ETC First Monday SALE!

ETC First Monday sale!! ♫ ☀☀ It's time again for ETC's First Monday SALE

http;//cordovastudios.etsy.com is offering:

FREE 100yd. skein of undyed Lincoln with purchase of $15 or more. I will honor my sale from 12a.m. Monday June1 until 8 am Tuesday (June 2nd) morning! 

Check out our promo thread: http://www.etsy.com/forums_thread.php?thread_id=6170555 ☀☀

 ♫~☀☀ ♫~ ♥♥All buyers in Texas will be charged a sales tax of 8.25% through Paypal. 

Proud member of Etsy Texas Crafters! Check out our team shop: http://etsytexascrafters.etsy.com

My favorite place in Texas

Right now, at this moment in my life, my very favorite place in Texas is my own backyard right here on this little lake right in the heart of East Dallas. Peaceful, inhabited by waterfowl, all kinds of other birds and full of wonderful shades of green and the lovely sound of silence. The fishing is good if you care to bait a hook. Hot dogs as bait will land you a granpa catfish. I have decided I am a true Taurean. I love "Home". I love being home, spending time with my "things", doing my "thing", creating, my "things". Nothing better than being HOME.

Super splashy day

After a quiet two days of indulging in fiber projects in my studio, the holiday weekend was capped off with a lunch and swimming with the fam.  For four hours Zoe only stopped to eat and she did that standing up.   Otherwise, she was in the water.  Charley is much braver this year:  "jumping" into the kiddie pool and paddling around the big pool with his floaties.  I remember summers, first as a girl, and then as a mom, heavily weighted with full days at the pool.  So delightful to see my grandkids loving it too.

Trinket hates it that she can't come.

Baby Blankets and Handspinning=perfect weekend time

I have been spinning some very fine yarn out of blue merino
mixed with seacell and clear angelina. I plied it last night
and am so pleased to have finally created a delicate yarn
on my spinning wheel.
I'm currently knitting up a fluffy baby blanket for my nephew and niece-in-law's (is that a word?) little baby girl who is due in early July. I'm using up a huge stash of Sirdar's Snowflake yarn. It's not very pleasant to knit but makes a blanket the little ones love.
It's been a quiet weekend full of my own projects with no time constraints.
Love it!

Green heron visiting my backyard

I sat on my back porch knitting while chatting on the phone with a friend in Taos when this guy flew in for a visit.  As I live on a small lake, waterfowl are frequent visitors but I had never gotten to see the vivid coloration of the male before.  What a treat.  These are photos from the web as my camera was in the house at the time.

My travel into geek-dom through Etsy

Getting a shop started on ETSY was and is basically to begin to dissiminate all the fiber I had accumulated and continue to acquire in a viable way.   Well, that is beginning to happen, and I love it.  But, what I love even more is I am totally consumed with learning more about the geek world of widgets, HTML, site-meters and on and on.  I sit at my laptop with all the accoutrements  you see in the photo and crawl through this new world AND I love it!  I had settled into a slow moving (for me) world of morning walks, a little gardening or spinning, lunch, then more spinning or knitting, with maybe a nap in there and it was all good.  Now I find myself energized and my mind on fire. 

 

Another big perk is finally getting off of "auto" on my Rebel SLR camera and amping up my photography.  A dear friend and my daughter-in-law feed me tips and instructions.  The next big step is trying "RAW" images.  Have to get the manual out to get to that on the camera menu.  Sometimes, I do resort to my Iphone camera for a quicky as I did in this photo.

For me, this just illustrates how we have to keep on learning and being inquisitive.  My dad was a great example of this.  His quick mind was on fire to acquire new info.  His eyes were terrible and he had to use a huge, awkward tabletop magnifying reader but he read the Wall Street Journal every day as well as the daily local paper.  He devoured books on tape from a source for the visually impaired.  He is my hero.

Zoe's first swim team practice

Lots of wet, excited kids demo-ing their "freestyle". She's having a ball

Basket full of fiber goodies headed for Etsy

I spent the afternoon in the studio deciding what should go on Etsy next. Here are some of my choices. Handspuns, handyeds, destash yarns, and some sparkle all made the basket. I will be photographing over the next few days. You can catch some of these before then on my flickr page:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/cordovastudios/

Favorite things from Saturday at SWAK

Ok, the little cap-sleeved jacket was not part of anything but I just love it.  Knit sideways, it a Debbie Bliss pattern that I will be 

searching for.  The square with embellishments

was done by Maryann in Mags Kandis's 

embellishing class.  I love the mirrors. and the 

flower on the left is a button.  Too cute!

I've gotten lots of ideas for my projects, jackets

and shawls being at the top of the list.    "Tempting"

is a new fav  yarn line dyed by Sherry.  Great colors.

Her Glam line is sprinkled with sparkles.  May have 

to have some that.  Tomorrow is Shaping shawls with

circles and curves.  Stay tuned.

Wendy Johnson workshop

Here is my "toe" for my toe-up socks. I think I got it but of was a struggle for sure

Off to S.W.A.K. in Guthrie, OK

I have wanted to go to this KNITOUT for three years but life kept getting in the way.  This afternoon a friend and I are loading up my car and heading up the road!  Guthrie, Ok. is the largest contiguous historic district in the US  featuring Victorian architecture antiqueing plus it has a great Knit Shop.  

I will be taking two workshops with Wendy Johnson, author ofSocks from the Toe-Up

and one workshop with Joan Schrauder on Shaping Shawls-Circles and Ovals.

Trinket says, "Mom's leaving AGAIN??"

Just added more Destash listings to Etsy store!

These are some of my handdyed bulky yarns from my 

rug-weaving days.  These days I have had  fun felting them into 

totes and rugs.

“Mimi days” are Thurs.  Charley and I usually hit Buckie’s for a “cow” milk, that would be a Horizon vanilla milk, and Madeleines for him and a decaf grande, skinny vanilla latte for me.  Then we head to my house for driveway fun.  He loves his vehicles.  The faster the better.  Should I be scared???

Mother's Day Flowers

These flowers from daughter, Kathleen, are in a vintage Spode pitcher that was my mother’s.  Makes me feel that the generation circle is complete for this year’s Mother’s Day.   Flowers and time with my family make for a special, special day.  I am blesssed!