my lil' cascade

A month or so ago, I posted a picture of this in my pile of unfinished projects. Well, I got on the ball and finished up my lil' cascade cardi on my trip home for Thanksgiving. And it looks like I finished it just in time because if fits my niece just about perfect (thank the heavens this girl grows so slow).

I really love the leaf detail that doubles as button holes. It was a bear to get straight and after frogging and reknitting it a couple times, I made a chart, checked off each row as I went and finally got it right. And I chose to just place the one button because, I'm kind of lazy and I think that she'd probably wear it open most of the time anyway.

Here she is reluctantly modeling her new sweater.

Now, that's better. Look how cute she looks!

Raveled here - you see that? I'm finally getting on board and posting my projects on Ravelry.

Christmas is upon us*

Confession, this weekend I bought solar powered Christmas lights for my porch only to discover that this time of year, the sun rarely graces my front steps. Yep, not my finest moment. But seriously, this is the northern hemisphere! Maybe I'll put them away and bring them out in June or send them to my friend in Australia.

So, I hope you have all enjoyed my Knitters Gift Guide series. To recap, here are the links:

• Hats
• Mittens
• Scarves

And if you're not a knitter, but would like to become one I can't think of a better new years resolution. Miss Nem over at Voice of Reason just put together a lovely and comprehensive guide on how to get started. I couldn't say it better myself, so I won't. Check it out here.

In other news, I've been channeling my sugar high* busily knitting and shopping for Christmas gifts and succeed in marking a few things off my list this weekend. Also, made said lists. It'll be here before we know it, better keep on moving.


* I'm inclined to believe that this is a song that has only ever been sung at my elementary school, a real shame. But to anyone else that went to Bonneville Elementary, I was an elf.

* What is it with sugar this time of year? I can't remember the last time I ate a real meal. Fortunately, I just received a crate of grapefruit (which I remember vaguely ordering from a neighbor kid who was raising money for a band trip or something) and I am hell bent on consuming before Christmas, in hopes that it will in someway counteract the sugar or at least prevent scurvy. 

work[s] in progress

Saturday morning, I ventured out into the rain and made my way to the yarn store. I was on a mission, to buy yarn for my very own chevron scarf. And boy oh boy, Fibre Space sure does have some be.a.u.tiful yarns right now. I was hard pressed to choose and there were several that I just can't stop thinking about.

Back at home, as I was searching for the right size of knitting needles, I came across a sad little queue of unfinished projects. "This has to stop!", I told myself. And I forbade myself from buying any more yarn, starting any more projects until I've finished all these. Now, let's see if I can hold myself to it.

Clockwise from upper left: Baby Jacket, Fern Lace Scarf, Chevron Scarf, Simple Baby Shoes, Cascade Cardigan. Looks like somebody loves purple, no?

It's going to be hard because, I really want to make this.

oh so tempting

I can't tell you how much I want to do this to my lil' Yaris.

I spotted this over on PoppyTalk. What do you think, maybe just the bumper? Could be a creative way to cover up some unfortunate blemishes - a sort of diy body work.

Uh, oh. Is this the sugar talking? I've heard that the best way to treat a sugar hang-over is with more sugar. That's why I ate brownies and licorice for breakfast. 

Have I mentioned how much I want a Fiat? Every time I see one, it pains me. Is it just me or are the ads EVERYWHERE? I've wanted one ever since I laid my eyes on 'em in Rome, back in 2001. And now that they are here in the States, it's just so hard. Maybe someday.

owls debut

Here it is, the moment you've all been waiting for.

OWLS

Pattern by Kate Davies

Yarn: Cascade Eco +

2 skeins - $40

pattern - £3.95

knitting time - 2 weeks

ta dah!

And I've already worn it twice.

wanna try that

I've finished my sweater (I promise pictures soon) and I'm on the hunt for a new project.

I'd really like to try my hand at these lovely felted bowls.

