Hello gnome!

My first beard and it's really cute. Totally worth every bit.  If I went with this beard, I would have been finished yesterday (Monday) for a total of 19 days start to finish.  (That includes about a week of not working on it at all!)

Now, onto the cuteness. This is the beard knitted with Foxy Sable. I thought it would be too dark from looking at it in the skein, but when it's knitted it seems lighter.  The light strands show up more. I like this beard, but am open to others. (So of course, I'm knitting some more to test!)






Typical. Always involved in the photo shoot.


More pictures on my flickr page in my gnome set..

Nearing the finish line...

We have a body!

You can see my center of the body stitch markers. These helped me center the legs and arms and I'm leaving them in so I know where to place the nose.
Next: the beard.

Seaming away

One arm down, one to go. Cute. Thumb was fiddly, but I redid it once and it looks much better. - Also, why did I decide to do the most fiddly one first? It's super cute, but I was not in the mood to seam more after this.  All I wanted to do was sit and look at the cuteness!

Yeah, the color is all off on these.  It was late and I was in my office with flourescent lighting.  Didn't realize how the combo of no sunlight/only flourescent light makes all of the photos so blue.  *Note to self in the future, it is worth it to wait a day to take pictures in the sunlight.  But, I was really excited about the first part all seamed and stuffed!

Gnome ho!

Check out my gnome pieces!

Staycation/Holiday

Last day of my staycation for Christmas/New Year is almost over.  I'm getting ready to head to bed now. I've finished all of the knitting for my first yuletide gnome! Now on to the seaming and stuffing.  I need to take some pictures.  It's cute so far. I also still need to knit the beard. I have a lot of different colors of Foxy and I haven't decided on a color yet.  I'm planning on sewing him up and then seeing what color I think looks best.  I might knit up several and then decide.  Then I'll have a beard or two ready to go for the future. Pics coming soon!  (and I need to figure out a layout, and a header picture!)

Binary Hat rocky beginnings

I'm knitting my brother a Binary Hat (from redshirtknitting blog). But I'm putting a different word in it.

Ugh. I cast on and knit a few inches. There is NO WAY that the man's size would have fit my brother's head. I was on gauge too. I'm going to have to measure some poor man's head. (Someone I know, of course!) Could you imagine me going up to strangers asking to measure their heads? Ha ha ha ha ha!

FO Pasha the Penguin

My sister's godmother is a really awesome lady. I've gotten to know her and really like her bunches. She's great. For Chirstmas, she goes above and beyond normal decorating and hires people to come and decorate her house. It looks incredible. And it is sprinkled with many many penguins. I had seen (and saved the link) to Pasha the Penguin on knitty.com, just saving it for some day when I would have the opportunity to knit it. I walked in her house while decorations were going up and BLAM! I knew I had found a home for a little knit penguin.

This is the cutest thing ever. I knit it up in a couple days and spent a Saturday while watching football seaming and stuffing. Oh - and one more day knitting a scarf. I just thought the scarf added a little something extra. (Plus, lots of the penguins in her house have scarves, so it went with the overall theme.)

Cute penguin!

Pattern: Pasha the Penguin from Knitty.com
Needles: size 6 - I think I used Clover bamboo DPNs or maybe my Boye interchangeable circs
Yarn: all from Michaels or Joann's -
Lion Brand Wool-Ease Solid, Color: 153, Black
Lion Brand Lion Wool Solid, Color: 187, Yellow
Lion Brand Wool-Ease Solid, Color: white frost - 501, White

Modifications: none really, although I did fold in more of the beak stitches (about half) to make a pointier beak and let those folded in stitches be the stuffing for the beak. Made a scarf out of scrap yarn. (6 stitches wide, as long as I thought it needed to be.)

Instructions are very complete. Great instructions. I did have to look up how to pick up the stitches for the short rows (my first short rows ever). Just wanted to make sure I was doing things correctly!

Top row: Under beak, close up of face
Bottom Row: View without scarf and posing with a kitty (Cassidy) for size comparison

Super Cute. I have to make one for myself! Lots more pictures on my flickr account.

