WIP Little Star

Hello Blog!

Progress is continuing on my Beth's Little Star blanket. I took a break on it last week after making a mistake in the pattern, but I've recovered now and am back on track. I don't have any plan at all about the stripes, I'm just doing them randomly as I go along :)

I Also may have ordered some yarn from ESK recently, I check my mail eagerly each day waiting for the order to arrive ^^;;

As always, check out Tami's for more WIPS.

Also, sorry for the delay in my podcast. I'll record a new one soon I swear ^^;;

WIP a Garden in Time

Hey everyone!

Here is a project that I've been working on since October that hasn't seen a whole lot of blog time. The Something Pretty blanket. It's a crochet blanket, done in squares. My goal is to end up with 50 total. Right now I have 25 flowers, but they still need the square border around them.

I've been working on this pretty much exclusively at work. It's a nice small, portable project, plus it's a cinch to memorize. I'm pretty confident that I'll be able to finish this by the end of December. Which is good, because this is my dissertation project for Nerd Wars.  

Thanks for stopping by, and don't forget to visit Tami's for more WIPs. 

Orange You Glad I Didn't Say....

Hello blog!  How are you?

Today I'm cooking a new recipe - or I should say, I'm editing one. I'm taking the Pot Roast recipe I made last week and doing the same thing except with chicken. Smells good!  Anyway, Today's post is almost completely about pumpkins!

I'm Crocheting/knitting pumpkins for Team Pumpkin Spice (Decoy Army! Unite! ) It's for a fun little game people over at Nerd Wars are playing until T9 starts :) 

Got sick of knitting with my scrap bulky/sport weight yarn, so I went out and got some pumpkin colored worsted weight today. Also, I *may* have recently been gifted a sewing machine for my birthday, (Thanks mom and dad! XOXOX ), so I got the first tiny bits of supplies to start learning how to spin sew!  I'm sure Amanda and I will be making a Jo-Ann Fabrics run for supplies in the near future and I'll be getting even more of a fabric stash :) 

As always, check out more creative WIPs at Tami's :)

WIP Madness

Hey guys, how are you?  

I’m GREAT.  Why? Because September is almost over >.< September has not been a good month for me so far, but there is a light at the end of the month! If you know anything about Nerd Wars  you might know that Tournament 9 starts October first, and I’m going to be playing!!! It’s my first time participating and I’m super excited ^_^ I will be joining my current favorite nerdery, Team Tardis!

September is the Month-off between the end of T8 and the beginning of T9  and there is a mini game – CUTE ARMY OF DEATH  (death part may have been added by me. ) Goal is to knit/crochet as many cute creatures as possible.  I’ve spearheaded Team Pumpkin Spice and am creating an Army of pumpkins! BWAHAHAHA!

 If interested please join me as one of my pumpkin crafting minions. To keep from boredom I’m using these four different patterns:

 Crochet Pumpkin 1

Crochet Pumpkin 2

Knit Pumpkin 1

Knit Pumpkin 2

Just a note, if you are following my other WIPS:

Demask : Zero progress

Renegade : I’ve started the moss stitch but it seems waay too lose. Must consult with designer, may frog back to the ribbing and add some decreases.

Dongo : Zero progress, the cool pattern I bought has a new crochet stitch in it that I’m struggling with

MKAL : As I write this, I still haven’t finished clue 2 even though the 3^rd clue comes out  TOMORROW.  It’s been a rough week. But I only have 14 rows to go and tomorrow is still a day off. I CAN DO THIS!

That’s all for today. Check back on Friday for my latest FO. Spoiler alert, it’s a hat ;)

Until then, check out Tami’s  for more WIPs!

Snails’ Pace

Hello blog, how are you?

I’m good. It’s still pretty warm outside, but the humidity is dropping fast. I’ve had to whip out my chap stick and nasal spray, and soon I can tell I’ll be doing my daily body lotion routine. I know, ridiculous, right? It’s not even really Autumn yet but I’m already starting to dry out.  My computer can feel it too, it was emitting an alarming burning smell this morning so I turned it off and left it for a few hours, now the smell is gone but everything is loading sooooo slowly, I know it’s my computer and not my internet connection. Grr! 

