Birthday Yarn

So my birthday was a couple of weeks ago... and just last week I finally decided on what to order from KnitPicks with the wonderful gift card I got for them. Well, I did not so much decide as just finally click on the send-order-button. Otherwise I probably would have changed my mind a million more times. Anyway, the result of my shopping spree came in the mail and here is a picture of what I got!

So as you can see one of the things I got is a ball winder... which is great for all those hanks of lace yarn you see on the top... Winding 440 yards of super thin flimsy lace yarn by hand is definitely not fun so I am hopping the ball winder will make the process less painful. Ok, so the top row, except for the one ball of gray, is all lace yarn ranging from 100% baby alpaca "Alpaca Cloud" in Tide Pool Heather and Raspberry Heather to Shimmer in Eucalyptus which is 70% Baby Alpaca and 30% Silk to 2 Hanks of Oregon Coast Heather and Forest Heather Shadow Lace Yarn (100% Merino Wool). My birthday also brought me 4 more hanks of Bordeaux Gloss Fingering Yarn (70% Merino Wool and 30% Silk)of which I already had 2 hanks. One half of a Bordeaux hank has already transformed into a beautiful fingerless glove. I also designed my own Butterfly Fingerless glove with the rest of the Kenai from my Haruni. Pictures soon to follow. The rest of the lace weight yarns are probably going to transform into lace shawls of various different styles to test-knit some patterns for a wedding shawl. The first hank I knit into something will probably be one of the baby alpaca blends... I keep taking them out to touch them. They are sooooooooooo wonderfully soft!

The bottom row of this picture is for a big special late birthday/possibly Christmas birthday present that had been on hold due to a lack of feltable yarn and time to go to the Local Yarn store to pick some up. So now there are plenty of browns and great ball of Onyx Heather (super dark gray) plus a nice light green called Green Tea Heather and tiny 50 grams ball of Shine Worsted Yarn called Robot. I can already envision Yoda in the Green Tea Heather and Maple Syrup Brown...

I also got 5 balls of City Tweed in Tahitian Pearl.... that are going to be a cardigan....

So I will be busy. Stay tuned

The Magic of Blocking

Finally, I took the time and blocked the Haruni Shawl. And I could not be more pleased with the end-result of all the work. The shawl is absolutely beautiful. Well, of course, I am a little biased ;) So see for yourself. The first picture is the unfinished, unblocked shawl in progress. The rest shows the wet but pinned into shape end-result. Enjoy!

Big Triangle and Little Triangle

For the past few days I have been working on two triangular shawls. The first one I started is knitted in a color called Kenai. It is fingering weight and knitpicks.com brand Gloss . I absolutely love the color... Which is probably why it looks almost completely like the blue I choose for the cardigan. I bought them both on different occasions without even being aware of the fact that they are so close in tone.

The pattern for this shawl is called Haruni and you can find it on knitpicks as well as ravelery. I really like how it came out. I can't wait to see the finished shawl. Unfortunately that is going to be delayed just a little longer since I am almost out of yarn (as you can see by the tiny yarn ball in the picture) and I had to order another skein for the last 6 rows... oh well. Hopefully the yarn is shipped soon and I can finish this project.

I also started knitting this beautiful pattern. I am knitting it in Gloss, lace weight. The color very fittingly is called Dandelion. Since the pattern is calling for a fingering weight yarn I am right now adjusting the amount of stitches. I think I will knit 9x15 instead of the suggested 5x15, which is almost double and should be sufficient to obtain a good size. This one I am actually making for myself. I always wear scarfs or shawls for teaching and in general so I actually own quite a collection by now. And I am always looking for a new addition. This one will be perfect. Again I can't wait to see the finished product. And I may just cast on another ginko shawl in the canopy Tonal Shadow I have in my yarn stash waiting to be used.

Have you ever wondered how to knit a Giant Clam?

At the beginning of January I was asked by Andrew if I can make a giant clam and a box jelly-fish... By the end of the night I had a long long list of underwater creatures that he would like for his 8th Birthday. I got to work right away but lost interest after one or two weeks and went on to other projects. Since the birthday was this Tuesday I had to get moving on finishing the various underwater creatures requested... And I did.

I already blogged about some of the creatures featured in this birthday present like the Nautilus Shells and Blue Sea Star Others just got done last night. Among those is the beautiful red and yellow sunflower starfish, which is a Hansi Singh pattern and featured in her book Amigurumi Knits. I absolutely love the vibrant color combination, the way how the knitting direction of the arms contrasts with the stitch direction of the body, and everything else about this fun and fast (if you don't hibernate it for weeks) project. I was really surprised at the decorative effect the whip stitch gave the bottom of the arms as well.

Another project that hibernated for weeks and got finished Thursday night is the jelly-fish. It is a modification of Hansi Singh's Pattern. The purple tentacles and navy-blue strings are 100% Hansi Singh while the body is a heavily modified version. The whole point was to make the body as "boxy" as possible. I am still not sure if it is square enough but this is what I got. I could make another one that is more box-like but at this point I really don't feel like making another one. Maybe at some point in the future...

