Moroccan

It was recently brought to my attention by some knitter friends that it's been a while since I last updated (some subtle and not-so-subtle hints were dropped). So I came back and found that my blogger account had been suspended! I guess it has been a while....
Then I found a draft that I never get around to post of pictures from my trip to Morocco, so here it goes.

Hats in the souk (traditional market). I don't think they're knitted, look more like crochet though I'm not entirely sure...

It's a dye bath the traditional way! I doubt our indie dyers do it this way :)

There's wool hanging all over the street!

Camel bone table and chairs set, so beautifully handcrafted.

At a rest stop on our way to Essaouira (coastal town west of Morocco), I saw a local woman who's guarding the toilet knitting. So I pulled out my knitting to show them and they got really excited (Tres bien Madame!) and passing it around to each other. One of the women went to get something, and right at this moment my friend came out of the loo. The woman proceeded to take off my friend's jacket, much to my friend's puzzlement. She then pulled out this knitted outfits and put it on my friend. It's a dress and cardigan suit with really interesting details, the dress is knitted sideways with short rows and in stripes! Thankfully my friend Maja is a good sport and she let me took a few pictures while she models for me. It always amazes me how knitting can link people through all boundaries.
And if you're wondering, yes, this all took place in front of the toilets.

Well, right at the end of that trip, the Auto Focus on my Canon 450 D stopped working. I still have no idea why and would have to take it to a shop to figure out what's wrong with it. So I guess that's my excuse for this hiatus!
Hopefully I'll be back soon to keep you updated on what I've been up to since my last post!

Obsessed

In my last post I've shared with you all my latest hobby(it's not an obsession, not yet anyway). Here's a product of my there new hobby.


(It's the same bag, fully reversible!)
My sewing machine arrived even before my loom did, but I couldn't just sew ANYTHING. I had to make sure it has proper lining, and let's try making bias tape shall we and oh why not add pockets and oh wait it can be reversible too! And let's make sure all the stitches are super straight too! The bag ended up taking me 3 days to finish (ok, I started at 2 am), and I'm really happy with as far as first project in more than 3 years go! I'm amazed that I can actually sew straight stitch (for most part), when I was using my old college sewing machine ages ago I had to call my sewing 'freestyle'! And I completely adore my bias tape maker that I might need one in every sizes!

And here's another one of my latest hobby *ehem*obsession*ehem*

I used to get them from friends who are destashing casually, until I chance upon a shop update in time to get a grab bag of 2 skeins. Then 2 weeks after that another grab bag and before I knew it I was waking up at 8 am (this doesn't happen often if you know me) to check for shop updates! I haven't managed to get any since but I'm seriously considering training to become a full-fledged Wollmeise stalker!
The weird thing is, while I like her variegated colourways, it's the solids I'm crazy about. As in I want every single colours crazy. I might have to save up and make a trip to Germany to visit her shop!

I know, I know, it's a knitting blog. So here's some knitting for you.

This is my swatch for Demi, from Rowan Vintage Knits, that I'll be knitting for the Ravelympics 2010. I'll be converting the pattern to knit in the round, it might take 2 weeks of crazy amount of knitting and dealing with carpal tunnel syndrome to finish this sweater but I'm game! What are you knitting for Ravelympics?

Anyway, I'm leaving for a short break (a friend asked, from what?) to Marrakech in 4 hours! Will be back soon hopefully with a lot of cool pictures, bye!

On warps and wefts

First come knitting, then spinning, and now weaving! This fibre obsession is never ending, is it?

So it all started a couple of weeks ago when I saw someone put up a rigid heddle loom in the Ravelry destash/trade board. I expressed interest and we got talking and I naturally got all excited. Then a friend of mine offered to lend me her loom to try out, and I had so much fun! Here's the first scarf that I made.


For the warp (that's the threads that go lengthwise on the loom) I used 100g of my handspun merino that I couldn't stand knitting with. And for the weft (that's the one that goes in and out sidewise) I used some leftover RYC Cashsoft DK from my Deep V Argyle Vest. I was SO proud of it, and decided right away that I wanted a rigid heddle loom, so I ordered a 20" Ashford Knitters Loom. It should've arrived last Monday but due to the courier's extreme incompetency I still don't have it.

Anyway while I still had my friend's loom I wove my second scarf!


It's a much shorter scarf (the first one was 2m long!) and I used some UK Alpaca yarn that I've had in my stash for years.

