Owl & Acorn

swallowtail

2009-06-26T15:07:00.000-07:00

this is something i finished several weeks ago...i don't know why i haven't bothered to blog it, since i am so darn impressed with myself for finishing it. you'd think i'd want to do a little showing off. never mind. here it is now!

i started this swallowtail shawl several months ago (like, almost a year ago. yeah, that long). it was to be my first big lace project, and i began the shawl with much enthusiasm. well, let's just say that enthusiasm didn't last. i used lifelines throughout, and though i was glad to have them, it was still discouraging to have to rip back a repeat (or at one fool-hardy point...four! i got a lot more serious about the lifelines after that). so though my mistakes were all easily fixed, each simple error was often enough for me to shelve the project for months at a time. i guess i don't deal will with adversity!

finally, finally, i decided it was time to just get it done already. when i picked it up for the last time, i was on the final repeat of the budding lace chart, just about to start the lily of the valley chart (with the infamous nupps!). well, it turns out that the nupps were way more my style. i loved making them! the last few charts went exceedingly fast, and i actually found myself binding off this sucker. my reward was my first true blocking-as-alchemy experience. sure, i've blocked sweaters and hats and color-work pieces and whatnot before, and it makes your stitches look even and the finished piece smell pretty, but wow! i had no idea. i had sort of mixed feelings about the shawl until i soaked it, pinned it out on my bed, and came back four hours later. it was perfect! i mean, it definitely wasn't perfect, but to my eyes, i was just so impressed that i had made something so intricate and beautiful. lace...it's really something crazy, isn't it?

pattern: swallowtail shawl, by evelyn clark
yarn: jamieson's ultra, 1.5 skeins, in clematis
needles: size 5
mods: none!

oh, bloggy!

2009-06-11T21:26:00.000-07:00

my mom has mentioned several times that i haven't posted on my blog in a while, so i better post something!

i actually have quite a little stockpile of finished projects. here are two:

first up, the adorable saartje's booties (rav link), for my niece, greta. these were to match the apple hat and quilt that i made her a while back. they turned out so cute, and they fit her (at least for a while)!

i used the debbie bliss cshmerino i had leftover from the hat, and some cute little apple buttons that i had in my button stash. an easy and sweet project!

next...i did another weaving project. this was a scarf that i made for a ravelry friend in sweden. we decided to do a little swap, and i sent her this scarf, along with a few other odds and ends. it was supposed to be a log cabin weave, but i did something wrong...i have no idea what, but it isn't log cabin. any weavers out there have any idea where i went wrong? i like how it looks anyway, but it would be nice to figure the log cabin out at some point.

the yarn was "weaving yarn," whatever that means, that i bought from my favorite local yarn store--it's harrisville designs new england shetland. it's a very rustic yarn, and it came in beautiful colors, so i thought i'd give it a try. it felt ok while weaving, but when i took the scarf off the loom, i was pretty sure i had just woven the itchiest, scratchiest piece of fabric ever. it felt like a burlap sack! i panicked, and prayed it would soften up after blocking. thankfully, it softened considerably, and developed a pretty nice drape as well. it's still not the softest thing ever, but definitely wearable. i think i will stick with my nice sock yarns for weaving from now on though!

that's it for now. i'm turning 30 this weekend, and i have to go finish making the lillet marshmallows that i'm making for my birthday picnic!

storm clouds are comin'

2009-05-01T18:40:00.000-07:00

hello! it's really me this time! and i finally finished something! my non-knitting run is still going pretty strong...i'm knitting, just not very much. i think the tide is turning though...i hope so. i miss finishing things, and i have several nice things that are nearly done if i just got a little bit of inspiration.

i cast on for this project right after lolly posted pictures of her completed storm cloud shawlette, because i instantly knew that i wanted to use the alchemy temple yarn that i won last year in the knitters for obama raffle to make one of my own. i felt like it would be a really good match for the yarn, and would allow this variegated yarn to "behave" how i wanted...i always struggle with what to do with variegateds, because i often thing they muddy up a pattern and just look too busy knitted up (though they're so pretty in the skein!), but i thought it might work here.

this was just the easy, mindless knitting i needed! it knit up quickly over a week, and was soon off the needles. i really love this little shawl! the little ruffle is so sweet, and the colors look rich and peacock-ish. this one is going to be a gift, i think, but i will definitely be making another one for myself with a lingering skein of sundara sport merino. it's the perfect project for one or two skeins of really beautiful yarn.

pattern: storm cloud shawlette
yarn: alchemy temple, almost two skeins exactly
needles: size 8
mods: none!

i actually do have other finished things to show, but they are also gifts, so i probably need to wait until they arrive with the recipients before i show those off. soon though!

My Visit with Matthew (and Megan and Greta)

2009-04-27T15:40:00.000-07:00

*edit* this is what i get for leaving myself logged into blogger when i go visit my brother, i guess. i was going to delete it, but i decided to leave it because it made me laugh, and because i've been so lazy about blogging lately. a fake post from someone else is better than no posts from me....right?!

This past weekend I drove to Vancouver to visit my brother Matthew, his wife Megan, and their new baby Greta! Greta is too cute. Megan was great. But what I was the most impressed with was how amazing my brother Matthew is. Not only is he handsome and fit, but he is so smart, caring, and insightful. I have decided that from now on, I will only knit for him. I am going to start a sweater for him now so that it will be ready for him when the fall comes. He's so great!

confession time

2009-04-08T22:15:00.000-07:00

i have a confession to make. with the exception of this evening, when i went to knit night, i haven't knit in a week! not even on the weekend! this just never happens. i'm either stuck or bored with all of my current projects, and what's more, i've been busy with things like yoga and gardening, and just hanging outside in the glorious sunshine we had this weekend. i don't think i've ever had a knitting rut like this before! hopefully it will all be over soon. in the mean time, i don't have much of interest to show here.

i can show the awesome package that jodi sent me last week, though. about a year ago, i signed up for jodi's pay-it-forward deal. the idea was that jodi would send me something in the next year, and in exchange, i would send something to three others, and so on and so on. well, i have another confession to make: i think my year is just about up and i haven't sent my packages off yet! all three are underway though. so kate, karen, and shannon? i'm sorry! just hold tight and i will get them to you very soon.

but let's not focus on my shortcomings...let's focus on the cool stuff jodi sent me! i got a beautiful, squishy spring scarf (which i have already worn tons, and my knitting group loved it!), some gorgeous alpaca/merino sock yarn from the plucky knitter, and some cute sheepy soap (which smells just like snowcake, from lush, one of my favorite soaps ever). and some tea, which is already gone, so i can't show you that. anyway, it was a lovely, lovely thing to receive last week, so thank you so much jodi.

that's all i got for now...hopefully i'll be back soon with something other than excuses!

happy things

2009-03-25T17:41:00.000-07:00

things that are putting a smile on my face these days:

the fact that i FINALLY got a p-patch (or community garden plot, for those not in seattle). i've been on the waiting list for two years now, and i finally, finally got a plot. at my first-choice garden, too, two blocks from my house. i've been lustily browsing through seed catalogs the past few days, planning and scheming for a bountiful garden this summer.
my knitting group's yarn swap that we had last weekend. i offloaded some odds and ends i didn't want anymore, and came home instead with a skein of handspun (love!), a cone of harrisville shetland wool, some vintage mohair/wool blend, some peace fleece, and a few other good things. new-to-me yarn! for free!
cherry blossoms in bloom on my street. though our winter was pretty mild this year, i have been craving spring more than usual. it's finally here!
this story.
this place. and another one opening soon in my own neighborhood!
and finally...these happy, crazy socks! i started these all the way back in july 2008, and they have been my background knitting project since then...the one i turn to when i'm in between projects, or when i just needed something easy. i finally pushed myself to just finish them, and though they are a little loud, they are certainly cheerful.

i wanted to use every last inch of this yarn, so these socks are pretty tall. i did calf-increases, but they are still a tiny bit snug--definitely still wearable. and i'm so pleased with my matchy stripes!

yarn: vesper wee skeins kit
needle: size 1.5, magic looped and knit two at a time (my first time trying this technique, but not my last!)
pattern: really, none. i knit these toe-up, and just kind of winged it. i referred to various online sources for how to do the short-row heel, but i don't remember what they were. i know, lame.

hope you're enjoying your spring (or fall, for those in the southern hemisphere)!

you're a woman, you love to weave*

2009-03-15T18:58:00.000-07:00

i can't believe i haven't blogged in almost a month! i just haven't felt like it lately, despite having quite a few little projects to blog about. but i'm back now, and i'll try to catch up!

i think i mentioned a while back that i bought a cricket loom. well, after a couple of false starts and frustrating hours trying to warp it, i finally figured things out. and i'm really enjoying it! i've made two scarves so far, and i've learned a ton. the learning curve with weaving seems to be pretty quick...by the end of my first scarf i felt really comfortable, and the second one looks miles better than the first. and it's so fast! each scarf took about five hours total, including warping up the loom. not bad!

here's the first one. it is, i believe, 'warp faced,' meaning my up-and-down yarn is longer looking than the weft, or side-to-side, yarn. or something like that. i used up some leftover sock yarn from my chevron scarf, two shades of socks that rock (farmhouse and watermelon tourmaline, if you're keeping track). i figured that those two crazy, disparate colorways looked nice in the chevron scarf, so it might work here too. one thing i love about weaving is how well it works with variegated yarns. i had kind of sworn off buying variegateds some time ago, because i hate pooling, but this has me reconsidering that policy. anyway, for a first project, i think it turned out pretty well. it's more of a scarflet though...i severely underestimated how long to make the warp!

and here is my second scarf! i'm calling it the arizona scarf, because the colors of this yarn really remind me of my home state. the yarn is hello yarn sock yarn, in the nymph colorway, and this skein of yarn is one of the reasons i decided to learn to weave. i just knew it would look really cool as a woven fabric, and i was right!

it looks like a sort of free-form plaid, doesn't it? this one also turned out a little short (i think i've figured out how to correctly calculate my warp length now though, so hopefully i'm done making stumpy scarves), but it's a MUCH more even weave, and my selvedges turned out pretty tidy. i'm so proud of this one!

weaving is so much fun, and i love that i can crank out a scarf in just a few hours. you will definitely be seeing more weaving from me in the future!

*i love this.

fruits of my labor

2009-02-16T23:23:00.000-08:00

wow...it has been an exhausting couple of weeks, culminating in an even more exhausting weekend. my brother and sister-in-law are expecting their first baby (i get to be an aunt!) in about six weeks, and i hosted one shower at my house for friends, and helped host a second shower for family members at my mom's house. two showers in one weekend--i think that is officially my limit! the above pink cookies were my first attempt at french macarons (well, actually third attempt. the first two batches failed!). these were cherry vanilla, and were a hit! i might be a little obsessed with these now.

before all the cleaning and baking, i first did some crafting for the baby. my main gift was an apple-themed baby quilt, which i hand quilted. the fabric was green and yellow apples on one side, and red and white polka dots on the back. it turned out really cute, but alas, i didn't get a proper picture of it before i gifted it. have i mentioned that i hate quilting? i think i am officially retiring from it after this one, which i finished at midnight the night before the shower. i don't think i've felt that kind of relief in a loooooooong time.

to go with the apple quilt, though, i made a matching apple hat--a much more pleasant, and quick, experience. so cute! i love this hat (i kind of want a red one for myself!). you can also see the quilt in the background here.

pattern: apple of our eye
yarn: debblie bliss cashmerino aran, almost one whole ball of the light green, and just a tiny amount for the leave. i used some scrap brown yarn for the stem
needle: size six and size 8

i can't wait to see my little niece wearing this!

the baby showers weren't my only excitement this weekend...my friend and i hit up target on friday for the release of the orla kiely collection. i had been eagerly awaiting this day more than i care to admit...and i may have bought a lot of stuff. this isn't all of what i bought, but isn't it cute! i'm a sucker for those pears.

rubber hubby*

2009-02-01T11:22:00.000-08:00

this winter, i've been cold. really, really cold! we've had less rain than normal, but the good thing about the rain and clouds here in seattle is that they kind of act like a blanket over the whole city. it's actually pretty nice. so less clouds, paired with no functioning heater in our bedroom, means that i get pretty chilly at night. my husband is no help...he always has freezing cold hands and feet, so he actually makes things worse. i decided that what i absolutely needed was a hot water bottle. requires no electricity, is easy to use, and will never, ever be mean and torture me with its cold feet...my perfect solution. and what does my new hot water bottle need but its own little sweater!

i found a free pattern on ravelry, and chose some pretty kool-aid dyed yarn that jenna gave me for my birthday two birthdays ago. i held the yarn double to achieve the called-for chunky yarn, but knew almost immediately that i was going to run out. i also immediately decided to make a lot of changes to the pattern, namely not doing a ribbon/eyelet at the top, and instead doing a button band at the bottom. i knit until i ran out of the pink stuff, then switched to a sort-of matching browny purple cascade 220, which is obviously lighter weight, but it didn't really matter, since i ended the cables with the pink and started up in seed stitch. i can't tell if it looks weird like that or not, but overall i am happy with the end result.

and guess what? this thing really does keep you warm! and wool feels so much nicer against the skin than rubber, so this is one project that is very useful and will be very much appreciated for winters to come.

*while working on this at knit night a week or so ago, amelia informed me that in australia, a hot water bottle is referred to as a rubber hubby. i found that kind of hilarious, so that's what i'll call it from now on too.

pattern: toasty hot water bottle cosy (links to PDF)
yarn: mystery sport-weight wool, dyed with grape kool-aid (and still faintly grape scented!), two skeins held double, plus about a quarter of a skein of cascade 220
needles: size 8
mods: omitted eyelet row, added a seed stitch button band, made six button holes at end, and did not close up the end with the three-needle bind-off as called for.

blog, i missed you!

2009-01-21T13:29:00.001-08:00

i'm back! i have a computer at home again, and can upload photos. i'm like a new woman. actually, it was kind of nice not having the computer at home, especially on weekends. whole days went by where i didn't check my email...and it was good! but still, i'm glad to have what my husband deemed the "fourth member of our family" back.

so...what did i do while i was gone? well, not much. i feel like i go through this phase every january where i'm just really overwhelmed by my desire to make EVERYTHING, all at once. i start tons of projects, and none of them really stick. i just want to finish something, finish everything. it doesn't work so well. so i'm plugging along on my garter yoke cardigan, which i haven't even posted a picture of yet. it's looking really beautiful, and i'm past the waist shaping, so it should be done fairly soon. i'm also working on some smaller projects, plus some deadline baby shower knitting and sewing. hopefully at least some of this stuff will be ready to show off soon.

but first...i absolutely had to make something from this book. i got it with some christmas money, and i immediately fell in love with pretty much every project in the book. i found a blank canvas bag at the thrift store, so the patchwork pocket bag got to be my first project from the book. and it turned out really, really cute, if i do say so myself.

it was a total pain to use the seam ripper to remove the canvas straps (and i stabbed myself once, and bled all over the bag. nice!). but the rest was a piece of cake...definitely my kind of sewing project. i made it one lazy sunday evening, and then hand stitched the pocket onto the bag the next evening. i used a lot of fabric scraps that i had lying around, so the actual out-of-pocket costs for this project was the dollar for the bag. not bad! i will definitely be making more things from this book.

back soon with some knitting! though...i should warn you...something arrived in the mail today to further distract me from my many works in progress. i got one of these!

12 months = 1 year

2009-01-02T11:34:00.000-08:00

wow, it's 2009. i meant to post this yesterday, but our laptop broke, bringing 2009 in with a bit of a heavy sigh and an unintended trip to best buy, who assure us we should have our computer back in 2-3 weeks. that's a long time! so no pictures here, either. but nevermind, i'm sure we'll survive. afterall, what is work for if not to play around on the internet.

anyway...at the beginning of 2008, i made a list of goals for myself--things i hoped to try out, accomplish, or improve upon in the coming year. here's the original list, and here's how i did!

1. i did take a spanish class, and was somewhat surprised to find that it was actually too easy for me. i took a conversational, speaking-focused class, and i realized that i haven't actually forgotten that much of my four years of high school spanish, at least the vocabulary.

2. i did bake bread in my new dutch oven. i also made stews, pot roast, and other yummy things. i love my dutch oven.

3. i just barely did read 30 books this year. nevermind that a couple were audio books, and a couple were graphic novels, but still. if i could rate it on goodreads, i counted it, and my final number was 30, with a 31st finished up yesterday, just a day too late.

4. i made jam three times this year. the first time was a complete, total failure. the second was technically better, but not great. the third time was a success. i think i've got this down now.

5. i got a book about preserving food, but didn't really progress much further than that.

6. i tried to grow some herbs...they all died. i blame the wimpy summer we had. and i am STILL on the waiting list for a community garden plot. it will be two years this spring that i've been waiting. maybe 2009 will be my lucky year.

7. my most exciting accomplishment...i got a REAL bed and a new, memory foam mattress. our mattress is no longer sitting on the floor. best money we spent all year.

8. i knit one sweater, and one little sweaterlet/shrug thingy.

9. major fail on this one. i barely broke out my sewing machine all year.

10. i creweled! and i loved it.

11. i also quilted. didn't love this quite as much, but at least i tried.

12. eat less sugar...hmm. i had mixed results with this one. i did really well at cutting out some of the sugar-loaded culprits in my diet for a while (hello, yogurt. you have a lot of sugar in you). but now i'm kind of back to where i was before. this is definitely something i want to work on again in 2009. oh sugar...why do you taste so good?

so...not 100% successful, but pretty good. i don't think i have too many goals for 2009, other than the sugar goal. i also want to learn to weave this year, and would like to use some of my stash that's been lingering for a while. other than that, i'm taking it easy on myself this year.

happy new year everyone!

short and sweet

2008-12-29T20:06:00.000-08:00

so, i had this lone ball of merino/alpaca blend that i bought in london two years ago. i wanted to do something nice with it, because it's a really lovely yarn that i don't think i can buy here, but i was somewhat limited by just having the one ball. it seems a lot of people have made fetching with this yarn, but i've already knit that pattern three or four times, and i really don't need more fingerless gloves.

