Gosh! it's grand-aunt

Yes! my baby blanket is ready and will be in blue wrappings for a boy. I plan to write on the gift tag, "every stitch knitted with love, from great aunt Sally".

My first baby wrap was knitted for DH's nephew while at Uni and this is for his son! How the years have flown by. I had completely forgotten about the little white cotton attempt when he mentioned his mum has it at home.

Imagine, an FO from 28 years ago! I'm definitely going to make an effort to take a picture of it for posting here.

Pattern: Fun stitch baby blanket

Yarn: 100% wool of Japanese origin

Skeins: 10 x 50 gm x 85 m

Needles: 6.5 mm

I can't wait to swatch for Cozy and Office Casual 3 but have to make another one of my detours again since I've promised a colleague's ballerina daugther a pair of leg warmers. She's been having trouble finding some that would stay up on her slimmer legs and suffers cramps.

My friend wants to learn to knit the warmers but don't you think it's less stressful for me to work on a ribbed pair myself ? There's plenty in my stash for a small gift anyway.

Office Casual 2

Finally completed while watching the World Cup, Wimbledon and British Open Golf Championships. Unblocked and slightly crumpled, here it is!

Office Casual 2 (no 1 is here)


Pattern: from Bendigo......................................... Green Gable


Yarn: Bendigo 4 ply 100% cotton
Skeins: 1.25 x 200 gm x 670 m (838m)

Needles: 2mm & 3mm




Modifications: Ribbing with 2mm instead of 2.75mm , number of stitches adjusted to knit in the round

Rose - a wool, cotton and acrylic blend will be number 3 and probably something as plain and 'boring' to knit like its sisters. There's been so many lovely lace FOs from the girls in the knitters community recently and it's tempting to go for something lacy at the collar like Green Gable.


In the meantime, it's back to my baby blankie and stole, I will not succumb to the temptation of casting on anything new until I'm almost done with them!

What yarn budget?

Its that time of the year again - corporate budgeting and the pages and pages of justification and statistics to cook(knit?) up.
I wonder how much lighter my stash would be if I apply the same principles of budgeting at work to yarn purchases?? Let's put some Budget Challenge questions to the test.

Why do you need this amount and explain the project?
err...no project yet..on e-Bay...good reviews on Forum..

Can you postpone the project to next year?
NO! I want more sock yarn..lacewight..a discount.. it's so soooft...alpaca..never knitted with it...only 7 WIPs....can manage more

Is there a cheaper alternative?
Yes, but the acrylics....blah blah...KnitPicks..no International deliveries....not the same as Noro....

Tell me about ROI (return on investment)
err...well..socks cost 4x...yes cheaper to buy..ahmm.. lost frogging man days?..FO? no deadline...

Come back with a 30% slash down
But...I need 10 skeins...long sleeves...love cables

Last year, I discovered a cheaper mosituriser (Olay Regenerist) that works wonders on my 'aging skin' and decided to switch from Creme de La Mer of which I had been swearing by for years. Now you see where I'm coming from, my savings yarn (pun intended)? Yearly cost difference between the creams pays for more yarn that I can ever knit in two!!
Now, what better lame excuse can anyone have to buy more yarn? I haven't thought of another for this year yet, anyway let me show off all my WIPs - only 3 !


Baby blanket - deadline August

Office casual - second sleeve in progress

Feather and Fan stole - 15" done







Sunday afternoon was spent on board the MV Doulos, a christian ship cum floating bookstore. The last time it berthed at Port Klang was 4 years ago. YL and her Youth Fellowship got to meet some of the crew at a concert and wanted so much to visit the ship. The queue was horrendous and it took us almost an hour to get on board.
I am a little disppointed that there were not many Craft books and none on Knitting but look what we got!

Attempt at Lace

The Knitpicks Alpaca Cloud was ordered with Trellis (IK Spring 2006) in mind.




I came back down to earth very quickly while swatching; when I couldn't find an easier way to K7 together other than with the help of a crochet needle for a major section of the pattern. It's such a lovely design, there must be lots of KALs out there I could visit to find a way I guess.
Anyway, it's gone into my 'future projects' folder and perhaps I'll make another attempt when I'm more experienced with lace knitting. Had I stubbornly went on with Trellis I'm quite certain it will be set aside out of sheer frustration.