One thing I love about weaving is how darn quick it is! Can you imagine how long it'll take me to knit a 9" wide 2m long scarf? That is, if I survive the boredom! Also, I get to be much more adventurous with my weaving as I can combine different yarns, something I'm always wary to do with knitting. One thing I've found with me and my crafts is, the more I know, the less adventurous and experimental I become. So I'm hoping this will help me be more adventurous with my knitting too.

Oh, and I just bought a sewing machine and it got delivered yesterday. I don't have any fabric to play with it yet, but I'm sure you'll be hearing more about my new endeavours in the future!

New Year

This is definitely my longest hiatus to date! Come March, I would've been blogging (on and off) for 6 years, and that's starting to feel like a lifetime. Now that I'm back, I'd like to make some changes around the blog and be a better blogger all around!

Every year for as long as I can remember, I have always made New Year's resolutions. Usually they are really long lists of things I'll forget a fortnight into the year. This year, I made none. Instead, I have a few mental resolutions. They are fairly vague, but my "rule" for this year is to DO things. Procrastination has always been one of my biggest weakness, along with lack of self control at yarn sales, but that's a different issue. Also, I vow to try to coax myself out of my comfort zone and say YES more often and seize more opportunities. For example, a friend's mother asked me if I'd like to volunteer teaching knitting at a group she's trying to organise once a month. My first instinct was to run away, giving myself and her all sorts of excuses. But I calmed down and said I'd love to do it! It's a little thing, but I'm starting with baby steps :)

So there, that's my New Year's non-resolution! I'll be back soon (hopefully!) with loads of knitting contents and some weaving too!

Happy New Year 2010 everyone!

Ooopss...

Thank you everyone for your well wishes!
I totally forgot one of the most important thing I "did" last week, I turned TWENTY TWO!!!
The fact that I forgot to mention it is like a testament of how busy I was last week. I had an awful, non-existent birthday, but the past couple of days my wonderful friends have been making up for it :).

On other news, you know my Knitted Chair project blog? Well it was featured in a blog, but I didn't think it was a big deal, because I didn't realise how many people actually read the blog. Well, I had over 2,000 hits yesterday, which might not be much to the big names blogger, but is a totally HUGE thing for me! Please wish me well, cause I think I'm freaking out just a little bit...

What I've been doing...

This blog is sadly neglected, I know.
Let's do a fast recap of what have happened in the past 20 days since the last post.

-My parents and brother came 2 weeks ago to attend my graduation.
-I graduated!

-Became a tour leader for my family for a whole week.
-Family left, went straight to uni because of course just because you graduated doesn't mean you're "done".
-Exhibited at New Designers in Business Design Centre, Islington until Sunday.


As you can probably guess, there were virtually no knitting happening in those 2 hectic weeks. But I did manage to take some more FO pictures before that...

Norwegian Wood Shawl, pattern by Sivia Harding, yarn used 3 skeins of Naturally Hand Knit Dawn 2ply. This shawl is the case of that "perfect" project. I fell in love with the pattern at first sight, and found the perfect yarn for it in the stash right after. The knitting was fun and easy, and I love the result! I did ran out of yarn towards the end so I had to omit 2 rows from the pattern and used a different yarn for part of the bind-off, but I still love it!



Handspun Feather And Fan Shawl, used 2 skeins of my own handspun. A great project to use up those 100g skeins of handspun yarns! I'm kinda wishing it's bigger but it was getting a bit boring after a while. Can I just say again how much I absolutely LOVE knitting with handspun yarn? It just heightens the pleasure to another level, seriously.


Hoarfrost, pattern by Anne Hanson from Knitspot. This pattern is absolutely gorgeous, but the yarn....oh the yarn.....just makes it all the more perfect. It's Swiss Mountain Cashmere and Silk, and it's amazing, as you can probably tell from the name. It took a while to get used to knitting with it just because of it's softness. It feels so soft and luxurious against my neck, I kinda can't wait for it to get colder so I can wear it out (kidding! summer please come back to London!).

Turquoise Decimal Cardigan

Here's the cardigan I promised to show you!