(this is a photo of my scarf laying in the snow. did i mentioned we got a LOT of snow last week?)

after a little searching, the anthro-inspired scarflet seemed like a possible match. i saw this project first on jodi's blog, then scattered around ravelry, and it seemed like the solution to all of my problems (or at least the problem of what to do with that ball of yarn!). i cast on one day and finished the next. easy, instant gratification knitting. it required a light steam blocking to get the edges to lay straight, but other than that, i barely wove in the ends before throwing this thing around my neck and wearing it happily (and warmly).

the bonus here is that it really does look like a scarf at anthropologie right now, and that is a major plus in my book (ooh...i got this for christmas. i love it).

pattern: anthro-inspired scarflet (free download on ravelry)
yarn: rooster almerino aran, in colorway "rooster", 1 ball
needle: size 8

that's it! like i said, short and sweet, and now i've finally used that ball of yarn.

comfort and joy

2008-12-24T12:34:00.000-08:00

merry christmas everyone!

i decided this year that i wasn't going to go the handknit christmas gift route this year...i tried that last year and nearly killed myself. but i still managed to make a few gifts this year.

first, grrr, a super cute little lion washcloth, for my friend's daughter. i loved making this! it was super fast and easy too, and making the loop stitch was fun. i definitely recommend this as a fun little gift for kids (or adults!). i'll definitely be making more of them.

next, i made a couple of logcabin pillow toys for my cat and my friend's kitten, using scraps of fabric. i stuffed each with copious amounts of catnip, and i can't speak for my friend's cat, penny, but my darling little spike adores this toy. he can't get enough of it! success!

and finally, for my friends and family this year, i made some cranberry apple preserves and cranberry curd. both were so good! i made sure to keep a jar of each for myself!

that's the extent of my handmade holidays this year...modest, but i think successful.

i hope everyone has a lovely holiday tomorrow, if you celebrate. we are totally snowed in here in seattle...we've gotten well over a foot in the past week and a half, which i realize isn't crazy winter weather for most people, but it's enough to shut this hilly, normally non-snowy city down. i'm hoping to dig my car out and be able to safely drive to my mom's tomorrow.

anyway...i just wanted to take this chance to say thank you to everyone who reads and comments on this little blog, and to everyone whose blogs i read and enjoy. i'm grateful to you all, and am glad to have you in my life!

xx
melissa

my new sweater

2008-12-16T18:07:00.000-08:00

hello! i've suddenly found myself with lots to blog about, knitting and otherwise, so i should actually be posting more often, at least for the next couple of weeks. today though, i wanted to show off my cute new sweater!

i started elizabeth zimmermann's seamless yoke sweater at the end of august. as i do with most big projects, i worked on it for a while, put it down, and picked it back up later. but finally i finished it last week. this was a sweater that was not technically difficult to knit at all, but it was frustrating. i knit the two sleeves first, using the first as my gauge swatch. when i moved on to the body, i used the gauge i calculated from the sleeve to determine my cast-on number for the pattern. well, i really don't know what happened, but my swatch lied. totally lied! i knit along for about ten inches of the body, and even putting in quite a bit of waist shaping, when i tried it on, it was a good three inches too big. the only thing i can figure is that my knitting relaxed somewhat with the long stretches of stockinette. anyway, i wanted a pretty fitted sweater, so this was disappointing. normally, i am not good about ripping things out and redoing them. if it's a small item, and it's for me, i'm usually happy to live with my mistake. but this time, i felt like not redoing the body would mean i would never wear the sweater. so i knit the body again, and i'm really glad i did. the finished sweater fits me perfectly...almost like it was made for me!

this sweater is really all about the yoke, and i gave what i wanted to do for my yoke some serious thought. i knew i wanted something simple, but not plain. i really loved the color of the yarn (a beautiful blue somewhere between robin's egg and turquoise, with olive and fuschia tweedy flecks), and i kind of wanted that to be the focus. when i saw blueskysun's (rav link) ribbed yoke version of the sweater, i knew i had found my solution. she was kind enough to give me some pointers on how she did her own yoke. i think it's quite genius on her part--the ribbed yoke is very flattering, and hides the yoke decreases very cleverly.

(looky, it snowed!)

overall: i'm very happy with the end result. it's probably my most successful sweater to date, and one i expect to wear a lot.

the details: pattern: elizabeth zimmermann's seamless yoke sweater, from knitting without tears and other books
yarn: peace fleece worsted, in lena's meadow. i used 4.5 skeins to make about a 41" bust size.
needles: size 8

i'm ready to start another sweater now, and it will be none other than melissa's garter yoke cardigan, using some pretty blue/violet beaverslide that i've saved up just for this pattern. i'm so excited!

crewel intentions

2008-12-02T17:54:00.000-08:00

oh, the potential for 'crewel' puns is rife, isn't it.

at the beginning of the year, i made of list of goals, or things i wanted to try, in 2008. one of those things was crewel, and i can now check it off the list!

this is 'birthday candles' from the new crewel.

i had embroidered before, but never creweled, and i found that i really enjoyed it. i guess the main difference is the thread you use: with crewel, you use a very rustic wool thread instead of embroidery floss. all of the stitches are otherwise the same. i think the wool thread made all the difference for me, because i vastly preferred this project to other embroidery projects i've undertaken in the past. or maybe i just really love satin stitch, another first for me with this project. anyway, there are several other patterns in the book that i think i might like to try some time, so this probably won't be my last crewel experience. maybe i'll even have a crewel, crewel summer (sorry!).

a closeup:

my french knots are a little wonky, but otherwise i think i did a pretty good job!

i used the recommended appleton crewel wool, but i can't remember which colors i used. i bought some of it here and some of it here.

i was happy enough with the end result to want to display it, so one trip to the thrift store and two coats of paint later, i was able to frame the piece and hang it in this little nook in our kitchen, along with my porcelain quails:

p.s. sorry for the very long absence. life, both good and bad, has been getting in the way the past few weeks. hopefully things will be returning back to normal soon though...

miscellany

2008-11-11T20:27:00.000-08:00

bah! it's so easy to get into the habit of not blogging, especially when i feel like i haven't been up to anything too exciting, or feel my knitting progress is slow. but i actually have a couple of small projects that i finished up recently to show off, so i'd better just do it, right?!

first up is the beehive hat i made for a recent charity auction. it's terrible, but i can't even remember what charity it was for! a friend of mine volunteered for the organization, and they do an annual mad hat tea party. she asked some of her crafty friends to submit a 'mad hat.' i don't know how mad this is, but it's cute, and possibly zany, no? what's mad is that my husband actually modeled this for me so i could get a picture!

pattern: bzzz hat for queen bees, from stitch n bitch nation
yarn: brown sheep lamb's pride worsted, 1 skein, in sunburst
buttons and felt from joann's
needles: size 8
mods: none!

next up...some simple mittens for a friend's recent birthday. i wanted to do some pretty, elaborate floral motif embroidery, but it just didn't turn out, so i ended up doing this simple scallopy thing instead. i'm only somewhat pleased with how it turned out, but i like the color combination, and i like the simplicity of the design--it's decorative without being fussy.

pattern: warmest mittens, from knitting pretty (the first knitting book i ever owned!)
yarn: peace fleece, ancient fern, about 1/2 a skein, plus a few yards of turquoise cascade 220
needles: size 4

i really like the dense fabric this pattern creates...they make for very nice, warm mittens!

i am finally, after a few months off, working on my swallowtail shawl again. i finally picked up an addi turbo lace needle, and that was all i needed to get reinspired. so much easier to knit with than my denise needles that i was using! so hopefully i'll have that done soon.

vote!

2008-11-04T12:29:00.000-08:00

socktober

2008-10-22T22:05:00.000-07:00

so...i don't know if these socks even count for socktober, since i believe i technically finished them the last day of september. but i'm blogging them in october. and i don't have any other sock efforts to show this month, so i guess it will have to do.

these are my woodsman's socks, raveled here. i knit these for my little brother, and they are really, really overdue. like, two years overdue. i promised him hand knit socks for his birthday two birthdays ago (and his birthday is in march!), but ran into some road blocks pretty early on. two in particular: size 13 feet, fingering weight yarn. not happy bed fellows! so finally i got smart and knit these babies in a heavier yarn. i wanted something kind of vintage and rustic looking, and this elizabeth zimmermann patterns fit the bill. in the end, i'm actually really happy with them, and i think my brother is too. and what's even more amazing is that i think i've finally found something to knit for my husband! we've been together over five years and i've never knit him a single thing, but when he tried these on so i could take a picture, he commented on how nice they felt. so i will be making one more giant boy-size pair of socks soon!

pattern: ez's woodsman's socks, from the opinionated knitter
yarn: mission falls 1824 wool, two and a half of the brown, and one of the red
needles: size 7

of even more excitement, seattle is now home to a beard papa's!

kerchief girl

2008-10-13T21:09:00.000-07:00

oh how i loved making kate's silk kerchief pattern. i knew the instant i saw it that i needed to make it, and in the exact shades that kate used in her's. can you blame me though? isn't it pretty? i found myself so completely smitten with this combination of colors: rusts and turquoises, charcoals and creams, violets and slate greys...so beautiful!

it was an easy pattern, and fairly quick, and i couldn't be happier with the end result. i sewed a little button on one corner, and used one of the yarn overs on the other corner as a button hole, and the result is a little kerchief that has already seen a ton of wear--to an almost embarrassing degree! the girl at the grocery store the other day declared it 'fabulous.' thanks for such a lovely little pattern, kate!

the best part is that i only used about half of each color, so i can make two!

pattern: silk kerchief, by kate gagnon
yarn: noro silk garden sock, in shades 045 and 069
needles: size 3
mods: absolutely none!

back soon with some socktober sock action...

knitters for obama

2008-09-29T16:20:00.000-07:00

whew! all done with twilight. life can go on now.

so, this isn't quite knitting content (though i do have an fo to show off later this week...), but sort of knitting related. i've been meaning to blog about it for a week or so now (like i said...life is finally going back to normal...). anyway, a couple of weekends ago, my knitting group put on a knitter's for obama bake sale. it was awesome! we set up camp on a busy street right in the middle of all the bars in our area at around 10 p.m. on a saturday night, and hung out til the bars closed at 2 a.m. we sold a LOT of goodies to drunk people, and ended up raising $400 for the obama campaign. how cool is that?

in other knitting/obama fundraising news, i won a prize in the recent ravelry knitter's for obama fundraising raffle! i won two skeins of alchemy temple in secret agent blue, and some texas-themed stitch markers, which are now officially the most fancy stitch markers i own. also, the funniest. there's an oil rig one, and a cowboy boot! i love it.

anyway, if you're not an obama supporter, feel free to ignore this post, but if you are...have you donated in the new knitter's for obama raffle? there are tons and tons of cool prizes this time around. go do it!

twilight

2008-09-25T13:49:00.000-07:00

oh my gosh you guys...i had the best intentions for september...getting my ez socks done and sent off to my brother, getting a good amount of the body done on my seamless yoke sweater, and even making another fun project, but ALL of that has fallen by the wayside since i got sucked (ha!) into the addictive-as-heroin world of the twilight saga. i am NOT proud, but there you go. i'm about a third of the way through the last book, so i hope to regain my life again soon. anyone else out there reading these too? anyone?!

back soon with some actual knitting!

my one-member ez fanclub

2008-09-10T17:55:00.000-07:00

thanks, everyone, for all the kind quilt comments! i appreciated them all a lot.

so what have i been doing, knitting-wise? well, i've started two new projects! i haven't forgotten about my other two wip's...the vesper wee skein socks and the swallowtail shawl, but these two new ones were calling out my name. and i should have all four finished in the near future, if my knitting master plan works out (it probably won't, but i always like to have a plan anyway).

it's funny...i just realized that both new projects are elizabeth zimmermann patterns! and i'm really loving both, it should come as no suprise. first up is some woodsman socks, for my brother. i've owed him some handknit socks for over two years now, and have been held up by my terror of knitting size 13 (seriously) mens's socks on tiny needles. so these are fitting the bill nicely: knit on size 7s, in mission falls 1824 wool. it's my first time trying this superwash, and i'm pretty impressed. it's really, really soft, and so far seems to resist pilling. we'll see. i'm down to the heel on the second sock, so these should be done soon!

the second project is one i'm really, really excited about. it's a seamless yoke sweater done in peace fleece, in the lena's meadow color way. i can't get an accurate picture of this color, but it's a beautiful light turquoisey blue, with dark turquoise, purple and olive flecks throughout. i really like how this is knitting up, too. i blocked the first sleeve and it really softens up a lot. i have high hopes for this sweater!

oh! and the yoke! i'm going to try something i saw another person do on ravelry: a ribbed yoke. i didn't want to do any colorwork for this yoke, but i wanted something a little more exciting than a plain yoke. i think this works really well. i am almost done with the second sleeve, but after blocking the first, i got a more accurate sense of what gauge this is knitting up to, and the sleeve seemed a bit big. so i'm going to rip it back a little and do fewer increases. i really want this sweater to fit well and be wearable, so i'm taking no chances.

quilting lessons learned

2008-09-02T19:02:00.001-07:00

my quilt is done! it's actually been done now for over a week, getting good use on the couch by both me and my kitty, but i've neglected to photograph it until now. so here it is:

(those columns outside my building look so formal!)

pattern: the lap quilt from bend the rules sewing
fabric: all from purlsoho.com. i used a few robert kaufman prints and rk kona cotton, as well as a couple of joelle hoverson fabrics, both from the cake rock beach series and the net of jewels line.

so, after completing my first full quilt, what did i think? well, i learned a lot, mainly that i don't really LOVE quilting. my yarn stash has nothing to worry about! i had quilted small projects before, but this was my first time wrangling that much fabric through my sewing maching (and maybe i would feel differently if i had a walking foot to aid me). so my quilting is, as the kids say, completely wack. in fact i'd venture to say there isn't a single straight line on this quilt, and that wasn't an intentional design element. plus, i can't get over the fact that i hate cutting fabric. it's so tedious! still, i'm glad i gave it a try, and despite its many flaws, i really do like my quilt. it's a good size for curling up on the couch, and once i gave it a wash and dry, and the fabric shrunk up some, the quilt took on a crinkly, wrinkly, vintage appearance that does hide a multitude of sins.

i expect that i will make one more quilt, at least in the near future: a hand-quilted baby blanket, and then, i think i will retire from quilting. if nothing else, this project reinforced my love of knitting. bring on the wool!

in addition to my quilting adventures, we traveled up to vancover, bc this weekend to visit my brother and sister-in-law. i had such a good time! we hit up several thrift stores, and i came away with two scarves (one hand knitted, and one hand crocheted), and this little cream and sugar set. couldn't you just die from the cuteness? tiny owls! trees! this is one of my best thrift scores in a while, and i can't wait to have a friend over for tea to break the set out.

baby's first toadstool

2008-08-22T10:13:00.001-07:00

ack, i lied! i'm not back with a non-knitting finished object, but it's SO close. who knew that sewing on a quilt binding by hand took so long? probably lots of people, but to me, this has come as a little bit of a shock. but really truly, i think it will be done this weekend.

so instead, here's a quick little knit i finished last week. isn't it cute? it's the toadstool baby rattle from the purl bee. there is a baby who will be joining our family (NO I'M NOT PREGNANT!) early next year, and i have lots of knitting plans for this little one, so here is my first effort. how could i not make this? it used the smallest amount of scrap yarn, and is so freaking cute! i definitely plan on making this project a baby shower staple in the future.

project details here (rav link)

have a great weekend!

mountain girl

2008-08-10T22:46:00.000-07:00

for some reason, i thought i blogged these slippers the other day. i guess not. this is not the only instance that is causing me to think i'm going a little bit crazy, but oh well. anyway, for reals now, here are my new slippers! i know, they are neither a swallowtail shawl, nor stripey socks. but i saw them and wanted them, and both of those projects were at points where i needed to think, and these were a nice time out from that.

this is one of those projects that i doubt i ever would have heard of if it hadn't been for ravelry, and especially the new 'spy on your friends' feature. i don't remember who queued these, but i saw them and remembered that i've been wanting to make knitted slippers pretty much since i learned to knit, but have somehow managed not to. now i have!

this pattern was fun and clever, and very fast. though it took me a couple of weeks start to finish to complete these, really it only took a couple of hours per slipper. i just really spread those hours out! anyway, it's too warm to wear these at the moment, but i really like them, and they are just one of the reasons i'm looking forward to fall.

pattern: mountain form slippers (ravelry link, because the link to this pattern seems to be broken. i messaged the girl who wrote it, and she emailed me the pattern.)
yarn: louet riverstone, in a color called mustard
needles: size 7, then size 6, because i couldn't find my size 7 dpns. this didn't seem to make much difference size-wise. they ended up fitting perfectly.
mods: none, other than changing needle sizes, as mentioned above.

