Not Just About Knitting

Constant Quest

2012-01-25T11:21:00.001-05:00

My yarn and fibre stash got the better of me last year. It was to the point I didn't even know what I had on hand nor where to find what I needed. Sound familiar? I am not a person who obsesses about a neat and tidy environment but I do need to be able to find stuff when I need it. And I like leaving my house in pretty good shape when I go on a holiday.

From what I can tell, the key is to find a system and stick to it. So this week at Canadian Tire, 9L bins were on sale (half price) for $1.99 each. They're stackable, see-through and have clear lids as well. I bought 8 of them and may drop in for more today. I dug out my label maker and started organizing in my office/craft room. You can see my shelves need some work. The paper bag on the sofa is where the cat sleeps.

These bins really only contain the 'overflow' from most of my stash, which are on IKEA shelves in another corner of the room. (That is an old photo. They cubbies are now 80% full of yarn and books). And yes, there are still piles of stuff but the most of them are organized now, too. I have lots of room in my house and adequate storage space, I believe. I just need to keep purging to make room in the spaces I have for the many things I'm going to keep or am not yet ready to throw away.

I have tried to make good use of the space under my desk as well. I like having everything within arm's reach. The binders hold printouts and patterns in various categories and the laundry basket is my paper recycle bin that gets emptied every month or so. The boxes in the top right corner are my beading stuff (they could use a bin, too).

Like most Baby Boomers, I now realize I have been very 'acquisitive' and now am always looking for things I can discard. I am on the constant quest for both simplifying my life and things and storing/organizing them so I can easily access what I need.

Alas, being ultra-neat and tidy will never be a trait of mine, but I have been working on getting things in better shape around the house, in general. I feel sorry for the person who will have to go through my stuff when I am no longer able to take care of myself or I die. But I'm hoping to make it a little easier for them. Watching "Hoarders" has shown me that I'm really not that far from the 'slippery slope' to being a true hoarder. This awareness (and having more time to explore more domestic pursuits) has really helped get me moving in a positive direction.

Trillium Embroidery Guild - January

2012-01-20T23:51:00.000-05:00

I enjoy the meetings of the Trillium Embroidery Guild. I am not a very stitcherly member and lately I've been taking my knitting to our meetings but I do enjoy seeing what the other members are working on.

This month was our garage sale, at which members bring charts and accessories they no longer want and display them for sale for only $1 or two. One of these years, I'll make a contribution but this year I only bought some stuff.

One of my favourite things each month is to see the finished projects people bring to display.

Norah's stitching was displayed on the lid of a beautiful custom-made wooden box.

This is the sampler project guild members (except me and a few others) worked on last year.

I really like these 4 Jeannette Douglas samplers.

Tara brought a couple of items she had woven on a lap loom and a beret she embellished with needle-felted yarn and beads.

Sheep Heid is Done!

2012-01-18T17:37:00.002-05:00

I finished Sheep Heid last night. Kate's charts were easy to read. She also put the yarn numbers on the right side of the chart for the crown so it was easy to keep straight the 9 natural colours of the Shetland Supreme yarn.

I blocked it with a dinner plate inside so it would be more tam-like than beanie-like.

I have a small head so there is quite a drape to the tam.

This photo shows the truest colours.

Those sheep are SO darned cute!

The yarn bloomed beautifully after its warm, soapy bath before blocking. It's still a bit scratchy, though. Wouldn't it look amazing in several natural shades of alpaca?

Handspun and Apps

2012-01-16T23:47:00.002-05:00

A couple of months ago, Julia, Mo and I decided to form a spinning group so we'd dedicate at least 2 hours per week to spinning. We picked Monday night and found a Coffee Culture in Whitby that would accommodate us. We posted it on Ravelry in a couple of groups and 2 gals found us right away. Last week we were joined by Nancy from Spinning Wheel Alpacas and her friend, Karen. This week, Eleanor also joined us who had heard about our group from Karen.

We're already thinking about cool places to spin in the summer including Nancy's alpaca farm and possibly a retreat up at Jennifer's cottage.

Last week I finished spinning some Dyeing For Colour 70% Superwash Merino/30% bamboo and firestar. I started chain-plying it last week and finished plying it this evening. What resulted was 288 yd. and 103g of yarn.

It's quite soft and sparkly. I don't know what I'll spin with it but for now, I'll just fondle it.

We also discussed Apps (downloadable Applications) for our iPods/iPhones/cell phones and I learned about iSpin Toolkit ($4.99) and iKnit Needlesizer ($0.99).

In the iSpin Toolkit there is a tool to measure the angle of the twist, wpi and tpi gauges, a calculator, a ruler in both inches and cms and a table of contents for all the references. It is a very handy tool.

In the iKnit Needlesizer, you lay the needle across the screen and can fairly accurately determine the gauge. I tested several needle sizes and checked with a regular gauge.

Android and Apple have a voice feature on the free Google Search app (blue icon). Touch the mic icon and just say what you're searching for. With voice recognition, it will put the text in the window and do an instant Google search.

A very fun and free app is Dragon Dictation. It is a very dynamic voice recognition app that then allows you to edit or add more text and then send directly to Twitter, Facebook or as an email. You can also copy and paste the text into another application.

