Counting Down

Well, I'm back from my Christmas visit to the Pacific NW and ready to kickoff 2013.  I had a pretty productive Christmas Season, at least more than previous years finishing pretty much everything I planned to give as gifts. Also, I’m about done with a hat for my brother-in-law, that I decided to knit from the leftover yarn from my brother’s hat.

Even though this month doesn’t count towards my 2013 Stashdown goal, I figured I’d tally the numbers anyway, as a practice for next year.

Completed Projects during December:
1. Lawnfawn Challenge Cards (x2) – 4pts (completed item)
2. Birthday Card for brother-in-law -2pts (completed item)
3. Wine Cork Trivets (x2) – 10pts (gift)
4. Wine Charms – 5pts (gift)
5. Bottlecap Magnets – 5pts (gift)
6. Handmade Christmas Cards – 5pts (goal follow thru)
7. Hat for brother – 12pts (gift + deep stash bonus)
8. Cowl for sister-in-law – 5pts (gift)
9. Leather Potholders – 5pts (gift)
December Total = 53pts

This was an unusual month since the majority of the projects are gifts and therefore got a few extra points. The points for December do not count toward my reward points (although I splurged a little at my LYS year end sale, so that is reward enough).

I’m super excited to start the stashbusting year…as it turns out, two of my favorite knitting podcasts are challenging listeners to knit from their ‘deep stash’ this year and using or losing yarn that has been languishing. It’s a perfect challenge to go along with my 2013 stash reduction goals and I can’t wait to get started.

Hope everyone had a great holiday season and I’m looking forward to 2013.

xoxo~rae

Mass Production

Forty-five handmade Christmas cards…for the second year in a row, we made all our Christmas cards. And, for the second year in a row, it came down to the wire…here we are 7 days before Christmas and my cards just got mailed. Better late than never, though.

Hope you got your cards in the mail.
xoxo ~rae

A Quick and Easy Hostess Gift

 

I don’t know about you, but this time of year we have a lot of parties, dinners, etc. to attend and we typically bring a bottle of wine to give to the hosts. This year, along with the bottle of wine, I decided to whip up a few wine charms to go along with it.

These are super easy to make and you can find a million different kind of charms. I got these ones ages ago, I think from Shipwreck Beads or EEbeads or any other bead stores either online or brick and morter. Along with the charms, the following supplies are needed:
• Hoop earring findings
• Small Jump rings (in order to make sure your charms face the right direction)
• Swarovski crystals or other small glass beads
• Metal spacer beads
• Needle nose pliers

Thread a bead, spacer, charm, spacer, bead onto the earring finding and bend the top so it will close and Viola!...instant wine charm.

I’ve made a ton of these for all different occasions and themes, summertime, knitting, etc. These are just some ‘wine’ themed charms that I had extras of and since the party was centered around international wine, they worked perfectly. I’m really happy with how they turned out (and I used a bunch of supplies I already had on hand) and they looked so cute wrapped up with the bottle of wine.  Hope you get a chance during this busy time of year to make up a few of these to go along with your gift wine.

xoxo- rae

Bad Dog

Meet Indy, the bad dog….

Indy is our 8 month old puppy who’s lived at our house since September. Indy HATES to be left alone and is kept in his crate when nobody is home. Yesterday he escaped from his crate and had free run of the house for several hours, during which time he chewed a shoe, ripped a stocking off the wall and did this…..

Completely dismembered an entire ball of yarn and had it strewn all thru the hallway and down the stairs! I’m not looking forward to untangling and rewinding this back into a ball.
Very bad dog, indeed!

Pinned it/Did it: Recycled

I love this project! Ever since I saw these on Pinterest, I knew I had to make them. Let me start by saying, we drink a fair amount of wine and I’ve always tried to save the corks with the intention of incorporating them into some craft project. I’ve seen bulletin boards, wall art, etc. We used to have a wine theme in one of our old kitchens and I had big glass jars with corks displayed. When we moved got rid of the bottles, but kept the corks. We have an old bread drawer in our kitchen that is metal and rusty. It needs to be replaced, however in the mean time I don’t like to store food in it. Instead, it’s been a “catchall” for our corks. It’s slightly ‘staggering’ (hehe) how many corks someone can accumulate in just a few years.

