First dress ever!

dress11.jpg
Originally uploaded by eusebius24

I sewed this dress on Friday. The pattern is Simplicity 3749 and I used a cotton seersucker from Fabricland. It's a simple pattern, but it's the first dress I've ever done and the first facings I've done since junior high (much more successful, I might add). I have a Flickr set documenting the construction of the dress ... maybe it will be of some use to beginner sewers.

You know you have a blog called PianoKnits when ...

... you're playing the piano part of Schubert's "Gretchen am Spinnrade" and you start wondering how the heck anyone could knit with any fibre spun like that!! And I'm not even a spinner. Yet. (Feel free to convert me.)

Thanks to Non Sequiturville for putting me on to this great image.

Anyone for tennis?

I was very fortunate to be able to attend the Rogers Cup singles and doubles finals yesterday in Toronto. Even though I was in the Fan Zone (read: nosebleed seats) I had a very good view of the action.



I was working on Jaywalker #2 the whole time:



Congrats to Justine Henin, one of my favourite players; Jelena Jankovic, who showed real fight; Ai Sugiyama and Katerina Srebotnik for their first Tour doubles title together; and Cara Black and Liezel Huber, a finely-honed doubles machine!

Claire came home with a cold on Friday and now I'm down with it, but it isn't too bad thanks to Dayquil. I did skip my run ... the first one I've missed in seven weeks, alas. I hope this hiatus won't be nearly as long as the last one.

I did manage to complete a throw pillow, my first ever sewing project to include buttonholes. Again the directions were from the ever-useful Sew Simple magazine. My machine has a super-cool automatic one-step buttonhole feature. Fun times! Zorra graciously agreed to appear in this shot.

Slow and steady

Since we got back from Newfoundland on August 7, things have been pretty crazy. I didn't expect to be playing or coaching nearly as much as I have. So things have progressed slowly on the crafty front. On the Rock I finished the back of DH's pullover:



Rows and rows of stockinette, but the Naturally Tussock DK from New Zealand is lovely, flecked with all kinds of tweedy bits. I also finished my first ever Jaywalker, in Socks that Rock Lightweight. The colourway is Fairgrounds, which is nice and summery:



My first completed sewing project in August is the bag from KwikSew 2320. It was fun, but I probably should have bought some heavier machine needles for sewing through four or more layers of fairly sturdy cotton. My thread kept breaking, which usually doesn't happen with Gütermann thread. Anyway, I learned to install grommets and reviewed a bunch of other construction things, which was nice.



Now on with the second sock, and the front of the pullover. I'll get back to St Brigid when that's done. Sewing projects in the queue: a buttoned pillow cover for our new chair in the living room; matching aprons for me and DD; some pajama pants with contrasting cuffs (this and the pillow are from Sew Simple 1) and a tunic from some African printed cotton I bought from Wazoodle a while back.

Very sad news this week of Richard Bradshaw's passing. The Collaborative Piano Blog has a collection of links to obituaries and memoirs. I still have not visited the new Four Seasons house in Toronto... early childhood and opera houses don't mix too well ... but I do appreciate all Maestro Bradshaw did for our Canadian opera scene. He will be missed.

Losing my Socks that Rock virginity

Whoops, so much for my G-rating. Well, the Opal Kid's Socks are on hiatus ... I realized too late that I would not have enough Fleece Artist left for 2 socks, so now I will finally cast on my Socks That Rock in Fairgrounds:



I was loving the colour changes and the smoothness of the hand while winding the skein, so I think knitting this up will be sweet. These will be Jaywalkers for me, and then when they are done I can stripe them with the leftover Fleece Artist for some pretty crazy colour action in Claire's socks. Also I have cast on in some lovely tweedy Naturally Tussock DK for DH's polo-collar pullover. It will be reams of stockinette, but that's about what my addled brain can handle right now.

Off to Newfoundland for two weeks of visiting the in-laws. I hope this year Claire will be old enough to start to appreciate what a beautiful place it is. It ain't Disney World, but there are some pretty neat things happening. I'm hoping to take her to places like the Salmonier Nature Park and maybe on a whale watching boat tour. Meanwhile, challenges for me include 2 weeks with the in-laws ... perfectly lovely people of course, but living in anyone else's house has never been my forte; 2 weeks without a piano; and staying OP with Weight Watchers. I have now had nearly 3 fantastic weeks on this plan and I am loving it, and I've lost 6 pounds already, so let's see if I can keep things going. The good news is that my in-laws, besides being lovely people, are very health-conscious and always have good choices in the house.

Random cuteness for your enjoyment, dear reader.

Who is that masked monkey?

















Here we see the Arctic fox in repose.

FINALLY an FO...

The Fleece Artist socks are DONE!
Pattern: Eleanor from Socktopia
Yarn: Fleece Artist Nova SocksNeedles: 2 2.75mm circs
Completion date: July 8, 2007

With the leftover yarn, I've started a pair of Opal Kid's Socks for Claire. This will be my first official Summer of Socks 2007 project. I realize I'll never keep up with the likes of Wendy, but I'm involved with a couple of other projects now (non-knitting ... details to come) so I'm happy just to be able to participate.

Another little project

It only took about 3 hours today to construct this very simple purse, again from KwikSew 2320. It has a zipper opening and a simple cord as a strap. Fun times!