finished just in time

May 7, 2013 by 22 Comments

In my last post I told you that I was making a cowl for a friend visiting from England, but that there were only 3 days in which to make it.  The deadline was met!

cowl1

Yep, I finished it in the car on the way to see her.  It’s not as thick as I would have liked but I simply ran out of time.  Good thing I used the crocheted linen stitch instead of trying to do the knit linen stitch, which would have taken much longer!

cowl5

 

Since the strips of color in the yarn weren’t very long, it looks more like a rainbow camouflage than I had hoped, but it is still very pretty and my friend loved it!

And, since she’s from England, my chef boyfriend Chris decided to do a Southern dinner for her!  We started off with mini crab cakes with jumbo lump crab meat and a dill sauce (no picture for those).  Then we had a low country boil.  Now I should explain a bit about this Southern tradition:  the low country boil is, I believe, unique to the coastal area (aka “low country”) of South Carolina and traditionally includes corn, red potatoes, some kind of sausage, and shrimp.  These ingredients are all boiled together in one pot (often outdoors over a propane burner) with bay leaves or bay seasoning of some sort, strained, and then dumped right onto the PVC coated table cloth.  Well, we did ours inside and didn’t dump everything on the table, but here’s what it looks like (after 6 servings have been taken out):

low country boil

 

It’s a messy meal because the shrimp aren’t peeled yet and you eat everything with your fingers, but it’s very, very tasty!  Chris also made some homemade butter (with some herbs I can’t remember mixed in) for the corn and potatoes.

Then he made dessert: mini apple pie tarts!  But these were no ordinary tarts: the crust was puff pastry, the apple pie mixture was fresh apples, apple sauce, and bourbon, and there were two unusual additions.  A baked cheese cracker was added, along with candied bacon that Chris made his own rub for.  It was AMAZING:

bacon apple tart

 

I must say it looked better in real life — you know, I’m sure, that it’s hard to photograph food.  But it was very delicious and I was so proud of Chris!  Everyone loved all of it!

Hopefully we’ll get to see our visiting friend again before she leaves, but she’s headed to the mountains for a few days with the person she’s staying with, so we’ll see.

Well, that’s all for today.  There’s another post lined up but it can wait until later tonight/tomorrow.  Thanks for stopping by!

 

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a lovely gift

May 3, 2013 by 21 Comments

I graduated yesterday with my MEd in Clinical Counseling!  All of the students are so glad to be done.  My parents got me a nice card, a delicious dinner, and a beautiful original print, framed and ready to hang somewhere special (hopefully my office, whenever I get a job)!  My aunt, who lives in Arkansas, sent a lovely card with some money to buy myself a present, so of course I got yarn!

yarn for catherine

This beautiful lace weight yarn is by Araucania Yarns, which is made in Chile (this specific yarn is called Nuble).  It’s a single ply yarn and each hank is 50g/1.76oz and 240yds/219m.  It’s 75% merino and 25% silk, and it’s colorway #2.  I’ve never worked with silk yarn before, or this brand, for that matter, but it’s so soft and beautiful!  This yarn will [theoretically] be made into a cowl within the next 3 days for a friend visiting from England.  A bit last minute, yes, but hopefully it can be done in time.  The verdict is still out on whether to try to do the lovely linen stitch that I’ve been wanting to try or to try the crocheted version.  I’m leaning heavily towards crochet because it seems very daunting to try and knit a whole cowl with lace weight yarn in 3 days, even if I have nothing else to do!  I’m not too fast at knitting yet and my hands do get tired.  Taking care of hands, in fact, leads to my next purchase:

lotions

I know I’ve shown you the lavender version of these lovely little lotion rounds, but they smell so good that I just had to get more!  They last a long time, too, which is great, and they would make great gifts if you can stand to let them go!

All of these items were purchased today at my local yarn shop (which isn’t really local as it’s 30 minutes away, but that’s the closest one, so it counts).  It feels nice to support their business, even though these products can probably be found online for a cheaper price, and it’s nice not to have to guess on what something will feel like, and then to wait on shipping.

So you can probably guess what my evening’s going to look like: quick hooking, some hot tea, and most likely a nice Jane Austen movie.  Well, I can’t wait to get started, so I guess that’s all for today!  Thanks for stopping by!

PS:  The Bloglovin’ site that I mentioned the other day should probably be explained for those who don’t know what it is (I didn’t).  It’s a site where you can subscribe to ALL the blogs you follow, not just the ones on WordPress.  That means it’s easy to follow blogs from Blogger or anywhere (and if the blog you want to follow isn’t on the list, you can add it immediately).  All of the posts from the blogs you subscribe to will show up in one handy feed that you can peruse at your leisure, and if you’re browsing the web with Google Chrome (which I would recommend for everyone because it’s amazing), Bloglovin’ will add a little icon next to your search bar that will notify you of new blog posts in your feed.  It’s pretty handy!  They also have an app for the iPhone, but I’ve had a few issues with it so far.  Hopefully they’ll fix it soon — I’ll use it all the time!

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two new stitch tutorials!

May 1, 2013 by 1 Comment

There are two new stitch tutorials up!  First:

the mirrored chevron

chev22

This is NOT the same chevron stitch that appears in our inspirational CAL blanket.  I’ve altered it so it will lie completely flat.  Next up:

surface chains

surf6

 

I’ve seen this recently online but I first found it in an old Better Homes and Gardens book called “Complete Book of Knitting, Crochet & Embroidery.”  It’s a neat stitch that you do after you’ve worked the main fabric and would be a great addition to all sorts of projects!