Shazam is a commercial mobile phone-based music identification service. Say you're in a store and you want to know the title or artist of the tune you're hearing. With the mic on your device, Shazam takes an acoustic 'fingerprint' of the song and within seconds, will tell you the title and artist. With the free app you get unlimited tagging and Lyric play (where you see the lyrics in time to the music you're hearing) but can enjoy more features if you upgrade to Encore for $3.99/yr or $5.99 for lifetime. It's the 4th most downloaded app in the world!

What cool apps (knitting, spinning or otherwise) can you recommend?

Sheep Heid and an iPhone!

2012-01-15T19:55:00.001-05:00

I've been working away on Sheep Heid.

I can see using that sheep motif on quite a few project designs.

Click here to see the cowl that Anne made with it!

It's different using the 'sticky' Jamieson & Smith Shetland Supreme yarn. It's a bit rough but it feels very 'authentic' and scratchy. It's somewhat like the feel of Briggs and Little yarn.

It's about half done. I'm looking forward to being able to wear it during our wintry blast. I may block it in a more tam-like configuration rather than as a beanie.

The reason I haven't finished Sheep Heid in a lickety-split manner is I've been a bit distracted. Yesterday I bought a not-previously-owned unlocked 32GB iPhone 3GS.

It is very exciting because I paid about half of what they're going for on eBay. All I had to do was take my Rogers SIM card out of my Nokia C3 and slap it into the iPhone and I was in business.

Rather than knitting, I spent most of last night synching it, putting apps on it and creating ringtones for it. I wasn't happy with the generic ringtones so I googled how to add a ringtone from a music file. I found this awesome, step-by-step video and in fairly short order was able to convert some music files that were deemed ringtone-worthy into ringtones to synch to my iPhone. Never one to do things in a small way, I then spent about 1.5 hours creating about a dozen of them so I now have quite a variety of them to choose from.

This morning, I started keying in some of my contacts and shortly thereafter realized that there had to be an easier way to transfer them from my iPod Touch to the iPhone (I don't have iCloud - yet). Back to Google I went and sure enough, I found a free app called 'Bump' that allows you to transfer Contacts, Photos, Apps, Music, Calendar and Social networks between devices.

There wasn't a lot of explanation but after downloading Bump to both devices and a bit of experimentation, I was able to transfer all 325 of my contacts to the iPhone by literally 'bumping' the two devices together. Huzzah!!!

Now I have pretty much everything that was on my iPod Touch on my iPhone AND the ability to use it as a phone (no data plan - yet) and a Skype device when I'm in a Wifi zone.

And now, back to my knitting...

Friggatriskaidekaphobia

2012-01-13T16:33:00.002-05:00

Frigga is the name of the Norse goddess for whom Friday is named. Triskadekaphobia is the fear of the number 13. So Friggatriskadekaphobia is the fear of Friday the 13th.

I normally do not suffer from this affliction, however, today had a few no good very bad elements.

Element The First: It was snowing and blowing when I got up this morning.

Element The Second: I had a flat tire on my car. I apparently drove on it enough yesterday and last night that the tire began shredding on the inside and this morning had to call the CAA (Canadian version of the AAA for you US inhabitants) to come and fill or change my tire so I could get it to the garage and get the problem diagnosed and if possible, fixed.

In spite of the crappy weather and innumerable accidents that were occurring this morning, the cheerful CAA guy showed up within 15 minutes of my call. I only got half of the driveway shovelled before his arrival (See Element The First above).

He filled my tire, claimed it was holding air and left. I put the snow shovel away, grabbed my purse and knitting, hopped in the car and headed to Canadian Tire for the diagnosis.

Element the Third: The tire was indeed shredded and ~~Crap~~ Canadian Tire doesn't carry the brand of tires on the other three wheels so the cute, petite mechanic, Avalon, who has pink hair, put my spare tire on and tossed the rim in my trunk. She waved goodbye as I drove off to the tire store where I was sure I could get the replacement tire.

Lesson learned? Don't buy a car with aluminum (aluminium for my UK readers) rims. Once they oxidize - and they will - you will never get a good seal between it and the tire. I have had no end of problems as a result of this. Buy a car with steel rims or find some at a wrecker's yard. But I digress.

I got the tire ordered but it won't be in 'til next Tuesday and won't be installed 'til Wednesday so I will be driving around on a spare tire that doesn't get good traction (front passenger side on a front-wheel drive car) in slippery, icy, snowy conditions. (sigh)

After running my errands, I headed home to update Skip on how my day was going so far. Whilst reading a Future Shop flyer, I noted the Nokia C3 mobile phone they were selling listed Wifi as a feature. What???? I have one of those phones and never even noticed that I could have Wifi access to the internet with it. Of course, I immediately tried to access the internet and failed which brings me to...