...so, if everything goes to plan, the next time i stop by here should be with a non-knitting FO! hopefully see you soon!

endpaper mitts

2008-07-29T15:37:00.000-07:00

i can't believe i'm finally posting about a finished pair of endpaper mitts! these have been such a long time coming...and as much as i'm happy with the finished results, more than anything, i am just glad to move them off the top of my ravelry projects page, down into finished object territory once and for all.

i started these in january, enthusiastically rushed through the first mitt, and then abandoned the project, since it was no longer new or novel. i still loved the yarn (oh nature's palette!), and i liked how the endpaper that i did finish looked, but more exciting things beckoned. occasionally, jenna would poke me with a stick and insist that i finish them, but these prods accompanied threats of stealing the finished endpapers for herself, so i took her advice with a grain of salt.

but she was right...i really did need to finish them! so finally, some time in june, i picked up my barely-started second endpaper mitt and started to work. i worked on it pretty slowly and intermittently (ha!), but never set is aside for good. and finally, they are both done. see...two!

i really, really love the color combination i used, and i will definitely use the nature's palette yarn again. i was a little worried that they were too small, but i took eunny's advice and blocked them on a tall glass that was about arm sized, and they loosened up to just the right size. i'm very glad i went ahead and finished these, and am left wanting to do some more color work.

pattern: endpaper mitts, by eunny jang
yarn: hand jive knits nature's palette fingering in coral, about half a skein, and shibuiknits sock in bark, a little over half of one skein.
needles: size 3 and size 1 addis
mods: i did not do the tubular cast on, because i tried it and it was way too tight, so i just did a regular long-tail cast on. i didn't do the tubular bind off, because i forgot. whoops!

ooh...one more thing! i made the now-famous new york times chocolate chip cookie recipe this weekend, and holy moly those are some good cookies! i followed the mods that orangette used (chocolate chips instead of the chocolate disks called for, and i just used regular all-purpose flour). i think the key is the long chill time (up to 36 hours!) and the sprinkle of sea salt on top, making these the perfect salty sweet treat. this recipe makes really big cookies! for my own health and safety, i've frozen half the batch so that i can enjoy them in a more moderate fashion, but i have no delusions that these will last long. go make some now!

i'm a work in progress

2008-07-24T09:39:00.000-07:00

i think i mentioned at the beginning of the year that i wanted to be better about blogging my works in progress, rather than just having a project appear fully formed out of nowhere on my blog. so here are two things i'm working on right now.

first...i took your advice on the wee skeins, and went for socks in the end. i'm just about done with the first color, and so far so good. i really like knitting socks two at a time! other than the two balls of yarn getting tangled, there's really nothing to it, and i feel an immense sense of relief that i don't have to worry about knitting one sock and then not feeling like knitting the other. genius!

as i started knitting these, i had to decide what order to do the colors, and i kept thinking that several combinations looked sort of like a sunset, with cooler blues and purples graduating up into vivid oranges and reds. so i'm dubbing these my sunset socks (or maybe sunrise? i can't decide). i'm eager to see how these actually look all knitted up, but in my head they look really pretty!

the other project i've got on the needles now is quite a big deal for me...my first big lace project, the swallowtail shawl! this project came out of nowhere for me...i have never really been drawn to triangular shawls before, but i saw this version of another shawl, the shetland triangle, and i was in love. but i didn't want to buy the book for just that pattern, and i equally loved the swallowtail, so i immediately cast on for that instead. i'm using some jamieson's ultra that i found at my yarn shop...i really liked how rustic and wooly it is, and the pretty pinky purple color, though sort of out of the ordinary for me, seemed just right. i'm halfway done with the second chart, and it's going fine. though the fact that each row gets longer and longer is starting to freak me out a little...

and that's it! two projects that i'm really enjoying at the moment...one simple and mindless that i can take anywhere, and one that is challenging me with a new skill. i hope to have both done pretty soon.

oh! and my weekend in anacortes! as i mentioned in my last post, we went to the what the heck? fest this weekend in anacortes, washington. i bought random junk at the shipwreck day event, and saw lots of very good bands play. it was a good time. i didn't take too many pictures, but i did snap this one outside a thrift store, that for some reason really cracks me up:

i'll be back soon, because i finally finished my endpaper mitts. finally!

things i've been doing instead of blogging

2008-07-15T21:40:00.000-07:00

- eating watermelon and rainier cherries and golden raspberries
- swimming in the lake, picnicking on the beach
- making my first semi-successful batch of peach jam
- reading this and this and this
- attending a whole lifetime's worth of barbecues
- hitting up the thrift stores every single weekend
- finishing some old knitting projects, and starting some new
- seeing this movie (love!)
- getting super excited about a weekend getaway to anacortes, washington, for this festival (hello, city-wide rummage sale!)

what have you been up to these past few weeks?

(the above pic is not really related to anything, but so as to not have a photo-less blog entry, i present 'still life of jam and sugar bowl')

we love wee skeins

2008-06-30T22:20:00.000-07:00

the other day i got some special mail: four wee skeins of vesper sock yarn from knitterly things! i'm so on this bandwagon. but i'm torn about what to do with it: make some toe-up socks (i was thinking of trying the two-at-once thing), or make a rainbow cowl of skinny stripes? there are pros and cons to both. socks: i would get to try a new skill, and they would be really pretty socks. i like striped socks. cowl: i don't think you can have too many, and this might be a more visible, more long-lasting use of some pretty yarn. i'm considering this an informal poll, so let me know your opinion!

here are the wee little babies, looking cute:

from top to bottom, build me up buttercup, muddy waters, sweet summer sky, and monet's garden.

yet another cowl

2008-06-23T21:23:00.000-07:00

but i think that's a good thing!

i've had this one skein of blue sky alpacas royal in my stash for quite a while. it was beautiful. just beautiful. the color, spanish leather, was the perfect taupe, and the yarn itself was sooooooooo soft. luxury alpaca, people! but i didn't know what to do with it. i only had the one skein, and i felt like i needed to do something special with it. after lots of potential projects that never quite stuck, i finally, recently, struck upon the aspen neck cowl. such a simple pattern, but i felt like the pattern and yarn would be a good marriage - the alpaca would make a nice, drapey cowl, and the simplicity of the pattern would showcase the yarn's loveliness, with just a tiny bit of added interest with the reverse stockinette horizontal ribs. plus, it's reversible!

so, i cast on, knowing i really didn't have as much yarn as the pattern called for. in the end, it's not quite as long as specified in the pattern (it's probably 2/3 the size), so i can't use it pulled up over my head like a hood, but i probably wouldn't ever wear it that way anyway. it's pretty big anyway, and i can only imagine that the alpaca will grow with wear. this thing is so luxurious and beautiful and lovely! i can't wait til it's actually cool enough to wear it (that seems to be my blogging theme these days).

here's a modeled shot:

and the "right" side:

and inside out:

pattern: aspen neck cowl
yarn: blue sky alpacas royal, in spanish leather, almost one entire skein
needle: size 6 circular
mods: well, the pattern calls for purling ever row, with knit ribs every 9th and 10th row. this seemed silly, since knitting is so much easier and faster for me, so i basically knit it inside out. but i like how both sides look, so i'm considering it reversible.

i'm somewhat in between knitting projects right now...i'm not really sure what to start next, though i have some ideas. for now though, i'm busy cutting fabric for my first quilt!

mitered mittens

2008-06-16T22:38:00.000-07:00

my mittens finally dried! i finished these mittens ages ago, but then i had a friend in town and i didn't have time to block them (which they definitely needed). then, they took a week to dry. finally, they are done. just in time for seattle to finally get warm weather. but as elizabeth zimmermann points out in the write-up of this pattern, they'll be all ready to go when it does get cold, right?

pattern: mitered mittens, knitter's almanac, by elizabeth zimmermann
yarn: folktale fibers, in sweet & sour, 1 skein
needles: size 6 circulars for magic loop

this project was all about the yarn. a few months ago i spotted folktale fibers on etsy, and instantly fell in love with her beautiful patchwork series of handspun yarns. i decided on a colorway called sweet & sour, and knew right away that i wanted some bright, cheerful, and stripy mittens.

i had a few issues getting yarn and pattern to work well together: the yarn was a very heavy worsted, and i had a difficult time getting the yarn to knit up to the right size. the fact that miters pull everything in tightly made it even harder to figure out exactly how many stitches to cast on. i started these three or four times before i felt happy with the stitch count, and even now, they are a tiny bit tight, though blocking loosened them up a bit. this yarn's gauge was so radically different to the original pattern that it made everything a little harder than it should have been, and my thumb turned out too big, because i increased too many stitches for the gusset (which is a mod i did, since i didn't want the thumb on the palm, as the pattern is written).

also...there were some colors in this skein that came as a bit of a surprise! in the skein, the yarn seemed to be predominantly orange/red/purple/brown, with a little yellow. knitted up, it looked way more like a 70s crocheted granny square afghan than i was expecting. some might even call it a bit gaudy. but i think in the end, the colors grew on me.

anyway, after all that, i think i like these mittens! the cuff is really long, and the fabric is really dense and warm. they will be perfect this winter, or who knows, maybe even next week. i don't think our current warm weather will last long.

flickr game

2008-06-13T09:16:00.001-07:00

i have a project, a pair of mittens, that is blocking and refuses to dry (it's been a week now!), so while i wait for those to dry out and become bloggable, i guess i'll join in on the flickr meme that's going around.

the concept:
a. type your answer to each of the questions below into Flickr Search.
b. using only the first page, pick an image.
c. copy and paste each of the URLs for the images into fd’s mosaic maker.

The Questions:
1. What is your first name?
2. What is your favorite food?
3. What high school did you go to?
4. What is your favorite color?
5. Who is your celebrity crush?
6. Favorite drink?
7. Dream vacation?
8. Favorite dessert?
9. What you want to be when you grow up?
10. What do you love most in life?
11. One Word to describe you.
12. Your flickr name.

go to my flickr page for links to the photos.

autumn leaves in spring

2008-05-30T14:12:00.001-07:00

i finally finished my embossed leaves socks! i love these socks. these are my final project for the earth segment of project spectrum, and i've loved knitting with these earthy colors these past few months.

pattern: embossed leaves, from favorite socks
yarn: socks that rock lightweight, in the beautiful oregon red clover honey colorway
needles: size 2 inox circular for magic loop
mods: i did an eye of partridge heel instead of the garter ridge heel in the pattern. this heel seems like a perfect match for the leaves pattern, and i really liked knitting it. it's just so visually pleasing and squishy/springy. pretty! i also, impulsively, decided not to do the toe in the pattern, but instead opted for a french toe (at least i think that's what i did!). i'm not really sure if this was the right decision or not, but i think it turned out ok.

this pattern knits up so fast! i knit socks slowly, and even though it still ended up taking me two months to finish these, it actually only took about two and half weeks of actual knitting time, with several weeks in between socks. not record time by any means, but fast for me. i think i definitely want to try some more lace sock patterns, and am thinking of meida's socks from the same favorite socks book next.

i'm glad to have these done and am eager to wear them. now, what to knit for air? i'm thinking more cowls!

eat your greens

2008-05-27T16:24:00.000-07:00

hello! sorry for the long absence. i feel like i'm always saying that...maybe i should accept that i'm just a few-times-a-month blogger, huh?

anyway...here's a little something i've been working on the past week. my first attempt at gardening! i've been wanting to grow something for ages now (in fact, it's one of my goals for 2008), but we live in an apartment building that doesn't really have a yard to speak of. i've had my name on the waiting list for a p-patch plot for well over a year now as well, with no luck yet. so i figured i could wait around probably another year to get my plot, or i could just start with a little window box.

it's sad to admit, but i haven't grown anything since the little bean plants everyone does in first grade. but i grew up in phoenix, where it's not so easy to have a lush and green and fruitful garden. i attempted some basil on my patio once in college, and the plants died within a week. my mom (also from phoenix) lives here in the seattle area now too, and she has a new house, where is she is making good use of her extensive garden area this year. she said to me the other day, somewhat in awe, 'stuff just GROWS here!' i can understand her wonder at this! so i started to think that maybe i could actually have some success, despite my perceived black thumb.

so last weekend i got a window box, planted some seeds, and crossed my fingers. i've run to my kitchen window every day with the excitement of christmas morning, hoping to see some tiny green thing poking it's head out of the soil. and this weekend, my babies made their first appearance! i have since spent a lot of time looking out that window at my little sprouts, daydreaming of more window boxes, a real garden, warm soil between my fingers, and whole meals comprised of foods i had grown myself.

so these little sproutlets are not much to look at yet (so tiny!), but i guess everyone has to start small, right?

baby basil:

baby chives:

baby oregano:

may baby sweater

2008-05-11T20:07:00.001-07:00

ok, i think this is my last green project, at least for now. but isn't it a cute one? it's elizabeth zimmermann's february baby sweater. i've wanted to make it for awhile, but didn't have any new babies to knit for, until now. luckily, my friend julia was kind enough to get pregnant (with a girl, no less!), so i got the chance. i am so smitten with this little sweater. it was a lot easier to make than i thought it would be - luckily, ravelry exists, where any questions you have about the weird, vague instructions for making the sleeves are explained. it was quick, too! i think this will be a go-to pattern for future baby girl gifts.

even before i went to buy the yarn to make it, i was picturing kind of a vintage-y color combination, and the second i saw the yarn, i knew i wanted to use it with red buttons. i think the two colors, though not a usual pairing, really work together. i love the little red apples (and you can see the trees outside my window in their reflection).

i gave this sweater to the mom-to-be at her shower yesterday, and it was well received. yay for new babies!

pattern details on ravelry (sorry, i know, that's so lazy, right?).

spring greens

2008-04-27T16:20:00.000-07:00

after all my talk about browns, pinks, oranges, etc. being my version of 'earth,' i've turned around and made a bunch of green things for this month's installment of project spectrum. oh well. they can all be 'earth,' right?

anyway, a friend had a birthday coming up, and i thought that would be a good opportunity to make one of the string bags that were collecting in my ravelry queue. for this one, i chose the elisa's nest tote, from the purl bee. i knit this in the round, instead of dealing with a purl side and what looked to be pretty awful seaming. i'm glad i did that, but i wish i had split the front and back a few inches from the top - as it is, the opening of the bag is a little small, and i think this would have helped. something to remember next time! i also probably would make this a little wider and shorter - this bag stretches a LOT, and when there's stuff in the bag, it's really long and skinny. so a little width might improve it's in-use shape. but these are pretty small issues. overall, i think this bag turned out really well, and i would make it again. this was my first time using applied i-cord, and i'm happy with how professional it makes the bag look.

pattern: elisa's nest tote, purl bee
yarn: rowan 4-ply cotton, in fennel, almost exactly one ball
needles: size 9 for the bag itself, and size 3 for the i-cord handle

i've also been doing a little bit of sewing! a couple of weeks ago, carrie held a contest on her blog, with some vintage fabric and patterns as the prizes, and i won one of the prizes! this was all the inspiration i needed to break out my sewing machine, which had been collecting dust since christmas. look at all the pretties she sent me (plus some awesome vintage patterns):

i decided to use a couple of the fabrics to make another soft clutch from bend-the-rules sewing. i made a bunch of these as christmas gifts this year, but had yet to make myself one. time to remedy that!

front:

back:

and the cute umbrella fabric that i used as the lining:

thanks again carrie!

i'll be back soon with another green project that i'm really enjoying right now.

volunteer park cowl

2008-04-20T16:01:00.000-07:00

i'm still working away on my sock, my endpaper mitt (well, not really, but i often think of it!) and my friend's b-day gift that i need to finish, but this week, i got a little bee in my bonnet and decided i HAD to make another cowl. like, right now.

cowl mania has set in in blog land, and i couldn't be happier about that. i made one last january, and i love it. i call it my handknit hug, because really, that's what it feels like when you wear it. who wouldn't love that? but i wanted a bigger, slouchier cowl. enter the dolores park cowl, which i've seen popping up all over blogs and ravelry. i was intrigued, but figured i'd make it some other time. i didn't really have the right yarn for it, and plus, well, i had lots of other things going, and it's spring....these excuses worked for about two days, but finally i decided to check out a yarn store that i hadn't been to before in seattle, and they had some malabrigo chunky in stock. i took this as a sign, and promptly bought a pretty, springy green skein. once i had the yarn, i quickly cast on while playing scrabble that evening, and about two and a half hours later, i had my cute new spring accessory. and the cowls win again! it's cute and warm, and i haven't taken it off since i finished.

a word about the yarn. i was a little dubious about trying the malabrigo chunky. i know everyone adores malabrigo, but i'm just not that into the worsted version. pilling is a big deal-breaker for me, and if there's one thing malabrigo worsted is good at, it's pilling. i'm not going to say this chunky version won't pill, but i have hopes (possibly misguided ones) that it won't pill quite as bad, since it is a 3-ply instead of a single. we'll see. it is wonderfully soft though, and for now, that's all that matters to me.

i took a little stroll yesterday to volunteer park, wearing my new cowl, so i'm dubbing this my volunteer park cowl. the details:

pattern: dolores park cowl, by six one seven
yarn: malabrigo chunky, in verde adriana, one skein
needles: denise size 13s. i used 15s to bind off.
mods: none, other than omitting one row, because i was afraid i would run out of yarn.

fire on earth

2008-04-14T19:47:00.001-07:00

hello blog friends! it's been a while since i last posted, but i've been diligently working away on things. what things? well, as i mentioned in my last post, i started a project that, to me, fits in so perfectly with this new-ish round of project spectrum, earth. for most people, 'earth' probably suggests greens and browns, but to this arizona-raised girl, earth means yes, brown, but also gold, terra cotta, pink, red...basically, the colors of fire, the last round of ps, which i conveniently forgot to knit anything for. so i'm kind of combining the two rounds in one project, the embossed leaves socks (ravelry link).

i'm knitting these up with some str lightweight in oregon red clover honey. i can't say enough how lovely this yarn is. it's so rich and deep, and....accurate! it really looks like honey!

socks are a slow project for me, but i quickly knit up the first sock in a week, which for me, is a record.

see:

and here are a few more accurate shots of the color. i did my first eye of partridge heel for these, and i love it.

so my goal for this round of ps is to finish the pair (the second sock is already underway, though at a slightly slower pace as i struggle to get a birthday present done at the same time), and to also finish my second endpaper mitt, another good earthy project. i'm excited to get these beautiful projects done!

a gift for you

2008-04-03T10:52:00.000-07:00

earlier this week, i signed up for jodi's pay it forward exchange. the idea is that she sends me, and two others, something in the next year, and in return, i pay it forward by doing the same. so here's the game:

“The idea of the exchange is I will send a handmade gift to the first 3 people who leave a comment on this blog post requesting to join this PIF exchange. I don’t know what that gift will be yet, and you may not receive it tomorrow or next week, but you will receive it within 365 days, that is my promise! The only thing you have to do in return is pay it forward by making the same promise on your blog.”

so...anyone up for it? due to recent stress on my pocketbook, i'm going to limit this to u.s. people only. first three who speak up will get something fun from me!

as they say on ravelry...ugh!

