Spooky Friday

On a Friday not so long ago a friend of mine threw a housewarming party. In stead of bringing her something traditional, I decided to knit something. The idea was to give her something cosy to wear when she's just chilling at home. The result was a pair of socks I call "Spooky Friday" -socks (and I really think the cute and funny ghosts somehow suits her personality).

This was a perfect project for a housewarming gift. It's a personal gift, fun and fast to make and it also helped me getting rid of some leftover yarns that have been hanging around ever since I made the cabled socks last winter.

Pattern: basic socks, but I found the spooky pattern in the new Sukkalehti by Novita (Villit Kirjoneulesukat)

Yarn: Gjestal Janne

Needles: 3 mm

In Ravelry

I also made a garter stitch heel to make the socks even more special. Plus, it was nice to try a new way to knit the heel. I have to admit that I liked these funny, yet cosy sock so much I was thinking about making another pair just for me. But we'll see. I have some other projects in mind as well that I'd like to do first.

Needle organizers

Here's a hint for how to make your own knitting needle organizer! Already last year I got one beautiful organizer for needles, and this Christmas I got another one (the striped one). It's made by Fanciful Belongings and bought in Etsy.

But even though I had these two organizers, I still had a lot of long, straight needles and nowhere to put them. But then I got an idea! And since the idea is very simple, I decided to share it with you:

It started out with an empty Pringles can that I washed. Then I took a sheet of plain white paper and decorated it the way I wanted. After I had glued it on to the can (with just regular paper glue), I wrapped some thin yarn around the bottom part to make it look like some earth. And voilà! I new knitting needle organizer was born!

More babies!

Another colleague at work was also leaving for maternity leave yesterday, and of course we had something soft for her too. Remember the patchwork baby blanket we made earlier this autumn? Well, for this unborn baby we made a similar one, but with different colours:

Pattern: just basic garter stitch squares

Yarn: we used left-over yarn from our stashes

Needles: 3 mm & 3,5 mm

Ravelry: Patchwork blanket II

Then, since I am actually going to do my colleague's work, I couldn't resist the chance of knitting something else for her and her baby as well:

Pattern: Vauvan lapaset by Sanna Vatanen

Yarn: Novita  7 Veljestä

Needles & hook: 3 mm & 4 mm

Ravelry: Teddy mittens

These are baby mittens, but I guess she can also use them as socks or as handpuppets if she wants. The idea is from a knitting book I got for Christmas. In finnish it's called Neulo. Virkkaa. Kirjo. Jämälangasta! by Sanna Vatanen, but I actually got the swedish version of it. I also slightly modified the pattern by knitting the mittens in a round, casting on 38 stitches and decreasing 2 st every second round in the end.

Lovely book, by the way! Now I finally know what to do with all my waste yarn. I hate it when my stash is filled with small skeins of different coloured yarn. I've promised myself to do something about those before I allow myself to buy any more yarn. And now that promise is public, so I guess I'll have to try and keep it! :)

Frost

 

If you want to see more of my photos, you can always visit my Flickr page.

Clear blue water

My new year began with that wonderful feeling of something warm and small cuddled up beside you. I woke up in the middle of the night to someone feeling me up. It was a cat that pushed her paws agains my legs trying to find the perfect place to lie down on. But I guess she didn't find it because eventually she cuddled up beside me in stead, gently pushing agains my feet.

Also, a new year and a new finished knit. This is a shawl I've been working on every now and then for almost a year now. Have to admit I'm already quite tired of it. But perhaps I'll start loving it again now that I don't have to knit that same lace pattern over and over again anymore. Because it was quite boring - not a surprise though, since it also was very easy.

...or maybe I'll just give it away to someone who wants it? Anyone?

Pattern: Clear water lacy scarf by Tanya Alpert

Yarn: Hjertegarn Play it

Needles: 4 mm

In Ravelry here

I found this pattern in a book called Haiku knits. It's filled with japanese-inspired patterns and I have to say I like quite many of them. Many of the designs was very simple, yet they had elegance and strength in them.

I didn't like this yarn that much because it isn't at all as soft as it looks. But since I had some of it left I also made this brooch to go with it:

Pattern: A rose by any other name

Yarn: Hjertegarn Play it

Needles: 4 mm

In Ravelry here

Feels good to have one project done! Now I can move on to new, interesting projects! Yay! I've also been photographing quite a lot with my new camera, so I'll probably post some of those pictures soon too.

Hope you all had a great New Year's Eve and that you've made some plans or at least have some dreams to fulfill in 2012!

P.S. In case you didn't notice, I've now also added a "like"-button after the posts. So if you like what I do but feel too lazy to comment, you can just hit that button!

Happy owner of a new camera!

About a week ago, I graduated from the university and are therefor now a Master of Arts. But that was actually only the history-part of my studies, I will still continue to study handicrafts for a while. Even so, it still feels good. 