The pattern is from Spring 2009 issue of Knitty. When I saw the pattern I knew immediately that I'll be knitting one, and I knew exactly what yarn to use! Now, how often does that happen? The yarn is Knitpicks Shine Sport in Turquoise, and since I've only got 8 skeins of yarn, I modified the pattern into short sleeve, and I like it much better this way since I find bell sleeves to be impractical. I ended up only using 7 skeins of yarn for this.
Overall, I love this pattern! The waist and raglan shaping is so cleverly done, and it's so easy to modify. I really enjoyed knitting it! I think the knitting part only took me over a week, but it did took me months to find buttons for it! And I haven't blocked it yet shuuushh...
Unfortunately, I wore it out to The I'm-not-going-to-Woolfest-consolation-spinning-party last weekend and it was way too warm! Guess I'll have to wait for the weather to cool down before I can wear it again, but knowing this country it probably won't be a very long wait!

In other news, my parents and brother are coming to visit me next week for my graduation ceremony! Knitting wise this means that I've been having to destash my yarn and magazines and books to make space in my room. Check out my destash page in Ravelry if you're interested!

The show is over but my needles must go on...

This past month felt surreal to me. So much have happened but I can't be sure what.
One thing for sure, the show came and go.

I think it went pretty well even though I was in daze mostly throughout the 5-day show.

A lot of knitting happened too, but they kinda came and go without much documentation on my part. Bad blogger, I know. I am so behind on FOs to show you guys! Let me just tell you that there are a Clapotis, a summer cardigan and a shawl that I need to block and blog (pun not intended) about. And a pair of socks I finished in a week on commission for Socktopus.

I did manage to make myself take some pictures a couple of days ago though, so here's some eye candy for you...

It's Lace Ribbon Scarf from Knitty! I'm sure you've seen it a million times, but here's my take on it. It's a really nice and easy pattern, very easy to memorise so perfect for carrying around. It was supposed to be my carry-around project but the yarn is sooooo amazing to work with that I had to restrain myself from knitting it at home! The yarn is Pagewood Farm Alyeska, and I got mine from Socktopus. It's soooo soft and bouncy and sproingy (it is a word in MY dictionary) and an absolute pleasure to work with. I was sighing with delight all the time while touching it, pretty sure my friends thought I was mad if they don't already.
Oh, the pretty tulip shawl pin I'm wearing in the picture is from this etsy store. Isn't it pretty? I would've love it more if only I didn't get stung by custom.
Here's a mini rant, I don't mind paying the £3.25 VAT, but £8 handling fee for 2 tiny boxes??? AGH! And did I ever tell you I got charged £49.50 for 2 knitted chairs that a knitter sent me from the States for my show? Double AGH!!
Ok, rant over. Here's more pretty pic.

Think I'll make some more of this.

This one has been a long time coming.

Pretty sure I finished knitting this hat a couple of months ago, and it has been sitting under my pile of WIPs since then. There was a lot of uncertainty with this pattern. It went like this....."Is this too small?", "Will this fit my head?", "Wonder how far I can stretch this...", "Uh oh, this looks more like a beanie", "Dang, other people say it's too tight, should've used bigger needles", "Should I just frog this and start over??", "But surely blocking will fix this....". Maybe that's why I ended up ignoring it after it's finished.

It is quite a tight fit and I had to add an extra repeat of the colourwork pattern to make it slouchy enough, but it kinda works. Especially with my "new" hairstyle. Oh and the yarn is gorgeous, it's Knittery Merino Cashmere 4ply and it smells goooooddd........yes I sniff my yarn.

Aeolian

This is definitely one of the most beautiful thing I've ever knitted, and it didn't took me a whole year to finish it! The pattern is so intuitive and ..dare I say..easy..for such an impressive result. It only took me 2 weeks to knit because I couldn't put it down. Every free time and procrastinating time I have, I devoted to knitting this luscious shawl. It's such a pleasure to knit, especially because of the yarn I used, Malabrigo lace in Burgundy (birthday gift from Van from eons ago!). This yarn is so soft and cushy and yummy and I need some more! And I only needed one skein for all this pleasure and gorgeousness...

My bundle of nerves

I'm not a morning person. On "normal" days I go to bed at about 4 a.m. and wake up at lunch time. But today I am a bundle of nerves and have been up since 8 a.m., it's not normal I tell you. I've been going through in my head everything that could go wrong during today's event. Let's see, for a starter the weather forecast could lie and it would be pouring rain, or maybe everybody decides to go to the zoo and see monkeys instead of me. Or maybe...or maybe....see why I have trouble sleeping?

So everybody please think good thoughts of me today so that I'll have some good news to report back!

Anyway, I have some pretties to show off...




