Wednesday, 3. January 2007
Update from the cottage.
knitting_keeps_me_sane, 19:04h
Right now and until the 7th of January, I am here at my parents cottage. It is nice to be here, and if I had brought enough to knit/craft, I would have knitted/crafted a lot...
I should not complain. I have knitted half of a large, elaborate scarf:
Dogs wool, silk, lambs wool, and various miscellanous merinos.
SOFT. Beautifull!
I had to respin twice, and recard once. The second half is a tad thicker, but I dont think that it is all that bad. I had just spun a batch for the fun of it, and am quite proud that I managed to knit it into a beautifull functional scarf. I had about, uh, 3 yards left over?
The only bad thing about this scarf is, that I did not finish it on my (imaginary) deadline. Which was midnight, december 31, 2006. It was finished at 00.15 AM, January 1, 2007 instead.
The pattern was a swedish, free online pattern, that I will not link to another time because it was literally riddled with errors, unreadable charts and counting mistakes that would make even a reconstruction based on the charts impossible.
Quilt Top
There are more crafty things around here. For example the squares I have mentioned earlier in the year, that I inherited from a friends wife - three handsewn squares, a pieced but not sewn together square, and fabric for another two (almost) squares.
Being Crafty
Measuring the squares gave me measurements that I better not have trusted... My squares are 1 1/6 inch too little in each direction. (I added three fabrics that I bought in Taiwan to the new squares, and do sincerely love the result).
To remedy that, enter strips of my wolf fabric! Works like a charm. Later tonight, I will add triangles to the squares, rotating the squares 30 degrees to the left, and sew them together. That way the uncomfortable measurement of ½ yard square will become bigger and I can create a decent-sized quilt for an adult (instead of the young teen it was intended for, who is now 30), and still have room for a border or two.
I am by no means an expert quilter or patchworker, but I am taking this as an exercise in getting better. It will have a fat piece of batting inside. My mother gave me a nice, but thin, quilt when I moved out in 2002, and it will be nice to have a thick and cushy one, too.
The wolf fabric is one my mother gave me because I cleaned the house before christmas, when her cleaning lady called in sick. I have 230cm, or 2½ yards of it. GLORY. It will not be my backing fabric though, my mother has a purplish fabric that will fit. No sense in buying fancy fabrics for backing, as long as they are durable and not all too ugly or vibrant.
Have a really nice day. I do. I am celebrating a one year anniversary: I started losing weight jan. 3, 2006. That's a year and 50 pounds, and 5-6 sizes.
Lene
I should not complain. I have knitted half of a large, elaborate scarf:
Dogs wool, silk, lambs wool, and various miscellanous merinos.
SOFT. Beautifull!
I had to respin twice, and recard once. The second half is a tad thicker, but I dont think that it is all that bad. I had just spun a batch for the fun of it, and am quite proud that I managed to knit it into a beautifull functional scarf. I had about, uh, 3 yards left over?
The only bad thing about this scarf is, that I did not finish it on my (imaginary) deadline. Which was midnight, december 31, 2006. It was finished at 00.15 AM, January 1, 2007 instead.
The pattern was a swedish, free online pattern, that I will not link to another time because it was literally riddled with errors, unreadable charts and counting mistakes that would make even a reconstruction based on the charts impossible.
Quilt Top
There are more crafty things around here. For example the squares I have mentioned earlier in the year, that I inherited from a friends wife - three handsewn squares, a pieced but not sewn together square, and fabric for another two (almost) squares.
Being Crafty
Measuring the squares gave me measurements that I better not have trusted... My squares are 1 1/6 inch too little in each direction. (I added three fabrics that I bought in Taiwan to the new squares, and do sincerely love the result).
To remedy that, enter strips of my wolf fabric! Works like a charm. Later tonight, I will add triangles to the squares, rotating the squares 30 degrees to the left, and sew them together. That way the uncomfortable measurement of ½ yard square will become bigger and I can create a decent-sized quilt for an adult (instead of the young teen it was intended for, who is now 30), and still have room for a border or two.
I am by no means an expert quilter or patchworker, but I am taking this as an exercise in getting better. It will have a fat piece of batting inside. My mother gave me a nice, but thin, quilt when I moved out in 2002, and it will be nice to have a thick and cushy one, too.
The wolf fabric is one my mother gave me because I cleaned the house before christmas, when her cleaning lady called in sick. I have 230cm, or 2½ yards of it. GLORY. It will not be my backing fabric though, my mother has a purplish fabric that will fit. No sense in buying fancy fabrics for backing, as long as they are durable and not all too ugly or vibrant.