Element the Fourth: I called the people who sold me my phone and with whom I have mobile phone service. They tried to help me as much as they could and I was able to get connected but unable to get service. I called my Internet service people and she got me connected and with service. However, when I backed out and tried to access it again (after having hung up, of course) I could no longer get service. So I called my ISP again and Luis did all he could, including changing my security system and security code on my modem/router and we concluded that it was indeed a setting problem with the phone, not the Internet service. Luis suggested I call the Nokia customer support. So I called Miguel in the Philippines and he took me right back to removing the SIM card and battery from my phone and going back to the factory settings for the phone (but not deleting my contacts, etc.). And miracle of miracles, I was finally able to get Wifi! Yay! I thanked Miguel profusely and started playing with my phone.

Unfortunately, Nokia doesn't have a Skype app, nor some of my other favourite apps, but at least now I know I can access the internet with my phone if I'm in a wifi zone (and don't have my iPod Touch with me).

I don't usually have a day when a lot of stuff goes wrong but then I realized IT IS FRIDAY THE THIRTEENTH!!! It all makes sense now.

So today I guess I had a touch of Friggatriskadekaphobia or shall I say F@#$$atriskadekaphobia. It will be interesting to see what happens on the two other Friday the Thirteenths this year - in April and July.

The day wasn't a complete loss, though. I got about 6 rows knit on my Sheep Heid.

Fair Isle Fascination

2012-01-13T02:05:00.001-05:00

I really enjoy stranded two-colour knitting. On our UK tour, I became aware of the designs of Kate Davies, a Scottish designer of knitwear.

I knit one of Kate's free patterns, her Stranded Colourwork Headband using 5 colours of Knit Picks Palette yarn I had from a Fair Isle sweater kit I abandoned last year. It's my first finished project of 2012.

I lined it with some 3 ply Sport Handwash yarn from Hubbert Farms . It's a blend of 75% Alpaca, 10% Finn, 10% Mohair and 5% Seasilk. It's deliciously soft and warm.

We have been fortunate to not have had a lot of wintry weather yet but all that is changing soon.

I think I'll look smashing trudging out in the snow with my new headband.

I have cast on Kate's Sheep Heid hat. The pattern was inspired by the Sheep Heid Inn near Duddingston Loch in Scotland.

I purchased the pattern on Ravelry a while back and then learned through Anne Featonby's blog that Debbie Wilson at Sheeps Ahoy was selling the yarn packs for the hat. The kit arrived this week. I expected to receive 9 50g skeins of yarn. Instead, the yarn was carefully measured out and labelled, ready for me to start right in on the project.

In my future, I hope to knit Alice Starmore's Oregon Cardigan.

I'm not a big fan of boxy drop-shouldered sweaters so I hope to modify the pattern for set-in sleeves. I found the Vogue Knitting 2007 Holiday issue on eBay which contains the pattern and it is winging its way to me as I write this. The next project will be to obtain the yarn for the project.

Skip and I are getting ready to go on a holiday and I've been planning what knitting projects to take with me. I won't be taking my spinning wheel or sewing machine. I may take a drop spindle and will definitely take some stitching projects and, of course, a bunch of stuff to knit.

Shaun the Sheep

2012-01-07T23:38:00.001-05:00

I knit the Shaun the Sheep case last night while watching "The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest" DVD from the library. It was an easy intarsia knit. I knit the entire project during the movie.

My handspun was too thin so I found some blue acrylic and it worked well with the black wool and fuzzy white yarn.

I had the googly eyes from some other project.

I modified the pattern by doing 3 rows of stocking stitch after the cast-on then a purl row then the 28 rows of plain stocking stitch for the back. When I finished the chart on the front, I again did a purl row then 3 rows of stocking stitch before binding off. The 3 rows of stocking stitch will be the seam allowance for the zipper.

I'm going to line it with some fabric or other - maybe from my stash, maybe I'll buy a fat quarter.

Thanks for the inspiration, Mo!

QR Codes

2012-01-06T17:18:00.000-05:00

Yesterday I bought a deeply discounted (1/3 off) Blackberry Playbook at Staples. When I got it home, I discovered it couldn't do a couple of things I really wanted it to be able to do on it. The Blackberry people are WAY behind with developing apps. One app they don't have is Skype. There is a circuitous way to get it through IMO.com but even with that, I was unable to do Skype calling to landlines with my monthly plan. The other app not yet available is the Google Search app with voice recognition.

I returned it today for a full refund and discovered overnight that they increased the price 50% to bring it back up to its pre-discount price. It would have been an amazing deal had it done what I needed it to.

I will either purchase the cheapest iPhone (1st generation) I can get or a Samsung Galaxy Tab 7.0 at a deep discount (if I can find it). Altho' the Samsung isn't an Apple product, it does have the highly regarded Android system and the nice people @ Android have been working very hard to develop apps for their products.

All that being said, I did discover a couple of cool things on the Playbook. Yesterday I downloaded an app to read QR codes, those funny black and white square codes one sees more and more. With any smart device and the QR download, it only takes a second or two to scan a QR code to get the information.

Last night at knitting, Mo and I were talking about them and today she sent me a Ravelry message about a knitter who has designed a square with a QR pattern on it. And it's even scannable (I hope that's a word).

So I found the QR creator online and made a code for this blog.

I think I'm going to graph it. Now what should I knit with it? Another idea, I could print it onto transfer paper and iron it onto some fabric and make something with the printed fabric.

Maybe I just have too much spare time on my hands...