Have you ever wondered how to knit a Giant Clam? Well, me neither. And according to my extensive internet pattern search not many people do in general. So I was on my own. To make matters more difficult I had strict requirements for this knit: You have to be able to open and close it. It needed to be as big as possible. There needed to be a pearl in the middle. I started out casting on with two strings of yarn and then separated the loops into two rows (which gave me a nice strong and indestructible joint for the upper and lower shell). Then I knitted a very basic shape in a rib pattern and ended in an i-cord cast off. (I can write up my pattern if you are interested). I picked up some stitches on the inside outer edge of each shell piece and knitted the inside in a great gray. It changes from light to dark gray which gave the inside a really interesting spiral-like pattern. Then I knitted a little ball in white and attached it to the middle of one side. It is not perfect, of course, and I may experiment with shaping the outside shell with short rows... I think I know how this would theoretically work... But I am sure the 8-year old in question will be just fine with this very basic version of a giant clam.

Now all that needs to be done is the wrapping... and we will hopefully have a very happy 8-year-old.

Ice and Knitts...

Snow... ehm Ice Day!!! Which means I don't have to teach today and it also means the lessons I prepared can be used on Friday and I don't need to prepare... Very exciting. And even better it gives me time to knit a few things that have been on someone's birthday wish list. I kind of have to make it up as I go and hopefully I will be more successful than the last few times I tried. We shall see.

On another note, I finally got around to blocking my rainforest scarf. Which is very exciting. I think it came out pretty well. Although I am not sure I will wear it. I have a million green scarfs among others a great big tube scarf from Urban Outfitters. So I don't know I may just give this one away... Not sure.

I also finished my very first cardigan. I really really like it. The pattern was super easy and it was flexible enough to be changed to fit me. I am still really really in love with the color of the yarn. It fits great and looks amazing. I actually wore it for teaching yesterday and it kept me nice and warm on the long drive to Montclair.

Recently, I also got some new yarn that I am very excited about. They are all KnitPicks brand. The beautiful Gloss Bordeaux is going to be a nice little sweater designed by Veera Välimäki called Plain and Simple. Of course the two hanks I got are not going to be enough... So I will just have to order a little more. I still don't know what I am going to do with the rest of the beautiful yarn. But I am sure I will come up with something. So stay tuned. New stuff coming soon.

Teaching Tools and New Yarn

As a language teacher I am always trying to find ways to make students interact with each other and have fun at the same time. One such method is to use a ball that is thrown from student to student. Students then either ask each other a question and elicit an answer or you go around reading something one line, word, letter at a time. I generally like to use the ball, because I don't have to pick people and students will keep track of who had a turn and who did not themselves... so its fun, they interact and I don't have to keep track... Yeah.

In Missouri, we had a tennis ball for such occasions. And quite honestly I never liked to use it because obviously you can really hurt someone with it.... Not a good idea even in a college classroom. So for the most part I use a very soft cow... (Yes the animal you would usually see on meadows grazing...). Obviously I do not have any of those things here in NJ. So I just knitted a ball-like thing.

It worked perfectly as we went around the room reading the alphabet... No one got hurt... We do need to practice the throwing... but all in all well worth spending the two hours to knit this. It also used up most of my left-overs from the owl-knit.

I also purchased new yarn today... Very very pretty blue. It is a heather so the color varies just a little throughout which adds some interest. Originally, I was looking for a nice gray. But this color just caught my eye and I had to have it. It is also perfect for my very first cardigan of which I have already completed 7 rows.

You may be asking what happened to all the stuffies I made in the beginning and why I am not working on those anymore... And no worries, there are still stuffies being made, although considerably less. I just finished another ninja. Since he is going to be a birthday present pictures are going to have to wait till March though. But he turned out quite well. I still have not decided on his special weapon though. I am also still working on some underwater themed stuffies for Andrew although I have not been having much luck with the box-jellyfish and giant clam so far.

Rainforest

Yeah... it is done. My first Lace project is all finished and I am in love with my new beautiful scarf. I still need to block it (and figure out how to block a knitted piece first) but I could not be more satisfied with the result.

Admittedly, I don't know how many times I had to open up entire rows again because I forgot a Yarn Over in the pattern row before.. but it was all worth the trouble.
I will definitely post another picture once it is blocked and even more beautiful.
The pattern is available for free on knitpicks. It is called Winter Flame by juliet romeo juliet.

I also still had about 1.25 skeins left after I finished the scarf so I went and started a pair of fingerless gloves. They are done with central cable... Very pretty, if you ask me. I have by now finished the first one and I really like them. I can't belief how easy they were to make.... I guess I always think things are way more complicated than they actually are... go figure. This pattern is available as a free download on ravelry. It is called Humanity by dlotter.

I also started another Ninja... So many birthdays coming up soon that I have quite the list of stuffies to make.... The ninja was just the easiest choice for right now... I guess I will start on the more complicated stuffies this weekend... (Permitting lesson prep does not take up all weekend....)