Weekend Roundup

Good Morning!

Welcome to Fall, one of the best times of the year for knitters!

Today comes to you in a quick weekend round up because I have a new pretty that has caught my attention.

First up, I finished the Spring Thaw Shawl.

It's not blocked yet, I'll do a full post about it once it's done, but this is another Wall of Shame off the needles. I'll be talking about the wall of shame tomorrow, but for now, work on it continues!

I was down to the wire on this yarn again. I first had to rip out an entire repeat of the lace pattern, and even with that, once I got the edging finished, this was all I had left.

And picture with a helpful cat for scale.

I also picked up some reading material, which I'm not allowed to pick up until I finish the Yarn Harlot's book that I'm reading right now.

This is book two in the series, the first being The Name of the Star, an absolutely amazing young adult novel. This book was released in February, and my library doesn't have it available, and I couldn't wait, so with a few extra dollars in hand, I bought myself the hardcover. I can't wait to dive into this one, but as with crafty projects, I need to limit myself on which books I'm reading or I'll start 20 and finish maybe 1 of them.

In other news, I got a beautiful magazine for Cross Stitching:

I was looking through all the options my local book store had (and there were close to 10 different selections), but I have pretty high criteria. 

For example, if I can't see the patterns because it's cling wrapped, you'd best have good gifts, and a number of cute patterns on the cover. This one did, there's the little penguin card that I'm working on, a beautiful sampler (though I will use less neon colours), not to mention the kindle holder, the geisha, the hedgehogs... this one caught my interest. I'm not one for kitschy cross stitch, I like beautiful stuff I can put on the wall and it doesn't look like it was made a century ago.

So far I have over 50% of the charts in here that have either caught my attention or that I want to make RIGHT NOW! So this one is a success.

The unfortunate thing is that it is made in the UK, and I haven't been able to find shipping cost for subscriptions to Canada, but I'll just have to dig a bit deeper. 

The Quest of the Baby Sweater

A coworker of mine gave birth to her baby girl yesterday. Last week was her baby shower, and with a baby shower must come baby knits! A week prior to the shower I decided I was going to make a little cardigan out of some sock yarn I had in my stash.

I dutifully looked online for a lovely little pattern, then realized as I was casting on that the pattern was for DK weight and I was using fingering, so that wouldn't work, and since I had enough of a long tail, I just cast on as many stitches as I needed to make it wide enough for a 0-3 month old. I decided to make it a cardigan that a baby could grow into. Short(ish) sleeves, and no ties or buttons on the front so it can just sit open. Just something to wear during early fall since that was when the baby was going to be born.

I knit like crazy, at work, at home, anywhere I could pull my needles out. On the day of the shower I finished my lunch with half a sleeve left to do, so I did something I'm not really proud of, but for the last half hour of the day I knit at my desk. I still answered all the phones, and did everything my job needed, thankfully we (for once) had a quiet last half hour. At the end of the day I just had to cast off the last sleeve and weave in 4 threads which were completed in 5 minutes, and I ran upstairs to the shower. The biggest comment I got from everyone at the shower was that they couldn't believe that something that small could fit a human. I mentioned back that considering where the baby currently was, you didn't want it any bigger!

Due to the last minuteness of the sweater, the only photo I have of it right now is of me presenting it to the Mom, though she has promised to send me better photos to put on Ravelry.

This was made with some variegated Patons Kroy for the accents, and another sock yarn that I will have to get the name from when I get home for the bulk of the cardigan in a lovely light pink. The pattern was created on the fly, and it's a drop shoulder, 1/2 sleeve cardigan with no buttons or ties. I wish I could have blocked it to get the front bands to lie flat. I just did a few stitches of garter stitch up both edges to try and keep the stocking stitch under control.

I'm glad that sock yarn is as nice as it is now. The mom will be able to toss this into the wash without any worry of it felting thanks to the nylon content.