2008-03-31T21:05:00.000-07:00

here, finally, is my disaster of a back-to-school u-neck sweater. i started this all the way back in...october i think? and then promptly set it aside in favor of christmas knitting. i picked it back up in january, and finished it in february. it's been a roller coaster of emotions with this one...i started out very excited, thinking it was SO cute, then got bored by all that ribbing, then excited again because the waffle stitch was fun and quick, and then...i got to the neck band, got it all finished, tried it on, and it was way.too.floppy. a girl in my knitting group suggested i do a few decreases on the neck band to pull it in and make it lay flat, so i diligently ripped out my neck band and started it over. i think i took her advice too much to heart, because now instead of flopping, it puckers and pulls and is basically no longer a u-neck!

it probably doesn't look too bad here, and obviously, i could do the neck again and try to reach a happy medium on the floppiness scale, but for now, i'm considering it finished, and unwearable at that. at this point, i'm over the whole sweater in general. i feel like all of those horizontal rib bands just make the vest look fussy. and the band in the middle hits me mid-boob, instead of at the base of my rib cage, which is really, really unflattering. maybe someday i'll take the time to fix it, or maybe the yarn will get reporposed for something else. on a happier note, i have a new project on the needles, and it's beautiful, and perfect for the new round of project spectrum. more on that later!

cozy

2008-03-23T21:12:00.000-07:00

thanks everyone, for the sweet comments on lu!

i was going to finally blog my failed u-neck vest today, but it's easter! i should focus on the good today, right? well, how about some cute, warm and functional leg warmers? last night i finished the super-easy legwarmers from last-minute knitted gifts, and here they are!

(i kind of tried to imitate the back cover of the book, but i didn't trust myself to photograph my own legs while standing on a chair!)

i had thought about making these for a while, but finally got the motivation to do so when i got that kidsilk haze in the fire sale i posted about earlier this month. the pattern calls for carrying a mohair yarn with cascade 220, and getting kidsilk haze for half off is pretty good inspiration, no? i also had filled up my punch card at my fave yarn store, and had $20 of free yarn coming my way, so i picked up a matching shade of cascade 220, and got to it! instead of costing, oh, $40, these cost me about $12, which makes them not quite so ridiculous i think.

anywho, it was my first time working with kidsilk haze, and while i don't think i would enjoy working with it quite so much on its own, it was absolutely lovely with the cascade 220. the yarn knit up in 1x1 rib created the SOFTEST and SQUISHIEST fabric you've ever felt. these babies are warm! and while they took considerable longer than the "2-4 hours" promised in the book, they still were pretty fast and nice and mindless. and i'm so happy with the end result! i will definitely be wearing these with skirts while it's still kind of chilly at night and in the morning, and i can see layering them under jeans in the winter.

pattern: super easy leg warmers, last minute knitted gifts
yarn: 2 balls cascade 220, in a teal color, and two balls of rowan kidsilk haze, in "trance"
needles: size 9 circular, for magic loop
mods: i went up a needle size and added a few extra stitches because i was afraid they would be too tight. i don't think it was really necessary in the end.

lovely lu

2008-03-10T17:36:00.000-07:00

lu is finished and i couldn't be happier with it. so cute and springy! i bought the kit to make this at madrona and cast on as soon as i got home. it was quick and fun and just weird enough to keep me guessing and entertained throughout. lu is knit from side to side, all in one piece, with absolutely zero seaming. it was kind of an act of faith until i got through the first sleeve, because i just couldn't picture how it was going to work, and the pattern didn't include any sort of diagram. but it worked! the top is made using the same stitch pattern throughout and uses short-row shaping to create the sleeves. the unusual stitch pattern is called turkish stitch, and i swear it looks crocheted! in fact, when i saw the handmaiden herself wearing it at the village yarn and tea booth where i bought the kit, i didn't actually believe her when she said it was knitted.

pattern: lu, by perl grey
yarn: fleece artist scotian silk, 2 skeins, with about half a skein left over, in 'earth'
needles: size 10 1/2 denise needles
modifications: i added a pattern repeat to each front panel for a little more coverage. the pattern is one-size-fits-all, and it definitely would have fit, but i wanted it to fit more like how it does in the pattern picture, and my chest is just a little too big to manage that!

i should add that i really, really enjoyed working with the scotian silk. what beautiful yarn! it's a bulky yarn, 65% wool, 35% silk. it doesn't feel like a silk yarn, but the wool feels really soft and sleek. i would definitely use this yarn again.

oh! and i had to buy a little pin to close it up! i should probably get a real shawl pin, but this cute little birdy pin that i got on etsy will work for now.

yarn binge

2008-03-06T21:49:00.000-08:00

i'm so glad we go on daylight savings this weekend (or are we going off? i can never remember how it works). the primary reason why i haven't been posting much lately is because i can't ever get good pictures during the work week, and then, during the weekends, i find myself too busy to blog. but i do have many things to blog about, to be sure! it's been a busy couple of weeks. i mentioned in my last post that i went to madrona, and i did finish the little wrap cardigan, lu, and it turned out very, very cute. i love it! i plan to get a good picture of me wearing it this weekend for sure. just to balance out the success of that project, i also have what turned out to be a disastrous finished object, my back-to-school u-neck vest. i'll post a pic of that later too, though not a modeled one. unless i do some serious reworking, that one is never, ever getting worn!

(you can see my cat sneaking into the picture in the top right corner!)

in the mean time, how about some stash enhancement? if you live in seattle, you no doubt heard about hilltop yarn and their recent electrical fire. no one was hurt, and in fact there really wasn't any damage to their stock either, but it was still considered damaged, so it couldn't be sold for full price. so last weekend, they had their fire sale, where everything in the store was half off. yes, half off! this sale reached epic and legendary proportions even before it started. everyone in my knitting group was talking about camping out a few hours before the doors opened in anticipation of a huge turnout. while i didn't resort to such drastic measures, i did make it to the sale, and i did pretty well, picking up a few balls of silk garden to try my hand at entrelac, some kidsilk haze to make the legwarmers from lmkg, and two balls of cashsoft dk to make minty's bainbridge scarf. plus a few pairs of addis in sizes i didn't have. all that for about $50! i was happy to do my part to help hilltop clear out their old stock to make room for the new.

as if that wasn't enough yarn excitement, i got an email saying that pureknits was having a closeout sale, and i finally bought the pear tree merino 4-ply that i've had my eye on for a long time (in a beautiful shade called 'turkey.'). so that's it--no more yarn buying for me for a while!

i'll really, truly be back very soon with pictures of some finished knitting!

merry christmas, mom!

2008-02-18T22:09:00.000-08:00

how sad is it that i'm just now getting around to finishing up the last of my christmas knitting?! i guess the important thing is that it finally is really and truly done.

this is the montego bay scarf, from the the summer 2007 interweave knits. i used a skein of handmaiden sea silk, in a pretty ivory (with overtones of gold here and there), that i picked up at last year's madrona fiber festival. i wanted to use it for something special, and finally decided that my mom was a worthy recipient. i thought this pattern made for a simple but sophisticated scarf that would really suit my mom. so i cast on in OCTOBER (!) and still...i wasn't done by christmas. crazy, i know, but this scarf and i just never did get along. first off, i had a hard time with the slickness of the silk. that, paired with the mind-numbing boredom i experienced whenever i worked on the project, meant that i never worked on it for more than a few rows at a time. once i was done with the knitting, i still had to do the fringe! i actually enjoyed this part better, but it was still tedious: cutting over 200 pieces of the yarn, slipping the strands through the loops of the cast on and bind off edges, and then braiding each and every piece. i spent, in total, probably ten hours on the fringe alone over the course of january. that just seems insane! but now it really is done, and i feel such relief, as well as pride for the fact that it turned out great. and my mom loves it! still...i think next year, less christmas knitting for me.

speaking of madrona, i went this saturday with jenna and karma, and i had a great time. we all fell hard in the fleece artist/handmaiden section of the village yarn and tea booth. much damage was done to our wallets, but we all picked up something pretty. i got a kit for lu, which seems to have gotten me out of my knitting funk that i've been in for the past month. it's knitting up very fast, so pictures of a soon-to-be-done lu coming up!

baby legs

2008-02-09T14:00:00.000-08:00

yikes! sorry for the long absence. not much knitting going on around here - or rather, i've been working on lots of projects, so progress seems slow. i've also been spending a lot of time focusing on the presidential election. i've become totally consumed with the whole process, and it's both exciting and totally draining/stressful. but i caucused today, for the first time. go obama!

anyway, i just wanted to pop my head in and say hi. i'll be back with some more knitting content soon. for now, here's one little project that i finished up last week: baby leg warmers! i used some crazy rainbow yarn that kristy gave me last year in a swap - the yarn is cleckheaton merino bambino, from australia. i figured if anyone can pull off rainbow leg warmers, it's a one-year-old, right?

i cast on 52 stitches, using size 1 addis for magic loop, and knit an inch of 2x2 ribbing, then knit till they looked about long enough, then did another inch of ribbing. i think they are slightly too small - i probably should have gone up to 56 or 60 stitches, but perhaps they can be worn as arm warmers when they get too small for legs. besides the pooling, which isn't so bad, i'm pretty happy with these. baby leg warmers! too cute!

blog land makes me happy

2008-01-25T14:19:00.000-08:00

leah and jodi both made my friday with a 'you make my day' award. yay! leah, with her great taste in music (and a shared love of wes anderson), has been one of my favorite blogs to read from day 1. and jodi always posts great recipes and beautiful knitted projects, and is just lovely in general. thanks girls!

Give the award to 10 people whose blogs bring you happiness and inspiration and make you feel happy about blogland. Let them know by posting a comment on their blog so they can pass it on. Beware you may get the award several times.

so in addition to the above lovely ladies, i want to give the award to the following ten bloggers: people whose blogs i absolutely love, and always am inspired by. blogs that i rush to read when i see they have a new post in bloglines. this was such a hard choice! these ten are only a sample of my many, many favorites.

1. twinknit. i just love jennie! i've been reading her blog since i started reading blogs, and hers is still one of my favorites. i'm always inspired by her choice of projects, and i like hearing about her music studies. i miss all the posts about her life in rural appalachia though!

2. me, myself and kai. karen is so prolific in her crafting, and is talented at knitting, sewing, embroidering...plus i admire her frequency in blog posting, which is something i always strive to improve but never quite achieve. her star pillow pattern is on my to-make list. and her doggy is so darn cute!

3. brainylady. i just love her whole aesthetic--the yarn and fabric she chooses, the projects she makes...i'm always left feeling like, 'i want that!' i love hearing about her thrifting adventures as well.

4. carrie girl. one of my newer reads! carrie is a fellow gocco-er, and in addition is a talented seamstress and all-around crafter. plus she gets the coolest stuff at the midwest thrift stores she frequents.

5. chrysanthemum. a fellow seattle-ite, and we also have a shared love of trophy cupcakes (and, looking at her sidebar, eerily similar taste in books as well).

6. kitty genius. i have SUCH a crush on ashley's art, especially her little beardy men. plus, her success in making a living from doing what she loves is great to see, and reminds me that it can be done.

7. quelle erqsome. more than anything, emma's blog makes me laugh. her stories about work and home life are hilarious. and her zeal for buying new sock yarn is infectious. also a fellow cupcake lover!

8. knotty bits. i'm glad that maritza has taken up the knit blogging again, in addition to blogging about her cute, cute softies. her color choices leave me breathless--check out the daisy stitch hand warmers she's working on (and she's already inspired me to make at least one of her projects, same yarn choice and all: the chevron scarf).

9. knitting school dropout. melissa never fails to inspire me with her amazing, amazing sweaters. seriously, this girl has given me knitter's envy more times than i care to admit (and i dream of one day making her scottish tweed raglan sweater). plus, we have the same name!

10. zeitgeist. again with the pretty, pretty sweaters! kate doesn't just choose patterns that i also happen to like...she designs her own sweaters that i absolutely love. sweaters are not my strong suit...seeing sweaters like hers makes me want to get better.

that's it! thanks to you all for bringing a little cheer to my days.

a work in progress

2008-01-20T13:38:00.000-08:00

thanks for all the kind words and support for my 2008 goals! though i have to admit...i'm failing somewhat already. i have done a terrible job of cutting back on sugar, and my first efforts at making jam...well let's just say i spent three hours yesterday making pink grapefruit marmalade, and instead ended up with two jars of hard candy that i'm pretty sure i will never be able to get out of the jars. good thing jars are cheap! (it's also worth noting that those two resolutions are in direct conflict with each other...there is a LOT of sugar in jam!) anyway, i will persevere with the jam-making efforts. i think next time i'll try some apple jelly.

one other thing i also want to be better about this year is showing more works-in-progress. i tend to only post about things when they're all done, which isn't much fun, and really, i think, not the point of blogging. so, seeing as i'm in the middle of quite a few projects at the moment and don't have any finished objects on the immediate horizon, i thought i'd show something i'm still working on. after making my raven mittens, i got the taste for doing some more color work. so i cast on for a project i've been dreaming of for some time, some endpaper mitts.

i struggled a bit with deciding on a color combination. i bought yarn for this project about a year ago: two skeins of louet gems in teal and green. but when i finally got around to starting the project, i decided the colors weren't contrast-y enough. so i decided i needed to buy more yarn! eventuallly i settled on some shibuiknits sock in bark, and some nature's palette in coral, both from the loopy ewe. perfect! i'm so in love with this combination, and i'm even more in love with the nature's palette yarn in general. the color is heartbreakingly beautiful, and the yarn is the perfect amount of squishy. so right away this project seems destined to be a winner. i'm almost done with the first mitt - i just need to do the ribbing around the top and the thumb. i can't wait to wear these!

looking forward, looking back

2008-01-11T15:30:00.001-08:00

Knits of 2007
Originally uploaded by owlandacorn

here we are, well into january, but i'm still feeling reflective about the past year. craft-wise and otherwise, i did quite alot in 2007! it was also a pretty stressful year, with both good and bad stress: i lost a job and found a new one, i moved out of my house for two months while our kitchen was remodeled, we bought our first house (well, condo. but still!), and my brother moved from seattle to another country (sob!). i also made some great new friends, read 26 books, watched more movies than i could count, and completed 19 knitting projects (and failed to complete a few others).

i think my fave projects of the year were my silk garden socks, my le slouch, and my foliage. i learned this year that i'm a hat girl!

looking forward, i have quite a few goals for next year, all of which seem pretty attainable right now. my list:

1. take a spanish class (already signed up!).
2. bake bread in my new dutch oven.
3. beat the 26 books i read in 2007 - i'm aiming for 30. there was a time when i easily read twice that amount in any given year...now 30 will be a struggle, but i think i can do it.
4. learn to make jam.
5. learn more about food preserving in general, and preserve some food this summer for the winter.
6. eat something i've grown myself.
7. buy a real bed...our mattress is still just sitting on the floor. i'm not in college anymore! i think it's finally time.
8. knit at least one sweater.
9. sew some clothes, starting with a skirt.
10. try my hand at crewel.
11. make a small quilt.
12. the one that will definitely be hardest for me...eat less sugar!

happy new year!

2007-12-31T16:50:00.000-08:00

i thought i'd fit one more post, one more finished project in before 2007 draws to a close. i had all of last week and today off work, and i've been pretty lazy, but i did manage to knit up this cute beret. it's wendy bernard's le slouch, and i've had my eye on this project since the moment it came out, but am only now getting around to making it. i love it! i'm in an instant gratification, small project kind of mood right now, and this was perfect. it took just two evenings, and i know i will wear it a lot.

pattern: le slouch yarn: peace fleece, negotiation gray needles: size 8 and 9 denise

i love how it looks like a sea urchin. i thought it would be a lot slouchier--i knit it to the full six inches before decreasing, but i think i might have misunderstood the directions for finishing the decreasing and finished it too soon, so i probably lost a little slouch that way. still, i don't think i would have liked it any baggier. i think i might make another one, possibly in red, and possibly in stockinette instead of the seed stitch.

happy new year everyone!

more handmade holidays!

2007-12-28T01:07:00.000-08:00

merry christmas, a little late! i hope everyone had a good day, if you celebrate, and got all the presents your little heart desired. my friends and family spoiled me absolutely rotten, and i got some really wonderful things this year, as well as some really lovely handmade gifts. yay! i got so many books, i should be set for at least the next six months. i absolutely love getting books for christmas! ooh, and i also got another beardy man from my friend brooke, which was a really exciting surprise. i'm growing a little collection of men on my kitchen wall!

it's not all about the getting though, right? i definitely did my fair share of giving this year too, and much of it was handmade. besides what i've already shown off, i made a pair of the raven mittens (annemor #5) from terri shea's selbuvotter book. i picked this book up a few months ago and only now got around to trying one of the patterns out. besides the thumbs turning out weird, i think these turned out really great (even though they weren't done in time for christmas). the pattern is sized for small children; i went up a couple of needle sizes to get a small woman's size. still, they were a bit too small. they fit my sister-in-law, but i would have been more comfortable if they were a tad larger. i'll go up another needle size if i make these again.

pattern: annemor #5, selbuvotter: biography of a knitting tradition
yarn: dalegarn heilo, one ball each of navy and oatmeal
needle: addi turbo size 4

i also made several of these little clutches from bend-the-rules sewing. these are so fun and quick to make--i need to make one for myself now!

i have one other gift knit that's still on the needles. i really, really tried to get it done in time for christmas, but it just didn't happen. hopefully, soon!

handmade holidays: sugar on snow

2007-12-18T11:29:00.000-08:00

last year, i made this totoro hat for my friend's soon-to-be-born baby, cora. in the past year, cora has worn the hat a lot, and looked cute to boot, but as babies are prone to doing, she's grown out of it. so i decided to make her a new hat, one that would grow with her, at least for a while. enter sugar on snow, from the fall 2006 knitty. it doesn't seem like that many people have made this hat, and i don't know why, because it's so cute! the baby cable pattern is really stretchy, and a little different from typical ribbed hats. the size i made is supposed to fit a child aged one to three, and i think that's very well possible, especially since i think it's a little on the large size right now. room to grow! anyway, i really enjoyed making this hat. the knit picks swish, held double, made a soft, squishy fabric that knit up very quickly, and the leaves add just the right amount of interest and cuteness. i think i would make this in the adult size for me!

pattern: sugar on snow
yarn: knit picks swish superwash, in sand dune, two balls, and some red scrap yarn for the i-cord and leaves
needles: size 9 denise needles
model: cora. isn't she cute? check out that dimple!

