Back to the World of Blogging

This is the third week of summer break and I’m really getting into the creative mode…slowly. OK, let’s face it that I’ve been slow about everything since the school year’s been out, which really makes the time fly by. Go figure!

I have some really awful photos of some parent helper gifts that we (me & my partner in crime at 3rd grade) gave for the end of the year. I started early, but ended up finishing/wrapping them at the last minute in the craziness called the last week of school, thus no decent pictures. And NO photos of a couple of the gifts.

For my mom who came in weekly to work with reading groups (among other things!): Above is the “Grrlfriend Market Bag.” The pattern can be found on Ravelry. I knitted a flower from Stitch ‘n Bitch Nation and put the funky big button in the center. The colors are bright, fun, and remind me of citrus fruits. I asked one of my sisters and a friend of what I should put in the bag. My sister Kay suggested the makings of an Italian dinner, and my friend Tonia suggested gardening tools and supplies, since when I asked her, she and her DH were in the process of planting their first ever vegetable garden. (Which gave me an idea for her and I’m almost finished with that something…come back later this week for photos!) I went into my local supermarket the morning of the last day of school, thinking I was going to load this puppy up with the makings of a pasta dinner. As I walked into the store, there was a display of plants, so the bag ended up holding a gorgeous spider plant. I knew this mom would be appreciative, but I did not expect her tears after I answered her that I made this. Yeah! Knitting was appreciated.

My gift from the mom above (and the rest of the family) was the Hello, Cupcake! book. Too fun! I’m not sure what I’m going to make first, but I will do something for a reunion that DH and I are semi-hosting at the end of this month for a bunch of people from our old neighborhood. The other part of the gift from this family was Eric Carle’s The Rabbit and the Turtle. On the last day of school, I only read one of the fables to the kids, but they liked it and were quick to articulate the moral of the story. Yeah! Guess I taught them something this past year. Back to the books…this mom wrote a personal note in the front of both, then signed by all of their family members. Not only am I thankful for the generous gift of the books, but am humbled by the thoughtful inscriptions.

The above set was for another mother who came in most Fridays to do copying, or whatever else we needed done. I’d made the Flower Power face cloth for myself a few years ago and LOVE it! For this, I made it bigger so it’s more of a washcloth, then made a cotton face cloth. The other item is a shower soap holder, which I just cast on and made up as I went along. I must admit, that I really like the little tags that I made up with fiber content and laundry instructions. The first photo is pre-blocked, and it really made a huge difference in looks after the blocking. The other thing I wanted to add to this was a spa head band, but in my limited time in creating this gift, I just could not get my brain to figure out how to do exactly what I wanted to do. Guess that’s on my “to-do” list now. This wonderful mom gave me…are you ready for this?!?!...a gift certificate for a massage! It’s been years since I’ve had one and am drooling over the prospect of setting my appointment.

Another parent gift was an apron and towel…sorry, no pics. I machine embroidered fruit slices (yellow, orange, and green) on one bottom corner of the apron and on the towel. She loved it, as I have loved her homemade BBQ sauce and jams! She gave me a gift certificate that I still need to use. Woohoo!

The final parent gift was a wine basket, and no photos here, either. This was for a mom who made lapbooks (the link gives you an example of what they are and the work involved in putting them together!) for the entire grade level, for the entire year’s language arts curriculum. 6 units x 50 students = 300 lapbooks!!!!! AND, she’s going to make up the first set for next year to get us started. My partner in crime at work, Joy (a non-drinker), loves to shop for unique wine bottles. She bought a couple of bottles of wine, a couple of wine glasses, along with a GREAT basket. I added in 6 cocktail coasters that I designed and digitized…machine embroidery, along with two bar towels that I embroidered my designs on it. Plus, I made up 6 wine glass charms. I think she liked it, based on her thank you note:

How do I say OMG?!?! The gift basket is unbelievable. Totally, the coolest! Thank you so much. Everything in there is sooooo cute. Truly unique and special. I'm not sure I want anyone else to use the coasters or towels. You guys think of everything. I just love it. You guys are awesome!

As I venture into this realm of designing and creating, it’s a great affirmative for what I’m doing. Now, just to keep up (or get!) some momentum to continue with my original ideas.

So many projects and so little time.

Flickr.com

Last summer my sister Kay introduced me to Ravelry, a knitting community online where both she and her daughter were registered. I played around on it some, mostly using it to find patterns and get ideas. After a few months, I decided that it would be good to use some of the functions available, especially as I modified patterns that I was working on and needed to make the matching item. I liked that I could add the notes to my project to add in my changes…no more lost sticky notes! I think it was in October when I finally decided to join the crafting community and set up a Flickr account so that I could add pictures to my projects. I found Flickr relatively straight forward to use, although it did take me a few minutes to go back in and find out exactly where I needed to be to add my tags. I had left those blank when I originally uploaded the photos. I will continue to use Flickr in my personal life, but I’m not sure that I will take the time to upload all of my photos. That will probably be done on as as-needed basis.

Flickr would be a great way to set up files for various writing prompts.

• Select photos to write about cause and effect. That’s difficult for my 3rd graders, so related sets could be added with increasing degrees of difficulty.
• Series of photos to aid in logical sequencing. This could be used for a variety of writing…narrative, informative, directions, etc.
• Fun, offbeat photos for students to write a narrative.
• Select photos to use when teaching the 6 traits.

I really don’t see a problem with using Flickr as mentioned above, but there would have to be limits set if it were to be used in different ways, which could include the students setting up their own accounts.