Warm Fuzzies

Is it totally pathetic that so far the high point of my day is that I had my favorite lean cuisine (sesame chicken) for lunch? My boss is driving me nuts with her "optimistic" attitude toward work. She thinks "go along to get along" is some kind of empowering philosophical choice. I hate being here with every fiber of my being.

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The good news is that I took a look at some of my new craft books and wrote up a couple of reviews. I am way behind on reviewing, and I think some will probably fall through the cracks, but I couldn't let it happen to this book:

Warm Fuzzies: 30 Sweet Felted Projects
by betz white

I love every project in this book. You should look over some of the projects in Betz's blog to see if this stuff is for you, but I'm sort of a Mary Engelbreit fan--love the bright and whimsical--so I dig the betz white.

The book is divided into five sections: an info section, projects for the home like pillows and throws, projects for kids and pets, accessories for the home like aprons and pincushions, and accessories for you like hats and purses. In addition to working with felted sweaters, the projects use wool felt, needle felting, and shibori.

The "how to" section is fabulous. It contains tips and tricks for felting and working with the resulting material (so could have used that before I made this). It's very visual. The projects are just yummy. (Did I say yummy?) The little girl's teacup jumper almost makes me want to have kids kidnap an adorable little girl make it and give it to the first little girl I find. (Unfortunately, sizes for that project range from 2T-4T and my favorite girls are a skinny 6X and a tall 7.) I even like the cat bed, and I'm extremely allergic to cats and can't tolerate the thought of them. Not only am I attracted to every project, I really feel like I could make them all; the instructions are so clear. FYI: the patterns are part of the book (not printed separately) and most need to be enlarged.

One complaint: I have been haunting thrift shops for a while now and I just can't find the adorable wool knits like she gets. Where are all the cute wool sweaters? If only I had known, I could have kept all those things I bought at Carol Reed--I had about 30 Fair Isle and other "preppy" wool sweaters when I was in high school. They'd be so cute as these projects!