Monday, February 22, 2010

2010 olympics.

Vancouver 2010
we are having some AMAZING weather. my husband decided he really wanted to go downtown to take in some of the olympic hub-bub, just to say we had been. some parts of the city were not as crowded as i'd expected, others made up for it. i'm feeling all the walking (just over 10,000 steps according to my pedometer) a bit today. i really love where we live. we have access to sooo much here and we really don't take advantage of that as much as we should. my little guy really really loved the park so we will definitely try to get down there again.

progress

one week of the Olympics down, one to go: one sock down, one to go

one down

finally got a picture of my cowl: this picture does not do justice to the colour of this yarn which is actually a very dark almost gray blue with hints of turquoise and pinks

Cowl

hope you all had a good weekend. we took a spontaneous trip down to Vancouver to take in some of the Olympic festivities. it was alot of walking but a great day over all.

Wednesday, February 17, 2010

ack!

so sorry for the recent lack of posting. i've been very busy so hopefully you can forgive me. i think winter has decided to completely skip over us this year, and while i'm not complaining (who could complain about the glorious sunshine we've been enjoying?!) it is a little sad that lovely little hand knit goodies like cowls and mittens and hats have not been entirely useful this year. that said, i have some recent FO's (finished objects) to share with you and some current projects on the needles.

i finally finished a project i started at the beginning of the new year...turns out they are mittens!

finished just in time for...spring?!

finished just in time for...spring?!

i also used one skein of my malabrigo chunky for a Doroles Park Cowl although i haven't managed to get a picture of me wearing it. it is soooo cozy and warm! i wore it to watch the Olympic torch relay come through town. what an amazing experience! i found it surprisingly moving.

speaking of the Olympics, i've entered a challenge through my LYS and cast on for my first pair of socks during the opening ceremonies. the challenge is trying to finish the project by the closing ceremonies. i'm using cookie a.'s monkey pattern and am really loving it so far. i've made a few changes like making the height a couple repeats shorter and changed the heel flap to eye of partridge. the fact that i actually know what i'm talking about makes me a little giddy. i think i say to my husband "can you believe i'm knitting socks!?" oh about every 5 minutes while i'm knitting. i think it's getting a little old haha.



in non-knitting related news i've acquired a new toy of sorts...my dad's old SLR. i used it some during high school and college but i've basically forgotten everything since then. i'm super stoked to get some film and play around with it a bit.

a new toy ;)

i think that's all the news from over here. spring is definitely in the air and i find myself making garden plans. i'm hoping to do a little vegetable garden this year with the help of my son. i know it's something he'll enjoy all aspects of it right down to the eating. anyways until next time...

Monday, February 1, 2010

february already

i can hardly believe it!! another thing i can hardly believe? this cold is still kicking my butt. i'm starting to get a little stir-crazy, but on the plus side i'm feeling very inspired from all the down time i've had to work on projects, ready knitting magazines and so on. we had a nice quiet weekend at home which was such a change for us. normally weekends around here are spent running errands that we can't do during the week (we are a one car household so the kids and i are without a car while my husband is at work).

i was given a gift certificate to our local yarn shop for my birthday a couple weeks back so last saturday my sister and i had a girls day out to ooooh and ahhhh and pet all the fantastic yarns. after going back and forth....and back....and forth i finally settled on...



you guessed it.



some more malabrigo. (big surprise eh?)



i did branch out and try the chunky this time and it is just as squishy and buttery soft as the worsted and silky merino i already have. it's time, i think, to start turning these into projects. my problem there is that i am a very indecisive person and the longer i have to pet these velvety skeins the more project ideas i have and the harder it is to decide. but, i have come to a decision for a few things.
  • my new chunky malabrigo will be used for the Dolores Park Cowl by Parikha Mehta and possibly some kind of fingerless mitt if I have enough
  • i've had these mitts in mind even before i was really hooked on knitting, when the only knitty site i really new about was knitty so as of right now i'll be using my worsted merino in "paris night" to make a pair for myself. i've also considered making a pair of mittens inspired by these or a variety of different cowls...you get my point about being indecisive...
  • all i know for my silky merino is that i'm making a shawl of some kind.
i'm really intrigued by sock knitting. i'm also scared of it. i don't know why. my favourite thing to knit is mittens which are really not much different from socks. in fact, they have thumbs which you would think would make them a little more complicated. the only think i can think about socks is that the yarn is alot thinner then any yarn i've worked with. it's good to do things that scare you though right? i think i'll have to add a sock pattern to my(growing) list of must-knits.

sorry about my rambling on about knitting. it's one of the first hobbies i've found that i find relaxing rather then frustrating so i'm a bit inlove with it at the moment.

on that note i'll leave you with a pic of the hat that i knit for my son last week. i used the Thorpe pattern but had to improvise a bit as my yarn was much bulkier, and my gauge was consequently much larger. it turned out though and he is stoked with it (which was the whole point) so i'm happy. I still need to stitch a red maple leaf onto the front and i have added long ties to the earflaps since the picture was taken but you get the gist.

Chunky Thorpe