So it's now an easy Beginners 4 rows Feather & Fan pattern.
Hopefully it will grow up to be a 20"x 50" stole.




Here they are, my socks! They badly need a wash as I insisted on wearing the completed one while knitting the other. The excuse is I need measurements but really I'm admiring them whenever I put my feet up. The pair has been all over the house and shown off to whoever is not bored with hearing how comfortable they are and how warm they're going to keep me during my winter travels.

Pattern: combination of various, short row heel flap, Kitchener stitch toe

Yarn: Opal sock yarn, 75% superwash wool 25% polyamide

Skein: 75 gm, 319 m (3/4 of a 100g 425m sock yarn)

Needles: 2 mm

Sock making made easy..God is a great designer

I haven't got a pair to show yet, but want to show off my first attempt. So here it is, the first born!

I chose to play safe and knit for myself, and this darker yarn to start with as it will hide mistakes I might make along the way, but surprisingly there were no laddering and the much talked about 'gap' between the heel, cuff and instep does not exist. (small pat on the shoulders)

I learnt that, 'for the majority of us, the foot is exactly the length of your forearm from the base of your palm to the inside of your elbow'. Phew! what a relief. Isn't it much easier and polite to measure the hand rather then for someone to turn his/her foot out for measurements? It could be rather annoying when one is in need of a shower too!

And the length of our foot is about equal to the circumference at the widest part. All this trivia from sock knitting!

I believe God created us and all these 'coincidences' are not chance and evolution. Sock making made easy - because God is a great designer!

Socks, flowers, soap and more yarn

I read everything I could get my hands on and found knitty's socks 101 the most helpful. This is my first attempt at socks and it is so stressful wondering how they'd turn out.

I couldn't find a pattern that is suitable for the tension I got from the Opal yarn and instead of the 2.5 mm needles recommended I decided on 2 mm. So I'm winging it with the help of these magazines. I've had the Knit & Style for ages and never gave the sock instructions a second glance and they turn out to be so good, distinct colours for different parts.

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More sock yarn arrived via Mona (again) and in between her to-ing and fro-ing from the hospital, left the yarn for me to collect. The plain brown is for DH who has always insisted that sock knitting is too much trouble. But I shall prove him wrong.

As with most years, I was going to let the day slip by without any fuss until I came downstairs to find these flowers on the dining table. My favourite flowers and soaps! JS and YL had splashed out their pocket money for the surprise. Hugs!

Pek Wah and I share the same birthday and would call each other to wish ourselves a Happy Birthday every year. She suggested we no longer celebrate birthdays from now but the anniversary of our xxx (a favourable year like 30th?) birthday! That way we'd stay 30 forever. Now, isn't that much much better?

FOs to go

Cream Jumper or chocolate chip vanilla ice cream as JS described it is finally an FO! I've enjoyed knitting the Drops Design although it is a little vague in some parts and could get an inexperienced knitter into a knot especially where the ribbing and raglan joins. It is so easy to go wrong at the decreases which could result in disjointed ribbing at the yoke.

Pattern: Drops Design 70-21

Yarn: Cleckheaton Country 8 ply Naturals
100% pure wool superwash
Skein: 14.5 x 50 gm x 105 yds (86m)
Needles: 3 mm & 4 mm

JS seems more excited over the ear warmers and mittens. He describes them as 'cool'. They were easy to make and I will probably make more as I expect them to be misplaced quite soon! I hadn't a clue how the ear warmers work out with the helmet when I saw the pattern initially. more info here Such a simple design and yet will keep the ears so warm.

Pattern: Bike helmet ear warmers

Yarn: Cleckheaton Country 8 ply
100% pure wool superwash
Skein: 2 x 50 gm x 95 m
Needles: 4 mm

Pattern:Voodoo wrist warmers

Yarn: Cleckheaton Country 8 ply
100% pure wool superwash
Skein: 1 x 50 gm x 95 m
Needles: 4 mm

My first lot of sock yarn arrived thanks to Mona and with the 2 Opals from her stash I am going to be 'socking' away for some time!

