Fun is Finished!...Or is it?

Here it is!


Pattern: The Four Seasons, Winter - Tanis Fiber Arts
Yarn : Tanis Blue Label (Four Seasons Kit)
Needles : 3.5mm

I just wanted to say how much I loved knitting this hat.



I got the kit at Pick up Sticks and I have another kit in my bag. The Autumn colours this time. I also have in my hot little hands the Gnome Mitten Kit. I can't decide which to start first.

Winter Hat

I started yet another project. I have no willpower. This one is so much fun!

I am knitting the Winter Hat from Tanis Fiber Arts Four Seasons patterns. I might like to have each colourway because I am LOVING this pattern and the yarn soooo much.

If you are looking for a project that you can't put down this is it!

Still no baby knitting but I have a few things in mind. Not knowing if it is a boy or girl is holding me back I think. 6 months down. I can't believe how fast the time is going by. In June I will get to meet the little person who is kicking me all day and night.

Quick and Easy

First of all, these are the flowers that hubby gave me for Valentine's Day. I am always glad when he doesn't get me roses. I love roses other times of the year but I feel they are too overpriced for Valentine's Day.

I have been enjoying these plain socks for my 4 year old niece. As per her pink and purple request this Dye Hard Serendipitous Sock in You had me at "Hello" is perfect. She wants them up over her knees and when I saw her last night they were at her knees. I knit a bit more straight and have now started the ribbing. One extra long sock in two days...Not to shabby for a busy little me.

This is me, using my arm to visualize my niece wearing her long socks over black tights.

And yes I am a little envious too, thinking I would love a pair of tall stripey socks socks for myself.

Finally

I am very glad that I am finally done the Tongues of Fire scarf. It isn't that I didn't like the project or disliked the yarn I was just done with it. I was ready for something else.

Here it is all done. Not blocked however because I am giving it to Connie to do that for me as she has blocking wires and I do not (at least not yet).

Here is a closer shot of the pattern.

And this is all that was left. It actually looks a little bigger in the picture than it really is. It is about a quarter in diameter and I would not have been able to do another full portion of the pattern.

Next up. A nice easy plain pair of socks for my 4 year old niece. She wanted pink and purple stripes and no other colours but the little bit of grey in Dye Hard's "You had me at Hello" (available at Pick Up Sticks) was acceptable for her taste. She wants them to be really tall so I will have to weigh out half and start at the toes to see how far I get.

Another plain sock that I started a while ago is also from Dye Hard. The watermelon self striping yarn is a lot of fun.

Ouch

My thumbs hurt! I am trying to knit as much as possible on Tongues of Fire. Considering that I work full time as well that means I am really only knitting for a 1-2 hours a night.

That is not nearly how much I knit at other times (weekends, Pre-Christmas) so I don't understand why my thumbs hurt so much.

I am not loving this very much so I thought I would take a break and write a quick post (complaint) about my discomfort.

Yes I know I should probably just not knit tonight but instead I'm just knitting slow.

Knitting/Driving on my Mind

I'm feeling much more like my old self this weekend. I finished a lot of work on Friday so spent Friday just relaxing.


Hubby brought back the new (used) vehicle Friday night. We bought a 2001 Hyundai Santa Fe and so far I love it. Not that I still don't wish the accident had never happened but I think this will be perfect for our little family. It is only one year newer than the Explorer that I was driving but it looks much newer and the interior is nicer.


When my hubby bought the Explorer he bought it is a winter car that he didn't really care to much about. He had a fancy car that he drove in the summer and went to shows with and stuff. Then when we moved in together we started to have some trouble with my car so he sold the fancy car an bought his truck and I got the Explorer. It was a great vehicle but it always had coffee and grease stains that I could never quite get out of the beige interior. This one is clean from the get go and we can keep it that way (as much as we can with a little one one the way)!


As far as the rest of my week has gone. All I want to do is knit or read about knitting or organize my knitting projects. Unfortunately I have to spend a good chunk of time cleaning the house that has been neglected while I worked every night last week on my reports.


Tongues of fire is slowly growing. I am itching to work on something else (socks and mittens are on the top of my list right now), but I am determined to finish the scarf first.

It is lovely and the yarn is a dream but..... you know how it is sometimes.

Progress

I'm excited that I actually made some knitting progress.

It has been one hell of a week this week.

I'm not going to go into detail cuz I don't want to get into everything but here is the just of it.

