Women on a Mission

The Once Upon a Time Bee met on Monday evening to make diaper covers/soakers for The Cloth Diaper Foundation. This group provides cloth diapering supplies to women who otherwise would probably not use cloth diapers with their children. Though the debate continues on how enviromentaly sound cloth diapering is, I, for one, believe that they are better than all the plastic, water tight, air tight disposables out there.

One of our group pre-cut almost a hundred soakers though we only completed 31 last night. We used a variety of patterned and solid color fleece. Here is a link to a site that has instructions on how to make them. There are lots of other sites out there for all sorts of cloth diapering sewing and it appears to me that all of them would make great gifts for new moms.

Here's how some of ours turned out:

Don't they just make you want to break out in song.."you put your right foot in, you put your right foot out..."

Here they are stacked up waiting for their size labels.

If you are one of those people out there will a huge stash of fleece yardage, this project is great way to recycle it into something useful for the benfit of Moms everywhere.

Time Waster

Ikea has these wonderful Swedish names for all their furniture. This site translates your first name into an Ikea name and appropriate furniture. Good for a ten second distraction after the Super Bowl.

Strip Club/Saturday Sewing

A couple of Satrudays ago a group of us met to use 2 1/2" strips to create Double Irish Chain quilts. I used a Moda Jelly roll and a bunch of white/cream scraps to create this:

I have a bunch of scraps leftover and may use them to increase the size as, at 50" x 70", it is a tad small for the dogs and myself if perchance we have a nap together.

There are a ton of patterns out there for pre-cut strips. Here is a link to a great site that has a good write-up on the different types of Irish Chain Quilts done in a traditonal way. By using the jelly roll I opted for a more scrappy look.

The Best Dog Toy - Final

The concept of a toy consisting of a cloth cover over a plastic bottle remains high on my list as a perfect toy for Alex, however, the results of my many experiments continue to be destroyed with great regularity.

To re-cap .. make a tube of fabric to go around an empty water bottle, close the top and bottom of the tube, add any embellishments you want, let dog play with toy until it disintegrates.

The following fabrics have been tried - cotton, canvas, duck cloth, pre-quilted cotton, silk dupioni ( nothing's too good for Alex!), woven wool, wool felt, hand knitting, crochet and cotton interlock knit.

In every case, before twelve hours had passed, Alex has managed to chew through all of them and got the bottle out of the fabric surrounding it.

I have given up, for now, until kevlar becomes available to the home sewer.

Until then, Alex has a bunch of empty fabric tubes that he is using to try to teach me how to play fetch.

Have a great weekend!

The Best Dog Toy - Update

I thought I had finally broken the code on what makes a great dog toy.





Fits in the mouth, makes a noise, doesn;t roll under the couch and doesn't fall apart.





The bottle toy fit in Alex's mouth, it made a crunchy noise, did not roll under the couch but it finally fell apart.





Look what I found later that day.

It took maybe a maximum of eight hours for Alex to take my creation from cute to garbage.

I still like this idea but next time I will use canvas for the exterior rather than something soft and fluffy.

I'll let you know how it turns out.

Wish me luck!

The Best Dog Toy

The magnificant Sandy sent me a link to a toy sold at Petco that looked like it would be perfect for Alex.

They are called Bottle Toys and can be seen here. Essentially they are a stuffed animal with an old water bottle as the stuffing for the body. There are a couple of problems with these toys. First of all, all the little embellishments like arms and legs are just begging to ripped off. Also, the closure is velcro, another thing Alex loves to wreck.

What's a girl to do .....except make her own version.

First I needed an empty water bottle. Being someone who does not pay for water in plastic bottles I went to my hurricane supplies and pulled out a bottle of water. After finishing off the water I discarded the screw top as something Alex would love to break into tiny pieces and swallow.

Then I found some spare furry fabric and some pretty ribbon.

For construction I sewed a long tube with one end closed. I stuffed the closed end with some fiberfill, inserted the bottle and sew up the end.