Have a really nice day. I do. I am celebrating a one year anniversary: I started losing weight jan. 3, 2006. That's a year and 50 pounds, and 5-6 sizes.
Lene
... link
Saturday, 3. June 2006
Money-Stealer
knitting_keeps_me_sane, 10:21h
This time, I blame it all on my mother and her wish for "2 Yards of mid blue not too heavily patterned silk fabric".
I certainly did get that! Not only that, but I also got two yards of blue rabbit fabric, twoandahalf yards of blue/natural fabric to back a quilt with (100% cotton and made for beadspreads... should hold up) and last, but not least, 9 30x28cm pieces of (pinkish) fabrics that have a good chance of fitting in with the squares I got from my friend some time back. All in all I spent 1110 NTD on fabrics - thats only 28 Euros!
I got 6+ yards of wonderfull fabrics for only 28 euros, imagine that. It is cheap, not INSANELY cheap, but it would not be possible to get it that cheap in Germany, for example.
I did see some yarn yesterday, but it was not cheap at all though one was 80% Merino / 20% Alpaca, and another was 100% silk - this was a man sitting at the street with his wheelbarrow, not a regular shop.
I also bought Pashmina Shawls for 100 NTD yesterday, 70% Pashmina and 30% Seta - even if it is a lie and they are 100% Acrylics you cant beat the price, and there were hundred of choices, meaning I wanted two shawls, one for each grandmother, but ended up with three and a yearning for the red-and-black-faded one, for example.
Now, have a really nice day and enjoy yourselves :)
Lene
I certainly did get that! Not only that, but I also got two yards of blue rabbit fabric, twoandahalf yards of blue/natural fabric to back a quilt with (100% cotton and made for beadspreads... should hold up) and last, but not least, 9 30x28cm pieces of (pinkish) fabrics that have a good chance of fitting in with the squares I got from my friend some time back. All in all I spent 1110 NTD on fabrics - thats only 28 Euros!
I got 6+ yards of wonderfull fabrics for only 28 euros, imagine that. It is cheap, not INSANELY cheap, but it would not be possible to get it that cheap in Germany, for example.
I did see some yarn yesterday, but it was not cheap at all though one was 80% Merino / 20% Alpaca, and another was 100% silk - this was a man sitting at the street with his wheelbarrow, not a regular shop.
I also bought Pashmina Shawls for 100 NTD yesterday, 70% Pashmina and 30% Seta - even if it is a lie and they are 100% Acrylics you cant beat the price, and there were hundred of choices, meaning I wanted two shawls, one for each grandmother, but ended up with three and a yearning for the red-and-black-faded one, for example.
Now, have a really nice day and enjoy yourselves :)
Lene
... link
Monday, 1. May 2006
Wonderfully vintage
knitting_keeps_me_sane, 20:17h
I presented Wumses sweaters in a previous post, and now I would like to show this little treasure he gave to me a few months ago.
There are three of these, with a fourth all ready to be sewn together. They are Hand Sewn! It impressed the heck out of me, even though I teoretically knew that all the "original" blankets were hand sewn, I didnt really appreciate this fact.
I like to call the colour sceme "80's Pink*... Very girly, so I will be offsetting it with some black and grey :P
I took some nice close-ups of the fabrics - I like them a lot.
I know for sure that they are pre-89, and have kind of worked out how they might have been planned to be put together because the quilter had even made the strips to go between the squares - 1.20 x 1.70, or thereabouts - a smallish, girly quilt. I briefly considered doing it that way until I discovered that there was no more left of one of the fabrics.
My mother, who is very much into quilting, and I made a kind-of plan today for these squares, since Wumse didnt want me to piece it together and give it back to him.
The plan (at the moment) is to sew the last square together and arrange them in a 2 by 8 grid, alternating a plain square with a patterned one, seperating in the middle with a wide-ish stripe with wolves on it :-) The large plain squares should have a quilt motif on them then, which would be echoed in a way smaller scale in the middle of the patterned squares.
Since I am so into horses at the moment, I considered quilting a horse, a helmet, a horseshoe etc. :-)
I do know that "Stuff Is Taking Over My Blog", but hey... I never claimed that I was following any kind of clear agenda!
Just to show that I can still knit:
The Stupid Shawl, now with larger and improved chart making life easier for me, but still hard to knit. Grows just beautifully though, and if I finish the second motif tonight happiness will abound. (There are 4 motifs total).
