In the Pink Again...Almost

"Think Pink" days continued through Friday. You may remember that Mandy made mittens for Dolly and surprised her with them on Monday.

On Tuesday, Vroni and Mandy decided they need some exercise, which is part of a healthful lifestyle, important for cancer prevention. Park City is a great place to enjoy the outdoors, with lots of hiking, biking and snowshoe trails, as well as the ski resorts, but there are two problems. 1) Mandy’s coat wasn’t finished yet, and it’s too cold to go for a hike without one, and 2) This is what the locals call “mud season.” (Actually, there are two mud seasons. Other places call them “spring” and “fall.” The snow melt causes the mud.) All the girls have snow boots, but no wellies, and I’ve ruled out running their…um…running shoes through the dryer, so I ruled out a hike, even if they all had coats. “Let’s go to the Fieldhouse!” I suggested. Little kids go there to run around in the indoor field and jump around in the blow-up castle, but older young people and adults can walk or run on the track. The girls have the proper attire for that, as well as their new pink water bottles. A cardigan is all you need to hop in the car and out again.

While they were getting ready, the girls decide to stop at the library, which is very close to the Fieldhouse, so they could get some books for Dolly, who was feeling better but still in bed.

All the girls love dogs, and Dolly really enjoyed the big picture book, Sorry, I Pooped in Your Shoe, although it’s a little difficult to turn the pages wearing her new mittens.

Mandy was rather annoyed when the nozzle came off of her special water bottle. She showed me when we got home:

"Get out your glue gun, Mum!"

By Wednesday, Dolly had stopped coughing and was feeling “in the pink” again. She was out of bed and dressed.

The theme for Wednesday was diet and food, so the girls decided to have a tea party to celebrate Dolly's recovery and the fact that no one else has caught the cold. They had a discussion about what they should serve at their tea party. Mandy wanted to know what Dolly wants to have, since it’s in her honor.

Dolly says that she thinks they should each bring their favorite party food. Mandy made a list.

Dolly said she liked chocolates.

Gabi said cookies.

Mandy added raisins as her favorite party food. 

Vroni said, “Well, unlike chocolates, cookies and raisins, MY favorite party food requires actual cooking...but I know how.

Vroni  put on a makeshift apron (the girls keep giving their actual aprons away) and assembled her supplies and the cookbook.

She spent at least five minutes slaving over a hot microwave to produce her favorite party food: popcorn.

The girls set the table. Gabi said they needed another chair. “I’ll get it when I get the package of cookies,” she said.

Mandy started putting raisins on a plate, and Dolly opened the box of chocolates, a gift from when she was sick. Vroni said she would pour the tea.

Tea! we all forgot to make the tea. Oh, well. Pretend tea is good at a pretend tea party.

On Thursday we received word yesterday that our new addition, Charlotte Anne, would be leaving for the US on Friday, along with her dog. Her immigration paperwork is in order and her pup had his rabies certificate and health certificate, so they could both fly together and enter the US with no problem. Vroni and Mandy were so excited, they stayed up way into the night, talking and planning.

Mandy was working on a sock for Charlotte Anne, and Vroni had planned to read in front of the fire (in honor of Diwali and the light at the end of the tunnel), but it’s hard to talk and read at the same time. At one point, while I was still up, Mandy came to me with a mistake in her work. (I guess it’s hard to knit and talk when you’re excited.) "Put on your glasses, Mandy!"

They were still jabbering when I went to bed. I guessed they would sleep late the next morning, and they did. Mandy didn’t wake me to fix her knitting again, so I knew she had it sorted out.

I wished Charlotte Anne a safe trip and hoped that she wouldn’t think all those shoes are just for her. Or that her puppy wouldn’t chew on them!

Friday came around, and the girls and I talked about what we should do for the last day of THINK PINK, which was a day of celebration. The girls decided we should post a photo of each of them. I handed them my album—um, iPad—so they could go through the photos and decide together what to post. Here are their selections: 

Dolly looks so young here. That photo was taken almost two years ago.

Gabi has had several pink items, including the jacket for her Everyday Play dress, but this is her favorite.

Mandy has a lot of nice clothes with pink somewhere in them, but this outfit was the closest thing to a best pink outfit. It reminds her of all the fun they had outdoors over the summer.

Of course, Vroni has her lovely Dirndl, but everyone has already seen that during “THINK PINK” days, so here she is in her best Sunday wrap dress, also a favorite.

Of course, the “Cotton Candy Gracie” (made with slightly longer sleeves) has made the rounds among the girls, because they all love it. 