1. Went back to work.

2. Got into an accident the first day back to work and now have to find the money for a new car.

3. Less then two weeks to do reports for work on top of my regular work day.

My stress level is .... a little high.

On a good note. My house is now brother-in-law free! I have a few things that I need to do before I can do this... for the rest of the night.

Happy New Year everyone!

I can't believe my holiday is almost over already. It has been very busy and I could use another week to do all of the things I wanted to do.

Christmas was nice. I love to see my family and do the whole Christmas thing. Then I'm glad when it is all over too.

Hubby was very thoughtful and put a lot of effort into my gifts.

My present was this beautiful singer sewing machine.

My "Stocking" was this playpen with some baby stuff in it. This one meant a lot to me!

He is so hard to read sometimes. We got pregnant so quickly after I stopped taking the pill. He was a little shell shocked and I didn't know what he was really thinking. I think spending two hours in Babies 'R' Us with no one to help him and going into a maternity clothing store alone says something about how he feels about this baby.

I have been working on Tongues of Fire scarf if you were curious about actual knitting stuff.

All of these pictures were taken with my new Camera! Well it is "OUR" camera but I'm always the one taking pictures so....

This is it. It was a gift from my husband's side of the family. I was going to save up to get a new camera before baby came but they beat me to it! I'm having fun playing with it and figuring out everything it can do.

Don't count me out yet

I know I'm a bad blogger. I am a bad lot of things lately. I feel like my life has been nuts since coming back to work in September. That and the loss of my camera compound to make blogging a no go.

I have my brother - in - law living at my house. He is 21 and was in need of a job. He is there for a yet to be determined length of time. (I pray he is gone by June .... more later). He is a respectful guy but he is 21 and seems to have blinders on to anything that doesn't directly impact his existence and his video game play. He is looking for somewhere else to live but nothing yet. Keep your fingers crossed for me.

He is one of two house guests I have had. The other brother-in-law was here too. He was doing a course at school and our house is closer than going home everyday. Plus the snow here has been making driving not so great where he is from. He went home Wednesday. One down, one to go.

I hope that Brother - in - law #2 is gone by the summer just in time to welcome a new member into our house. I am 14 weeks pregnant and very excited but would really like it to be just my husband and I home to learn how to be parents together.

I think I know where my camera might be and so I hope to have knitting pictures very soon.

craziness

I knew it had been a while since I posted but I didn't realise just how long it had been.

I have every intention of getting back into a routine.

Going back to school this year has been very overwhelming. I'm not entirely sure why. We did have a big reorganization at school after the first 3 weeks and my class was changed almost entirely. I have been so busy with work (at school and bringing work home) that knitting has fallen a bit by the wayside.

Now I have to find a different way to balance my life. Particularly my work life.

I will post some knitting content soon (when I find my camera).

Presents

My mother in law just came back from her trip to England and Wales to visit her mother and other family. She came back with many beautiful pictures that tempt me to move to Wales. She also brought back many gifts I don't have pictures of everything because the camera battery died.

She brought my husband West Brom Albion tie, jersey and other footie paraphernalia.
We are well stocked with Twiglets, Chocolate buttons, and Curly Wurly bars. She also brought us a Welsh Love Spoon and a necklace for me.

This is the bag that she brought for me. Unfortunately my camera seems to take blurry pictures more often than it is taking clear ones. I might have to ask for a new camera for Christmas.



This is the sideways picture of Austin Hoodie. I'm at the ribbing section after the woven section on the back of the sweater. (Again I don't understand why sometimes blogger seems to turn my pictures sideways- I assure you that the picture is the correct direction on my computer).



I made a lot of progress last night when I couldn't sleep. I was knitting until 2:30. I am really going to have to get my sleep issues under control before I get back to work in a few weeks. I go to bed in good time each night as usual when hubby does. I don't sleep too late each morning. But it seems that I have one good night of sleep followed by a horrible night of broken sleep.

I know I will sleep tonight because I am trying to not fall asleep now.

New things

One of my goals this summer was to finished as many unfinished projects as I can so that I could jump into this Autumn with a clean slate ready for new fall projects. So far my plan has not worked out that way as I finished Girasole I cast on for two more projects. Abalone and Austin Hoodie.

I have not done much on Abalone which would be the much faster knit because to be honest I'm scared. I'm toying with fate on this one. I have adjusted the small size for my bust but....even if I were a small size the amount of Sweet Georgia Worsted I have for this project might not make it. All the reason in my head tells me that there is no way I can make this project with the amount of yarn that I have, so why I'm I not listening to reason? In my marriage I'm always the one rationalizing and reasoning through things so why when it comes to this yarn am I determined that it will be some kind of sweater against all my better judgement?

