Dog Sit? Knit?

I was dog sitting last week with my sons dog while he was out of state for some job training.  He was very well behaved for us.  But you have to watch close when you open the door because if he gets out he is gone.  He has been known to lead the family on an hour chase and ran for blocks if not miles.  Let's just say when it comes to running away, he doesn't listen well.  He got out when we were camping last year and after trying to lure him every way we could, he kind of liked the idea of cheese and crackers in those individual containers.  Silly dog did he really think he was going to get a treat for being naughty?  I do miss my lap warmer this week though. He is smart in that he knows when I am in my recliner and knitting he must lay on the lower part of my legs.  If he tries to get up by my stomach, he gets pushed down so he just goes there right away unless I have nothing in my hands which isn't very often.
   So while he was here I worked on afghans done in strips so I could keep them to my side as they got longer and wouldn't touch the doggie.  He doesn't mind.

I finished the strips for this one while Buddy way here and then put it together on Monday when I had my lap to myself.  It is listed in my Etsy shop at this time.  This one is Soft White and would make a lovely wedding present for someone.  A couple of years ago, a gal asked if she could put one of my afghans on her wedding registry and I agreed but must say I was skeptical.  Lo and behold someone in Texas bought it for this gal who lived in Washington DC.  She was so happy to get her afghan for a wedding gift.  Then about 6 months later I got a convo from her and she wanted to buy an afghan for a friend that lived out of state and asked if she purchased it if I would wrap it and put in a card, she told me what she wanted the card to say, and mail to the couple.  Of Course I agreed.  I am always a bit leery about mailing to someone who hasn't purchased from me afraid they will return to sender.  So I started putting the purchaser name with mine in the return address so they should get the hint as to where it came from.  So far so good.

At present I am working on an afghan in this pattern.  This one was a special order in Aran Fleck and the one I am making now is in Buff Fleck.  This is the one pattern I have made for myself.  I never make for myself always to sell but I did like this one.  This was my best selling afghan last year.  I sold a couple that were premade and had 4 special orders.  Special orders are always nice but I feel a bit more pressure to get them done.  Love it though.  So keep your eyes open I should have this one done in about 3 weeks or so.

HAPPY SPRING!!!!

Lets Make Some Stew

I am one who doesn't often think of taking pictures while I am cooking or of my plate filled with food.  I guess maybe that is a mistake and as I am new to blogging, maybe in the future I may think of doing just that.

   My blog may contain a bunch of various things that I do in my retired life, from my home business of knitting and crocheting, maybe family vacations, cooking, oh you name it.  It could be a surprise from time to time.  So it will not be just a one themed blog and hope I don't lose you in the process.

   Since it has been a very cold and snowy winter here in Minnesota and seems across most of the US I decided to put a recipe here today for Easy Oven Stew.  I got this recipe from my sister and I made it last week and it was so good so decided to share it with all of you. I have a smaller size roaster and it was full to the top.  Probably got 6 to 8 servings.  I am actually thinking of making some more and freezing some to eat later.  So here goes.

Easy Oven Stew

3 lb. Beef Stew Meat (cut in 1 inch cubes) Since stew meat seems to be rather expensive and I buy my beef direct from the farmer I had some tenderized Round Steak and I used that cut into cubes.
2 medium Onions (cut in 1 inch pieces.
4 Potatoes (cut in 1 inch cubes)
1 lb. bag of baby carrots
4 Celery ribs (cut in 1 inch pieces)
1 garlic clove minced.
1 can 14 1/2 oz Diced Tomatoes
1 15 oz can Italian Tomato Sauce (I couldn't find that so just used plain Tomato Sauce)
2 cans Beef Broth
3/4 cup Quick Cooking Tapioca
1/2 tsp. Pepper
1/2 tsp. dried Thyme
1/2 tsp. dried Oregano (I grabbed the ground by mistake and it was ok).
1/2 tsp. Salt Optional (I didn't use salt)

In a 5 quart Dutch Oven combine all ingredients.  Like I said I used a small roaster, next time I will use a little bigger one because it was so full.  Cover and bake for 2 1/2 to 3 hours at 300, stirring every hour, or until the meat and vegetables are tender.  After 2 hours it didn't seem to be getting done so I upped the temp to 350 the last hour and everything was done when time to eat..