(thanks to brooke for taking the photos!)

handmade holidays: a knit tie

2007-12-15T16:09:00.000-08:00

so...holiday gift making is going...okay. i felt really confident and not stressed about a week ago, but now i'm not so sure. most of my big sewing projects are done (and gifted already! i'll have to wait till i give the last couple away til i show them off though), but the knitting is taking a lot longer. i really only have four knitted gifts in mind, and i finally finished two of them. the first one i can show here is a tie. my brother asked for an 80s-style knitted tie, and i said, why not! so i picked out a sock yarn that looked suitably 80s knit tie-ish and cast on. i couldn't really find a pattern that matched what i had in mind, so i just sort of improvised, using one of my husband's ties as a guide. i worked the self-striping yarn in seed stitch, and you know what? it really does look like an 80s knit tie! it's off the needles now and blocking. some of the edges look a little ragged, so hopefully blocking will tidy those up. i'll take a picture of my brother wearing it on christmas!

pattern: my own
yarn: universal yarn inc. ditto
needles: clover bamboo size 2 dpns

i also made my christmas cards with my gocco again. these look a little more rustic than i'd like, but i still think they turned out pretty cute. i need to break out the gocco more often than just for holiday cards!

now...back to the other knitted gifts.

being naughty, not nice

2007-12-02T20:42:00.000-08:00

sorry for the extended blog break...it's not for lack of knitting, purely a lack of light to take pictures. it's impossible to get a good picture after work, since it's dark before i even leave. and even the daylight is pretty dim these days. but the darkness and cold does make for good knitting. i finished the noro silk garden lite socks, and i'm very happy with them.

these were my first toe-ups, and as such, the toes are both slightly wonky, and the short-row heels are not perfect, though the second one came out much better than the first. still, i really liked knitting these toe-up! i can see it being my sock knitting method of choice in the future. i'm a little bummed out that my stripes don't match - the second ball had the beige at the end of the ball, as opposed to the beginning, like the first. so my stripes were offset by one color throughout, but i made up for that by making the foot of the second one slightly shorter. the first sock is just a touch too slouchy, and the second one fits perfectly. and in the end, the stripes pretty much match up on the leg, but not the foot, which is fine. i've been wearing these as house socks, and also over tights and thinner socks, in my rain boots. comfy!

pattern: none really. i used the toe-up sock guide in the summer 2007 IK as a guide, but really, i kind of just cast on and went for it.
yarn: noro silk garden lite, color 2015, two balls
needles: addi turbo size 4

so...once the socks were done, i was supposed to get right back into my christmas knitting. here's where the naughty part comes in. instead of getting going with my gifts, i decided it would be a great idea to make myself a hat! i've had this frog tree merino in my stash since i went to the madrona fiber festival in january. i was flipping through ravelry the other day and realized that the yarn would be perfect for foliage.

i had some of the called-for malabrigo, but i thought that the variegation would obscure the leaf pattern too much. i'm glad i went for this solid yarn instead. it's super soft, and has a nice halo to it. it almost looks like it glows! i really had fun making this hat - it took just a couple of hours, and was an easy enough lace pattern to make while watching tv. and it's so cute!

though my version looks less like the autumn leaves in the original pattern, and more like a spring green version. or maybe a 1970s shag carpet version? it's very avocado! in any case, i've been wearing it non-stop, and it's kept my head warm this weekend when we had SNOW!

pattern: foliage, fall 2007 knitty
yarn: frog tree merino worsted, color 46, one whole ball and a few yards of a second
needles: inox bamboo dpns size 7, and brittany birch dpns, size 6

anyway...i will have progress shots of my holiday knitting soon! i promise, i really, truly am going to get to work on it now (though now i want to make myself more hats...namely, le slouch and tillie)!

some good things

2007-11-11T14:02:00.000-08:00

1. any carrie brownstein/sleater kinney fans out there? i found out the other day that carrie now has a blog on the npr website. i love her, so this excites me greatly.

2. i ordered this on amazon this week. i'm picturing lots of evenings knitting in front of the tv in my future (as if that's not what i already do every night, but still...yay!)

3. i also ordered a beardy man print from ashley g, after spotting it on the design*sponge blog. i love those beardy men! (can you tell i just got paid and have money burning a hole in my pocket...?)

4. i started some noro silk garden lite socks this week, and they are flying along. the first one is done! they're my first toe-up socks, and i don't know if it's just the fact that i'm knitting them on size 4 needles or what, but toe-up seems so much faster! i think it's psychological...the foot part is always what seems to take the longest for me with socks, so getting that out of the way first seems so liberating. i'm so much in love with these socks.

i knit the foot slightly too long, but otherwise, it's really cute!

kubota garden, and a finished drops jacket

2007-11-04T21:10:00.000-08:00

this weekend we went to kubota garden. i'd never been before, and it's hard to believe this huge, beautiful spot is just a 15-minute drive from where we live. the japanese maples were flaming red, and all of the other plants were in the midst of their downward decay into winter-ness, which i think is so beautiful. i'm eager to visit the garden again in winter, spring and summer; if it's half as gorgeous as it is in the fall, i feel i'll be going back many, many times. here are a LOT of pictures!

i also used our visit to kubota garden as a backdrop for taking pictures of my drops jacket, which i finished early last week. i didn't really get any good shots, but here is one, plus another one in my living room.

pattern: drops jacket
yarn: rowan yorkshire tweed chunky in damp, exactly seven balls
needles: size 11 denise needles
buttons: vintage plastic

as excited as i initially was about this project, i ended up feeling disappointed in the end result, and feeling like i should have known better than to use such a chunky yarn. my disappointment is two-fold: i think the finished sweater is way too bulky and wildly unflattering, and also, the finishing of the sweater turned out very poorly. i shouldn't have used the chunky yarn to seam the sweater, but i did, resulting in very bulky seams. also, the yarn kept breaking! i liked the yorkshire tweed though - the tweediness itself is beautiful, and it created a soft fabric. i will probably still wear this as a house sweater, and maybe occasionally out. it's very warm, and it does have those cute vintage buttons working in its favor! at least i feel like i learned some valuable lessons with this sweater. next time will be better!

now that the drops jacket is done, i'm back to work on the back-to-school u-neck, and have also started three (!) other projects. i'll show those off, plus some pretty new yarn, later this week!

Handmade Holidays -- 30 Days of Gifts to Sew

2007-11-01T10:53:00.000-07:00

have you all heard about the sew, mama, sew project that's going on in the month of november? i'm super duper excited about it (yes, super duper!). every day in november, sew, mama, sew will post tutorials for a different handmade gift. today, kicking off november, is aprons. i never do too well at cranking out loads of knitted gifts each year, but sewing? i think can probably do a little better with that. i was already planning to make a lunch bag for someone, so i especially look forward to that tutorial, but i'm also interested in the baby items and household items.

what do you plan to make for holiday gifts this year?

my knitting gets a new home

2007-10-22T15:39:00.000-07:00

how has it been two weeks since my last post? i have no idea! i'm sorry to say i still don't have much to report on, but yesterday, i did get some exciting mail. a month or so ago, karen made a fabulous knitting bag, and i fell in love with it. she suggested we do a little swap, and then she proceeded to make ME! a fabulous knitting bag too! after the postal service sent the bag on a little adventure from new mexico to washington to georgia and then back to washington, it finally arrived on my doorstep. and it was worth the wait!

i love the nautical theme karen went for, and i love the combination of mint green and red. so cute! she's really thought through her construction of these bags as well, and has included little nooks for needles, notions and projects. plus, i think it's the perfect size for carting around town. i think i'll be getting a lot of use out of it. she also kindly sent along some cute fabric-covered buttons, some candy, some vintage bright red knitting needles (!) and an adorable pin cushion that i am obsessing over. of course, i don't have pictures of any of that, but rest assured, it's all good, and i'll try to take pictures over the weekend when i have some daylight hours for picture taking. thanks again karen! i'll swap with you any day.

in actual knitting news, the drops jacket is getting very close to being done. i just have to finish up the right front and do one other sleeve (the first one only took a couple of hours), so i'm anticipating finishing this up maybe this week? don't hold me to that though!

what are your thoughts on blocking before vs. blocking after seaming? this sweater is going to be heavy...i'm scared that if i block it after seaming, it will never ever dry. but blocking all the pieces separately seems like a pain. i don't know. you tell me!

sweater love

2007-10-09T10:04:00.000-07:00

it's gotten chilly here in seattle these past few weeks...maybe it's always like this this time of year, but to me it feels colder much earlier this year. not that i'm complaining! i live for this time of year, when i'm perfectly justified in making a little nest of blankets/cat/knitting on the couch and settling in to watch lots of movies (i pulled out our american splendor dvd the other day...i love that movie so much!). it's also when my mind turns to sweaters--the cozier the better.

with that in mind, here's one i've been working on for a while actually, but haven't had time to blog about. it's the back-to-school u-neck sweater from fitted knits, done up in some pretty cascade 220 heathers. i'm just past the boob darts, which didn't go so well, but i think they'll do. just an inch or so more of the waffle stitch, then i can split for the arms. i'm really liking this sweater! the cascade 220 is squishy and lovely as always, and the color, paired with the waffle stitch, reminds me of honeycomb. i'm a little scared that all that ribbing will be unflattering, but i plan to wear it over another top, so hopefully that will reduce the clingyness.

then this weekend...i accidentally cast on for a new sweater, that drops 3/4-sleeve jacket that is so popular in blog land right now. i knew i was going to make this, i just didn't expect to make it right now. and yet, here i am! this is knitting up very fast - i finished a sleeve in a day, and am now well into the back (too bad it's an unphotogenic sweater...i could not get a non-blurry shot of it!). i've heard of people knitting this up in four days, and i don't think i'll finish that fast, but i think i should be wearing this one pretty soon. and i have the most perfect turquoise vintage buttons that match the blue, tweedy flecks in this yarn. i'm going to be so sad if they turn out to be too small!

which one will i finish first? i'm feeling more excited about the drops cardigan right now, but the u-neck vest is further along, so i guess only time will tell which sweater i'll be wearing first.

happiness is...

2007-10-03T17:52:00.000-07:00

...a quick, cute knitting project

making new throw pillows for the couch

10 balls of beautiful yarn to make this

oregon flock and fiber

2007-09-27T19:25:00.000-07:00

this week i turned one in blog years! blog years must be something akin to dog years...it feels like i've had this little blog for much longer than just one year (in a good way!), but the numbers don't lie. i remember starting it on impulse while bored at work, thinking i would probably abandon the idea in a short time, but instead, it turns out i really like blogging. so here's to another year!

saturday morning, jenna and i got up early and drove to the oregon flock and fiber festival. it was such a nice day! we got to the festival a little past noon, and immediately hit up the blue moon fiber arts booth, where i scored some much-coveted socks that rock lightweight in oregon red clover honey. i'm so in love with this color, and i contemplated buying it in the silk thread and lace yarns as well, but my better sense prevailed.

i also picked up a cheapo mill ends skein of the medium weight, in a color i've admired for some time, blue moonstone. i'm really going for the semi-solid yarns these days.

i had planned to buy some yarn to make the drops cardigan that everyone seems to be making these days, but i didn't find anything suitable at the festival. instead, the only other thing i picked up was some sock hop handspun in 'my boyfriend's back' -- this will hopefully become calorimetry here shortly.

so three skeins of yarn - less than $40. i was pretty well behaved!

of course what fiber festival would be complete without some cute, fuzzy little animals? we saw goats, sheep, bunnies, alpacas, llamas, yaks and even two teenaged camels.

and that was our exciting day! we headed home at around 5:30 (not before getting some great photos of the clackamas county fair and rodeo queens and princesses), stopping near mt. st. helens for some roadside mexican food, and got home at about 10. it was a long day, and i was glad for sleep, but it was a really fun little road trip. i'm looking forward to going again next year!

fo: chevron scarf

2007-09-20T15:06:00.000-07:00

so my plan was to get this done before i moved back home, and i almost made it. i had all of three inches, plus the border, left to do the night before we were to move, and i fully planned to come home and finish it up, but my car had other plans. i ended up spending that night waiting for a tow truck, so scarfy had to wait. if only i'd had the scarf with me at the time, that two-hour wait wouldn't have been so bad. but i did finish it the day after i moved back - i can live with that!

the end result is, i think, really great. i had kind of a roller coaster of emotions about the color combo all the way through - i love it! it's too green! it's too burgundy! it's perfect! in the end, i think i am happy with the colors. it's not a subtle scarf, for sure, but i think the blend of goldenrods and olives and navies and peaches is actually quite lovely, and will match many things in my closet - including my new navy coat!

it's funny though - these two, disparate colorways look nice together, but individually, i think they've got to be two of the ugliest skeins of yarn i've ever bought! or not ugly exactly...just really not to my taste. watermelon tourmaline is way too pastel-y, and farmhouse reminds me of the early 90s when people wore mustard and forest green jeans and thought that was a good idea. yet somehow the two together work!

i did not knit it to the full 72 or so inches called for in the pattern - i knit it to 65 inches, which is how tall i am. it seemed like a good place to stop. i blocked it though, and it grew several more inches - i haven't measured, but it's probably around 70 inches now - a good scarf length. a good weight too - i used socks that rock lightweight, as opposed to the medium weight that many others have used, and it makes for a warm but not heavy scarf that feels really nice around the neck.

i'm so pleased with my new scarf!

here are the details: pattern: chevron scarf, last-minute knitted gifts
yarn: str lightweight, in farmhouse and watermelon tourmaline. i used a little more than half of each, so i have enough for baby booties or something else small in each color still
needles: size 5 denise
modifications: i added two stitches at either end to prevent curling, which worked pretty well. i also made it shorter.

yesterday i went to oregon flock & fiber with jenna - i'll show off my goodies later this week!

home again, home again

2007-09-19T20:11:00.000-07:00

we are finally back home! it's been a hectic couple of weeks getting everything finalized and getting moved back in, but it's pretty much calmed down now, and we are now homeowners! even though one of the benefits of buying our apartment was that we wouldn't have to move, it pretty much felt like we had to move anyway, even though most of our stuff never left the apartment. everything was boxed and moved to one side in the living room so construction in the kitchen and bathroom could take place. our house was an absolute mess of dust and boxes and crumpled newspaper. so i took thursday off to unpack and get settled, and i spent a whole lot of the weekend doing the same. but who cares about that...want to see some 'after' shots?

first, the kitchen 'before,' in case you forgot what it looked like pre-remodel:

and partially through the process, when i thought it would never end:

and finally...ta-da!

i really like it, though it feels way fancy. i can't actually believe it's our kitchen. i was worried it would look a little too show-homey, but i've tried to put in some personal touches, like all our colorful plates and mugs, and some art, and lots of photos. and already, it feels like home again.

eight random things

2007-09-17T20:12:00.000-07:00

carrie tagged me for the eight random things meme. how exciting! i've never been tagged before. i know practically the whole blog world has done this already, but this is a first for me.

so let's see...

apparently i'm a really picky eater, even though i don't really feel like i am. i don't like most cheese, mushrooms, pickles, olives, cottage cheese, or cantaloupe. *shudders*
when i was little and learning to write, i would pick up the pencil with my left hand and start writing, and then halfway across the page i would pick up with my right hand and finish writing. my mom made me just choose a hand, so now i write with my left, though i do a lot of other things with my right hand.
i have a regular, m-f job, but on sundays i also work at lush for a few hours, purely for the discount. i've worked there over two years now!
i'm obsessive about getting my hair cut, and keeping my fingernails really short. if i let either go too long, i go nuts.
i have lots of little random collections: vintage japanese mugs, vintage buttons, and old state postcards - the ones with the map of the state and little drawings of that state's industry and attractions all over. i don't have all 50 states yet though, so if you have any you don't want, let me know!
i lived in england for a year, for grad school. london and i didn't really click - i liked it ok, but couldn't wait to come home, though i still desperately miss marks & spencer!
i have a big and totally irrational fear that when i pull out the plug in the bath tub when i'm done taking a bath, cockroaches are going to swarm up the drain and attack me. i've never even seen a cockroach in seattle! i grew up in phoenix though, and everyone has them. they tormented me throughout my childhood.
i drink a LOT of tea. i live in seattle, where coffee reigns, but i don't drink the stuff. i do, however, drink several cups of tea a day, and i have a whole cupboard devoted to the stuff at home. my favorite is vanilla earl grey with milk.

sheesh, that was hard! i don't think i'll tag anyone in particular - if you want to list eight random things about yourself, consider yourself tagged.

i have two posts-in-progress that i'm working on. i'm just waiting on the chance to get good pictures. more later this week!

brigitte = bad

2007-09-03T20:18:00.000-07:00

hello! thanks for all the tag blanket love!

unfortunately i have some fugly knitting to report on. i finally got around to finishing brigitte, and it's awful. really, really awful. i really like the pattern in theory - i was picturing a cute, open, sort of retro tunic-y type top to layer over summer dresses. that's definitely not what i got. i started to get a bad feeling about this top pretty early on when i had to keep doing raglan increases way past the point that the pattern indicated. i was using the called-for yarn, and had the correct gauge, but still, the sweater was knitting up way too small. it also was a lot less elastic and stretchy than i expected - the pattern said that it was a really stretchy top, and the huge spans of measurements for each size suggested as much as well. it just didn't even really look like the top in the picture! it was so frustrating.

i decided to persevere anyway because it was such a fast knit, and i figured i wouldn't ever find another use for the rowan cotton braid that i used. so i used up all of the yarn, which should have been enough to knit the largest size, and still the sweater comes up three inches shy of my belly button when i put it on. i think it's safe to say that i'm not bothering to weave the ends in on this one. i've been talking to jenna about it, as she had a similar experience with her attempt at brigitte as well, and i really don't know if there's something wrong with this pattern, or if we just both had bad luck. who knows...i guess my cute little summer top just wasn't meant to be though.

and about that yarn! i kind of went out of my comfort zone a bit with the rowan cotton braid, as it's definitely in novelty yarn territory, and i also don't usually go for oranges. i learned my lesson for sure. no more orange! and easy does it on anything so poofy!

at the very least, i can now cast on for another sweater guilt-free, and hopefully i'll have better luck with this one. tonight i got started on the back-to-school u-neck sweater from fitted knits. i'm using cascade 220 in a pretty heathered mustard color. i looked at some other people's finished sweaters on ravelry tonight and i'm super excited about this project now! everyone else's looks great, and i'm hoping mine will be a very wearable piece. pictures soon!

tag!

