My new favorite “sunday morning coffee and knitting” mug.
Category Archives: knitting
Bunny Watching
Its been bunny-watching central around our little house lately. I had to pause before pulling the car into the driveway the other evening to let two silly buns chase each other across the street and I usually get a cute bunny-grass-snarfing glimpse or two any time I peek out the little window over our kitchen sink. Joey and I have taken to sending each other text message updates on what the bunnies are up to when one of us is not at home. “Bunny is out front” was one I got the other day as he was leaving for work.
Bunny-watching, it seems, is pretty hard work when it comes to capturing and sharing these sweet little moments with others. I tried so hard to take a video to send to Joey when he was in Sweden a few weeks ago. Two buns were just chasing each other in circles around our back yard for almost an hour. Unfortunately, I couldn’t get close enough to capture the cuteness. And wouldn’t you know, even knitted bunnies are hard to snap shots of. I was only able to get two quick pics before these little buns hopped off a new home with my niece and nephews.
The one on the right thinks he hears a camera clicking in the distance
Hightailing it outta there
Pattern: Tiny Baby Bunnies by Anna Hrachovec of Mochimochi Land
Ships and Seaside Cowl
As the sidewalks here in Texas start to sizzle, I begin to prepare for cooler days which seem so far away. Cooler days when my beautiful new Ships and Seaside Cowl will keep cool breezes from chilling my bones.
I chose colors that have me envisioning walking along a foggy beach in late fall as a salty breeze has me snuggling just a little further down into this warm wooly cowl.
Knit with Rowan Felted Tweed DK in Camel, Clay, Maritime, and Seasalter
Latest and Greatest
I’ve been embellishing a few of my hexipuffs and thought I would share my latest and greatest of the bunch.
The Fiver
Well hug your hanks and snuggle your skeins because I have a surprise finished knit to show you! May I present The Fiver:
When it comes to a sweater that was five years in the making, all I can say is that this baby has some stories. I cast on back in March of 2007, thinking it seemed like a million stitches since it was also my first time working a big project with fingering weight yarn. I knitted slowly through the bottom portion of the sweater over the next few months, but eventually got bored with it and put it aside for newer, easier-to-finish projects. When we moved to NYC that next summer, it was boxed up with my yarn and made the journey with us.
I pulled it out of that box just after Christmas 2008, at a time when all I wanted to do was knit on something, but I couldn’t afford to buy yarn for new projects. It was our first winter in New York, and it was a cold one. I remember sitting next to a space heater with Henry, knitting away at the sleeves, wondering if I would ever finish it.
I did finish the sleeves that winter, but I was never happy with my attempts at seaming and kept ripping it out. The sweater and sleeves went back into a box and were ignored for many more months. Again, they were boxed up with my yarn and made the journey with us back to Texas last fall.
I was chatting with a fellow knitter one day at work and happened to mention this project that I was always agonizing over in the back of my mind, that sweater that was completely finished except for a few buttons and some shoulder seaming and she just looked at me and said “I’ll seam it for you.” And sure enough, she did. And just like that, this sweater that I had put so many stitches, so many hours of my life into was finished.
I used to be more of a product knitter than a process knitter, but it seems the tides are turning. I really like the idea of looking at a knitted piece that took a long time to complete and remembering all the moments of my life that have been knitted into every stitch.
Puff ‘n Fluff
One of my favorite things about being out of the city is enjoying all the woodland creatures that inhabit the area around our little house. On any given Saturday morning, you can sit by my living room window (while knitting, of course) and watch all sorts of squirrels running back and forth between our big tree and our neighbors’ trees. Those squirrels get up to all sorts of mischief, and they’ve even worn a little squirrel path through the grass in our yard.
But as cute as those squirrels are, they’ve got nothing on the bunnies. Oh, the bunnies! I can’t tell you how cute these little brown bunnies are. I see one or two almost every night as I let Henry out before bed. They usually scamper about when I open the door, but that just means I get to see their fluffy white tails as they hop away into the darkness.
Speaking of fluffy puffy cuteness, I’ve been quietly working on lots of little hexipuffs for my Beekeeper’s Quilt, and they’re multiplying like…. well, you know.
Last Minute Merry Making
I had a little last minute merry making to do, and these tiny Christmas sweaters were the perfect quick little stocking stuffer treats. I duplicate-stitched on some last name initials, and they were a hit with both mine and Joey’s families.
Pattern: Cheers by Cheryl Niamath
Yarn: Cascade 220
Long-Term Project Alert: The Beekeeper’s Quilt
You’ve probably heard of the Beekeeper’s Quilt by now, so forgive me if I’m telling you something you already know. The Beekeeper’s Quilt is one of those patterns that has spread like wildfire across the knitting world these past few months. It’s a long-term, stash-busting project that is immensely customizable to your own tastes. Hundreds of soft, fuzzy, cushy hexipuffs sewn together into a cozy, floppy quilt? Yes, please!
This project has an added bonus of being charming even while laying around the house in its in-progress state, which is a good thing because this is going to be a very long-term project for me. I started exactly three months ago and I’m only up to 27 puffs, which is yielding about one square foot of quilty goodness.
Its so much fun pulling all the hexipuffs out of their bowl and laying them out to get just a glimpse of what the finished quilt might look like. It also gives you a chance to consider adding additional colors to the mix, which I’ll be doing very soon.
St Joseph Hat
I wanted to knit Joey something special for our anniversary. It was supposed to be a surprise but here we are, still a couple of weeks before the actual anniversary, taking pictures for the blog. I was never very good at keeping surprises. In fact, I spilled the beans and told him I was knitting it the day after I cast on.
I was just so excited to tell him about it because he had found a hat he liked at Allsaints and I told him I could knit him one just like it. Then I sat down and charted out a pattern and gave it a go. It came out pretty great.
The brim can be folded up for a less slouchy look, but this is his favorite way to wear it. The alpaca in the yarn I used (Blue Sky’s Techno) makes it super soft and warm.
Warmth and love for our ten year anniversary for my dear Joseph. A saint if I ever knew one.
Fairy Castle
When I was in the UK, I was introduced to fellow knitter Stephanie, aka Tiny Owl Knits. After checking out her patterns, I instantly needed to cast on for a Fairy Castle.
Not only are Fairy Castles completely adorable, they also hide a magical little secret:
They’re the cutest needle storage around! The pattern includes instructions for three fairy castles- one sized to hold DPNS as shown above, one sized for crochet hooks, and a tiny little castle for darning needles. You can bet I’ll have a few more fairy castles sprouting up in the coming weeks.
And because Henry was lying around while I was taking pics, I couldn’t resist:
He’s quite the grumpy gnome today.
Love Is All You Knit 