Spanish Paella and Pot Bottom Crust

To celebrate Father's Day we went to a Spanish style restaurant that serves a delicious Seafood Paella of savoury rice, tomatoes, spices, mussels, clams and prawns. When the dish arrived, its rich aroma brought back warm nostalgic memories of Jinet, my Persian room /classmate at college and our happy chatty shared dinners.

I think its a modified version of 'Tah-Cheen-e Morgh' (Pot-Bottom Crust with Chicken). She would cook the rice grains, canned tomatoes, chicken, raisins and spices in a normal rice cooker. When ready, she tips over the pot and out comes this heavenly golden mould of rice with a thick crust that needs to be cut with a knife for serving. Our local burnt rice is not palatable but THAT crust is out of this world, especially after some butter is spread on it.

Unfortunately, we drifted apart when we went to different universities and all efforts to trace her some years later came to naught.
I've often wondered how she is and whether she's migrated to the US. If you know of people with 'forever spring' for a family name, please ask if they have a Jinet in the family?

JS brought home this jumper, knitted last year in Cleckheaton 8 Ply in Fishermen's Rib stitch. It got into a 'you came too close fight' with some branches and parts of it appear as if a cat had polished its claws on it. He says it feels like an armour and I have to admit the stitch has got this 'double layer' effect and IS heavy.
I am seriously contemplating frogging the whole thing and recycling the wool into another jumper for him.

This arrived in the post from Roxysyarn where I ordered another lot of Plymouth Fantasy Naturalle Cotton. Roxanne included the 20 packets of Kool-aid when she found out I wanted to try a spot of home dyeing. Since she refused payment, we've agreed that I put some money into the Indonesian Aid fund for her.

Knitting by the beach

It didn't turn out as planned, me vegetating under the palm trees on a deckchair, knitting and reading while the kids (more like young adults now!) and DH laze around the pool for the 4 days we were vacationing in PD (Port Dickson). There were no deckchairs, it's a long story which I won't go into, anyway I settled for the couch in the living room.

The sunset from our balcony was fantastic as you can see from the picture and we took more at the beach. It's been ages since we've had a 'bonding' holiday like this and it's a good change from rushing and following tour schedules. DH and JS got into the World Cup mood with the crowd in the lounge downstairs while I knitted away with an action pack HBO movie.

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Look what I got!Choptick holders made from rattan and woven cloth for needle holders during our day trip to Malacca. The size of the hand painted wooden boxes is just perfect for my DPNs and stitch holders. The smaller one will definitely keep many stitch markers.


Aren't obsessed knitters like us a little dotty sometimes? I'm always on the lookout for something I can use for my knitting paraphernalia and luckily for the family, there aren't any LYS around!

Updates

The yarn label says 'blue' , it's lilac to my eyes, but then someone posted an orangey FO here and I thought it was yellow. I'm not sure if it's age creeping in or what , anyway here's my latest blue/lilac WIP, Office Casual 2.
It's the second in a series of semi-formal tops I plan to knit for myself after giving up on ever finding the 'just perfect' one on the many frustrating trips to the shops.

290 stitches of single rib with Bendigo 4 ply cotton on 2 mm circulars can be a challenge and I couldn't wait to move on to stockinette on the 3 mm. Well, after the non-stop 2 parts, 3.5 hrs of 'Blood of the Templars' on Star World, it's ready for the camera.
The front's got to be plain since I am not comfortable with the lacey column right down the centre.














I haven't neglected my cream jumper though. The 2nd sleeve should be done by this weekend and then the fun starts with uniting the pieces for the raglan yoke. I find this satisfying, everything coming together and soon, an FO! Oh yes! practically no seaming and all the tails are tucked in as I knit.

The Weekend Shrug

Pattern : adapted from shimmer

Yarn : Plymouth Fantasy Naturale 100% cotton
Balls : 2 x 100 gms x 140 yds
Needles : 5mm