swaps

I participated in lfinns fat quarter swap and got three wonderful fat quarters. I only wait for the fourth one to arrive before I take a picture.
One of my swap partners was Miya. She is now hosting the Unbirthday swap at her blog and I signed up. My swap partner is Nova in Australia! I'm thrilled. I'm definitely not going to quilt for her. Her quilting is really wonderful. She doesn't have a real wish list, but tells me she likes blue... I think I can help there!

Update on quilts

Okay, I will try to catch up with what happened the last 1 1/2 years.
First there is the baby quilt I made back in the US for my god child who will be turning 2 years next month. By now the quilt already looks a little loved but the picture shows it brand new up on the wall in a small exhibition. There are some appliqued animals. The quilting shows the family animals, chess figurs for the dad, lots of books for his mom, ships for his grandpa and cooking equipment for the grandma. Also there are lots of hearts, stars and bumblebees. The brown fabric has lots of cats and dogs in it.Next is a christmas table runner I made in a quilt class here in Germany. It's the Hunter's Star pattern. The star has two different fabrics in it. On the runner you can see a German christmas tradition: The Adventskranz (Advent=the 4 weeks before christmas, Kranz=wreath). It has four candles for the four sundays before christmas. On each sunday you light one more candle, so by christmas day all the four candles are lit. It was introduced in an orphanage in the beginning of the 19th century to show the children how much longer they will have to wait for christmas to come. I love this tradition and make the wreath myself every year.

And finally we have B's baby quilt. I chose churn dashs in greens and browns. There is a 'flutterby' and a teddy bear in applique. The quilting shows lots of family related things. I tried to incorporate symbols for all the grandparents and great-grandparents. There are animals (dachhounds, horses,...), physical and mathematical symbols, cars, sail boats and trains, needles and thread, the lighthouse we got married on, the Bremen town musicians and many, many other things.

Long time no blog

There is no real good excuse for not blogging more than one year...
I had to take a qualification exam in winter 07, than started a new job in summer 08 which used much of energy. But in January I switched jobs again. The most exciting, resonsible, keeping me from sleeping, knitting & quilting job I ever had: I'm a stay-at-home-mom! My son B is today 8 weeks old!
If he is okay with that; I would like to start blogging again to keep track of all the things I made for him and others.
Let's see...

Got my Saviour Socks!!!

My Sockapalooza Socks are here! My sock saviour is from the Netherlands. Bianca sent me socks of her own design: cables and a wonderful cuff. They arrived together with some autumn tea, a pencil and a little sketchbook. She also sent me a letter in German. Thank you, Bianca!
See, they look great to jeans, match my carpet and the stripes are almost similar on each sock! They have my favourite heel. See the cables and the cuff:Now, that I was not forgotten in Sockapaloza 4 I'm waiting for number 5 to appear! (Thank you, Alison!)
Until then I promise to blog more often... Since I started back to work I'm too lazy to take the time. But there are some knitting and quilting fo's I should write about.

Cats and Whiskey

First the cats:
My best friends birthday is this Saturday.
I tried the Gracie bag pattern I bought in Concord, Mass. The pattern was easier than expectected. I think there will be more bags in the future. The bag took me one afternoon.

To complete the present I added an 'Almost Free Tissue Holder' and made another shopping bag. My friend has two cats (at the moment) and two dogs. A little while ago she complained that everyone is giving her cat stuff as presents and nothing with dogs... but I could not resist to buy this fabric for her. Sorry, doggies! Maybe for christmas!

I finished the my husbands Whiskey socks: Spey Valley from Nancy Bush's book Knitting on the road: Sock Patterns for the Traveling Knitter. The yarn is Regia Stretch in a dark greyish variegated colour. I think the pattern on the cuff would show better in a solid colour.

I think my sockpal received her socks in Finland. I got a note from the database. But she hasn't blogged about her package yet.
My upstream sockpal left another comment here. She is not finished yet. So I have to wait patiently... but it's difficult!

The socks are one their way to ...

The green 'Kew' socks are on their way to my sockapalooza pal! If you get this package, you are my pal! The socks don't have to travel alone. I included a letter to my pal and some goodies: some chocolate leaves made in Bremen (matching the leaves in the sock pattern), some chocolate for my pal's kids (featuring the Bremen Town Musicians, not shown in the picture), some jelly frogs ( when it comes to frogging, a knitter needs sugar), the left over wool, the socks (of course) and if you wonder, what the red thing in the right corner might be...
It's a shopping bag, that you can fold in this little heart shaped bag. It fits in every purse. Maybe she can use it at one of her next visits to her LYS?

Back home!

Wow, it took me one month to start blogging again! And: it's not the fault of the Telekom. They needed only one week to set internet and phone sevice back up. So, it must have been my laziness...
Everything arrived fine. Even my sewing machine was no problem at the security screenings. I took it as my carry-on luggage. The security at Logan Airport were really fond of the machine and showed me the x-ray screen. Now I know what 'Mrs. Singer' looks like from the inside.

The secret socks I started for myself turned out to be no good idea... I finished 2/3 of the first sock but already used half of the skein. So far I didn't frog it, but stopped knitting. But since I am pretty sure that I will only take a photo and rip them afterwards: The pattern was Pomatomus by Cookie A.
I started a pair of Spey Valley from Sock Patterns for the travelling Knitter for my husband. He collects whisky, so they are his pattern.

That's it for today. Pictures are going to follow.