I’m glad the girls have been having fun, because I had to sit them down and tell them that, Charlotte Anne is now bringing two horses with her, and because of the horses, she can’t just hop on a plane. It means her arrival will be delayed perhaps two weeks.

After a few minutes of glum silence, Mandy left the room and came back with the belt for her new coat.

“Here,” she said. “You only have to sew the buttons on and attach the belt now. Please finish my coat so I can go outdoors and play.”

We all looked at her…

“Well,” she continued, “I’ve learned two things in the past 10 days: Waiting is long, and life is short. Stay well and get a mammogram once a year. And live it up!”

I think Mandy’s right. We really should “THINK PINK” all year long. Celebrate life!

Mandy did get to go outdoors for a bit. Here she is in her new coat.

It was nice of her to be so patient for the photo shoot, because she was really anxious to run off and play. 

She was outdoors for all of 30 minutes when it started to rain, which later turned to wet snow. Mandy says, "I guess you have to take the bad with the good."

I didn't go to Common Threads this week because of my cold, but I'm much better, so I hope to be able to make Vintage Stitchers on Thursday.

I've changed my disclaimer (below) to indicate that no dolls were harmed, either. My regular blog will be back next week.

Note: This blog post was produced on the iPad and the MacBook, using the iPhone for some photos and some photo processing. No other computer was used in any stage of composition or posting, and no Windows were opened, waited for, cleaned or broken. No animals or dolls were harmed during the production of this blog post.

Farewells and Goodbye

We said goodbye to the Knitting Community yesterday. And my page:

I have such fond memories of the years on the Knitting Community and special friends, some of whom I have no way of communicating with again (Susan, Marty, Judith), as well as some I'm still in touch with even daily.

On the bright side, we have The Frog Prince and His Knitting Community Orphans, which is now in full swing.

I spent a good part of Saturday on the Knitting Community copying photos I thought I might not have elsewhere. I had already copied half of them, but the past couple of weeks has been very busy with extra practices for Beethoven’s Ninth, with our first performance this coming Sunday. I had a deadline and priorities.

I did get a few other things done this week, though. I had been waiting for my contact person at the Winter Sports School to tell me what they wanted on the label for the back of the quilt commemorating the life of Sam Jackenthal, the young skier who died after an accident in Australia. I finally wrote up something and got an OK on it. Here’s what it looks like, including the names of all the quilters who donated their efforts.

Here’s a photo of the finished quilt. The blocks were painted by students at the school who knew Sam. I think it was therapeutic for them to say goodbye in this way, and will be therapeutic as well when they see the quilt. (The Winter Sports School is for young athletes who participate in winter sports, which they practice during the winter. The school allows them to go to school during the seasons when there are no winter sports.)

The quilt will be on display at the school and once the students who knew Sam have graduated, it will go to Sam's family.

Many thanks to everyone who took part in producing it.

I delivered it after church on Sunday, before dropping by to visit my friend Joanie, who needs to have her current knitting project restarted after she made a mistake and had to frog back to the CO.

I managed to get more spinning and knitting done during the week, but not enough to show much difference, so watch for an update next week. I managed to organize my squares for Johan’s I-spy quilt, and got a few cut to size. And (Ta-da!) Dolly finally got her slip.

This was the pattern I made for it, similar to the one I used for the dirndl to go with the Red Ridinghood outfit.

The line on the skirt pattern shows where I had to cut it to make it short enough. If anyone wants the pattern, I plan on making a better copy, one that will fit on an 8.5” X 11” piece of paper, which will require a fold in the middle of the bodice. Send me a personal message if you want one, either on Quilt With Us or on Ravelry, but if you’re in a real hurry, you can just copy this and blow up the photo so that the 1” marks on my portable cutting mat are 1”.  You will see that the tops of the shoulders are placed on the fold, and one side of the skirt is also on the fold.

I use freezer paper for my doll patterns if I make them myself. Then I can press them onto the cloth, maybe put in one pin, and cut carefully without separating the fold underneath. I wanted a decorative trim down the front, so I placed that on first.

I used a pin to hold it in place. Then I folded the entire piece with the wrong sides together, pinned in several places and sewed (quilters: “chain-pieced") up the left back, around the left armhole, around the neck, around the right armhole and finally down the right back, not cutting the thread at the tops of the shoulders. As you can see, I trimmed the seams, trimmed the corners and clipped the curves.

Then I turned it right-side out and pressed.