When I saw a link on Pinterest I knew I wanted to make them, however, the link was for a kit….$39 for the frame and then another $15 for corks. Well, I knew I wouldn’t need to buy corks and I wanted to see what I could find rather than ordering a blank frame for $39. I searched my local craft stores and couldn’t find a suitable substitute – at least nothing that wasn’t going to require a significant amount of rework (which wasn’t what I was looking for). I figured I was going to have to make something, so I put the project on the back burner….that was until I saw some wooden 'canvases' in the Art supply section of my local Michaels that were about the right size and very affordable (about $6/ea). I grabbed two and figured I’d give it a shot.

The first frame just got a clear coat of polyurethane and the second one was stained. I like them both, I but I think
if I make more I will stain them. Each frame used 32 corks and I sorted thru mine to find ones that looked nice and fit (since not all corks are the same size).

Overall I love how these turned out, and plan on making a few more. I’d love to hear what you think.

Until then,
xoxo~rae

Disappointed

Last year I bought the Evergreen Boughs die from Papertrey Ink. I love anything inspired by nature, especially on my Christmas Cards. That said, I ended up not using it on last year’s cards, it just didn’t work with the design and I didn’t have opportunity to use it on anything else. This year, especially as part of my challenge to use up old supplies, I tried it out. Well, it didn’t cut thru the cardstock paper…I tried running it thru many times, using extra cardstock as a shim, etc. but nothing worked (see picture). I’m not sure if I got a defective die or if it’s just the nature of the little detail of the pineneedles, but I’m disappointed. I’ve emailed Papertrey Ink to see if anyone else has complained about this issue.

In other news, I did complete and mail a card for my brother-in-law’s birthday (+2pts). I think it turned out kind of fun – I was under the gun to get it done and in the mail!

Don't miss the Pinned it/Did it post I have coming up later this week. A super cute Christmas idea.
Until then...
xoxo ~rae

Riva Cowl - One ball down

My goal this week was to finish my brother's hat (which hasn't happened yet) and to knit one ball of yarn on the Riva Cowl (which did happen).

Here's the progress so far...

The stitch pattern is nice and squishy (it's a P2tog, M1 variation)...very similiar to the Honey Cowl, only reversed if I remember correctly.  After one ball of the Debbie Bliss Riva, the cowl measures 2.5" wide.  I'm not sure if I'm going to need all three balls or not.  We'll see next week when (hopefully) I get the second ball knit up.

xoxo ~rae

Book Review: Mollie Makes Christmas

Have you heard of Mollie Makes?  I adore this magazine (I'm not a subscriber, but I have a few issues on my iPad).  The styling is lovely, the projects are usually cute and whimsical, and I love that there are many different techniques (knitting, crochet, papercrafts, sewing, etc) featured in each issue.

When I was at the Dream in Color night at my LYS (Yarnings), I perused thru the neighboring fabric shop Stitchwell and came across the Mollie Makes Christmas book and had to pick it up.  The book is just as lovely as the magazine.  The projects are cute and whimsical and honestly I'm not sure how many I would actually make, I still couldn't resist purchasing the book.

One of the projects that caught my eye was this little cushion.  I probably won't make any of these up this year, but I would love to make them and stuff with lavendar from my garden next year.  (note to self: perhaps some good summer knitting)

Here is a peek at a few of the other projects that caught my eye: 

 

All in all, I would recommend it as an inspirational book, even if not very practical. 

 

xoxo ~rae

 

 

Another Lawn Fawn Entry

This is a repeat of a similiar card I made for our neighbor's son last year.  I liked how it turned out and decided to make another variation of this card for the Lawn Fawn Challenge that ends tonight.  It's hard to tell from the photo, but the letters are colored with glitter pens.

I had a couple of other sketches, however I ran out of time and mojo (I'll just have to save those for another day).

Supplies: Lawn Fawn: Schoolhouse Backdrops, Hats of to You and Quinn's ABC's. 

xoxo ~rae

In the interest of full disclosure...

I bought yarn today. I know, I said I wasn’t going to, however, I’m justifying because it’s *kind of* a ‘club’ purchase. I went to the Dream In Color night at my LYS and got this month’s club kit. I just couldn’t stop myself…it’s so shameful.

I’ve never used DIC’s yarn and I thought it would be fun to participate. I got thru the cast on and garter stitch border during the Knit Night. A couple of the girls started theirs but then decided to knit the Simmer Dim shawl by Gudrun Johnson. This pattern has been in my queue, so I considered jumping on their bandwagon, however I think I want that shawl in a different (more autumnal) colorway. That said, I do think the club pattern, Seychelles, is a cute, wearable pattern and can’t wait to knit it up….I just need to finish my Christmas knits first.

xoxo ~rae

A not so quick note on what I'm knitting...