Angry Birds and Shaun the Sheep

2012-01-06T12:25:00.002-05:00

I saw a lot of Angry Birds stuffed items for sale this year.

Skip and I played the game obsessively on our iPod Touches at one point.

Today whilst reading Dani Miller's blog, 'Knit, Stitch, Click' she cited a tutorial for making an Angry Bird stuffed toy.

It looked like fun to make out of fleece or felt but wouldn't it be fun to knit?

Sure enough, on my Ravelry search, Knitterbees has designed free patterns for the red bird, the green pig, and the yellow bird.

Last night my enabling BFF, Mo, was knitting a Shaun the Sheep DS cover by Kirstie McLeod. Later at home, I found some fuzzy yarn (Patons Pixie) in my stash that would be awesome for Shaun's fleecy coat. I knit a swatch and I will need to use worsted weight yarn for the background and Shaun's face. Like Mo, I'm going to create a fabric-lined, zipper bag for knitting or sewing notions. (Photos by stacyprince)

This post-Christmas knitting is going to be fun!

Potato Chips

2012-01-02T11:28:00.004-05:00

In a blog I was reading the other day, someone referred to a project they were working on as a 'Potato Chip' project. From the context, I inferred that they meant a project of which they couldn't just make one.

The Christmas balls have been like that for me. In fact last night I knit another one. It is my own design based on the Selbu star. This time I did use a white background and just didn't anchor the strands of red yarn.

This is the fifth ornament I've knit from the same two balls of red and white yarn. I've used exactly half the red skein (the colour I've used the most) so I will be able to get 10 ornaments from the two balls.

I've also been working on a comfort shawl for a friend of mine whose husband of 52 years passed away at the beginning of December. It's the Everyway Wrap from the Winter 2009 Interweave Knits magazine. I'm using Cascade 220 superwash and am about half finished.

I like that the cables are reversible and not hard to execute.

Speaking of potato chips, I feel a sock project coming on...

Happy New Year! Bonne Année! ¡ Felíz Año Nuevo !

2012-01-01T11:04:00.001-05:00

Skip and I had a very nice New Year's Eve at home. He watched football 'til about 9 and I was working on my little sewing project, a business card holder from this tutorial.

At about 9 we started watching a delightful French-Canadian movie that we had borrowed called "La Grande Séduction" (The Seduction of Dr. Lewis). It was quite reminiscent of a French movie we had seen last year called "Bienvenue aux Ch'tis" (Welcome to the Sticks). Both about city people forced to move to a very remote area to live and how they learn to appreciate the simpler way of life. Note: The public library is about the only place we can find DVDs any more. Check your library's DVD collection out. You'll find lots of good movies to watch and for free!

At midnight we toasted the new year with our tiny bottle of Freixenet

and then played with our computers for a while, then went to bed.

By the way, I completely forgot to mention my 43rd 2011 knitting project - my denim-coloured Cassidy cardigan.

Happy New Year!

Knitting Year in Review

2011-12-30T23:03:00.003-05:00

I completed 42 knitting projects this year. I started several others but these are the ones I completed:

6 shawls and shawlettes,

9 scarves and neckwarmers,

2 pairs of mittens,

some baby items,

7 1/2 pairs of socks,

2 mousies,

2 Christmas stockings,

4 Christmas balls,

some miscellaneous items

and 3 commissions.

Wow! That's a lot of knitting.

Lately, I've been conspiring with Mo to do some more sewing. I've been combing the Internet for ideas and patterns and today Mo and I went to Fabric Land and back to my place to peruse sewing books. I have 2 projects in mind for tomorrow.

Skip and I will celebrate New Year's Eve quietly at home. I borrowed videos from the library that should amuse us.

2011 has been an excellent year for us. We are very fortunate and do not take that for granted. We really try and take advantage of every opportunity we can fit into our budget or schedule. I hope 2012 is as good a year as this year was.

Best wishes to you for a safe, happy, healthy and productive 2012! Thanks for reading!

Christmas Morning

2011-12-25T13:53:00.000-05:00

We had a lovely Christmas morning.

I slept in 'til 10am and we had waffles with Saskatoon berries for breakfast.

We lit the tree lights

and turned on the fireplace (channel).

We weren't too upset that we aren't having a white Christmas. This photo was to show the absence of snow.

And the above freezing-ness of the outdoor temperature.

Skip surprised me with a teeny-weeny sound system, the X-mini Mini II - The Original Capsule Speaker (and lots of other cool gifts).

It has a 12 hour rechargeable battery and compresses down to about the size of a clementine when closed.

He also surprised me with a Mac photo book of photos from our cruise. (Can you tell we're techno-geeks?)

Skip liked the wine and iPad keyboard case I gave him (among other things).

He was bummed out that he misplaced the Chapters gift card he had planned to give me. He has such classy sticky notes!

Ollie got into the action by squatting on the tissue paper.

This is Ollie's usual perch - under the grow lights beside the geraniums Skip brought in from the garden for the winter.

Later this afternoon we'll be off to Lorna's for Christmas dinner - turkey - yay!

We are so fortunate to have such good friends and family and (touch wood) our good health.

I wish you all a very Merry Christmas and fun times with your family and friends for the holiday season.

