Sometimes you should look down, Part Four: Porous Palm Remains

Submitted by ailuros on Thu, 2012-02-02 13:24

Once in a while you’ll see something really weird if you spend enough time looking down.  I’ve seen the holes that palms (mostly Sabal palmetto, Sabal Palm, in this area) leave when they finally die.  I’ve even seen palms that look like they have melted because the inside has rotted away but the outside is left relatively intact.  palm bits 012

But I’ve never seen this before.  

Bamboo Mitt made with Bamboo Yarn

Submitted by ailuros on Thu, 2012-01-19 17:37

I love this bamboo stitch pattern.  I wanted to make something with it, and it has (sort of) been mitt weather here in Florida, so I thought a bamboo mitt would be fun.  Usually when I think of something I try to find out if anyone else has made it, and when I first searched I didn’t find much (there are lots of mitts made of knit fabric containing bamboo out there, and it’s almost asbamboo mitt palm tough to search for the stitch pattern for similar reason).  I did forget to look at Ravelry at first, which had a few things with the stitch pattern, including these bamboo field mitts.  I had something just a bit different in mind, and I’d found the perfect yarn.  I like knitting in the round, but I wanted to make something a bit simpler and

Meet Rigel!

Submitted by ailuros on Thu, 2012-01-12 19:07

rigel the puma

This is Rigel, Namir’s cousin, a puma.  I was actually planning to put him together first, to practice a new pattern with familiar fabric, but right from the start that presented problems.  So Namir was practice, and Rigel came next once I knew what I was doing.  He’s made of flannel (solid aqua) and quilting cotton (blue dot print and white cloud print).  I gave him big dark eyes and moved his ears up a little after seeing how Namir came out.  He looks like a warm weather cat, like an equator Puma, and Namir looks like an Amur leopard ready for winter, especially when you see them together!

Meet Namir!

Submitted by ailuros on Thu, 2012-01-05 19:11

leopard front

Here’s Namir!  He’s a plush leopard and my first attempt at sewing a stuffed animal.  (I used the Funky Friends Factory Larry the Lion pattern, but for some reason I’ve never been a huge lion fan, so I left the mane out and chose a print fabric.)

I’m not entirely happy with the result, but I’m not entirely unhappy either. 

Amigurumi Roly Poly Cat Family

Submitted by ailuros on Thu, 2011-12-22 09:50

roly poly cats family

I’m on a quest for cute crocheted cat patterns.  Unfortunately, my definition of cute – when it comes to cats at least – doesn’t seem to match most everyone else’s.  Someday I’ll design my own, but I’m not that experienced with crochet yet. 

In the meantime I did come across Puchitomato’s pattern for a roly poly cat amigurumi and I ran with it.  When I was making the first one (blue, green and yellow), I thought of how neat it would be to have them be the main decoration on a Christmas tree.  Being between the size of a baseball and a softball, it wasn’t quite going to work for our small tree (it would be great near the bottom of a very large tree). 

Feigned Innocence plus catnip toy tips

Submitted by ailuros on Thu, 2011-12-15 17:52

The other day Neko was trying to get into the dogs’ dishes.  She’s always trying to sneak their food (she doesn’t care if it’s dry or wet, she just wants it), so we store the dishes under the bottom shelf of the rack near where we feed them while they’re not interested in eating or are outside.  Neko was trying to reach between the wires of the shelf to pull out food.  I always ask her what she’s doing when she does this, but this time she stopped and looked at me, said “meow!” just like she was saying “nothing!” and then went right back to it.  I can’t believe she thought I would believe that.

Something else Neko really goes for is catnip, and I’ve learned a few things about keeping catnip toys interesting:

Sometimes you should look down, part 3: Baby Rats

Submitted by ailuros on Mon, 2011-12-12 18:52

Baby rat near Lake Jesup

I found this little guy in the middle of September near Lake Jesup while walking an overgrown trail where the grass was nearly over my head. I heard multiple squeaks behind me in the grass just off the trail. (It pays to pay attention to what you hear too!) Based on the sounds, there were at least three mice/rats in the area, possibly more. The one I managed to get a picture of went a different direction from the others, and continued they all continued to squeak. A little later I heard some of the same squeaks at another spot further from the lake, but in a similar tall-grassy area.

Parting with a fabric scrap

Submitted by ailuros on Fri, 2011-12-09 19:01

2dzoo scrap I’ve been hoarding this scrap for a while.  Even though I’d used all the bits with the tiger (one of my favorite animals), I still did not want to do anything with it.  It’s also on the small side for the things I’ve been making.  But then I was able to get another huge piece and I’ve started learning to piece scraps together, so it seemed to finally be the right time to do something with that scrap!

I’ve been making notepad covers lately (from this notepad cover pattern), and this was about the right size.  I sketched out how my ideas would fit with the measurements so I could use a (relatively) solid piece of fabric for the lining and figure out what sizes to cut the other pieces.

Sometimes you should look down, part 2: Sundew

Submitted by ailuros on Thu, 2011-11-17 13:00

The sundew pictured to the right (I believe it to be Drosera brevifoliaClick to Enlarge) is teeny-tiny, about an inch across.  You could step on one -- or several -- without even realizing it. Normally I find sundews near lakes or ponds, but last week I was hiking a trail that went through some scrub and transitioned to a slightly wetter flatwood and to the side of the trail, where fewer people step, there were some tiny red sundews.

Helpful Yarn Tags

Submitted by ailuros on Mon, 2011-11-14 18:40

My yarn stash was starting to be everywhere, rather than in the boxes meant for it, so it was time to reorganize.A simple cardstock tag for identifying a ball of yarn  While I was winding the skeins into balls, I thought of these yarn tags to mark which ball is what.  It will be easier to choose a yarn for a project or buy more without having to keep track of all the ball bands (I have a bag with many in it, but I have, of course, already lost some). Some of my yarn looks pretty similar to each other as well, but the difference can be important (a yarn with some wool vs. an almost identical yarn sans wool).

To make yarn tags you will need:

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