Anyway, kind of appropriate because today’s post is a crochet FO! 

Martin the Snail 

By FreshStitches,

Random sport/dk  acrylic  with a G hook.

I knit it for Stacy’s Tiny-a-long, which lasts until September 18^th. So if you are reading this now you can still make something to enter if you hurry! I’m still a  newbie crocheter and this project took me 4 days to do… But it’s not like I was working on it for long periods at a time, you know? I’m sure if you just sat down and did this you could pump it out in a day. Plus most people seem to be using sock yarn or even thread for theirs, so if you did that I’d bet it would go even faster!

I think it’s kinda cute, don’t you?

BOMBED

Hey guys. This is a test of the scheduled blogging feature. If this has been posted on Tuseday August 27th the test was successful.

We managed to yarn bomb my mail box!!!!

It's super cute and I love it!!!!! 

Yarn Bombing WIP

Hello Blog!

Today's WIP is a bit random. My friend Mandobug, got the great idea that we should yarn bomb my mailbox, ( I think, hard to remember who started it really. ) We've been making a bunch of granny squares using scrap acrylic (mostly hers ), and today we joined them all up. It was insanely fun, even the weaving-in ends part, if you can believe that.

We almost finished in time to put it on the mail box, but I had to go pick up my husband from work, so we didn't get that far. Next time for sure though!

In other news, first handspun from my wheel. Squee!

WIP - That's life

Hey everyone!

I'm back again with an almost-but-not-really new WIP!

First off, still working on the Demask shawl and Renegade mitts, but not enough progress to make for interesting photography. I'm ready to start the increases for the thumb gusset, but I'm not using an actual pattern and I don't have the confidence to just wing it so I've been stalling....

Totally restarted the interim mitts. Crochet or Die! Still having problems crocheting in the round without adding/subtracting stitches. MandoBug is helping me problem shoot and while I don't want to jinx myself.... I think I've got the hang of it now!

The rest of my life is sort of taking up my crafting time. I'm taking a kind of important test today,  and have mostly been studying for that this weekend, so fingers crossed. Also, my husband and I bought our house in march, but only have purchased a lawn mower this past weekend. Its been raining a lot and while the grass is not growing, the weeds are RIDICULOUS. They are thicker than my big toe and tall, and I cant just yank them up because they have thorns/serrated leaves. So now I have to go buy gardening gloves to rip them up before we mow, because our tiny electric mower can not handle them. Sure would be nice to have a yard that doesn't look like a miniature rainforest, just saying!

PS. so I wrote this on Tuesday with the intention to post on Wednesday......

Happy Crochet of Death

Hello everyone,

Yet another Wednesday that the blog goes up late in the day. I don't know why I try so hard to post in the morning, when I'm so clearly an evening blogger! Today's WIP is a little crazy.... I've mentioned before that I'm on a mission to learn to crochet so that I can knit some of the patterns out of a crochet book I got for my birthday a few years ago called Crochet So Fine.  Now in order to knit these patterns I need to both feel comfortable doing the crochet stitches in lace weight, and be able to read crochet charts like this :

(lifted from This Site. Hello Heidi! ) 

So what does all of this have to do with me? Meet my lace stash:

Some of this is Malabrigo lace that I intended to use to make scarfs, but most of it is left overs from other projects.  You might recognize the green from Bramble, and the Brown is from my jeweled cowl, ( but more on that Friday. )
I can't remember what that light purple stuff is, but I hate it. Hate it. It is soft and it has nice drape.... But it's SO SHINY. It looks like cheap acrylic (even though it is not ) and hurts my eyes. Everything I've tried to make with it looks tacky. I can't stand it.