These were made by Maria Roth, a designer based out of Vancouver, Canada. You can find her shop here. And a brief tutorial on PoppyTalk.

o-w-l-s

Well, it's fall here in the Northern Hemisphere, and we all know what that means, knitting season. Okay, maybe I'm alone in this but as soon as temperatures start dropping I start thinking about warm woolen mittens and find myself rushing to the yarn store after work to get there before it closes.

I started out with a cardigan for my niece and then decided to go big. I decided to try and make a sweater for myself. This isn't my first sweater, in college I made a cardigan and started another that is still unfinished. But the problem with sweaters is the fit. Baby sweaters are fun because they're fast. You can knit them and reknit them and it's not such a big deal. And it doesn't hurt that everything is cuter when it's smaller.

I've been eying patterns for a while now and have quite a collection piled up in my favorites on Ravelry. But one in particular has been nagging at me. It just so happens to be the first thing I ever put in my favorites. It's so popular that it has become a right-of-passage of sorts.

O w l s: The pattern is available on the designer, Kate Davies website here.

I started it a week ago and have been knitting and reknitting all week. It's knitting up quickly (thank heaven for chunky yarn) and I think it's going to turn out nicely. But I'm taking my time and altering the pattern a bit as I go to make sure that it's going to fit me well in the end. Like I said, that's the problem with sweaters.

summer project

I've been living in this house since October and as I think I'm going to be here for a while 

and as the landlord is beyond negligent, I decided to spruce up my room. 

I painted the walls a lovely shade of robin's egg blue 

and recently started adding some furniture. 

I had been using some hand-me-downs that had been laying around the house 

and while I was grateful for them, I was itching for a upgrade. 

I bought a new mattress and this bed from Ikea. 

The cartoon instructions implied that it was a two man job but I did just fine all on my own. 

And oh how grand it feels to spread out on my new bed.

(still not sure about those two paintings - definitely need some tweaking)

My room is sort of half way done at this point. And this is the half done. 

My goal for the weekend is to assemble some shelves, get rid of the old desk and organize my sundry possessions and piles of crap.

And then, I'm still on the look out for some bedding 

- you know, something fabulous to tie it all together.

I never knit anything just once

We've had a fair bit of downtime at work lately - which means I'm likely to rejoin the ranks of the unemployed again in the near future.  But despite the associated anxiety, this downtime has afforded me lots of quality knitting time.  

I'm working on this most adorable dress for my niece.  Did I mention that I became an Aunt over the weekend?  I'm pretty psyched about it - both the baby and the dress, but mostly the baby. 

So after a week of knitting, the dress is almost finished and I am oh so tempted to frog the whole thing and start over.  It's just that I think that I gauged the gauge wrong and I wish I had made the smaller size, and I sort of goofed early on and never fixed it because I thought it might be a happy accident, and now I'm not so sure.  I am reminded of how much I dislike knitting sweaters - you knit and you knit, row upon row and you're almost done before any real shaping takes place and it's not til you're done that you know what you're getting.  Alas, I never knit anything just once, why should this be any exception.  

My co-worker asked about what I was making the other day, and after watching me knit for a few hours said, "I think that I'd just buy something." To which I replied, "Yeah." 

I don't expect him to understand my brand of crazy, I hardly understand it myself.

A year or so ago, I bought 2 skeins of this:

 

I just couldn't help myself - I mean, it's GORGEOUS! And I was sure that I could find something to do with it.  Well, sometimes love just isn't enough.  And gorgeous yarn without a pattern is just a lovely skein in my stash. 

Thankfully, through the wonders of Ravelry, I found this pattern.  And turned one of these lovely skeins into a beautiful scarf for my Mom.  (Yes, this is in fact another story about unfinished Christmas gifts.)

I lament that scarfs are so difficult to photograph, because try as I might, my pictures just don't give it justice. 

I put this in the mail this week, along with Abbey's mittens.  And with that I officially succeeded in accomplishing one of my New Year's resolutions before the end of January.

warm woollen mittens

Abbey Dearest, your mittens are ready.