I’m actively knitting two projects…both of which I hope to finish and gift as Christmas presents. One a man’s hat, knit from REALLY, REALLY old Lion Brand Wool Ease yarn (we’re talking deep stash – bought when I first learned to knit). I’ve meant to get rid of this yarn for awhile now, but for whatever reason I couldn’t donate it when I donated a lot of my other acrylic yarn. I always figured I’d use it at some point, and now I am.

Second active project is a Cowl I’m working on in Debbie Bliss Riva yarn. I was at Yarnings for their Black Friday sale and saw the sample of this cowl knit up and thought it would make a great gift and quick knit. It’s a pretty bulky yarn knit on size 11 needles. I’ve modified the pattern a bit, in order to make it long enough to wrap twice.

I recently finished another “Rustic Cowl” knit in Noro yarn for my friend Pam’s birthday. I didn’t get a photo of this modeled, but here is a picture of it blocking. I like how it turned out, although I always worry that the unevenness of the yarn makes the knitting look bad to a non-knitter. Oh well, they’re fun quick gifts.

Aside from that, I have some very old WIP’s (works in process) that either must be Finished or Frogged – taking a page from the Doubleknit podcast with their Finish, Frog or Slog challenge. Here are some of the old projects I’ll be focusing on this year:

1. Central Park Hoodie – back is almost complete, I plan to pick this back up
2. Chevron Scarf – I don’t love the color combo here…it just doesn’t suit me and I don’t think I can commit to finishing it, although I haven’t brought myself to frog it yet.
3. Honey Cowl – Just need to commit to working on this…I like the yarn and how it is knitting up.
4. Rockefeller Shawl – this isn’t that old, I just put it down when I was going thru the loss of our little pup Huck last summer. I want to finish it now, though.
5. Rainbow Scarf – I’ll slog thru this...it’s good car or tv knitting
6. Fallberry mitts – probably will frog these, they were intended to be a gift but I don’t know that I like the yarn choice.
7. Summer Flies shawlette – I’d like to finish this before next summer…it’s fun to knit, but I put it down to do the West Mystery Knit (Rockefeller shawl)
8. Lace Curtain – Need to finish this for my bathroom (someday).

Ok, gotta run...I've got some knitting to do.

xoxo~rae

Lawn Fawn Challenge

I love Lawn Fawn stamps! They’re so stinkin’ cute and a lot of fun to use, however sometimes I forget to get them out for a project. I’m always looking for inspiration and since I’ve never really participated in a challenge, when I saw the call for submissions for the Winter CHA show, I figured this would be a good opportunity to create something using the guidelines for the project. The deadline to submit is this week, so I’m right down to the wire…as usual.

Since we couldn’t use patterned paper, I decided to try and make my own patterned paper using the Chevron Basic stamp set. I really like using tone on tone with background stamps. It’s nice and subtle. I also used some white accent paint on the hat.
Supplies used: Critters in the Forest, Hats off to You, Chevron Basics.

Confession: Kitchen Cotton Obsession

As part of my Stashdown Challenge, I’m updating my Ravelry Stash to make sure everything is accounted for. The amount of yarn I have is a little staggering, especially since I haven’t really been completing knitting projects (*blush*). I have an entire bin devoted and crammed full of kitchen cotton. It’s a little obscene….I think I have a problem. It seems I can’t walk out of Michaels without buying a ball or two with the intent of making some cute dishcloths or kitchen-y items. As a result, I’ve amassed 21 balls of solid colors and 22 balls of multi-colored, not counting the cone of natural that I’ve been hauling around for the last 8 years. SERIOUSLY…over 43 balls of ‘effing cotton??? What the hell was I thinking? After this shocking discovery, I had to go search Ravelry for pattern ideas in order to get rid of some of this yarn!

Here are a few I’m going to start working on:
Ballband Dishcloth – I’ve knit a few of these and really like working on them. I’ll be playing around with color combinations.
Other Dishcloths and Scrubbies
Yoga Mat Bag – my variation of the market bag that I crocheted several years ago
Chairpads - for the barstools in the kitchen
Tea Cozy for both teapots and my coffee pot
Hot Water Bottle Cozy – maybe?
Coasters – I made some for the kitchen…perhaps I’ll make some of the rest of the house (along with some plant ‘coasters)
Other suggestions?

xoxo ~rae

PS – shoot me if I buy anymore of this yarn this year!