There are three of these, with a fourth all ready to be sewn together. They are Hand Sewn! It impressed the heck out of me, even though I teoretically knew that all the "original" blankets were hand sewn, I didnt really appreciate this fact.
I like to call the colour sceme "80's Pink*... Very girly, so I will be offsetting it with some black and grey :P
I took some nice close-ups of the fabrics - I like them a lot.
I know for sure that they are pre-89, and have kind of worked out how they might have been planned to be put together because the quilter had even made the strips to go between the squares - 1.20 x 1.70, or thereabouts - a smallish, girly quilt. I briefly considered doing it that way until I discovered that there was no more left of one of the fabrics.
My mother, who is very much into quilting, and I made a kind-of plan today for these squares, since Wumse didnt want me to piece it together and give it back to him.
The plan (at the moment) is to sew the last square together and arrange them in a 2 by 8 grid, alternating a plain square with a patterned one, seperating in the middle with a wide-ish stripe with wolves on it :-) The large plain squares should have a quilt motif on them then, which would be echoed in a way smaller scale in the middle of the patterned squares.
Since I am so into horses at the moment, I considered quilting a horse, a helmet, a horseshoe etc. :-)
I do know that "Stuff Is Taking Over My Blog", but hey... I never claimed that I was following any kind of clear agenda!
Just to show that I can still knit:
The Stupid Shawl, now with larger and improved chart making life easier for me, but still hard to knit. Grows just beautifully though, and if I finish the second motif tonight happiness will abound. (There are 4 motifs total).
... link
Monday, 27. March 2006
Lots of sewn, and one knitted thing
knitting_keeps_me_sane, 13:50h
December 25, 2005, Erik was born! He is my first nephew and the first child in our family since my little sister.
First, I made him a blankie:
He loves it, and that makes me insanely happy.
I also made a sweater for him:
I will try to snap a picture of him in it later today. I hope very much that he will like it!
As the last one for today, there is a Pirate Hat that I made after having seen the "We call them Pirates" hat. I thought that the skulls looked a bit too 'angry' for my taste, and besides, I wanted a really silly and really warm hat. I havent yet decided if I want to add earflaps, but for what it's worth, I made up this cheerfull skull hat!
I do plan on stuffing the top so that it will stand up like a point! :-)
Lene
First, I made him a blankie:
He loves it, and that makes me insanely happy.
I also made a sweater for him:
I will try to snap a picture of him in it later today. I hope very much that he will like it!
As the last one for today, there is a Pirate Hat that I made after having seen the "We call them Pirates" hat. I thought that the skulls looked a bit too 'angry' for my taste, and besides, I wanted a really silly and really warm hat. I havent yet decided if I want to add earflaps, but for what it's worth, I made up this cheerfull skull hat!
I do plan on stuffing the top so that it will stand up like a point! :-)
Lene
... link
Tuesday, 21. March 2006
Haul out the sewing machines!
knitting_keeps_me_sane, 10:01h
It is not all knitting, all the time over here.
I actually own a *gasp* sewing machine, that gets a little work-out every once in a while. In January my favorite Fabric Store Chain had a nice sale, and because I had seeen a pattern that looked like it might be modified into a beautifull sweater, I bought 2 colours of fleece and two very different kinds of bands. The salesperson highly doubted that those colours and bands EVER would get along, not to mention that the width of one was way wider than stated in the pattern. It would _never_ work, besides the fact that the pattern didnt come in my size.
Maybe it wouldnt work for making a hoodie strictly from the pattern, but this:
Was everything I could ever have asked for.
Note that I _am_ losing weight, and the picture really isnt flattering - that is why the sun rose right as we took the picture. What a coincidence, isnt it?
Call me proud :-)
I actually own a *gasp* sewing machine, that gets a little work-out every once in a while. In January my favorite Fabric Store Chain had a nice sale, and because I had seeen a pattern that looked like it might be modified into a beautifull sweater, I bought 2 colours of fleece and two very different kinds of bands. The salesperson highly doubted that those colours and bands EVER would get along, not to mention that the width of one was way wider than stated in the pattern. It would _never_ work, besides the fact that the pattern didnt come in my size.
Maybe it wouldnt work for making a hoodie strictly from the pattern, but this:
Was everything I could ever have asked for.
Note that I _am_ losing weight, and the picture really isnt flattering - that is why the sun rose right as we took the picture. What a coincidence, isnt it?
Call me proud :-)
... link
