I have heard from several of you that if I am going to write about my crafting, I really should put up some pictures. Thank you for your (gentle) nudging, I really do appreciate it. Although I still haven’t taken a picture of the first element I completed in my Periodic Tablecloth of Elements, I promise I will soon. What I can share are photos of the stuffed animals I recently 
made for my niecelettes and a small piece of fabric I wove while I was in Lake Placid.
Back in the Spring, my niecelettes chose some fabric and asked me to make them a dog and a bear. The bear was easy. I found a good, free pattern online. The dog was much harder. I spent quality time online trying to find a decent pattern for a dog. Most of them just added a dog head to a generic body. There were some dachshund and scottie patterns that I tried, but they each had their own set of issues. Finally, I gave up and bought a fox pattern thinking I could modify it using pieces of the problematic patterns to make something that looked like a dog.
As you can see, I didn’t quite succeed. Everyone except for my niecelette referred to it as a cat. My niecelette named it Doggy Lindsay Schweber, I guess as a way to remind people what it was supposed to be.
This is also the project that made me cry uncle and replace my new-fangled, computerized sewing machine with a much more manual (but not at all basic) Singer. I love my new sewing machine and have a renewed appreciation for doing things the old fashioned way.
I discovered weaving a few years ago when I purchased an extremely basic lap loom at a garage sale. I find weaving to be very peaceful and meditative and really wish I could do it more. But, my beloved cat, Dancer Salvador Dali Snotmonster Ratbastard (that really is his full name, everything but Dancer–the name he came with– coming from his habits or traits) thinks weaving is an invitation to play with the shuttle. So although weaving may be my favorite craft (at least to date), it is the one I do the least.
David’s family makes an annual sojourn to a house in Lake Placid that has been in my stepmother-in-law’s family for generations. The house has a playroom filled with games and toys that have been brought there over the years. It is also where the modem & router live. The first full day of our visit, I went into the playroom to fix the router (no, the Tech Whisperer does not take vacations) and I saw a basic lap loom, not all that dissimilar from the one I have at home, sitting on a pile of games. Obviously, finding a loom necessitated a trip to the local yarn store for something to weave with. I found some nice yarn and decided it was time to try a pattern I had never tried before. Here are the photos:
My oldest niece (for the sake of clarity, my nieces are my brother-in-law & sister-in-laws’ kids and my niecelettes are my brother & sister-in-law’s twins) took the fabric home and is using it as a blanket for one of her dolls.
I promise I will get some photos of elements up here soonish.