To finish the week out, here's a bunch of pictures of my cats swarming me the second I sit down when I get home.

Please excuse the state of my living room, we're still getting caught up after camping. Also woohoo! I made it one week! Happy Friday everyone. We'll see you on Monday. I'm hoping to have the Fisherman's Rib shawl/scarf thing done by the end of the weekend, and I have a couple other projects that I'm going to be working on finishing that I can chat to you about.

I'm so excited that a schedule seems to be working, we'll see how long I can keep this up.

Multicraftual

Good Morning!

So, I could show you more pictures of my Fisherman's Rib Shawl, but it's really just a big rectangle that's getting slightly bigger. Therefore, I decided to talk about some other crafts that I enjoy doing when I have the time or inclination.

My husband refers to me as Craftually ADD, in that, I rarely stick to one craft very long, and will abandon projects at the drop of a hat if something shiny comes along.

Knitting and sewing are my main crafts. I learned to do both when I was four from my Grandma. I tend to knit more than I sew right now, because I can easily knit in front of the TV or computer depending on what I'm doing. Not so much with the sewing. I know how to do beginner crochet too, but I only learned about 8 years ago and I didn't really keep up with it. Making some tiny lace things is something I'd like to get into eventually, but my knitting usually calls me louder than crochet, mainly because crochet is still a struggle for me as I'm technically still learning.

What I'm going to show you pictures of though is my other favourite fibre craft. Cross stitch. I learned how to do this at school when I was 11, and it's the only embroidery I can do with any amount of decency. I've always wanted to figure out how to embroider and make things pretty, and I'm determined that before I die I'd like to make a sampler with different embroidery, just to say I did it. However, when I just want to play with some thread and needles, I reach for my geeky cross stitch patterns. Like this lovely Mario Mushroom.

The nice thing about cross stitch for me is that I can easily grab a photo of a silhouette and with a little figuring, make my own simple patterns. The next two designs were designed by me, and if you want to use them as inspiration go ahead. If you want me to chart out the patterns let me know and I'll stick them up here somewhere. They're a little racy, but I'm a pole dancer for fitness and confidence and absolutely love playing on the pole. So I made a couple designs to go on my bags. These guys are only about an inch and a half on their longest side, and are really quick to stitch up.

I have a number of other designs to work on for my pole ladies. They take a bit longer to do because I have to figure out the design myself.

So yes, I am multicraftual and you'll likely see a bunch of different things pop up here, if you have any good crochet or embroidery resources please let me know in the comments. I'll definitely check them out.

I'll leave you with proof that my kitties are weird, because what's a craft blog without some pet photos right?

Peari and her not very ladylike way of warming her belly by the fire, which, since fall is starting to cool us down, the fire will be coming back online soon. I love knitting by the fire!

This is Maow Maow's way of stealing water. If the water isn't in a bowl she won't drink it straight from its container. She uses her paw to scoop the water into her mouth, which is smarter than Peari, who just sticks her face in and inhales the water up her nose.

Fisherman's Rib

Good morning!

So, after fighting for about half an hour with my iPod to upload my picture, I think I'm going to have to make sure all my pictures are uploaded the night before I post. Nothing's ever easy.

So I figured today I would show you my current WIP, my lovely Lamb's Pride Worsted Fisherman's Rib scarf/shawl thing.

Can I just say that I have fallen in love with Fisherman's Rib since I've started this. At first I was really unsure about it, and had avoided this stitch pattern because it didn't make sense to me. Stitching into the stitch beneath the one you're working with, wasn't that asking for trouble by leaving a loose stitch?

This time though, I bit the bullet and just started doing it! Rather than second guessing myself, I just followed the directions and kept going. It's so smooshy! I love it! I'm pondering making a sweater with Fisherman's Rib in the future, since I live in Canada and it can get pretty darn cold in here.

I'll leave you with this rather old picture of me and Peari snuggling in my old apartment that was rather cold, which was a rarity.