It's my Ishbel! The pattern is by the mega talented Ysolda Teague. The yarn is some laceweight silk from Fyberspates that I got at Ally Pally 2 years ago. I have more than half leftover, wonder what to knit with it next. I'm totally in love with how pretty this thing is, I think it's the combination of sleek silk with that delicate lace that does it for me. It blocked wonderfully and dried within hours! Think I need another one, maybe in sock yarn?

Some more pink goodness....


The pattern is Darkside Cowl(link to .pdf) by Sarah Fama. But of course I'm calling mine Pinkside cowl. The yarn is my own handspun that I blogged about some time ago. Can I just say again how much I LOVE knitting with handspun yarn?

Ivy Leaguer wannabe

According to Ravelry, I cast on for this on 4th April 2008, heck that's a whole year for a vest!


I bought the yarns as a kit because I was too overwhelmed by the thought of picking out 6 coordinating colours. It's my biggest colourwork project to date, and it fits really well! I was pleasantly surprises when I got to try it on after I cut the steeks because I had my doubts all along.
Oh, of course you'd want to see the steeks...

See how neat it is? I did the crocheted steek and they all lie down so neatly, makes me all giddy. Can you tell I love my new vest?

The crazy thing about this project is, I used less than one skein of each colour! The pattern specifies 2 skeins of 5 different colours and a skein of 1 colour, so that's what I got. But now I ended up with more than enough for another one, there should be a limit to over estimation in yarn requirements.

Anyway, I'm organising my first knitting event EVER! Check it out here. I'm so scared of it not going well and have been playing through everything that could go wrong with it in my head. Hopefully I won't freak out when the time comes, fingers crossed! I'll also be eternally grateful if you could help me pass the word around!

More chair

I have no idea what happened, time really seems to fly and I can't even recall when was the last time I blogged.
Anyway just a quick update I haven't been knitting much, worked on a couple of WIPs here and there, so things are growing ever so slowly. Mainly I've had to focus on my project here...


Yep, another chair.
I love how this one turns out, and the fact that it uses so little yarn. And my non-knitter friends think it's a sexy chair!
It's a bit disconcerting how I'm relying on these chairs to earn me degree. But I guess I have to keep on believing in the power of knitting, and the power of knitters.
Oh, I've moved the blog for the project, it's now here. Please do come take a look, leave a comment, and spread the word! I can't do it without your supports!

Casting off...

Beware! Long post ahead, but it'll be mainly pictures for your viewing pleasure, I'll be brief and catch up with the knitting I've been doing.


I knitted these Very Orange Vinnland socks for Malabrigo March KAL with the Socktopods. The yarn colourway is "Terracotta", but really it's just orange.

This bag had been on the needle for a few months. Or at least the handle did. I finished the bag in a couple of days but the handle took really long because I got bored knitting it. And since I was using much smaller needles for the handle so that it won't sag that much, it hurt my hands to knit it. But finally a couple of days ago I decided to just finish it up and wore it to the local shop to buy grocery.

I was worried it won't be able to hold the weight but it held up pretty well I thought.

We had a bingo night for Red Nose Day at Socktopus and I won TWICE! I won a skein of Socks That Rock, 2 skeins of Lorna's Laces Sheperd Socks, a skein of gorgeous handspun by Marianne and to top it all, a voucher of a dozen cupcakes by Arianna from Bittersweet Bakers. Let me tell you her cupcakes are THE CUPCAKES, they've gotta be the best I've had. I was more excited on winning that compared to the STR, that's how much I love her cupcakes. But the handspun was gorgeous too and I couldn't wait to knit with it, so I made these.

I was reminded on how much I LOVE knitting with handspun yarn. Perhaps I should slow down on the spinning and start knitting up my handspun yarns. They are just really simple 3x1 rib with holes for my thumbs, then I increased to 3x2 rib as they go up my arms. I wore them to Brighton on Friday, and they kept my hands nice and warm.

Then yesterday, I went to Socktopus again wearing this.



My Cardigan for Arwen! Finally done! I'm really happy with it and I love wearing it. The only thing I followed from the pattern was the cable pattern. I did it all in the round, seamless, with raglan decrease and waist shaping. Too bad the kitty shawl pin that I wore to fasten it yesterday was lost.
But I haven't told you what I was there for yesterday, I had a class with Cookie A.!

It was absolutely fabulous and I dare say you guys should look forward to my future sock design!