Another Julekule

2011-12-24T14:56:00.000-05:00

Last night I finished one of the knitted Christmas balls with a Selbu design

and the date.

They're so easy and fun to make. It wouldn't take much effort to make one for every year.

God Jul!

Capybara Scarf Completed

2011-12-23T19:08:00.000-05:00

I blocked the scarf the night before last and gave it two nights to dry. You don't really even sew in the ends, just make sure the yarn ends are anchored and then with a needle put the end between the two sides of the scarf.

Here's the black side.

And its identical twin, the red side.

Only the most discerning eye would be able to detect where I grafted the two pieces together after reknitting this capybara.

I was quite impressed how this sock yarn knit up on 3.5mm needles. The fabric of the scarf is nice and drapey and is a warm double thickness. All that scarf and I only used one 50g skein of sock yarn of each colour.

To recap - once I had completed the two-colour capybara design, to speed things up, I put all the black sts on one circular needle and all the red sts on another then worked stocking stitch on both needles, twisting the two colours around each other each time both yarns were on a side.

I'd like to knit one of these (with another design, that is) for myself! Maybe a graphic of a ball of yarn and some knitting needles?

Thank you, Alasdair Post-Quinn, for your very cool double-knit pattern.

BTW, this is my 700th post on this blog.

A Handmade Christmas and the Simple Things

2011-12-23T00:10:00.001-05:00

I finished two of the Julekuler (Christmas balls). One yesterday

and one this evening.

These two will be hostess gifts at a party we're attending on Christmas Eve. The white on a red background looks much better than red on a white background. I have designed a couple more myself based on Selbu patterns. Hopefully, I'll be able to whip up one or two tomorrow; perhaps with the year on one of the 4 sides. I can see how one can get quite taken with knitting them. They only take a couple of hours each.

I used to put tons of ornaments on my Christmas tree and many decorations throughout the house. I went through a rather lengthy Peanuts phase (30 years or so) where my tree almost exclusively had Hallmark Peanuts ornaments on it. I sold almost all of the ornaments on eBay in about 1994 and with the cash that was generated, Skip and I had a lovely get-away weekend cross-border shopping. Since then, there has been an evolution to using handmade ornaments almost exclusively.

I have also simplified my decorating. Now one can actually see green areas between the ornaments.

Before I became obsessed with knitting, I was an avid cross-stitcher.

I also did a bit of quilting

and a few years back, I crocheted a whole bunch of snowflake ornaments.

This mini-sock was knit from leftover yarn from the first sock I ever knit.

The old world Santa was a kit stitched on 32 count Aida cloth and the Canada goose stocking dates from 1993. That year I stitched about a dozen of the stocking ornaments.

The candy cane ornament was a Mary Maxim kit.

The clock is from the Leisure Arts "Timeless Ornaments" book. The sweater is from other scrap yarn.

The green and pink ornament on the left (badly photographed) is a dated one from Hallmark this year and says "Close-Knit Sisters 2011". I received it from a sorority sister and long-time friend, Lorna. If you want one and wait a bit, you might even be able to buy it on sale as dated ornaments are often deeply discounted after Christmas.

My tree topper is a commercially purchased Hallmark stuffed snowman. The kitty cat angel ornament is from the 1984, my first Christmas with my first cat (named Stanley) when I was an adult. The snowman is one of those tart tin kits. I also stitched quite a few of those festive mitten ornaments one year.

The martini glass is new this year - a gift from a long-time friend and sorority sister, Sue. The black, open-toed, strappy shoe ornament was also from Lorna. To the right of it is a clear globe ornament with our wedding picture in it.

Each year, I put fewer and fewer decorations out. I'm liking the simplicity. And it takes a lot less time to put stuff away after the holidays. It also makes me realize that I'm turning more and more into my mother. Eeeek!

Christmas is a secular event in our home - a time of the year where we take time to visit and celebrate our relationships with various groups of friends and family. Just sitting, sharing a meal or treats, and chatting (and knitting - tee hee) is such a nice respite from all the rushing around buying gifts. It's a time to reflect on all the wonderful things we enjoy in our lives and to really note how fortunate Skip and I are. I try to take time to be aware of how content I am at this point of my life. Skip and I really try to 'live in the moment' and take as many opportunities for fun that come our way. We will continue to do so as long as we are physically able. It can all change in an instant so for now our motto is carpe diem - sieze the day.

Home Stretch

2011-12-21T23:32:00.000-05:00

I baked some sugar cookies this morning and along with the gingerbread ones I did on the weekend, I'm making up some cookie gift bags. I may even decorate some of the cookies tomorrow.

In knitting news, I finished the Capybara scarf last night and just need to get it blocked.

I made some stitch markers for a knitterly friend who really likes the colour blue. (She really liked them and one of the project bags I had made last week.)

And today I knit an ornament from Julekuler - 55 Christmas Balls to Knit. I did one yesterday with red on the white background but the red showed through too much. I like the look of the white on red much better.

I have one more to complete by Christmas Eve as I'll be giving them as gifts to our hostess for a Swedish Christmas Eve feast that Skip and I are invited to every year.

