the cherry that had been so sweetly enveloped in it only a few moments ago........are you drooling yet???

Pink Flamingos

Here's the Pink Flamingo I made this afternoon. This is Claudia dressed in her Alice in Wonderland outfit I made. I even crocheted little red and white striped socks for this outfit. I just love this one. The pink flamingo is just the right size for her don't you think? I sure do..

Our grandson is over for a sleepover so we're going to play some games and have a special seafood dinner. Grandkids are so special!

where does the time go?

ok, so i forgot about my blog. well, not really, just didn't get around to it. I don't know why. I guess it just got away from me. this year should be better. at least I'll try......

I've gotten back to my sewing. I had surgery on both hands and they're healing pretty good. the right hand is doing really good. just some strength issues and the dam elbow problem. the left hand is going to take longer, but hey. it's so much better already I"m super duper happy!!! hurry for a great surgeon!

I knitted a lovely ski suit for my new mocha colored Bleutte. I used the new 'Spa' yarn-it's a bamboo yarn. so soft and lovely--ooh. I also crocheted her a new Christmas stocking.

Now I'm crocheting 14 sets of bleuette sized fingerless gloves for a Valentines project. A group of us are all making little Valentines things to share. They're coming out so cute!

Yesterday I made a fur coat, hat and muff for my Ginny. We had to go to a doll club meeting today and it's just too cold (5 degrees-frikkin burr)for her to go out without being properly dressed. I had a piece of super soft, silky fakey white fur fabric and it made an adorable set. And yes, she is wearing teenytiny little gloves that I made for her from some stretch lycra that I found in my stash. it was the smallest piece. I need to find some more of that stuff. it made awesome gloves.


I couldn't sleep this morning so at 6:30 I was up making a little pink flamingo to go with an Alice in Wonderland outfit that I bartered away. It came out so doggone cute (so did the outfit)I'm going to make another flamingo for myself. Unfortunately I forgot to take a pic before giving it today. I used an old Julie McCollough pattern from SD&A. It made a 28inch flamingo-wayway too big for what I needed so I copied the pattern at 68%. that was still too big so I copied the reduced pattern at 50%. It ended up being the perfect size! I'll post a pic of the next one I make.

Here's what it looks like outside:
we're getting more tonight-supposedly another 5-7 inches. and in this deep freeze, it's not going anywhere soon.
I'll talk to you all soon!