So my goal with of of this is to make a lace weight version of the Happypotamus

Isn't that so crazy? I saw the African Flower granny square on another blog, and HAD to knit it. When I looked it up on Ravelry I found out that there were so many patterns that used it. The coolest and most interesting by far being the Hippo and it's Frog counterpart (whence came my idea for the lace weight. )

I'm not crazy. I started with a worsted weight practice piece, so I could learn the pattern and the join as you go method. Then I tried it on the lace weight....

We'll see what happens.

As always, check out Tami's for more WIPs!

FO : New Skills Aquired

Hello everyone,  Today I have two FO's on the theme of learning new things. The first one is Octopode Pandemonium.  I knit this pattern in order to practice crocheting in the round without dropping or adding a stitch. It was a huge success!!

Yarn was left over STR medium weight sock yarn in the Dragon Dance color way. BTW, have I mentioned I used to think that I hated crochet because I associated it with really cheap, splity, acrylic? It's taken me this long to realize that crochet can be just as nice as knitting if you use just as nice yarn ^^;;  Who knew?
Anyway, loved the pattern so much that I've already cast on another one. Perfect work project because it fits in my pocket and is hard to mess up!

Next up is my Two-at-a-time practice sock. I knit this with random left over  yarn, and they knitted up at pretty different gauges. The pink is red heart  and the yellow is Vanna's choice.  I learned a lot and completed it on my first try, without merging the two socks, so I'm considering this a success. However, I have some notes.

When they tell you that Magic Loop works best with a larger cable needle, that does NOT mean to try it on a 60" needle. Lesson learned.



I'm fuzzy on sock anatomy and had trouble placing the toe decreases as the instructions just said "On the instep" I originally had a stitch marker at the correct place, but removed it thinking that I knew what I was doing. I didn't. Doesn't really matter because nobody is going to wear these socks, but I'm sure the decreases were uneven.

The pattern I used gives nice clear instructions on how to use a cable needle to get these :

In a position for doing the decreases :

I ignored that and just did whatever. Don't have the patience for cable needles. The socks survived.

And thats it. It was easy once I got started, I got really bored towards the end and stopped waaaay before the pattern said to for the toe. (I think I still had like, 14 stitches or something, the pattern has you decrease to 8). I look forward to making real socks this way.

 

Somehow I managed to consistently twist the stitches on the outer edge sock (the one that you do the purl stitches for ). I'm not sure why that happened, but I'm sure it will seem obvious with time.

That's all. Thanks for reading!

Pandemonium - Crochet

Hello Everyone!  How are you today?  I'm doing good, suffering through warm-but-not-really-warm-enough-for-outdoor-pools weather right now. I even put on my swimsuit and wore it around the house for a few hours today, hoping to coax the sun to come out - alas in vain. But that's neither here nor there.
Decided to take a break from my numerous knitting WIPS in order to work on my crochet skillz. Specifically, I have been struggling with crocheting in the round and accidently either increasing or decreasing stitches, so I figured a little octopus toy like this one would be perfect for practice. It's basically a bunch of tubes sewn together. Easy Peasy!

 So far I've got the body done:

For reference, here are the resources I used to help improve my crochet in this project. Crochet in the round video.  How to tell the wrong side of crochet.  (I'm still not sure I actually have the correct side facing, but I feel my guess is more educated now. ) and Stitching pieces together. (I used a slip stitch through the back loop. ) 

This little hole is left in the back to make sewing in the legs easier, the body gets stuffed last so that all the little ends can be pushed in ;) 

Don't forget to check out Tami's for more WIPS!

Wisteria WIPS

Hello everyone,

How are you?  I'm still working on the Gratitude KAL. Not sure if I'll finish in time, but I'm really enjoying it. It's so easy to say that you are grateful for the big stuff, like "Family" "Health" "A Job" and not really mean it. I think people take gratefulness forgranted sometimes. They say, "of course I'm grateful!" for those things, but they don't stop to really feel what they are saying. That's why I've been focusing more on the smaller, every day things in my life. I thought it would be hard but it's been ridiculously easy!