I have been working like crazy on Austin hoodie. Not much to see at this point except 7 inches of stockinette. Austin does have a hemmed edge which I always thinks makes for a nice looking sweater. This is a slightly smaller hem than I'm used to doing and I thought about making it longer but decided to trust in the pattern. There is also a garter stitch border on both edges.

The yarn is beautiful. It is Dye Hard Fibre Arts and it is so soft and drapes nicely. I can't wait to keep at it.

And other new things in this house are the new couch.

Our old couch was slobbered on and the frame would dig into you when you sat on it. The cushion covers wouldn't come off to wash so I was always trying to wipe it off but the dog drool never seemed to come off. The new couch is very comfy and yes I can flip cushions around and wash the covers and all that jazz. However as you can see in the picture, Oscar is not all that impressed because he has not been allowed on the new couch. He is sticking with his chair or the floor and giving us the eye. I am missing our cuddle time so I don't know how long it will last before I give in an call him up with me.

Just when you think it is never going to end

It does!!! No.. not the weeds in my yard...but this



Girasole if finished. I loved almost every minute of knitting it. I got a little tired when I was knitting the border but even then the pay off was worth it. That picture makes it look even bigger than it really is but I had to push furniture out of the way in my office for it to be able to spread out on the floor.





Pattern: Girasole by Jared Flood
Yarn: Tanis Fibre Arts Green Label in Olive


This is my baby looking very sad that he couldn't come in the office because Girasole was spread on the floor and I didn't want him to step on a pin by mistake.

Weeds in my grass

There are too many weeds out there in the grass for me to handle. Every time I'm outside with Oscar I pull up more weeds. Just when you think you are making some progress, this is what you see outside...

I don't know if you can see very well in the picture but all those little spots are white fluffy weed seeds from the field beside our house. It is very depressing.

The other night I couldn't sleep upstairs in my house so I went downstairs to the couch. I opened our back sliding door to let the air in and didn't realise until the morning that that screen door wasn't closed. Then yesterday when I was working in the kitchen I saw something over on my curtain rod by the back door. I went over for a closer look and this is what I saw.

I carefully took it down and put it back outside but I had never seen a praying mantis in my yard let alone in my house. And thought it was kinda neat in a creepy bug kinda way. Not long after hubby came home and the mantis was still on the deck. I showed him and he was not impressed (bugs make him a little squeamish)

Knitting has been going well. I am almost halfway done the border of Girasole so I hope to have some finished pictures of that soon.

Lets just call it a hiatus

There is no reason for my lack of blogging (or lack of knitting). I thought that having my summer off would concentrate on getting caught up on a lot of unfinished things but instead of unfinished knitting projects I have been working on unfinished house stuff.

The cleaning and organizing that I have been neglecting for a while now. The weeding in the garden and of the lawn (never ending weeds in the lawn) I would like to say that now I can settle in but hubby wants me to touch up paint and pick paint for the front door and garage door.

Usually I'm the one leaving him a "to do" list.

Hopefully though some of my time can be spent on knitting!

It's been a while

I knew it had been a while since I posted. I didn't realize just how long. I haven't been doing much knitting so I haven't been blogging. Life gets in the way of hobbies doesn't it.

So what have I been doing? Working, working and sleeping with a little housework thrown in.

I have been crafting a little but not knitting.

I made these for two girls that I work with.


It was a lot of fun and I really enjoyed making them. I already have plans for a large quilt for my mother in law and another baby quilt for my friend who is having a baby in June.

This weekend was the DKC Knitter's Frolic. I got a few fun things and...my mojo back. All I want to do is knit.

Here is my small haul. I was trying to be very reserved and not spend a lot. I was a very good girl.

This is my Van Der Rock sock yarn in Lead. I knew I had to work with this yarn again after finishing my Ivy League Vest with it.


These are my new Charteze from Turtle Purl. I wish I had bought some of the laceweight that she had with her as well. Go check it out.

The weather this weekend was perfect knitting weather. Windy, grey and cold. However I was not happy to see the snow in May!

This is what we saw on the way home!

Last night I cast on for Girasole with some Tanis Green Label. I think it was just what I needed.

I didin't realise just how long it had been since I posted. Being back at work is one thing and I haven't felt like I have been able to stop and take a breath since. I have thought about posting but never had any pictures of anything to show so I just didn't.

