much love monday

Happy Monday!

Here's what I love this week.

this beautiful photo of the fairies, including Vivien Leigh as Titania, from a 1937 film version of 'A Midsummer Night's Dream' 

this cute and easy DIY paper lantern

this painting by Ivan Slavinsky

these cozy socks and flannel shirt-- here's the pattern for the socks!

this idea for a hanging centerpiece-- it won't get moved from the table to the floor halfway through dinner like traditional centerpieces.

Can you tell that I'm ready to jump straight from Halloween into the holiday season?
Enjoy the rest of your day!
♥

fill-in-the-blank friday!

via the little things we do

1. Something I swore I'd never do, but have ended up doing anyway is watching television.  Not a lot, and when I move to my own place I'm not planning on even having a television, but I have to admit-- I get really excited when there's a Storage Wars marathon.  I keep up with a few shows (Once Upon a Time, The Mindy Project, The Office, and sometimes New Girl) on Hulu, but Storage Wars is pretty much the only show I actually watch on tv.

2. Something I've always wanted to do is learn to build furniture.  Not the kits that you just have to put together, but from-the-beginning, ground-up furniture.  I have kind of specific tastes in desks and tables and chairs, that sort of thing, and I'd love to learn to go from sketch to finished object just like I do with fashion design.

3. Something I have absolutely no desire to ever do is drugs.  I know, I'm such a square, but sometimes you don't need to try something to know it's not for you.  A few years ago I had two of my wisdom teeth out and there was some complication and I had to be given a second dosage of general anesthetic.  When I woke up I was completely out of it.  Seeing my mom's face when she realized I didn't really know where I was or what was happening was just heartbreaking, and I couldn't imagine voluntarily doing something that could lead to that same reaction.  So yeah, nope, not for me.

4. The best thing I ever did was going back to FIT for my senior year after losing my dad the summer before.  It didn't seem like a major feat at the time-- I was grateful to have something positive to focus on and put my energy toward-- but looking back on it, I'm proud of that.  

5. When it comes to trying new things, I am open to it as long as I'm prepared.  

6. One thing I've never done is gone to a drive-in movie.  I want to though-- it seems like so much fun!  And it might be a good option for Marissa and me, since we cannot stay quiet at the movies.

7. My favorite thing to do is ...oh jeez.  I have a lot of favorite things to do.  Designing, knitting, drinking tea, cuddling the kitties, going to concerts, walking, spending time with Marissa... too many favorite things to choose from!

Happy Friday, everyone!

♥

on the needles: busy bee blanket!

Happy Thursday, everyone!

I mentioned on Monday that I had a fun new knitting project-- and here it is!

I've started the beekeeper's quilt!  It's a blanket made of lots of little hexagonal puffs (affectionately known as hexipuffs!).  

Here's one of my favorites-- a little cottage puff!

And here's my speckled egg puff.

And sometimes Bucky tolerates having them balanced on his head.

I'm up to 23 hexipuffs after a week of alternating them with working on my Moonpie Shawl.

The shawl is now finished, so until I cast on something else (maybe a sweater from Little Red in the City?), I'll be knitting away on these little guys full time!  I'm going to hide little treasures sewn among the hexipuffs, too-- little antique keys I've collected, sparkly beads, a vintage subway token, and whatever other little bits and pieces I find!  Eeeeeep I'm so excited about it!  This is going to be a long-term project, so I'll have lots of time to accumulate pretty things to put in.  Also, if you're knitting your own beekeeper's quilt, I'd love to trade mini-skeins of sock-weight yarn!  Just leave a comment or send me an email at julie@julierosesews.com.

Have a wonderful day!

♥

happy halloween!

Happy Halloween!

Obviously I'll be spending the evening perched saucily on a giant pumpkin, showing some leg and wearing a sophisticated owl headpiece.

Well... that or hugging the kitties and watching It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown!

Y'know.

One or the other.

We'll see.

Have a happy Halloween!

♥

much love monday

Well, hi there!

I hope everyone in the path of the storm is staying safe!

It's drizzling here, but that's about it.

Here are a few things I love this week.

this mouse treehouse!   I love that there's a little mudroom at the bottom to avoid muddy little pawprints in the house.

this sheepy sweater

these kitties-- my cats totally play the tail-batting game, too.  the key seems to be for one kitty to be going crazy while the other looks totally uninterested.

this sweet beehive illustration... which is also a hint at a knitting project that will be revealed later in the week.  hint hint hint. 

these beautiful flowering fields and trees

this beautiful illustration for the e-book companion to A Fine Frenzy's new album-- my favorite part is the kiwi wearing carefully constructed wings so he wouldn't be left out.

I hope your week is off to a wonderful start!

♥

amigurumi!

Hi there!

I'm still knitting away on my Moonpie Shawl, and it's grown a lot!  But now each row is more than 700 stitches long, and it can get a little monotonous sometimes.  I like to throw in fun little projects every now and again to keep things interesting.  Lately I've been making amigurumi-- crocheted treats and creatures with happy little faces!

they like to hang around with their mini-pumpkin pal

I'm going to keep making amigurumi and attach fishing line loops so I can put them on my Christmas tree!

I hope you're having a wonderful day!

♥

fill-in-the-blank friday

1. The best feeling in the world is when I'm feeling especially creatively inspired and 'in the zone.'  When I get in that mindset, it truly feels like designs are just drawing themselves, or solutions to a problem are just appearing in a list.  It's so refreshing, too-- when I have to go do something else, I feel as energized as if I'd had a fantastic nap.

2. My favorite smell is the way the air smells when the seasons are changing.  The 'first real day of autumn' and the 'first day of spring without a winter coat even though it's not really warm enough yet' smells are two that I particularly like.

3. My favorite taste is warm chocolate chip cookies and milk.  Or peanut butter and homemade strawberry jam.  (Apparently I have the culinary preferences of a semi-sophisticated five-year-old.)

4. The most beautiful thing I've ever seen was the way my parents looked at each other.  They remained, as my dad would have put it, "a young couple, very much in love" for every moment of their time together on this plane of existence.

5. The best sound ever is, and I hate to be such a fangirl here, but I think it's when The Hold Steady are playing a concert and Craig Finn just has such infectious joy in his voice, like there is nothing in the world he'd rather be doing than sharing that experience with the audience.  The sounds of being in the forest and the sound of happily purring kitties are pretty great, too.

6. A smell that reminds me of my childhood is the smell of a fire in a woodstove with pear slices drying on the top.  I smelled that walking in the door after school every fall for as long as I can remember.

7. My favorite of all the senses is touch.  I think its because I'm in such a tactile field.  Obviously sight is important for fashion design, but unless someone spends the entire day looking in the mirror, the thing they'll notice most about the clothes they're wearing is how they feel.  This is part of why I love knitting and spinning so much, too, there's such an emphasis on how things feel-- the yarn, the roving, the feel of bamboo knitting needles or metal ones, or the feel of a knitted fabric.

Have a lovely weekend!