Tuesday Ripple or Groovy Girls of Anarchy!

OK - so here I am buzzing by our house in town, nabbing a bit of wifi from the neighbor (he's fine with it-I buy him beer in exchange!) and I thought I'd quickly do a Tuesday Ripple. The Granny Bee has been making these Granny Squares.  She's going to cover a foot stool with them.  Very cool.

 This is Kristi's ripple blanket,

 and this is mine!

 Kathy is finally caving in and learning to crochet!

 And this is "K's" ripple and bag.  She's probably done with her ripple by now.

And I don't have a picture of Miss Groovy Girl's project.  Can't remember what she was working on, but probably something on knitting needles.....oh yes, I remember now.....she was knitting....and apparently I didn't get a picture of it, but I do remember putting it all back on the needles when it fell off.  Hmmm, wonder what's become of her project.  I'll let you know...

In the meantime....I have questions about wifi and Internet and such.....

Does anyone out there use their I-phone and plug it in to their computer for 3G or 4G to use the Internet?  I'm thinking of doing that.  I'm always concerned when I go to sign up for something and the person says they'll call me back, and they don't.  If that's the "sign-up" service I get, what kind of service will I get when I have problems.  Apparently the person I called for wifi has their own service out by us.  But she hasn't called me back.  And my other option is wifi through Direct TV which I way do not understand at all.  Any ideas?

I'm going to go sit and crochet tonight and forget about everything else for a bit.....but come tomorrow, I'm going to want Internet again....sigh...........

Cindy Bee

Attic 1200 and teaching granny squares

These are the mansions where the Winter Woolen Workshop takes place. Two mansions in Kokomo that are now used by the Howard County Historical Society. (I know I tell you this all the time....but I'm telling you again....My Shug and I got married in the one above)


Crochet Council was in this mansion, in an alcove, of which I showed you yesterday. Crochet council consists of the Bee Lady (me) and Reality Jayne.

So, yesterday morning I happened to be looking at Attic 24's blog, before I left for the WWW and I thought.....I'm gonna take an alcove picture....I told my outlaw friend RJ, and we conspired to sneak up a level (ssshhhhh don't tell. That level was pretty much off limits) Quickly and quietly we go up the stairs....... There was only one room (closet?) open up there. All of the other rooms had locked doors. What's behind those locked doors we wondered....

But we had a mission....a picture....from the attic...I'm going to call it Attic 1200!





I couldn't stop it was so fun taking pictures from the attic window! Of course RJ was behind me..."take it up close...put your camera on the window....Beee.....your picture taking skills....jeeeesh." I told her to shuuush!

OMG! Somone's coming....quick! HIDE! We hid behind the wall waiting for them to leave. phew...close call.....

Another view - close up - hmmmm, wonder what's on the other side of that window.

Today - we will sneak over to that mansion, sneak up to the attic level, and take more pics from that side of the fence (so to speak)

Later that day.....I took my granny square stuff over to the other building. Drug it all from the second floor of one building to the third floor of another - how many flights of stairs would that be...yup five. A cart of yarn and two big bags of stuff. I forgot a couple of things in the other building but guess what....I was not going back.

I was getting ready to teach a granny square class. I set up and had a few minutes so I took a stroll through the room. I will take more pics today because you have to see this room. I believe it was probably a ballroom back in the day. Dangit...I want a ballroom in my new house.

These ladies were making an Easter Bunny Basket. That's Jeannie with the tape measure over her mouth! Kinda funny, considering what I told her earlier that day. I said, "Jeannie...guurrrrl....I have no idea what you are talking about because you just drink caffeine all day long and talk and talk and talk. I have learned to tune you out just like I used to do the boys I watched!!! I just hear a bunch of background noise yammerin on....!" We have so much fun hanging out all weekend together.

Look at these adorable baskets. See the bunny ears?

Cute huh?

And Barb is teaching a quilting, embroidery class..something like that. Knowing her, there are beads involved! Maybe it was a crazy quilt class.

All I know is.... I knew I was in trouble the first five minutes of my class. I was teaching five people how to make granny squares. Yup....I was in Trouble! Quadruple trouble!

Let me start out by saying the only one that had crocheted before was 11 years old...

She was my star student and I loved the way her nail polish matched the yarn she chose!

By the time it was over .....three hours later....I was nervous and sweating in the arm pits! It was not this hard when I taught my left-handed cousin a few weeks ago! I bet I walked around that table 30 times. I now have granny square rules for teaching a class. The first one being...you must have a basic knowledge of crochet! But by the time I kicked them out...I mean...they left....they all had a granny square.

I fully expect them to hunt me down today to help them again. I'll be hiding in the attic. Shhhhh...don't tell.

Cindy Bee

Granny Square Messenger Bag - done!

First of all, thanks everyone for the compliments and for helping me solve the mystery. It's really weird because I had everything together in a basket. The yarn, the hook, the blanket. I tried again, loosening my tension, still wrong. So now I have two wrong sized squares that I'll probably turn into pillows. Anyway, I switched up a crochet hook size and it worked beautifully. I still have to stitch the squares together and finish the border, then I'll have a blankey ta-dah moment!
But it isn't done yet.
However, this is!
Remember these squares? I never really said what I was going to make out of them. That's because at first it was going to be a bag. Then after making so many squares, and thinking it through, I decided to make an afghan instead. Then when I realized I would have to make this many squares all over again for it to be an afghan, I went back to the bag idea.

And here it is!

A messenger bag. What do you think?

This is the back. And I'm using it to hold yarn projects.
You know the plastic bags that sheets and bedspreads and such come in? Well, a lot of the Granny Bees use those to hold their projects they are working on'. It's great because you can see through them so easily. So, I made the messenger bag to fit this plastic zip bag.

