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Yarn-along: yak yarn and clubs for the kids …
~ Two of my favorite things are knitting and reading, and the evidence of this often shows up in my photographs. I love seeing what other people are knitting and reading as well. So, what are you knitting or crocheting right now? What are you reading? Take a photo and share it either on your blog or on Flickr. Leave a link below to share your photo with the rest of us! ~ Ginny at small things
Yarn-along: August 3, 2011
With school just weeks away, most of the reading around here has been kids reading on their own while I buzz around, organizing and planning and going to meetings and rehearsals (we’re headed into tech-week with Oklahoma!). HotRod has discovered the Jack Stalwart series and is now running around pretending to be a kid-secret-agent! Kit is working her way through the Dear America series … while HamBone is devouring the Knights of the Silver Dragon series. I’ve been drooling a book recommended by Elizabeth Foss: Stitch by Stich … this is literally the FIRST of the new crop of how-to-sew books that doesn’t have any negative reviews (many of the them have errors in the pattern pages, are missing pieces, or just plain have horribly confusing directions). The book includes a CD-rom for downloading patterns to print, size information and other tips and techniques that require a visual medium. AND, it’s got an internal spiral-binding so it lays flat but the spiral is protected. Love it! I will be using this book with all three of mine so they can all learn how to sew simple projects (we’ll tweak some of the items a bit … but you get the idea).
While they’re reading … I’ve been organizing two enrichment groups for the coming year:
- St. Brigid of Ireland’s Literary and Crafting Society — a group for girls from 10-14. We’ll be reading a novel every 4-6 weeks, working on era-appropriate crafts (or crafts inspired by the novel) and finishing off with an era-appropriate tea. The books we’re planning to read are: Jane Austen’s Northanger Abbey, Louisa May Alcott’s An Old-Fashioned Girl, (for our Christmas meeting, we’ll read the stories in either Elizabeth Goudge’s A Christmas Book or Alcott’s The Quiet Little Women), Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Little Town on the Prairie, Lucy Maud Montgomery’s Anne of the Island, Maud Hart Lovelace’s Betsy and the Great World, and, if there’s time, we’ll read either Rumer Godden’s China Court or Willa Cather’s My Anotonia or Shadows on the Rock.
- Blessed Pier Giorgio Frassati Boys’ Club — a group for boys ages 6-10. We’ll be learning all about boy life skills: hand-sewing (and making a personal sewing kit), pocket knives and whittling/carving, campfire cooking, nature journaling (including making a personal journal, sewing a “journaling kit” to keep with us, a bit of nature drawing), learning knots, some first aid (including making a first aid kit), orienteering and using a compass, and ending with constellations and the night sky. I’m using Alice Cantrell’s wonderful book Tin Cups and Tinder as well as the Dangerous Book for Boys, Field and Forest Handy Book, and the American Boy’s Handy Book.
Should be great fun, no?
close-up of yak/bamboo shawl
On my knitting needles, I’ve got the shawl I mentioned last week. The shawl will have cuffs on either end to keep it on my arms so I don’t have to fuss with it … a very good idea, no?
I started the k2p2 cuffs on #3 dpns and then increased significantly while also switching to a #9 needle, for the lace portion. The lace is a relatively easy-to-memorize diamond lace pattern … when blocked you’ll really see the angularity of the pattern. I’m lovin’ using Shokay’s yak yarn — the stitch definition is great and the yarn has a good spin to it so it doesn’t split. The Dusk is a rich, dusty blue that will look great with just about anything from jeans to evening wear!
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