Realizing that it looked pretty pathetic I sewed a neck and drew a face on the resulting head-like thing.

After tying the ribbon around the neck I tossed it on the floor and let nature take its course.

Once Alex realized it was his toy, he has barely let it out of his sight. He even took his walk this morning with the new toy in his mouth. See his devotion.....

He had also been trying to bury it in one of the old holes the Girls dug to get at the moles in the yard.

So there you have it. A non-sqeaky toy that has kept him busy for hours without falling apart. I think I need to a few more of these are Kemora and Kelis seem to be envious of Alex's good luck.

Things I Don't Understand #7,615

Like everyone else I keep seeing ads for cheap cell phone plans.

This is what I don't understand...

If data transmissions, like texting and internet access is the cheapest form of cellular phone usage and voice transmissions the most expensive, why do we pay for data and get voice almost free.

I don't get it.

I Thought I Was Safe.....

from fabric lust, at least for a few months.

After all I picked up about 25 yards at the latest fabric sale I attended and a dear friend gave me another ten yards of fabulous cottons for Christmas.

How could I possibly want more fabric?

Then I saw a post in Vogue.com about a new line of fabric being sponsored by the Victoria and Albert Museum. The first collection, produced by Liberty Art Fabrics for the museum, are based on fabrics in a quilt made in 1829 to celebrate Wellington's victory at Vittoria.

If you are interested, and I know I am, you can pre-order the fabrics at the V and A Shop for $5.64 (approx.) a fat quarter . Yardage is also available.

I will now struggle to keep my credit card in the wallet.

I don't need more fabric.

I don't need more fabric.

I really don't need more fabric.

Where's that website again?

Puppy Tales

Alex and the Girls have been driving me a little nutty over the past week or so. For your consideration I present the following tales.

Scenario One

Next to my bed is a chest of drawers. I keep several items I might need during the night in the second drawer that I keep open at night. Things like sleeping pills, asthma inhalers, handkerchiefs, cough drops and lip balm are all in a little open basket waiting to be used if needed.

Alex has decided that this is where I keep my toys and has started to steal things from it and bury them in the back yard.

I didn't realize he was doing this until the other day when I went to grab some lip balm and it wasn't in the basket. I then noticed that I was down to only one inhaler, no sleeping pills, no cough drops and only one handkerchief! After following him around outside I found all the missing items in a little cache he made for himself in a corner the yard.

No more open drawer.

"You mean you don't want this rope shredded?"

Scenario Two



My 'office' is in one of the spare bedrooms. Alex and the Girls used to drive me crazy competing with each other to sit in my lap while I work on the computer. I solved this by placing a board across the entrance to the room... short enough that I can step over it and tall enough that they can't jump over it.



Now they have decided that they can have wrestling matches outside the door while I work. I finally had had enough of all the growling, barking and running around and stepped out to lecture them on their poor behavior. All three sat down to listen to my lecture. Once I stopped they started up again. At that point I grabbed the spray bottle filled with water that I have used in the past to discipline them. All three sat again and looked at me expectantly.



Alex sat wagging his tail and looked earnestly looking at me as if to say..'I'll be good Momma. Really I will.' The girls just looked at me, no tail wagging and no remorse. Then Kemora started lecturing me! It sounded to me like she was saying..'You think your going to spray me you bitch? Fat chance. We can do whatever we want and you can't do anything about it!'.



I sprayed both Girls and they decided to go outside for more fun and games. Alex decided to stay and whine outside the 'office' until I could stop what I was doing and let him sit on my lap.



Need a substitute for the water bottle sprayer.

"You think this face needs discipline?"

Scenario Three

This morning I was sitting at the kitchen table deciding what to eat for breakfast when I noticed Alex and the Girls were very interested in some paper ont he floor of the living room. I couldn't see what it was but decided to leave them alone. I then noticed that I couldn't see the paper, or them, anymore so I decided to investigate.



