Finally Finished

Sometimes you have these projects that are nearly done, so very nearly done, but not quite. This was one of them…

Back in the day (summer 2015), I’d just finished the Winter Sweater in Summer and had quickly cast on a kangaroo sweater with a similar yarn (here is my project). It was dutifully knit all the way to the top, adding some additional shaping here and there. I struggled with the collar a little but got it all worked out in the end. There were seven buttonholes, about a million ends to weave in and I just didn’t want to do it. I didn’t feel like it at all. Into the box it went, and it stayed. It came out occasionally only to go back in when all the hairiness from loose ends kept going on. Pure drama.

Cue the house move in December. With the project so close to completion I didn’t want to just throw it away. I also didn’t want to finish it just for the second hand store. I’d since figured out what my problem with it was; I chose the wrong pattern. I don’t do large collars very well, nor do I do semi-long length sweaters very well. I just wasn’t going to wear it, even if it was finished, hence the back burner. But, my brother’s girlfriend was coming to help with the move, and she is skinny, although quite a lot taller. I asked her if she would like it. If I only had a target to finish it for, I might even get it done, or so my thoughts were. We chose some buttons from the stash, which meant I had to close three button holes, but that was fine.

I realised a little while ago that the holiday which was my deadline was approaching quickly, so I sat down on a Saturday and Sunday to weave in all the ends, to put on the buttons, to finish the button holes and to just make it presentable. The project was finally completed, the relief was palpable. This is the project on the receiver, marking the end of a struggle!

 

Baby Groot

There I was, one day, browsing Ravelry’s free knitting patterns for toys, when I stumbled upon a baby Groot. I recognized it because I’ve seen Guardians of the Galaxy. I quite liked the film, but I had a friend who liked it much more, so much that they wanted to dress up as such. I figured everyone needed a knitted baby Groot in their life, and especially him. With his birthday coming up soon, it was the perfect timing.

So off I went, downloading the pattern from ‘a Shade better than STICKFIGURES’ – blogspot and grabbing some gray yarn to start knitting while traveling two hours by train to get to my parents house. A partially completed Groot, without arms, looks a bit… strange, to say the least. Anyway, I did make a few changes; he’s a little longer, has got some different hair, longer and reinforced arms and has a different smile. You can find my notes here. Here he is!

I went through the entirety of town to find a pot that was sort of similar to the one in the movie and that wasn’t much to big or small for the Groot. I did find one after a while, but it’s deeper than the ‘roots’ of Groot, so he’s got some additional padding on his bottom.

The hair was the part that took the longest. I did a combination of i-cord, finger crochet and just tufts with the gray, there are some green knots in it also. His arms can move and be put in different positions. I think his recipient was pleasantly surprised. It was different in any case.

I’m currently knitting a green sweater and sewing jeans, so hopefully those will be finished soon too.

Colour Scarf

At some point in the past I found some Wibra Fenna yarn that had all kinds of different colours that slowly changed into each other. I really liked the combination and I figured I knew someone else who would really like it, my very colourful mom. Since it was a couple of months before her birthday, I figured I would have enough time to make something from that yarn I found. That made me convince myself that buying the yarn was a good idea.

So I browsed Ravelry in search for a pattern. I wanted to experiment more with knitting lace, so I chose a nice easy lace-y pattern. It’s called the Wakefield Scarf from Knitting Daily and you can see my project details here, including the link to the pattern itself. It’s actually quite easy knitting, the repeat is *k2tog, yo, k2tog, yo, k2* on even rows and purl on the odd row and then shifted over one stitch every knit row. This creates a diagonal lace pattern, which is very interesting with a horizontally striping yarn.

I told my mother I had a present for her, but sadly I only managed to finish it in the week after her birthday. Due to the wish to work on another knit project (see the next installment of Hopefully Creative for that project). She was worried that it wouldn’t be warm enough, due to the holey nature of the fabric. However, she does love the colours and they go with everything, so she has worn it, voluntarily, and received many compliments. Especially the texture in combination with the colours seems to be interesting.

This is it, it curls up on itself, but that’s also part of the charm. You can also barely see the areas where I had to switch to the second ball of yarn and where I made another connection. Scarf knitting takes quite a while for me, with a lace pattern especially, but I still enjoyed the process over long periods of sitting in the train and listening to audiobooks.

Beanie Bribe

Yes, I did spend way too much time figuring out a (semi-)suitable synonym for gift that would alliterate with Beanie. However, this was problematic, in the end I decided on bribe and just tell the rest of the story also. You see, last year, a friend of mine had his birthday during a larp event we would both attend. I wasn’t really sure what to gift but I think I vaguely remembered him telling me that he didn’t have or had had stuffed toys. I believe stuffed toys are necessary for sleeping, but he apparently didn’t. Strange stuff… Anyways, I’d produced a teddy bear (this one) that needed a new home and decided his home would be great. Long(er) story short, he was very happy with the bear. It apparently ended up high in the list of best presents ever.

