WAYWO is a weekly series - What Are You Working On - for all things creative and crafty.  

Please share what you are working on, and post the pictures if you have them.  

I promised a Cake Decorating Lesson, but alas, that diary is not finished.  I will share slices of cake though, from the final birthday cake, and share the finished picture.  

No, not this kind - we're in a different kind of war here. And it starts on May 9.

The war is conducted with these sticks and some very fine and beautiful string ... er, yarn.

Yes, it's time for SOCK WARS III!!!

We've been enjoying our weekly WAYWO chats for a while now. Well, except when my real life intervenes (or my increasingly spongy brain forgets) and I don't post it like I should. Therefore, I'd like to open WAYWO to a rotating schedule of hosts.

I've made a Gmail calendar for the rotating hosts' reference. Please message me through the Yahoo! WAYWO Group if you'd like to host. If you are not already a member (and you want to host) you must join to send messages.

Now, housekeeping done for the time being ... Let's talk about what we're working on!

In the late 1980s, GM launched the "Not Your Father's Oldmobile" campaign in an effort to revive interest in the brand. The Olds is now defunct, but the tagline lives on in various forms, pushing the idea that old is bad, new is better and that the previous generations are hopelessly square.

At the same time, though, PBS launched a series of reality programs that documented modern families' attempts to live as their forbears might have -- in a frontier house, or in the 1900 house.And you know what? It's hard! Those old folks lived differently than we do and had to invent their own solutions to their particular problems. Perhaps there's a lesson here about learning from the old ways.

All things crafty!  Many mediums - hard, soft, or combinations.  

This is an emergency substitution, so pretty thin.  Still longer than about half the diaries I've seen this week though ;-)

So Share:  Write!  Post pix if you've got them or ask for help if you don't know how!

Yep, I'm back. Didja miss me?

We've been across the country and back, and have seen a lot of beautiful countryside, and we've met a lot of friendly people. But, I must say, it's good to be back home.

I had hoped to get my act together enough to upload some pictures to Photobucket for you, but, alas, I am a slacker. So, no photos this week. I'll try for next time.

Well, I'm not quite sure who's where, but I figured I'd toss this up anyhow.

Hope Spring has sprung where you are.  We still have big patches of snow on the ground here, but my daffodils are poking through the soil.

I haven't seen a WAYWO for two weeks!  Not since monkeybiz talked about 93% problems.

Our fearless leader, emerald maiden, is in the middle of a move.  

So I wanted to give us a place to chat and share, a refuge in the storm.  Please post pix of the stuff.

So, What Are You Working On ?  Textiles, ceramics and glass and polymers - home improvement, anything DIY, you are all welcome here.  

I have a confession. When I am about 93 percent done with a given project, I have the urge to just put the damned thing down and start something else.

Yup, it's a sunny Sunday afternoon in Tucson. I'm thinking how much I will miss the mild winters here, since we'll be leaving Tucson for Delaware on the 29th of this month.

Even though I have tons of packing left to do, and plenty of purging, too, I have still managed to get in some knitting time.

I made a cute little Feather & Fan facecloth for my mom:

What Are You Working On? is a weekly community series for all things crafty and hand-made.  Our dear emeraldmaiden is away from her computer this afternoon.

In my user name, there is a q for quilt; a k for knit; and a w for weave.  Long ago, yahoo limited a new user id to 8 characters.  And those were my three favorite hobbies at the time.  I still quilt and knit.  About the time I got a grip on weaving, I finally became and stayed pregnant.  I dropped that hobby before I became overly involved, to simplify (ha!) my life.

I also recently tried a new medium of self-expression and art, and have pictures below the fold.  So come and share - what you're working on, what you finished (yeah!), and any questions . . .

At the end of this month, my husband, two cats, and I are moving across the country, returning to Delaware. Thank goodness it's a leap year - we have that extra day!

Unfortunately, we are moving back to assist Rich's elderly parents, and will be living in a makeshift apartment in their house until we can determine how much distance is possible. ;) In the meantime, our style will most definitely be cramped.

To prepare for this move, and the attendant downsizing, we are going through a major purge of our possessions. This is, I think, a good thing for us. Like most Americans, we really have too much "stuff'.

Except for the craft stuff.

Hi, everyone!

It's a last-minute, late edition of WAYWO this week; I am just now home from helping my sister with some of her packing and moving. She's moving to Seattle on the 15th. Then I got to come home, write this quickie little WAYWO, and get back to my own packing; we're moving to Delaware on the 29th, if not a few days earlier.

I'm still finding project time, however! My first sock is still merely a half - I've turned the heel, but not picked up the gusset stitches, so there is no foot. I have a sun facecloth half-done for my mom's February 25th birthday, and I picked up yarn to make hats and scarves on the way to Wilmington.

One day, a few years ago, I was browsing through Off Fifth with my now-ex sister in law. For those who don't know, Off Fifth is Saks Fifth Avenue's outlet store. We had fun, saw lots of things, but we bought nothing.

One thing that caught my notice was a hand-crocheted sweater. It was hand-crocheted (I don't think they've been able to teach a machine to crochet yet, have they?) of tiny granny squares. It wasn't something I would wear, to be sure, but it was on the cute side. It was priced at $80.

Even at the time, pre-Daily Kos, I wondered - who actually made this sweater, and how much did they get paid for their labor? I'm guessing they didn't get paid much, and that they weren't working for union pay, either.

Okay, I knit. I know many of you WAYWO'ers do, too. But I never considered knitting to be an extreme sport.

Enter Sock Wars.

Sock Wars is a twist on the game Assassin, whose other variations require participants to shoot assigned target players with water pistols or Nerf weapons or tag them with spoons. Such games are played a lot on college campuses.

Julie Gardner, a freelance TV and film production manager near Belfast, Northern Ireland, got the idea for Sock Wars last year after hearing a radio report on StreetWars, an urban Assassin-style tournament involving water guns. Gardner, 31, was planning a follow-up to an online knitting contest she had run and immediately was drawn to the idea of pitting knitters against one another like assassins locked in mortal combat.

No, the players aren't challenging each other with knitting needles - at least, not the way you think.

Yup, it's that time - the last minute frenzy of preparing for the holiday. We are officially down to the wire.

Knitters are frantically knitting.

Crocheters are frantically crocheting.

Every Christmas crafter out there is putting the finishing touches on those gifts, and maybe burning the midnight oil to make sure it all gets done - sometimes under the very noses of the giftees!

Can I get just ONE MORE GIFT done before time's up?? Just a little one?

One thing I have noticed about those of us who craft is that we like to use our talents to help others. Whether that help is monetary donation from the profits of our work, do projects for a cause, or simply make a hat for a cancer patient or preemie, we want to contribute.

A few days ago, EmilyD wrote a lovely diary highlighting Jennifer Marsh's gas station project. You can find it  here, and I urge all of the fiber artists here to contribute their own panel. I know I am. A design is slowly coalescing in my mind ...

There are so many things I wish I had more time to do.  The WAYWO folks who are so creative and productive leave me in awe.  I'm more of a craft hacker, I'm afraid.  

What does WAYWO stand for? "What Are You Working On?" WAYWO is a weekly series about crafts, arts, and DIY. All are welcome to post in WAYWO, and guest hosts are invited to email emeraldmaiden at the address in the profile. WAYWO posts every Sunday at approximately 6:30 pm Eastern time.

If you would like email notification when WAYWO is up, please join our WAYWO Yahoo! Group.

Thanks for visiting WAYWO!