This evening at my embroidery guild (Trillium) was our pot luck and ornament exchange. There were 9 ornaments up for grabs.

Sorry this one is such a bad shot.

If you look really closely this one is 'faux' Hardanger. It has Kloster blocks but there are no cut threads. It's Patricia Ann Designs "Christmas Heart" from the 2011 Just Cross Stitch Christmas Ornaments issue.

And from the same issue, "Christmas Tree 2011" by Rosewood Manor.

And Santa's face is all Hardanger.

This is JBW Designs "French Country V Reindeer".

There were other ornaments on display. These are simple but beautifully finished.

I also like how this piece was framed.

Once I get my Christmas knitting done, I can get back to knitting for myself. Yay!

I'm anxiously awaiting delivery of an ebook I created on my UK knitting tour on Mixbook. It's the most flexible online ebook creator that I've found so far. There are a few features that I really liked: 1. the themed books had colour coordinated 'stickers' that could be added to any page, 2. photos or text could be added to any page, and rotated to any angle. 3. The price is comparable to other photobook programs I've previewed (including the Mac one). 4. The customer support were very accommodating and helpful when I realized I had to change several things on my first submission - even after the final editing deadline.

I just got notification that it has been shipped by UPS so I'm really hoping I'll receive it before Christmas. I saw Marion's today and it is wonderful. I sure hope mine gets delivered on Christmas Eve (fingers crossed).

Crafting Crunch

2011-12-18T19:34:00.000-05:00

It has been a busy week. It was Scooter's birthday on Monday and Skip's on Tuesday. Skip and I spent Sunday and Monday nights in The Big City. The first night was with a Groupon deal that I found at the Delta Chelsea. We were underwhelmed. It is a nice hotel but the room was no better than one we'd find at a Quality Inn and they charge $13.95 for WiFi! I hate it when expensive hotels nickel and dime me. I'm glad I didn't have to pay full price.

The next night I booked us into the Hotel Victoria on Yonge St. between Wellington and King. It is a boutique hotel over 100 years old. It was lovely. Our room was urban chic with FREE WIFI!! Yay! And we were given breakfast vouchers totalling $24 with adequately covered our morning nutritional needs. Because we were in the city, we met Scooter for his birthday dinner in the neighbourhood where he lives with his mother. We had a very nice time at his favourite restaurant, Queen's Pasta.

I also spent a couple of hours at Romni Wools and bought some red and white Lanett yarn to make a Christmas gift for our Christmas Eve party hostess, some Rios for a friend to give to her daughter who knits, some understated sock yarn for me

and some Fleece Artist Woolie Silk 3ply that matches the Malabrigo sock yarn with which I'm knitting my Maia Shawl. My plan is to knit some handwarmers for myself.

Skip and I also poked around the Eaton Centre. I really liked the enormous reindeer sculptures.

In this closeup, you can see the lights wrapped around the curly metal frame and the many colours of stars hanging inside the body.

I also like to take photos of the Swarovski tree with its more than 44,000 crystal ornaments. This photo does not do it justice.

We returned home on Tuesday afternoon and had a nap!

Wednesday I knit with my 'peeps' in the afternoon and Thursday I met with my monthly knitting group at the tea shop for lunch. I skipped my knitting group that night to do some more crafting. I made a couple more reversible project bags. This one isn't very colourful but it has a ewe and a lamb on it.

I decided to go with the companion fabric for the other side.

I really liked this multicoloured yellow fabric

and found striking taffeta fabric to coordinate.

Today, I made 4 sets of stitch markers using 9mm jump rings.

I finished two commissioned pieces. One was a shawl that just needed casting off, the border knit and attached and the whole thing blocked. The other involved knitting the remaining 80% of a lace scarf and blocking it.

I have Joseph's capybara scarf and the Nordic Christmas ornament to finish. 7 days and counting...

Being Multicraftual

2011-12-09T00:07:00.001-05:00

I like to do lots of crafty things. Of course, my favourite of all is knitting but I also enjoy cross-stitching, needlepoint, I dabble in crocheting and drawing pysanky (Ukrainian Easter eggs). I also can sew. I don't do a lot of sewing but have done some quilt piecing and machine quilting. My sewing machine is a very basic White which I purchased used in 1973 and have only had to have it repaired once in all that time. It sews forward, in reverse and has a zigzag feature. It weighs a ton. I think it's because it's made of cast iron or some other very heavy metal. I does what I need it to do - the little sewing that I ever do now.

Last week at my Thursday night knitting group, one of the participants had a lovely Lantern Moon project bag. It was silk taffeta and I really liked the look of it. I figured I could certainly make project bags with a nice, shiny fabric, too. So yesterday I headed to the fabric store and bought some black and white, music-themed cotton fabric and some red taffeta fabric.

I wanted to make drawstring bags that were completely reversible.

I figured I'd find a pattern somewhere on the Internet and found this one that had a good explanation of how to do a lined bag in such a way that it can be reversible. I didn't necessarily need mine to have a flat bottom or a gusset. I even had the right colours of thread in my sewing box! A couple of hours later I had two done.

And reversed...