Now, this year, we would again meet at a larp event on his birthday. You understand that I had to keep my reputation up and produce another winning present. Not just for the reputation, but also because the friend is one of the nicest I have and he deserves good things. So at some point weeks before his birthday, he mentioned that he’d worn his friend’s beanie and loved it. Clearly that was the answer. So I very subtly asked him his head circumference. It wasn’t obvious at all..

Looking through my stash of yarn, I found something black/brown/gray-ish that wouldn’t be too fluorescent to wear outside. For his protection you understand, he might have worn a hot-pink one just to show appreciation. Anyway, this is the finished item, modeled on my globe.

There are some gradual colour shifts due to the yarn choice, but I like that. It’s also supposed to be a bit slouchy, which I think worked fairly well. He seems to like it too, so I consider this a win! Next, another present, also of the knitting variety.

Purple Pterodactyl!

From the same book that produced the Plesiosaur, now comes the Pterodactyl!

It all started from the plesiosaur and when I showed it and the book around. One of my friends seemed to like it and really liked the pterodactyl that’s also in the book. I told her I’d make her one. She requested the colour scheme from the Dinobabies pterodactyl, Dak. He is purple/pinkish with a white belly. I got some yarn for my birthday that was a pretty good  to pictures I found of Dak.

I knit mostly according to the pattern, although I did make some changes to make it look more like Dak. The instructions were followed for the legs, although black toes were knit. It was also according to instructions for the tummy, but guestimated where to start adding white to create the belly. I followed the instructions for the head (including errata), but decided not to change colour. I didn’t make the arms, although he did get strips of knitting along his wings to simulate arms. There are black fingers following the pattern for the arms. For the wings, I didn’t want him to have trapezoid wings, so I followed the pattern to where the fingers are, then I increased a stitch along the top in every row and decreased a stitch in the bottom every other row. This gave the wings more shape. He does have more of a tail than Dak, but less than the original. Last but not least, he’s got a neck! This was completely improvised.

Here you can see the knit-in belly and the toes, also visible are his arms. I added red buttons for the eyes. I really do think that the colour matches quite well.

These two really show the shaping on the wings (there is some!), and his little tail on the left. The right picture shows the neck, which he has, and that you can still move his legs around to suit the occasion. I think my friend liked him, so I’m proud.

I really like the book. I also started another one right after finishing Dak. That one is an Allosaur. I also made some small ones, where I took the body and legs from the book but improvised the defining features. You’ll probably see those around here too at some point.

Invisible Plastic

The gift!

Can you guess what it is?

And now? Well, find the answer below!

It is a… plastic bottle carrier, made from faux leather and faux suede. It is meant to be worn on a belt, that’s what the leather bit is for, with a plastic bottle inside (see below for the inside view). At some high fantasy larps it is preferred to have as little ‘now’ stuff showing as possible. But people have to drink and I decided at some point in the past that I needed a bottle cover, which I thought I wrote about, but I cannot find it anymore. However, you can admire mine below.

  

The difference between these two is that mine is cross stitched and the other one is ladder stitched (?). Another difference is in the button, the present has a purple button, mine a woody coloured one. Mine has a cuff while the other folds over. This means that they’ll never be mixed up, and I even have another set of the fabrics laying in my house so I can make another one, if needed.

He seemed to like it when I gave it to him. I enjoyed making it, as it was part of my train journey one day and quite entertaining to figure out how to get it to work. So who knows, maybe another one is in the future.

 

Laundry with Peru on the Mind

I have this wonderful friend, who seems to be the complete opposite of me in some ways. She loves to travel (I hate it), experience new cultures (center to corner of The Netherlands is a culture shock to me), eat local food (leave the guinea pigs to her) and live and work abroad. I still love her to bits and she’s absolutely wonderful to be around. However, she’s been in Peru for the past few years, luckily she comes home for Christmas every year. That’s always the time that we meet up, since I’m not yet over my fear of going to places where guinea pig is an acceptable food stuff. Nicest of all, the first year she came back, I got this present!

It was about a meter of beautifully coloured Peruvian fabric, super bright and striped. Now, I didn’t really see an opportunity for this fabric as a wearable garment in my day-to-day life. However, last week, I realised that it would be perfect for that other thing I had been craving for a while. That was a clothespins bag. Up to now, my clothespins have been hanging out in an ugly green plastic bag. Time for an upgrade I thought.

I’d found the pattern for a retro bag or oval bag via pinterest, original was here. I printed the fabric and found it was much to big to serve my purposes, so I free-handed my own version based on the original. I did pockets on both front and back, because I thought that would be cool. For the contrast I used the same fabric as yesterdays pants, but with added interfacing.

I learned that you should sew curved seams the same direction as it is horribly asymmetric. I will no either start at the top or the bottom, but not go in a continuous curve, as this stretches out the one half while the other half doesn’t stretch. Since this is a bag with a definite use, and it’s not very noticeable, I didn’t try to correct for that after the fact. Also the Peruvian fabric frayed like nobody’s business, so I had more interest in keeping my sanity than getting it perfect.

I added a pipe cleaner along the top edge, since that helps to keep it open. It also provides a nice furry edge, which I thought was an added touch. Last but not least I used the handle from an old discarded sports bag, which means that it is adjustable and very sturdy. All pockets are functional and I took it out on its first assignment today and it did the job better than its plastic counterpart. I’m happy! Now on to find a use for the remainder of my Peruvian goodness.

