AT Hiking Trip, Home Along-Day Two

Tuesday was a very busy day.  It was only yesterday but I have already forgotten a bundle of things. I had planned to take some friends and go to the temple but I had been awake much of the night and finally awoke around 6 AM with a sick headache and terrible lethargy.  Just before 7 AM I called my riders and canceled the trip.  We will try again next week.

After a nap which ended (again!) with a phone call, I started working in the guest bedroom/fiber studio to get things more orderly.  When I opened the little plastic bureau I found some deep red corduroy and decided to try making a zippered boxy bag.  I had gotten some zippers at the Upper Valley Sew-op sale last Friday so I watched a couple of videos on YouTube and got down to business.  The first bag I made was small and boxy and came out very well. It just needs a zipper pull to make it pretty useful.

Having succeeded with the little bag I decided to make a big bag with a vinyl lining....so back to YouTube to watch a few more videos where I gained confidence and went to work.  This bag has nice long handles so it can be carried over the shoulder.  It is meant to hold all my knitting tools in one place, so it is fairly large.  The vinyl sewing part of the project was not as successful as it could have been...but it worked.  The bottom/boxy part of the bag is not right but I am going to leave it.

Small boxy bag

Big zippered lined corduroy bag which is cranberry rather than the cherry it looks in the photo

Note to Self: When I make another lined zippered bag with boxy bottom: measure both lining and outside fabric separately and mark the seam line; sew the seam lines separately; finally--turn the bag right side out and nest the lining into the bag and see if it fits snugly and properly.  If not, re-do.  It will be MUCH easier this way.

Kim called on her way home from North Haverhill where she was called for jury duty.  Because she had time, and because I was actually home, she stopped in for a visit and a tour.  It was so great to have her here.  After a nice visit we both left and I did a few more errands which included stopping at White River Yarns to see if they carried Bartlettyarns since it was too late to get to Country Woolens where I know they DO carry Bartlettyarns.  Karen does not carry this yarn but told me that Hilda Yates' daughter has it at the Plainfield gas station/general store and that they probably were open until at least 7 PM so I took Jonathan and Alissa up on their invitation to supper--delicious fish sticks, french fries, stick fries, and tortilla chips with cinnamon sugar on them which were absolutely fabulous. I amazed myself with my restraint but I only ate one of them which Eldon brought me in the kitchen to test!

More errands after supper (Home Depot, Joann, etc) and after driving to Plainfield and finding EXACTLY the yarn I needed to continue on with the patriotic afghan I started using Barbara Walker's Learn to Knit Afghan book three years ago--had finished five blocks and used up most of the light cornflower blue yarn.  While driving to Boston the other day I finished the cornflower yarn so...

Home by 8:30 and immediately started the Joann knitting class project demo piece--a cabled handbag.  Robbie caught me up at 11:30 again!  I had made several gauge swatches but finally just decided to go with the size 7 needles.  I can only hope it was the fatigue that made me do it because I forgot how much cables pull in the yarn so perhaps the size 10.5 needles really were the right ones to use.  Oh well.  Good practice.