2007-08-25T17:46:00.000-07:00

have you ever heard of a tag blanket? i hadn't, but my friend brooke asked me to make one for her baby, cora. basically it's a small blanket that has little loops of ribbon along the edge for the baby to play with. who knew babies liked playing with tags so much? i didn't, but then i don't have a baby!

anyway, brooke picked out some gorgeous fabric from superbuzzy, and i found some coordinating flannel to use for the back, and some cute ribbons that matched. then i just layered the front, back, and some batting, with the ribbon loops pinned between the two fabric layers, and sewed around the edge. it was a really easy project, but i think the end result was is really simple and lovely. in fact, i think i will make these as baby shower gifts from now on, because they're kind of unusual, and they're a good way to show off a fairly small amount of nice fabric.

see....cora likes it!

vancouver is not so far away

2007-08-16T18:47:00.000-07:00

this weekend my little brother, matthew, and his wife (so he's not that little anymore) picked up and moved from seattle to vancouver, bc. he will be starting graduate school there in a few weeks. this fact has bummed me out ever since i found out it was happening, oh, almost a year ago. vancouver is only a few hours from seattle, and i'm happy for him to be starting school, excited for them to start on this new adventure, but sad for myself. i'm really going to miss having my little bro just minutes away!

i made them a little present to take along with them, for their new home, to remind them of their old one. a log cabin pillow:

my favorite part is the little tag i put on it. my sister-in-law has a thing for squirrels, so how could i not use this cute trim i had lying around:

i'll miss you matty!

kitchen destruction

2007-08-14T22:16:00.000-07:00

our kitchen remodel so far:

this is after a month of being worked on, a month living in another apartment. i don't think we're coming home for a while yet, what do you think?

finally, a new project

2007-07-30T16:04:00.000-07:00

i'm a little limited in what i can knit right now - all of my yarn and needles are stashed away at home and now trapped behind a wall of plastic while our kitchen gets worked on. pretty much everything in our house is inaccessible at the moment, which can be frustrating when you realize that something you need is not one of the things you thought to bring with you to the temporary digs! so while i would like to start a new sweater (no, i didn't finish brigitte yet...i haven't even touched it in over a week!), i have to make do with what i decided to bring with me. and what i brought with me is two skeins of socks that rock, in the watermelon tourmaline and farmhouse colorways to make...a chevron scarf, of course!

this has actually turned out to be a good project to work on while staying at what i am now calling 'the hotel,' - it's pretty mindless and easy, but really fun to watch the color combinations develop, and it's keeping me pretty entertained for the moment. plus, i want a long scarf so it should take me a while. i've set myself what should be a pretty easy goal - to have it done by the time we move back to our place, which should be in about a month. i have about a foot done so far:

i fell in love with this combo of yarns the first time i saw them together in a chevron scarf - i knew i had to make one myself. and now that i finally am, i still really love these colors together. i think my watermelon tourmaline is a little heavy on the light green, so that color is dominating a little more than i would like, but that's really my only complaint so far. that, and i wish there was more of the beautiful goldenrod and olive green in my skein of farmhouse! but i can already tell this will be a much-loved scarf. and i love the back as much as the front. it looks like pointillism!

and if i finish it up sooner than i expected, i have another scarf project ready in the wings. my clementing shawlette has languished at the bottom of my knitting bag for too long now, and i've decided i'm not in love with the project anymore, so away it goes! instead, i'm going to use the yarn, which is a lovely ivory skein of handmaiden sea silk, to make the montego bay scarf from the summer interweave knits. i like how slinky this scarf is, and i especially like the braided fringe. i think i will make this for my mom for christmas.

alrighty, i have to go back to my real house to pick up my mail now!

summer time and the living is easy

2007-07-18T16:24:00.000-07:00

chaos is the only word to describe my life this past week...and i don't really have much to show for all that chaos either! is everyone like this during the summer? i feel like every year, knitting takes a back seat during the warmer months, just because i'm busier with social engagements, i spend more time outside, i don't know.

but this year, i have even more going on. a few months ago i mentioned that we were looking to buy our first home, and we did settle on a place a while ago but i hadn't mentioned it since, because there were various holdups. but now stuff is starting to happen with it, so here's a little update: we're buying our apartment! which sounds a little anti-climactic (it was for me at first), but really, i'm so, so excited. we've lived here for over two years now, and i love it. when the building was bought last year to be turned into condos, i was seriously sad about it. i didn't want to leave. but when they first offered the place to us at a 'reduced' price, as is, we weren't impressed with the amount it was being offered at. it seemed too high. however, when we started looking at other condos in the area, we realized what a great deal it really was. our place was built in 1928 and it's beautiful. what's more...it actually has quite a bit of storage, and is fairly large for the price. so in the end, it seemed like the smartest move to stay. plus, we don't have to pack all our stuff up and move!

anyway, even though we are basically buying our place as-is (as in, we're not paying to have them renovate our entire apartment like they are doing to the other units in the building), we did decide to have them redo our kitchen. soon, granite counter tops and stainless steel appliances will be mine! here's a 'before' picture that i took after we cleaned everything out:

in the meantime, we had to leave our apartment for a while so that those renovations could be done. so this weekend, we packed up our kitchen and some of our everyday stuff, and moved into another building that the company owns. ugh. for us only staying there for six or seven weeks, it was a lot of work. plus, the place we're staying in is a studio apartment, and basically looks like a cheap hotel room. it's kind of depressing. our clothes are scattered everywhere and there's not a whole lot to do there, since most of our stuff is still at our place. i'm trying to be upbeat about it, but it's already getting old. i'm already counting down the days til we can move back in!

i have done some knitting. here's brigitte:

i think i like her now. i'm not entirely sure it's going to fit well (i know i could take it off the needles and try it on, but i'm too lazy), and i'm also not sure if i'm going to have enough yarn! even though i'm using the called-for yarn, and i bought enough, i'm a little worried that this sweater is going to end at belly-button level, which is just way too short. i have two more balls of the yarn and a little bit of a third left. we will soon know for sure!

i've also done a tiny bit of sewing. a lot of friends have birthdays right around now, so i've been whipping up little sewing projects as mini gifts. i'm working on some more purl bee cocktail coasters, and i made these potholders, from the lotta jansdotter book:

and that's all i got for the moment! hopefully things will calm down now that we're settled into our temporary home, and i can finish brigitte and get going on a new sweater: i'm torn between starting the hourglass sweater from lmkg, or starting breton girl from the new knit scene. i have yarn for both. maybe i'll start them both!

breton girl

2007-07-07T23:32:00.000-07:00

i picked up the new knitscene the other day, and even though i had already looked at the preview online, i was way impressed with this issue. is anyone else as obsessed with the breton girl pattern as i am?! i saw it and immediately knew i had to make it. i love boat necks, i love stripes...what's not to love? well, probably the millions of ends i'll have to weave in. oh yeah - and it's knit in acrylic. but besides that - nothing, right? i even ordered the called-for yarn already, because i'm actually oddly intrigued by this acrylic yarn. besides being cheap, it has elastic in it, and i don't know, it just sounds kinda cool. i had to order it from the uk, so shipping was really high, but hopefully it will be worth it. the pattern is cream with navy - i tried to think of a new combo to do, and in the end, i just decided to swap the colors: navy as my main color, and cream as the stripe. not too origina, but i just love the nautical look of this sweater too much to mess with it a whole lot.

i can also see myself making the teardrop scarf, the picot posey mittens, and maybe the ribby retro socks. all cute patterns! and the intricate stag bag? i'll probably never make it, but i love it so much.

in other news, i keep meaning to mention that i'm on ravelry now - have been for about a month actually, and loving it. so if you're on there too, let me know! it's kind of hard to know sometimes if someone is using their blog name or their real name or something else entirely on there.

snakes and owls

2007-07-04T13:45:00.000-07:00

hey everyone! thanks for all the rusted root love. i am really enjoying it - it's a great summer sweater! and sorry for the extended break - it wasn't intentional. everyday stuff seems to have gotten in the way of both knitting and blogging lately, so i haven't had much to write about. i've been making minimal progress on my oak and apple socks, as well as the socks i restarted for my brother. i also started brigitte, and i'm completely unsure about it. i might hate the color, but i can't decide. i'm going to persevere with it for a while though - i figure there's nothing else really that i could do with that cotton braid i got to make with it! it's such a weird yarn. definitely in the novelty yarn category, and i think that fact is making me a little uneasy. i should just embrace it i guess. anyway, none of those projects are really photo-worthy at this point, but they should be soon.

i did finally make something from the lotta jansdotter book, simple sewing- a draft snake! this is the project that immediately captured my imagination when i first flipped through the book. i just think it's such a cute idea, and a great way to mix fabrics. and of course, it's a super easy project, so that adds to its appeal. i whipped this up in just about an hour, using some of the new katie jump rope fabric and a cute little bumblebee linen that i've had for a while. the funnest part was filling it with lentils. it's such a narrow little tube that i had to drop the lentils in with a tablespoon (i don't have a funnel but i certainly wished i did at the time). it was time-consuming but oddly relaxing. i think i overstuffed the snake a little though, because the seams look a little stretched now. oh well. anyway, i think it turned out very cute, and it's now sitting in one of the windows in our living room - not really doing its job at the moment, since there really aren't any drafts to speak of this time of year. but i'm sure it will work great in a few months! i can see myself making these for all our other windows too, and making them as gifts. i've already had one request for a draft snake as a birthday gift!

also, i just wanted to show off the most recent addition to my owl collection: little salt and pepper shakers! i love these. my friend jessica gave them to me recently, and they are cheering up our kitchen table now. they're so sweet!

hope you all have a good 4th of july (if you're celebrating). we're going to go see ratatouille here in a bit, then go find a place for a picnic and some fireworks-watching.

rusted root

2007-06-21T08:40:00.000-07:00

...is done!

(there is so much random crap in the background of this picture! my cat's toy cherry, weights, window screen, charging ipod...i'll do a better job of tidying up first next time i do a photo shoot)

pattern: rusted root, by zephyr style
needles: denise needles, size 6 & 5
yarn: cotton fleece, in emperor's robe, about 3.75 skeins
started some time in april, finished earlier this week

i've been nearly done with this sweater for ages, and i finally did all of the finishing over the weekend. i love it! it fits perfectly, save for the sleeves being just a tad too loose. the pattern called for using size 4 needles for the arm bands and i probably should have done that instead of using the 5s, but my denise needles were out and i don't have 4s with that set. it's a pretty minor issue. oh yeah...one other little thing. my last skein of the cotton fleece was a different dye lot. i was planning on mixing the last two skeins, but then got lazy, and unfortunately, you can tell the difference in certain lights. the bottom three or four inches of the sweater are a different color, as are the neck and arm bands. but in most light you can't tell, and hopefully it won't be glaringly obvious. i learned my lesson though - laziness in knitting does not pay off!

now that this sweater is off my plate, i am starting brigitte with some rowan cotton braid that i picked up for cheap. i think it's also about time i started up on my brother's socks again. better luck to me this time!

and the winner is...

2007-06-17T19:26:00.000-07:00

michael! i've sent you an email so you can let me know which color you'd like.

thanks for playing, everyone! i can definitely see why people like having contests. having all those comments roll in was lots of fun. and you all have such great taste in cake! i forgot about red velvet and ice cream cake...those two would definitely be up there on my list of favorites as well.

just so i don't have a photo-less blog post, check out what i got at anthropologie today. i got a gift card from my in-laws for my birthday, and i decided to just get a few cute little kitchen items. i'm in love with these napkins (and i didn't get charged for one of them. score!) and this mini collander, which is the perfect size for washing fruit. a somewhat frivolous purchase for sure, which is exactly how birthday money should be spent, right?

happy birthday to me!

2007-06-14T17:41:00.001-07:00

as i mentioned the other day, today is my birthday! i am 28. it's been a pretty low-key birthday this year - i worked, and we're going out for pizza here in a bit. i'm going out for drinks with some friends next week, but that's it for the celebrations this year!

last year, when i turned 27, i decided that 27 was going to be really great year for me, and that i really wanted to develop my creative skills and interests. i think i've done a pretty good job. i took up sewing, and continue to learn more about that. i've definitely developed as a knitter. and i started this here blog, which has certainly pushed me to put my crafty skills to work more often. it's also afforded me the opportunity to be inspired by other crafters like me. so i thought that today would be a good time to have my first contest, to thank you all for reading and inspiring me, and to celebrate the year ahead.

so i'm going to make it really, really easy. just leave me a comment on this post, telling me what your favorite birthday cake is. mine? when i was a kid i always asked my mom to make me pumpkin pie for my birthday, but there's also something really good about plain yellow cake with chocolate frosting, too. i'll pick a winner probably on sunday evening.

and the prize? some yarn pirate yarn! you can pick one of the two shown above. that's clementine on the left and sadie on the right. if you win you can pick your fave!

catching up

2007-06-10T20:05:00.000-07:00

wow, it's been an exhausting week and i don't even know where to start writing! i guess i should start by saying thanks to everyone who left me a nice comment about losing my job. all those comments really did make me feel better. so thanks!

this week has been a total whirlwind and i feel completely off, out of my normal flow. my in-laws were in town all week and while it was fun, i was pretty glad to see them leave today. that sounds really mean. i'm just tired of sleeping on an air mattress in the living room, tired of my cat waking me up at 5 in the morning because i'm in 'his' room and he's a morning person, tired of eating rich food at restaurants and tired of having to entertain. i think that makes me a big whiner, but there you have it. i spent all of today napping, reading a book and trying to catch up on my out-of-control bloglines. and it felt goooooood.

while we were entertaining this week, i also managed to get a job! i know, crazy! it happened really, really fast. i applied on monday, got a call on tuesday, went for an interview wednesday and was offered the job on friday. i'm not 100 percent sure about this job, but i think for now it will be good, and i'm thankful i didn't have to be out of work for too long (though after my exhausting week, i could do with another week or two of slackerdom). i start tomorrow!

i also managed to work in a quick little project. it was my friend's birthday this week, so i made her what else? fingerless gloves! my fourth or fifth pair this year. this time i made the hand/wrist warmers from last minute knitted gifts. i used the called-for noro cash iroha, and though it's very beautiful, i had some issues with it. namely, the huge variation in thickness of this yarn. i would say it's mostly a worsted weight, but there were some parts that were really chunky, and those parts sort of obscured the pattern, a diagonal rib that was really fun to knit. still, i like how these turned out. snug and comfy, and they really did only take a few hours to make. my kind of project!

here's a picture of one of them...i really did make two, but i only finished one in time for my friend's birthday party, so i gave her that one then, and finished the second one the next morning.

my birthday is on thursday, so i think to celebrate, i'm going to have my first-ever contest later this week. stay tuned!

thank goodness for mail

2007-06-02T18:09:00.000-07:00

so i had kind of a bad day yesterday. yesterday i lost my job. actually the whole company went under, so quite a few people in the bellevue, washington area lost their jobs. it's unfortunate, and definitely not what i was wanting to deal with at the moment, but i'm sure it will all be okay in the end. i felt fairly fine about it yesterday but today started to feel kind of down, so the sound swap cd that arrived in the mail from jennie cheered me up even more than it normally would have. it totally made my day!

when i signed up for the sound swap, i was secretly hoping that jennie would be the one sending me a mix because i felt like she probably knew a whole lot about an area of music that i was curious about. and lucky me, i did indeed get a great mix from her! and one that i know i'll get a lot of enjoyment from and that will prompt me to look into many of the artists on here that i'm not already familiar with.

the tracklisting for 'phonographic: a saturday morning anytime feel good mix'

1. rum and coca cola - andrews sisters
2. pistol packin' mama - al dexter and his troopers
3. let me play with your poodle - tampa red w/ big maceo
4. scatterbrain mama - delmore brothers
5. chicago rhythm - jimmie noone
6. make up your mind - kitty wells
7. i'm wild about that thing - bessie smith
8. coucou - django reinhardt
9. barbecue bust - mississippi jook band
10. coney isle - roscoe holcomb
11. roly poly - bob wills and his light crust dough boys
12. corina - carter sisters
13. don't try to keep up with the joneses - dizzy gillespie
14. country blues - dock boggs
15. wish i was a single girl again - lulu belle and scotty
16. if i didn't love you - hank williams
17. beans and cornbread - louis jordan
18. little satchel - fred cocherham
19. lord, i want to die easy - josh white
20. big leg blues - mississippi john hurt
21. she's got money too - uncle dave macon
22. don't falter at the altar - cab calloway

and the cover is cute to boot! jennie also sent me a skein of sundara sport weight in a gorgeous blue, which is just about the most exciting thing to happen to me in a very long while - i've been lusting after some sundara yarn for ages now but never seem to get to the website in time to make one of her yarn updates. thank you so much jennie! i love everything!