One of them (Alex?) had grabbed the cereal box off the kitchen table, opened it, dragged out the inner bag, torn a hole in the inner bag and the three of them then proceeded to eat about half a large bag of Honey Nut Cheerios.



Gross! What was left was covered in doggy drool and dirt.



Need to buy more cereal!

"Of course I didn't do it!"

So there it is. Three Scenarios, all true, about Alex and the Girls and how they drive me crazy. If my son hadn't already given me grey hair, these guys would have done it for him.

Knitting Basics

Thursday morning I am teaching some members of the Kingwood Area Quilt Guild how to knit. Although I have gathered a lot of donated knitting needles and yarn and even made a few knitting bags, I realized that adults, unlike middle schoolers, like things in writing so I came up with the following.

Knitting 101

Basic Tools

Two sticks – normally called knitting needles but chop sticks or pencils will do in a pinch
String – also called yarn

Other Tools (in order of extravagance)

Scissors – used for cutting string

Pen and paper – for making pattern notes

Yarn Needles – for weaving in ends of string

Crochet hook – to help with fixing dropped stitches

Row Counter – neat little tool to count your rows instead of keeping track of them on paper

Markers – can be anything from a paper clip to fancy beads on an ‘O” ring to keep track of stitches

Tape measure - for checking the length and/or width of your projects

Metal Needle gauge - needed to find out the size of your needles and for establishing your gauge/tension of a swatch of knitting

Project bag – to hold your projects and tools, can be anything from a zip lock bag to a leather suitcase

Reference materials – I like ‘The Knitting Answer Book’ but there are others like ‘Knitting and Crocheting for Dummies’

Ball winder – for helping with transforming skeins to balls before knitting

Swift – holds your skein of yarn while winding (instead of using a volunteer)

Project One

Book Mark
Cast on 18 stitches
Knit eight rows
Bind off
Tie bound off yarn to yarn from cast on for a tail

Basic Skills

Cast on – Reverse Loop Cast On
Knit – Pull string towards you
Purl – Pull string away from you
Increase – Knit one in the front of the loop and one into the back of the same loop
Decrease - Knit two stitches together
Bind off – Knit two stitches, take first stitch and loop over second stitch so that only second stitch remains on your right hand needle



Internet resources

http://www.knittinghelp.com/ - I think this is the place with the best videos on different knitting skills

http://www.ravelry.com/ - an online community of knitters. I don’t go there a lot except when I am looking for a pattern. My name there is knittyalice.

http://www.youtube.com/ - just write in the search box what you need and up pops thousands of videos. Many of the videos are poorly made but there are some real gems out there.

http://www.knitpicks.com/knitting.cfm - great place to spend a lot of money on all things knitting. Excellent prices on tools and I like their self branded needles a lot.

http://elann.com/ - incredible yarns at incredibly good prices.

http://www.lionbrand.com/ - one of the best places to find free patterns from famous designers. JoAnn’s carries their yarns.

Local Stores

Twisted Yarns – On the road into Old Town Spring from I45 - http://twistedyarnstexas.com/

The Hen House – On Louetta, west of I45 - http://www.thehenhousetx.com/

Knitting in the the Loop – north of 59, east of 610, just south of Westheimer - http://www.knittingintheloop.net/index.html

Yarns 2 Ewe - south of I10, going North on Shepherd - http://www.yarns2ewe.com/

Other Resources

Knit at Night Guild – meets all over the city. Closest meeting is in Spring (Knitters North of Town = KNOT) on the fourth Thursday from 6:30 – 8:30 PM. http://www.knitatnight.org/

Yarn it! Darn it! – Sponsored by the Kingwood Branch of the Harris County Library System. Meets the third Saturday of the month from 10:00 AM – Noon.

Friday Morning Knitters – every Friday at 10:00 AM some of us meet at the Town Center Starbucks to talk and knit. Everyone is welcome to join us. Show and Tell is always welcome and advice is always available for free.

I hope the quilters enjoy learning a new skill. Some of them are such talented sewers that I think they will surpass their knitting teacher in no time at all.