My creative endeavors and a fondness for old blogs + homespun crafts…

 I have been in the mood to do more journaling and blogging, actually sitting down to do so is the first (and really only) obstacle however.. so after weeks of passing thoughts about doing it, here I am. Finally.

I think this has been spurred on by a few things, one: reading an old favorite blog Omelay.com and reading my mom’s old blog Harvesthaven.blogspot.com as well as knitting + sewing with scrap yarns and making do with fabric ends. Always puts me thinking to the creativity of such bloggers.<3 i have a great fondness for scrappy colorful almost Waldorf, almost hippie, yet none of these things in style. I adore it. It isn’t what I myself wear preferring a more quiet folksy farmwife look for daily wear. However, babies in cloth diapers and joyful colorful things brings me much joy. Babies I have not (yet:) someday Lord willing) but fabric, paper, yarn, I do have! This past week has included a paint by number (which doesn’t quite fit the theme but is related in my memories of painting alongside the early blogging days<3) which has been a joy although unexpectedly tedious as well. I decided it will be my Shabbat only craft. Last Shabbat I started it in the morning and became so engrossed that except a midday nap I never left it..ops. So this Shabbat I have put it off knowing I also wanted to knit.🧶 

The first knit of the week was a hat made from scrap yarn from Azariah’s sweater I knit him 2-3 years ago. It is inspired by Zachery Fowler’s signature hunters orange cabled hat. The boys love watching him so I thought they would enjoy it. Oh yes I did manage to squeak in two hats from the 2 skeins (and some scrabbles) for Mark-Simeon and Azariah. <3 Wisdom wants me to save them for Sukkot gifts and I have decided to do that. I am also thinking about what other small gifts I could give to some of the others. We have never really tied gifts to the biblical feasts, wanting them to stay as biblical as possible. Not commercialized. But we have friends who give gifts spontaneously but with intention during Sukkot and the littles really love that. So without pressure or going overboard we are mildly incorporating that. Happily those hats used all but 2-3 yards of the orange superwash and I am so glad to have it destashed! (First photo a screenshot from Zachery Fowler’s YT channel)

Next I made a sweet little pixie hat. I used yarn spun and naturally dyed by a lifelong family friend. Her oldest and I used to play together as babies and we spent many many days and some nights camping by the lake, eating Cheeto, swiss miss, and fish we caught.<3 The yarn is a blend of Alpaca and Romney dyed with Madder and cochineal which gives a lovely bright red that depending on the lighting looks pure red, pinky or orange toned. I love it. 

And now to my current WIP… I have finally started knitting a vintage pattern, I was a bit intimidated and also just had so many other projects I wanted to knit more. Everyone always talked about how confusing old patterns were with outdated terms, inconsistent sizing etc. but I have finally cast one on. I am using scraps from my Willum’s overalls (I purposely bought enough yarn for the largest size since I didn't know which I would knit, and knew the extras would be easily used) and cast on the Fable In Cables from the Star Book NO. 220 by the American Thread company. I found the ebook on Project Gutenberg. I didn’t want to purchase a pattern right now and knew I wanted an all over cabled cardigan. I wasn’t finding what I wanted on Ravelry and this was close enough to my vision. I swapped the seed stitch for 1x1 ribbing and a cable under the arm. I altered the pattern to be worked in one piece and decreased the button band since I don’t like vertical ribbing like that. I will pick up the button bands later. The first row was a doozy until I realized after 20 minutes of knitting and unpicking the first 30 stitches, that I had missed that the knits and yarn overs were all in the same stitch.. such a simple detail I was blind too… ever since it has been simple to read my knitting and know what is next. However these small cables are a pain. I calculated about 354 cable twists just to reach the 6” mark before decreasing for sleeves..help! 

And I am trying to silence the part of my brain that says how practical and convenient a cardigan in this weight + pattern would be… i may have to knit the garden cardigan instead…I don’t know if it is less cabling but it seems like it would be. I tried to add a video of the bonnet and I think I broke blogger as it won’t allow me to add any additional photos…I will try to add them after this is published or in another post. 

Jo✨