As you may have guessed, both of these stitches work with our other CAL stitches, and I’m definitely going to use both!  So, to recap, here are the “fancy” stitches that will work for our CAL so far (excluding regular dc and hdc):

To reiterate, if you’re participating in the CAL it is up to you which stitches to use for your blanket — you can always replace what you don’t like with regular dcs!  I will be posting exactly what I will be doing next, however, for those of you who want more direction.  I’m honestly not sure about the woven DCs — they look so cool but to be most effective they should be done in one color, and I’m not sure that I want such a thick stripe of one color in my blanket.  You are free to use it if you like, but I think I might pass.  I will have to use it for something else though — it would make a fabulous cushion or perhaps a bag!

So, has anyone been trying out these stitches in preparation for the CAL?  Some of those stitches are tricky.  I’ve practiced lots myself, making all these tutorials!  I hope you guys are as excited as I am — I can’t wait to get started!  My yarn should be in soon.  If you’ve bought some yarn already, you can share it on the Ravelry group page in a discussion thread so we can all see and admire!

OK, I’m done for the night.  Those tutorials and this post have taken a long time!  If you try the new tutorials and find that something doesn’t make sense or I could have done something better, please let me know!

As always, thanks for stopping by!

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changes & additions

April 27, 2013 by 15 Comments

Hi everyone! You may have noticed some appearance changes around here — you know me, I love to change it up!  This look was inspired by this beautiful blog, although I’m trying to change little things so it doesn’t look exactly the same.  As always, the content of this blog/site remains the same. Except, that is, when I add more stuff! Let me introduce to you a new stitch tutorial:

woven double crochets!

This was introduced to me by Carina over at Häkelmonster (thank you Carina)!  She suggested it as an addition to our CAL stitches, and the math totally works out.  Here’s what it looks like:

woven7It looks neater the more you go.  I love the texture!  My light is again poor due to the cave I live in and the fact that I’ve been mostly nocturnal for the past few days just because I can.  For those of you participating in the CAL, I’ll let you decide whether or not to throw this stitch in your blanket.  It does look best in one color, I think, and it takes at least 5 rows to start seeing the pattern take shape, so if you’re wanting smaller stripes of color you might want to pass this one up.  However, this is the only stitch we have so far other than the bobble that has dimension, so that’s a plus!  Here’s what it looks like in multiple colors, just so you can see:

woven10You can still see the textural pattern but it’s a little more difficult.  (And no, my couch isn’t stained, it’s just hard to get the light and color balance right on my phone camera in my living room, haha).  If you test out the pattern either for CAL use or something else, let me know if there are any problems in the pattern.  It’s got some funky stitches that aren’t used too often, and I tried to demonstrate them as clearly as possible, but if you need assistance or something needs to be changed, please let me know!

I hope you enjoy the pattern, and I hope you like the new look!  I tried to find some cute bunting to use instead of the bubbles at the top, but I couldn’t find anything for free and my Photoshop skills aren’t nearly up to snuff.   You may continue to see some edits though.  Anyway, thanks for stopping by today!  Love you guys!

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testing out the stitches

April 25, 2013 by 16 Comments

I bought my CAL yarn!  I got the Stylecraft Special DK in these shades (which I mentioned in my last post):

I bought two of each color except the pale rose, in which I only purchased one because the only thing I’m using it for is the border.  That’s 21 skeins, which will be more than plenty, I believe, to make a full sized blanket, although I may only choose to make a large throw so that I can make a second throw another time.  I do love throws…

Anyway, with some scrap wool I had lying around, I tested out some stitches I’m hoping we can use, and they all worked.  I have a picture for you but I must say that it looks a poor due to the nonexistent lighting in my apartment and the fact that the yarn colors themselves were mostly dark ones…

testing3

Labeled for your convenience!  There are some rows of plain old dc and hdc (US terms) in there as well just to space out the fancy rows.

Whatcha think?  I think I would like to figure out something else that would fit with the stitch count I’ve got going (I’ve been doing so much math — I had to look up a least common multiple calculator online and it knocked many of my stitch ideas off the board).  I’ve already found this granny spike pattern that should work, and the wave and chevron stitch from the inspirational blanket  would also work.  I do hesitate to do consecutive rows of sc just because it make such a tight, stiff fabric that would be at odds with the other stitches, but a couple of rows here and there would be fine.

Not seeing your favorite stitch pattern?  If there is a stitch you would like to add, see if it fits this count (or see if you can alter it to fit):

The total of stitches across can be any multiple of 24, and then add 1 more stitch.  i.e. 25, 49, 73, etc.  (This is the number of STITCHES across, NOT the number of chains we start out with, due to the fact that we add extra chains to count as our first stitch.  Make sense?)  This means that any pattern repeat that evenly divides into 24 will work (2, 3, 4, 6, 8), so long as you can stick on that extra 1 stitch at the end, which most of the time isn’t a problem.  If your stitch pattern works, share it and someone else might want to use it!  The Ravelry group page would be a good place for that because you can add pictures of a swatch.

If you’re a new crocheter, I’d recommend practicing the “fancy” stitches beforehand.  Here are some tutorials for what we’ve got lined up now:

catharine wheels

bobbles  (I know this is my tutorial but I ended up adding an extra stitch in the bobble itself for added poof)

full star stitch

granny stripe

You know, as eager as I was at the onset of this idea to get going ASAP, I’m now glad that we don’t start for another month.  Gives us all time to get our yarn together, practice any difficult stitches, and add more stitch patterns if we want to.  I finished my last assignment of grad school today (HOORAY!!!!!!!!!!!!), so I should have more time on my hands unless I magically get a job and have to move or something.  Magically is about how it would have to happen — none of my fellow students are having any luck finding a job either.

Anyway, please let us know if you’ve got a stitch idea, and I’ll be looking, too!  Thanks for stopping by!

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