If I make more, (I bought enough fabric to make several more), I will make them with little gussets so they'll have a flat bottom and will stand up easily like this. Hmm, an unlined one would make great wine bottle bags for the festive season. (making mental note of this...)

After I finished the bags, I took a closer look at the printed fabric. It looks like they just printed a piano keyboard over the music staves. It looks a bit confusing but OK in small doses.

On closer inspection, I realized the music is actually the notes for "The Last Post" which is played on Remembrance Day. I wonder how it was decided to pick that particular piece of music - one played on solo bugle - to accompany a printed piano keyboard? Could the fabric company not have selected a public domain piano work by Chopin, Liszt or Beethoven? Just a little something that made me go, 'hmmmmm'.

Soap Sweater and an Update

2011-12-08T00:28:00.001-05:00

While at the Woodstock Fleece festival in October, I purchased three Honey and Lavendar (sic) All Natural Handmade Soaps from the Pioneer Brand Honey people. They smell wonderful! I've been storing them in my linen closet since then with plans to give them as Christmas gifts.

Recently, I was browsing on Ravelry and came upon Cynthia Hall's Soap Sweaters and thought they'd be perfect for the fragrant soaps. I hauled out some Lion Brand Fisherman's Wool from my stash and in about an hour, I finished the project.

I really liked the feel of this yarn and there is excellent yardage in the 227g (8 oz.) skein - 425m (465 yd.) I'm not sure why I haven't knit more stuff with this yarn. I think it's the label that has scared me as it states it's "Perfect For Felting" and most of the items I knit aren't for felting. It would be great for an afghan that isn't likely to be mistreated or need washing very much as it definitely calls for hand-washing.

In capybara scarf news, I finally have photos of the second half of the scarf. You may remember that I knit the first half from a graph I did using regular graph paper with squares. The resulting design looked squashed. So I re-did the design on graph paper that reflected my gauge (5 sts/8 rows = 1") and knit the design of the second half.

Ta da!

They look much better now. I have about another foot of stocking stitch to knit before finishing the 2nd half. Then I'll go back to the first half and cut out the squashed capybara, pick up the stitches above the 'faux fringe' and re-knit using the revised graph, then graft it to the stocking stitch part.

When I switched to two circular needles for the stocking stitch (red sts on one and black sts on the other) I should have gone up one needle size. When I finish the knitting and grafting, I'm going to wet block the scarf and pull the sides out to the correct dimension. That should take care of the gauge issue.

Always Learning Something...

2011-12-06T20:46:00.001-05:00

I finished the Christmas stocking.

I had to modify the nose and outline the pom pom, hat and beard with half a stitch of grey. I also cross-stitched Jon's name on it because it looked a lot better than my attempts at duplicate stitching the lettering.

The jogless stripe for the toe worked out really well. It is SO easy to do. Just knit the first round of the new colour and then slip the first stitch of the second round and continue knitting. Slipping the stitch pulls it up to the second row and just evens things out. Isn't that nifty?

I continue to work on the second half of the capybara scarf. The straight stocking stitch is going quickly. I'll probably get it done in the next few days.

Also, on the weekend Stephanie and I learned how to post one of her patterns on Ravelry. I have a couple that I want to get written up to share as well.

Next on my project list are a cable and lace cardigan using reclaimed worsted weight cotton/nylon blend yarn and a cable sock of my own design.

Acrylic Yarn and Thoughts on Sock Heels

2011-12-03T11:31:00.001-05:00

I admit it. I'm a yarn snob. I don't really like the feel of most acrylic yarns and I really don't like knitting with most of them. However, recently I was asked to knit a Christmas stocking for a new family member (spouse). The family's existing 4 stockings were acrylic with a Santa head on them.

My commission was to knit another stocking about the same size. I had a little bit of yarn at home that matched the red of the existing stocking but not enough to do much with it but a few rounds so off to the craft big box store I went.

I discovered it is really hard to match the reds of yarn (from the existing stockings) from 25 years ago. Go figure. I found some Vanna's Choice red yarn that was pretty close so I decided to knit the top of the stocking to match the other one and knit the body of the stocking with white (crunchy Red Heart - ugh) using the red for the heel and toe and the Santa hat.

The leg of the stocking is knit flat to accommodate the intarsia of the Santa head. Then the stitches are joined in the round and the rest is knit like a conventional short-row heel sock.

I used my graphing software to graph the Santa head from the original stocking and thought I'd use the exact same pattern for the new one. I had a bit of pink yarn in my acrylic stash (I keep the stash for this exact reason - so I don't have to go out and buy full skeins of acrylic yarn) that I thought I'd use on Santa's face.

Since Santa's pom pom, hat brim and beard are white, I decided to outline them in grey to delineate them from the white of the stocking's background.

I also decided to match the short row heel so I found Priscilla Wild's video on YouTube that didn't use wraps yet didn't have a lot of holes. She does the short rows and just turns, slipping the first stitch of each row. When increasing the stitches again, she knits to the stitch before the 'gap' and knits the next two together, then picks up and knits a stitch from the row below, thus doing the increase and closing any hole there might have been.

The fabric of the original stocking was very dense. I didn't want to knit that tightly with this awful-feeling yarn so I used a 4mm needle. The stocking came out a bit bigger, but that's OK, the stocking that was knit for the other daughter's spouse last year was about 20% bigger and didn't match the Santa heads at all.

