Goodbye.

Robert Nielsen
Robert Nielsen was born March 16, 1921 in Chicago and died in his sleep August 25, 2006 in Salisbury, North Carolina. Preceding him in death was his high school sweetheart and wife of 54 years, the late Dorothy, nee Scovie, Nielsen; loving father of two sons, Robert (Charlene) and John (Vicki) Nielsen; four grandchildren, Christian, Nicholas, Kirsten and Jason and six great-grandchildren, Hunter, Tanner, Brenna, Caetlin, Alyssa and Ashley. Before and after World War Two, Rob worked briefly with Tews Funeral Home and U.S. Steel. During WWII Rob served with the 82nd Airborne Division and participated in every deployment of the 82nd Airborne. The invasion of North Africa, Sicily and Italy before going to England to get ready for D-Day. In the early hours of June 6, 1944 he went into France by glider landing near Ste. Mere Eglise. During operation Market Garden he again went into battle in a glider and received a Purple Heart for injuries sustained in Holland. Towards the end of the war he was part of a group that liberated the Nazi concentration camp near Ludwigslust, Germany. Like many who have witnessed mans inhumanity to man, Rob very seldom spoke of his wartime experiences. Rob Nielsen was a devoted funeral director and General Manager for the Donnellan Family Funeral Homes both on the South Side of Chicago and the North Shore for over thirty years. His dedication to his profession and the Donnellan Family will be forever appreciated and remembered. Rob's family requested a private service for their father, grandfather and great-grandfather at Florida National Cemetery in Bushnell Florida. Info: Donnellan Family Funeral Services, 847-675-1990 or www.donnellanfuneral.com. Published in the Chicago Tribune from 8/28/2006 - 8/29/2006.

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Everything is hard to do right now. Please be understanding if I'm late on some stuff or if I don't get back to you right away. I promise to soon. Thanks... Kiri

Yarn :)

Got this from Amber today! How pretty...


I owe her more yarn now -- she did much better on her yardage than I did. So more spinning for me :) Hope to get that out to her this weekend if all goes well.

Ode to the Postman (Spinning Swap Buddy DO NOT LOOK!!)

This was an exceptionally good mail week for me! Not only did I get my spinning gear, some yarn off eBay and a stack of cool new cookbooks from a relative, but a package from my friend Vlad appeared. (Thanks, Vlad! That was really awesome... expect something in your mailbox in a week or so.) Long story short, Vlad and I practically have the same birthday and he sent me some crafty buttons and a new CD as a present. I know exactly what I'm sending in return, I just hafta get it finished. Anyway, here are the buttons joining some other ones on my bag:


Yay for buttony goodness :) In addition to getting good stuff in the mail, I had some sending out to do... stitch markers for one swap and three skeins of handspun yarn for the other. I didn't get pics of the stitch markers, but here's the yarn:

L to R - Corespun Mohair, Handyed Merino, and 2-ply Coopworth/Corriedale blend.
Here's a closeup of the merino... it was my favorite. The colors rocked.

I hope my swap buddy likes them. Usually I'm too worried that my spinning is bad to let anybody else have some yarn,so this was a real challenge for me. Eeek! Cross your fingers.

Funky Scarf Swap Q&A

Let’s get the allergy part out of the way. Are you allergic to any fibers? SOY like a mo' fo'. Please no soysilk or other such soy-related thangs. There is not enough Benadryl in the world for me to wear a scarf made out of it ;)

Do you prefer any fibers over others? Nah, not really. I'll be happy with any fiber pretty much. But soft wool is better than itchy scratchy wool any day.

Thinking back to Scout’s post about what funky means to you, post an image of something that you think is funky!

Note the peacock feathers, metallic blue paint, and use of fancy-schmancy antique gold picture frames. I totally stole this off of a Craftster post, but that's neither here nor there... hehe.

Would you prefer funky yarn or a funky pattern? I really have no preference here. Hopefully that means I'm an easy swap pal -- just make something you'll enjoy working on. There's nothing worse than dreading picking up a project and having a deadline on top of that, so don't subject yourself to any knitting torture. I can pretty much guarantee ya I'll be a happy camper when the scarf shows up at my house!