I did something really tacky this last Christmas.  I gave my Mom and my sister unfinished gifts.  (Apparently, this is something my Grandma was famous for, so maybe it's genetic or at the very least, it's comforting to know that I am in such good company.) 

 

 These lovely mittens were placed in a box and wrapped with the knitting needles still in them and nary a thumb on Christmas Eve.  And I took them right back as soon as they were opened for finishing. 

I think that I was a little over ambitious to think that I could possibly finish them for Christmas, with all their lovely little cables.  I bought the yarn (wish I remembered the name of it, I love it so) on sale a week before Christmas with no idea of what I'd do with it.  I loved the pinky-red color and fell even deeper in love with it when I started to knit it - it's fabulous! And the pattern was really fun, though I altered it a bit (I just can't leave anything alone).  The pattern can be found here and here. 

Two of my new years resolutions this year were to finish my Christmas presents and take more pictures, and it looks as though I'm off to a good start.

show and tell

I've had some requests that I get over my photo-phobia (which I realize is a sensitivity to light and not a disinclination to post photos on ones blog) and start posting some pictures of the projects that I've been working on.  So here goes:

Last winter, I took a weaving class.  It was a lot of work and I learned quite a lot.  For my final project I decided to make lace dish towels as a birthday present for my Mom.  Well, I bit off a little more than I could chew and in August (Mom's birthday is in June) they were still on the loom. And though they are now off of the loom and washed, they are still in one 6-yard long piece of cloth.  I still need to cut them apart and hem them, but I'm really pleased with how they turned out.  Here are some pictures I took while they were still on the loom.

christmas stocking in August?

That's right, because I'm a planner and I'm also obsessive like that.  So I realized that I left y'all in the lurch.  A while back I had just gotten started with my tale of funemployment when I pulled a to be continued and then got all caught up in the wonders of the golden arches before finishing my story.  I'm sure you've all been on the edge of your seats wondering what happened next and how I got from Fairbanks, Alaska to Washington, DC (er Springfield, Virginia, rather).  And well I'm going to tell you, eventually.  

When I left off I'd just sold my uncooperative car, packed my bags, given away half of my belongings to good will and boarded a plane for Salt Lake City.  Well as you may or may not know, most flights from Alaska to the lower 48 are red-eyes.  I don't know why this is so but it means that the airports are bustling between 11pm and 2am give or take an hour.  So after doing battle with the lady at the Frontier counter, I checked my 4 bags and proceeded to sneak on the rest in my over sized carry-on's.  I was so exhausted that I had little trouble sleeping on the plane and before I knew it I was waking up as we approached Denver.  And then from Denver to SLC I flew on the smallest plane I had ever been on - this is where I put in my plug for Dramamine, it's my miracle drug.   

Back in SLC it was sort of like my whole Alaskan experience was just a dream... but maybe that's just because I had just seen inception and had lost my spinny top toy along the way....hmmm.  Anyway, it was good to be home and especially nice to have all my sisters at home (or near home, at least).  There was lots of good shopping and eating and crafting to be had.

Finding some time on my hands I embarked on a project, Christmas Stockings.  And as with all good projects, this project was booth pertinent and useful but required careful planning.  Our family's stockings were seriously dated and as we recently grown in number it seemed like a logical time to make new ones.  We set out for inspiration at the local fabric stores.  And I fell in love with this lovely cream wool (see previous posts about my obsessions with wool).  It's a fabulous herringbone weave and like I said I love it.  We took it home and washed a couple times in hot water to thicken it up a bit and paired it with corduroys and Christmas prints.  We have plans of embroidering them but we haven't gotten that far yet.  

I'm sad that I didn't think to take pictures, 'cause they're pretty darn cute even unfinished, if I do say so myself.  But as I've said before, I'm just not a picture taking, documentative type of blogger - I'd say I'd work on it, but nah, I probably won't.