Next, I took the skirt, folded over the two back edges 1/4” and then 1/4” again, and sewed them down. I ran a row of stay-stitching around the waist, just inside 1/4”, and then clipped to the stitching.

Right sides together, I sewed the right side of the bodice to the skirt. (If you don’t care if you have raw edges or want to serge or zig-zag the raw edges, you can just sew both right side and lining to the skirt.)

I pressed under the raw edge of the lining to line up with the seam. This was what it looked like from the outside:

Then I made a row of top stitching over the seam and another row about 1/8” above that, to hold the lining in place. (Here you could make a nice finish by sewing the lining down by hand, but I was in a hurry to get the doll clothes sent off.)

To cover up my (ahem) irregular stitching, I put another piece of decorative trim over the stitching and sewed it down.

I tried it on Dolly (with her cooperation) for length and to determine how to sew the shoulders together. A very thin strap might have fit OK just sewing them together straight across, but I found I got a better fit at the shoulders by overlapping the shoulders and sewing them at an angle. (I might try not having shoulder sections at all next time and using ribbon in place of them.) I cut off the excess fabric at the hem and turned it up, adding a lace trim to hide the stitching. The final step was to sew small pieces of velcro on the back edges at the top, waist and hem. The same pattern would make a great summer dress.

Dolly was a big help with fitting the slip and making sure it was going to work. She didn’t get to keep it long, though, because it got shipped off in the package for Miss Daphne’s birthday, coming up May 14th, to be worn by Daphne Jr..

Here are Daphne Jr.’s duds, furniture and bedding packed and ready to ship. We needed a big box, because the mattress had a stiff piece of board at the bottom, so Daphne Jr. won’t sink into the depression in the lid of the storage box that is her bed. (We can’t have her sinking into a depression, can we?) That made the mattress too big to fit flat in the box. I could have had DD buy a comparable storage container there, but the mattress still would have been a problem.

DH filled the rest of the box with air pillows, and styrofoam peanuts, and when he ran out of those, plastic bags. He carried it for me to the Post office. It wasn’t that heavy, but it was bulky. (I held the doors.) Here he is at the Post Office.

(I love the sign on the wall that says “PACKED WITH HEART.” So true.)

With all the goodbyes, I’m glad I don’t have to say goodbye to my Knitting Community friends and fellow "orphans." Activities in the Ravelry forum are moving along. We even have plans for a special Spin-in during the Tour de Fleece, starting July 2 and runs through the 24th, so pretty much the whole month of July. The Tour de Fleece coincides every year with the Tour de France. (You might have heard of it. Bicycles are involved. We’re spinning. Get it?)

This year we will be spinning fiber prepared for us by Christina/AlohaBlu. She also does hand-dyed yarn, but we’re going to be spinning from her fiber. She’s even making two special colorways just for us (although we can use any colorway we like for the Spin-in). The special colorways are based on our logo photos, first The Frog Prince:

…and then His Knitting Community Orphans.

I plan on a braid of each, along with some Waimea Rooster.

I would give you a link to the Waimea Rooster colorway in a braid, but we bought it all up, so there’s no more in the shoppe. In fact, she’s dyeing more for us. If you really like it, I'm sure she'll make more.

What's on my needles: Still hand-quilting the “Delectable Pathways” quilt. Working on the the Vicenza Lace Shawl. Progress on both Still have Aran sweater for Daphne Jr. and socks on needles.

What's on my Featherweight: Johan’s I-spy quilt. Ready to start on Dolly’s Regency outfit when I get a chance.

What's on my wheel: Full Circle Roving, in "Fawn," still, almost done with second bobbin (out of two...whoo-hoo!)

What's on my iPad/iPhone: Listing to the Beethoven’s Ninth choral practice recording is still cutting into my audiobook time. Reading A Love That Never Tires by Allyson Jeleyne on the Kindle app.

What's in my wine glass: Lindeman’s Cawarra. The big bottle. Not that I drink the whole thing by myself at one sitting.

What's my tip of the week: Keep backups of the photos you really don’t want to lose on CDs, well-labeled. I lost some photos that were on my hard drive when my old laptop died. I lost more that were on Flickr when I had to give up my Yahoo account because it was repeatedly hacked. I could have lost even more photos that I had on the Knitting Community, if I hadn’t copied them to CD, especially the ones from before I got my new computer. I also have an external hard drive as a backup for my MacBook. 

Note: This blog post was produced on the iPad and the MacBook, using the iPhone for some photos and some photo processing. No other computer was used in any stage of composition or posting, and no Windows were opened, waited for, cleaned or broken. No animals were harmed during the production of this blog post.