Christmas Gifts 2016

I made all of the Christmas gifts in 2016 and already have a head start for this year as well, which was mostly because I had quite a few problems either finishing or finding the needing items to finish other projects. I made five pillowcases and I due have two more to make (the fabric was sold out), and several knitting washcloths, and several handmade EPP ornaments.

I made the pillowcases a lot bigger, but just have them folded in the pictures.
I made two of these for my nieces which they enjoyed.

This one was for my mother who enjoys gardening.

This one was for my Dad who is a huge fan, I plan to also get similar fabrics for the other two pillowcases I still owe my sister and her husband.

I made this one for my husband who is a huge fan of the Simpsons.

This is one of the ornaments completed, I made one for each niece with their name and the year. The one with the snowmen are halfway done and it was for my sister and her husband. I made one with bears for my nephew.

Temperature Blanket 2017

I am excited to start this year with doing a Temperature Blanket. Basically, every day you take the highest temperature in your area (some also due both low and high temp.), and knit or crochet a row with a particular color for that degree. Some even go back and due a "historical" temperature blanket of events such as a year someone was born,wedding, etc. I plan on just doing a garter stitch, and haven't decided if I will just due the high temp or both. Here are the color ways I have picked;

95+ Red
85-94 Burnt Orange
75-84 Orange
65-74 Yellow
55-64 Bright Green (it is brighter than the pic shows)
45-54 Sage
35-44  Bright Blue
25-34 Light Blue
15-24 Dark Blue
0-14 Purple

I plan on making a notebook to keep track of all the temperatures of the year and my journey, just in case I get behind. I think this is also a great idea to do this for crafts such as quilting and perhaps weaving. There is a group on facebook and I have seen a few posts on other people's blog showing the colors and degree's they have chosen. It should be fun and interesting to see how it turns out.

Getting Caught Up...

I have quite a few posts to put up this week and perhaps more after that. I hope that everyone had a great holiday and New Year's. I did quite a bit for Thanksgiving and made a homemade Apple Pie for the first time, it wasn't all homemade as I didn't make the crust. I just put butter, salt and pepper on the green beans. I did something different with the turkey breasts this (now last) year, I took off all the skin and added a rub of different spices and cooked it in the slow cooker. It was really good and had lots of flavor. I made the homemade rolls, they were ok turned out more biscuity that I would have liked. The sweet potatoes most were the homegrown ones, but a few store bought ones as well, then I added brown sugar and butter to them. In order to save time though I made them the day before and they had more flavor.

One of my cousin's got married in early December and I was unable to attend the event, but made some hand knit dishcloths as gifts. 

I made two of each color and each pattern.

Knitted Dishcloths/Washcloths

These are some small projects that I have done while at the doctor's office and watching tv. Since I don't need as much yarn compared to working on a scarf, so it easily fits into my purse or small container to take along. Obviously, the dishcloths/washcloths aren't this big, but I wanted to show the varied and vibrant colors.

Dewey's Readathon Wrap Up and Review

I only read about 70 pages on Saturday of The Plain Choice. However, since then I have finished that book and started and finished Fruit of All Evil. I don't think I did too bad in challenge, as at least it got me motivated to finish two books in the next few days.

The Plain Choice wasn't really what I expected it to be, and I was disappointed in it. I felt that it focused too much on her early life before even becoming religious, and then not enough when she "joined" the Amish faith. Which brings me to the issue that it never says she actually joins the church, perhaps she does later on after they move for the last time, but it is never mentioned. Most of the later book focuses more on her daughter. It also in the prologue mentions her sister and what happens to her, but it never went really back to why her sister became that way or what happened afterwards (which I was expecting there to be some update on a little bit). I think it needed to be much longer as it was a pretty short book. I give it a 2.5 out of 5.

Fruit of All Evil was a little slow for me to get interesting. This is the second book in a series, but it is one of those that you don't really have had to read the first book in order to read this one. The main character Becca sells jams and preserves at a farmer's market run by her fraternal sister. Becca' friend from the farmer's market named Linda, who is going to be getting married, and suddenly her future mother-in-law is murdered. Becca want's to try to find out who the murder is as the wedding has been canceled. Linda's groom Drew wanted them to get married fast as he is in the military and going to be deployed soon on a secret mission. There is a long list of who wanted Drew's mother Madeline killed, as she wasn't the nicest of people.  One thing I think is a little weird is that Becca's sister isn't really involved in the sleuthing that much, which kind of surprises me. I think Becca is kinda mismatched with her boyfriend and think she will eventually be with someone else, or perhaps that is my wishful thinking. Overall, I didn't think this book was bad but not as good as the first one. I give it a 3.5 out of 5, as it did take my so long to get interested in this one, after that it picked up for me.

Deweys 24-HR Readathon Sign Up

I forgot to previously post what books I will be reading tomorrow for the readathon. It will be a short list and includes one that I have been currently reading;

• The Plain Choice by Sherry Gore (I think about 30% percent completed, it is a pretty small book)
• A Daughter's Dream by Shelley Shepard Gray
• Fruit of All Evil by Paige Shelton
• I Am Not A Serial Killer by Dan Wells

I am not going to list more as I don't think I will be even able to complete all of these.

Spin List Book and other news

The Classic Club Spin book I ended up getting was one I was actually dreading to read,  I had thought previously of changing the position of the book on the list but never did, of course that is the book that made the pick. I had tried to read it before and just couldn't get into The Heart of Darkness and other stories by Joseph Conrad. I have been sick since a few days before the start of October so haven't actually restarted to read it yet. The date I need to have it read by is December 1st, so assuming I can get into the book I don't think it will be a problem. I realized that there are at least one book that I have read for the classics club, but haven't reviewed it yet. I plan on participating this Saturday (depending on where you live) in the Dewey's 24 Hour Readathon, not sure which books I will read for that, but plan on posting about it on Friday. I have a feeling it will mostly consist of library books and other put down books I haven't gotten back too. Other than that I have gotten quite a bit more done on Mr. Crafts4others scarf for his belated birthday. I need to get back to working also on Christmas gifts, some of them will be relatively simple to do and others not as much. A cousin is getting married in December so I need to make a gift for that as well, I think I will either make her a table runner or placemats with reproduction 1930's fabric (she likes vintage items as well).