Contest I Entered/ New WIP

I just discovered another blog that is running a great contest right now full of awesome knitting related things off of Etsy.  Go check it out and let her know that I sent you if you enter.  You can find the contest post here. 

Also I started a new pair of basic sock using the Knit Picks Felici Sock Yarn in the colorway Arugula that I bought a couple months ago.  I really needed something basic other than afghan squares to knit while watching tv so I cast them on.  I don’t have any photos of them yet but I plan to take photos of those and my Twisted Tulip Socks  progress either tonight or tomorrow and doing a post about them.  Thats all for now.

Read Full Post »

Monday’s Book Review/Guenevere Queen of Summer Country

This week  I am going to review the first book in the Guenevere Trilogy by Rosalind Miles.  The book is called Guenevere, Queen of Summer Country.  I love this book because it shows the story of King Arthur from a completely different perspective.  The book is extremely descriptive about everything (from battle stories to sex stories) so beware if you do read it that it is not a book for someone who doesn’t want to hear about the little details of things.  The first book starts off before Guenevere and Arthur are married and you learn a lot about the background of the characters and there cultures.  You also learn about the problems between the people of Guenevere’s culture who believe in the Lady of the Lake and the Christians.  Overall it was a great book and I loved reading about the King Arthur story from Guenevere’s perspective.   I think that I would give this book a 4 out of 5.

Read Full Post »

Forgotton Projects and IK Summer Preview

Well I had kind of put down the afghan due to being bored with knitting square after square and I still am somewhat bored with it, however I needed something to knit while watching tv so I have picked it up again.  It is boring but good tv knitting and due to having other great tv knitting for a while it was forgotten.  I finished about half of a square the other night but don’t have any pictures.  I haven’t gotten much knitting done at all on my socks or my lace stole.  I have gotten a couple of rows into the part of the sock that has a ton of cableing and so the work is moving extremely slow due to the complicated cable pattern.   I am loving the socks and how they are coming out but they take a lot of brain power which I haven’t had much of lately so only a row or 2 has gotten done at a time.  The Honeybee Stole got about 5 rows done on it the other day while I was at the laundromat waiting for my laundry, but is also moving along rather slow due to the amount of brain power it takes.

I just checked out the Interweave Knits Summer 2008 Preview Page a little earlier and love a ton of the patterns.   I may just have to get over my fear of trying colorwork because of this issue.  Which I know it sounds somewhat irrational to be afraid of colorwork when I dove head in to sock and lace knitting with only a couple of months of knowing how to knit especially considering the leval of patterns I am working on in those types of knitting already but colorwork for some reason scares me.  I am thinking maybe it is the knitting with 2 hands thing I don’t know but I think I am going to try it sometime soon.

Anyways back to the Summer 2008 Preview, I thought that I would list some of my favorites that I am thinking that I might make eventually.  These are in no way in the order of which ones I like more it is just the order that they are listed on the preview.

-Tidewater Wrap

-Elinor Tunic

-Delft Tiles Tee

-Imprint Tank

-Tapestry Skirt

-Wallis Cardigan

-Brick Pullover (my husband would never wear this but maybe I could make it for my father since I love it so much)

-Confectionary Tank (already downloaded so that I won’t forget to do it before the date it goes off the site)

-Roped Shell

-Windowpane Socks

-Eyelet Surplice Dress

-Wakame Lace Tunic

-Gossamer Stars Scarf

-Apres Surf Hoodie

I know its crazy how many I like and I will never get around to knitting them all (although I wish I had the time and money to) but those are the ones I like which is great because that means that I will have a lot to choose from depending on what I want to knit.  Anyways that is all for today hopefully more knitting will get done and I will have pictures to show of it soon.  Probably either Sunday or Tuesday since Monday is book review day and I doubt I will have enough knitting done for it to be worth photographing by tomorrow.

Read Full Post »

Friday’s Favorite

This weeks favorite comes from the shop maidenlove on Etsy and just adorable.  It is called the Tangerine Gingham Mama and Baby Elephant Set.  The elephants are handmade out of cotton with saddles made out of cotton gingham and stuffed with 100% pure wool and a pinch of organic lavender.  They are adorable, great for babies, and eco-friendly.   She has a number of other elephants sold in sets and individualy as well in her shop and 1% of all profits made from the elephants goes to The Elephant Sanctuary in Tennessee.  She also makes blankets, pillows, paper goods, and mobiles.   Go check out her shop.

Read Full Post »

WIP Photos

Well I have photos of some of my WIPs.  The first two photos are of my Honeybee Stole which is coming along rather nicely if I may say so myself.  I am really enjoying working with this yarn and pattern.  I love the way it is knitting up.  In these photos I have just started the 3rd pattern repeat.  I have been moving rather slowly with this as it is not great tv knitting or podcast knitting because I have to concentrate pretty hard on it.

 

The next photo I have it of my Twisted Tulip Socks.  I started them this past weekend but got a couple rows in and had to frog them due to not reading the directions for the chart properly.  So I started them over and they are moving a little more smoothly now.  I still haven’t gotton a whole lot done on them but am beginning to get used to reading a chart so I think they will move a little quicker from now on. 