Today though I have a finished (almost) project.

(again my picture was turned when I uploaded it... I still don't know why it does that sometimes and not others but... )

Pattern: Ribbon Edged Cardigan by Debbie Bliss

Yarn: Sirdar Snuggly Baby Bamboo DK

I made the largest size and it took almost exactly 5 balls. I had maybe 2-3 metres left. I love that I didn't have to start the 6th ball at all. I hate when that happens.

These are my monkey socks in Tanis Blue Label Multis. So much fun! I love these colours

This weekend I have to motor along on more baby socks for some of the girls at work. I have another shower in a week for the next two preggers about to pop at work.

Time to have a coffee and sit and knit.

Back to the grind

It is always so hard after a holiday to get back in the swing of things. I have been doing a little bit of knitting on the ribbon edge cardi (sleeves don't make great pictures) and I started a pair of Monkey Socks.

But this is what I was doing during the break.

This is some Merino that I dyed ages ago and tucked away. Some of this was my most even singles yet. The second bobbin was not as even. I think I was just so into spinning again that I was tired but determined to keep going. It is plied but I didn't take a picture of that yet.

This one is some silk and wool I think (no label as it was some left overs from a class I took) There is also some green and blue in there but you can't see it here. I haven't plied this one yet.

I will post pictures when I finish but for now I'm going to get back to Ribbon Edge Cardi.

I feel like I'm back

After the knitting Olympics I seemed to have lost my knitting mojo. I didn't finish in time, I wasn't sure I was happy with how the vest was turning out so I just avoided it. I didn't knit on anything else (except a baby sock that I had to finish before I get together on Tuesday) I had little desire to knit anything at all.

Tuesday I decided I had put things off long enough. I'm on holiday right now and there is no excuse for not getting some serious knitting done and all I had left of Ivy League was to pick up around the neck. So I got out my trusty knit picks interchangeable set (cuz that is the only place I have the shorter needles and started to pick up the 200+ stitches around the neck when this happened.

The cords I have for this set are almost all loose. They don't often come unscrewed but they do come out from where the cord is attached. Well today the "loose" cord pulled free from it's join leaving my newly created stitches with nothing to support them. After a few muttered profanities I decided I could put off a new set no longer (I was planning to buy one as a birthday gift to myself in June).

This was at 7:30am and didn't think it appropriate to call Connie and say "I'm coming over right now", so I put the vest down gently, resisting the urge to throw it across the room, and did some housework instead.

When I did go by Pick up Sticks (during the hours that they are actually open) I was faced with a new dilemma. Connie has two different sets of interchangeable needles. One which she has been using for a while and one she is just trying out. Well after a long period looking at pros and cons and wondering which to get I came home with.....

So far so good. I know I have read some mixed reviews but I think you are going to get that with any interchangeable set. They all have their own little snags (haha yarn... snag... hmm it is too early for this). I did finish Ivy League and it is blocking in my craft room/office.

Today I have to make myself clean in the basement. I have been working on it for two days. Packing up some stuff for charity and some stuff to just put in the garbage. Now today I have to get that stuff out so I can keep cleaning. However, after knit night last night I feel the knitting and lounging today.

Like Oscar!

What Ivy League Vest?

I may not have finished the Olympic challenge but I finished my own next challenge which was to be ready to cut the steeks on Saturday. My husband was at work so the house is empty and if there was the need to use colourful language no one will question me.


I did decide to hand sew a reinforcement before I cut because this is my first time and I want to take all precautions possible and am I ever glad. As I was picking up around the arm holes the steek stitches inside did start to unravel in some places. Yikes. It was not relaxing at all so one arm hole got finished on Saturday night and then I had to put it down. I didn't pick it back up again until Monday.

Last night I finished the second arm hole and am now picking up for the neckband. I did however try it on last night and .... I don't think I like what I see. Mind you I was trying to be very gentle with it but....I think even after me changing a bit of the pattern at the bottom edge it is still a lot shorter than I had wanted it to be. I got nervous about adding too much when others online told me they actually had wished it was shorter. I guess this is where body type comes into play because this is not the case for me. I am feeling a little disappointed but ALMOST to the point where I want to knit another vest and make it longer. ALMOST!

When I didn't finish it for the Olympics I really stalled and now ... well I'm itching to cast on something new. I should really go back now to my pre-Olympic plan to finish a lot of projects.