What are your favorite colors? Oh, like you couldn't tell. Purple and blue mostly, but I like pretty much anything. Bright colors, soft colors, etc.

What is your favorite piece of art? The Kiss by Klimt.

What colors would you never have up close to your pretty face? Um. I guess maybe lily white would make me look sickly. And hunter green kind of makes me look like a blue-eyed X-mas tree (reddish hair).

Would you prefer an actual scarf or a cowl? Once again, go with the flow. I live in Southern Indiana, so weather is unpredictable here in cold months. I have been known to wrap my scarf around my head, so I'm totally fine with a cowl if you wanna make one.

When you wear a scarf do you prefer a wider/shorter scarf or a thin/long scarf? I want my neck to be warm, but I don't want to strangle myself or look like a mummy. So probably nothing extremely skinny and long. Plus that would suck to knit.

What is the climate like where you live? Cooler weather doesn't hit until October, but this has been an exceptionally mild year. Usually around winter vacation it starts dumping snow and being bitter cold. It's hella windy January-March, too. I frequently walk into class with a tear-stained face because my eyeballs are frozen/windburned from trekking across campus.

Would you prefer a functional scarf (to keep you warm) or one just to funk-up your wardrobe? I'll take either one. By now you've probably figured out that I'm so not picky.

What else would you like your partner to know about you? I hoard peanuts in the kitchen cabinet because I'm hiding a small elephant in the backyard. Okay, not really... I'm just a smartass who saw a jumbo bag of peanuts and decided to buy it. Just so we're clear. :)
(That only makes sense to people who go thru my cabinets in search of munchies. Someday I'll have to post a picture so everybody's in on the joke.)

Photo Medley and Other Mischief

This showed up at my house today.


Finally! I was waiting and waiting... Not to mention using some string and an elastic hair tie as a brake. Now I have a double treadle kit to add and some replacement parts for the brake cable.

I've also been busy doing a little of this:

Dying my mom's unwanted antique linens that she sent down to us. So far we've got purple (what else? my favorite color :) ), kind of an aubergine color, and this scarlet red that unfortunately faded to a deep reddish orange. Think I'll try to fix the red because it was SO pretty until I rinsed the napkins out. Also wanna try some yellow or a dreamsicle orange color.

Been sewing, too. I found a bunch of holiday fabric at the store - Halloween, Turkey Day, X-mas - and they're all going to become aprons. Here's a look:

And a closeup of the fabric. Witchin', no?


And last weekend's great car caper... we scraped the roof liner out of the Studebaker. Well, Dan scraped and I used the awesome orbital sander his dad bought us for our anniversary. It ROCKS. I think it's my new best friend, despite the fact it made me look like this:

Scary. No makeup, bad camera angle, covered in 54 yr old roof liner adhesive and who knows how much mold. Nas-Tee. It took half a bottle of dish soap to get that crap off of my skin and out of my hair. Next time I'll opt for the do rag. Possibly even a turtle neck. ;)

Supplies + Abode = Seriously too many pictures.

Two mailbox suprises today: 1) we got our deposit refund from the old apt. AND 2) I got spinning fibers from Hello Yarn (with some cool freebies).

No pictures of the refund check though... it was quite a pittance after all that waiting.

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Okay, this is mostly for my family and friends who might actually want to know what our new place looks like... but you got your crafty fix earlier, so it's okay, right???

So we take a little picture of the living room...


And we turn around and take a quick one of Dan in The Corner Ye Shall Not Speak Of (full o' fabric and a loom),

Then rotate and take a picture of the kitchen,


And wander over and take one of the bedroom,

Then mosey on into the bathroom and drool at the glorious tub. This is where I hide out and peruse knitting supplies whilst trying not to dunk Dan's laptop. Shh, don't tell...


And before anybody flips out and talks about how much furniture there is for two poor graduate students: it's all pretty much hand-me-down stuff from my mom's house. It's nice to have a mom who likes to rotate her furniture out every once in a while :)