I can slide the bag out, work on my next project, and put it back, and it looks just like a bag.

What do you think?

Cindy Bee

Friendship Bread, Grannie Squares, and Valentines

So...at the Granny Bees the other day someone was giving out friendship starter.

Why doesn't anyone ever want friendship bread starter?

When you say, "does anyone want Friendship bread starter", people run like it's zucchini in July! Have you ever had the bread/cake it makes? YUM

So I took a start...

Squeezed the bag for the first few days...added the ingredients...squeezed the bag...

and made the bread.

Bummer.

I was all excited to take pictures of this yummy looking bread, but for some reason, it wouldn't come out of the pans without falling apart! Oh well, no matter what it looks like, it is still very moist and yummy. (might have been that I didn't have any instant pudding so I used the cook and serve kind)

Now I have four bags to give away. Anyone? anyone?

And you know I've been knee deep in granny squares, preparing for the Winter Woolen Workshop. (see side bar for information)

My cousin had last Friday off of work. She came over. She's a lefty. And I wanted to see if I could teach a lefty how to crochet. Well, she was fumbling around with the hook and yarn, and I got a little panicky inside, and I admit, I was hoping no lefties sign up for my granny square class. But then something amazing happened. She held the hook in her right hand, and voila' she started making grannies!!!

Perfect little grannies! Easy peasy, huh cuz?

I was showing her how the grannies I made look sewn together. (above)I didn't much like them.

So I decided to stitch some white, cream, or black around them, to see if that would help.

I

chose

white.

First set of grannies in above picture no border.

Second set, white border.

So I went to the library and got some of my favorite, easy-to-watch, movies.

Movies I've seen before, so if I miss a bit, no big deal.

Cranford

Miss Marple

Enchanted April

My House in Umbria

Enchanted April

and

Cross Creek

and on Sunday, I got up veeerrrrryyy early. Six episodes of Cranford later...

I have stitched white borders.

Ta Dah!

More on this later.

Because...before this post gets too long, I want to make sure the following people are the ones who want to be in the Valentine exchange.

If anyone else wants to join, let me know before Friday.

See previous two posts if you don't know what I'm talking about.

Theresa (no blog)

Hookin it with Mr. Lick Lick

LadyBug Dreams

Grandma Pedens Porch

Reality jayne

just breathe janis

east plus 4 & 1 more

ME

And just to recap - it does not have to be handmade. Not all of my blogger friends make things. I went to the fabric store and bought a few fun small pink heart things that fit in an envelope. It's just fun getting Valentine-y stuff in the mail. Think simple, small, and fun. Or if I must say it...cheap and easy!

Cindy Bee

Granny Square Hearts...finished!

I got this pattern from the Royal Sisters blog spot.

I have to admit, they were a little harder than the tree and star pattern they have on their blog. But I fumbled my way through a few of them. I have not been crocheting long, and I find myself doing what I do when I knitted. I do easy patterns that I can sit and watch t.v. and not have to pay much attention. I've got to stop that. But that would require sitting down and paying attention, and I seem to have a problem doing that!

I like the way it turned out.

I just threw this picture in because it seems like the thing to do :-)
When I was going through some stuff, packing up my craft (clutter) room, I found this sack. Most of the stuff inside came from Damask Designs, when I went to their sale last February.

Hmmm, wonder what's inside?

Cindy Bee

Edited to add - I went around each heart with a single crochet. That was not a part of the Royal Sisters pattern.

Winter Woolen Workshop & Granny Squares

This Fiona, not this one, asked me how my granny squares were going, so I thought I best show you...but first I must ask....would "lounge" be an English word for the American "couch"? Should I put it in my English/American language lessons (on my side bar)? Just wondering. And I've heard on hgtv when people are off buying houses somewhere in England that they call the yard, garden. Is that another one? In America, a garden is a place where we grow flowers, or herbs, or vegetables. But it appears in England it is the entire yard. So I wonder...what do they call the place where they grow the vegetables? Fess up Fionas! We gotta know this stuff.

OK - Granny Squares and WINTER WOOLEN WORKSHOP!

Every year, The Granny Bees host a Winter Woolen Workshop.

I have been asked to teach a class on Granny Squares. A simple Granny Square. One that most anyone can do. Beginner crocheters. So I picked this one. It is SO versatile.

And quick.

But if you are not into crocheting, or knitting, no problem. Because at the Winter Woolen Workshop you can learn other things, such as painting, punch needle, embroidery, rug hooking, spinning, weaving, hand quilting, tatting, rug punch or needle felting. There will be classes and workshops and little make it-take its on all of that stuff.

And if you don't want to learn anything, that's no big deal either. Just come and visit. There will be guilds and groups and clubs and organizations sitting, or standing, and working on their craft. Sit a spell and visit. Or shop. There will be all kinds of hand-made items for sale.

You could buy all of your Christmas presents for next year, and have it done!

And if you have a project you are working on at home, bring it. Sit and work on it with a group of lovely, like-minded women.

The Winter Woolen Workshop takes place at the Seiberling Mansion and The Elliot House (two mansions) in Kokomo, Indiana. (address is 1200 W. Sycamore St) People come from all over the United States to partake. There is a one time entry fee of $10.00, which goes to the Howard County Historical Society. This fee gets you in the doors both days.

It takes place on

Saturday, February 25, from 9am to 6pm

and

Sunday, February 26, from 11am - 5pm

I hope to see you there,

Cindy Bee

PS - I have a plan for all of these grannies...I'm not just making them to be making them. I hope to finish one of the projects today. I'll show ya later!