Category / Craft

Things that I’ve made

by princesshotflash

Still going . . .

. . . on my Quarantine Knit-a-Long with squares from the Quarantine Knitting Group on FB. I’m on #13 Butterfly. I’m slow people have done with their blankets. Some have made 81 squares. But this isn’t a race, it’s something to do together while were in quarantine. To inspire each other with creativity.

#13 on the needles

I was going to stop at 15 squares but I’m getting better at knitting them and decide to continue. I needed to find more dk (weight of yarn) yarn in my stash. I have tons of worsted weight but only a couple of dk; reddish purple, yellow orange, navy-er blue that I’m currently using and a muted green.

So I guess when I run out of yarn, I’ll stop. I told myself this is a stash busting project, no buying new yarn and I’m on a budget now since the furlough.

These what I have so far 12 squares. I have a new set up to knit with charts. I sit at my computer, chart on the left and movie from prime on my right. This is working much better and on top of it my tension is better and I’m reading the charts faster.

not the final layout, needed to see what combinations I have.

If you interested in doing these squares, check out Arne and Carlos blog for the square patterns. https://arnecarlos.com/the-arne-carlos-quarantine-knitting-kal-hug-me-later-pattern/

by princesshotflash

Life

from my morning walk

I originally started this post as a “whoa is me” post to complain about unemployment, not receiving my check, and sitting in the phone queue for 5+ hours. But I take that all back.

Yes, I am furloughed, I’m yet to receive a check from UI, I will be stuck in the phone queue until I settle this issue and my furlough has been extended to January 4th. But I can’t feel sorry for myself. That’s how you get stuck and curling up in a ball and not want to do nothing for yourself. Sometimes life is harder than you expected.

I told myself at the beginning of the furlough that I would make use to this time instead of festering and becoming bitter. It’s been a tough road, the unemployment situation doesn’t help a bit. But I still want to make the best of this time. When will I get this kind of time to do something for myself, to do something creative, to make something beautiful.

I decided to write this to remind myself I have this time to do for myself. To think about life and where it may take me. Here’s my list so far I hope I can complete some of it before the end of the year. I’ll be posting my progress and going ons at the home front with the my 4 roommates (haha).

  • for my aloha shirt quilt
  • #7 in the works
  • from my last hike
  • my lucky find
  • crocheted net bag
  • produce bags
  • seed stitch pouch with Hawaiian print lining
Thing I’ve been doing to get to items on my list
  • make my aloha shirt patchwork quilt
  • learn to double knit
  • finish my strand work squares, on #8 half way there
  • start journaling
  • start my Etsy shop
  • learn how to use the watercolor pencils
  • walk more often
  • write letters
  • get rid of stuff I don’t use
  • plan my next hiking trip
by princesshotflash

What a stash!

This box was full of stuff

Got an unexpected gift of yarn from a friend of my cousin, it was her aunt’s stash. It came in box filled with plastic project jars filled with patterns, yarn, needles and notes, bags of yarn, many different sizes of needles, and a yarn ball winder. What a great surprise.

Lots of the project in the jars were partially finished projects with notes annotated on patterns. She loved fuzzy yarn of good quality and I thank her so much for her love of good needles that have become part of my ragtag collection.

I’m worked through the collection to see what I could finish, what I needed to frog to because of a missing parts, what would be give-aways, and what mom wanted for her stash. I found a partially finish hat in one of the project jars and that was first to be finished off.

Partially finished brown beanie

The brown beanie was almost done, lots of notes and a great donation knit for my pile of hats to Kuakini Hospital. The yarn had a nice feel to it would keep anyone warm. Pattern was pretty easy, after I read the notes on the pattern to figure out what she altered in the pattern.

Lots of annotations

Mom decided to try her hand on some fancy yarn. I suggested doubling it with another yarn so it’s easier for her to knit. She could pass up it up. Let’s see what she comes up with.

I think it was those dots of color that sold her.

After the brown beanie, I decided to frog bag project in tones of brown. She knitted together Crystal Palace Merino Stripes and a sueded yarn. It was 3/4 of way done but there wasn’t any more of the suede yarn left. I think that’s why she probably stopped. The merino stripes is a fuzzy yarn only a crazy person (me) would have frogged it. After a bit of gentle tugging and pulling, I think I have enough for a pair of mittens. I love the antler toque pattern from #tincanknits that I bought the mitten pattern.

This color way quite beautiful–medium to dark to light

This is as far I have gotten one side just need to finish off the top of the hand section then do up the thumb. This may be my project for my upcoming trip and maybe a hat or baby blanket.

There’s are much more to this stash but I that’s far as I got with doing anything to them They are living in their project jars or waiting to be organize in a new needle folder. More to come on the knitting front. May more yarn from trip. Hah! Because I just don’t have enough.

by princesshotflash

Random things

Of what I’ve been doing lately.

Frogged (ripped out)

yarn from Japan

Started this cowl, found a mistake, got irritated, frogged.

Actually been frogging most things these days. Knitting isn’t making happy. After I bought all this beautiful yarn from Japan, I’ve decide to take a break to let my knitting.

Baking and Jamming

Cooler weather brings baking and jamming–banana chocolate chip bread, caramelized onion, carrots, and pepper quiche, custard pie, pickled veggies for salads, mixed berries jam, almond shortbread, and blueberry custard pie.

Sunset, Beer and Friends

Last minute sunset outing with friends.

Keep on hiking

Sights from my many hikes at Aiea Loop Trail. Maybe one day I’ll get others to another trail.

Sleepy cats

Orange and Ollie napping around the house. Ollie is usually up high, too hard to get a shot.

by princesshotflash

A project I could finish . . .

I decided to knit a hat with one of the skeins from the goody bag I bought from Jimmy Bean Wool, Madelinetosh DK Twist Desert Bloom. All of my recent projects at are still on needles, mostly going backward. Lots of ripping out or total start overs, have made those project very boring. I need a break. I needed something to make me feel acomplished.

The pattern I choose was Amida from by Maiko Hikosaka. I wanted something easy-ish but cute (of course) and I like the graphic quality of the lines.

I realized from my recent projects there were many false starts. Cast-on, knit, find a mistake, read the pattern wrong, rip out mistake or total start over. This process may repeat a couple of times and this project is no exception.

To change this habit, I need to read the pattern really well, account for stitches in the instruction to make sure I understand what I’ve been asked to do. Every pattern designer has their own way of writing a pattern, and I need to read the pattern and annotate what it means in my own words. This is what a good educational content designer would do. I’m just lazy. haha.

Once I got this pattern in my head, it was very easy and the yarn was a dream to knit with. I took the project with me on my trip to Japan and finished on my first full day of the tour while on the train to the first trail.

now to weave the ends in

By the end of my hiking tour, I decided to give the hat to our tour leader. We had a conversation on the trail about Hokkaido in the fall and the winter. I thought she could make good use of it on a winter hike.

Here’s a preview on the my next project.
Pattern: Alicorn by Julie Crawford
Yarn: Lecce from Puppyarn.com, color: 412
Bought the yarn from Masuzakiya
Fiber: 90% wool 10% mohair
Cast-on: day 7 of the tour in the court yard of our inn.
Continued to work on in Kyoto. Probably use two skein (40g each) to get this done.

scarp yarn stitch markers to help me track my pattern