Read Full Post »

Monday’s Book Review/Getting Started Knitting Socks

My book review thsi week is going to be on Getting Started Knitting Socks by Ann Budd.  I used this book to learn how to knit socks a couple months ago.  When I started knitting socks I had only been knitting for a couple months so I didn’t understand quite a bit of the knitting language.  I loved this book because it had great pictures of every step along the way of knitting socks and everything is clearly explained so that even a new knitter who doesn’t really  know all of the terminology used in knitting can use it to learn how to knit socks.  I went into knitting socks thinking that it was going to be really hard and that I was going to have to rip them out a million times trying to get them right, however because of how clear the book was in all the directions I don’t believe I even had to rip them out once.  The only thing that came out wrong on the socks once they were done was that they were to big.  One of the other great things about this book is that it lists a whole bunch of stitch patterns that you can plug into the leg of the sock instead of just a plain rib so that if you are bored with a plain rib but don’t want to do a completely differant pattern you can just plug in a differant leg pattern.  The book also has a number of fairly simple sock patterns in it other than the basic sock that you can move onto once you have gotten the hang of the basic sock.  I believe that there is a knee sock pattern, a basic lace sock pattern, a striped sock pattern, and a basic cabled sock pattern although I don’t have the book right in front of me so I can’t be sure. 

Book Rating:5 out of 5

Read Full Post »

FO and new socks

Well I finished the Monkey socks earlier this afternoon and have pictures of them on my feet. 

I love them and they fit wonderfully.  These are my second pair of socks that I have made and the first pair were to big.  So this is a big deal that they fit so well.  I am super excited.  They are super comfy and I will probably wear them tomorrow.

Also I have started a pair of socks with the Yarn Pig Petunia Sock that is talked about in this post.  I decided on the Twisted Tulip Socks even though I am a little worried about doing cables on such small needles.  Also this is the first pattern that I have had to use a chart in which I was a little nervous about because I am horrible at keeping my place in stuff like that.  I cast on for them and did two rows on them this evening and am not finding the chart to hard yet but it is still pretty easy to keep track of the rows as I am not to far into them yet.  However I have already done one cable cross and found it super easy so those fears are completely gone.  Hopefully working with the chart won’t be to hard because I love the socks and would hate to have to pull them back and start something else due to being to confused with the chart.  I don’t have any pictures of them yet but will probably have some either Monday or Tuesday once I have a little more done on them.

I also got a little bit of work done on the Honeybee Stole and am almost done with the second 20 row repeat and will have pictures of that once the repeat is done although I can’t promise that will be real soon because the project isn’t good tv knitting so I have to be in the mood to just sit and knit to be able to knit on that. 

Anyways I am having a great weekend so far and tomorrow promises to be a great day as well.  My youngest sisters 16th birthday is tomorrow so I went out to breakfast with my family this morning and then tomorrow night my mother is making a big birthday dinner.  So this weekend is full of family fun.

More on those socks at the beginning of this week but for now I have to leave and go to bed.

Read Full Post »

Friday Favorites

This weeks Friday Favorite makes me wish that I knew someone who was having a baby so that I could buy this for them it is Sushi for Babies from Jkalea Boutique Baby Gifts which is as always on Etsy.    

Is made out of:

-a 17″ Handmade Baby Blanket made by Lulus Woobies (also on Etsy) in cotton sushi print and light green satin edging (go check out her shop as well all of her blankies and the such are adorable)

-12 Pampers Swaddlers Diapers

-a fish toy

-2 onesies and a pair of Khaki pants from Cherokee

  

You can also find diaper cakes, cupcakes made out of blankies, and lollipops made out of washcloths and spoons in her store.  So go check it out all of her stuff is just adorable.

Read Full Post »

Contest I Entered

I just entered a contest over at the blog Studio Knit.  She has six questions for you to answer about yourself and if you leave your answers in a comment you will be entered into the contest.  Here is the contest link.  Let her know that I sent you so that I can get an extra entry.

Read Full Post »

Yarn Goodies

Well I just received my prize from the contest on Yarn Pig’s blog Baa Baa Blacksheep.  Here is what I won.

This is a picture of all of the prizes together which are all just amazing.  There is sock yarn, a little sock bag, and some handmade stitch markers.  I will follow with some individual pictures of each item.   All of these items are from her Etsy shop.  She now sells sock kits which come with a sock bag, sock yarn, and stitch markers all matched up together.

This is the sock yarn.  It is the Petunia Sock Yarn in the colorway Deep Love and as said before other colors of the sock yarn can found at her Etsy shop although I don’t believe she has anymore of this colorway.

These are the stitch markers which she hand makes and can also be found at her Etsy shop. 

 This is the sock bag which she makes in all different fabrics and sells on her Etsy shop.  She also sells larger bags as well.

Now I just have to decide which sock pattern to make with this yarn.  I have a couple ideas and don’t know which I want to do so I am going to post my options here and would love to hear what you all think.  I will be starting them this weekend hopefully so leave your comments by then.

The Options:

Pomatomus by Cookie A from Knitty

Twisted Tulip Socks by Chrissy Gardinar from Interweave Knits Spring 2008 (this one is a Ravelry link)

Queen of Cups by Nathania Apple from Knitty

I love them all and have no idea which one I want to make with this yarn so your opinion on it would be great.

Well that is all for now i should have the 2nd Monkey Sock done by the end of the week and I have a couple of rows added to the Honeybee Stole which is moving along slowly.  I can’t wait to hear your opinion on which sock pattern to use.  I should be starting the socks this weekend either Saturday or Sunday whichever day I get over to my Mom’s house to use her ball winder.

 

Read Full Post »