Thursday, July 30, 2009

Easy, Peasy, Lemon Squeezy

Some of you may know that I "teach" a craft class at a local Independent Living/Assisted Living apartment complex. Every month I need to come up with a project/projects that are pretty, functional and SUPER EASY! Here is what we are making for August:

The post-it/picture thingie is a refrigerator magnet. I cut some strips of paper and added some of my beloved Martha Stewart butterfly punches. If you don't own one of these - you should. It's the best $7 I ever spent. I got mine at Michaels, but I think WalMart has them too. I plan on having some flowers and misc stickers for people to use to decorate theirs if they don't want to use butterflies.

The card - while incredibly easy - is adorable. (If I do say so myself!) I pre-punched a ton of butterflies (out of cardstock left over from last months project) so all my "students" need to do is pick the colors they like and glue them on. I usually stamp the sentiment - it just works better that way.

I planned on doing something like this for this months project, but I didn't realize that I only had 9 magnets......DOH!! I put in a quick "HELP" cry to my good friend Kimberly, who supplied me with the first batch. Thankfully she had more that she was willing to donate to the cause. Thanks Kimberly!! (And now that I have a supply of them, I plan on making a calendar project for my Nov or Dec class.)

Enjoy!

Tuesday, July 28, 2009

Not Meant To Be....

I love the Hey Teach pattern. I have some worsted (I think??) weight recycled blue cotton that would look fabulous in this pattern. I have tried to knit this several times now. After swatching (multiple times) and starting (multiple times), I have decided that this yarn and pattern are not meant to be together. It makes me sad. I will knit something with this blue yarn, and I will knit the Hey Teach - someday.

The blue yarn has already started on it's journey to being a Badia tank. This pattern is also written for a worsted weight yarn, but this patterns gauge fits my knitting much better. I think it will be quite lovely when all is said and done.

Mods thus far:
  • I'm knitting this in the round. I will have to split at the arm holes and work back and forth, but this eliminated most of the seaming - and I *hate* seaming.
  • I only knit 3.25 inches of the 2 x 2 rib at the bottom.....I just was not going to make another 1.25 inches. I don't think this design element will be noticed :)
  • I'm only knitting the lace /cable pattern on the front. I don't see the need for a pattern on the back since I will never see it. Yep - I'm selfish that way.
I was a bit surprised that the lace/cable section was not charted, so I charted it myself. There once was a time when I would refuse to knit a pattern if it had a chart, and now I'm irritated when they don't have one. It was simple enough to do so I may find myself doing it more often. Go figure!

Knit on!

Saturday, July 25, 2009

Quick post

Life has been busy.....summer is in full swing in my household! Good news - Trooper was adopted. And I'll admit that I miss the little guy. We're taking a foster break for a month or so because we are doing some dog sitting.

Here is a quick card that I made for Miss C*'s birthday. Her birthday was two weeks ago, but we had a family birthday party last night because my sister was in town with her family. So I *had* to make another card!! Stamps are from Purple Onion Designs. (Psssstttt......they are having a sale. Everything is 25% off until July 31.)


And now we're off to a Saturday morning soccer game....the last one of the season. Have a great day!

Thursday, July 9, 2009

Mother Daughter Socks

I'm not one for matchy, matchy Mother Daughter stuff, but these socks are cute!! And it's the only thing we own that sort of matches!


And now to get to my Hey Teach cardigan. I recast-on with 9's and I'm hoping I get gauge once I get a few inches knit. (Gauge swatch was good, but so was my swatch on 8's.) If I can't get gauge with 9's, this project was just not meant to be.

Knit on!

Tuesday, July 7, 2009

Sorry for the radio silence

Life has been very busy. Our foster dog Trooper is doing great. I get up about 5:45 every morning and take him and Luna for a walk. I have to admit that I'm really not a 5:45 person, but I digress.

Things have been moving right along on the knitting front. I finished my socks with my birthday yarn. They came out beautifully! And I had quite a bit of yarn left over, so I'm whipping up a pair of socks for Charlotte! Here are my socks and Charlotte's socks in progress.


My socks are knit using the Eleanore pattern (Rav download only) and Charlotte's are a modified version of the Riblet sock (another Rav download - sorry!). The colors of these socks are just gorgeous....almost makes me want winter just so I can wear them.......or maybe not!

As soon as I finish Charlotte's socks, I'll cast on for these: Montgolfiere (yet another Rav only download). I can't wait!! (Thankfully kid socks don't take much time - I made the first one is just about 2 days!) Here is a picture of the socks I pulled from Stephanie van der Linden's Ravelry pattern page:


I'm planning on using TyDy sock yarn from Knit One Crochet Too along with Knit Picks Essesntial in Black as the main color - they should come out very striking. At least I hope so.

I also cast on for the Hey Teach cardigan. I've admired it for a long time, but haven't made it yet. I have some recycled yarn that I got from a sweater I unraveled and I think it will be perfect for this pattern, but I just CAN NOT get gauge. I've been tinkering with the pattern a bit to see if I can just work with the gauge I'm getting but I worry about how all the math will work out. But I'm pretty determined. I might just forge ahead. If it doesn't fit me, I'm sure I can find someone to give it to! (Started knitting on the recommended 8's - even swatched - but once I started on the main project - my gauge changed - arrggghhh!! I might just frog the 2" I've done and re-start on 9's. Not completely sure just yet.)

Knit on!

PS - I'll be bringing Trooper to a MARS meet and greet on Sunday, July 12 (scroll down to see the info.) If you're in the Maple Grove, MN, area - please stop by and say hi!!