and while i'm showing off cool mail, i also wanted to say thanks to stickchicky for the lace book that i won in a contest she had on her blog. that arrived this week too, and the book is gorgeous. i think most of the patterns are waaaaay beyond my skill set right now, but it's nice to have something to aspire to, and there are some things in there that i'd love to make some day. so thank you!

that's all the exciting mail for me for the week...probably next week the thing i'll look forward to receiving most will be my unemployment check!

airy scarf

2007-05-31T11:12:00.000-07:00

i finally finished a knitting project! it's been...way too long. like, the beginning of april i think. yikes! but i haven't finished rusted root, the project that really should be done by now (i'm almost there...i just got a little tired of all that stockinette in the round). instead, after my trip to portland where i picked up last-minute knitted gifts, i sort of decided one afternoon that i'd take a quick detour and make the airy scarf from the book. it's quick, it's short, it's light - perfect for this time of year, when the weather is warm, and my knitting attention span is even shorter than it normally is.

i used some habu textiles silk/mohair that my friend aruni sent me back in february. i have loads left of the cone she sent me, so i may have to make a few more of these as gifts at some point. the habu is a little finer than the kidsilk haze called for in the pattern, so my scarf is slightly narrower and shorter, but it's still the perfect lenght for tying around your neck for a little decoration without a lot of warmth.

i knit this up on size 10.5 needles, and at first the little yarn/big needle combo was so fiddly, i never thought i'd be able to finish! but i persevered, even when the scarf was only a couple of inches long and looked like a really bad toupee. i think it looks a little better now.

our lovely pacific northwest, in song and picture

2007-05-29T14:43:00.000-07:00

i finally finished the cover for my sound swap cd, and it should be in the hands of its recipient here shortly. i finished the cd weeks ago! i don't know why i took so long to do the cover, but i'm pretty happy with the end result. the cd is all (well, mostly...) songs by artists from this neck of the woods. i hope my swap person likes it!

market bag

2007-05-24T19:34:00.000-07:00

another sewing project, this one much more successful! this is the market bag from the crafter's companion. i've been looking forward to making this bag since i got the book, and it ended up being really fun to make.

the fabric is from my favorite online fabric store, superbuzzy. i picked the pear fabric out first, then had to choose something that matched for the lining and top part of the outside bag. i like the one i chose, but it doesn't quite match - i kind of wish i'd gone for something a little brighter. does anyone else think that the hardest part about sewing is the cutting of the fabric? it takes me forever and totally stresses me out. but...this was my first time adding piping to a sewing project! this thrilled me to no end when i sewed up those two outer pieces with the piping sandwiched in between, and saw when i was done sewing that it worked! it's not completely even and the piping is probably a little thinner than it should be, but i'm still quite impressed with myself for learning that new skill. also, i learned how to make a bag gusset. i seriously stared at the instructions in the book for like an hour, and kept putting the outer bag and liner aside to do other parts of the bag, because i could NOT figure out how to do the gusset. then, i woke up the next morning and magically had figured it out. i love when that happens.

and look! the coolest thing about this bag:

i really, truly think i should have an honest-to-goodness finished knitted object by the end of the week, though it might not be the one you're expecting to see (oops!).

i love the city of roses

2007-05-17T08:41:00.000-07:00

this weekend we went to portland! i love portland so much - and luckily it's only a 2.5 hour drive from seattle, so we can go often (though we usually don't...but we should!). we planned to visit with some friends on friday and saturday evening, and drive back up on sunday afternoon. however, my hubby made it clear to me that during the day on saturday, i was on my own, as he had plans to hit up ALL of the city's record stores. fine with me!

after breakfast at the tin shed, we parted ways and my day of fun-ness began. first up was bolt, a fabric store i'd heard of but hadn't gotten to try yet. i went a little nuts in there but it was fun! things i'd only seen online before were right there in person. i love this paper crane fabric:

and also this:

then i went to the yarn store next door (i'm sorry - i can't remember its name!), and it was great, but i didn't buy anything. they had some pretty fancy yarn - the jade sapphire cashmere, in particular, caught my eye. but i wasn't in a yarn-buying mood, so off i went to the pearl district and checked out powell's. i bought last minute knitted gifts (am i the last knitter in the world to own this book?) and a few used novels, and then just wandered around the area for a while. i went to saint cupcake for an afternoon treat and had these three mini cupcakes:

that's red velvet, carrot and coconut cream. yum!

i saw this little bunny graffiti:

then i headed over to hawthorne and rummaged through the red light and buffalo exchange. i was on the lookout for the perfect pair of vintage sandals, which of course i didn't find, but i did come away with a weird little bead necklace and a pretty bag:

that was about it for the day...we met up with one of my friends and we went to hotlips pizza for pizza and on-tap blackberry soda.

it was a good weekend (we also went here for breakfast on sunday...the chocolate chip banana pancakes were SO good), and we got home exhausted sunday evening. but now i can't wait to go back!

an apple a day

2007-05-09T18:53:00.000-07:00

i feel like such a lame blogger of late. i've been a busy bee with other stuff, so i don't really have much knitting progress to show. but i guess i have a few thing of interest to report, so here goes!

first off, despite my whinging about my bad sewing skills in my last post (thanks for making me feel better, by the way), i still continue to buy fabric and sewing books at an alarming rate. it seems that in my head, sewing skill is directly proportional to the amount of fabric in your stash. at least i look like a real sewer with all these piles of fabric! anywho...i got the lotta jansdotter book at last, and there are several cute little projects that i can't wait to make (why am i SO excited about making a draft snake? i don't know, but i really, really am). i picked up some fabric from sarah's new etsy shop, including some of the new denyse schmidt katy jump rope fabric. it's so pretty...i feel like denyse schmidt can do no wrong as far as her fabrics are concerned.

second, progress continues to be made on my rusted root - i need to do probably another four pattern repeats, and then the neck and sleeve ribbing and then...i'll be done! but i've had to momentarily set it aside while i make yet another pair of fetching (my third pair, to be exact. that's crazy!). fetching just makes such a great gift - all three pairs that i've made have been gifted. but hopefully i can finish rusted root by early next week. that would be almost exactly a month since i started it, and i think that's pretty respectable.

rr however has gotten too big to carry around with me to work, so i've started a lunchtime project - a pair of socks, my first knitted with magic loop, which i'm loving. i'm doing the oak rib socks from nancy bush's knitting vintage socks, and using some yarn pirate in apple. so i'm calling them my oak and apple socks - i know, i'm so clever! i've barely started, but you can see that these not only fit in perfectly with project spectrum, but they're like spring personified (or sockified?!). i really like how they're mostly green, and actually lots of different greens, with the thin stripes of bubblegum pink and rosy mauve thrown in. love!

alrighty! i have to go get ready for the craft night i'm hosting tonight - jenna and shannon will be there, as well as all my other crafty-though-blogless friends. good times!

the ugly apron

2007-05-01T13:40:00.000-07:00

oh my. i think i hit an absolute low point in my crafting career last night. i had admirable intentions, inspiring materials to work with, and there was the potential for everything to work out okay, but somewhere along the way, things went seriously pear-shaped.

i picked up this pillow case at the thrift store a few months ago, with the pillow case apron from the crafter's companion in mind. i washed it and ironed it, and didn't get much further than that until this week. i have several other little crafty projects in mind for the next few weeks, so i thought i'd get this one out of the way first. plus, it's pink - so project spectrum! i love aprons, i love the crafter's companion - what could go wrong?

well for starters, i have very limited sewing skills. i don't think that can be over-emphasized here. obvious issues:

the pocket i created is noticeably crooked
the pocket is made by sewing a zig-zag stitch through two layers then carefully cutting down the center of the zig zap to create a slit. i did this, but the result was a very sloppy, uneven looking pocket. it looks like a giant gash in the fabric - like a mistake with the rotary cutter. not like a pocket, though it certainly can function as a pocket.
because of the pillow case's weird dimensions (it's a king size pillow case, so it was a lot longer than normal, but not wider), i folded it length-wise instead of width-wise as the pattern calls for. this made sense to me at the time but now i have no idea why i did it! the result is a really long, REALLY skinny apron

i think that's about it, but it's enough. the whole thing is just funny looking. the good news is that it was my first time making little darts, where the apron ties are sewn to the apron body. those worked out fine!

ugh...please ignore the clutter in my apartment. it's always like that.

for all that went wrong, i'm not actually too sad about this project. i mean, it's an apron! i now don't have to feel bad about getting it really messy, right? and if i really hate it, it means i have about a pillow case worth of cute, pink flowery fabric. i guess it's projects like this (this was supposed to be a really easy project, damn it!) that keep you humble, and i'm definitely feeling humble right about now, for sure. better luck next time!

orangina, orangina, where you been so long?

2007-04-25T22:10:00.000-07:00

as promised, here's a progress shot of my orangina. none of this is new progress - this is as far as i got with the project last july, when i started it, pre-blog. back then, i was sooooooo excited about getting this done - i loved (and still do!) the design, and couldn't wait to wear it. but then a few gift knits got in the way, and before you know it, it's april and i still don't have an orangina to my name! still, that first half is complete, and i think the second half will go pretty fast as well. not that i've cast on for it yet! soon, soon.

the yarn is rowan 4-ply cotton, which is lovely and soft to work with. the color is 'fennel,' which is fun to say and always makes me smile. i'm excited, if nothing else, to just not have it hanging over my head. but i think i'll enjoy wearing it as well.

and i try not to post too many pictures of my cat, but i can't resist sharing this one. he's just too darn cute here! he was helping with the photo shoot.

feeling blue

2007-04-18T23:57:00.000-07:00

hello!

first off, i wanted to say thanks to chris for the cute card she sent me this week as part of the knitterly letter swap. look, it's knitters, knitting:

thanks chris - your return letter is on the way!

in my last post i mentioned that i was going to focus on getting two sweaters done in the next two months: finishing my orangina from last summer, and starting rusted root. well, rusted root came first, and so far i'm really enjoying it. this is my first top-down sweater that i've attempted, and i can already see why people like this method so much. i'm almost done with the raglan increases, and it looks, believe it or not, like a sweater! this thrills me way more than it should, i know. but...like i said before, i've started many a sweater and not finished a single one, largely because i get bored of knitting large rectangles, and have a hard time imagining the final product. here, i can definitely see the puffy sleeves taking shape, the neckline is obviously a neckline, and the length of the sweater is growing. i hope to get this done in the next few weeks, as it's knitting up really fast, and i'm feeling really motivated by the project. and as long as i don't have any more mishaps like i had the other night, when the two connected cords of my denise needles spontaneously unconnected, leaving me with a few severely dropped stitches, then i think that goal is attainable.

i'm using lamb's pride cotton fleece, in the 'emperor's robe' color. i know, i should have picked a pink or a green! but when i went to buy the yarn, none of the pinks or greens really thrilled me, and my orangina is green anyway, so i thought i'd go for another color. now that i'm knitting with this color, i'm not sure if i like it or not. i kind of wish it was more of a navy blue, but oh well. maybe it will bring out the blue in my eyes!

hopefully i'll have an orangina progress shot for you later this week as well...

fake-a-gamo completo!

2007-04-12T18:32:00.000-07:00

it's been a while since i last posted, mostly for lack of anything to post about. i feel like any knitting i've done over the past few weeks has fallen into some mysterious knitting black hole, leaving me nothing to show for my efforts. but finally (and it does feel like ages since i can say this), i have a finished object to show off - fake-a-gamo is finally done!

i got really excited about this project the second i laid eyes on it, way back in october. and i remained excited through the first side of the bag. but when i realized i had to do it all over again, what originally seemed fun and cool and whatnot suddenly seemed...not so much those things. i REALLY struggled to bother finishing the second side. i'm still not exactly sure if it was worth the effort either - i think it looks nice, but i don't really know how much i'll use this bag - i need a BIG purse, and this is not that. it's teeny! at about 11 inches across and five or six inches tall (not including the handle strap parts), this bag basically holds my pretty darn big wallet, and not much else. so i guess it will get use as an occasional bag when i go out, but i don't see me using it as an everyday bag. but i sound so negative! i do like it - i like the triangle patterns, i love the lining, and i think it's a super cute summery bag. so yay- a cute, finished knit!

the details:

pattern: fake-a-gamo (this is a free pattern - i just emailed kate and she sent it right to me)
yarn: lamb's pride cotton fleece, in buttercream - one skein (a sidenote on that...i bought WAY too much of this stuff. i really don't know what i was thinking at the time, but seriously - way too much. after i finished the first half, it looked like i had used less than 1/2 of the first skein, so i took the other skeins back to the yarn store and exchanged it for another color, for another project. of course...i ran out of yarn before i got to the end of the second half of the bag. i felt *this* dumb. luckily, i ran out on the last folded-over handle bit, and luckily, i had a wool yarn that matched almost exactly, but still...silly me.)
needles: denise needles, size 6
modifications: i didn't do the little curlicue thingies at the bottom, and my bag is quite a bit smaller than the dimensions in the pattern, which is because i used a different yarn and didn't bother swatching first...i figured it didn't matter too much since it's just a bag. i'm just lazy like that.

i've decided that for april and may, i'm going to focus on finishing my orangina that i started last july (it's green, for project spectrum!), and also finish up another sweater that i started this week - the popular rusted root. please keep me honest here - i really want some cute summer tops to wear this year, and i'm excited to work on these, but i always lose steam on sweaters. i've actually never finished one (orangina is a good example of my typical sweater experience), though i've started many. i find that really sad, so i'm hoping to change that soon.

oh yeah! last week veronica emailed me to say that i had won some yarn on her blog. we both live in seattle, so last saturday we met up for chai, which was a fun treat, and she gave me this:

that's three skeins of art yarns regal silk, and one of a matching art yarns silk tape. it's gorgeous! i keep petting it. thanks again veronica! i'm not sure what i'm going to do with it yet, but i'm starting to think about making a second, smaller clapotis. any other ideas?

pink, green, yellow...the colors of our lives

2007-04-04T21:19:00.000-07:00

today lolly asked to see our pink, green and yellow stash, and i was happy to oblige...i think green is the most represented color in my stash. i can't get enough green! and if it's the right pink or the right yellow, i can't get enough of that either.

so here are the greens:

(that's roughly, from top right, trekking xxl, rowan 4-ply cotton, yarn pirate in 'sadie,' frog tree, socks that rock in 'alina,' yarn pirate in 'apple,' socks that rock in 'watermelon tourmaline,' the knittery (shade unknown), and louet gems in 'fern')

and the pinks (much fewer of those):

(knit picks shine in orchid - i have LOTS of this stuff!, and yarntini in 'pomtini')

and the yellow:

(that's jamieson's shetland spindrift in 'flax,' lisa souza sock! yarn in 'ginger peach,' and some unknown cotton that i used last year to make my mom some dish cloths)

and some more project spectrum around my house...

about five or six years ago, i bought these japanese/chinese language flash cards at a little boutique and bought some cheapo frames from ikea to frame them. i painted them yellow and green because that matched my bathroom at the time. these live in our kitchen now.

tea is a very important part of my day:

soy bean afro ken!

this is an afghan that my great-grandmother crocheted. i love it!

this is where my button collection lives:

and some buttons:

and my book journal, where i record lists of all the books i read in a year:

alpaca love

2007-03-31T23:09:00.000-07:00

today, my friend and i went to alpacapalooza! i've been wanting to go for months, ever since i first learned of the festival from a fridge magnet on my office refridgerator for a previous alpacapalooza. i think the festival lived up to the enormous hype i'd built up in my mind - there were SO many adorable little alpacas, and tons of alpaca yarn for sale too. i was well behaved and didn't buy any yarn (or alpacas for that matter, though i was tempted), but i definitely fondled a lot of yarn, watched some being spun, petted some alpacas, and even got a kiss from one! we decided we definitely want an alpaca farm one day - i want a fluffy tan alpaca, to be named butterscotch. :) here are some pictures from our day.

(sorry for so many pictures...i couldn't pick just a few)

ooh! i also got some exciting mail yesterday. a month or so ago, i commented on kristie's blog that i loved the green yarn she was using for a pair of socks. she responded that it was one of the few australian sock yarns that she thought was really good, and would i like to do a sock yarn swap? knowing what an awesome swap partner she is, i was quick to agree. and she sent me the best stuff! the yarn is gorgeous and so soft, and lots of lovely shades of green - i like how it is labeled as 'cheerfully handpainted'! and then she also sent me a cute brooch that i've already worn twice, a little fabric pouch, a sweet little roll of trim (i'm so excited to find something to use this with!), and a cd of australian bands. i love it all! thanks kristie!

fake it 'til you make it

2007-03-28T14:03:00.000-07:00

i'm sure you've all been sitting on the edges of your seats, waiting to find out if the sock fit my bro's foot, right?! well he called me yesterday to say that in fact, it's way, way not going to fit. at this point, i'm ok with it. i think i've recovered. but i'm not feeling the urge to start over right away...he's moving to vancouver in august for grad school, and i've promised to have them done by then...that seems fair, right? he probably wouldn't be wearing them now anyway since it's warming up. but when i do start over, i think i will go up a needle size (or rather, switch to the addi turbo size 1s that i recently bought, which are bigger than the inox size 1s i was using), and i think i might use a different heel flap. i think the pattern has a dutch heel flap, and it looks cool, but i feel like even with a bigger sock, this heel isn't going to fit right. so that's my plan, and i'm sticking to it....when i feel like it, that is!

moving on...last week i had a miserable cold and i still am suffering from insane sinus pressure. no fun! it's left me absolutely exhausted in the evenings, and completely uninterested in knitting. still, i managed to knit one half of my fake-a-gamo bag last week. i'm making the bag in a pretty yellow called buttercream, and if all goes to plan, this will be my first yellow-green-pink project for the next two months of project spectrum. i am way excited to be starting the new colors...i have a lot i'd like to get done in those two months. i have an orangina that i started last july that it would be nice to finish (it's a lovely fennel green), i have two sock yarns that would make perfect green and pink project spectrum socks, and i also plan to make some endpaper mitts as a birthday present. plus i do have some gray and white projects to finish as well!

anyway, back to the bag, it's such a fast and fun knit! i love the part where you double-wrap the stitches, then drop the double wrap on the next round and knit all 11 of the stitches together. it's such a cool trick. i'm using cotton fleece instead of the called for classic elite provence, and as a result it's knitted up quite a bit smaller than the pattern's called-for dimensions. i think i'm ok with that though, and i think this is going to look pretty cute when it's all done. i'm going to line it with this fabric, and i still haven't decided on handles. but the big question is, curlicues or no curlicues?

winning the battle...