I hope some of you try this and let me know how it goes.  We loved it at our house.

Of course after your tummys are full you will have to do the dishes so try these new dishcloths I have for sale in my shop on The CraftStar.  Check them out along with a bunch of new colors I have just added.  Go http://theneedlehouse.thecraftstar.com    The texture of these aids in cleaning your dishes and I think you will love them.









If things are a bit dried on you may want to try my nylon net scrubbies also available in my shop and I am working on some new ones now so should have more available in a few weeks.  These scrubbies have so many uses.  As a matter of fact I always have a green one on hand for scrubbing my fresh fruit and vegetables. 

Winter is for Afghans

As I said previously I have been doing Craft Shows for 30+ years and the one thing that has remained constant has been my afghans.  I love, love, love making Afghans.  With winter being what it is this year in just about every state, they have been very popular.  So nice to snuggle under when chilly. 
   I do both knit and crochet afghans but I think the knit ones look richer although I have some crochet afghans that I love also.  Knitting takes much longer to do than crochet.

This afghan is done in strips and them must be put together and in most cases fringed.

Then afghans like this one are knit all in one piece.  Nice thing about that is when you are done, your done.  That is unless it has a fringe also.  This is a new one for me and doesn't have a fringe.  Probably my least favorite thing about making afghans is putting them together.

Here is a picture of this one finished and ready to mail.  I just listed it on The CraftStar yesterday.  Here is the link to this item.  https://www.thecraftstar.com/product_details/143115/knit-afghan-in-cables-and-pebbles-by-the-needle-house/

This afghan in made in strips and put together and fringed.  It is by far the best selling afghan I have ever made.  I have never gotten sick of making it either.  The first one I made was for my mother and I think she used it for over 20 years and I finally made her a different one.  I figured she had used that one long enough.  The link for this afghan is:  https://thecraftstar.com/product_details/141802/knit-afghan-in-patchwork-by-the-needle-house-in-aran/

I wish over the years I had kept track of how may afghans I have made.  I have been aske many times but I just don't have a clue.  I have given them as gifts for birthdays, weddings and anniversaries as well as selling them.  I hope you have enjoyed reading about my afghans and keep warm the rest this winter.

My Story from the beginning

I am going to tell you a little bit about my beginning into the craft business.  We were on a camping trip with friends.  After eating a good meal we were sitting by the fire and chatting, we were both doing daycare at the time and since we both liked to crochet and I also knit we thought perhaps we should start to do craft shows and support our habits.  It took awhile to establish ourselves and really decide what we wanted to do.  After several years of playing around with stuff and I made afghans from the start.  This is like 32 years ago.  Gee am I old?  I don't think so.  I decided I wanted to get a knitting machine so we both went shopping and each got one.  I started out making stocking caps and scarves.  When going to craft shows we had a pickup truck full of totes.  With caps you need sizes.  It was a lot of hauling, but I was younger then.  It was a pretty good business selling stocking caps and afghans and we did quite a few fall shows.  Then the company I was buying my acrylic from quit making it and I couldn't find another quality that I liked as well.  Now where do I go.  I got wind of the dishcloths and it has been dishcloths ever since. 

Here are a couple pictures of the cotton I use for making the dishcloths in my knitting room/yarn room.  This was after my current shopping trip and I will be making another trip probably in February and March then the shelves will for sure be over flowing.  My son helps me with them and we take the plain colors and twist them together to see what would make a good combination as you will find two tone dishcloths in my shop.  www.theneedlehouse.thecraftstar.com

HH

 

Then we go on so you can see what it looks like when working on the machine.  Many think it is a machine that you can turn on and walk away.  Sorry it takes arm muscle and since my row counter is broke you must count the rows so you know when to change pattern and when you are done so you can bind off.  Many work the ends in on the machine but I don't feel that is secure enough so I work both ends in by hand.  Takes a bit longer but I feel well worth it.

 

Once this is all done they are put on a shelf and ready for sale.  Besides my on line shops, I do 3 or 4 craft shows a year and I wholesale to a gal who in turn also sells them at craft shows.  Have a lot of empty space right now waiting for the new combinations to be done.