Now all I have to do is stitch the grey outlines of the beard, duplicate stitch the name and seam the leg.

I plan to use this heel again! Whilst doing my sock heel research, I watched Cat Bordhi's 'Sweet Tomato Heel' video. I remembered her mentioning it when I took that class with her in October. I would definitely try that heel as well but definitely not with striped yarn as once each heel wedge is completed, you knit all the way around for two rounds. For a reinforced heel I'd use the 'Padded Sweet Tomato Heel'. However, I would modify it by using my preferred 'Eye of Partridge' heel as I like the look of that better than columns of slipped stitches.

I must admit, the feel of the Vanna's Choice yarn was quite nice and was nice to knit with. To me, it felt a lot like Patons Canadiana or Lion Brand Wool Ease. I don't know if it pills a lot with abrasive use but I would definitely consider using it for an afghan that could be machine-washed and only if I could get it for a deeply discounted price.

Yesterday on the GO train on my way into and out of The Big City for a "girls' night out", I finished knitting the faux fringe of the second end of the capybara scarf and completed the 6 plain rows before starting the new capybara chart.

My plan is to knit that entire half, then cut the capybara part out of the first half, pick up the sts above the faux fringe and re-knit using the new graph, then graft it (Kitchener) to the rest of the first half, then graft the two halves together. I think it will work out well so I don't have to completely re-knit the first half.

Speaking of capybaras, I got a message a couple of days ago from someone who writes a capybara blog from the viewpoint of the capybara. She cited and linked my blog to hers. I have since learned that her blog is read by capybaraphiles from all over the world and for a couple of days I received more than twice the number of hits on my blog.

One never knows who might be reading one's blog.

Capybara Scarf Update

2011-11-26T22:48:00.001-05:00

I got beyond the capybara design a couple of days ago and rather than tediously knitting both sides at the same time, I decided to put all of the red sts on one needle and all of the black sts on another and then I could just knit a stocking stitch tube.

I quickly realized I had a dilemma. How do I knit the intarsia in the round? I couldn't figure out how to do it without an opening down the side. I figured there had to be a way I could knit a stocking stitch tube with one side in each colour.

At my regular monthly tea house knitting meeting, I asked the proprietor, Cheryl, a very skilled knitter, how to solve my problem. She quickly explained that I needed to put the red sts on one circular needle and the black sts on another. Then at the beginning of every row, I make sure I cross yarns and purl with colour A, then knit across with colour B. Then turn the work, twist the colours and purl with B, then knit with colour A. That way, the yarns get twisted on each side leaving no opening.

- - - - - - - - - - -

cross yarns on each side --- X X

- - - - - - - - - - -

I happily began this and knit about 14".

It's coming along, nicely. However, it kinda bugged me that the capybara was distorted and seemed to be squashed vertically. He kinda looks like a hippo and that just won't do. I had an inkling this would happen before I even started the project but was in denial and thought it would magically be the right proportion. So much for magical thinking.

Of course, it's because my grid paper had squares - which would be fine if my stocking stitch is 5 sts and 5 rows - a 1:1 ratio. But my stocking stitch on this project is 5 sts and 8 rows - a 5:8 ratio. In order for the capybara to be proportional, I needed to graph it on assymmetrical graph paper.

Where does one get that? Online, of course. So I 'googled' knitting graph paper and found this website. I had to do a bit of fiddling with the parameters so I could print grid paper the right width to accommodate my capybara diagram. And...I'm having issues with my printer. It keeps not wanting to print unless I shut my computer down and restart it. It's a software problem between it and my computer. Anyway, I'm pretty close to the right size grid paper. I just need to get my printer to print it. Then I can re-graph it with my knitting software.

Anyway, what I'm going to do is start again with the faux fringe and new capybara grid with the same number of stitches per row and same needle size and see how it looks. If it looks better, I'll just cut my knitting above the original capybara, conserving the pile of stocking stitch I've completed and graft it together with the newly knit end. I really do think it'll look a lot better.

Lesson learned? Measure the swatch and make sure your graph paper reflects your knitting ratio.

(a few minutes later)

So now I've printed my proportional graph paper and have traced the capybara outline on it.

And here is my new graph from my software that doesn't print assymmetrical graph paper.

The graph looks wonky but I'm pretty sure the capybara proportions will be more accurate once knit.

Stay tuned ...

Rowan Kidsilk Haze Stripe

2011-11-24T17:40:00.001-05:00

What happens when you hand Kaffe Fassett a ball of Rowan Kidsilk Haze yarn? You get Rowan Kidsilk Haze Stripe hand-painted yarn at double the price!Wheeee!

This yarn has just been made available in North America over the past month or so.

The striping is very random. There really isn't a pattern repeat in the whole ball! It does take about half the ball before all of the lovely colours are revealed.

And the yarn is so soft! I didn't really find it to be 'picky' at all. Right now there is only one pattern for this yarn on the Rowan website. The same pattern is on the back of the ball band. I look forward to new patterns for this yarn that are scheduled to be released this month.

I have two more balls of it in two different colourways to plan for.