Aaron's Grandparents have been visiting all week, and they are just such delightful people! I feel lucky to be joining their family :)  It's not the first time I've met them, but I have managed to get to know them a lot better this time around. Grandma is just as serious about cross stitch as I am about knitting, and we both love everything purple, so it hasn't been hard to find things to talk about!

I found out that she is interested in learning how to crochet flowers, so I looked up patterns and did this :




She also likes photography, so I got to see what I look like to other people when I take photos of my yarn

And knit in public 

Went shopping for wedding shoes! I ended up getting the flats... Wish they came in a Wide! How come there aren't more dress shoes for people with wide feet? 

This candle smells like heaven!  Lilac and Wisteria!  Wisteria grows like a weed here in Augusta. We kept seeing it on the side of the road everywhere we went, and eventually we just couldn't take it anymore and we pulled over and picked some ^__^ 

I feel like I should have gotten a *little* bit more knitting done, but it was a pretty fun-filled week!

Check out Tami's for more WIPs!

Monday Meh

Hello Everyone, Today I have more to say on the subject of crochet. For starters, that is a really weird word to say, I'm always spelling it wrong, and don't get me started on how many times I have referred to my crochet as "my knitting" this past week. Guess I can't get mad when other people get them mixed up anymore!

I finished my Hat (blog post pending ) and, eager to start on a new crochet adventure, I started these mitts with some Lorna's Lace I had on hand.




First I cast on 60 stitches like the pattern said. Since I was using a smaller hook than called for I figured I'd be set. No such luck.




Then I cast on 40 stitches. This fit much more snugly (to the point where it was a bit tight to get over my thumb)  However somewhere along the line I started adding stitches




Now I have almost 50 stitches.  Ack! I know this problem is related to the problem I had with my hat - not joining the next round consistently. Instead of a nice tidy line of joins I had this weird zigzag thing going on. While the mitt's joins seemed to line up much nicer, I must still be doing something wrong here to create new stitches. I fear that not only will I have to rip out and start (almost ) from the beginning, but I will have to COUNT to 40 every row until I figure out what I'm doing wrong.

Also. The pattern didn't specify exactly how to work the thumb, so I guessed. Does this look right?

I realized when I said that I had a book of 'fancy crochet patterns' that I didn't really specify what I meant. Just so that we're on the same page, it's this book.

I love pretty much everything in this book, but especially love the Shimmer beaded lace cape and the Visage Lace Beret

Crochet or Die

Hello all, Today's WIPW post needs a bit of an introduction.
I am a knitter. I've been knitting for a long time and I love knitting. I'm also a dabbler. I can't stand seeing someone do something crafty without at least finding out the basics of how it works. So I've had an on and off again affair with crochet. One of my BFF's Crochets, she's bought me a few crochet books and patterns, and occasionally, due to her influence, I've knit masses of random unrelated granny squares, and once, even a hat.

I want to get better, but unlike with knitting, every time I start a crochet project I have to re-learn all the stitches. And the patterns in the book I have are all knit with difficult types of yarn, like lace weight, or ribbon yarn. So I want to make sure I really have stuff down before I start. Plus it's all charted in that book, and crochet charts still look like black magic to me!


All that being said, I promised myself I would try to knit crochet This Hat after I finished Aaron's socks. (Finished, btw, photos on friday. )

But I wanted to practice the stitches first, which meant granny squares. Last week on WIPW I read about a bunch of crochet projects that other people were doing that inspired my granny square choices.

Yarnknitreadlit got me started with granny square CALS and a cool plaid crochet blanket
Little Bird knits  is doing a weekly granny square pattern. So is
8th Gem
Mixedmartialarts introduced me to this pattern, which I am now obsessed with!


So, to make a long story short. I've been making Granny Squares using leftover sock yarn and a 3.50 MM crochet hook.




I also finished the band for the hat :

The puff stitch is so relaxing I can't put the thing down!

 


For more WIPW posts visit Tami's Blog!