As a graduation present, I got something I've been wanting to have already for a long time: a new camera. And what a camera I got! It's a Nikon D5100 with a 18-105 mm lens. And it takes absolutely gorgeous photos! I don't think I'll ever use my old camera again..

Just to illustrate, here's first a picture taken with my old pocket camera and then the same motif photographed with my Nikon:

I hope you agree that the first picture just looks very, very flat compared with the other one.

Just to celebrate my wonderful new camera, here's a few photos I shot at Christmas:

Next time some more crafts will be seen on this blog. So stay tuned.

Lambs on a field

I was so incredibly busy this autumn that I actually had time to finish only one knitted Christmas gift. And this is a sweater I started knitting already last spring. So I already started thinking it would never be finished. But eventually it was.

Pattern: Offset Wraplan

Needles: 3 mm & 3,5 mm

Yarn: Anemone by Marks & Kattens

In Ravelry: Lambs on a field

A cardigan for my 1,5-year-old godson. Since I made it a little bit bigger than my godson actually needs at the moment, I also used cotton yarn. Therefor the cardigan may be used during the summer too.

The sheep-buttons I just happened to stumble over in Sinelli the same day I finally finished the knitting part of the cradi. I had intended to sew on some smaller buttons at first, so the buttonholes could actually have been a bit bigger for these. But I hope they'll stretch, because these sheep eventually turned out quite perfect for this sweater, didn' they?

ROAR!

Since this was the only gift I had time to finish, I've now made a pre-New Years resolution: next year I'll start knitting on Christmas gifts already in january! Now I just need to find somewhere to store everything for a year...

Will be back soon with more news from my life lately! Till then, be good, even though Christmas is already over!

My photographic year

This time I wont say much. In stead I wanted to show you some of my favourite photos from this past year. Let them speak for themselves.

Seagull

Happy couple in 1889

Yellow beauty

Bug

Marmalade

 Miserable

 Boat

Next time I'll probably have some handicrafts to show you. See you then!

For someone small

Since I mentioned the baby boom in my last post, here's still another small knit for a baby. It's for the same soon-to-be-born baby that got the soft baby blanket I showed you in my previous post. Since I happened to have just enough left of some white yarn, I decided it was time to start using it up. You see, a winter baby absolutely needs a lot of woolen clothes!

Pattern: Pebble (Henry's Cobblestone-Inspired Baby Vest)

Yarn: Novita 7 Veljestä

Needles: 3,5

In Ravelry

This was such a fast knit! Yeah! I love miniature-sized clothes! :) At first I was going to embroider something on the vest, but since I got a bit short of time (and became I felt very lazy) I just sewed on a small teddybear in stead. Turned out pretty cute, didn't it?

I also got a new knitting book: Knitted Lace of Estonia. Really love the cover, it's so very beautiful.

So now I'm just waiting for the inspiration to find me. But hopefully I wont get too carried away since I have at least six unfinished projects waiting for me. But maybe after those ;)

Where do all these babies come from?

As you've probably noticed, I haven't updated anything for a long while. It's just that I've been quite busy (again). But now everything's done and I may start living a normal life again. Three weeks ago I handed in my Master's thesis for an official evaluation. Since then I've also had two written exams and deadlines for two short essays. But if everything goes as planned, those should have been my last studies of history. Phew. Feels great! Now I'll just continue whit my handicraft studies and try to get them done as soon as I have enough time for them.

But then, over to the actual topic for today. Babies. All around. I mean, I know at least seven women who's just had a baby or who will shorty give birth to one. So there's clearly a baby boom going on. But it's very nice since it gives me a reason to knit a lot of small, quick and cute stuff.

For a little baby boy, born a few months ago, I made these very basic socks for the winter:

Pattern: Novita Perussukat, size 22

Yarn: Novita 7 Veljestä

Needles: 3 mm

They are actually too big for the boy at the moment, but maybe they'll fit later in the spring or then next winter. I just figured he probably got a lot of clothes exactly the size he wears right now, so his mom would perhaps be greatful to have something to change up to.

Then, there's another baby soon to be born. The mom is one of our colleagues at work, so when she left on her maternity leave, the rest of us at work decided to surprise her with something that perhaps would provide her family a softer landing to their future life together:

Pattern: just basic garter stitch squares*

Yarn: we used left-over yarn from our stashes, mostly Novita 7 Veljestä, Nalle, TicoTico, Polka and Raita.

Needles: 3 mm & 3,5 mm

Ravelry: Patchwork blanket

I think it turned out really nice although we hadn't really thought that much about the colours. And the mother seemed very pleased with it too. It was also much nicer to give her something homemeade that had been created with the help of all of her colleagues, in stead of just buying something from the store. Now we're all just waiting to hear when the baby is born and if it's a boy or a girl.

* EDIT: If you'd like to make similar squares, you might want to use for example this pattern or this pattern. We used 39, 41 or 43 stitches, depending on the yarn.

And oh, together with the blanket we also gave her a card I made:

I'll be back with more news (and handicrafts) soon!