FO Fetching

These Fetching Mitts from Knitty.com knit up very fast.
I used the extra ball from leftovers from backyard leaves scarf. (which oddly enough, happened to be the same yarn and color from the Knitty pattern!)
I did make one modification - I added another cable row in the top part of the mitt. Just thought that it mirrored the bottom better.
Let's see, first cables, first picked up stitches (to make the thumbs). Neither gave me any troubles (but I also have my Vogue Big Book of Knitting to use as a reference - so I have good reference materials to help me out.)
Love them. I can drive in them and my hands won't slip on the wheel. They are suprisingly warm.

Fetching. Still needs blocking, but
that will have to wait until I can part
with them for a few days!

Blocked!

So, just wanted to show off the blocked Backyard Leaves scarf from scarf style. (Love this book! There are soo many things that I want to knit out of it.)
This was my first foray into blocking and boy howdy, did it make a difference! So much better now.

Hello. I am a scarf. I lie nice and flat now
that I have been blocked!


Another angle. Look at the pretty leaves!

When I was first knitting this - almost a year ago - I brought it to Florida and was showing it to my Grandma. (Who used to knit and ran a KNIT SHOP! I wish I could do that now....) My Grandma kept pulling the scarf wider and saying that it was so skinny and maybe I could add on to the sides. I could add on here or even use a different color. But my scarf was too skinny. Harumph. She did keep commenting on how nicely it was knitted and how even my stitches were, but she was stuck on the fact that my scarf NEEDED more width. (but it has this cool edge Grandma! It will be fine eventually! I don't want to add on to the sides! No really. Not. adding. to. scarf.) This time, after blocking, she thought that it was great and just kept on saying how nice it was and the design was so pretty. (and complicated! and look at all of those leaves!) Awww. Thanks Grandma!

So yay for blocking! Blocking helps. Go block your stuff!

And just for comparison - the unblocked version.

I am unblocked.
Determined to be too skinny by
professional Grandma knitter.

FO Pumpkins

I love these pumpkins! They are too cute. And....you get to felt! I am sooo addicted to felting things! Okay, sure the pattern requires seaming (gasp) and lots of it. Maybe you could knit these in the round and no one would be the wiser, but hey - it's going to be felted! You don't have to make the seams all pretty. Just leave a long tail and whipstitch those panels together. Easy peasy. The end result is so worth it. I went a little pumpkin crazy and made lots of these. I gave three away and I still have some that I need to felt. Now get ready - cute pictures follow! (and many more on my flickr site - here's the link to my pumpkin set)

Pattern: Pumpkins from Knitty.com
Yarn: Orange, Lion Brand Wool Color 133 (which is named pumpkin, appropriately)
Brown, Lion Brand Wool Color 125 (named Cocoa)

The bigger pumpkins are the small sixe in the pattern. The smaller pumpkin I made by only increasing to 11 stitches, then decreasing. I also left off the last five rows. (So I decreased to seven stitches and then bound off.)

Cute!


One of the bigger pumpkins.


Tiny palm-sized pumpkin!

Boring - but helpful - notes:
I felted these for two short cycles on my washing machine. (about 15 minutes) I marked all of the seams with cotton twine before felting by tying a loop at the top of each seam. I let them spin dry in the washer. Go spin cycle, go! Barely stuffed with plactic bags and tied cotton twine to make the grooves.

Sewing on the cap:
This project has such detailed instructions then leaves you to figure out the final finishing all on your own! So, here's how I handled it. I put a little bit of fiberfill inside. Then, I used brown thread and sewed through all of the grooves around and pulled tight. I attached a curly vine if I wanted one in a groove. To attach the top I sewed through the top of the panel, then right by the stem in the cap, then back to the middle of the next panel, then to the cap....and so on, all the way around. Voila! Pumpkin! (If this is not so clear, please let me know and I can try to explain better - maybe with photos or something.)

These are soo adorable. I gave two to my sister when she moved and she wouldn't even stuff them in a bag! She left them sitting out on top of all of her stuff during her drive! I gave another to my Grandma (who used to knit). She said that it was soo cute and better than a real one! (She also kept showing it to my Grandpa: "Look at my pumpkin, isn't it cute?") My brother even thought they were cool. Sooo cute. Cuteness rating - high. Very high. (Rated by all who see them.) If you have the slightest inkling to make these - do!

magic y'all, magic! - and my invite arrived!