An introduction of sorts

Hello one and all, and welcome to my (new) blog.

My name is Jessie and as you can guess from my blog title, I knit and sew. Over the years I have created a number of different blogs in which to write about my craftyness, however over the majority of the time, these have lasted a month, maybe two, and then have gone off into nothingness.

I am nothing if not fickle, and will quite often leave my logs to languish and die. However, I am hoping that with this blog I will be able to get myself on a schedule. As it is September, the start of the school year where I live, and a time of new beginnings and steps forward, let us step forward into why I have decided, once again, to start a blog.

The steps to a new beginning

I know myself, and I know that I get distracted by pretty things and will drop something that is not pretty like a hot rock if and when I get bored with it. This has happened to more blogs than I can count, some of which I have deleted outright, and some of which I leave for posterity, as it was a time in my life and chronicles some things that I went through.

For the last, oh, four years, I have basically not blogged. I decided that it wasn't for me, I wasn't a writer, and no one wanted to read what I had to write anyway (oh the angst). Then this past weekend (the long, labour day weekend) I went camping. When going camping, a good crafter takes two things along:

1. a simple project
2. a good book

The simple project that I took was a Fisherman's Rib Scarf/Shawl that I'm making with Lamb's Pride Worsted in a lovely blue, with a few grey stripes on the ends.This yarn is the left over yarn that made the Husband's Sweater of Insanity that he will never wear, but won't let me reclaim because it's HIS sweater.

The book was Wendy Knits: My Never-Ending Adventures in Yarn, a book that I love and read at least once per year. This time I grabbed it because it happens to have a quick and easy description of how to do Fisherman's Rib (as I had never done it before), and I just happened to start reading it while I worked on my scarf.

Wendy discusses her joy of blogging, reaching out to the world and just putting what she's doing out there, not to mention sharing her kitties with the world. It got me thinking about how I don't really chat to anyone on the internet anymore, and how I missed that. Sure, I may not get a bunch of readers, but I can still have fun with the few that I meet. Not to mention that maybe my lack of talking to people was partially my fault for falling into the time sucks known as Tumblr and Youtube (not that there's anything wrong with that).

So I got to thinking, which is dangerous, did I want to go back and pick up my old blog. I thought about it, looked at it, and came to the conclusion that the girl who was represented on those years of stops and starts isn't the person I am today. She was a young woman, really struggling to figure out what this thing called life is, and really unsure of everything she did.

I then decided that if I was going to do this I needed a clean start. So, new blog it was. Secondly, did I have time to blog, well duh. I sit at a coffee shop every morning for about 2 hours because I drive in with my husband, then walk the rest of the way to work after the building opens (this is cheaper than public transit, and allows me some internet time in the morning before work) so yes, I have plenty of time to post blog entries.

So, what should I do with a new blog and time to post? Set a schedule, and who better to emulate than the lovely lady who got me back into blogging in the first place.

So, following Wendy's example, I am looking at posting a blog each weekday while I'm sitting at the coffee shop, with at least one picture (though it may end up being just a shot of the sunrise if I forget to take other pictures the night before). Luckily I have some pretty cute cats who can distract you from lack of knitting and sewing content.

I can't guarantee this will be a success, but I'm going to try.

And to finish this off I'll introduce you to my kitties who you will likely see a bunch of:

First up is Peariwynkle (Peari for short) who was adopted from our local Humane Society on Boxing Day 2007. She was 8.5-9 years old, is a cinnamon tabby, and is very loving... when she wants to be.

This blue-eyed beauty is Maow Maow (her real name being Misty), who we inherited from a roommate when he moved out. We are her fourth owners, and are giving her a last go at life. She's a very old cat, somewhere between 14 and 20, and has kidney problems. Maow is a chocolate point Siamese, and is such a cuddle bunny, once she gets used to you.

Hopefully I'll be able to get shots of them in better light for next time. Until then!