 

This has gotten a bit lengthy so I think next time I will tackle telling you about the afghans and other things I have in my shops.  Hope you enjoyed reading about this end of my business.

Christmas

This is the first Christmas party we had at our house and it was spent with my siblings and family.  We each buy 10 $2 gifts and then play a game and chose from the pile which presents we want.  The picture doesn't show them well but there are 90 presents in that pile of gifts.  We have a good time without spending a ton of money.  We don't know what anyone is buying.  Last year it seemed everyone seemed to buy air fresheners and this year it was Glad storage containers.  When the game is over then we go around the room 5 times and you can trade something you got that don't have any use for  with someone that has something you want.  We call it stealing but we actually trade so everyone goes home with 10 gifts.  We sat around and did this after we had a meal of ham and turkey with roasted vegetables and of course some Christmas goodies.

 We spent Christmas Day with Troy and Alec and didn't get any pics.  Then on the 28th we celebrated our family Christmas.  Seemed we had presents all over the living room.  This time we opened our gifts in the morning and later had a dinner of ham and scalloped potatoes.  I put out a spread of cheese, sausage, crackers, veggie pizza and Christmas goodies for snacking most of the day.  We spent the whole afternoon playing 500 for prizes.  As you can see everyone has a different beverage of choice.  Later in the day we did open a couple bottles of wine.  It was a great holiday.

We did not forget the reason for the season was to celebrate the birth of the baby Jesus.  Love to all.

It's Christmas, It's Christmas

Spent this past week getting ready for Christmas.  Even though the tree in the living room has been up for a couple of weeks.  Notice the tree skirt.  I made mine with Blue Bows.  The one I offer for sale has Red as can be seen in the previous post.  This tree is decorated with angels which most are hard to see as they are spun glass or plain glass.  I add just a few blue ornaments just to give it some color.





This is my second tree which some years I put up and some times not.  I went all out this year and decorated it.  It is decorated with all kinds of ornaments.  Some antique and some new.  I also put colored lights on this tree to make it a bit different from the angel tree which has clear lights.  Ok now the trees are up and came a busy week.

First thing on the agenda was to get  Buddy (my sons dog) a hair cut and a good bath so he would be ready for Christmas.  He wasn't co-operating very well for a picture though.  So you don't get a very good view of what my haircutting skills are.  Ha ha I am not a pro.

During the week did some candy making.  No pics of that because you might want to eat it.

I am also working on a custom afghan.  She ordered in after the 1st of December and I told her it would not be ready in time for Christmas but she was OK with that.  This is my second custom order this year with this pattern.  YAY!!

Ok, so I can't seem to get my cursor to go where I want it to go, next to the pictures I am talking about so I am going to punt.  The presents are all wrapped and should I say hiding in the corner of my tv/computer/knitting room.  The smaller presents are in another corner.  So am I ready?  Well not quite.  I am taking today off, I think.  Then tomorrow will be cooking and baking getting ready for my first Christmas Party on Sunday with my siblings and families.  Then of course clean up the bathroom and kitchen.  They always get left til last.

Sorry I couldn't get this set up the way I wanted to but I am just learning how to do this.

Wishing you all a very Merry Christmas.

Tree Skirt in time for Christmas

 Sunday morning, I am showing a couple of Christmas items from my shop at www.theneedlehouse.thecraftstar.com, that if ordered today should be at your door step in time for Christmas.

This tree skirt is the last one I have this year.  The red bows can be changed to blue as I have some in stock, or you may have it with no bows at all.  I will remove the red ones.  Will be a great gift for yourself to enjoy for years to come.

I don't know how fast the mail is coming right now but if ordered today you should have this gift set in time to give for Christmas.  It comes all gift boxed also.  I have a few other sets that also come gift boxed so if this color doesn't work for you another one may. 

After the fiasco with the burning of the chocolate chips and peanut butter on the stove, I managed to finish my candy without incident.  Although my house smelled all day of burnt offering. 

In the days to come I will try to share a few of our favorite recipes with you.  I love to cook when I am not all tied up in yarn as knitting and crocheting are my first loves.  At present I am working on a custom order afghan.  My 4th custom order this year.

Have a great day my friends.