So, I have been invited! Finally! and if you're asking to what....well, where have you been? I've finally received my invite to Ravelry! I am very excited. I have spent numerous hours looking and adding (and more looking and more adding). The Ravelry site is so awesome.
Reasons why it is awesome:
(a) I wanted to make a hat and found a pattern, but couldn't find a picture of said hat on a head. It has cables and I had no idea what it would look like on. And said hat is for a boy and it couldn't look too frilly. There are 50 pictures of this hat on Ravelry! and google search turned up one pic on a head! Awesome!
(b) Wanted to make hat for my sister for Christmas, but I have no idea what. Found one! (and I thought I would have to design something when I have never made a hat before.) Now I know she will have a cool hat. (and I am making one for myself too. can't wait!)
(c) Resources, resources. Forums, pictures of FOs, ideas, stash organization, people's notes.

So, to sum up: Awesome! I've only been playing for a day, but man, if you haven't yet, get on that waiting list! I'm kristiknits on Ravelry. Go check it out. http://www.ravelry.com/

Now for my UFO story....
My second knit item ever that I started was Backyard Leaves from Scarf Style. (great book, by the way. I want to make most of what is in there.) Second item and I'm doing a chart. I started it in New Zealand and finished one half of the scarf. Set it aside because I started driving into work and didn't have all that knit time on the subway. Fast forward several months.....
Get scarf out and realize I don't have enough yarn to finish another half! eep! Could have been that I didn't buy enough (but I bought an extra ball for my first project, so I think I would have bought an extra) or (probably) I lost a ball. Oh noes!

Hello, I am half of a scarf. Don't you want to finish me?

So, I set out on a quest for another ball. Call, call, call. Drive, drive, drive. No one seems to have any in the color I need. (don't even care about dye lot anymore, I just want enough to finish!)

I'm telling my problem to these nice ladies at Cast-on Cottage (Hello! Y'all are awesome!) and they take pity on me and my dilemma. They are pulling alternate yarns to add on to the ends, calling other stores and have a sheet out to order a whole bag of the color I need just so I can have another ball. (awesome, right?)

One lady, Susan, suggests to use a shawl pin. Genius! Half a scarf pinned stays cozy round my neck, I still have the leaves in front, and *POOF* UFO to FO. Magic!

Here is my pin (which I will be able to use with other future FOs)

Cute shawl/scarf pin. Kitty and yarn.

So, my scarf still needs to be blocked, but it is finished! And I can wear it! Yay for magic!

Close up of the leaves. Pretty!

I. Love. Yarn.

I've had this blog set up for about a month now and didn't know where/how to begin. Sometimes something so simple can be so hard. This morning, it struck me. I should start with yarn. (Yesterday's knit shop experience may have contributed to this realization)

I. love. yarn.
I think I'm addicted. (help! I'm a beginning knitter and I may have a problem. Is there some sort of support group for this?)
I also love yarn shops. (because they have YARN!) I love to touch everything. I also seem to be drawn to the mucho expensivo stuff. Y'all know, because it's all soft and squishy. For now, I seem to be controlling urges to spend all of my money on yarn and I am just buying yarn for slated projects. (mostly Christmas presents.) Well, except for this Mirasol Hacho yarn. For which I bought just because I love it. I think it will become my first pair of socks.

Due to yesterday's most excellent yarn shop experience, I now have all the yarn needed for four out of five knitted Christmas presents. (and yarn for a pair of gloves for myself!) (I can't believe I'm going to make gloves!) Yay for me! and I have my eye on buying out the rest of the shop. Well, maybe just half of it. I can save the other half for a later day.

Yarn for my gloves.

Yarn for my brother's present.

Yarn for my sister's present.

(The color is more cranberry/wine colored.)

Yarn for my sister's boyfriend's present.

Also, the awesome ladies performed some magic on a - err- problem I had and *poof* changed a UFO to an FO! whooo-hoo! More on that magic tomorrow. magic I tell y'all, magic!