Orange dress turned into a shirt

My 7 year old is very small in the shoulders and she wanted the dress turned into a shirt (pattern on Ravelry) & (etsy) for 3.75 US Dollars. I actually finished it today and she is out skipping around finding grasshoppers outside in it to feed to her praying-mantis. If you want the pattern it is available on etsy and ravelry. If you get the pattern and you find mistakes let me know and I will fix them and send you a new copy

Just so you know all these photos in this post are natural light. The bottom two we are standing by our front door and the light is shinning on my daughter from the side windows next to the door. It looks like I put a spot light on her but I didn't.

Repairs on second afghan done

The second afghan is all done with its repairs. This one was harder to match threads to as I said before it was a strange size of thread. Also this one had a strange color to the thread kind of a gray blue patina. Not sure what it had been washed in, in the past probably liquid blueing which tends to make colors a little weird after ward. This one was washed about 10 times trying to get it clean. Had some weird yellowish stains on it and a few weird orangeish stains. Very pale ones but very annoying to try and get rid of.

Romanian Lace a few links

I noticed that I had a few hits from a specific French site this morning so I thought I would check it out. Every now and again I do that. This site has a person working through Romanian point lace. I have a tutorial how to make the cord but I don't have one up yet what to do with the cord. She is working through her project and posting it isn't a how to but it might show you enough for you to get it your self.

• In French
• google translation
• Alta Vista's bable fish Bad English translation

And a few other Romanian lace links

• macrema a crochet

New repair Project

This project actually traveled all the way from Illinois for me to fix it. The owners are staying in Provo for the summer and had been trying to find someone to fix it for them.

It is an interesting size of thread for something so old. It looks to be size 5 very odd indeed as most things this age are in size 20 or 30. Size 5 is some thing more from the 1960's so it is perplexing to me.

Enclosed in this post are just a few of the damaged spots on this afghan there are many more than I am showing but once again that would be to many photos to post. I tried to take two photos with out holes which are the top two in this post

Pink Hat for infant

This is a hat I was playing around with making today. It is a little hat for a little girl the widest part measures 18 1/2 inches around my tape measure slipped when I was taking the photo so it looks like 18 1/4 in the photo. The hat is made of a synthetic yarn.

The seventeen flowers are all double sided satins and organza. With a few white bead accents. There is an organza ribbon going around the hat with a bouquet of flowers on one side with their stems steaming around the hat.

Colors Galore Eye Candy

The above threads are all new as of yesterday to me. But they are all old silk button hole threads most are on wood spools but not all.

Above my storage boxes for normal threads.

I returned the afghan I repaired to its owner yesterday. She loved the repair job. I did show her that the repairs are still visible if you look for them. But in general repairs don't show if you are just glancing at a piece which is what most people tend to do. She asked if I would like some thread she had received and some silk fabrics and a hide (I believe she got all from her grandmother). The threads are silk button hole thread and others too. I didn't have my camera yesterday to take a picture and I had already stored them with my other threads by the time my husband got home with the camera. I just decided I would show the old and new threads together. You can just enjoy all the colors.

Below are my old threads mixed with the new (vintage) threads from yesterday. I guess I have a collection of threads. But it is always nice to just be able to grab the correct threads with out having to go to the store to find the right color. Some are cotton, poly, some a mixture of cotton and poly, mono-filaments, stretch threads, and nylons .... just a wide variety. Lots are on wood spools. I keep the wood spools in time I hope to carve on them.

This is the fabrics she gave me. She also got the Irish crochet tam I made a few weeks ago. I am glad as she likes hat and wears them a lot she said. So since it was something I debated on keeping or selling I am glad it went to a person who loves hats and will use it.

Blue oriental silk over 6 yards.

Cream acetate rayon blend looks like raw silks not sure how many yards but I think it is over 16 yards.

Jacquard cream and green 16 yards.

This is the calf hide she gave me too. In time I will use this for the cover of some hand made books.

An interesting turn on English Paper Piecing

Have you seen this tutorial. I think it is such a nice new concept on EPP. Sort of like a yoyo quilt or Cathedral windows in that as you add the pieces to the quilt you are done with that piece don't have to go back, and you quilt as you go so thatis already done too. Wish I had thought of it but it does open up ideas for me. I will have to try this in the future. Here is a goggle translation into english. This tutorial was found through a link I saw on this blog.

Part 4: Repairing crochet how to

Decided I needed one more post as I finished the repair job on Saturday. After working with the afghan in repairing it, a decision was made that this afghan will not do well with a washing the swelling and movement of the fibers and the weight even basted to a sheet would be to much for it. So there are some stains it had that I wasn't going to remove. The owner was going to try and wash them out after a discussion it was decided I would crochet them out. This afghan should live the rest of its life on a quilt rack being pretty but not being used as a blanket.

Someones previous attempt at a repair with needle and thread. Do not repair this way it is more damage to the piece as it splits threads and you have to cut out more of the afghan to do a repair that doesn't do this type of damage or bulk.

After previous repair was removed but not filled in yet.

What looks like a chocolate stain forgot to take a picture before I started to remove it.

All the stain removed.

Crocheting back in because this stain went all the way to the edge of the block no weave in required but lots of adding of thread. You add thread the way you would change a color in the last yarn over of the previous stitch. Also you do a slip stitch into the next stitch when finishing a thread off. You know basic crochet stuff there but just in case someone has that question.

1 round

3 rounds some how I missed a photo of round 2. Oh well.

4 rounds

5th round and joining to other block.

All back in just need to weave in tails.

2 orange stains have no idea what they are on back side of afghan.

Removed from afghan back side view.

Repaired front side view, this is a dirty part of the afghan so the repair is actually a little whiter than what is around it.

There are lots more previous repairs and holes I am not showing but that would be way to many photos I think you get the idea of it all.

The things one learns when working on repairs. I can tell someone tried to repair this before with a needle and thread and lots of knots not what I would recommend doing to an heirloom. Also this was a very used blanket. The person who had it first used it all the time and they got in and out of their bed on the right side of the afghan (when standing at the foot of the bed looking at it, left side if you are laying in bed looking at the ceiling) they sat on the blanket a lot, lots of wear on the middle and that one edge. They didn't fold it down at night to save it but pulled it up over them selves as all the damaged is at the head end of the afghan and the right side. Also the person who made it stopped for a long time and went back to working on it and forgot what size hook they had been using because there are two rows that have a bigger stitches and the roses are a different size than all the rest. Found out they ran out of green because there are two different greens in the afghan not nicely spaced all clumped together. Funny the things you learn when actually examining a piece of work this big. Also found out the original crochet was not found of finishing threads in a secure way as most have worked themselves out. I do not recommend just crocheting over thread ends weave some of them backwards it makes them stronger.

All done photos.

15 hours of repairs

Now I have another repair to pick up Tuesday in Provo and drop this one off Tuesday in American Fork)

Tutorials on this repair

Intro
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4 this post