2007-03-23T20:08:00.000-07:00

...but unfortunately, not the war.

here we have one completed, giant boy sock. awesome! i'm half way done with what turned into a pretty boring project.

but here's where this story gets sad. when i finished the sock, i was so excited, and quickly coerced my husband into trying it on for me. he kind of grumbled a little, then obliged, taking off his sock and shoe and pulling on the new sock. and he tugged and pulled and kind of twisted, and finally sort of managed to get the sock on his foot, but clearly, it was a bit too small. the heel is fitting weird, and the sock just looks, well, stretched. and the sad part? my husband wears size 12s. these socks, for my brother, were supposed to fit a size 13. my excitement very quickly turned to panic and just....aaaaaiggggghhh! how could this happen? it's not a gauge issue, and i used a sock size card to figure out how long to make it. where did i go wrong?!

so my brother hasn't actually tried it on yet. we're seeing him on sunday (for his birthday dinner...i am officially not getting these socks done in time), and i'm going to have him try it on. maybe my husband just has really fat feet (sorry honey!). but if not, and if they don't fit, then what? i've never ripped back a sock before. i don't think i'd know what to do. it can't be that hard - these are just plain stockinette afterall, but when i make a mistake in my knitting, i have to admit, i usually will either ignore it or just start over. that's terrible, isn't it? so i'm looking at this as a potential learning experience. i don't want to start over!

wish me luck (or wish for my brother's foot to fit...)!

yay, yarn!

2007-03-17T16:28:00.000-07:00

thanks everyone for all the well-wishes on the home-buying front. it's pretty exciting! though this is a prime case for my true worry-wort self to show through.

so today has been so good! i wish all saturdays were like this. we started out by spending a few hours with our realtor looking at places, then i've just spent the rest of the day relaxing and getting free yarn! i went to my favorite yarn store to spend the final $10 on my punch card ( i got two balls of jamieson's shetland spindrift for some more stranded mittens or fingerless gloves) and with my filled card, i got a few skeins of cotton fleece to make fakeagamo. free yarn=free purse!

when i got home, i had a package waiting for me from my friend aruni. aruni and i both frequent a music message board, but on this board she and i and a few others have secured a tiny little corner where we can talk about knitting. and we all decided to do a little secret pal swap type thing. so aruni was my swap person, and she sent me the best stuff!

aruni (who has a blog by the way...go check it out!) lives in nyc, and she sent me some gorgeous silk/cotton blend yarn from school products, in a great burgundy color. she also sent me some noro aurora that i'm really excited about, and some habu textiles silk/mohair blend that i'm seeing as a cute little lacy scarf. and she also knitted me a dishcloth! i really scored. thanks aruni!

and on top of all that, i get to go to the theater tonight to see this play. hope you all have a good weekend too!

bits and pieces

2007-03-13T20:27:00.000-07:00

i'm finally working on the foot part of the first of my brother's socks! i don't know why these are taking so long...i mean, i thought the long part would be the size 13 foot part, not the leg, right? needless to say, i don't think these will be done for my brother's birthday on the 26th...hopefully it won't be too long after that though. also, hopefully the stockinette will even out a little with some blocking. i'm not feeling too jazzed about these at the moment

i've also been working on clementine...this is such a fun knit! it's easy, and i think it's shaping up nicely. i'm about 10 rows from being done with the increasing of the first half. i don't know if this is a common feature of lace shawls or not, but this shawl is knit in two identical pieces, then kitchenered together at the end. i'm a little freaked out by the prospect of so much kitchener stitch...that will be about 70 stitches, which right now seems daunting. i've done it before, and it's not technically hard, but it still scares me!

other than that, i haven't been working on much these days. we're in the process of shopping for our first house (more likely condo or townhouse), so that is taking up a lot of my free time at the moment. it's exciting but scary - wish us luck!

cocktail coasters

2007-03-08T23:24:00.000-08:00

i promise i'm knitting...really! but i've been wanting to make these for a while, and receiving some cool new fabric in the mail this week seemed like the perfect excuse to finally do something about it. so no knitting for now, but instead some cute new coasters for the living room:

my sewing machine and this project just did not want to play nice together. i don't know what the problem was, but it seemed that i spent more time re-threading the machine and un-stucking jammed up threads than i did actually sewing these. so if you look closely (please don't), you'll see that their construction is pretty sloppy. but if you look big picture, i think the results are pretty great: i LOVE these fabrics and colors together. i think i'll give these a test spin and have a big ol' icy adult beverage to celebrate!

trekking to shoreline

2007-03-05T13:48:00.000-08:00

this weekend i bought...more sock yarn and another sock book! two things i definitely don't need, but i oh-so-wanted them, so there you go. they are mine!

first up was some trekking xxl in shade 100. i believe this shade is somewhat famous, and i can see why - it's so cool and stripey, and the colors are perfect. on friday i braved the horrible rain and made my way over to village yarn and tea in shoreline to check out the store and also to say hello to yarn pirate, who was having a trunk sale there that night. though the shop is a bit out of my way to go there regularly, i'm glad i got to see the place and try out a new yarn store - i tend to only buy yarn from one or two shops here in seattle, and sometimes i forget that there are actually lots of great places here. i picked up some yarn pirate (not for me!), and then somehow that trekking found it's way into my hands and just wouldn't let me put it down. it was love at first sight - i'm having dreams of rainbow stripey loveliness, possibly in the form of another pair of ribbed socks from knitting vintage socks. and as the predominant color here seems to be green, i think these may have to be made for april/may project spectrum - we'll see!

and then there is the new interweave sock book, favorite socks. i went to get it a week or so ago at weaving works and was told that they couldn't keep it on the shelves. but they put me on a hold list for when they got more copies in, and saturday i finally picked up my copy. i don't think i love all of the patterns, but i do love a lot of them. i'm thinking the padded footlets will be one of the first i make - they sound so cozy and cushiony, and they look pretty quick to make as well. i'm all about the slipper sock, so i think i'll get a lot of use out of these. and meida's socks, and the embossed leave socks, are beautiful too. and the bonus of buying this book is that it has put me ten tiny little dollars away from filling my punch card at weaving works! i guess that means i've spent quite a lot of money at weaving works over the past couple of months, but never mind...i get free yarn next time i go!

no knitting of consequence to show off...later this week i'll have a turned heel to show on my brother's socks (which are taking forever), as well as the clementine shawlette that i've started, and some quilted coasters that are going to be so cute!

i'll just leave you all with a little taste of the springtime that seems to be settling in here...today it was easily 60 degrees outside, and when i was walking home tonight, i found this beautiful tree, filling the air with the smell of flowers. yay!

fo: purl beret

2007-02-26T11:48:00.000-08:00

this weekend i somehow injured my lower back (while i was sleeping no less!) so i spent much of the weekend on the couch, leaning on either a heating pad or a frozen bag of edamame, knitting away. nothing really makes you feel like you're starting to get old (i'm 27!) like not being able to fully stand upright, or having trouble putting on pants. but besides all that, i did get a lot done on my brother's socks, and i finished my beret!

it was really touch and go with this project - if you'll recall, i had a few false starts, and then once i really got into it, i realized that i might not have enough yarn. in one of the earlier incarnations of this hat, i was knitting with the recommended size 3 needles, and it seemed too small. so i frogged and moved up to size 4s, and in doing so, i think (well, i know) i used more yarn than the pattern really called for. and since this was koigu, and it was of course the last of the color when i bought it from my lys a few months back, i felt i had very little chance of getting the exact same yarn. so i just hoped for the best!

the pattern calls for knitting the hat 4" from the start before decreasing, with the option to make a floppier hat by knitting 4.5-5" instead. i was hoping for a floppier hat, both because i prefer the look and also because my head and hair are both big, so i thought a little extra room would be nice! but since i was afraid of running out of yarn, i stuck to just over 4". now i wish i'd been a little more daring, as i did end up having probably five yards of yarn left - enough for that extra inch. oh well. the hat is a little small but i think it looks pretty cute anyway.

the specs:

pattern: purl beret - i've yet to try one of their patterns that i haven't loved.
yarn: koigu kpm, and i've lost the little tag so i can't tell you what the color number is, but we'll just call it blue. or maybe...sapphire blue, just to be a little more exciting. as the pattern pointed out, the decreases really stand out and look great with the variations in this handpainted yarn.
needles: clover size 4 16"-circulars and dpns.

ooh! i also made blueberry bran muffins this weekend. they are yummy in a very healthy tasting kind of way...and with peanut butter and honey, they are just plain yummy.

project spectrum around the house

2007-02-19T22:47:00.000-08:00

i feel like i haven't blogged in ages! my dad was in town since thursday for a long weekend, and even though i took friday and today off work (no holiday off for me...), i feel completely exhausted. it's hard work being a hostess! but my dad, my brother, our spouses and i had a pretty good weekend: we went here, and here, and here, and managed to occupy ourselves in various ways for the rest of the weekend.

so with all that going on, my knitting projects haven't gotten a lot of attention. i re-started my beret, and started nancy bush's gentleman's winter socks for my brother, for his birthday. i'm using yarn pirate's new semi-solid yarn, in fog. it's beautiful, and just right for this month's project spectrum. but like i said...for my brother, and his size 13 feet! these are going to take a while. here's a really, really dark picture of my progress so far:

since i don't have much else to show you, i thought i'd look for the blue, gray, and white around my house, and i found quite a lot! sorry...most of these pictures are 'artfully' blurry. it's such a dark, dreary day today that i have no chance of getting anything better unfortunately.

some fabric from superbuzzy that i'm going to use for some coasters and other fun stuff:

our telephone (which we almost never use, in this age of cell phones, but still it looks nice):

i made this string of origami lights last year. the little balls are called water bombs. some of them are blue:

a blue melmac tray that i found at an antique store in tucson last summer:

a little owl crumb sweeper!

one half of my hello kitty/dear daniel book ends:

and some blue, white and gray buttons from my button collection:

that's all for now...hopefully i'll have some real knitting to show and some better quality pictures later in the week!

also...i just installed halo scan for my comments, because i'm tired of not being able to reply to comments with blogger! which is exciting, but i just realized that in doing so, i deleted all my old blogger comments, which makes me kind of sad.

i quilted!

2007-02-11T13:54:00.000-08:00

remember, oh, about a month ago when i mentioned that i had started a log cabin quilted throw pillow? well, it sort of languished on a living room chair for several weeks after that, until this weekend when i decided to finish it. i was pretty much done sewing the pieces of the top together, but i still had to do the actual quilting part. i've never quilted anything before, and though this piece is about as easy as it comes, i was still so scared to take the sewing machine to my beautiful, carefully sewn together piece! the quilting is one big concentric circle of lines, and i had to stop after each line and kind of take a deep breath and convince myself that everything was going to be okay. and it really was okay!

front:

back:

the pattern is lisa congdon's, from the crafter's companion, a book that i am really enjoying. the fabric was just lots of little things i've picked up, both vintage bits as well as goodies from purl and superbuzzy. i like how this pattern allows you to really use up scraps of fabric, and it was fun (though sort of stressful!) putting the colors together. i deviated from the pattern slightly in a few places - i didn't use pre-quilted fabric pieces for the back, but opted instead to just sew some batting to a large square of fabric i had lying around. i also omitted the ribbon ties on the back - i added them, but they weren't really laying right, so i took them off.

i love how the end result looks, and i think i will make a mismatched pair for it. and now i'm setting my sights a little higher for my next quilting project...maybe even an actual quilt!

oh yes...and a second finished object as well: i finished the pair of fetching(s?) that i made for a friend - i gave them to her yesterday, and i think they were well received. nevermind that a few of the cables are cabled the wrong direction, but it's pretty hard to tell. oops!

these are made with rowan classic yarns cashsoft dk, in poppy. i made the last pair of fetching with this yarn too - it's so smooth and soft and squishy!

blue, gray, white...it's project spectrum!

2007-02-08T12:20:00.000-08:00

so this first set of colors for project spectrum hasn't gotten of to a great start...as i mentioned the other day, i started a navy blue beret as my first project...well, i'm on my second attempt at knitting the beret after some drunken, post-book club knitting last week, and let's just say it's not going to be the last attempt either. i was in denial at first, but i think before i get any further with the hat i need to face the fact that it's knitting up a lot smaller than the pattern (like maybe baby beret size). i think i'm going to try going up to size 4 needles instead of the 3s. i feel like this should have been a project that i whipped up in like a day, but hey...i've got a month and a half left to finish it!

in the meantime, i've deviated from the color scheme in favor of another pair of fetching for a birthday gift, this time in a gorgeous poppy red. so like i said...project spectrum isn't off to a real rip-roaring start here around my house, but if all goes to plan (and i'm sure it won't), by the end of the two months we'll have a white trellis baby sweater, a white clementine shawlette, and some gray nancy bush 'gentleman's plain winter socks,' in addition to the beret. i think i'll also be making some little quilted coasters in shades of navy and turquoise, with a little brown thrown in.

i'm excited for this first round of colors - i love the combination, though they don't seem to be shades that i knit with often. and blue, gray and white just seem so february, don't they?

since i don't really have any knitting to show, here's some project spectrum photography of a more general nature: gray and white geese in the pond outside my office.

saturday knitting

2007-02-04T21:11:00.000-08:00

yesterday i had the best knitting day! i started out by hitting the yarn store nearest my apartment, one i don't particularly care for, but it is the only local place that sells str. so i picked up some watermelon tourmaline, with the intent of making a scarf similar to maritza's. i am obsessed with that scarf! i still need to get the farmhouse half of the yarn combo, but the scarf will be mine! then i stopped at my favorite yarn shop and got a few random items (including some addi turbos...guess who's going to give magic loop a go for her next pair of socks?!), then i rounded out my yarn store tour by going to hilltop for their spinning demo. i got to meet georgia finally, and also sarah, and lots of other nice gals! and i think i might sign up for their spinning class in march - seeing the demo inspired me and got me excited to try spinning!

after coming home and relaxing a bit after all that yarn store excitement, i went to a knitting night that my friend shannon invited me to, which was lots of fun. giant pieces of cheesecake, hoegaarden, people talking about knitting as excitedly as i do, getting to work on my first project spectrum item (a navy koigu beret)...these are the makings of a good time in my book.

i need more saturdays like this one!

fo: lichen ribbed socks

2007-01-30T17:08:00.000-08:00

i finished my second complete pair of socks! hooray! and i love them so. my jaywalkers will always have sentimental value as my first pair, but these...these i will actually wear, and wear often.

you might recall that i started these way back in november. i knit the first sock almost entirely during the week we spent in the uk, and then when i got back to seattle, i never quite got around to starting the second sock during the holidays. january came around and i was finally able to start the second sock. i significantly picked up the pace on this pair: the first sock took basically a week, and this one probably took a week and a half? two weeks? not a world record by any standards, but still an improvement over last time.

so the pattern is nancy bush's lichen ribbed socks from knitting vintage socks. the only thing i didn't like about this pattern is the welsh heel - it has a weird seam down the center of the heel that i just don't find appealing. but since you can't really see the heel when wearing them, it's hardly a problem. the pattern was so easy to follow, and i love how the finished socks fit - the three-point star toes look a little weird, but fit great. i will be knitting many more of nancy's sock patterns, for sure.

and the yarn! this is yarntini's cherry cordial self-striping sock yarn. it was my first experience using self-striping yarn and i think i'm hooked. plus, my stripes match up! i stupidly started decreasing for the toe about three rows too late on the second sock, so the very tip of the toe has slightly mismatched stripes, but i'm just going to call it even.

madrona stash enhancement

2007-01-28T15:14:00.000-08:00

yesterday i went to madrona and had lots of fun in the marketplace! i think i did pretty well - i can comfort myself with the fact that my friend spent way more money than i, and i came home with some dreamy stuff! i even spotted a yarn harlot while i was there, so i think the day was a success.

one of my new year's knitting resolutions is to try out a more complicated lace project than i've done before (which isn't saying much - orangina is about as complicated as i've gotten). so to get me started on that, i picked up some handmaiden sea silk. i loooooooove this yarn. i keep petting it. they were running low on this stuff by the time i got there, and they only had a few colors left. i almost wish i'd chosen the red now, because i'm a little scared that a lace shawl in white is going to look too bridal, but we'll see. regardless, i am in love with this yarn.

apparently i plan on making TWO lace pieces this year, because i also picked up some of this italian cashwool yarn as well. it's by zegna baruffa, which i'd never heard of before, and it actually doesn't have any cashmere in it at all - it's 100 percent extra fine merino. it is the skinniest yarn i've ever seen, and so soft. and a bargain at $13 a skein! i think i'll have to use two strands of this stuff together, but i loved the color and think it will make another pretty shawl. now i just need to pick out some good shawl patterns! the frog tree stuff shown with it is to make the beret from the winter interweave knits issue. i am such a sucker for that shade of green. other than that, i just picked up a few issues of knitscene, which i'm excited about. i was good and skipped the str table and some nature's palette sock yarn. go me!

and finally, i didn't buy this at madrona, but i bought it recently and it deserves showing off. it's some blue skies alpaca royal in the color 'spanish leather.' it's so soft, and the color is perfect. i'm not sure what to do with it yet - i was thinking some full-length arm warmers but when i shared that idea with one of my friends, they said they thought that wouldn't be very practical or wearable, so now i'm kind of undecided. i want to do something special with it. any ideas?

and here's where spike decided to join the photo shoot...

i'll have pictures of my finished socks later this week - i just have the toe left to do so they should be done very soon!