Deadline Work (3) – Wedding Present

Last time was the Tuesday made shirt, well that Friday it was time for the wedding of the person I’m still in (sporadic, but still) contact with that I’ve known the longest (i.e. since I was 10 years old). I was there the day she came back to school with the biggest grin on her face, she’d just gotten together with her boyfriend, now husband. It’s nice to see how people grow and evolve even if you aren’t going that fast yourself. I knew I’d be too exhausted from the week before to make something to wear, so I settled on a party dress I wore for a 25 year-wedding anniversary of my parent’s friends, I think. However, the present, that was a different matter…

On Thursday, which luckily is the day shops open till late, I was scouring pinterest for fun origami money presents when I found the bill-butterflies. I combined those with the ‘Jar of Luck’-idea I’d come across some time ago. I found a nice jar at a store and got two cups to go along with it, I found some nice bills and started the project.

 I folded three bills into the bottom part of the wings. The top parts were quotes I found appropriate on pictures, with a hand-written wish on heart themed paper on the back.

“The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams” ~Eleanor Roosevelt
“Happiness lies in the joy of achievement and the thrill of creative effort.” ~Franklin Delano Roosevelt
“Keep your eyes on the stars, and your feet on the ground.” ~Theodore Roosevelt

I also cut some colourful feathers and made a bunch of confetti for in the bottom. I then attached the butterflies to the top of the jar with bouquet wire, this made them seem suspended in air. I personally was a big fan of this.

Last I attached the cups and wrote the card. The idea of the Jar of Luck is that whenever you break something, you keep the shards in the jar, and when you need luck the most, you turn to the jar. In Dutch there is a saying that ‘scherven brengen geluk’, shards bring you luck [bad literal translation]. So this jar is for the times when it isn’t going to plan. And if you need some instant luck, there are two cups you can break easily. I hope they liked it, they did enjoy their party enormously so that was a good start to a hopefully fantastic marriage!

Changes, Again and Socks

Changes, not the things I like most in my life. Some happened, I needed to deal with them. I did, mostly.

Now, you may think that something bad happened, but that was not the case. On the first of May 2014 I started my new job at my old University. This involved a move and the leaving behind of my old life, both living at my parents and when I used to live here before. It’s difficult for me to come to terms with the fact that I’m not a student here anymore. I’m in some ways further removed from the school than when I was attending it, and in other ways closer than ever before. New stuff scares me and I’ve been busy adjusting to my new life.

While I may not have been active at my own blog so much, I have been making some things. I made a bird to put on a key chain, but I have since given away said key chain without taking a picture, so that was stupid.
One of my friends and coworkers (friend first) had her birthday and I decided, the day before that I wanted to knit her a recordersockthing. She had her recorder in a regular sock and I decided it could use an update.

Not long before I had bought a book on knitting and had knit slippers (next time, my dears, next time). I also remembered that there was a pouch for glasses with a cat on it in the book. I was supposed to be taking care of her cat for a week when she was on holiday so I thought it appropriate to knit the cat.

The pattern stated that I was supposed to sort of weave in thread over the knitted base to form the cat picture. I decided to completely ignore that and learn myself some colour work. So I did, and I think it turned out quite well! I was going to make it a spitting image of their cat, but knitting it took a bit longer than anticipated so I didn’t have time to add the tiger stripes. This is the front and back:

The insides are on the left. On the right you see a close up of the little cat button I’d scored at some point in my life and was precisely big enough for the hole I’d made and it had another cat. Double win, right? *cough*

 

Honestly, I think it’s not bad for a night’s work. I do hope that non of you own the same book, because I’m worse than a pre-schooler at counting and managed to lose an entire.. column? A vertical row, so my cat is a little different from the original, but it still looks like a cat. In my eyes at least. Now we’ll see how it’ll hold up to real life…

Also, hang on for next time when I’ll show the fantastic ‘8 squares slippers’ I’ve made from that same knitting book.

Play Dice With The Universe

Ok, maybe not with the universe, but I like the quote, even if it is most likely not what was actually said. (Something Einstein, blabla).

Anyways, back on topic. I have a friend. She plays DnD (Dungeons and Dragons, for those not in the know). It was her birthday not too long ago. I wanted to make her something to give as a present. Now, for some reason that I don’t really remember, I was searching the internet for weird-numbered-sided-dice a bit before. In DnD the most common dice are d4 (4 sides), d6 (6 sides), d10 (10 sides) and d20 (go guess how many sides that one has..). For some reason I google image searched a d14, because I wanted to know if they existed. I found out they did, and I found a picture of a d14 laid out flat! After a while I put 1 and 1 together and decided to make a d14 shaped dice box for my friend.

I got out the felt I had conveniently bought a bit before, used the garden wire I had bought for my Christmas cards (which will be explained after Christmas (or after I’ve sent all of them)), and sewed the thing together. This is the layout (click on it for link):

This is the final product. The elastic is to keep it closed when there is something in it, like dice, or little clothespins to form a Christmas card line with a bit of ribbon.

Next up, ducks!