Sorry, Slow Postings Lately

I'm in the middle of the Christmas Rush and the very tail end of catnip picking before the snow comes and kills the last of the plants off for the year.

 

Stockpiling catnip all summer has been an on/off thing with the rain, but I think I have enough. I aim to accumulate enough to fill 25 paper ream boxes with the dried leaves/flowers.  I'm at 29 boxes this year and there's still stuff drying in the garage on the tarp that I have to strip off the stems yet. Potentially two more boxes.  Anything else picked will have to dry inside, we've hit freezing temps lately at night.

 

Right now the most in demand item is the catnip mice.  I've got maybe 4 more weeks then orders will die down and things will be back to normal, allowing for some more creativity here.  I have two full rooms of fabric, at some point it needs to get made into things, not be added to every time I pass a fabric store.  There is no truth to the saying 'they who die with the most fabric, wins!', no siree, if you die with rooms full of fabric it just means there's going to be a HUGE rummage sale after the funeral. That or it'll make a funeral pyre you can see for 30 miles.  Ha!

 

I like the unicorn horns I finished up, the flocked texture of the upholstery fabric is very soft and the spiral designs lasered into the fabric look sort of Celtic on the horns.  The yard of fabric made 32 horns about a foot long. I put catnip in each one and I'm sure they'll all go fast at the Renaissance fair.  The store didn't have any more of that fabric so this may be a one shot item.  Sometimes it goes like that.

 

Two things I haven't tried yet but am looking forward to designing are the shrimp pita cat toys and the sushi wraps, which I've made once before but I think I can eliminate one of the steps. The sushi wrap is a black cone with stuff out the one end - sort of like a black ice cream cone but shorter.  Rice, veggies and a curled shrimp (all very small) sewn in on the end makes it a fairly time intensive thing but if I can eliminate one of the steps it would shorten the sewing time down a bit.  Reworking how I made the rice would help too. Last time I did white fleece balls I stuck in and tacked around the edge.  There's a number of other ways to do it though. Just takes a little thinking time.